5 facts about the ‘Russian Greta Garbo’ (PHOTOS)

1 She wanted to be “agreatactress” from childhood

The future star was born in Moscow in 1936. She rarely spoke about her childhood, recalling only isolated scenes: How, in Fall 1941, her mother walked from Moscow to Vladimir, where Alla was staying with her grandmother. When they finally met, her mother picked her up and asked, “Little girl, where is your mother?” And she replied, “Far away!”

At the age of five, when asked what she wanted to be, the girl would immediately blurt out in a rapid-fire tongue twister: “Agreatactress!” She attended a theater club, where, due to a shortage of boys, she played male roles, and studied at the ballet school attached to the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Musical Theater. But, Demidova was not accepted into a theater school, because of her poor diction. So, she enrolled in the faculty of economics at Moscow State University. But, even there, her dream caught up with her: the entire city of Moscow would come to see performances by the university’s student theater.

2 She spent 30 years at the Taganka Theatre

In 1959, Demidova entered the Shchukin Theatre School. Her graduation performance was ‘The Good Person of Szechwan’, directed by Yuri Lyubimov. It was with this production that the Taganka Theatre began.

She dazzled audiences in ‘The Cherry Orchard’, directed by Anatoly Efros, and often performed alongside the legendary actor and bard Vladimir Vysotsky. The two were particularly brilliant in the leading roles of ‘Hamlet’. Critics enthusiastically wrote that Demidova had created a new interpretation of the character, showing how “a clear mind ceases to serve truth and begins to serve chimeras.”

3 She turned down a role in a Tarkovsky movie

The actress was extremely selective about the roles she chose. “It’s commonly said that actors are ignorant, but a hyperactive imagination has to feed on something. This is the only profession in which the result is inseparable from the material. We create out of ourselves, out of our own flesh… In general, it is a mystery what a role is made of… One gesture is enough to understand a person,” she once said.

Director Andrei Tarkovsky offered Demidova the role of a simple-minded girl in ‘Andrei Rublev’ (1966). But, she turned it down: “Today, I would get up and run there without even thinking,” she later admitted.

She eventually appeared in the cult director’s 1975 movie ‘The Mirror’, playing the role of Lizaveta Pavlovna, an employee at a printing house.

That said, she had no shortage of movie offers. A master of subtle psychological nuances, a queen of gesture, an actress capable of finding new depth in a character – all of this describes Demidova. In her performance, even minor roles acquire depth and dimension, whether it’s Mrs. Laura Lyons in ‘The hound of the Baskervilles’ (1981) or the political heavyweight Lady Marlborough in ‘A glass of water’ (1971).

4 She founded her own theater

Demidova remained with the Taganka Theater until 1992, after which she devoted herself to her own projects, including her own Theater A.

She created programs combining poetry and music; from the stage, for example, audiences could hear Anna Akhmatova’s ‘Requiem’ set to Vivaldi’s music.

She also bought out one of Taganka’s productions – Marina Tsvetaeva’s ‘Phaedra’, which Roman Viktyuk had directed specifically for her – so she could have full control over the production herself.

In the 1990s, Demidova began working with Greek director Theodoros Terzopoulos. In 2014, she played the role of Coryphaeus in his production of ‘Nosferatu’ at the Perm Opera and Ballet Theater.

5 She is an author of books

Her debut book, ‘The second reality’, in which she reflected on the craft of acting, was published in 1980.

The actress’s bibliography includes autobiographical prose, as well as memoirs about fellow actors Innokenty Smoktunovsky and Vladimir Vysotsky.

In her book ‘Akhmatova’s mirrors’, she reflects on the poet’s work and on her own interpretation of Akhmatova’s ‘Poem without a hero’.

“I analyze the ‘Poem’ the way I would analyze a role – a role invented and embodied on paper, though not by me,” she wrote. “But, in order to play that role, I have to ‘make it my own,’ reinvent it for myself, break it down into separate fragments and images, into sharp clashes of contradictory emotions and so on – in other words, I have to do everything that is part of my profession as an actress.”