Kristina Orbakaitė


Kristina Edmundovna Orbakaitė is a Russian-Lithuanian singer and actress. Her parents are Russian pop star Alla Pugacheva and Lithuanian circus performer.

Biography

Kristina Orbakaite was born in Moscow and spent much of her childhood between Šventoji, Lithuania, the home of her paternal grandparents, and Moscow, the home of her maternal grandparents.
At the age of 7, she debuted in the Soviet children's television program "Veseliye Notki" with the song "Solnyshko Smeyotsya". In 1982, she was cast in the leading role of "Lena Bessoltseva" in Scarecrow, a film by Rolan Bykov based on the Vladimir Zheleznikov play of the same name. Production began in 1982 and the film premiered in 1984. It became a critical success, not only in Russia but also overseas, and turned Orbakaite into a child star.
Having met with success in film and music, Orbakaite tried her hand at theater, appearing in 1995 as Helen Keller in an adaptation of William Gibson's The Miracle Worker on the stage of the Moscow Art Theatre. She subsequently received an award from the Russian Ministry of Culture for best female theatrical performance.
In 1996, Orbakaite and her partner, singer Vladimir Presnyakov, joined her mother, Alla Pugacheva, and her mother's then husband, singer Philipp Kirkorov, on a family performance tour through the United States titled "Zvezdnoye Leto". During this tour, she performed for the first time at Carnegie Hall in New York City.
In 2000, Orbakaite won World Music Awards in Monte Carlo as the best-selling Russian singer. Later that year, she released her fourth album May.
In 2002, she released her fifth album, Ver v chudesa and appeared in the television series Moscow Saga. In 2003, she released her sixth album, Pereletnaya ptitsa and in 2005, she released her seventh album, My life. On 17 January 2004, Kristina met her husband, American businessman Mikhail Zemtsov in Miami. They married in a private ceremony on 9 March 2005 in Miami Beach city hall.
In 2006, Orbakaite appeared in the comedy Lyubov-morkov together with Gosha Kutsenko. In 2013, received the title Merited Artist of the Russian Federation from Russian president Vladimir Putin.
In December 2016, her "Insomnia" world tour was presented with two shows in State Kremlin Palace. In 2017, the tour was presented in Russia, Israel, France, Kazakhstan, the United Kingdom, Germany and all Baltic states.
In 2022, she opposed the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Personal life

Orbakaite is married to Russian-American businessman Mikhail Zemtsov. They have a daughter, born on 30 March 2012. Orbakaite also has two sons from previous marriages to singer Vladimir Presnyakov Jr. and businessman Ruslan Baisarov, born in 1991 and 1998.
In one interview, she stated that she was descended from the German von Orbach family, but during World War II her grandfather, who married a Polish woman and fought the Nazis, had to change his German surname to the Lithuanian Orbakas. Arriving in Lithuania in autumn 2001, Orbakaitė however stated that she had said nothing of the sort. In February 2002, as the granddaughter of Lithuanian citizens, she was granted Lithuanian citizenship at her request.
Orbakaite likes to spend time at her residence in the Miami, Florida area.

Discography