Crazy star Gennady Shpalikov: What made the "singer of the 1960s" lay hands on himself

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

November 1 is the day of remembrance of the remarkable Soviet poet, "singer of the 1960s", author of the poem "And I walk, walk across Moscow", screenwriter and film director Gennady Shpalikov. 45 years ago, in 1974, he committed suicide. He was only 37 years old - an age fatal for many famous poets. Later Shpalikov was called "the brightest legend of the 1960s", a symbol of the generation of the thaw era, and during his lifetime he could not find his place among people, as if he was a hero of another century …

They wrote about him that from childhood he was not left with a feeling of orphanhood - however, like many "children of the war." Gennady Shpalikov was born in 1937, and in 1944 he lost his father, a military engineer. After 3 years, the young man entered the Kiev Suvorov military school, and among his fellow students there were many children of the dead front-line soldiers. The stories of his friends and their families were superimposed on Shpalikov's personal memories and experiences, and the theme of wartime childhood later became one of the main ones in his work. And he himself did not become a military man - after he received a knee injury, the commission found him unfit for further service.

He was born in the Stalinist era, and his youth fell on the thaw. Shpalikov became a real "singer of the 1960s", because it was according to his scripts that the legendary films that became the symbol of that generation were shot - "I am twenty years old" ("Ilyich's Outpost") and "I walk around Moscow." Shpalikov was not only the author of the script for the films, but also wrote the song "And I walk, I walk around Moscow", which was later called the anthem of the sixties.

Unfortunately, it often happens that the most talented poets receive recognition only after their death. To some extent, this also applies to Shpalikov, who was in many ways ahead of his time. Songs based on his poems were incredibly popular among the people, but not all of his creative ideas met with understanding and approval. This happened with the first film, on the script of which Shpalikov worked. Director Marlen Khutsiev suggested that the poet become a co-author of the script when he was still a student at the screenwriting department of VGIK.

Thanks to Shpalikov, live dialogues appeared in the film, conveying the genuine feelings of the youth of the 1960s - the main characters of Ilyich's Outpost and the poet's peers. The film turned out to be lyrical and light, but Khrushchev found it ideologically harmful: "".

And Shpalikov himself was the same - a seeker, doubting, not knowing "how to live and what to strive for." He himself often "wandered around the city" without a goal, with a cat in his bosom. The heroes of the next film, shot according to his script, “I walk around Moscow” behaved in the same way. When Shpalikov brought his new script to director Georgy Danelia, with a cat in his bosom and a bottle of champagne in a string bag, there was only one scene that later became the most recognizable in this film: "". This is how the legendary film was born later - simply from a carefree mood, from one poetic scene. Probably, Shpalikov has always remained primarily a poet, and his scripts, like the films based on them, have always been very lyrical. Danelia said: "".

Of course, it seemed to the censors to be an absolute nonsense and trinket. The first question to the filmmakers at the artistic council was: "" The genre also raised questions - the director announced that it was a comedy. "" Danelia was not taken aback: "". Thus, a new genre of Soviet cinema was born.

I saw neither aesthetic value nor social benefit in the work of Shpalikov and Nikita Khrushchev. In 1963, he ripped apart the creative intelligentsia in the Kremlin, and Ilyich's Outpost came under the harshest criticism. But instead of repenting in response to critical attacks, Marlen Khutsiev began to defend his picture, and Shpalikov even stated that soon the time would come in the country when filmmakers would enjoy the same fame as astronauts, and that he was convinced of his right to make a mistake. His words were drowned in a hum of disapproval.

There is another version of these events. Allegedly, the following dialogue took place between Khrushchev and Shpalikov:

And the most incredible was the ending of this dialogue: after the unexpected insolence of Shpalikov, the whole hall became silent, and then Khrushchev suddenly began to applaud - and after him all those present. Probably, such a legend could have been born only in the era of the thaw … A friend of the poet, film director Julius Fait, said about him: "".

Many of Shpalikov's scripts never found their embodiment in the cinema. Much of what he had planned was rejected. Many hopes did not come true. The only film in which he acted not only as a screenwriter, but also as a director, was the picture "Long Happy Life". And the life of Shpalikov himself was neither long nor happy. Second half of the 1960s became for Shpalikov a period of creative lack of demand. His plans do not find implementation, internal contradictions lead to depression, the salvation from which the poet tried to find in alcohol. His wife, actress Inna Gulaya, was tired of fighting her husband's drunkenness, fearing for the fate of their daughter. Family discord led him to leave home. I had to spend the night with friends or at the station.

On November 1, 1974, Gennady Shpalikov was found hanged. Someone believed that the poet was ruined by the dictatorship of officials and the struggle against free-thinking that unfolded in the 1970s, someone was sure that he ruined himself by not coping with alcohol addiction. P. Leonidov argued that at the end of the 1960s. I heard from Shpalikov such a monologue: "".

Shortly before his death, Shpalikov admitted: "". Although the whole country sang songs based on Shpalikov's verses, the first collection of his poems and scripts was released only 5 years after the author's death.

Films based on his scripts have long become classics of Soviet cinema: Behind the scenes "I walk around Moscow".