In 1967, in our film distribution, two films, which entered the top ten undisputed leaders in the entire history of Soviet cinema, took the lead by far ahead of competitors in the number of viewers. One of them is “The Wedding in the Robin”, which is not much behind the “Caucasian Captive”.
To the 50th anniversary of the revolution
The film “Wedding in the Robin” was staged by the famous actor and director Andrei Tutyshkin on the operetta of Boris Alexandrov. The picture was timed to the 50th anniversary of the October Revolution, and its action takes place during the Civil War. The inhabitants of the village have already lost count - so many times they have had to go through a change of power. But soon a long-awaited holiday is coming - a couple of lovers, Andrejka and Yarinka, decided to get married, what is no reason to have fun?
But, as luck would have it, at this time the gang of Pan Gritsian was taking over the area, and the plans of the appointed could collapse. Only a detachment of red horsemen, which hid nearby, could help. Headed by the Red Army Nazar Duma. Yarinka and her mother Sofia do not even suspect that this is their father and husband long mourned, a revolutionary condemned by the tsarist authorities, whose traces were lost in exile. So begins the sparkling “Wedding in Robin”. Actors in it - as a selection! Screen star and handsome Vladimir Samoilov played the role of Nazar Duma. The most colorful figures are a married couple Gorpina Dormidontovna and Nechipor in a brilliant performance by Zoe Fedorova and Evgeny Lebedev. It was with Gorpina that the artilleryman Yashka performed his famous dance “To That Steppe” (Tustep). Mikhail Pugovkin was not given a dance in any way; he spent half a month learning it. But then she forever became a kind of "calling card" of the actor.
Episode masters
The actors of the film “Wedding in Robin” managed to create a real miracle, casting memorable characters from episodic roles. So, for example, the still very young Tamara Nosova played the soldier Komarikha, and her skirmishes with Tryndychikha (Emma Treivas), very short ones, decorated the comedy very much. The master of the episode, Aleksey Smirnov, is touching, dragging a huge bottle of moonshine with him. And how funny he is trying on a bra instead of a bonnet! The catchy image of Redhead, a sort of front-line friend in the Gritian’s gang with a constant cigarette in the corner of her mouth, was created by Ukrainian artist Margarita Krinitsina, who forever remained for the public the very Pronka from the comedy “For Two Hares”.
The musical numbers of the “Wedding in the Robin” are wonderful. Actors Nikolai Slichenko (cavalryman Petya Bessarabets) and Mikhail Vodyanoy (adjutant Popandopulo) sang beautifully, because both of them shone with vocal skill, one in the Roma gypsy theater, the other on the opera stage.
Robin and Robin
Mikhail Vodyanoy and his Popandopulo are undoubtedly the best find of the comedy “Wedding in the Robin”. Actors often become hostages of one role, but cinema was not the main thing in Vodyany’s life (the real name of the artist was Wasserman, he is from a Jewish family, however, contrary to legends, he was not from Odessa but a native of Kharkov). The meaning of the existence of this artist lay on a different plane. Odessa Operetta Theater, which he headed at the end of his life, was what was the center of his universe. But if someone begins to recall the film “The Wedding in the Robin”, the actors who first come to mind are Vodyanoy and Pugovkin. Undoubtedly, the venerable artists of Abrikosov, Andrey and Grigory, who also played the roles of relatives of each other in the picture: Balyasny and his son, who took on the sonorous pseudonym pan Ataman Gritian Tavrichesky, also remain in memory.
An interesting fact: it turns out that the film was shot in the real village of Malinovka, in the Kharkov region. And the whole crowd is the real Raspberry inhabitants. This is how the village and artists (professionals and local residents) entered the gold fund of such a national cinema revered by our people.