Connecting multiple routers via ethernet cable for range?

Although I haven't looked through all the forum topics I couldn't find anything very similar to my situation. I have a rather large house and my modem/router (Netgear DGND3300 v2 due to DSL) is in the very corner. Given this most of the opposite corner of my house gets either poor or no connection; however, I do have an ethernet cable run across the house through the basement to my home theatre setup. This is where I encounter another problem, I need multiple devices to be connected via ethernet and I also need to have wireless in that same area. In my mind I picture myself connecting a second router to this ethernet cable through which I could have wired connections to all my devices, and a second router broadcasting wirelessly. I'm familiar with some types of wireless bridging, but I'd rather use more of a wired bridge concept if possible, but I've never really seen something like this. The question is, is this possible? Or, what is another possible way to achieve the same results? The only other thing I can think of is to run an ethernet hub from the original wired connection to my home theatre so I can connect multiple ethernet devices and run a separate wireless extender or something, but this just seems pricy. Anyone have any ideas?