When the Kremlin tree was first installed. Who was the main Santa Claus on the Kremlin tree? From the history of the Kremlin Christmas tree

In the Soviet Union, Christmas trees for children were not noticed at first, then they were banned, and then they were made a weapon of ideological propaganda.

First, the Christmas tree, as an attribute of a religious relic - Christmas, was included in the list of class alien elements. At the same time, for the time being, there was no harsh persecution of New Year's celebrations. Soviet books for children even talked about how Vladimir Ilyich Lenin personally attended New Year's matinees.

However, in 1928, at the peak of the anti-religious campaign, Christmas trees and New Year celebrations were over. It seemed like forever.
But in 1935 everything miraculously changed. Candidate member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks Pavel Postyshev appeared in the Pravda newspaper with an article in which he actually rehabilitated the New Year and called for merry New Year holidays for children.

Already on December 30, 1935, in Kharkov, where Postyshev had recently worked as the first secretary of the regional party committee, the first New Year's carnival ball in the USSR was held. It was attended by about 1200 students.
Postyshev's initiative was recognized as timely, and after 11 months the secretariat of the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions decided: "Since the celebration of the New Year has become and is a national holiday and is celebrated by the working people, this holiday must be legalized."
From that moment on, both children's and adult New Year's celebrations received a permanent residence permit in the Land of Soviets.

On January 1, 1937, a ball-carnival of excellent students was held at the Moscow House of Unions, which opened the tradition of the main Christmas tree of the country.
Interestingly, even at the highest level, the term "the country's main Christmas tree" was very conditional. When Lazar Kaganovich asked the leader of the USSR Joseph Stalin where to put the country's main Christmas tree, the leader of the peoples said:
- We have all the main Christmas trees!
Nevertheless, the “Kremlin tree” unofficially had the highest status. At the same time, it should be noted that initially, as mentioned above, it was held in the House of Unions, located near the current building of the State Duma.

The first Soviet Christmas trees were quite politicized. The performances, one way or another, touched on the theme of the class struggle, and the children came to them in the costumes of Red Army soldiers or shock workers. The achievements of the heroes-pilots, the conquerors of the Arctic were also sung about - in a word, boys and girls were popularly explained why it was “good to live in a Soviet country” that way.
Time affected not only the scenarios of New Year's performances, but also the fate of the "father" of the Soviet New Year, Pavel Postyshev. In 1938, the intra-party struggle led to the fact that he was removed from all posts and arrested, and in February 1939 he was shot in the Butyrka prison.

New Year's celebrations, however, continued. Even in wartime, despite all the difficulties, children's New Year's parties were held. And in 1945, the festive scope of the New Year tree in the House of the Unions symbolized the approach of Victory. On the main staircase, young guests were greeted by mummers playing musical instruments. The children especially liked the hare orchestra. "Hares" played carrots instead of pipes. Amusements worked in the foyer: swings, ferris wheel, carousel. Puppet jazz was played in front of the "magic room" under the direction of the conductor Gutalin Gutalinovich. The Snow Maiden-Stalinist and the New Year-Communist On December 23, 1947, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR declared January 1 "a holiday and a non-working day." Thus, the New Year in the USSR received not only recognition, but also an official status. The main Christmas tree of the country was held in the House of the Unions until 1954, when for the first time a New Year's children's party was allowed directly into the Kremlin, or rather, into the St. George Hall of the Grand Kremlin Palace. The script for the festive performance was written by the famous Lev Kassil and Sergey Mikhalkov. At the same time, the ideological component did not go away - for example, until the death of Stalin, Father Frost and the Snow Maiden did not forget to praise the “leader of the peoples” in poetic form. And after the change of the Soviet leadership, the topic of achievements and "individual shortcomings" resolutely did not want to leave the New Year trees. In 1961, with the opening of the Kremlin Palace of Congresses, the country's main Christmas tree moved there. But here, at first, everything remained the same. So, after Nikita Khrushchev announced a plan to build communism in the USSR by 1980, the artist informed the children: “I am the first year out of twenty, you go to communism with me!”
The ideology was won by the creators of Volk and Cheburashka A radical change in the situation occurred in 1964, when young authors Alexander Kurlyandsky and Eduard Uspensky, the future “fathers” of “Well, wait a minute” and “Gena the Crocodile”, were involved in the development of the script for the Kremlin tree. Instead of the traditional for that time cruiser "Aurora", Corn and similar topical subjects, they proposed a journey of a pioneer to the Land of Fairy Tales. Nevertheless, Kurlyandsky and Uspensky managed to bring the scenario to life, and from that moment on, the main Christmas tree of the country, like all others, began to evolve towards a magical children's holiday, not mixed with any ideology. The Kremlin tree was the most, as they say, “status” - during the winter New Year holidays, the performance was shown on TV.
Tickets to the Christmas tree in the Kremlin were awarded to the best students of Moscow and other cities of the country. It was believed that not only the best performances, but also the best gifts were on the Kremlin New Year tree. A feature of the Christmas tree in the Kremlin Palace of Congresses was its mass character. The hall, accommodating several thousand people, was packed with children to capacity. Another nuance of the main Christmas tree of the country is connected with this. In order to avoid the loss of children by their parents, who were not allowed to attend the performance itself, after the end of the Christmas tree, the boys and girls were marched out to the Cathedral Square of the Kremlin, where they walked in a large circle, while the parents standing around grabbed their children.
Naturally, in the children's environment, horror stories arose on this account, beginning with the words: "The parents did not take one boy from the Kremlin tree, and ...". And then there was a horror movie, depending on the power of the narrator's imagination. After the collapse of the USSR, the status of the “main Christmas tree of the country” fell significantly. Numerous bright New Year's shows pressed her in the eyes of children and parents. Nevertheless, the authorities of modern Russia do not want to completely abandon traditions either. This year marks the 50th anniversary of the first New Year tree in the Kremlin Palace of Congresses, now the State Kremlin Palace. For the anniversary, a New Year's show based on Pushkin's fairy tales - "Unspeakable Beauty" was staged, in which over 300 artists of theaters, universities, and creative teams are involved. And rightly so - after all, good traditions make this world a better place. And the main Christmas tree of the country for decades has warmed the hearts of hundreds of thousands of boys and girls with the light of its New Year's lights. The material was first published on December 31, 2012 http://www.aif.ru/

Every adult whose childhood fell on the Soviet years remembers well the famous Kremlin New Year trees. Every child dreamed of visiting the main performance of the country, but only a few had a chance - as a rule, they were either excellent students or children of party and state leaders.

First Kremlin New Year tree lit up in the Kremlin Palace in 1954, before that the winter holiday was not given due attention, and the Kremlin was closed to the public. Festive events were held in the Great Hall of the Palace, and the green beauty was installed in the St. George's Hall. Later, when the Palace of Congresses was built, the New Year's celebration began to be held there.

The photographs of that time show that the first performances were ideologically motivated: the main characters were workers, peasants, Bolsheviks and Red Guards, and Kremlin New Year tree ignited under a toy volley of the Aurora cruiser. The scenario of the children's holiday was carefully thought out, because it was important for the younger generation to show the values ​​of the country. Over time, the traditions of celebrating the New Year at the main Christmas tree of the country have changed significantly.

Ten years later, young directors - Uspensky, Khait and Kurlyandsky - began to participate in the development of the New Year tree program. Thanks to them Kremlin New Year tree became the way we know it today: with Santa Claus, the Snow Maiden and other fairy-tale characters. It was from that time that the development and staging of the New Year's festival began to be trusted by the best theater directors and screenwriters of the country, keeping the script of the performance in the strictest confidence until the last.

Kremlin New Year tree and today it is very popular among many other New Year's performances. The fairy tale begins on December 25, on this day the Kremlin opens its doors to children and their parents, inviting them to enjoy one of the brightest and most memorable shows. Many special effects, bright theatrical scenery and costumes create a unique festive atmosphere of childhood, which adults remember with nostalgia.

The New Year Tree in the Kremlin is often called the Presidential Tree, as one of the founders and organizers of the event is the Administration of the President of Russia. The opportunity to meet with the head of the Russian Federation is also a kind of small miracle.

Submissions on Kremlin New Year tree will be held daily for two weeks, until January 10, but tickets for a fabulous performance dedicated to the meeting in 2013 can be purchased on December 1 or you can already leave an application on the official website. The main thing is not to be late, because the performance gathers children from all over Russia and in total for the New Year holidays it is expected to receive about three hundred thousand children!

The event is held simultaneously in three halls of the Kremlin Palace of Congresses: a theatrical performance takes place in the Auditorium of the palace, a Christmas tree around which children dance in the Armorial Hall, and in the Parquet Hall, guests will find many game attractions and fun contests.

New Year is a time of gifts and miracles. Today, like half a century ago, the country's main Christmas tree invites you to share the joy and magic of one of the most beloved holidays by everyone, promising a sea of ​​surprises and vivid impressions!

For a Soviet person, this was a special, most long-awaited holiday. They started preparing for it in the summer. Although the main elements of a home holiday have been preserved since Soviet times, in those days, preparing the New Year in the traditional form was almost heroic, and many now recall that painstaking work with nostalgia.

People in the USSR were preparing for the New Year long before it came: due to the fact that it was difficult to get food, everything they needed was bought several months in advance and carefully stored until the right moment. Now it’s hard to imagine it, but to get the main ingredients, for example, Olivier salad, you had to try hard: there was no mayonnaise, green peas, sausages in the free sale - they started stocking up in October. With great difficulty, they also got the main drink of the holiday - Soviet champagne.

So we also decided to prepare in advance and remember in a nostalgic selection how it was.

At first, the New Year was not an official public holiday, but most families traditionally celebrated it along with Christmas, and the holiday was considered a family holiday.

For the first time, the New Year was officially celebrated only at the end of 1936, after an article by a prominent Soviet figure Pavel Postyshev in the Pravda newspaper.

“Why do our schools, orphanages, nurseries, children's clubs, palaces of pioneers deprive the children of the working people of the Soviet country of this wonderful pleasure? Some, none other than “leftist” benders, denounced this children's entertainment as a bourgeois undertaking. This wrong condemnation of the Christmas tree, which is a wonderful entertainment for children, should be put to an end. Komsomol members, pioneer workers should arrange collective New Year's parties for children on New Year's Eve. In schools, orphanages, in the palaces of pioneers, in children's clubs, in children's cinemas and theaters - there should be a children's tree everywhere! City councils, chairmen of district executive committees, village councils, public education bodies should help arrange a Soviet Christmas tree for the children of our great socialist homeland.

1960 Costumes and Christmas decorations reflected the power of the country: divers and cosmonauts on the Kremlin tree. The first satellite has already been in orbit, and the film "Amphibian Man" has not yet been made.

Tickets for the New Year tree for children were also difficult to get. You also need a gauze snowflake costume or a bunny outfit. The gift, which included caramels, apples, and walnuts, was given to the parents by the trade union committee. The dream of every child was to get on the main Christmas tree of the country - first in the Hall of Columns of the House of the Unions, and after 1954 - on the Kremlin Christmas tree.

It was only after the war that the traditions of celebrating the New Year in the USSR began to really take shape. Christmas decorations began to appear: at first very modest - made of paper, cotton wool and other materials, later - beautiful, bright, made of glass, similar to decorations of pre-revolutionary Christmas trees. By the end of the 1960s, mass production of toys for the New Year tree was launched, and it was possible to buy fairly simple plastic options, usually with Soviet symbols.

Festive table

Prepare for the holiday in advance. First, you need to buy food - that is, "get it", stand in hour-long lines, get sprats, caviar, smoked sausage in grocery orders.

Those who had a familiar seller in a grocery store could afford cognac for New Year's Eve for 8 rubles 12 kopecks, semi-sweet Soviet champagne, and tangerines.

Or stand in line for a long time, as in this photo.

Outfits and gifts

Every Soviet woman absolutely needed a new fashionable dress - it could be sewn with your own hands or in an atelier, in rare cases you could buy it from black marketeers; the store was the last place to find anything.

New Year's gifts are another obstacle for Soviet citizens in the process of preparing for the New Year. There was tension with any goods in the country, and with beautiful goods it was even worse, so our parents went to visit, taking champagne, sausage, preferably Servelat, canned exotic fruits (pineapples), boxes of chocolates. Women were given Soviet perfumes for the holiday, which were in abundance in stores, men - colognes.

"Nothing paints a woman like hydrogen peroxide." - this joke becomes relevant on the eve of every New Year's celebration in the Soviet Union. The phrase "beauty salon" then did not know even the most fashionistas. They signed up for hairdressing salons in a few weeks, preparing hairstyles, makeup and the whole “New Year's look” required maximum time, ingenuity and independence from Soviet women - sometimes friends did the hair.

The last stage of preparation is to wipe (repair) the TV, which, according to the postman Pechkin, is "the best decoration for the New Year's table." "Carnival Night", "Irony of Fate", "New Year's Adventures of Masha and Vitya", "Blue Light", "Morozko" - Soviet films, programs and cartoons in the morning, without which not a single Soviet citizen could imagine a festive night.

They were carefully collected by our grandmothers and kept by our mothers. Because for some Soviet citizens, new toys were a luxury, while for others, old Christmas balls are associated with good memories and are dear as a memory. Many toys have become the subject of private collections. People are happy to collect and exchange old New Year's toys and show their collections online.

Bright Side presents a selection of Soviet Christmas decorations. They are not as bright and elegant as modern ones. But they cause a warm wave of nostalgia for those times when we believed in Santa Claus and waited for the New Year like a miracle.

Christmas decorations are fraught with special magic. Their fragility, subtlety, golden luster awaken a feeling of fragility and transience. The world cannot always be brilliant. The holiday doesn't last forever. So these graceful trifles reflect bright light for a short time and ... again find themselves in the bowels of boxes and cabinets for the whole coming year. Until the new Year...

However, these unshakable for us glass and cardboard toys, from a historical point of view, are very young. More recently, decorations were different. The wonderful Christmas tree, near which the amazing events took place in Hoffmann's beloved Nutcracker, carried other outfits on its branches. "A large Christmas tree was hung with many gold and silver apples. Candied almonds, colorful candies and other wonderful sweets hung from each branch like buds or flowers."

The first Christmas decorations were edible. Candies in silver-golden wrappers, figured gingerbread, waffles, cookies, nuts, apples, tangerines, pears, grapes and even eggs flaunted in abundance on the Christmas tree branches. Although, if you look into the very depths of centuries, you can see a completely unusual Christmas tree. The first coniferous trees began to decorate the ancient Germans. They used firs for rituals, attached burning candles to their branches and laid out colored rags on their fluffy paws.

According to one version, the custom of using a Christmas tree as a Christmas tree was born in the first half of the 16th century in the territory of modern France, in Alsace. According to another, the first "Christmas" tree was cut in his garden by the German reformer Martin Luther, being impressed by the wondrous glow of the heavenly stars, breaking through the spreading spruce branches. He lit candles on his spruce, which symbolized the stars of Christmas night from that time on.

In addition to candles, they began to decorate the fir tree with fruits, they personified gifts to the baby Jesus. The first among the fruits were apples, since spruce was considered a paradise tree that bears fruit. New customs came in the 17th century. As a matter of fact, it was then that the "ancestors" of modern toys appeared. And even though, according to today's understanding, they were "home-grown", some of them were not lacking in grace. At first, materials were used that were always at hand - empty eggshells were covered with a thin layer of chased brass, ordinary fir cones were gilded. Tin wire was rolled up, twisted into a spiral, then flattened: silver tinsel was obtained. Artificial roses were made from paper, stars and snowflakes were cut out of silver foil. Even from sheets of brass, some craftsmen managed to carve figurines of fairies and elves.

Gradually, artificial fruits and sweets made from glass and cotton wool appeared. It is believed that the glass balls that are indispensable on the current spruce appeared due to a poor harvest of apples. As if not a single apple had been preserved in local cellars before Christmas, and the forest beauty would have stood without the traditional fruit. But no! The glassblowers of a small German town took a chance and made a replacement - round balls. So in the middle of the 19th century, in 1848, in the town of Lauscha (Thuringia), Christmas balls, popular in subsequent years, were born. They were made of transparent or colored glass, coated on the inside with a layer of lead, and decorated on the outside with sparkles. Almost two decades later (1867), a gas factory was opened in Lausche, and with the help of gas burners with a flame of very high temperature, they began to blow out large thin-walled balls. The lead reflective coating was replaced with silver nitrate. Around the same time, glassblowers went beyond the spheres themselves.
There were birds and animals, pipes and bunches of grapes. Finished products were covered with gold and silver dust. Women and children were engaged in coloring. Lausch has remained in history as the world's first major manufacturer of Christmas tree decorations.

At the beginning of the 20th century, "glass toy craft" was taken up by Bohemia, which was then part of Germany. And a new address appeared on the Christmas tree map - the city of Yablonets. The Japanese, Poles and Americans mastered this business much later. There was a period when the fashion for decorating the Christmas tree suddenly changed. At the turn of the century, shiny tinsel was sent to the shelves. A Christmas tree designed in silver-white tones was welcomed. Later, figurines made of paper, cardboard and straw came into fashion. The factories of Dresden and Leipzig became famous for the manufacture of these toys.

Leipzig was proud of toys made of embossed gilded and silver cardboard, it seemed that they were made of the thinnest metal sheet. Dresden - an unprecedented variety of "plots" - numerous animals, musical instruments, spinning wheels, steamers and even horse-drawn carriages!

Apparently, similar toys decorated the Christmas tree described in the poem by A. N. Pleshcheev.

Children's gaze toys beckon...
Here is a horse, there is a top,
Here is the railroad
Here is the hunting horn.
And the lanterns, and the stars,
that burn with diamonds
And golden nuts
And transparent grapes!
Christmas decorations in Russia

In Russia, the first toys were German. Later they opened their own production - in St. Petersburg and Klin. In addition to glass, papier-mache was used - paper pulp mixed with glue, plaster or chalk. Then the products were covered with bartolet salt, due to which their surface acquired a shine and became more dense. In the middle of the 19th century, numerous artels bred, which engaged in the production of garlands and chains made of thin foil in the form of needles, long thin threads from the same foil, later nicknamed "rain".

For the manufacture of Christmas tree decorations, cardboard and wood, metal sheets, straw and paper were used. Similar toys were produced by special cardboard workshops. Cotton toys were very popular. The wire frame was covered with cotton wool, while the faces of the dolls were made of papier-mâché or porcelain and painted. Decorated with Christmas trees and wax figures of angels, they, alas, were short-lived, as they melted from the heat.

In the twentieth century, carved wooden figurines also appeared - they also found a place on hospitable Christmas trees. In some families, the Christmas tree was not only decorated, but also its trunk was “ennobled” - they wrapped it with white paper, cloth or pharmaceutical cotton, sprinkled with Bertolet salt. "Hid" and the cross, to which the tree was attached.
Practical advice was published for its readers in 1909 by the Niva magazine: “The foot of the Christmas tree can be arranged as follows: they lay the cross in which the Christmas tree is embedded with green moss, dry grass and Christmas tree branches, among which pebbles can be placed in some places; then they install cardboard or cotton mushrooms with a small family, and if you put a plush hare among this green pile, which can very often be found among children's toys, then it will be very beautiful under the tree.

At the end of the 19th century, a new surprise awaited the Christmas tree. The English telegraph operator Ralph Morrison decorated it with a garland of electric light bulbs. Here, the Americans have already "taken" the championship - the first electric garland decorated the New Year tree in front of the White House in 1895.

XX, rich in various events, brought new stories for Christmas decorations. In the USSR, the crowning Christmas tree "Star of Bethlehem" was replaced by a red five-pointed one with a hammer and sickle. Parachutists and hockey players appeared, a polar bear delivering mail to the conquerors of the Arctic, children of different nationalities. Later, they were joined by orderlies, planes, astronauts. The year 1937 was marked by balloons with portraits of Lenin and Stalin.

The appearance of cardboard mailboxes for New Year's letters dates back to the beginning of the 40s. XX century, at that time glass and cotton wool became an unaffordable luxury. The mailbox, not exceeding the size of a matchbox, concealed a candy or a small coin. Crystallized crystals of salt made amazing snowflakes! The wire frame was dipped into a saturated saline solution, and after a few hours the toy was taken out and dried. During the Great Patriotic War, glass beads were also made at home. Burnt-out ordinary or removed from the New Year's garland light bulbs were painted or pasted over with multi-colored paper ...

Today, handmade toys are once again at the peak of popularity. Some of them demonstrate the skill of professional artists, while others, although not so magnificent and exclusive, bear the warmth of a home. A native, cozy home, where, as in previous Russian homes, adults and children made the holiday, literally, with their own hands...

It's no secret that many residents of our country associate the New Year with Moscow, or rather with the chimes on the Kremlin's Spasskaya Tower. With the chimes, we make wishes, see off the old year and hope that the next year will be more successful. Let's see how they used to celebrate the New Year in Moscow.

Christmas tree in the Georgievsky Hall of the Kremlin, 1950-60 The most important Christmas tree in Moscow and the country is still in the Kremlin, and the second most important Christmas tree has always been in the Hall of Columns, next to the current State Duma.

The celebration of the New Year in the form in which we celebrate now, we still owe to Stalin. Before the revolution, as in other countries, Russia celebrated Christmas with a Christmas tree and gifts, which was immediately banned by the Soviet government, but only in 1935, before the new 1936, it was decided to put up Christmas trees again, make holidays for children, call Santa Claus and the Snow Maiden, but everything was prescribed to be done exclusively on the secular New Year, which we still do.

Now it’s hard to imagine, but this is Arbatskaya Square in 1959. In the background you can see the entrance hall of the Arbatskaya metro station of the blue line, which we continue to use now, but we enter it from the left side, through the new building, and not through the original large front entrance . The fact is that under Brezhnev a huge complex of the Ministry of Defense was built around this vestibule, and the Stalinist vestibule still stands in his courtyard, which is very clearly visible on the satellite map.

Itinerant trade at Detsky Mir, another, probably, the most New Year's place in Soviet Moscow.

And so in the late 1950s, the "Children's World" itself looked on the Lubyanka.

In those years, Muscovites, even low-income ones, tried to put a Christmas tree in their house for children, decorating it with cardboard and glass toys, mushrooms, balls, tinsel, "beads", even multi-colored light bulbs, they put Father Frost, Snow Maiden under the Christmas tree, children - their own favorite toys, etc., and the "crown" was crowned with a star or a spire. They also hung sweets, chocolate medals, tangerines.

Vechernyaya Moskva newspaper: "A few hours remain until the New Year. There is a lot to do: visit a hairdresser, go to a store, and send a congratulatory telegram. In a word, you need to hurry. In the picture you see Muscovites in the center of the capital, on Gorky Street the day before New 1961".

New Year's decoration of "Children's World", 1970-71.

"Children's World" in the 1970s

Christmas tree in the Kremlin Palace of Congresses, 1971

Tin chests from the Kremlin Christmas trees still gather dust in many apartments on the mezzanines. Grandmothers loved to store threads, buttons and other household items in them.

Christmas tree in the Kremlin Palace of Congresses, 1971 Tin chests from the Kremlin Christmas trees still gather dust in many apartments on the mezzanines. Grandmothers loved to store threads, buttons and other household items in them.

Every year, on the eve of the New Year holidays, many children's performances take place in our capital. However, the Christmas tree in the Kremlin is still considered the brightest and most colorful. More than one thousand children and their parents are looking forward to this event. Therefore, it is not surprising that many people are already interested in what the Kremlin tree 2018 will be like.

History reference

The first time this event took place in 1954. The heroes of the then representations were not fairy-tale heroes at all, but real people - revolutionaries. A lot of time has passed since then, and now on the stage of the Kremlin you can see cartoon characters, fairy-tale characters and, of course, Santa Claus and the Snow Maiden.

To visit these performances has always been prestigious. Previously, this event could be compared with a trip to Artek, since there were no free tickets for sale, and only children of the party nomenklatura or heroes of socialist labor could get to the Kremlin tree. Now, in order to visit the country's main Christmas tree, it is not necessary to perform heroic deeds.

In the thirties of the last century, the main Christmas tree was held in the Hall of Columns, and only in the fifties did the Kremlin become its place of residence. The first role of Father Frost was assigned to M. Garkavy, the husband of the country-famous artist L. Ruslanova. He was a very charming person and played many interesting roles, ranging from soldiers of the Second World War, and ending with the entertainer of jazz orchestras. Mikhail Naumovich, like no one else, approached the role of the main Santa Claus of the country. The children of the Soviet country loved him very much for his sincerity and openness.

Since the nineties, the main post of Santa Claus in Russia has been occupied by the famous actor D. Nazarov. He is known to many for his roles at such theater venues as:

• Maly Theatre;
• "Sphere";
• Moscow Army Theater;
• Moscow Art Theatre. Chekhov.

Some remembered him for his roles in films, as Stalin and Yeltsin. He also starred in a number of television projects. More than one popular cartoon has been voiced in his voice.

What is remarkable about the Christmas tree in the Kremlin in 2018

The Kremlin tree has a rich history and traditions. Most of the country's children still dream of visiting it. For many years of existence, she has not lost her human face. Here everything is subject to the tastes and interests of the children. The Christmas tree in the Kremlin continues to amaze the public. Every year, directors and stage directors do everything to make the New Year's event in the Kremlin remain in the memory of the kids for a long time. Every season, the scriptwriters invent new exciting stories so that interest in the Christmas tree not only does not fall, but also grows continuously. The directors of the children's show are constantly changing the scenery, making it even richer and more colorful. Do not lag behind them and the creators of all kinds of special effects. What will be the performance this year is kept secret until the very last moment. Despite the intrigue, most viewers are confident that the next show will be even bigger and more impressive. After all, the best specialists in this field are working on the project. There is no doubt that the Kremlin Christmas Tree 2018 will be the best in recent years.

The experience of recent years shows that presentations with interactive content are of the greatest interest. For sure, the next New Year's performance in the Kremlin will meet these requirements, and small spectators will be able to participate in the development of events on stage. Kids will feel that they are in a real fairy tale with their favorite characters.

A good tradition has already developed when the New Year's holiday for children begins from the very threshold of the Kremlin Palace. Right in the foyer before the main performance, wonderful events unfold, where children can take part in all kinds of competitions and fun games. Animators dressed as their favorite children's characters lead round dances with the children and entertain them as best they can. The duration of the variety and game program is 45 minutes. Before each performance, kids can also watch an interesting cartoon. The performance itself runs one hour and ten minutes. The finale of the holiday invariably ends with the presentation of a tasty and sweet gift.

The timing of the children's New Year's holiday in the Kremlin has remained unchanged for many years. This winter it will take place: from 25.17.17 to 08.01.18.

Schedule of New Year's performances

the date	Time spending
From 12/25/17 to 12/31/17	10:00, 14:00, 18:00
01.01.18	14:00, 18:00
02.01.18	10:00, 14:00
03.01.18 – 08.01.18	10:00, 14:00, 18:00

Tickets

You can buy tickets for performances from 06.12.17. It is from this date that the official distribution of tickets starts. They act on children from 7 to 15 years. One ticket gives the right to receive only one gift. At school performances, accompanying persons are not allowed in the hall, with the exception of one leader for every ten students, for whom a ticket is also required. For performances held on December 25, 26, 30, 31, 2017 and January 1, January 2 and January 8, children are allowed only with adults. For other numbers, this order applies only to 18:00. Sessions are an exception:

• 25.12.17 — 10:00;
• 29.12.17 — 10:00;
• 30.12.17 — 10:00, 14:00;
• 31.12.17 — 10:00, 14:00;
• 01/02/18 - 10:00 and 14:00;
• 07.01.18 — 10:00;
• 08.01.18 — 10:00.

If the event is going to be attended by two adults and one child, you need to buy two sets of tickets, if one adult and two or more children, then you should purchase one set and the required number of children's tickets. This applies to events held at 10:00 and 14:00.

You can buy tickets for children in the stalls. Places on the balconies and in the amphitheater are designed to be visited together with adults, that is, you need to buy sets.
Adults without children are not allowed to the performance. They can only receive a gift for an already purchased ticket.

Morning and afternoon performances are attended exclusively by children, with the exception of 25, 26, 30, 31. 12.17 and 01, 02, 08. 01.18.

The gift stub must be kept until the end of the performance. It is for him at the end of the performance that a gift will be given in the lobby.

Entrance to the performance begins one hour fifteen minutes before the time indicated on the tickets.

You can get to the Christmas tree by driving the metro to the Alexandrovsky Park station and then passing through the Trinity Gate, which is under the Kutafya Tower.

If you are your child going to the performance himself, make sure that he has a mobile phone with your number.

Access to the performance is carried out on tickets corresponding to the date and time of the performance.

Ticket price:

Ticket price includes:

• wardrobe;
• game program in the lobby;
• main view;
• new year gift.
• good mood.

Official site

At the end of his Bibigon, Korney Chukovsky promised: “And when the New Year comes, I will carefully hide my tiny friends in the pocket of my warm fur coat, and we will go to the Kremlin to the Christmas tree. And I imagine how glad and happy the children will be when they see with their own eyes the living Bibigon and his cheerful, smartly dressed sister, his sword, his three-cornered hat and hear his fervent speech.

"Bibigon" after a 10-year stay "on the shelf" was allowed to be printed around the same time that the first Christmas tree was held in the Kremlin Palace. Until 1954, the main Christmas tree of the country was a holiday in the Hall of Columns. After death, the doors of the Kremlin opened, and on New Year's Eve, several thousand happy children gathered here. The Grand Hall of the Kremlin Palace was used to hold the New Year tree in the Kremlin, and the main Christmas tree of the country itself, richly decorated with airplanes, satellites, astronauts and sheaves of wheat, was installed in the St. George Hall, which was completely unsuitable for this.

The heroes of the first performances, scripts for which were written by such aces as Lev Kassil and Sergei Mikhalkov, were Red Army soldiers, workers, peasants and Bolsheviks - these are “ours”. The main Baba Yaga of the 50s were the White Guards. But ours won by waving a saber and quoting paragraphs from a short course of the CPSU (b).

After 10 years, the student theater "Our House" found new screenwriters for the Christmas tree in the Kremlin Palace - Eduard Uspensky, Alexander Kurlyandsky and Arkady Khait. The "fathers" of the crocodile Gena and the parrot Kesha brought back the New Year's fairy tale, making the main characters of Santa Claus, the Snow Maiden, wizards and sorceresses and, of course, the charming Baba Yaga.

Natalya Vishnyakova