How was the real life of Stirlitz's wife from the film "Seventeen Moments of Spring": The joys and sorrows of Eleanor Shashkova

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

The filmography of the actress has about forty works. But the most significant, vivid and memorable role was the role without a single word. She was on the screen for only seven and a half minutes and forever remained in the memory of the audience as the wife of Stirlitz in the film "Seventeen Moments of Spring". Eleanor Shashkova with just one glance was able to convey the whole gamut of feelings of a woman who has been separated from her dear person for many years. However, in life she also had to lose and part.

Fidelity to the dream

Eleanor Shashkova's father was a border guard, and the family traveled with him to military garrisons. Eleanor was born in Batumi, grew up in Simferopol, and came to the theater in Moscow from the Kuril Islands.

As a child, Eleanor was carried away by the theater, which was helped a lot by the girl's mother, a kind and gentle woman, unlike her stern father. Mom often took Elya and Marina, the youngest daughter, to the musical theater. Elya began to dream of a stage, but her father even forbade her daughter to think about a career as an actress. The girl could not disobey her parent, after graduation she entered the agricultural institute, continuing to engage in amateur performances in the garrison club.

When a piece of plaster fell on her head at the club, Eleanor took a sabbatical, hoping to spend time devoting herself to rehearsals in the drama club, but again her father decided everything for her. By that time, Elya was alone in Simferopol, the family left for the Kuril Islands, where her father received another appointment. In a telegram, dad categorically demanded her reunification with her family. Eleanor again obeyed, arrived at the garrison, where they found a place for her in the headquarters intelligence department.

Eleanor liked the work, but the thought of the theater did not leave her. After watching the film "The Thief Magpie", the girl felt like the very serf actress played by Zinaida Kiriyenko. For a long time Elya could not stop her sobs, frightening all the household with hysteria. After a while, she enlisted the support of her mother and sister and went to conquer Moscow. The father was angry, but he could not do anything with the obstinate daughter. She firmly decided not to change her dream.

The promise to stay always young

In the capital, the girl was completely confused. After all, she even had no idea how many universities train actors. And she decided to simply submit the documents to the Shchukin School, which was located not far from her temporary home, and even to the opera studio. The opera studio noted the girl's dramatic talent and advised her to go to the theater. But she entered Shchukinskoye, having amazed the admissions committee with the extraordinary passion with which she read a monologue.

Only the leader, Boris Zakhava, doubted the advisability of admitting a girl to the school. The applicant did not come to enroll immediately after leaving school, but Eleanor promised Boris Evgenievich to always remain young.

She began to appear on the stage of the Vakhtangov Theater in her student years, and then she was enrolled in the troupe. Within the walls of the theater, she had a chance to survive the envy of colleagues, and the absence of roles, and outright dislike. But Eleanor Shashkova gave him more than half a century of her life, always considering the theater as her second home.

Two marriages and the main role

The actress met her first husband Ernst Zorin in the theater, and the relationship between them arose during a tour in Tselinograd. There were beautiful courtship, romantic dates, and promises of eternal happiness. Soon after the wedding, daughter Antonina was born. But the feelings were getting colder.

After that, there was an invitation to play Stirlitz's wife in the film by Tatyana Lioznova, when the actress in the frame in seven minutes was able to live her whole life. Later, she was repeatedly invited to the filming of films, which required the same dramatic silence. But the actress categorically refused them, realizing: she did her best in "Seventeen Moments of Spring", it is impossible to play better.

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Later, the role, which became the hallmark of Eleanor Shashkova, will serve as a reason for refusing to accept her into the Union of Cinematographers. The reason was named precisely her meaningful silence in the frame. Then her second husband Valentin Selivanov, comforting his wife, will ask her not to get hung up and not pay attention to the manifestations of human envy.

Eleonora Shashkova tried to get acquainted with the director Valentin Selivanov several times, hoping to take part in auditions for his films. However, every time they met, something interfered. When they finally managed to talk and shake hands, a spark immediately ran between them. Soon, the actress finally broke up with her husband, Valentin Selivanov also filed for a divorce.

Eleanor Shashkova and Valentin Selivanov lived together for 22 years, trying to always and in everything to support each other. At first, the actress was accused of commercialism, they say, she married a director so that he would shoot her in a movie. However, she starred with Selivanov only once. Later, my husband started having problems, and he stopped making films. Eleonora Petrovna was the main earner in the family for 20 years. She received the title of Honored Artist of the RSFSR and Honored Artist of Poland, where she led several significant concerts.

When Valentin Ivanovich died in 1998, it was very difficult for her to come to terms with bereavement. The lack of roles in his native theater did not add optimism.

In 1987, Mikhail Ulyanov became the head of the theater. He promised not to fire anyone, but this did not solve the problem: the actor cannot help acting. While her husband was alive, Eleonora Petrovna found solace in household chores, after he left she tried to come up with various activities for herself. She did not refuse filming in films and TV shows, even the smallest roles. And today the main joy for the actress is her family: her daughter and grandchildren.

Eleanor Shashkova still does not lose her optimism and faith in a bright future. Today she rarely appears on the stage of the Vakhtangov Theater, being engaged in only two productions. Eleonora Shashkova is slightly over 80, but she still tries to stay young, as she once promised Boris Zakhava.

Eleanor Shashkova played her role in "Seventeen Moments of Spring" so reliably that she was even awarded an award from the Foreign Intelligence Service and called her "a model of the spy's wife. And Vyacheslav Tikhonov, after the film was released on the screen, remained Stirlitz forever in the minds of millions of Soviet TV viewers. Despite this, the actor himself constantly denied the resemblance to the Russian spy, whom he played brilliantly. The role of Andrei Bolkonsky was much closer to him. The intellectual, yearning for the wonderful ideals of a bygone era, has become one of the brightest actors in Soviet cinema.