The opportunity for Stanislavski to institutionalize his realist finally came in 1897 when he met the playwright Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko.
Vladimir Nemirovich Danchenko
Nemirovich, a celebrated Russian playwright, had been an instructor as the Moscow Philharmonic Dramatic School where his students included a talented young performer named Vsevolod Meyerhold.
Meyerhold
While teaching at the Dramatic School, Nemirovich had become disillusioned with the predominant school of Russian theater, believing that preeminent (but not yet successful) playwrights like Anton Chekhov were producing work that could only be done justice by a new, naturalistic style of performance. In an 1998 meeting lasting from 2pm to 8am the next day, Stanislavski and Nemirovich planned and founded the Moscow Art Theater, the company which would define the rest of their lives. 
Dedicated to perfect realism of staging and performance, the two placed the company under their joint directorship: Nemirovich would control the selection of scripts and production elements of shows, while Stanislavski would control the acting ensemble and their performances. On October 14th, 1898, the Moscow Art Theater formally opened with Stanislavski’s production of Tsar Fyodor Ioannovich (Stanislavski’s primary concerns as a director: “the actors punctuality and backstage drunkenness).
Constantin STANISLAVSKI (Trigorin) & M. L. POKSANOVA (Nina) in Chejov's 'Chayka' (1898)
Their next show – a December production of Anton Chekov’s The Seagull in which Stanislavski directed and played Trigorin – marked their first massive success, making both the company and Chekov famous throughout Russia. In honor of this first triumph, the Moscow Art Theater adopted a picture of a seagull as their official emblem. Over the next several years, the Moscow Art Theater continued to enjoy exponential growth and critical success. Performances of Uncle Vanya, An Enemy of the People, Three Sisters and The Wild Ducks, as well as numerous tours of Russia and western Europe, established the Moscow Art Theater as the foremost company in the world. The hyper realism advocated by Stanislavski and Nemirovich had become the standard for quality production; their ensemble included the best of current and future Russian theater professionals, from Chekov to Nemirovich’s former student Meyerhold. Already famous, Stanislavski became perhaps the best-known director in Europe. Indeed, by 1902 – only four short years after their initial meeting – it seemed as if the two realist visionaries had exceeded even their own desire to change the face of western theater.
stage of the Moscow Art Theater
