Leonid Kuravlyov


Leonid Vyacheslavovich Kuravlyov was a Soviet and Russian film actor. He became a People's Artist of the RSFSR in 1976.

Early life

Kuravlyov was born in Moscow into a working-class family. His father Vyacheslav Yakovlevich Kuravlyov worked as a locksmith at the Salyut Machine-Building Association and his mother Valentina Dmitriyevna Kuravlyova was a hairdresser. In 1941 with the start of the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union his mother was arrested on false report, accused of counter-revolutionary activity and exiled to Karaganda, Kazakh SSR to work at the local plant. In five years she was freed without a right to live in Moscow and sent to Zasheyek, Murmansk Oblast in the Russian far north where she continued working as a hairdresser. In 1948 she managed to get a permission to see her son who spent a year with her at Zasheyek, and in 1951 she finally returned to Moscow.

Career

In 1955 Kuravlyov entered VGIK to study acting under Boris Bibikov. He graduated in 1960 and joined the Theater Studio of Film Actors. He made his first movie appearances while still a student. In 1960 he was noted by Vasily Shukshin and took part in his diploma film Reported From Lebyazhye. In 1961 they both starred in the popular melodrama When the Trees Were Tall, and in 1964 Shukshin gave him the leading role in his comedy movie There Is Such a Lad which brought Kuravlyov true fame and which he considered to be the start of his successful movie career. He also acted in Your Son and Brother and felt so grateful for what the director did for him that he later named his son after Shukshin.
The role of Shura Balaganov in Mikhail Schweitzer's comedy The Little Golden Calf based on the book by Ilf and Petrov was one of his first successful roles: he managed to create an image of a brash yet charming petty thief. His other notable roles of that period include Khoma Brut in one of the first Soviet horror movies Viy, antagonist Sorokin in a psychological melodrama Not Under the Jurisdiction, Robinson Crusoe in Stanislav Govorukhin's Life and Amazing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, a Nazi officer Kurt Eismann in Seventeen Moments of Spring and Lavr Mironovich in Pyotr Todorovsky's The Last Victim.
In the 1970s he appeared in three to four films per year. Even though Kuravlyov was adept at playing serious dramatic roles, he is still best known for his leading roles in top-grossing comedy movies such as Afonya by Georgiy Daneliya, Leonid Gaidai's Ivan Vasilievich: Back to the Future and It Can't Be!, The Most Charming and Attractive by Gerald Bezhanov and others.
According to Russian actress Lidiya Fedoseyeva-Shukshina, after being tipsy, Kuravlyov openly spoke about his negative attitude towards the leadership of the Soviet Union. She recalled that, drunk, he had opened the window at her house and had shouted to the whole street that he hated the Soviet regime. She had feared that "the police would come and take everyone away as rebels."

Later years

During the late 1990s he hosted a popular TV programme The World of Books with Leonid Kuravlyov where he talked about new book releases. In two years it was closed and then relaunched with new hosts. In 2012 he was awarded the IV class Order "For Merit to the Fatherland".
Kuravlyov was a devoted Christian, a member of the Russian Orthodox Church.
In 2014 Kuravlyov along with 100 other Russian members of culture signed an open letter in support of Vladimir Putin's position regarding Ukraine and Crimea. In his last years Kuravlyov lived in a nursing home where he was diagnosed with dementia.
In January 2022, he was hospitalized with pneumonia. According to Kuravlyov's son, tests for COVID-19 were negative.

Death

Kuravlyov died from pneumonia on 30 January 2022, at the age of 85.

Selected filmography

  • All that Jam as Father Leonty
  • The Book of Masters
  • The Heirs
  • Streets of Broken Lights as Ershov, police colonel
  • Brigada as MVD general
  • The Aristocratic Peasant Girl as Grigory Muromsky
  • Shirli-Myrli as US Ambassador to Russia
  • The Master and Margarita as Bosoy, chairman of housing association
  • Weather Is Good on Deribasovskaya, It Rains Again on Brighton Beach as President of USSR Mikhail Gorbachev'
  • The Stairway as Uncle Misha
  • Private Detective, or Operation Cooperation as editor in chief
  • Entrance to the Labyrinth as Lev Khlebnikov
  • Yolki-palki as electrician
  • The Left-Hander as Emperor Alexander I Pavlovich
  • The Twentieth Century Approaches as Von Bork
  • The Most Charming and Attractive as Misha Dyatlov
  • Dangerous for Your Life! as Spartak Molodtsov
  • TASS Is Authorized to Declare... as Zotov
  • The Invisible Man as Thomas Marvel
  • The Trust That Has Burst as Farmer Ezra Plunkett
  • Copper Angel as Larsen, professor
  • We Are from Jazz as Samsonov
  • Look for a Woman as Inspector Granden
  • Vitya Glushakov - A Friend of the Apaches
  • Simply Awful! as Ruslan Ivanovich
  • Ladies Invite Gentlemen
  • Borrowing Matchsticks as peasant
  • The Meeting Place Cannot Be Changed as "Kopchyony", thief
  • Little Tragedies as Leporello, servant of Don Juan
  • Tailcoat for Scapegrace as police captain Deev
  • Incognito from St. Petersburg as Shpekin, postmaster
  • Mimino as Professor Khachikyan
  • Timur and His Team as Georgiy Garaev, Timur's uncle
  • You to Me, Me to You as Ivan Kashkin / Sergei Kashkin
  • Afonya as Afanasy Borshchov
  • The Flight of Mr. McKinley as Mr. Droot
  • It Can't Be! as Vladimir Zavitushkin
  • Circus in the Circus as Grísa
  • Seventeen Moments of Spring as Kurt Eismann
  • Ivan Vasilievich: Back to the Future as George Miloslavsky, burglar
  • This Merry Planet as Y
  • Life and Amazing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe as Robinson Crusoe
  • Two Days of Miracles as Vadim Murashev
  • Liberation as Chuikov's signaler
  • Shine, Shine, My Star
  • The Beginning as Arkady
  • The Little Golden Calf as Shura Balaganov
  • A Literature Lesson
  • Time, Forward! as Korneyev
  • Viy as Khoma Brutus
  • Older Sister as Volodya
  • Your Son and Brother as Stepan Voyevodin
  • There Is Such a Lad as Pashka Kolokolnikov
  • The Little Golden Calf as Shura Balaganov
  • Michman Panin as stoker Pyotr Kamushkin
  • ''There Will Be No Leave Today''