Armenia: Yerevan – Kavkazskaya Plennitsa Restaurant

This post will get lost on anybody not born in the USSR (so apologies). This restaurant in the heart of Yerevan, the Armenian capital, is themed on the 1967 Soviet comedy “Kavkazskaya Plennitsa (Prisoner of Caucasus)”. While the movie was made way before I was even born it was an absolute comedy classic and perhaps one of the best Soviet comedies of all times. Featuring the trio of “Coward” (Georgy Vitsin), “Moron” (Yuri Nikulin), and “Seasoned Pro” (Yevgeny Morgunov), and Natalya Varley (the Soviet equivalent of Margot Robbie), the comedy told the story of a bridal kidnapping in the Caucasus that went awry wrong. The movie pushes the limits of what was allowed at the time in the USSR in term of ridiculing the socialist reality and it was even censored until Brezhnev (Soviet leader) saw it and laughed so hard that the movie was released. The restaurant is replete with wax figures, quotes, pictures, and music from the movie. The service though was also typically Soviet and borderline awful.