Memory. Benjamin Smekhov

On August 10, 1940, Benjamin Smekhov, theater and film actor, director was born.

Personal business

Veniamin Borisovich Smekhov (77 years old) was born in Moscow in an intelligent Jewish family. His father was a professor, doctor of economic sciences, mother - a therapist, a factory department in the Moscow clinic. In 1941-1943 he was with his mother in evacuation near Kazan. He saw his father only in 1945, when he returned from the war.

At the school, a drama circle at the Palace of Pioneers of the Dzerzhinsky district of Moscow, which Rolan Bykov, spent on the school.

In 1957 he entered the Schukin Theater School (the course of Vladimir Etush). After graduating from the school in 1961, he was sent by distribution to the Kuibyshev Drama Theater (now Samara dramatic). In the same year, he married a student of a food university in Alla. In their marriage, their daughters Elena (1963) and Alika (1968) were born. Smekhov said: “He found his wife away from the theatrical fuss. In 1960, after the Winter Session, I, a third -year student, went to the youth camp. Alla, a student of the eating institute, rested in the same place. We met, a novel began. The wedding was celebrated on the day I received a diploma. Soon I went to work in Kuibyshev, and Alla remained in Moscow for another year to graduate from the institute. ”

In 1962, Smekhov returned to Moscow and was admitted to the troupe of the Moscow Drama and Comedy Theater (Taganka Theater), where he played until 1985. The actor recalled : “In Moscow, I was not able to find a job right away. He even began to seriously think about changing the profession, he wanted to write a dissertation on the topic "Reincalling Alexander Pushkin" at the Institute of World Literature. Nevertheless, he made another attempt - he appeared to the theater of drama and comedy on Taganka, which was then led by Alexander Plotnikov. And they took me. So, we can say almost by accident, I ended up on Taganka, not suspecting that for many years this theater will become my life. ” In 1985-1987 he worked in a “contemporary”, where he left with Leonid Filatov and Vitaly Shapovalov after the exile of the main director of Taganka Yuri Lyubimov from the USSR. Since 1987, he again played in the Taganka theater.

In 1968 he made his debut in the cinema - he played Baron Krause in the film "Two Comrades served." But the most popular actor brought the role of Athos in the film "D'Artagnan and three musketeers" (1978).

In 1980, he divorced his first wife and married a 19-year-old Theater student Galina Aksenova. “It all started in 1979, when a young beautiful student Galya Aksenova came to our theater to practice in the literary part from Leningrad,” Smekhov said. - I admit, I was not ready to radically change my life, since by nature a cowardly. But fate ordered a different way, at some point my wife and I decided: we must get divorced. Divorce was not easy. Everyone got it. My parents, mother -in -law, and, of course, children were worried. ” The marriage of Smekhov and Aksenova has been going on for 35 years.

Since 1990, Smekhov has been setting up dramatic performances, television and operas in Russia and abroad. For several years he taught acting at US universities. “In the 90th year, I agreed with Lyubimov that I will not play anymore. But I couldn’t leave at all: about then the terrible scandal and split of the theater began, so I fundamentally left my portrait to hang in the photo gallery of artists, and I myself came to the theater only to play two performances - “Masters and Margarita” and “House on the Embankment”. It lasted eight years, and then ... Then a choice appeared, ”he said.

Since 2013, Smekhov has been playing on the stage “Taganka” in his own production “There are no years” to the verses of Yevgeny Yevtushenko.

He lives in Moscow, often tours with performances and creative evenings, works a lot on television, mainly makes productions for the Culture channel. The author of several art books and memoirs: “One fine day”, “Alive and only” (about Vysotsky), “When I was an atose ...”, “The violin of the master”, “Theater of my memory” and others.

What is famous

Veniamin Smekhov is one of the most recognizable actors of Lyubimovsky “Taganka Theater”. He shone in the performances “Good Man from the Sesan”, “Suicide”, “Fallen and Living”, “Life of Galilee”, “Master and Margarita” (Woland), “Boris Godunov”.

In the cinema, it has grown together with the image of Athos from the "three musketeers." He also played several small characteristic roles, including Cure Maksimen in the “Trap for a Lone Men” (1990), Don Quixote on the dragon in the “Fairy Tale of Wandering” (1983), Sonya's boyfriend in “Balzac age, or all the men of his ...” (2004).

Smekhov announced a series of audiobooks (a collection of stories by Mark Twain, “Master and Margarita” by Mikhail Bulgakov, “Twelve Chairs” by Ilya Ilf and Evgenia Petrov). His voice also sounds in a large number of television peppers.

What you need to know about

By his own admission, “he never relate to the cinema seriously,” therefore I played a little roles in the cinema: “I, having received a dose of Lyubimov’s infection, never treated the cinema, fortunately, and therefore did not suffer from unclaimed. Vysotsky wanted and dragged me into the cinema - even persuaded Dunsky and Frida, who loved him very much, to enter the role for me in “Two Comrades served”: since Nekrasov - Yankovsky has a friend, let Baron Krause Brus Crause have! They entered. He was terribly serious about the role, enjoyed riding, not allowing understudies. About everything - up to the Bessarabian Vurens, who we tried there - said with enthusiasm: "Venya, this is a movie!" I have never shared his reverence. ”

Direct speech:

About the first marriage and about the second (“ 7 days ”, 2008): “My adult life is clearly divided into two halves. The first is the birth of two wonderful daughters, communication with friends and a crazy, agile work in the Taganka Theater. And the second, amazing part of my biography, I would designate in one word - Galya.

In my first family there was everything: happiness, and love, and holidays, and scandals, and quarrels. Although for our common friends we still seemed to be a very happy couple, we both felt that they had become strangers.

The only connecting link between me and Alla remained children. For the sake of them, I supported the appearance of the family, which is not original - many coexist. So I decided to live for the sake of children, and for myself I did not expect anything good. Life went on its own way - we both had fleeting novels, I had a lot of interesting work in the theater, on television ... "Well, good and enough," I thought and could not even imagine what a gift to me fate. <...>

Galino, the appearance in the theater did not go unnoticed by the male half of our team. Volodya Vysotsky, for example, invited Galya to his concert, where she, to his amazement, came with her younger brother Zhenya. As for me, I did not see myself in the role of a boyfriend of a young beauty: Gale was then 19 years old, I - twice as much. But this was the case when, according to Bulgakov, love struck us like a Finnish knife ... It was useless to resist. We began a dizzying novel. We used any opportunity to be together. Galina parents lived in Moscow, and she came from St. Petersburg constantly. In January 80s, they flew to Yalta. And when in the summer our theater toured in Minsk, Galya flew to me, having passed the session ahead of schedule. I had a separate large number, and it seemed to us that we follow all the rules of conspiracy, but, as it turned out, we have long known about our relations in the theater. Some of the "well-wishers" called my wife and reported everything ... <...>

I won my life. I met a woman who I loved and still love. ”

About children (ibid.): “The formation of the Taganka coincided with the birth of my daughters - Lena, and after four and a half years - Alika. I felt an absolutely happy person. For his daughters, he was a dad, a mother, and a nanny - fed, a swaddling, walking, bathing. When Lena was born, we lived in a house without an elevator and hot water, 12 more families lived in our communal apartment. And I ran into the fifth floor with a stroller, warming the water in pots, rushed to the dairy kitchen. The wife worked a lot at that time, and by mutual agreement, these domestic troubles fell on me. And although I was also wildly loaded in the theater, I helped me, I think, some kind of “vitamin enthusiasm”, or maybe there were more hours in days. (Laughs.) ".

About the “national question” (“ Independent Gazeta ”, 1991): “All my life I have confidently lied that I have been living without complexes. There are no complexes: I am strong, independent, high, healthy, I like people, and I have never heard calls to beat me to save Russia ... I remember my own scream-scandal on the same cute topic, which I raised my ex-wife 21 years ago ... [In 1970] they gathered my parents at school: my daughter went to first grade, and now the start teacher asks to fill the questionnaire ... It is even clear that the young woman is clear, that it is clear to the young woman. The Soviet people will refuse to build their favorite communism tomorrow if I refuse to name the nationality of my child today. I raised the scandal from behind my wife. She demanded to write "Russian", although our parents, except for her mother, were Jews. I am not ashamed that we wrote a lie. I am ashamed today that I did not insist on my 21 years ago, because I secretly rejoiced for my daughter. As true believers said: "Not us, so at least the children of our children."

About anniversaries and journalists (a monologue addressed to Venedikt Erofeev, entry on Facebook Smekhova, 2015): “Dear Venechka! Good people from newspapers and from TV editions call me: they cope how I cope with life before the "anniversary". Yesterday he calls from the youth super -woman lady. Three questions (I affected terribly busy). “ 1 Also or not?

5 facts about Benjamin Smekhov:

• In childhood, I wanted to become a driver.
• Having learned to write, he began to compose novels on the topic of Soviet ideology. In one of them, he described how black families sit in prisons.
• The eldest daughter of Smekhova, Elena is a writer, author of the novels “French Love” and “Flying over the Universe”. The younger Alika is an actress, a singer and a TV presenter.
• Since 2007, the wife of actor Galina Aksenova has been teaching the history of cinema at the Moscow Art Theater School-Studio. For 15 years, she taught the history of Russian cinema at a summer Russian school at Middlebury College (USA), from 2000 to 2009 she was the deputy director of this school.
• Benjamin Smekhov is a People's Artist of Russia.

Materials about Benjamin Smekhov:

Actor's biography on Wikipedia

Biographical certificate of the magazine "7 days"

Help on the site "Find out everything"

Biography on the site of artist fans