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Video: Farewell to Abdullah from "White Sun of the Desert": How the audience remembered the actor Kakha Kavsadze
2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55
On April 27, the heart of 85-year-old Georgian actor, People's Artist of the Georgian SSR Kakha Kavsadze stopped. He played more than 90 roles in films, but most of them were not known to the general public, because he starred mainly in his homeland. Most of the viewers remembered him in the image of Abdullah from "The White Sun of the Desert" - it was this role that became his hallmark, and once even saved his life …
Artist by chance
Kakhi inherited artistry and musicality from his father - David Kavsadze was the leader of the folk song and dance ensemble of Georgia, and from his grandfather - Sandro Kavsadze he founded this group. Both close and distant relatives of Kakha were musicians. Both of David's sons studied at a music school, but could not finish it - by that time, their father was declared an enemy of the people. With the beginning of the war, he went to the front, and a year later he was captured and ended up in a concentration camp. Thanks to the efforts of the Georgian emigrants living in France, he was rescued from there. He was persuaded to stay in Paris, but David decided to return to the USSR. And at home he was repressed and sent to Siberia, where he died in 1952. Members of the Kavsadze family were declared relatives of an enemy of the people.
After Stalin passed away, the Kavsadze brothers were able to continue their studies at a music school. Both of them tied their destinies with creativity: Imeri later became an opera singer, his brother - an actor. But at first, Kakhi was going to enter the Polytechnic Institute and did not plan to become an artist. Everything was decided by chance: one day, just before leaving school, he was invited to audition - and unexpectedly approved! In one of the scenes, according to the script, he was supposed to jump into the river. During the first take, Kavsadze broke 6 ribs and ended up not on the set, but in the hospital. The role went to another young man.
Later, Kakhi said that this accident became happy for him: "".
Failed doctor
Although Kakhi made his film debut as a student, his film career could not be called successful: for about 10 years he starred in episodic roles in Georgian films, most of which were not known to the general public in the USSR. Once he even seriously thought about changing his profession. His uncle was hospitalized for a long time, and Kakhi decided to get a job there as an orderly. He carried patients, was present at operations, observed the actions of doctors, read medical literature.
He was already going to get a specialized education in order to become a doctor, when one day the surgeon of their hospital, professor and academician, saw Kakhi on the stage of the Tbilisi Academic Theater. Sh. Rustaveli, where he continued to perform. After the performance, he left a note to the actor: "". This was the end of Kavsadze's hobby for medicine. Whether the patients suffered from this or not is a moot point, but the audience definitely won.
Finest hour
10 years after graduating from the Tbilisi Theater Institute. Sh. Rustaveli Kakhi Kavsadze got the role that made him famous throughout the Union - the leader of the Basmachi gang Abdulla in Vladimir Motyl's film "The White Sun of the Desert". Other artists also applied for this role - for example, the more experienced Otar Koberidze, but the director decided to take a chance and approve an unknown 34-year-old actor.
In the performance of Kavsadze, Abdulla turned out to be too colorful, courageous and attractive. When the commission reviewed the footage, the verdict was issued: "". As a result, several episodes with the participation of Kavsadze were simply cut out during the final editing.
However, the remaining scenes were enough to make a strong impression on millions of Soviet viewers and become the idol of the public. The actor himself explained this success as follows: "". After the collapse of the Union, Abdullah saved the actor's life: once he needed a complex operation, and in Russia he was already a “foreigner” and had to pay a large sum for it. But the Moscow doctors recognized the artist and did not take a penny from him.
In the memory of the heart
After his triumph, the actor continued to act in his homeland, and only from time to time he was invited to Mosfilm, so his work was little known to the general public. However, Kavsadze himself was absolutely satisfied with the way his creative destiny developed. Kakha considered his most favorite roles to be the role of Simon in the play based on Brecht's play "The Caucasian Chalk Circle", Don Quixote from Rezo Chkheidze's serial film "The Life of Don Quixote and Sancho" and, of course, the role of Abdulla from "White Sun of the Desert", which the actor considered milestone work in his film career.
He was called one of the most popular Georgian actors, he played more than 90 roles in films, but he never considered them himself. On this occasion, Kakhi Kavsadze said: "". And it is safe to say that the actor succeeded - he remained "in the memory of the heart" of millions of viewers.
All his life he was faithful to one theater and one love: Swan loyalty to Kakha Kavsadze.
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