MOSCOW THEATERS IN ALARM

MOSCOW, February 3 (RIA Novosti) - The apartment of Mikhail Levitin, head of the Hermitage Theater, on Karetny Ryad street in downtown Moscow was recently attacked by hooligans, Noviye Izvestia reports. According to Mr. Levitin, the burglars failed to penetrate into the apartment. After that, he received a phone call. Someone ordered him to quit the theater threatening bodily harm.

Mikhail Levitin is convinced that the attack was caused by criminal interest in the theater building.

This is not the first case of blackmailing theater figures in Moscow. Ten years ago, in the fall of 1994 bandits broke into the apartment of the then chief director of the Army Theater Leonid Kheifets. After that, he resigned.

Three months ago the Okolo Doma Stanislavskogo (Near Stanislavsky's House) Theater burnt to the ground in Moscow. Firemen arrived at once but it took them nine hours to extinguish the fire. According to a common version, it was an arson 'to free' an attractive site in Moscow's center.

Bureaucrats are also interested in theater buildings located in downtown Moscow.

The notorious scandal around the Moscow government's attempt to seize the building of Anatoly Vasilyev's Dramatic Art School Theater on Sretenka street is still fresh in the memory of theater circles. Theater figures all over the world and mass media defended the renowned director and the Moscow authorities had to give up their idea.