By Owen Reyes · Originally reported by Richard Horgan (2012) · Wayback archive →
In mid-January 2012 The Hollywood Reporter announced it was launching a Russian-language monthly print edition in March, with a companion website at thehollywoodreporter.ru. The launch was the third foreign-language THR property under Janice Min — following the path Billboard had pioneered with its Russian edition in 2007.
Then
The Russian launch put THR among the major U.S. trades systematically expanding into local-language markets. The Russian entertainment industry in 2012 was substantial — domestic film production around 100 features a year, a growing TV sector, significant Hollywood box-office presence.
Now
The Russian THR’s trajectory was substantially redrawn by geopolitics rather than by trade-press economics. The 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea, the subsequent sanctions cycle, the 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and the broader Western corporate disengagement from the Russian market have all reshaped the foreign-language-edition landscape. THR was acquired by PMC in 2020. The 2012 launch reads now as one of the small documented moments when major U.S. trades were investing in international expansion just before the political environment made some of those markets structurally difficult.