The formation of the theater spectator subculture in the cultural space of a provincial town

nikiforova sargylana valentinovna PhD in Cultural Studies Docent, the department of Culturology, Ammosov North-Eastern Federal University 677018, Russia, respublika Sakha (Yakutiya), g. Yakutsk, ul. Kulakovskogo, 42, of. 226 nsv2107@mail.ru Other publications by this author

The formation of a national theater school and an original theatrical style in the regions of Russia often become the subject of research: dissertations are defended, research and journalistic materials are published. But parallel processes: such as the building of the "theater — spectator" connection, and more broadly, the problems of the sociology of theater in modern national cultures (theater in the culture of the people; especially if there was no such institution among the ethnos before) are not sufficiently considered. The theater does not exist outside of relations with the audience: the nature of the theater, like the nature of culture, is communicative, and therefore the socio-cultural perspective of the study gives him the opportunity to understand himself more clearly and become a truly necessary institution of the culture of his people. In theatrical circles, it is recognized as an axiom that the best portrait of a theater is a portrait of its audience. Topical issues of the time are articulated on the stage, the attitude of society to a particular problem is revealed. And vice versa: the "identification" of their audience gives theaters the opportunity to more clearly define their creative person, the direction of stage searches" ^{[1, p. 58]}.

The purpose of the proposed research is to determine the dynamics and specifics of the formation, the nature of the subculture of the theater audience in the cultural space of Yakutsk. To do this, the following tasks have been solved: the history of theater and spectator relations has been considered; the analysis of the dynamics of the growth of the competence of the theater spectator (stages of subculture formation) has been proposed; the regional specificity of cultural communication "theater — spectator" has been identified; variants of the strategy for the formation of the subculture of theater-goers in the youth environment of a provincial city (university and college students as the "backbone" of the audience) have been proposed.

The coverage of the issues of the "art — audience" relationship and the functioning of artistic values in the national sociology of art are reflected in a number of works by Yu. N. Davydov, Yu. V. Petrov, S. N. Plotnikova, A. Ya. Kuklin, I. S. Levshina, N. A. Khrenova, etc. In 2019, the year of theater in the Russian Federation, the team of authors of the State Institute of Art Studies under the leadership of A. Ya. Rubinstein prepared an expert and analytical report "Theater and the viewer in the proposed circumstances". This study "made it possible for the first time to measure, as a whole, the preferences of the public, its attitude to the repertoire poster of Russian theaters, to traditional and innovative productions, to the creative composition of theaters and the expansion of its functions, including the demonstration of performances in cinemas, and to compare the estimates obtained with the economic conditions of theatrical activity" ^{[2, p. 3]}.

The theater as a social institution was analyzed in the works of art historians K. B. Sokolov, S. S. Mokulsky and others. At the beginning of the XXI century, the HSE was engaged in theater sociology in Moscow (N. V. Bolshakov, A. S. Maksimov, etc. NRU), in St. Petersburg (B. Pavlovich BDT, O. S. Kopalova RSPU) and Yekaterinburg (A.V. Yurieva, UrFU), etc. Traditional theater studies, as it develops, acquires a distinct socio-cultural orientation. The same approach to the theater was considered by G. G. Dadamyan, L. N. Kogan, V. N. Dmitrievsky, A. N. Alekseev. The theater audience as an association is understood by Yu. I. Morozov and S. S. Papovyan.

The history and development of the theatrical art of Yakutia were considered in the monograph "An essay on the history of the Yakut Drama Theater" (1985) by D. K. Maksimov; publications of different years by V. A. Chusovskaya (1990-2013), etc.; dissertations by N. I. Illarionova (2005), A. A. Bilyukina (1998-2005), V. K. Krylova (2012), etc. When determining the stages of the formation of the subculture of the theater audience, we focused on the chronology of the theater art of Yakutia, proposed in the "Anthology of the Sakha Theater" (in 3 books, 2010), to work on which a large team of authors was involved, including art historians, historians, actors, directors: Z. I. Ivanova-Unarova, V. N. Maksimov, A. P. Nikolaev, A. A. Borisova, etc., synchronizing them with socio-cultural changes. It should be noted that these processes are not necessarily parallel and simultaneous, we have revealed that at one time there is a lag of some or an outstripping development of others. Thus, the history of the Yakut theater, according to the Chronology of the compilers of the Sakha Theater Anthology, represents five stages: I stage 1906-1920, II stage 1920-1930, III stage 1931-1960, IV stage 1961-1982, V stage 1982- to the present ^[3]; whereas in the formation of the subculture of theater audiences in Yakutsk, we relatively clearly distinguish three stages.

The specifics of the subject of the study led to the application of interdisciplinary, socio-cultural and cultural approaches. The interdisciplinary approach made it possible to integrate the methods of different research areas: cultural studies, sociology, art history, literature, folklore studies and pedagogy. The culturological approach made it possible to analyze the formation of the subculture of the theater audience and, in this regard, to determine the nature of changes in the cultural space. The synchronic method provided an opportunity to analyze in a cross-section mode the formation of the subculture of the theater audience, as well as the expansion of the theater's influence on the cultural life of the region and the national culture of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). The dynamics of the formation of the subculture of the Yakutsk theater audience within the time boundaries is considered in more detail: the 1960s to the 2020s, the time when the theater was formed as an organic institution of modern Yakut culture, and not something artificially introduced into the national culture.

The source base is represented by publications in the republican media; articles in the Russian specialized magazines "Theatrical Life", "Maestro", "Screen and Stage", etc. The results of the study are based on a content analysis of 32 titles of newspapers, magazines and social platforms. In addition, auxiliary sources were posters and programs of performances of city theaters of different years (based on questionnaires according to the methods of M. N. Egorova ^[4].

Theater — spectator: the formation of the subculture of the theater spectator of Yakutsk

The viewer is a consumer of a theatrical product and at the same time an object on which the activities of playwrights, directors, actors, set designers, etc. are focused. Interaction takes place in the process of emotional and artistic communication - during the transmission and perception of the main substantive and emotional "message", the assimilation by the audience of values and meanings transmitted through a theatrical performance. The perception of the performance presupposes an understanding of both the content inherent in the dramaturgical material and the form of the performance. In communication with the audience, the theater is able to influence the formation of moral and aesthetic values of the viewer. "The very fact of creating a work of art does not become a fact of culture until this work is put on public display" ^{[5, p. 24]}. Art embodies the spiritual energy of society, which is aimed at the self-consciousness of the ethnic group.

Theatergoers are defined as people who not only regularly attend theaters, but also have a high level of selectivity and expressed preferences when evaluating a performance. The theater audience consists of the sum of individuals, each of whom has an individual spectator experience (watching and dedication to the theater environment), aesthetic experience and artistic taste. The definition of "active spectators" is closest to the category of "theatergoers" to the definition of A. Ya. Rubinstein ^{[6, pp. 100-102]}, as well as the definition of A.V. Yurieva "permanent audience" [Interaction of the theater and the viewer in a small town. Autoref. diss. by spec. 22.00.06 — sociology of culture. Yekaterinburg, 2012. p. 18]. Subculture is characterized as self-organization based on interests and attitude to the same values. "For a modern city, the desire for subculturality becomes universal and manifests itself in the strengthening of informal horizontal ties, in the designation of cultural and social boundaries, in the development of specific norms of communication and behavior inherent in this group" ^[7]. The formation of the subculture of the theater audience includes both a steady experience of communication between the viewer and the theater, and the impact on the cultural space of the city. It (the subculture of the theater spectator) is the social element that accelerates the development of theatrical culture, expands the field of the theater's presence in society; changes the overall picture of the cultural space of the city, the republic and the region; forms an opinion about the theater in a general cultural context.

Stage I (1830-1920) of the formation of the subculture of the theater audience

This period can be designated as latent, amateur and spontaneous. The first theatrical productions were carried out in the form of the work of circles and amateur societies. In a letter dated November 1830, a seconded official N. S. Shchukin writes that in Yakutsk "... there is a club, and in it a Theater, on which the serving and trading youth breaks the comedy" ^{[8, p. 170]}, amateurs played in Russian for exiles and Russian-speaking officials, which made up a very small part of the townspeople (less than 30 people together with the actors).

The first experience of a theatrical performance in the Yakut language – the staging of a heroic-romantic excerpt from olonkho "Bert kisi Bareet Bergen" (3 acts represented fragments of the epic "Brave good fellow Bareet") ^{[9, p. 6]} was also carried out by non-professional actors. Among the performers are a poet, a firefighter, a playwright, a teacher, a publisher, a lawyer, public figures; for the first time in history, Yakuts played on the stage in their native language. The performance took place on January 3, 1906 on the stage of the club "Mutual Assistance Society of clerks and trade employees"; it "was a huge success," the correspondent noted in the "Chronicle" section on page 70 of the magazine "Living Antiquity" in No. 3 of 1906. In the autumn of the same year, the first drama in the Yakut language "Manchaary" was staged ^{[10, p. 6]} about the Yakut national hero — fighter for justice, the author of the play V. V. Nikiforov – Kulyumnyur. "Yakut folk art created the prerequisites for the emergence and development of professional theatrical art" ^{[9, p. 8]}. It is worth noting that "the viewer was aware of the plot twists and turns, the characteristics of the actors, ... the dramatic effect is built taking into account the audience's knowledge of the oral cultural tradition, but the task is to fill the folklore image with the necessary ideological content and bring it to the viewer. ... it is important that it be consonant with the problems of contemporaries" ^{[11, p. 159]}, the presentation format was new. The audience recited some fragments with the actors, the naive delight and enthusiasm of the audience frightened the provincial authorities.

Before the revolution of 1917, Russian classics were played on the same stage in Yakutsk, translated into the Yakut language plays by N. V. Gogol, L. N. Tolstoy, A. P. Chekhov, M. Gorky, as well as plays by one of the first Yakut playwrights A. I. Sofronov "Poor Yakov", "The Mud of Life", etc. It is worth noting that in the productions of 1906, the future playwright was involved as a prompter, and his wife then shone in the role of the heroine.

To the bewilderment of the viewer, the first theatrical experiments were met with hostility: the Main Directorate for Press Affairs and the Ministry of Internal Affairs were connected; the permission of the censorship committee was demanded, bureaucratic delays began. "Language, faith, traditional production, the state way of life, the self-consciousness of the people are comprehended by art, are introduced into the consciousness of the audience in artistic images. Fundamental sociogenic needs bring to life the installation of moral guidelines, patterns of behavior and ideals worthy of imitation. The axiological basis of the system of human values consolidating the ethnos is formed in classical theatrical art, which is explained by its original cultural functions" ^{[12, p. 66]}. Most of the population did not understand Russian, and therefore the productions of 1906, performed by amateur actors-Yakuts, in their native language, can be considered as the first Yakut theatrical experience, among the audience there were those who came to the city from uluses. The formation of the provincial amateur theater, which played in Russian and Yakut languages, lasted more than half a century. It was realized that "artistic life includes not only the problems of art, but also many other phenomena and processes – social, political, ethnic, economic" ^{[13, pp. 83-84]}.

Stage II (1920-1980) dynamics of the formation of the subculture of the theater audience

In the history of the theater of Yakutia, this is the time of the formation of state drama theaters. There are stationary theaters with professional compositions of full-time actors, artists, costumers, directors. "The first theatrical season was opened by the Russian troupe of the State People's Theater on September 25, 1920 in the building of the People's House (the former Club of the Society of Clerks) with the production of the play "On the day ... On November 10, the Yakut troupe staged the drama of V. V. Nikiforov "Manchars " ... The first spectators of the performance were delegates of the congress of the revkom of the Yakut district, as well as "cadets and Red Army soldiers-Yakuts. On November 11, the same drama was presented for students and for the Yakut population of the city" ^{[3, pp. 57-58]}, it is worth noting that the Soviet practice of recruiting spectators to the theater was already being introduced. The authors specifically describe in detail the composition of the audience and the repertoire; it is easy to imagine how revolutionary romance overwhelmed the youth. "For the most part, the new audience was far from the theater, illiterate, and therefore agitation flashiness, contrast of colors, visual, accessibility, common understanding in dialogue with the new audience were considered the most acceptable forms of stage performances, and the household psychological theater should be pushed to the sidelines of culture along with its traditional "bourgeois" audience" ^{[14, p. 38]}. The Soviet theater assumed "cultural service to the broad strata of collective farmers and workers ... theatrical culture activated and inspired the local intelligentsia to serve the region" ^{[15, p. 80]}.

It is impossible to overestimate the role of V. V. Mestnikov in the formation of professional forms of the Yakut National Theater. He was sent to the directing department of the Moscow State Institute of Theatrical Art (1931), contributed to the recruitment of the Yakut acting group (17 people in 1932). As a director, he staged 26 plays and the first Yakut opera "Nyurgun Bootur the Swift" (1940, 1955, 1957). Honored Artist of the Yakut ASSR, People's Artist of the YASSR, People's Artist of the USSR ^{[16, pp. 7-8]}. A connoisseur of the Yakut epic, history and culture of his people, from school "a passionate propagandist of theatrical art" ^{[9, p. 19]}, as a student, as a professional actor and director (1926-1943); later, as an artistic director, director of the theater (1944-1946) ^{[16, p. 7]}, head of the Arts Department at The Council of People's Commissars of the YASSR, he largely determined the policy of the development of the national theater and, accordingly, the formation of the subculture of the theater audience in Yakutia.

 The audience especially singled out talented nuggets — actors without special education, the first graduates of the studio at the theater (1932): M. V. Zhirkov, Y. P. Kychkin and P. S. Petrov in the future all Honored Artists of the YASSR; P. M. Reshetnikova — People's Artist of the RSFSR; D. F. Khodulova is a People's Artist of the USSR, — masters, each of whom is a legend of the Yakut theatrical art. "Performances and concerts for them (the audience) were a miracle that happened for the first time in their lives, were always a great success, and the living word that sounded from the stage became the most active means in building and strengthening the Soviet system" ^{[9, p. 21]}. The middle of the twentieth century was a "period of strengthening and flourishing of the professional theater of Yakutia" ^{[3, book 1, p. 143]}: the first acting dynasties were formed, the first laureates and winners of creative competitions and state prizes appeared.

Public consciousness underwent radical changes in the 1960s. N. A. Khrenov in his work "Sociological studies of theater in the context of the formation of sociological and cultural knowledge" characterizes the viewer of the thaw period in the USSR as follows: "the disintegration of ideologized stereotypes of attitudes to art, differentiation of tastes, ... (served) as the beginning of sociological reflection on mass culture, (which) brought the public back to the early forms of reaction to art... the phenomenon of mass character, stardom, the boom of adventure, entertainment ^{[17, pp. 16-17]}. For the first time in the culture of the region, the viewer influenced the repertory policy of the theater, was ahead and led by himself, determining the degree of pathos and the sharpness of the director's vision and enthusiasm of the actors.

The challenge of official morality, liberation from excessive ideologization and fear determined the vector of creative searches of leading directors in the capital and on the periphery. In the Yakut theatrical art , the creativity of F. F. should be noted . Potapov (1929-1995), artistic director and director, who combined the three main components of the success of the National Theater: epic, classics and modernity, while involving the creative forces of writers, artists and the entire theater team" [3. Book 1, p. 178]. He went from the theater of the actor and puppets — actor of the collective farm theater, to the chief director of the Yakut theater: Euripides, Pirandello, Shakespeare, Gorky, Shatrov, Gogolev in drama, a number of opera productions, etc. The viewer certainly trusted his taste, sympathized with his civic position, understood aesthetics and saw in him the mouthpiece of his doubts and hopes.

The theater resumed productions of works by Yakut classics A. E. Kulakovsky, A. I. Sofronov and N. D. Neustroeva. The regional party Committee did not stop vigilantly monitoring the activities of the theater, continuing to pursue a strict repertoire policy" [3. Book I, p. 141], but even here, in the hinterland, waves of thaw were heard; the public felt freedom, interest in the socially relevant theater was aroused. It seemed that the viewer was "adjusting" the theater. The Yakut Drama Theater, which gained national recognition, was perceived as the cradle of Yakut art. In fact, since the theater was musical and dramatic, it really became the center of Yakut folklore, music and drama; the temple of art, which prompted the development of drama, opera and ballet.

In the 1970s, it was decided to transform the music and drama theater into two independent ones: the drama theater and the opera and ballet theater. "Spiritual values are introduced into the life of society by fixing them in material carriers and institutions, the organization of which is connected with material culture. ... There is a need to train personnel for the Sakha Theater in Yakutia, at home, where the cultural context contributes to the fact that the skills acquired in the field of national theater art have an ethnic nature" ^{[18, p. 13-14]}. The Yakut Theater has become an institution and an instrument of the spiritual culture of the people. The People's theaters of the republic received assistance from him in solving creative and personnel issues. The Yakut Theater's tours of the uluses were regular, performances were performed on the stage of crowded rural clubs. The theater has become a part of the life of its audience. In response to the spiritual demands of society, the personality of the artist arises. In this capacity, it is impossible to ignore the figure of the director, teacher and statesman A. S. Borisov (1951): "over the past twenty years, the Sakha Theater ... has firmly taken its rightful place in the theatrical life of the country. It was the creative quest of the Yakut directing that played a decisive role in the process of the formation of the subculture of the theater audience, allowing the Yakuts to realize their own identity. "At the same time, in the space of the Yakut stage, the artistic achievements of the Russian theater organically merged with the national culture and ancient traditions of the Sakha people" [N. I. Illarionova. Stages of Andrey Borisov's directorial path. Autoref. diss.k.isc. Specialty 17.00.01 — theatrical art. M., 2005. p. 3]. At the same time, the theater intensively contributes to the formation of the national consciousness of the people and the strengthening of their spiritual orientations.

In the public life of the country in the early 1980s, interest in the origins of national culture increased. Perhaps because the devaluation of socialist ideals and the uncertainty of moral criteria forced us to look for support in popular culture. The theater's appeal to national culture, mythology and folk philosophy led to a multidimensional understanding of modern man. Public articulation and reflection of topical issues of the time from the theater rostrum united the audience, structured the self-consciousness of contemporaries and contributed to the formation of national identity.

Stage III (1990-2020) the Olonkho Theater spectator subculture

The Sakha Theater began preparing a play about the legendary first leader of Soviet Yakutia, the repressed M. K. Ammosov, the premiere took place in 1992. In this performance, the hum of time is heard, changing the mode of comprehension of human existence; exactly according to Mandelstam, "in order to start a new world, the knotty days of the knee need to be tied with a flute." And the provincial theater, barely numbering the third generation of directors, quite manages to convey the spirit of the times and raise its audience above the ordinary. The expert of the "Golden Mask" A. Khitrov: "Yakutia is the first region where I find my own theatrical genre, my own theatrical tradition, based not on European, not on Russian tradition. This is olonkho, the genre from which my theatrical apparatus breaks down" [cit. according to the newspaper "Yakutia". No. 12 (33346), dated March 29, 2019, p. 18].

S. S. Potapov (1975), graduate of the directing faculty of RATI (GITIS) 2004, workshop of M. A. Zakharov. Director of the Sakha Theater, winner of the Golden Mask Award for the play "Macbeth" by E. Ionesco, 2005. The event of the theatrical life of Yakutsk was all the productions of S. Potapov based on the plays of V. Shakespeare, B. Brecht, M. Bulgakov, M. McDonagh, Y. O'Neill, etc. He puts on a lot outside the republic, in particular in Khakassia, Gorno-Altaysk, St. Petersburg, Yekaterinburg, Tallinn, Paris and in theaters in Kazakhstan. He shoots a full-length feature film at the Sahafilm studio, is engaged in teaching. Overcoming their own mistakes, experiencing a craving for shocking with age, experiencing a complicated romance with the audience, breaking their stereotypes and the recipients of the production, S. S. Potapov grows into a serious, independent-minded master who has something to say to his contemporaries.

The Sakha Theater went to a new aesthetic a long way: from the graduation performance of A. S. Borisov "My desired Blue Shore" (1972) based on the story of Ch. Aitmatov "Piebald Dog running by the edge of the sea" — to the first performance -olonkho "Kyys Debiliye" (2000). The play "My Desired Blue Shore" has been preserved in the repertoire for 38 years, several generations of actors have changed, this allows us, following V. N. Dmitrievsky, to assert that "the life span of the play ... does not depend on ... the actor's successes in it, in contrast to the depth of the integrity of the director's embodiment" ^{[1, p. 69]}. Having singing actors in the troupe, director A. S. Borisov has been working on epic-scale dramaturgy since the first productions and is looking for appropriate space-time solutions in the stage embodiment: the middle world in eternal cyclic time. The nature of the performer's interaction with the audience determines the aesthetics of the spectacle; as in the Yakut national epic Olonkho, the theater of experience emerges.

By the end of the XX century, not only in the Yakut, but in the world theater, there was a desire for a large form — an hour-long spectacle based on mythological material. Realistic theater gives way to ritual, folklore tradition with the involvement of fiction; realistic action is elevated to the level of mystery (synthesis of mass and folk forms of culture). "For thirty years, Andrey Borisov has been leading the theater to a new aesthetic — the aesthetics of the Olonkho Theater. Today, by treating the Olonkho Theater as a cultural need, the Sakha Academic Theater troupe solves the problem of national significance. The performances of the director A. Borisov fill in the blank spots of history, opening the way for the spiritual quest of the Sakha people, give an artistic interpretation of the philosophy of the Yakut people based on the epic, the work of the Yakut classic writers" [3. Book 1, p. 218]. Geography of competitive festival screenings and tours of the Sakha Theater under the direction of A. S. Borisov: Kyrgyzstan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Buryatia, Tuva, Mongolia, Germany, Norway, USA, Poland, Lithuania, Switzerland, France, Japan and China.

The combination of simplicity and sophistication of form, nationality and academism, lyrical beginnings and large-scale epics is characteristic of A. S. Borisov's productions. Bright, expressive, repeatedly noted at the largest Russian and international festivals, Andrey Borisov's productions were included in the golden fund of the Theater. They brought up a new generation of viewers, including those who realized the beauty and greatness of their native culture through the theater. Based on the above, we can conclude that the theater becomes an urgent need, because it revives the moral ideals of the people, awakens feelings of citizenship.

Theater attendance is closely related to an increase in the number and improvement of the quality of theatrical offerings (a small number of the population assumes a change of repertoire more often than in a megalopolis ^{[19, p. 50]}), the development of spectator culture and an increase in public interest in performing arts. The active role of the viewer in the development of the theater determines the need for new forms of propaganda of theatrical art. Due to the fact that modern youth turned out to be detached from art in general and from theatrical art in particular. Attracting young people as a target segment of the market can contribute to solving/reducing the severity at the present time, it is young people (students, students) who should become a priority consumer of the theater if it, the theater, assumes its existence in the future.

Based on the fact that the prestige of theatrical art and the prestige of visiting a particular theater are not created and are not supported by themselves, there is a need to involve young people in organizational and motivational activities aimed at creating, promoting and popularizing theatrical art. Creative team, directors, touring performances, repertoire poster, premieres, theater festivals, activities within the framework of the global trend of convergence of various types of "cultural consumption": lectures, excursions, seminars, advertising and charity events with the participation of leading actors. In addition to well-known foreign practice, one can recall concerts of classical music "December Yesterday" (Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts), jazz concerts and photo exhibitions (Pyotr Fomenko Workshop), lectures on the history of theater (Chekhov Moscow Art Theater), film screenings, concerts and other activities (Gogol Center) ^{[2, p. 14]}. Democratic (differentiated) policy of affordability.

Professional theater criticism has not yet been formed in the region, and the viewer needs criticism "as an interpreter, interpreter of public opinion, artistic consciousness, she ... takes on the mission of an intermediary, contributing to the coherence of aspirations and mutual understanding of the artist and the public in the conditions of growing mass production of cultural products and differentiation of spectator attitudes and tastes" ^{[14, p. 652]}. On the other hand, regional criticism is really a "luxury" and in the narrow cultural space of a provincial city, "theaters are only interested in promoting their theatrical product, and they need criticism of PR quality" ^{[20, p. 166]}.

In addition, the youth studio at the theater can act as an initiative capable of offering an alternative recreation option as a form of applying the forces of active youth and as a field of cultural, socially adequate and educational recreation area ^[21]. The main feature will be the activity aimed at organizing a team of like-minded people, consisting of young people capable of independent social and cultural activities.

Of great importance in the formation of a youth theater audience is the use of traditional communication channels such as festivals, contests, seminars, creative meetings with actors and directors. A noticeable trend in recent years has been the exit from the walls of the theater into the urban space, such a "form of communication of theater workers is popular within the framework of the theater's interaction not only with schools, but also with orphanages and healthcare institutions" ^{[22, p. 106]}. At the same time, innovative forms and methods of building communication links are used: presence at rehearsals; pre-premiere screenings of performances; participation in exhibitions; master classes for youth audiences; introducing young people to the festival theater movement.

Theater is one of the most important means of constructing national identity. The aesthetics of the theater is grounded by the deep epic traditions of the people, is based on the comprehension of the logic of the development of the theatrical culture of the world and is in demand as a synthesis of ideological and cultural principles. The Yakut theater played an extremely important role in the preservation and development of the Yakut language, the spiritual culture of the Sakha people as a whole. Knowing the audience, the theater has an idea on the basis of what outlook, experience, knowledge these motives for turning to the theater arose, as a result of understanding the "patterns of cultural consumption" ^{[23, p. 54]}. Today it is difficult for the theater to find a single problematic and meaningful sphere of influence on the public, but while maintaining its uniqueness, originality, fidelity to the intonation of time, it finds its audience.

Thus, the regional specificity of cultural communication "theater – spectator" influences the formation of both moral and aesthetic characteristics of the viewer, the national identity of the people and contributes to the strengthening of its spiritual guidelines. The Yakut Theater is a fundamental cultural and social institution, an instrument in the development of the spiritual culture of the Sakha people. The basis of the national theatrical art is the epic memory of the people. In this aspect, the people have preserved pagan and folklore traditions, a unique oral heritage. Sakha Academic Theater named after P. A. It contributes to the preservation of the unique culture, richness and colors of the native language, is an indicator of the spiritual maturity of the nation.

Conclusion

Theatrical productions reveal topical social issues of the time, the attitude of society to the social and cultural problems of our time. St. Petersburg scientists from the research group "Sociology and Theater" spoke very accurately about this: identifying "your audience" gives theaters the opportunity to determine the direction of stage searches. The culturological approach to socio-cultural studies of the theater-spectator relationship presents a unique opportunity to get to know the people who fill the auditorium every evening, to understand themselves more precisely to the theater and become a truly necessary institute of culture of the city and the people.

In order to determine the relationship "theater — spectator", the dynamics of the nature of the relations between the stage and the hall are considered. The stages of the formation of the subculture of the theater audience are determined. The criteria base is determined, indirectly testifying to the growth of the competence of the theater audience: the change of repertoire, issues, directing styles, participation in All-Russian ("Golden Mask") and foreign theater competitions (Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Canada), touring policy, pricing, including the "Pushkin Map", etc.

The analysis of methods of introducing young people to theatrical culture is carried out; measures are proposed to expand the presence of the Sakha Theater in the cultural space of the region. The strategy of the formation of the subculture of the theater audience in the youth environment is defined – students and students as the "backbone" of the Sakha Theater audience. The format of the youth festival can and should contribute to the formation of the subculture of the theater audience and the expansion of the theater's influence on the cultural life of the region and, in general, on the national culture of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). The regional specifics of the theater – spectator communication influence the formation of both moral and aesthetic views of the viewer; it affects the national consciousness of the people and contributes to the strengthening of their spiritual orientations. The Sakha Theater took place as a fundamental instrument and institution in the cultural space of the city of Yakutsk and in the development of the spiritual culture of the Sakha people.