Acterian was scenic director for the Bucharest-based Ventura Theater. He was by then heavily influenced by the classical works of William Shakespeare and Aeschylus, but practical constraints prevented him from staging them. He directed a series of other plays, including one by George Bernard Shaw. Around that time, he became good friends with Petre Țuțea, who was taking an interest in the world of theater. Initially a communist (like Mihail Polihroniade), Acterian contributed articles to Bluze Albastre (a literary magazine published in 1932, with backing from the Romanian Communist Party). He affiliated with Amicii URSS ("Friends of the Soviet Union"), a loose grouping of left-wing intellectuals which was created and disbanded in 1934. Later the same year, he traveled to Italy, and trained in filmmaking at the Cinecittà in Rome. Acterian took part in the Volta International Theater Conference, and reported on it for Vremea. Over the following year, he traveled to France and Switzerland, briefly residing in Paris and Geneva; this sojourn was the topic of a diary, published later. With Eliade and others, Acterian was a founding member of the Criterion literary society. Rejecting his early political ideas, he soon became a disciple of Nae Ionescu and Trăirism, and later a supporter of the far right Iron Guard movement. In 1936, Acterian completed his Pretexte pentru o dramaturgie românească ("Themes for a Romanian Dramaturgy"), with a preface by his friend Edward Gordon Craig, and published a volume of poetry, titled Urmare ("Follow-up"). The following year, he completed a lengthy essay, published under the title Orientarea Teatrului ("The Direction of the Theater"). He also wrote several works on the first Romanian monograph on Shakespeare (1938), and an essay titled Limitele Artei ("The Limits of Art", 1939). Also in 1939, Acterian produced and directed two documentary films: one on the Bucharest industrial plant of Nicolae Malaxa (Fabrica Malaxa), and the other on the Apuseni Mountains (Munții Apuseni). As a journalist, Acterian contributed propaganda for the 1940 Iron Guard government, the National Legionary State, and served as head of the National Theater Bucharest. In this capacity, he founded, together with George Franga, the National Theater's Museum. In February, he also organized the premiere of Iphigenia, a play by his friend Eliade, who was at a time living in London. Haig Acterian was arrested when the Guard violently clashed with Ion Antonescu's forces in January 1941 (see Legionnaires' Rebellion and Bucharest Pogrom),