This paper explores the role and potential of theatre in societies undergoing crisis. A prime example is the profound transformation that took place in Russia after 1917, when the October Revolution brought sweeping social and political changes, along with radical institutional reforms. During the years of the Civil War (1917–1922), these changes also affected the distribution of theatre tickets, which shifted from a market-based system to allocation through various organisations such as professional associations and factories.

Under War Communism, theatre auditoriums and other performance spaces became arenas of intense communication among different social groups. Another distinctive feature of this period was the belief that theatre could serve as a tool for social engagement and emancipation.

When we think of revolutionary theatre during the Civil War, the image that most readily comes to mind is one of distinctly masculine and militant rhetoric, epitomised by Vsevolod Meyerhold and the circle of the Theatrical October movement. Yet alongside this, other groups within early Soviet theatre assumed functions of social work through artistic means, creating spaces for emancipation.

This paper examines two such cases from the perspective of socially engaged theatre. The first concerns the development of children’s theatre—particularly puppet and shadow theatre—after 1918, initiated by women artists such as Nina Simonovich-Efimova in Moscow and Lyubov Shaporina in Petrograd. The second focuses on the various forms of social work undertaken by the Petrograd Mobile Theatre (Peredvizhnoi teatr) under the direction of Pavel Gaideburov and Nadezhda Skarskaya. These projects were united by their roots in pre-revolutionary educational and enlightenment initiatives. After the Revolution, however, they were compelled to rethink fundamental theatrical concepts such as play, improvisation, amateurism, and people’s theatre—within a new political framework.