30 years of loneliness of Valentina Karavaeva: What ruined the career of a talented actress

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

She was preparing to play Nina Zarechnaya in Chekhov's "The Seagull" all her life, and in this role she appeared on the stage of the Mossovet Theater. And after 30 years she filmed herself in this image on an amateur video camera in a tiny apartment in the VDNKh area. Valentina Karavaeva became famous after filming in the film "Mashenka" and could play many more bright roles. She was happily married and loved by the nation. The talented actress ended her life in poverty and complete loneliness.

A dream come true

She was born in 1921 in Vyshny Volochyok, and at the age of 10 she almost said goodbye to life. The girl developed a severe form of tuberculosis from lack of nutrition and constant cold. No one knew then whether it would be possible for Valya to get out. A compassionate roommate gave the schoolgirl a volume of Chekhov, and Valentina read it as soon as she felt better. Most of all, the girl admired the "Seagull".

She began to dream about how to grow up and become an actress. Not like Nina Zarechnaya, she will definitely be successful! Valentina Karavaeva learned this role by heart. As soon as her parents left for work, she played. And then she repeated the words by heart on the way to school, and in class. She even wrote letters to Joseph Stalin, in which she spoke about her dream of becoming an actress. And she received an invitation to the Mosfilm school.

At the age of 14, she went to the capital, leaving a note to her family: "I am going to Moscow to become an actress." At the audition, she read her beloved Chekhov, and after a high commission, by a general decision, she enrolled the girl in an acting school under the collective tutelage. She studied with enthusiasm, even selflessly, preparing homework seriously, sharpening her sketches to exhaustion and dreamed of getting a real big role in a movie.

During her studies, she first starred in Boris Barnet's film "Night in September", but real fame came to her during the Great Patriotic War, when the film "Mashenka" by Yuri Raizman was released. She did not get this role right away, initially Valentina Karavaeva's tests were rejected, but she was able to convince the director, in whose workshop she studied at the acting school, to give her a second chance. On the second attempt, the actress was approved for the main role.

She played brilliantly, and the film made a splash. With a photograph of the telegraph operator Mashenka from the film of the same name, the soldiers went into battle. The actress instantly became famous and received the Stalin Prize, becoming the youngest laureate at 22.

Fatal accident

Soon she starred in the role of telegraph operator Tony in the film collection "Our Girls", but the film was banned from the Gosfilmofond with the wording "the presence of a touch of femininity, which was given to the heroine." But Valentina Karavaeva was not upset, on the contrary, she believed that all her best roles were ahead. Soon Yuri Raizman invited her to his new film "The Sky of Moscow", and it was a great success, because the director usually did not film anyone twice.

In 1945, she still had a chance to play Nina Zarechnaya at the Mossovet Theater with Yuri Zavadsky. It was a real success! Critics and spectators agreed: the best Zarechnaya on stage has not yet been. But she had a chance to play in only a few performances, after which Yuri Zavadsky appointed another actress for the role. This Valentina Karavaeva could not stand, and therefore quit the theater.

Already during the filming in the "Sky of Moscow" Valentina Karavaeva got into a car accident. When Valentina regained consciousness, the doctors informed her about the impossibility of having children in the future. But she wondered if she could act in films. No one could guarantee this to her: there was a terrible scar on her face. Soviet doctors could not remove it.

Broken hope

She could not come to terms with the fact that there would be no more main roles in her life, and only episodes and concerts as part of a concert brigade would become her lot. Even before the accident at a reception at the English embassy, she met the attaché George Chapman. The diplomat, heir to a huge fortune, fell in love with the actress almost at first sight. Valentina did not hide her feelings, she was truly happy. George Chapman, seeing his beloved Valechka all in bandages after the accident, suddenly realized that he could not live without this girl and made her a marriage proposal.

The lovers got married, and Valentina Karavaeva was able to obtain permission to travel abroad with her husband, hoping that foreign celebrities would be able to remove the ugly scar, and after that she would return to the big screen. But neither English nor Swiss doctors could help the actress. Disappointed Valentina Karavaeva immediately filed for divorce and began to seek permission to return to the Soviet Union. George Chapman continued to love the actress and was even ready to support her after the divorce. But the actress, as soon as she was allowed, returned to her homeland.

Actor's theater without spectators

At first, Valentina Karavaeva had the right to live and work only in Vyshny Volochyok, because her reputation was hopelessly ruined by her marriage to a foreigner and living abroad for five years. Without waiting for "high permission" to return to the capital, she arrived in Moscow illegally, filming corners in communal apartments. Tired of endless wanderings, the actress wrote a letter to Ekaterina Furtseva, after which she was given a small one-room apartment in the VDNKh area.

The job was very bad. She worked on dubbing, but money was desperately short. She sold out all her expensive outfits, once donated by her husband. I only kept a few dresses for myself so that I could have something to wear. The directors in the cinema did not call her, everyone had forgotten about the actress for a long time, and she filmed herself.

She put on a beautiful dress, put on makeup and played in front of an amateur movie camera mounted on a tripod in the room. She stepped onto the impromptu home stage over and over again, imagining herself on the stage. Anna Karenina, Ranevskaya from The Cherry Orchard and, of course, Nina Zarechnaya. She has lived like this for the past 30 years. Without communicating with anyone and selflessly reincarnating in front of the camera.

None of the neighbors even noticed that the lonely old woman had stopped leaving her apartment. After unsuccessful attempts to reach out to the hostess, when a pipe burst in the house, the door was opened and a truly terrible picture was found. A woman was lying on the floor, and a white bird made of paper and wire, attached to a string hanging from the ceiling, was flying over her. Gull…

The exact date of death of actress Valentina Karavaeva is unknown - presumably from 25 to 30 December 1998.

The fate of another Soviet actress turned out to be difficult. In the 1970s. Natalya Bogunova became famous all-Union for the role of the Snow Maiden in "Spring Tale" and the teacher of the Russian language and literature Svetlana Afanasyevna, the wife of Grigory Ganzha from "Big Change". But soon after her triumph, she disappeared from the screens. In the last 20 years of her life, the actress did not appear in public, almost nothing was known about her fate.