“The Brezhnev series is like a joke made with love”

As early as November 7, Leonid Ilyich stood on the Mausoleum, waved his hand, accepted the parade, blessed the demonstration, and three days later he was gone. On this occasion, the First Channel volunteered to celebrate the sad anniversary, again showing the Brezhnev series last Sunday. An excellent series, I must say, it looks in one breath. Directed by Sergei Snezhkin. In the role of Leonid Ilyich – Sergei Shakurov, perhaps this is his best work. Victoria Petrovna, wife – of course, Svetlana Kryuchkova, but who else? And the members of the Politburo are all people’s artists: Vladimir Menshov – Ustinov, Vasily Lanovoy – Andropov … All this looks like a big beautiful anecdote, but done with love.

Leonid Ilyich appeared at the very pinnacle of power after the overthrow of Khrushchev, a secret conspiracy. Soft, gentle, with the right biography, he suited everyone. In some ways, he was even a philosopher, he understood Russian, Soviet people. They stole everything, Brezhnev looked at it through his fingers: well, at least the people will rejoice. Corruption was planned in the state budget: people’s salaries are small, 120 rubles on average, so let them get their way. Yes, everything around is collective farm, everything around is mine. For their own, there were special distributors with special rations, the Fourth Directorate, where they treated and rested in a completely different way than the working class. In a word, legitimized privileges.

He ruled for 18 years, then it seemed like infinity. For example, I was born under Brezhnev, it seemed that it would be like this forever. When the news of his untimely death (he was 75) was broadcast on radio and TV, there was an absolute feeling that the end of the world had come. Because he had no alternative and did not even leave himself a successor.

The country lived by selling minerals, primarily oil and gas. Propaganda worked to the fullest, blinded the eyes and minds of ordinary workers, sang songs about the society of developed socialism. He was – on TV, on paper. But in real life… As they said in the Soviet city of Odessa, there are two big differences.

In culture, with all the stupid and vicious censorship, Leonid Ilyich personally played a blessed role. Possessing spiritual responsiveness, he often cried when problematic films about the war were sent to his Zavidov estate for viewing, he remembered himself, his fellow soldiers in the Great Patriotic War, and the films were released on the big screen. Having a natural sense of humor, he again laughed to tears at the comedies of Ryazanov, Danelia, Gaidai, and this movie was also published in spite of fearful officials.

The country was slowly rotting from within, but the broad masses knew nothing about it and did not want to know. In 1968 they entered Prague – a handful of people protested, the rest approved, understood, were silent. And it all ended quickly: the problem of a single socialist camp was soon solved by force. And in the 79th, the old sick Leonid Ilyich and his comrades came up with the Afghan war, the eternal American threat, on their own and our heads, brought in troops … After 10 years they left, and after another 2 years the country collapsed – “the great, mighty Soviet Union.”

Comrade Bender

What are your favorite literary characters? To paraphrase: tell me who they are and I will tell you who you are. I’ll start with myself. I decided to come out, to undress before the game. Here are my main literary characters: Pinocchio, Don Quixote, Martin Eden, Sanya Grigoriev from “Two Captains”, Baron Munchausen (but only the same one, from Gorin, Zakharov, Yankovsky) and … Ostap Bender.

According to “Culture” they just showed it – “12 chairs” from Mark Zakharov. There were many Ostapovs in our cinema. So, my Bender is not Sergei Yursky with his tragic breakdown; not Archil Gomiashvili – too simple and unsophisticated; not Oleg Menshikov, who is tired of everything in life, a kind of Onegin-Pechorin with an extinct look. No, my Bender is Andrei Mironov!

For whom life is a game, and who is to blame for the fact that he was carried away by this game.

Oh, the pleasure of sliding along the edge

Freeze, angels, look, I’m playing.

Leave the analysis of my sins for the time being,

You will appreciate the beauty of the game.

Yes, such a person, “You are my idol, I will not leave you.” Zakharov filmed this to himself, Mironov played himself, Yuli Kim (aka Mikhailov) wrote to himself, and the composer Gennady Gladkov composed to himself.

This Ostap did not like boredom, gray everyday life, animal seriousness, on the go he composed, created, played his life and reveled in it.

Exactly the same is Shirvindt, there were Gorin, Kvasha – that’s what kind of company. How Zakharov moved at full speed, moved from car to car, how he turned somersaults in the lobby in front of the cloakroom attendant, so as not to fall into pathos when he was appointed head of Lenkom. As Zakharov, Gorin and Mironov dragged Shura Shirvindt a huge corridor battery as a birthday present, and Shura appreciated this feat, but already from the second time (he sent them the first time). How the same Shura was seen off by his friends on the train to shoot in another city, and then they suddenly decided to meet him there first. Zakharov, Mironov and Gorin rushed to the airport, boarded the plane, and… Shura appreciated it again.

This is our way, Bender’s way. They – Gorin, Zakharov, Mironov, Kvasha, Derzhavin – lived their lives joking, laughing at her, but at the same time very seriously, with full dedication, and Shirvindt, thank God, still lives, although he played in that Zakharovsky film not Ostap, but a one-eyed chess player.

But they are all Benders. Their life is exciting. “The ice has broken, gentlemen of the jury, the ice has broken!”