The grand columned theatre on the central square is one of the most prominent buildings in the city — built in the early 1930s in Soviet-Classical style, with a tall pedimented portico that occupies most of one side of the square. The resident Russian Drama Theatre was founded in 1939 and performed for the rest of the Soviet period as one of the regional theatrical centres of the eastern Ukrainian SSR.
The repertoire mixed Russian classics (Chekhov, Ostrovsky) with Soviet-era plays and, after independence, contemporary Ukrainian work; performances are in Russian.