"When We were Young": Three great Grandmothers of Soviet cinema

"I was once young, three hundred years ago," the tortoise Tortila sang, performed by the eternal grandmother of the Soviet Union, Rina Zelenaya. But how many of us remember this brilliant young actress?

They became popular in adulthood, they never had the roles of romantic beauties, and often they shone only in episodes. With all this, their popularity sometimes surpassed the fame of the actors of the first plan. Let's remember what our favorite grandmothers of Soviet cinema were like in their youth.

The most famous grandmother of Soviet cinema is Tatyana Ivanovna Peltzer. She became popular with viewers only at the age of 47, and we remember her as a kind Baba Yaga and mother of Ivan Brovkin. Her tiny roles as mischievous old ladies were always the highlights that made even a bland film better.

She never received an acting education, which she was very proud of all her life. At the same time, Peltzer first appeared on the stage in 1913, when she was only 9 years old, but she made her film debut only three decades later.

And this is how Tatiana Ivanovna looked in her youth, in the 20s. And at that time, she broke hearts.

In 1927, Tatiana Peltzer married a German communist internationalist, Hans Tabler, who studied in Moscow at the Comintern school. In 1930, the couple went to Berlin, where Tatiana worked as a typist in a trade representative office. The actress lived in Berlin until the arrival of Hitler, although there are rumors that the departure to her homeland was not connected with the change of power, but with adultery. 

In the 30s, after the departure of his Russian wife from Germany, Hans married a second time. His grandson then came to Moscow, stayed with Peltzer, she received him very cordially, until the end of her days she maintained close relations with Hans and his family... Already at an advanced age, Peltzer went to Karlovy Vary for water, where she met the "husband of her youth".

For many years, Tatiana Peltzer was a bosom friend of another famous grandmother of Soviet cinema-the sparkling Faina Ranevskaya.

Tatiana Ivanovna told a story that later became an anecdote. Once on tour in Leningrad, they lived in different hotels. Faina Georgievna calls and says into the phone in a low voice: "Ta-nya! Come and dine with me. I can't eat alone at all. Eating alone is as immoral as eating alone together."

Faina Ranevskaya in the 70s

Ranevskaya is remembered for her sayings, many of which have become winged. Often this great actress is called the " queen of the second plan»: she did not have a single major role in the movie, but who would remember today "The Foundling", "Alexander Parkhomenko", "The Girl with the guitar" and "Easy Life", if it were not for Ranevskaya?

Young Ranevskaya with her older sister Bella before the revolution

Ranevskaya was born in Taganrog in a rich Jewish family. Like Peltzer, Ranevskaya had no acting education, only lessons in a private theater studio, but from the age of 19 she began acting in the theater. The actress made her film debut at the age of 38, in the 1934 silent film "Pyshka". And in 1940, she received all-Union fame thanks to the film "The Foundling", after which she forever remained in the people's memory as "Mulya, don't make me nervous".

According to her own recollections, Faina Ranevskaya had a hard time letting people into her personal life. All her life she was accompanied by loneliness: from a very young age, when her family emigrated after the revolution, Faina was alone. In her autobiography, the actress recalls how, as a very young girl, she fell unsuccessfully in love with a hero-lover from the troupe. He did not return her love. Worse, he had insulted and humiliated Faina, thus closing that part of her soul forever.

Ranevskaya with her sister in the 60s

She never married, never had children. Only once, and for a short time, did she enjoy the hearth. In the 60s, her older sister Bella returned from emigration. They lived together for only a few years, after which Bella fell ill and died soon after.

The unique Rina Zelenaya is remembered and loved for the roles of Tortoise Tortilla in "The Adventures of Pinocchio", Mrs. Hudson in "Sherlock Holmes" and for a huge number of episodic, but memorable roles.

The actress was born at the dawn of the XX century in Tashkent, studied at a prestigious gymnasium in Moscow, by chance entered a theater school and first appeared on the stage in Odessa. The unusual name Rina appeared only because the first poster did not fit her full name Catherine.

Ekaterina Zelenaya began as a pop singer, then played in the theater, and at the age of 38, cinema firmly entered her life. In 1939, together with Agnia Barto, she wrote the script of the comedy "The Foundling" and played the housekeeper Arisha there.

For a long time, Rina Zelenaya got small roles of generals, governesses, visitors and secretaries, but she became really famous only in the 70s.

Unlike her two colleagues in the shop, about whom we told earlier, Rina Zelenaya was happy in her family life. She got married for the first time at the age of 18, but this marriage did not last long. But the second husband became her true love, they lived together merrily and amicably for forty years.

Rina Zelenaya and her second husband, architect Konstantin Topuridze

The beginning of their long life together was a holiday romance-they met in an Abkhazian sanatorium. And they got married quickly. The actress loved to watch how her husband, a talented architect, worked, who became the author of the projects of the fountains "Friendship of Peoples", "Stone Flower", "Golden Ear" at VDNH and other monumental creations.

Zelena had no children of her own. She raised Topuridze's two sons and his nieces. It's hard to imagine, but Rina's first husband and Konstantin's first wife were happy to visit their house.

The couple lived together for four decades, and when Rina Zelenaya was widowed in 1977, she very soon completely lost her sight, as if she did not want to look at the world in which her beloved man was not.