Eldar Ryazanov is the master of Russian cinema. More than one generation has grown up on his films, and without "The Irony of Fate" it is already impossible to imagine New Year's holidays.
Biography
Eldar Alexandrovich's parents worked at the Soviet embassy in Iran, and under the influence of the culture of this country they gave their son a name. Translated from Persian, it means "master of the country." Upon returning to Moscow, the couple divorced, the boy at that time was only three years old. The father remarried, and soon he was arrested and sentenced to five years. He escaped from the camp, but he was caught and added ten more. Eldar later tried to contact his father, wrote to him, but in response received only one letter with a completely neutral text.
When Eldar was seven, his mother also remarried. Lev Kopp became a real father for the boy, about whom he warmly recalled: “I was raised by my stepfather from the age of seven. He was an absolutely amazing person. I have a half-brother, and never in my life have I felt the difference in my stepfather's relationship to my own son and to me … I was not flogged or put in a corner, but I was reprimanded so that I remember."
The main educator of Eldar was life itself. He was already a teenager when the war began. The family from Moscow was evacuated to Nizhny Tagil, and while the parents worked at a defense plant, Eldar looked after his younger brother and stood in line for food. And in his free time, the boy read a lot and dreamed of becoming a writer himself.
But this profession, in his opinion, required a rich life experience, so first you had to see the world.
After graduating from ten classes, he wrote to the Odessa Naval School with a request to enroll him in the course, but there was no answer, since the educational institution was in evacuation. But he had to study somewhere, and Eldar submitted documents to VGIK for the company with a friend.
Ryazanov entered the directing department, where Grigory Kozintsev, already well-known at that time, was just typing a course. In addition to him, Eldar Aleksandrovich studied with Sergei Eisenstein, who taught the theory of film directing.
Ryazanov completed his diploma project - a documentary film "They study in Moscow", which he shot with Zoya Fomina, a classmate who soon became his wife. The first place of work for the young director couple is the Central Documentary Film Studio, where they shoot newsreels and film essays.
Career
But this turns out to be not enough for Ryazanov, and he decides to try his hand at feature films, so he switches to Mosfilm, which at that time was directed by Ivan Pyriev. Ivan Aleksandrovich becomes a mentor for the young director and persuades Ryazanov to take up a comedy film. Eldar Alexandrovich resisted for a long time, because at first he saw himself as the creator of serious cinema, but in the end he succumbs to persuasion. This is how the story of Carnival Night began.
When the picture was almost ready, Ryazanov, as expected, demonstrated it at the commission, which he later talked about in his usual humorous way: “Among the members of the artistic council, unfortunately, there was no one who had staged at least one comedy in his life … We must pay tribute to the respected directors - they were unanimous in their assessment: the filmed and edited material was considered gray, boring and mediocre."
How wrong they were! After the release of the picture on the screens, both the director and Lyudmila Gurchenko, who played the main role, woke up famous throughout the Soviet Union. Ryazanov realized that his vocation was a comedy, and continued to work in this direction, which, in his opinion, required "a particularly careful attitude."
Appears "Girl without an address", "Give a book of complaints", "Hussar ballad". A stranger to being far-fetched and light-hearted, Ryazanov is not afraid to touch on social issues, with the result that almost every film of his is dismantled by censors. The seemingly completely apolitical "Hussar Ballad" did not escape this either. However, according to officials, Igor Ilyinsky, a comedian, could not play Kutuzov: they saw this as a mockery of history.
But the director courageously overcomes all this, continuing to shoot film masterpieces: "The Incredible Adventures of Italians in Russia", "Office Romance", "Garage" and, of course, "Irony of Fate, or Enjoy Your Bath!", Which is awarded the USSR State Prize. Eldar Alexandrovich himself soon received the title of People's Artist.
Ryazanov worked actively back in the early 2000s, but his health began to fail him more and more often. The favorite director of the whole country passed away in November 2015.
