Actress Elena Valyushkina at the premiere of the film “The Challenge”
Photo: Ivan MAKEEV
“I WILL NOT FLY INTO SPACE”
– How did you get into the “Challenge”?
– First, Klim Shipenko filmed scenes at Baikonur and in space. Yulia Peresild sat in the rocket for four hours on takeoff, she had a tablet with her, and I wrote to her: “Julia, I’m with you, hold on!” We previously starred in the amazing film “Milk”, where she played my daughter-in-law, so we know each other very well. And then the whole earthly history began to be filmed, the casting began, to which I was also invited. When I went to meet Klim, I wrote to Yulia – “Yulya, I’m going to your mother!” She replies: “Then I will come!” And came to test. And we were so cool with her there that Shipenko said: “You really are like mother and daughter!” Somehow I won hearts.
– Would you fly into space yourself?
– Certainly. Just for this, you still need to be healthy.
– Well, Dennis Tito, the first space tourist, was by no means a young man when he went into orbit. And he flew with a not very healthy heart, he grabbed something there at the start …
– That’s just what I needed for complete happiness! Still skiing to break arms and legs … No. Probably, if I were 30 years younger, I would buzz, but now I don’t.
“KHARITA IGNATIEVNA – A TRAGIC FIGURE”
– And where is it easier to work – in the cinema or in the theater? After all, the theater is considered by many to be a “terrarium of like-minded people.”
– It’s the same in the movies. And you have the same thing in the newspaper and on the radio. Any organization that employs more than five people is already a difficult story. It is always a battle of vanities, talents, mind. All the same. Do you think there is less of this at the factory? Yes, the same!
– Recently, the play “Dowry” was released, where you play Harita Ignatievna.
– This performance is not a classic Ostrovsky. This is not the Maly Theatre, my favorite. This is a completely new story created by our artistic director and stage director Evgeny Marchelli. And he called the performance “Dowry”. According to his idea, demons sit in the characters, which interfere with purity, interfere with the girl who enters life. She is constantly provoked by the male environment, which does not appreciate her, lives only for herself …
– And what kind of demon is sitting in Kharita Ignatievna?
“But there’s just no demon in her.” But this is my cunning idea, the director does not know about it. No matter how much I watched “Dowryless”, I understood that Harita Ignatievna was a completely tragic figure. She had three daughters, and two of them died. One was slaughtered, the other disappeared, and only Larisa remained … Everyone writes and says – oh, she wants to marry her off in any way, get away with it. And she wants to save her by all means, to save her life. But she can’t do it either. For me, this is a tragic role, and I play it that way.
“IN THE LAST BOGATYR I PLAYED IN MY OWN WIG”
– Until the beginning of the 21st century, you had few film roles. And since 2006 – several films and serials a year, a giant filmography. Why did this happen at this particular moment?
“Then it must have happened. They sat upstairs and thought: We stole something from her at first, let’s return it. And they returned. For which we thank them very much. They saw me from above and decided to restore justice.
– In the trilogy “The Last Hero” you play the main villain. You didn’t get to play characters like that often before…
– I easily agreed. True, when she agreed, she did not know that she would grow into the main villain. In the first “Bogatyr” it was generally about one shooting day. I wanted to play Baba Yaga there, but this role had already been given to Lena Yakovleva … They told me “Wait, there will be a continuation”, but this is always the case: first they lure you into some little figurine, they promise: “Then we only write about you!” and that’s it. But here is my heroine, who at first only waves a broom, and the truth turned out to be at the very center of the story. At first, no one knew what she would look like as a villain: even the girls who sewed the costumes could not find her head for a very long time. They sewed a lot of wigs, they understood something, but the director Dima Dyachenko categorically said: “Not that!” As a result, I brought my short wig, which I once bought in America, in a Chinese wig store for a penny. And Dima said: “Gorgeous, this is our Galya!”
– Another film that is probably just as popular now as the “Formula of Love” – ”Bitter!”
– It’s a brilliant picture! I’m not afraid of this word. Somewhere in the middle of filming, I thought: director Zhora Kryzhovnikov reminds me of someone in the manner of work. And they say to me – hello, we have arrived, he reminds me of Mark Zakharov, this is his student! He created an incredible atmosphere on the site, on the one hand, free, on the other – under the direction of the director. Kryzhovnikov is an absolute leader, as was Mark Anatolyevich. Because there should be one leader on the set – the director, this is his movie, and we are his colors.
“YOU PLAY RAIS MAKSIMOVNA, AND YOU NEED TO PLAY NAINA IOSIFOVNA!”
– What is the most unexpected role you had to play in your life? For some reason it seems to me that this is Naina Yeltsina in the 2011 film Yeltsin. Three days in August”, which few people saw.
– Yes, perhaps this one is one of the most unexpected. When I was offered to try, I replied: “Comrades, have you seen me in person at all?” Dima Nazarov, who played Yeltsin, resembles him at least remotely, but I … When I arrived, they began to sculpt plastic makeup for me. I say: “Isn’t it easier for you to find an actress who looks a little like her?” – “No, Lena, we want it to be you.” Then they themselves looked at what happened, and removed all the plastic makeup from me. True, they made a very good wig – one to one, which gave at least some similarity. Then, when I finally began to audition, they laughed a lot and said: “Listen, wait, you are now playing Raisa Maksimovna. And we invited you to Naina Iosifovna! In general, they decided that I would just play a woman, the president’s wife. And I did not communicate with Naina Iosifovna herself. Then they told me that she seemed to have watched the film and said: “Well, it’s not me at all, and in general it has nothing to do with me …”
PRIVATE BUSSINESS
Elena Valyushkina was born in 1962 in the German city of Potsdam, where her father served. She returned from the GDR as a child. In 1984 she graduated from the Shchepkin Higher Theater School, and since then has been working at the Theater. Moscow City Council.
She starred in the films “Formula of Love”, “How to Be Happy”, “Black Lightning”, “Bitter!” and “Bitter! 2″, “Grandmother of easy virtue”, “I’m losing weight”, “Super Beavers. People’s Avengers”, “Milk”, “Christmas Trees 8”, the trilogy “The Last Hero”, “Challenge”, as well as in the TV series “Univer. New hostel”, “Lavrova Method”, “Londongrad”, “Concerned, or Love of Evil”, “Investigator Tikhonov”, “Olga”.
The first husband – Leonid Fomin – was her teacher. The second, Alexander Yatsko, is an actor. In a marriage with him, a daughter, Maria (in 1997) and a son, Vasily (in 2002), were born.
