Woe From Wit

Alexander Griboyedov’s play Woe From Wit was premiered at the Bolshoi Theatre in St Petersburg on 26 January 1831. In 1902, the Museum of History in Moscow acquired the manuscript of the play. That year, the performance was revived, with new sets, by Alexander Yuzhin at the Maly Theatre in Moscow. Such actors of the Imperial Theatres as Vera Komissarzhevskaya (Sofia Pavlovna), Maria Savina (Natalia Dmitryevna) and Konstantin Varlamov (Prince Tugoukhovsky) performed the play at the Hermitage Theatre on 31 January 1902. Konstantin Somov designed the programme, addressing the art of the reign of Tsar Alexander I and combining symbols of state power, theatrical attributes and Neoclassical motifs.