Aleksey Batalov


Aleksey Vladimirovich Batalov was a Soviet and Russian stage and film actor, film director, screenwriter, and pedagogue acclaimed for his portrayal of noble and positive characters. He was named a People's Artist of the USSR in 1976 and a Hero of Socialist Labour in 1989.

Life and career

Batalov was born on 20 November 1928 in Vladimir, into a family associated with the theatre. His uncle Nikolai Batalov starred in Vsevolod Pudovkin's classic Mother. The Modernist poet Anna Akhmatova was a family friend, and he painted a well-known portrait of her in 1952. Batalov joined the Moscow Art Theatre in 1953 but left three years later to concentrate on his career in film. During the Khrushchev Thaw he was one of the most recognizable actors in the Soviet Union. The Cranes Are Flying is his best-regarded film of the period, and the one which won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival. He also starred in Mikhail Romm's Nine Days of One Year. In 1967 he was a member of the jury of the 5th Moscow International Film Festival. In 1973 he was a member of the jury at the 8th Moscow International Film Festival.
During the 1960s and 1970s, Batalov became known for his fastidious approach towards choosing roles for himself. He appeared mostly in film adaptations of Russian classics, including Anton Chekhov's The Lady with the Dog and Bulgakov's The Flight. He also directed screen versions of Gogol's The Overcoat and Yuri Olesha's Three Fat Men. In the 1970s he concentrated on a professorship at the Gerasimov Institute of Cinematography.
In 1979, Batalov was invited to play Gosha, a mill machinist, in the melodrama Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears. After much hesitation, Batalov agreed to play his part in the movie, for which he won the USSR State Prize. The role was central to the film's Soviet message. As one character says in the picnic scene: "Seventy percent of my doctorate was due to Gosha's mechanical genius". After that, he effectively retired from acting and devoted his time to coaching new generations of film actors. Boris Yeltsin presented the Lifetime Achievement Nika Award to him in 2002. Batalov was awarded the State Prize of the Russian Federation.
In 2007, he received a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 29th Moscow International Film Festival.
In March 2014, he signed a letter in support of the position of the President of Russia Vladimir Putin on Russia's military intervention in Ukraine.
Batalov died on 15 June 2017 in Moscow from complications of a fall, which resulted in a hip fracture, at the age of 88.

Honours and awards

;Awards of Russia and the USSR:
  • Hero of Socialist Labour
  • Order "For Merit to the Fatherland":
  • *2nd class – for outstanding contribution to the development of national culture, for his many years of creative and educational activities
  • *3rd class – for outstanding contributions to the development of national cinematography
  • Vasilyev Brothers State Prize of the RSFSR – for his role in the movie Nine Days in One Year
  • Two Orders of Lenin
  • Lenin Komsomol Prize
  • Honored Artist of the RSFSR
  • People's Artist of the RSFSR
  • People's Artist of the USSR
  • USSR State Prize – for his role in the movie Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears
  • State Prize of the Russian Federation
  • Russian Presidential Prize in Literature and Art in 1999
;Foreign awards:
  • Order of St. Cyril and Methodius
;Community Awards:

Actor

  • Zoya as Alyosha Batalov, Zoya's classmate
  • A Big Family as Aleksey Ilich Zhurbin
  • Mikhaylo Lomonosov as Muzhik
  • Mother as Pavel Vlasov
  • The Rumyantsev Case as Sasha Rumyantsev
  • The Cranes Are Flying as Boris
  • Dorogoy moy chelovek
  • Shinel
  • The Lady with the Dog as Dmitri Dmitrievich Gurov
  • Nine Days of One Year as Dmitri Gusev
  • A Day of Happiness as Alexander Nikolaevich Beryozkin
  • Svet dalyokoy zvezdy as Lukashov
  • Three Fat Men as Tibul
  • V gorode S. as Shergov
  • The Seventh Companion as commissar
  • The Living Corpse as Fyodor Protasov
  • Vnimanie, cherepakha!
  • The Flight as Sergei Pavlovich Golubkov
  • Vozvrata net as Aleksey Vladimirovich Yegorov
  • A Very English Murder as Dr. Botwink
  • Nezabytaya pesnya as Mikola
  • The Captivating Star of Happiness as Sergei Petrovich Trubetskoy
  • Rikki-Tikki-Tavi
  • Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears as Georgy Ivanovich "Gosha"
  • Speed as Igor Vladimirovich Lagutin
  • O lyudyakh atomakh
  • Time for rest from Saturday to Monday as Pavel
  • Dose cheloveka v 'Mersedese'
  • Zontik dlya novobrachnykh as Dmitriy Pavlovich Kraskov
  • Stalin's Funeral as Eugene's father
  • Poltergeyst-90
  • ...Pervaya lyubov
  • Rokovye yaytsa
  • Malenkaya printsessa
  • ''Karnavalnaya noch 2, ili 50 let spustya''

    Director

  • The Overcoat
  • Three Fat Men
  • ''The Gambler''

    Voice

  • Hedgehog in the Fog as Narrator
  • The Adventures of Lolo the Penguin as Narrator