RITS: A Successful Start

Russian newspaper 'Angliya'
9th February 2007

In January 2007 the UK’s first ever Russian drama school opened its doors to young people in London.

Russian International Theatre School (RITS) is located in London’s historic Bloomsbury Way. Classes are held in a two-roomed building in the courtyard of St. George’s Bloomsbury church, as well as in an art gallery within the church building. The stone walls and high ceiling of the gallery provide excellent acoustics and the spaciousness of the venue creates the ideal theatrical atmosphere.

The objective of the theatre school is to encourage a child’s appreciation of the moral values of Russian culture and to develop a child’s identity and spiritual qualities through the performing arts.

The school curriculum consists of subjects such as theatre and film acting skills, speech work, movement, dance, theatrical fencing, singing and theatrical make-up. Such techniques are taught in the best universities but RITS has adapted the teaching to suit the needs of children aged 4 to 20 years.

The teaching staff work hard to find an individual approach to each child so as to unleash their creativity to the fullest extent. From the first moments in the classroom they strive to create an atmosphere of collective creativity, regardless of the age of the students.

All subjects at the theatre school are taught in Russian. The aim is to encourage teenagers not to forget their Russian and to increase the Russian vocabulary of the younger ones. Whilst working on the texts of the Russian classics the students are taken to a different era. Not only do they gain a profound knowledge of Russian literature but they also get an insight into Russian history, Russian culture and the traditions of its people.

It is gratifying to see that all students at RITS have a huge desire to learn and to know more about themselves and the world that surrounds them. The experience in communication that they gain at RITS will certainly be useful to them in later life, no matter what profession they choose.

We believe that the day will soon come when we see ex RITS students expressing themselves in all walks of life and we will be justifiably proud of them.