April 25: the birthday of Mikhail Kononov, an actor remembered for his kind roles.
Mikhail Kononov was born on April 25, 1940, in Moscow. He appeared in over 60 films, worked with Tarkovsky and Panfilov, and forever entered the history of Soviet cinema as Nestor Petrovich from "The Big Change."
Beginning: The Doorman, the War, and the Drama Club
Kononov's father worked as a hotel doorman and died young. At the outbreak of the Great Patriotic War, his mother, a cook, took her one-year-old son to a village near Tula to live with relatives. After the Germans were routed near Moscow, she took him back. At school, Kononov attended a drama club with his classmate Andrei Smirnov, the future director of the Belorussky Station.
Shchepka, the Maly Theatre, and a scandalous exit
After high school, he enrolled in the Shchepkin Theatre School. While still a student, he was spotted by director Ivan Pyryev and cast in the melodrama "Our Mutual Friend." Kononov played the minor role of schoolboy Vitka and was remembered as an awkward but charming simpleton. After graduating, he joined the Maly Theatre. However, the production of "Dancing on the Highway," directed by aspiring director Anatoly Efros and in which Kononov played one of the roles, was banned due to the play's perceived "parent-child problem."
The country was sterile: there was no prostitution, alcoholics, thieves, or bribe-takers. I was very sorry to lose my character, which I expressed harshly to the party organizer. He turned out to be very touchy, and it left its mark on me.
Had to leave with a scandal.
Tarkovsky, Panfilov and the Golden Leopard
Kononov threw himself headlong into film. At 26, he achieved fame with the lead role in the tragicomedy "Chief of Chukotka." At the same time, Andrei Tarkovsky cast him without an audition for the role of the monk Thomas in "Andrei Rublev"—the actor himself considered it the best role of his career. He then starred alongside Inna Churikova in Gleb Panfilov's "There's No Ford in Fire," which won the Golden Leopard at the Locarno International Film Festival. Another memorable role was as the commander of a self-propelled gun in "In War as in War."
"The Big Change": An Unloved Triumph
In 1973, with the release of Alexei Korenev's four-part series "Big Change," Kononov became a national favorite. The lead role, schoolteacher Nestor Petrovich, was unavailable until the very last minute. Kononov reluctantly accepted, for financial reasons. He didn't like the script.
The director's daughter, actress Elena Koreneva, recalled:
He behaved on set like an actor who categorically mistrusts the director. He ostentatiously read a magazine off to the side and emphasized with his whole demeanor that he'd been cast in the film by accident.
By that time, Kononov had survived his mother's suicide and was deeply depressed. But even after its resounding success, he remained skeptical about "Big Change":
I had to justify phantasmagorical situations and absurd text. I simply fulfilled my professional duty.
The village, the garden and the return
In the 1990s, he rarely acted—he'd read scripts and "recoil." He sold his Moscow apartment and moved to the countryside with his wife, selling vegetables from his garden. A few years later, due to health problems—he was severely beaten while selling his apartment, and became disabled—he had to return to Moscow. He struggled financially: he didn't have enough money for medical treatment. His last screen appearance was in 2006, in Gleb Panfilov's series "The First Circle," based on the book by Alexander Solzhenitsyn.
Last months
In the summer of 2007, he fell ill with pneumonia. Doctors recalled how he continued to tell funny stories and jokes to his fellow patients until the very end. He died of heart complications and a thromboembolism. He was 67. Shortly before his death, he wrote a memoir, "Forgive, Life, and Farewell," which he was never able to publish.
Both in art and in real life, I lived a cool, independent, albeit modest life. I sent horrendous boors and amateurs packing, and people remember me only for good roles in good films. It turns out I lived like Stanislavsky: honestly, truthfully, and in accordance with the circumstances.
