Chistyakov, Victor Ivanovich

Early Years, Studying at a Theater Institute

Viktor Chistyakov was born on June 30, 1943 in Leningrad in a family that had no relation to art. In addition to him, the family had two sisters. Parents drew attention to the artistic talent of their son (three years after watching the ballet Swan Lake , he skillfully imitated all the artists) and from the 2nd grade of the school they sent him to the choreographic school named after A. Ya. Vaganova . However, in the 7th grade, due to overloads affecting his health, he left the school at the insistence of his father. But soon Chistyakov entered a music school and graduated from it in the clarinet class. In 1962, Victor entered the acting department of the Leningrad State Institute of Theater, Music and Cinema (LGITMiK) .

The course was experimental; teachers included etudes for imitation of animals and birds in the education system of future actors. It was here, at the institute, that Chistyakov gained the ability to master intonation, voice, facial expressions and gesture. He studied at a drama course, and not at a variety course, but even then he parodyed everyone - teachers, students, friends. At the training sessions at the institute, his parody talent did not develop in any way, but in life he did it continuously. Victor constantly participated in student concerts, not a single skit was played without his participation, and it was here that vocal parodies for Ivan Kozlovsky and Sergey Lemeshev were first heard. Chistyakov's thesis was the King in the “Ordinary Miracle” by Eugene Schwartz .

In May 1966, shortly before graduating from the institute, Victor married a student friend Natalya Rybakova, a classmate, a graceful slender blonde who did not have an acting career in the future, either in Leningrad or Moscow theaters: she never managed to get out from the crowd. With Natalia Chistyakov lived for six years, until his death. Spouses did not have children ^[1] .

The beginning of a theatrical career

At the end of the institute in 1966, Chistyakov was immediately invited to the Leningrad Drama Theater. V.F. Komissarzhevskaya , where he made his debut in the play "The Prince and the Pauper" according to Mark Twain as a pauper. At the theater, Chistyakov met with young actors Stanislav Landgraf and Ilya Reznik . All three with roles were not dense, unspent energy was splashed out on the acting “skits”. When Landgraf and Reznik discovered that Chistyakov possessed the gift of imitation, they began to compose parody texts for him. With this literary material Chistyakov soon began to work on the stage. Victor came to the stage from the inability to fully realize his talent in the theater. He was a very gifted man, but his fragile and infantile personality conflicted with the image of the Soviet hero. And Role, and mental warehouse Chistyakova clearly did not meet the needs of the builder of the communist future. Victor suffered greatly from his situation at the Leningrad Drama Theater ^[1] .

Chistyakov dreamed of trying himself on another scene. He was insistently advised to leave for Moscow, and Chistyakov was already ready for this. He turned to Yuri Lyubimov at the Taganka Theater , but set the condition that he would go there only with his wife, to which the master refused. Victor refused to even meet with Lyubimov to look for a compromise. At the same time, Chistyakov did not want to leave the theater, clung to him. Victor, according to the memoirs of his contemporaries, was a very theatrical and very vulnerable person, he lived in the world of art, quite closed and fragile ^[1] .

In the theater, Chistyakov did not work out, but, having opened the genre of musical parody on the stage, and, most importantly, on television, the artist became very popular. Chistyakov appeared on the All-Union stage in 1968, shortly after the Czech events . His career as a television person quickly peaked and lasted 4 years ^[1] .

When Chistyakov gained all-Union popularity, the authorities of Leningrad allocated to him and his wife a small 2-room apartment in a prestigious house on Vasilievsky Island ^[1] .

In 1971, Chistyakova and his wife took director Boris Golubovsky to their place in the Moscow Drama Theater named after N.V. Gogol . Then Victor and his wife moved to Moscow, having received an exchange apartment in the area of ​​the Belorussky railway station . The couple did not have time to move in, they lived in the hostel of the actors of the Gogol Theater. By that time, Chistyakov had already become a sought-after entertainer, the New Year's “ Blue Light ” could not do without him, he toured the USSR a lot ^[1] .

Parodies

In 1968, Chistyakov made the number "Radio Concert at the request of those who sleep." The artist’s absolute hearing and richness of the vocal apparatus were combined with the rare gift of an imitator, a parodist. He began with a parody of Leonid Utesov , Sergey Lemeshev and Klavdiya Shulzhenko , and then changed and added numbers. Chistyakov's phenomenal voice range allowed imitating both the velvet voice of Leonid Utesov and the tenors Sergey Lemeshev and Ivan Kozlovsky, but the female images - Mireille Mathieu , Claudia Shulzhenko, Lyudmila Zykina , Edita Piekha and other celebrities of that time, were especially delighted with the audience. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Chistyakov was one of the most popular artists on the Soviet stage.

Chistyakov was given the nickname "genius of a parody." It happened that the performance by Chistyakov of the songs of those artists whom he parodyed from the stage was superior to the original, and the artists themselves sometimes could not distinguish their voice from the voice of Chistyakov. With his performances, he earned love among millions of viewers.

Chistyakov worked a lot on the stage, sparing no energy. He has performed in more than 1,000 concerts. Once in 10 days of the New Year holidays, he gave 60 concerts. According to the memoirs of contemporaries, Chistyakov “burned” himself with endless trips, his name alone in the posters guaranteed a full house. “Chistyakov participated in a large number of television and radio broadcasts, holiday concerts. His“ Concert by Request ”appeared regularly on the air. Chistyakov performed with him right up to until his death, he completed most of the concert programs where he had performed.

Chistyakov also did parodies of Maya Kristalinskaya , Anna German , Vladimir Troshin and other popular performers.

Doom

Victor Chistyakov's life ended when he was only 28 years old. The An-10 plane, on which the artist flew from Moscow on the anniversary of the Kharkov Operetta Theater on May 18, 1972 , crashed 24 kilometers from the Kharkov airport during landing approach as a result of fatigue destruction of wing elements and overloads on the landing course.

In the morning of that day, Chistyakov slept in the actor’s dormitory, got up late and, without breakfast, rushed to the airport. His habit of being late was known, he was late for the plane, which was supposed to fly to Kharkov. He arrived in Vnukovo when the plane was about to take off. But the departure was delayed for technical reasons. He was late again at the airport - the gangway had already been driven away from the plane. But when the crew found out that the late one was Chistyakov, the ladder was again adjusted. He managed to get on a plane, and after 1 hour and 13 minutes the liner collapsed in the air over Kharkov.

Chistyakov was very superstitious, especially he did not like the number “13”, but he was 13th on the plane. On the plane, he took off his Czech leather jacket, in which lay his passport and ticket. A jacket was found among the wreckage. Identification of fragments of the bodies of victims of air crashes through DNA examination in those years was not possible due to the lack of appropriate technologies.

Viktor Chistyakov was buried after cremation in St. Petersburg , at the Theological Cemetery , section 39, at the end of the Ditch track.

In 1993, to the 50th anniversary of Chistyakov, a book of memoirs about the artist was published, it was called " Victor Chistyakov - the genius of a parody ." In 2005, the documentary film “The genius of a parody. The short life of Viktor Chistyakov ” ^[1] .

Chistyakov easily created his sound images in completely different voices, in a different manner. The combination of the “golden throat”, natural talent, skill, respect for what he does made him unique. According to legend, when a documentary was shot about Sergey Lemeshev, where there were excerpts from his works, in one of the arias there were some notes that the singer, being already in old age, was not able to take. Lemeshev suffered for a long time, trying to rewrite the musical phonogram. And then the idea arose to ask Chistyakov to perform such a trick, with which Victor successfully coped. Even if we assume that this is fiction, then it arose because Chistyakov successfully imitated any of his characters. He dreamed of singing with his own voice, but at the same time noted: I do not know what my voice is . When trying to create his own vocal repertoire, Chistyakov didn’t even remotely succeed in the samples. The artist was constantly losing parody. He did not have a singing school at all, his ligaments often hurt.

The uniqueness of Chistyakov, experts noted, was in his unsurpassed ability to imitate female voices. It is inaccessible to almost no concert parodist. Possessing a voice of tenor nature and a rare musical ear, Chistyakov accurately copied tenor singers, but he also successfully reproduced baritone voices. Chistyakov did not study singing professionally, but he sang Kozlovsky and Lemeshev as masters of Belcanto . Such a musical gift was combined with the finest actor's sensitivity and observation, with which Chistyakov penetrated the very essence of a parodied artist, reproducing all the nuances and features of his voice.

Among the parodists influenced by Chistyakov are Gennady Khazanov (who gained all-Union fame in the mid-1970s), Sergey Bezrukov (with whom Chistyakov has external similarities), Vladimir Vinokur , Maxim Galkin ^[2] .

Parody texts were written to him at different times by actor Stanislav Landgraf , poets Ilya Reznik and Yuri Entin . Here is what Entin remembered about working with Chistyakov:

“At that first meeting, we sat at the table, talked as if we had known each other for a hundred years, and then at about twelve o’clock he said that the concert rehearsal was scheduled for tomorrow morning, and the concert itself in the evening, and we needed to make six skits . I was confused: “Wait, well, let's say I will write, but how can you learn all this ?!” He replied: “There’s nothing to be taught! There will be such a move: as if a telegram came from Kozlovsky, then from someone else. ” And all night, until five or six in the morning, I wrote these parodies, then we went with him to the morning rehearsal, because I hadn’t finished everything yet and I had to think up on the spot, in addition, the accompanist had to check how much my words they sound good, lie down on the music, and then, to my great surprise, Victor went on stage confident in himself, an absolute winner, and, without any mistakes, sang. Indeed, he looked into the text, but he did it inconceivably organically, as if he were reading telegrams from pop stars, the audience didn’t have the thought that I had added the last words ten minutes ago. ”

^[3]

Victor’s great success was facilitated by the agility and mobility of his body, he easily and enthusiastically danced and performed various acrobatic stunts, as well as witty and slightly malicious poems by Reznik and Entin.

In the last two years of Chistyakov’s life, his huge popularity falls. It was enough to announce “Our guest is coming out of Leningrad ...”, as the audience burst into applause. Other artists used the same technique after his death, said Gennady Khazanov . A close friend Entin was preparing Chistyakov a great career in animation. According to the memoirs of Entin, he practically foresaw his death. Apparently, Chistyakov himself foresaw it, as Gennady Khazanov recalled:

“The last days - and this is confirmed by his last photograph on the disc - he came to concerts in a black shirt. He wore a light blue suit and a black shirt. At this last concert in the Hall of Columns, the host Boris Brunov asked me, “Vitya, do not you think this is a concert shirt?” And he replied: “Boris Sergeyich, why did you pester me, maybe I have mourning.” It was actually a few hours before his death. " ^[4] .

Photos of Chistyakov in a black shirt and light suit, made shortly before his death, are presented in the documentary "Victor Chistyakov - a genius of a parody." Entin tried to dissuade Chistyakov from flying to the anniversary of the Kharkov Operetta Theater, citing the optionality of this event in the artist’s schedule, but Victor did not cancel the trip. The unexpected death of Chistyakov remained an irreparable loss for the Soviet stage. Gennady Khazanov believed that after the death of Chistyakov there was a feeling of emptiness on the stage, since there were no artists of such talent ^[4] .

Entin recalled the parodies of Chistyakov for foreign performers:

“Once, in such a situation, he began to explain to me that he owns a dozen different voices, but doesn’t know what to do with them, how to approach him, because his characters sing in a foreign language, and how can you make a parody here, how to write words? “Well, who can you show?” I asked. And he began to do Anna German, singing “Eurydice” absolutely exactly and terribly similar. Then - Robertino Loretti, showed Tom Jones, Mireille Mathieu, wonderfully. I began to think how it is I didn’t come up with anything, but nevertheless suggested something: Polish, as it were French ... I remember the first sentence from Mathieu was: "I'll bet," were there other words that could pass for the French, for example, "double-breasted jacket," and he even played it in the radio broadcast "Good morning" / ... /.. ^{[ 3]} .

Touching on the “hidden sides” of the life of the parodist, Gennady Khazanov mentioned “Victor’s very close friendship with one Czech,” in connection with which Chistyakov often flew to Czechoslovakia . In this regard, it was noted that Chistyakov may have had plans to leave for this country, both for friendly reasons and because he subtly felt the vocalization of the language and “very well owning his apparatus, he could probably do some kind of international parodies ” ^[4] .

Memories and significant efforts to preserve the memory of Chistyakov and his work were made by sister Galina.

• " Radio concert on request for those who sleep " - a parody of Leonid Utesov, Lyudmila Zykina, Polad Bul-Bul Ogly, Ivan Kozlovsky, Edith Piekha, Muslim Magomayev and other popular performers.
• “ Blue Cities ” are parodies of a popular song (as, according to the parodist, it would have been performed by Ivan Kozlovsky, Eduard Gil, Edita Pieha, as well as Mireille Mathieu and Louis Armstrong).
• “ On the anniversary of Lenfilm” ”- a parody of Edita Piekha and Lyudmila Zykina.

Records of Chistyakov’s speeches, to which interest again grew in the 21st century, are widely presented on the Youtube service.

Filmography

• 1969 - Abduction - parodies of Ivan Kozlovsky, Claudia Shulzhenko, Muslim Magomaev and Olga Voronets.
• 1969 - At the thirteenth hour of the night - a parody of the film " Cherbourg Umbrellas ", Edith Piech and Eduard Gil.
• 1970 - Hurry to build a house - a parody of Lyudmila Zykina, Edith Piekha and the operetta Isaac Dunaevsky's "White Acacia".

Parody Objects

Soviet performers

• Polad Bul-Bul oglu
• Olga Voronets
• Lyudmila Zykina
• Ivan Kozlovsky
• Maya Kristalinskaya
• Sergey Lemeshev
• Muslim Magomaev
• Edita Pieha
• Nikolay Slichenko
• Vladimir Troshin
• Leonid Utesov
• Edward Gil
• Claudia Shulzhenko
• Tatyana Shmyga

Foreign performers

• Louis Armstrong
• Anna German
• Tom jones
• Robertino Loretti
• Mireille Mathieu

• In 1998 in St. Petersburg the St. Petersburg Theater of Doubles and Parodies of Jean Chathyakov named after Victor Chistyakov was created and operates.
• In the city of Ufa, the parodist Alexander Chistyakov in 2008 created a school-studio "Academy of Parody named after Victor Chistyakov "

• Graves of celebrities. Victor Chistyakov
• Memory page. Victor Chistyakov
• St. Petersburg Theater of Doubles and Parodies of Janet Party named after Victor Chistyakov

Video

• Parodies of the singers Polada Bul-Bul Oglu, Klavdiya Shulzhenko, Muslim Magomaev (1970)
• The song “Good!” By Edita Pieha