New Party Headquarters : Emigres: Ex-Soviets eat, schmooze and boogie at Studio City nightclub.

The melting pot was bubbling at Moscow Nights, a Studio City restaurant and nightclub catering to the growing Soviet immigrant community.

The crowd of 300 hoisted full glasses of vodka and toasted America, freedom and the health of Valery Moiseyev. A former Moscow Circus comedian, Moiseyev was celebrating his birthday by ridiculing the communist system from which he escaped 12 years ago. He goose-stepped around the stage in a stiff, brown Soviet army coat, then threw the coat open to reveal a happy-face T-shirt.

“This is the best place in the world, my second motherland,” said the small, mustachioed man, who gave this party “to get all the immigrants together.”

Moscow Nights has earned a special niche in the Russian emigre community by serving up authentic Russian food and a high-decibel cabaret show featuring dancers from St. Petersburg and a Gypsy singer. The house band is led by the black-suited Misha Shufutinsky, a bearish man whose music was banned in the Soviet Union. His songs tackled sex and politics instead of focusing on more acceptable issues, such as how beautiful life was in the socialist state.

But what makes the place stand out is its unabashed love affair with Western decadence, which should come as no surprise to any acquaintance of owner Arkady Kivman, who bluntly proclaims that his goal is to be a “successful capitalist.”

Unlike the spare, noisy ethnic eateries with great food and surly waiters that are common in immigrant communities, Moscow Nights might have been designed by Bugsy Siegel when he dreamed an opulent dream called Las Vegas. There are crystal chandeliers, marble flooring in the entryway and bar, private VIP booths and a blackjack table for those who like to pretend they are at Caesars--or the czar’s.

The effect of the atmosphere and the cornucopia of foods laid out before her was almost more than Nina Alexandrovich could bear. A hairdresser visiting from Moscow, she sat near the dance floor with a wide, frozen smile. “She’s overwhelmed,” said her friend, Regina Korbatov of Beverly Hills.

Kivman is a wry, brooding man with a beard who grew up near the Black Sea and studied economics. After leaving the Soviet Union in the late ‘70s, he moved to Los Angeles and four months later had his own hamburger stand in the Wilshire District. He opened Moscow Nights in a small Canoga Park building. Eight months ago, he took on an American partner, psychologist Richard Kritzer, and moved to Ventura Boulevard. Open Wednesday through Sunday and only lightly attended during the week, the place is packed on weekends, the partners say. As for the food, Times restaurant reviewer Max Jacobson said he found it comparable to that at hotels in Russia, which was not meant as a compliment. Several immigrants who eat there, however, praised the cooking.

Whether or not Kivman becomes the fat cat of his dreams, he has already developed some pricey habits. He drives a Rolls-Royce and collects art. The walls of the restaurant are lined with more than 100 samovars--large Russian tea kettles; one, which dates back to czarist times, he sneaked out of Russia during his last vacation, a depressing visit to a country he says is trapped in its past. Behind the bar is his 130-brand collection of vodka, from sources as diverse as Africa and China.

Scattered around the restaurant are little red flags with pictures of Lenin on them. Back in the Soviet Union, such trinkets were given to workers who did a good job in lieu of more money. “Now I give them to my employees, like a joke,” he said.

Kivman works 80 hours a week and sees no reason to apologize for his capitalistic dreams. In the Soviet Union, he said, everyone was supposed to be the same. “I don’t want to be like everybody else.”

Preparations for Moiseyev’s party began the day before, when two collages were brought to the restaurant depicting his life in the Soviet Union and in the United States. Filled with contrasting images of poverty and plenty, they could not have been more effective propaganda had they been concocted by the CIA during the Cold War.

The photographs from the Soviet Union were black and white, and showed a young, unsmiling Moiseyev in a military uniform. Others depicted dour men in peasant garb tramping through the forlorn fields of some collective farm.

The pictures from the United States, on the other hand, were in color. They showed laughing faces, some of which belonged to American showgirls cuddling Moiseyev like a doll. Gypsy singer Carmelina Vinciguerra, who is actually a Canadian of Italian descent, stopped by to try on her costume and remind Kivman of their date for pasta on Sunday. “Working with Russians,” she said, “I’ve been able to learn a lot about the culture, and Arkady gets to learn about mine.”

When Friday came, Moiseyev was in a green jerkin greeting members of the crowd as they filed through the doors and past the glass case displaying Moscow Nights T-shirts for sale. Many of them knew Moiseyev from Russia, where he was more a mime than a stand-up comedian, known for his sleight-of-hand trick of removing customers’ watches without their knowledge. The customers shook hands and shoved birthday envelopes in Moiseyev’s pockets. He opened one and found a $100 bill.

The show began with Shufutinsky’s lilting arrangement of “Moscow Nights,” a flamboyantly emotional song that Kivman calls “Russian soul music.” Two women in red caps and peasant dresses bounded onstage with a young man and launched into a folk dance.

Kritzer, the silver-haired co-owner, hovered near the bar, dressed nattily all in black. He refused to give his age. He is single, he said, and spends most Friday and Saturday nights here. Though Kivman designed the restaurant, Kritzer’s touches could also be seen.

“We have one of the largest dance floors in the Valley, I saw to that personally,” he said. A smoke machine had been installed over the floor to add a frisson of disco to the club.

These things, he said, eyeing a crowd that had its share of leggy young women in short skirts, were “for the second generation.”

Moiseyev appeared in a peasant scarf and false face with huge, red lips. He dragged Alexandrovich, the Moscow hairdresser, from her table and twirled her around before planting a rubberized kiss on her cheek. Then he pulled three men out of the crowd and led them in a series of dances.

Moiseyev asked the crowd to vote for the best dancer, promising a prize for the winner. When the audience shouted its approval of a young man from Fairfax Avenue with flowing jet-black hair, Moiseyev awarded him his own watch.

Off to the side sat Svetlana Uber, whose British-American boyfriend, Stephen Rodda, brought her to celebrate her 19th birthday. She liked this place because it brought back memories of a childhood in the Soviet Union, of her father tying sleds together and pulling his children through the streets.

But now she is an American and feels keenly the conflict between her parents’ conservative values and the free-spirited life she wants to live. Her parents don’t like her habit of speaking up for herself; “talking back,” they call it. Most of all, they disapprove of her friendships with members of the opposite sex.

“My parents can’t understand that people of the opposite sex can be just friends,” Uber said. “I say, ‘Get real, we’re in America now.’ ” Back onstage, the music died down and a blonde in white fishnet stockings confronted Moiseyev.

The woman, who goes by the name Maureen Starr, cooed, “I have some very special things I’d like to do to you, I mean for you.” She stripped to red underwear.

“Are you finished?” asked Moiseyev. She looked around doubtfully as he stripped to a turn-of-the-century bathing suit and chased her around the room like it was a Marx Brothers movie.

She finally ran away, tossing business cards in her wake. Outside the club, she was fuming.

“I’m an aspiring actress from New York,” she said. “I’m actually a performing artist. I’m not really a stripper. I do 13 theme shows, I eat fire, I do rodeo, a bondage show, twirling whips onstage.”

Having established her credentials, she said that what happened in Moscow Nights “was not professional. Being an exotic dancer, being a performer, you should be given your space.”

All in all, however, the night had gone well. Kivman said he was so pleased with how the club was working out that he was already looking forward to his next venture, a chain of steak-sandwich shops. Is there anything more American, after all, than fast-food franchising?

After that, he just might buy his own island in the Bahamas. If you’re going to dream, you might as well dream big capitalist dreams.