Yura Borisov to play a Russian poet (again!)

And it was recently announced that Yura Borisov will also portrey another one. But, this time, in a Hollywood production. He was asked to play the role of Russian poet Denis Novikov in actress Emily Mortimer’s directorial debut. The movie, titled ‘Dennis’, will tell the love story of a British student and the Russian poet at the very end of the USSR.

It is curious that this is an autobiographical story from the life of the director. In 1990, she arrived in the Russian capital on an internship from Oxford. This is where she met Novikov. According to another version, they met in London, where Denis was on tour as part of the ‘Almanac’ poets' theater, which also included Sergei Gandlevsky, Timur Kibirov, Dmitry Prigov and Lev Rubinstein.

In London, Novikov also met Joseph Brodsky, who was greatly impressed by the young poet's poetry. He even wrote a preface to Novikov's collection, ‘A Window in January’. In it, Brodsky called Novikov's poetry "a conversation with himself". "When talking to oneself, a person hears oneself quite clearly and is therefore forced to tell the truth. Therefore, if there is a reproach in Novikov's poems, then it is a reproach to oneself and not to the world order and, in any case, not to society."

Mortimer and Novikov never married, however. Instead, the couple broke up. And, in 2004, Novikov emigrated to Israel, where he died of a heart attack. He was only 37 years old.