Elena Proklova: “I dropped a huge burden by talking about Tabakov’s harassment”

69-year-old actress Elena Proklova is now touring a lot in the Russian territories bordering Ukraine with the entreprise “Bride for Rent”. Her favorite partner, the famous Alexander Mikhailov, insists that the performance should first of all be taken to those places where people especially need support and joy. Before the next show, Elena Igorevna met with the Express Newspaper columnist and explained why she condemns homeowners, and with her abundance of novels, she does not belong to their number.

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Before speaking with Proklova, I had the opportunity to watch her prepare for the performance. And I was surprised to learn that the actress puts on her makeup herself and literally in 10 minutes and a few strokes of brushes from the most ordinary woman turns into a rare beauty.

– Elena Igorevna, isn’t it scary to perform in such an unsettling atmosphere when houses explode nearby and people die?

– I do not exist separately from my country. Isn’t it scary for those people who live here, raise children, fight? What is happening in Russia and in the world is also my problem. I speak without pathos, but absolutely honestly: I am a citizen of my country, and all her victories are my victories, and all defeats are my defeats.

– Some residents of the border regions reproach the local authorities for the abundance of celebrations and festivals and the waste of budgetary funds. In your opinion, do people need comedies like “Bride for Hire” when they are stressed?

– I think it’s necessary. People should feel that they are not alone, that people from other cities come to them, seek to share their problems, help, support. I hope that we, Moscow artists, will dilute with our performance all the dangerous, disturbing, terrible things that are happening here because of Ukraine armed to the teeth.

We have been playing the play “Bride for Hire” for eight years and every time we get incredible pleasure from the partnership, the audience, the humor of the play. Despite the fact that my role in this production is far from the most important and not the most beloved, but in some ways even unpleasant for me. But because of the partners I play it with pleasure.

– Why is the role unpleasant?

– My heroine steals her husband from another woman, and the man’s children hate her. You don’t envy her either. Unfortunately, many are faced with the betrayal of men and themselves sin infidelity. When it comes to love, it is always difficult, ambiguous, nervous, subtle.

– How do you feel regarding homeowners? Have you ever taken men away from other women?

– Men are not sheep to be taken away, are they? First of all, it is necessary to make claims to a man who left his wife, and not to blame another woman. Any man who leaves his family and children for a new love, I despise. For me, these men are traitors. But to make claims to other women who also want happiness, a family, in my opinion, is strange. I didn’t take men away from their wives. Unless she returned.

– Do you condemn the representatives of the stronger sex who marry many times?

– Each case is individual. There are men for whom relationships with women are purely physiology, and for them a young body is preferable to an old one. And so it is better not to marry and not to take an oath of allegiance.

Oleg Pavlovich and Elena in the film “Burn, Burn, My Star” (1969)

Not sex, but inner intimacy

– Elena Igorevna, doesn’t it bother you that for 20 years you were the leading actress of the main theater of the country – the Chekhov Moscow Art Theater, and now you are traveling around the cities with an unpretentious enterprise?

– I worked at the Moscow Art Theater in its best years, being Oleg Efremov’s favorite actress. And he stayed in my heart forever. And I left the theater when Oleg Nikolaevich, with whom I had a trusting, special relationship, began to get sick and lose his power. Around him appeared theatrical adventurers who ran everything. It was terrible.

– Do you mean the arrival of Oleg Tabakov in the theater?

– The intrigues began even before all the power was in the hands of Tabakov. As for his reign, I did not go to the theater for these 20 years. I really hope that with the recent arrival of a very good person and artist Konstantin Khabensky to the post of artistic director, a long-awaited revival will come.

– In this case, it is impossible not to ask you a painful question – do you regret telling the whole world regarding the harassment and violence of Oleg Tabakov over you, then a young girl?

– Why should I regret it? I’m sorry it wasn’t possible to talk regarding this earlier. There was such a time. Every woman who was raped was in absentia considered a prostitute. Thanks to my story regarding the true face of Oleg Tabakov, many women followed my example and revealed the names of their rapists. It became much easier for me to live following I told how Tabakov persecuted me. At that time, the famous actor, who was much older than me. And by the way, he was married … I seemed to have thrown off a huge burden. I think I did the right thing, honestly.

– Talented, beautiful artists Andrei Mironov, Oleg Yankovsky and the same Tabakov lost their heads because of you. What is it regarding you that other women don’t have?

– About this you need to ask the men who fell in love with me. I didn’t ask them: “Why did you fall in love with me?” For me, it was not so much sex that was important, but inner closeness with a person, his ideals, the spiritual world. I love human relations with a man: common interests, joint travels. For me, the status of a man, his external data, his wealth is not important. For me, harmonious relationships are important, beautiful, filled with light and goodness. All my relationships with men were dear to me and my partners. I have something to remember. And I don’t regret anything. But I can’t forgive violence.

Elena Proklova

The mirror is not always happy

– You have a fantastic figure – like a young girl. Do you play sports?

– Doing nothing. Of course, I take care of myself, my diet, appearance, but to say that I am directly engaged in myself is not. All my life I have been engaged in my profession and I do it selflessly.

– You are too modest… Share the secret of beauty and sexuality.

– Oh my God! Maybe gardening, love of nature, fishing. “I was born a gardener” – this is regarding me. Outside the city, I get such relaxation – beyond words. I have two beautiful gardens – in Zhostov near Moscow and in Sochi. And in both gardens this year I planted amazing trees. Everything blooms, bears fruit, smells sweet and makes me very happy. Yes, I have garden helpers, but I still do the main work myself. At my age, the love of gardening is another very important love that brings youth and optimism.

What is your relationship with age?

– Next year I will be 70 years old, and to say that I am young is stupid. But my soul is young. If there weren’t a mirror that doesn’t always make me happy, then I would think that I’m 17. The soul grows old only if it is bored, but this is not in my case. I am very interested in life. Perhaps today, when passions have gone into the background, it is even more interesting. Every morning I wake up, as it was in childhood, when friends, plans, gifts and new discoveries were waiting. Every morning I thank the Creator for the opportunity to live another day and do a lot of useful and joyful things. I am grateful that there is work, albeit a bit heavy, albeit in conditions of danger to life, but it is there. Thank you for the wonderful children, for the gardens, for the roles, for the audience.

– Often faced with black envy?

– All my life I live with her, I’m used to it. More precisely, I do not care regarding people who envy me.

Photo source: Still from the film, Legion-Media, Mikhail Frolov/KP