Maria Andreeva

Maria Fedorovna Andreeva ( _ru. Мария Федоровна Андреева) was the stage name of Maria Fedorovna Yurkovskaya ( _ru. Мария Федоровна Юрковская) (July 4, 1868 – December 8, 1953), a Russian actress and Bolshevik administrator.

Between 1918 and 1921, she was Commissar of Theaters and Public Shows in Petrograd. Between 1931 and 1948 she was Director of the "House of Scientists" in Moscow.

She was the common law wife of writer Maxim Gorky from 1903.

She has been characterized as one of the two most powerful people in Soviet theatre, if only for a short time. [Leach, "Revolutionary Theatre", p.27]

Biography

Her father Fedor Alexandrovich Fedorov-Yurkovsky ( _ru. Федор Александрович Федоров-Юрковский, 1842-1915) was director of the Alexandrinsky Theater, while her mother was an actress. She followed into the steps of her parents. After drama school she went to Kazan, aged 18. She married her elder by 18 years, Andrey Zhelyabuzhskiy, controller of the Kursk and Nizhny Novgorod railroads, but who was also involved in theatre. The couple had two children, Yuri (1888-1955) and Ekaterina (born 1894). Yuri ( _ru. Юрий Андреевич Желябужский) went on to become a film director.

After Zhelyabuzhskiy received a new post, the family moved to Tbilisi, where she had success as an actress. They next moved to Moscow, where Andreeva worked with Constantin Stanislavski at the Moscow Art Theatre. She made her Moscow debut on December 15, 1894. She enjoyed great success.

But Andreeva took an interest in Marxist literature and she secretly joined the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party. In 1902 she decided to leave acting. In 1900 she had met for the first time Maxim Gorky in Sevastopol.

Gorky and Andreeva travelled to the United States, then moved to Capri in Italy.

Already by 1914, she was active in attempts to promote classical theatre to the masses. Only after the October Revolution did these endeavours bear fruits.

She was instrumental in the establishment of the Bolshoi Drama Theater, which opened in 1919.

In January 1919, Anatoly Lunacharsky‎ nominated her as his deputy in his role of head of art section of the Narkompros in Petrograd. The Petrograd Soviet refused to confirm her nomination, but Lenin intervened in her favour and the appointment went ahead.

In 1920 Lunacharsky‎ offered her the position of head of "TEO", the theatre department of Narkompros, in Moscow, but she refused.

In the 1920s she separated from Gorky.

References

*cite web |url=http://www.peoples.ru/art/theatre/actor/andreeva/index.html |title= Maria Fedorovna Andreeva Biography|accessdate=2008-07-12 |language= Russian|work= |publisher= |date=
*cite book |last=Fitzpatrick |first=Sheila |authorlink= |coauthors= |editor= |others= |title=The Commisariat of Enlightenment: Soviet Organization of Education and the Arts under Lunacharsky|origdate= |origyear= |origmonth= |url= |format= |accessdate= |accessyear= |accessmonth= |edition= |series= |volume= |date= |year= 1970|month= |publisher= Cambridge University Press|location= |language= |isbn=0521524385 |oclc= |doi= |id= |pages= |chapter= |chapterurl= |quote=
*cite book |last= Leach|first=Robert |authorlink= |coauthors= |editor= |others= |title=Revolutionary Theatre |origdate= |origyear= |origmonth= |url= |format= |accessdate= |accessyear= |accessmonth= |edition= |series= |volume= |date= |year= 1994|month= |publisher=Routledge |location= |language= |isbn=0415032237 |oclc= |doi= |id= |pages= p.27|chapter= |chapterurl= |quote=
*cite book |last= Clark |first=Katerina |authorlink= |coauthors= |editor= |others= |title= Petersburg, Crucible of Cultural Revolution
origdate= |origyear= |origmonth= |url= |format= |accessdate= |accessyear= |accessmonth= |edition= |series= |volume= |date= |year=1995|month= |publisher=Harvard University Press |location= |language= |isbn= 0674663365|oclc= |doi= |id= |pages=pp.101, 103, 107, 110-111 |chapter= |chapterurl= |quote=