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Алла Пугачёва: большое интервью «Скажи Гордеевой» — Transcript

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0:06THIS MATERIAL (INFORMATION) WAS PRODUCED, DISTRIBUTED BY FOREIGN AGENT KATERINA VLADIMIROVNA GORDEEVA, OR RELATED TO THE ACTIVITIES OF FOREIGN AGENT KATERINA VLADIMIROVNA GORDEEVA.
0:22To this day, from war to war, I live.
0:28This time is important to me because
0:31it really revealed the essence of people.
0:33But people in Russia don’t step down from the top positions.
0:36In vain!
0:39Our country is such, a great power, which,
0:43in fact, lacks just one word — magnanimity.
0:47But now you’re a traitor.
0:49Remind me, how am I a traitor?
0:51You must tell everything to your homeland, come and help with that.
0:55It’s a necessity! How much must you disrespect your country
0:58to say you ran away from it, as if it were some kind of prison.
1:03Guys, learn to tell the truth.
1:07Why is the opinion of intelligent people so suppressed?
1:12You can’t imagine how sorry I am this is happening.
1:16Later it will all end, but the people won’t return.
1:18Before me sat the doomed.
1:20Did you understand that?
1:21Of course, but there was no way back for us.
1:25I still had many marriages.
1:27Five?
1:29Just a minute.
1:33I feel that people live for me too.
1:37This is probably the first time in my life.
1:41In my life I’ve received so many scars on my soul
1:44that I am practically invulnerable.
1:54Katyusha!
1:55Hello!
1:57Hi!
1:58Greeting on the doorstep isn’t very good, of course.
2:00But you’ve stepped in.
2:01How sunny it is for our Latvia.
2:06By order, all by order.
2:09A piano.
2:10Yes, Raimonds Pauls comes here every time.
2:12In a couple of days he’ll come and play.
2:16- And you? - Yes, I play.
2:19But with nails like these you can’t play anything anymore.
2:25So, if you had to choose between nails and...
2:27I used to choose the piano, and now — the claws.
2:43See, it catches.
2:47Not Raimonds Pauls.
2:48I think there’s no point in us sitting at home.
2:51So let’s better go to the lawn.
2:53We have a nice spot there.
2:55Which side is better for you to sit?
2:57It makes no difference to me.
2:58Let’s sit here.
2:59Because in life they say, “oh, you’re so beautiful.”
3:03Then you look at photos or somewhere else and think,
3:06oh my God, the light is wrong, bags under the eyes,
3:09it turns out something else too.
3:10But honestly, I don’t care anymore.
3:12Tell Gordeeva
3:14Alla Pugacheva
3:18Take your hand out of the sleeve.
3:20- Why? - There, that’s it.
3:22But why?
3:23Because on camera it will look different.
3:26It’s fashionable.
3:27Fashionable, but a little bit should stick out.
3:30Otherwise they’ll say Pugacheva hides her hands.
3:31And do you know why she hides her hands?
3:34Because the guys filmed in the kitchen, I said, my hands shake.
3:37And it really was hard for me to stand.
3:39And everyone started saying my hands were shaking.
3:42Sometimes my knees tremble, but my hands don’t shake yet.
3:47In general, I feel quite good for my age.
3:51The only thing is those childhood illnesses,
3:55but I’m still a post-war child, and those childhood illnesses
3:59are, of course, showing themselves now.
4:01Back then everyone was sick, but it was fine.
4:04At the time I seemed to withstand it.
4:06And now they’ve somehow begun to show up.
4:09My legs have started to hurt.
4:11I ran to the doctor.
4:13I said, “why have my legs weakened so much?”
4:15This was my favorite doctor in Moscow.
4:17And he said, “you’re taking statins.”
4:18You can’t not take them.
4:20But I learned a lot from them.
4:22They weaken the legs a little.
4:23So I started exercising them.
4:25And it’s fine. It’s okay.
4:26- Does it annoy you? - Why would it?
4:31On the contrary, it amuses me.
4:32You see, my parents lived to 64 and then passed away.
4:38Grandma lived to 74.
4:39But my granddad was long-lived.
4:42My great-grandmother was also like that.
4:45Apparently I take after my father’s line.
4:48There were long-livers there.
4:49And granddad lived long.
4:51In principle, I do have reasons and people to live for. Here they are!
4:58And I haven’t seen you, Harry.
5:01When I have a goal, then I have the will to live.
5:05Because I don’t understand when someone says,
5:07“I can’t, I don’t want to live.”
5:09But I have a goal, I am happy.
5:12They give me some kind of tenth youth.
5:14And I can’t complain.
5:17I understand that some people won’t like hearing this,
5:20but I am satisfied with my life.
5:24And maybe that’s why I’m giving you this interview,
5:27so that maybe some gossip, those silly myths,
5:29which I, in principle, brushed aside long ago,
5:31I’m doing this for them.
5:34It’s like a document.
5:35If there are any questions, I will answer them.
5:38Ones I didn’t even intend to answer.
5:40Who knows what! Tomorrow — who knows, you understand?
5:45But who knows what.
5:46Let it remain as a document for people.
5:48Just like I did the “Postscriptum” concert at 70.
5:53And I need to do it now, since these thoughts appeared.
5:59It’s clear why.
6:00I think, I’ll tell Katya everything.
6:04So be it.
6:05I want the children to know the truth about their father and mother.
6:09And what’s happening in the world, they already know.
6:12What do they call you at home?
6:13The kids call me Mommy.
6:14Max — Bun.
6:16- Bun? - Well, I’m Bun.
6:18He’s my Masyanya. Masik.
6:21I always hear people call you Alla Borisovna.
6:24Can I just say Alla?
6:26Of course.
6:27Well, so that we’re somehow…
6:28Well, they’ve called me Alla Borisovna since childhood.
6:31That’s impossible to change now.
6:33I realize I don’t have a single chance
6:36to make this interview impartial, objective,
6:40to expose you somehow,
6:41because I love you endlessly,
6:43and this will be an interview with love.
6:45But we agreed with you that
6:49at least we’ll try to answer all questions honestly.
6:52Hey, when have I ever answered dishonestly?
6:55Of course honestly, Katya. What are you saying?
6:57Listen, your life has always had a lot of mystification.
7:00Well, basically, yes.
7:02Probably, deep inside I never fully open up.
7:07That’s personal, only my close ones know.
7:09So I’ve lived in an image for many years.
7:13But in any image, you must remain an honest person.
7:19How did you make the decision to leave?
7:21That February of 2022.
7:22As I understand, you were in Moscow then, but Maxim wasn’t?
7:25Well, let’s see then.
7:26Alright, I didn’t want to talk about this.
7:28The fact is, Maxim was abroad.
7:32I was at home, and I had to go for treatment in Israel.
7:36They simply saved me.
7:38And saved me then because there was a doctor
7:41that I desperately needed.
7:43As soon as I left, everything started.
7:46That crazy priest, what’s his name, Tkachov,
7:50“what happiness, the air is clean now. She left.”
7:54And I hadn’t even planned to leave.
7:56Well, I thought, maybe that’s just his opinion.
8:03Then, since we were against the war, they attacked,
8:07some people wrote things at the Ostankino TV center.
8:10It was nonstop insults.
8:12Well, if they don’t like you, you start thinking, so why stay?
8:17My friends told me, “they want to talk to you.”
8:21And Max had already spoken out by then.
8:24I said, “alright, let’s talk.”
8:26Talk in what sense?
8:27Talk with Sergey Kiriyenko.
8:30Well, I knew Sergey.
8:32I always had a good attitude toward him.
8:34I thought, fine, I’ll go, we’ll talk. Maybe he’ll advise me.
8:37We talked.
8:38He first asked what I was unhappy about.
8:40I said, I’m unhappy with the permissiveness.
8:43That is, I can basically give up everything,
8:45get through it all, let it all pass by my ears.
8:52But what worries me most is this permissiveness toward our family.
8:56I think it’s very bad, because
9:01they’ll rehearse on us, and I worry about you.
9:06Well, he said, “are you planning to leave?”
9:09I said, “no, why would I leave?”
9:10He said, “well yes, I read here…”
9:12And I saw on the table nearby all the materials about Max.
9:18What he said, how he spoke out.
9:21He said, “I looked here, it’s clear, a person spoke in emotion.
9:25He’s sensitive, he’s an artist.
9:27So I see no reason for you to worry.”
9:30I said, “but wait, you could have at least warned us
9:33that there’s no freedom of speech anymore?”
9:34He said, “don’t worry, it’s all fine.”
9:37That’s when I felt something was wrong.
9:40Something was hanging in the air.
9:42I even kissed him.
9:44I said, “goodbye, Sergey.”
9:47I knew I was unlikely to meet him again.
9:51And I just had a feeling,
9:54like something suspicious.
9:55It was so pleasant and suspicious that everything turned out so easy,
9:59that everything would be arranged, decided, banned — whatever.
10:04“Live calmly. You are our national pride.”
10:08I flew on wings to visit Igor Nikolayev.
10:14Igor Krutoy was there.
10:15I said, “Igoryok, listen, there are decent people.
10:19Like Kiriyenko, I’m just thrilled.
10:22How rightly he understands everything.”
10:26Two days later my husband Maxim Galkin was declared a foreign agent.
10:30Can you imagine?
10:31Of course, my friends who brought me there
10:34told me, “don’t think about it, don’t think, don’t think.
10:38There’s just no contact yet, right now
10:40there’s no connection with the Ministry of Justice, with the authorities.
10:44There’s no common agreement on one position yet.”
10:47He kept saying things, and I thought it was strange.
10:51And I had to think about it.
10:55Why?
10:56Alright for me, but when the kids went to school after that,
10:59when “foreign agent” — as I say, “they called him a foreign agent” —
11:04and children being children, they started trolling.
11:10Trolling?
11:11Of course, because “you’re spies’ kids, your dad’s a foreign agent,” and so on.
11:16Like "Children of the Arbat" — the father is an enemy of the people.
11:18We packed our suitcases, called their father, said we’re leaving.
11:24We had $30,000 with us,
11:29the amount allowed to take across, and left for Israel.
11:33I’ll be honest, it was such a sharp pain for me,
11:38that it was happening like this, you see?
11:42I wrote something like, “declare me a foreign agent too.”
11:45Because I don’t understand why the opinions of intelligent people are so suppressed.
11:52Because I believe that in a state there should be different opinions.
11:57How can you decide correctly if you only have
11:59one opinion and all others are suppressed?
12:02Do you think one can speak out against a war in a country
12:05that is waging war?
12:06Yes, but I thought it was possible.
12:10Could you have stayed silent?
12:11Could Maxim have stayed silent?
12:12Did you tell him, “be quiet, we’ll
12:15live peacefully, everything is fine, the kids go to school,
12:17let’s stay and be silent”?
12:19No, I wouldn’t have stayed silent, because it was better for me to leave.
12:24Of course, I knew how it could end, and
12:27Maxim wouldn’t have stayed silent either.
12:29Because, Katya, there is such a thing as conscience.
12:33And conscience, Katya, is more precious than fame, than luxury, than anything.
12:42Especially at my age.
12:44In the last minute you’ll be thinking about
12:47what you did, and how you treated people.
12:51No, it’s conscience.
12:53Don’t cry.
12:54- I’m not crying. - That’s it.
12:56To tell your homeland it is wrong — is that patriotism?
12:59Of course.
13:01You must tell everything to your homeland, come and help.
13:06It’s necessary — differences of opinion, discussions, debates.
13:11It matters. How can there be only one valid opinion
13:14and not listen to another,
13:16then make your own judgment from everyone else’s opinions,
13:20find the best, and only then decide something?
13:24It was all unpleasant.
13:25Especially since we had no villas, nothing at all.
13:29- Were you leaving for nowhere? - For nowhere, absolutely.
13:33And when they processed our Israeli citizenship, because
13:37it’s necessary in the country where you live to have some…
13:41So you left, and you didn’t even have Israeli citizenship yet?
13:44We didn’t.
13:44Max started thinking how to work, and he’s focused on that to this day.
13:49Father chops, I carry away.
13:53Yes, it was unpleasant, because, so to speak,
13:58they practically expelled you.
14:00It turns out you can’t say anything.
14:02That shocked me.
14:03I don’t want to end my life again under Stalinism.
14:08But Katya, I was born under Stalinism.
14:13It was nothing but prohibitions.
14:15Even when Joseph Stalin died, on TV they showed
14:20everyone weeping, crowds of people crushing each other.
14:25Listen, it was such a celebration.
14:28Whoever you asked, it was just a celebration.
14:30But still, everything was forbidden.
14:32Then the repressed returned from the Gulag.
14:37It was always nerve-racking, because...
14:39And did they pass through your house?
14:41Well, there were relatives, yes.
14:43- You had relatives? - Yes, of course.
14:44We had to help them, and even though I was little, I understood what was going on.
14:50Especially when Easter was forbidden. A ban.
14:54You had to cross yourself in secret. We were baptized at about eleven.
14:59So you see, the bans were always there.
15:01Always prohibitions.
15:03Long hair later, when it was no longer allowed.
15:06You’d get on a tram, it said, don’t lean out.
15:10In the metro, don’t lean against the wall.
15:13And always this no, no, no, no, no, no.
15:16Well, it all got a bit tiresome.
15:18And besides, I remember from childhood that our parents…
15:23I was about 13, my brother 12.
15:26It was the Cuban Missile Crisis.
15:29They just cried, hugged us as if saying goodbye.
15:34Everything was hanging by a thread.
15:36Well, thank God, they reached an agreement.
15:38That ability to agree — that is real peace.
15:43And to solve problems by saying, “what did you say? I’ll punch you in the face,”
15:47that is, of course, shortsighted.
15:49It turns out that to this day
15:54I’ve lived from war to war.
15:57The Cuban crisis, the Suez crisis, Afghanistan, the first Chechen war,
16:03the second Chechen war.
16:05Not to mention Damansky Island, the peninsula,
16:08when our men were cut down by the Chinese.
16:10That was such a tragedy for me.
16:11It touched you personally, didn’t it?
16:13You had a fiancé there?
16:15- That was at Suez. - He was at Suez?
16:17Yes, Valery Romanov.
16:18He, by the way, later became a big boss in the local KGB.
16:24A big, intelligent guy.
16:26He nearly died there, really.
16:28So you see what was happening.
16:30The first Chechen war especially stuck with me,
16:34because I knew Dzhokhar Dudayev.
16:36He was such a decent, honest, intelligent man.
16:41A handsome man.
16:42And his wife — oh, what a wife!
16:46An artist, a writer, a politician.
16:48I even feel ashamed.
16:49She called me, as if she thought I could help somehow.
16:53But how could I help?
16:55With nothing.
16:57Even now I feel ashamed to send her regards.
17:01Alla Fyodorovna, if you happen to see this interview, I apologize.
17:07For not being able to do anything
17:12to keep Dzhokhar alive, to help you somehow.
17:16I couldn’t do anything.
17:18Is that the reason you never went to the front to sing?
17:21Listen, I’m a post-war child.
17:25I know veterans who have long since passed away.
17:29And I know about war, maybe more
17:33than the current generation — what it is and what a nightmare it is.
17:37But not from my parents.
17:39They were always silent.
17:40But when veterans came, they tried not to talk about it.
17:43But I knew where they talked.
17:45They could talk about it in a café.
17:48It was simply a catastrophe.
17:50And I never wanted it to be repeated.
17:53Never.
17:54I don’t know who could like war.
17:57Probably no one.
17:58Especially when war is, so to speak, with brothers.
18:01Vitaly Borodin, get ready.
18:03Informers and snitches. Attention.
18:07All of this is wrong.
18:09But in my opinion, the only politician who had
18:12the courage to admit a mistake and rethink it was Gorbachev.
18:16The courage of repentance.
18:18And the goals of war matter to me, you see?
18:21To defend the homeland, I’ll be the first to run. Even on crutches.
18:24But when I don’t understand what’s happening, and
18:29when I do understand what’s happening, that’s terrible too.
18:33When people die — ours and those from another country.
18:39It’s unbearable.
18:41I kept thinking, what is this?
18:44But why?
18:45What are we lacking?
18:47But I realized that it’s inherent
18:50to any power in the Soviet Union and in Russia.
18:54It’s pride.
18:56And pride is a sin.
18:58That’s what’s horrible.
19:00You’d think — I had a brother who was just unbearable.
19:05Unbearable. Also a KGB man.
19:08He was military originally?
19:09Well yes, military.
19:11He was irradiated on the Chinese border in Semipalatinsk.
19:14And children were born dead.
19:16He was an excellent communications specialist.
19:19For some reason they sent him to Afghanistan, he went with a comrade.
19:24And when the bombing or shooting started there,
19:27he held his comrade’s hand, and they ran holding hands somewhere to hide.
19:34And he reached some shelter and said, “that’s it.”
19:38And he had only one hand left — his friend’s.
19:42Can you imagine the trauma of the people who are fighting now?
19:45- Can you imagine that? - No.
19:47I can’t either.
19:48Because we don’t want blood in the 21st century.
19:53It seems to me that politics should already be farsighted,
19:57diplomacy at the highest level, the ability to negotiate not by fear.
20:04But it turns out it’s all so difficult.
20:06Did you ever think of escaping in Soviet times?
20:09Well, leaving the country and not coming back.
20:10No, of course not. What are you saying? Escape.
20:14Well, imagine what kind of career would have awaited you, for example,
20:16in Sweden, where ABBA offered you to sing in the musical "Chess".
20:20Oh, I was offered many things.
20:21The offers were absolutely incredible.
20:24To act in movies, to play a Russian, and yes, the musical "Chess", and sing with someone.
20:30What was the coolest offer?
20:33Well, I think "Chess".
20:34Because for me they were very close and wonderful people.
20:38I adored them and visited often.
20:41And during one of those visits
20:43they invited me to their gorgeous studio.
20:46I still remember, Benny was at the piano.
20:50And next to me was a Swedish translator from the embassy, Marianna.
20:56And they, with such joy, such happiness,
20:59told me, “sit tight, sit.
21:04We are offering you the role of Svetlana in our musical.”
21:08And I was like, oh my God, how amazing!
21:12And then suddenly the translator said to me,
21:16“quiet, calm, you must not agree.”
21:18And ABBA didn’t understand what she was saying.
21:20I said, “why?”
21:21“You have family in the Soviet Union.
21:25Parents, a daughter. Who knows what could happen.”
21:27Tears were streaming down my face. I couldn’t help myself.
21:30They thought I was crying from happiness.
21:32He stood up, hugged me, “Alla! Congratulations!”
21:39I didn’t even know how to tell them.
21:41I said, “I can’t.”
21:43How did they react?
21:45For some reason Benny immediately stood up and left.
21:48Björn frowned and said, “why, what’s wrong?”
21:50I said, “I can’t, because… well, such circumstances.”
21:53Later we talked about it.
21:55He said, “you should’ve agreed,
21:57and then we’d have figured everything out. Your mom, your dad here.”
22:00I said, “you don’t understand, if I don’t return to Russia, I’m not me.”
22:04And they explained that the contract was only signed for one year.
22:10No. I had to refuse.
22:14But seriously, you never thought of leaving?
22:17Imagine what kind of career awaited you.
22:19Well, I had many offers.
22:21Once I was, of course, very, so to speak,
22:24upset, disappointed.
22:26I was even offered a fake marriage — I won’t name who.
22:31But just to leave for America… I couldn’t.
22:35After five days abroad I already miss home.
22:38Not the homeland, but my home.
22:40I get bored, I don’t understand anything.
22:42I’m such a Russian person.
22:45Back then I couldn’t imagine life without Russia.
22:49I simply couldn’t.
22:51And now, as you see, I not only imagine it, I’m living it.
22:55Everything God does is for the best.
22:57I don’t know how I’d feel there now,
22:59what it would be like, and with the children.
23:03No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
23:08In Soviet times you were accused of
23:11not singing civic or patriotic songs.
23:13How so? Who could accuse me of that?
23:16In the film "The Woman Who Sings", not a single patriotic song.
23:19Wait, I sang the song "Birch Keys".
23:22"Birch Keys" — fine, that’s one song.
23:24And "Tell Me, Birds". Give me the list,
23:26I’m old already, I don’t remember what I sang.
23:28But for me they were all patriotic songs.
23:31And what is patriotism, really?
23:33It’s not love for the homeland,
23:35because homeland means something different for everyone.
23:38It’s love for your loved ones.
23:40That’s homeland for me.
23:41Where your loved ones are, that’s your homeland.
23:44It’s the place where you were born.
23:46For me, homeland is gone in the sense of what it meant.
23:51There are no longer those places, those people
23:54with whom I shared that homeland.
23:57And now, of course, it’s still homeland, but not the pigeons and sparrows
24:00fluttering around, you see?
24:03And not the swans and cranes, when there was Perestroika, the Thaw.
24:10Now it feels like the time of piranhas, you see,
24:14who must devour each other, imprison, arrest.
24:17A time of lovelessness in this world.
24:20And that?
24:21Songs for the homeland.
24:22Do you remember "Dandelion"? “My dandelion…”
24:25Maybe I’m explaining this clumsily,
24:27but homeland is also love.
24:29If homeland treats you like this,
24:31whether you love it or not, you have to leave home
24:34and prove that life goes on, not ends.
24:42It always seemed to me that when people taste wine,
24:45they mostly lie.
24:48No one really understands much.
24:49Well, I have friends who do understand.
24:51But that’s different.
24:52I just go by: does it taste good or not.
24:54But do you drink?
24:55I don’t drink, but I can sip a little to keep company.
24:59It’s just that after the 90s \I can’t see it or hear it,
25:02or sniff it, because I had to drink back then.
25:08Not a single issue was solved without a feast, without drinking.
25:13Smart people always told me,
25:17if you’re forced to drink, what should you do?
25:19- What should you do? - Drink kefir.
25:21Before or after?
25:21You can chase it with kefir.
25:23During? Alcohol with kefir?
25:24Yes. Vodka, for example.
25:26There are many ways — to drink, pour it back, spit it out.
25:30Pour it out somewhere, you know, while talking.
25:32It depends on the circumstances.
25:35And I always feel very bad after alcohol.
25:38Well, with the musicians we had to, at the end of a tour.
25:42We had a dry law, so only when
25:44the tour ended, we’d set a table, a spread, and
25:48have a little drink.
25:49But is it in your nature to actually get drunk?
25:53That was always my joke.
25:55When I was offered a drink, I’d say,
25:58“listen, I don’t drink, I get drunk.”
26:00I can get drunk, but I don’t like drinking.
26:01That was my folksy reply.
26:03They say the only thing you can drink a little of is red wine.
26:07So that’s what we ordered.
26:09- But you do smoke. - Oh, Katya.
26:12- Well? - I hadn’t smoked for a long time.
26:15And I was happy about it, though I did put on some weight.
26:19And in 2022 it turned out that Max said to me,
26:24“you know what, better smoke.”
26:27Well, I was very nervous.
26:28I told the kids, “forgive me, children, it’s just for a short while, just a little.”
26:32I had good cigarettes, so I didn’t hide it.
26:36I said, “I’ll smoke a little.”
26:38Such is life, such is the lifestyle.
26:43There’s no serenity that I dream of,
26:47but peace of mind appeared, because I’m in harmony with myself.
26:52I know that peace of mind can save me,
26:56but it can’t help anyone
26:59if I don’t have it myself. Right?
27:02Then my toast will be for peace of mind.
27:04No, for serenity. I await it, I wish for it.
27:08To your serenity.
27:14What a box instead of the sea.
27:16Look, it’s like milk.
27:19No horizon.
27:19Oh wow, what is that? I’ve never seen it before.
27:23Mom, even the ships look like they’re floating on the horizon.
27:26Oh yes, they look like they’re flying.
27:29Really, like they’re flying.
27:30My God, right there.
27:32Yes, yes, you see?
27:33Listen, this has to be filmed.
27:36Amazing.
27:37Looks like fields.
27:40It’s the first time I’ve seen ships flying on the horizon.
27:45And you can’t see the horizon at all here.
27:49There it is.
27:49Yes, yes, fantastic.
27:53Yes, even two are flying.
27:56Three, mom.
28:00Alla Borisovna, thank you for supporting Ukraine.
28:04My God, they dream.
28:05My heart is jumping out.
28:07Thank you, thank you.
28:11You know what I was thinking?
28:13We have three filming days with you.
28:15A person’s life usually divides into three periods.
28:19When he prepares to become who he will be,
28:21when his finest hour comes,
28:24and when he reaps the fruits of who he has become.
28:26And I’d like to ask you about each of these three periods
28:29about the happiest day.
28:32The happiest day of your childhood.
28:34Interesting, you speak of three periods,
28:37but I think people live like this:
28:39born, endured life, and died.
28:43Those are your three periods.
28:47- Interesting three periods. - Yes.
28:49And I never even had time to think about periods.
28:52I studied so much.
28:54There was a time when the family had no money at all,
28:57I worked from the age of 15 across from the First Watch Factory club.
29:02I was good at accompanying.
29:03They took me into a group where people came to sing.
29:07Amateur performances.
29:08And as a side job, I was a cleaner after all that.
29:12And I earned decent money.
29:14First 30 rubles, then I think 35, something like that.
29:19That was very good.
29:20I could buy a duck, roast it in the oven
29:24when friends came over.
29:25So what was the happiest day of your childhood?
29:27I’ll tell you now.
29:28In May, when we were taken to a rented dacha.
29:32A little house. And the piano came with us.
29:35I was on the truck, with the piano.
29:38Me and the armchairs — and I could go a whole month without studying, without playing.
29:43I was resting.
29:45That was my happiest day.
29:47I sat and watched.
29:50And there appeared those yellow flowers, buttercups and dandelions,
29:54that later turned into white fluff.
29:58And so I’ll say honestly,
30:00that was the happiest day of the year.
30:04I remember for my birthday they gave me a very fashionable nylon scarf.
30:08What color?
30:09It was light blue, nylon, very pretty.
30:16It didn’t suit me at all.
30:17But proudly tying it on, I went out into the yard to show off.
30:22Well, you know, I’ve had many happy days.
30:24So you can’t single out just one.
30:27I had some absolutely amazing periods.
30:30I was happy.
30:31Because I wanted to be happy.
30:35For the first time, I went on a boat at night with our neighbor.
30:41He convinced my grandmother to let me experience it.
30:44He took me through the forest to the tourist base — scary.
30:47There they sang songs, and I sang something too.
30:50And after that he took me out on the boat at night.
30:53The moon, it was very beautiful.
30:56So you see, happiness for me came from
30:58moments of freedom, of beauty.
31:00And it still does.
31:01Like you telling me about the sea.
31:03I’m already happy just to see this.
31:05Something I’ve never seen here.
31:07I’ve been here so many times, but this is like a painting.
31:10- Floating ships. - This is like a painting.
31:14Good evening.
31:15You look wonderful.
31:18I want to paint.
31:19- Can you? - Good question.
31:22I think you can, Mom.
31:24Liza is learning.
31:26It’s not that I can. I don’t know.
31:28I’d call them mood drawings.
31:30- Hello. - Hello.
31:32Somewhere you told that when you can’t sleep,
31:35you always imagine a field full of cornflowers and daisies.
31:38And you walk through it, and somewhere there
31:40at the end is a house where your grandmother waits.
31:43That was a dream, yes.
31:44And then I started to imagine that field.
31:47Such peace. Grasshoppers chirping.
31:50Grandmother waiting at the doorstep.
31:52Then I walk through the field, I’m walking.
31:55It’s calming.
31:56I see that field before my eyes, because it was real in my life.
32:00And I walk, I know my father is fishing at the bay.
32:05And I go to him.
32:06And he treats me to black bread with oil
32:10and onion or garlic.
32:12That is my homeland, those are my memories.
32:16And where was this?
32:17In Novoalexandrovsky settlement.
32:18We spent our whole childhood there, renting. A tiny house.
32:21- And in general you lived poorly? - Well, like everyone. Like everyone.
32:25There were five of us, living in 12 square meters.
32:29That’s father, mother, you, your brother, and grandmother.
32:31- Mother’s or father’s mother? - Mother’s.
32:33Grandmother would unfold a cot at night in the kitchen.
32:37Father and mother closed themselves off with a curtain, I still remember,
32:40where only a sewing machine and a small wardrobe could fit.
32:43My brother and I were in the living room, in the hall, as they called it.
32:4712 meters — that’s about the size of where you and I are sitting now.
32:52Well, it’s nothing, others didn’t even have that.
32:54They lived in communal apartments, and we called it a communal house.
32:57Because we had a separate apartment, we
32:59moved out of a communal flat when I was born, I think.
33:03There were such apartments.
33:04Still, you could hear everything, just not see it.
33:07Guests came, some even stayed overnight.
33:09My brother and I were under the table.
33:11That was our favorite night.
33:12We had a round table, and that’s where we were put to sleep.
33:17We liked it, our little house.
33:20In childhood, did you and your brother get along?
33:22We did, yes.
33:23And when did that change?
33:24Later, when he was older.
33:27He had a tragedy, of course — his life was
33:30an unfortunate life.
33:31He studied at the only English school in Moscow, near Aeroport metro.
33:39And every day he had to go there with Mom or Dad.
33:46He studied brilliantly, he knew the language perfectly.
33:49And he dreamed, he was advised to apply
33:53to the Military Institute of Foreign Languages.
33:57He passed all the exams with top marks,
34:01but wasn’t accepted because of special features.
34:04That “special feature” came in his final year,
34:08when they staged "The Snow Queen" at school,
34:11and a boy had to lunge at him with a knife,
34:16and he was supposed to catch the knife.
34:19But the knife was cardboard, so nothing serious.
34:22But he forgot the prop and grabbed a real knife, without warning it was sharp.
34:27The other boy caught it the same way and cut his little finger.
34:31Of course, it healed, but the finger remained a little bent.
34:38And he was rejected because of that.
34:40It was such a tragedy for him.
34:42I think he almost lost his mind then.
34:44It was bad, very bad.
34:46He started drinking, all sorts of things.
34:48They sent him to some factory so at least he’d be occupied.
34:51Then a family acquaintance, Uncle Misha, came and said, “come to Gorky with us.
34:58There’s a military communications school there.
35:02Let’s go.”
35:03And so he became practically a military man, not a translator,
35:06but a soldier, a communications officer.
35:09But even there things never quite worked out for him.
35:13And mentally, of course, he wasn’t well.
35:16When he was nearing the end of his life,
35:20it was very hard.
35:22He couldn’t speak with that tube in his throat.
35:25And as always, I forgave him everything.
35:28I said, “don’t worry.
35:31I’ll help your children, I’ll help everyone.”
35:34I thought, imagine that.
35:36My life turned out so fortunate,
35:39and his the exact opposite.
35:40That’s what it means to be an unwanted child.
35:42Mother felt guilty about him her whole life.
35:45Well, he knew right away.
35:47I was born on April 15, he on April 7.
35:49He was incredibly talented.
35:51He wrote poetry. He wrote beautifully. He even sang.
35:56He acted, he was an artist.
35:58I don’t understand how it works that
36:00one child’s fate turns out one way,
36:03and my mother always said, “what an artist is growing…”
36:08- She meant him. - Yes.
36:09“You should have been the general, the soldier,
36:11and he should have been the artist.”
36:13And in your yard they teased you as “Feldwebel.”
36:15Yes, Feldwebel.
36:16Well, what could I do, when my brother was Russian, and my cousin Jewish.
36:21They would go out together.
36:23And then it started — as they used to say,
36:26“zhid-zhid, running along the stick.”
36:29You understand, it was unpleasant for me to hear that.
36:32Even if it hadn’t been my brother.
36:34Well, I used to open the window.
36:36And then they shouted, “the Feldwebel heard, the Feldwebel is coming.”
36:41And of course I gave it to them for all that.
36:45And how hard was it for the family when your father was imprisoned?
36:48Well, it was, of course, a terrible shock.
36:51And we couldn’t even understand why.
36:55He was always praised, always the proper war veteran.
37:00Later we learned that the guilty one
37:03was a man responsible for some export of goods, but he was disabled.
37:06And my father took pity on him and took the blame. Can you imagine?
37:10Back then, they imprisoned everyone. Managers.
37:14Khrushchev suddenly decided to restore order.
37:17The director of the Sapphire factory committed suicide,
37:20he was such a good man.
37:23He couldn’t even imagine he might be accused of something.
37:26He was a proud man.
37:28And how did your mother tell you?
37:30Oh, well, you had to know my mother.
37:32I asked, “where did they take Dad, what did he do?”
37:36My mother said, “he picked flowers in someone else’s garden.”
37:43That was my mom.
37:47And I was so naïve too.
37:48I was friends with our neighbor, Dima Straussov.
37:51He said, “I know what happened.”
37:53And I said, “can you imagine, why did he go into someone else’s garden
37:56to pick those branches, those flowers?”
37:59He looked at me.
38:00“You believe that?”
38:04And then?
38:05And then they confiscated property.
38:06But we had nothing to confiscate.
38:09A veteran had given us a painting.
38:12He must have brought it back from the war.
38:14Well, as they say, don’t touch what’s not yours.
38:16So they confiscated that.
38:18I was even glad, because I used to sleep under it.
38:23And later I was scrolling through something.
38:27The internet, maybe Instagram, I don’t remember.
38:30But I saw that painting in someone’s apartment.
38:35So interesting. I even have it somewhere.
38:37I took a photo of it.
38:38But tell me, when you went to school —
38:40your father was in prison.
38:41Surely there must have been whispers.
38:44No one said a word to me.
38:45That school had such tactful people.
38:50Our teachers were all very, very good people.
38:54And my homeroom teacher was
38:58Vera Alexandrovna Petrovskaya.
39:00Such an intelligent person.
39:03You asked such a good question.
39:04I think it was thanks to her that no one ever said anything.
39:10No one.
39:11So it wasn’t like what later happened with Harry and Lisa at school?
39:15No. And besides, he wasn’t in prison long.
39:20After a year and a half, they understood the case.
39:22It was cleared up.
39:24I don’t know, maybe friends helped somehow.
39:26He worked in the library.
39:28And then he came home.
39:30Did prison change him?
39:32No, he just didn’t go back to the Communist Party.
39:35They invited him. He said, “no, thank you.”
39:37“I’m not worthy.”
39:39And how did you end up in the Party?
39:41You, in 1985.
39:43When it was already almost over, you joined the Communist Party.
39:46Me? My God, what must my comrades think of me?
39:51Well, well, well.
39:52Who told you I joined the Party?
39:55I read it in books about you.
39:59Katya.
40:00So now we’re clearing up some myths.
40:03Yes.
40:04So I must ask you,
40:06were you in the Communist Party, Alla Borisovna?
40:08No, Comrade Gordeeva.
40:10I never made it into the Communist Party, though they courted me
40:14and said, “Borisovna, it’s time for you to join.”
40:20And I thought, let me think —
40:22why would I, what would I even do there?
40:24I didn’t have the time.
40:25And suddenly another man walked in, sat down arrogantly,
40:30and said, “what’s going on here?
40:32Are you inviting her to the Party?
40:34Oh, that’s fine, just remember, you’ll have to sing different songs.”
40:39I said, “then no need,” and ran away.
40:42Did your father ever tell you how he was wounded?
40:44He lost his eye in the war.
40:45He never said a word, veterans never talked about it.
40:48For them, Victory Day wasn’t a celebration,
40:50because it was the most tragic day,
40:53when they remembered everything, their friends.
40:56And there weren’t parades, because it felt awkward.
41:00What parades?
41:01They would gather, go to Red Square,
41:04meet in little restaurants, drink and remember,
41:09but not at home.
41:10And then, I don’t remember which year,
41:12the parades suddenly began.
41:14Under Brezhnev, in ’65.
41:15But without parades it felt somehow more honest, you see,
41:18because they couldn’t even imagine such a thing.
41:22It was very moving — Kristina was little,
41:24she went to veterans’ gatherings and said, this is unbearable —
41:27Mom with her veterans, Dad with his.
41:30And your mother spent the second half of the war in an agit-brigade?
41:33No, she was in air defense and sang in agit-brigades.
41:37Did you know your mother gave an interview
41:39to Svetlana Alexievich for the book "The Unwomanly Face of War"?
41:43No.
41:44How interesting. My mother was such a dandelion, simply,
41:47so pure, so naïve.
41:50I remembered — I often tell the kids this story,
41:55it really captures who my mom was.
41:58I was leaving for a tour, and she said,
42:01“I want to talk to you seriously.”
42:03I said, “what is it, Mom, tell me quickly, I have to pack.”
42:07“Georgy came by.” I said, “which Georgy?”
42:10“Well, that handsome one from Georgia.
42:13He spoke with me, he proposed marriage.”
42:21I said, “to you?”
42:22She said, “to you! Shame on you.”
42:27I said, “he’s a good man, very good.
42:29But he’s homosexual, they say. I’m not interested.”
42:32She looked at me for a long time.
42:36“I don’t understand — I raised you,
42:39did everything right, everything good.
42:42Don’t you understand that in our country all professions are equal?”
42:48That floored me completely.
42:51That was her — she didn’t even understand what gay meant.
42:54But truly, the guys in Georgia were wonderful.
42:57Inguri HPP, we had an agit-brigade with which
43:00we traveled everywhere.
43:03My God, what an interesting life it was.
43:05I don’t like to live in memories, to live in the past.
43:08But there’s much to remember.
43:10Some things resurface — unforgettable.
43:13Absolutely.
43:14Even now on Instagram you’re Alla Orfei.
43:18And Orfei is forever with you.
43:20Of course.
43:21Was that the moment when Pugacheva became "Pugacheva"?
43:24I was born Pugacheva.
43:25It’s just that people found out, because when they sent me —
43:28there was supposed to be another singer.
43:30From Armenia?
43:31Yes, he got sick, a very good singer.
43:33And they turned to Konstantin Orbelian.
43:38He said, “I see only one replacement — Alla Pugacheva.”
43:42They called me in.
43:43“What songs will you sing?”
43:45Not for them to decide — you decided.
43:46Well, of course.
43:47They sent me one Bulgarian song, and then
43:50Mozhakov wrote a second song for Alexei.
43:55Those were the two I had to sing.
43:56"Arlekino" — and I thought I needed a third one.
43:59And quite by chance, in a dark hall,
44:02I was waiting for a rehearsal with Vesyolye Rebyata, and a man walked in —
44:06I don’t remember his name, because he appeared suddenly and left.
44:12He said, “I want to give you a song — a translation
44:16of a Bulgarian song, "Arlekino".”
44:19I said, “all right, give it to me.”
44:20And he left, disappeared — as if sent by God.
44:24I started looking at this song, put on a cassette
44:28with Emil Dimitrov singing it.
44:30I thought, well, the theme is gorgeous.
44:33But what is he singing about?
44:34It was nonsense to me.
44:36You see, it was such a sad little song.
44:39Emil Dimitrov — "Arlekino".
44:55Not a hit at all, you know?
44:57I thought, what kind of sadness is this?
44:59How will I sing something so sad?
45:01But I liked the theme — “Arlekino.”
45:03And how do you tell if it’s a hit or not?
45:05I don’t know, I just feel it.
45:07It’s like wearing something you feel good in — that’s a hit.
45:11And you step on stage knowing it’s a hit.
45:15You feel that it will stay in people’s hearts.
45:17Yes, and once at a party,
45:20we were hippie-ing like crazy, visiting Boris Barkas.
45:25Alexander Lerman, Vesyolye Rebyata — everyone sitting around, having fun.
45:29And I remember I brought this little gadget
45:33you could fry things in.
45:35We were all cheerful, having a good time.
45:38And Boris said, “let’s talk.”
45:40I said, “all right.”
45:41We started talking — he had been drinking — about creativity.
45:44I said, “Boris, write me lyrics for this music.”
45:48He said, “for me that’s a five-minute job.
45:54I’m a people’s, a genius poet.”
45:57I said, “Boris, I’ll go back to the guys,
46:01and you sit here and write.”
46:03Not even half an hour, maybe forty minutes later,
46:05he came down with the lyrics.
46:07We were all stunned, the text was incredible.
46:10And that was exactly the final lyrics?
46:12Yes, that text.
46:23And the laughter — was that your own idea?
46:25Of course.
46:26Back in circus school we used to sing songs with laughter.
46:31Even the Soviet national anthem.
46:39Is it true you sang it, and then they clapped
46:42for 10 or 15 minutes until you sang it again?
46:45Yes.
46:46You performed and toured a lot, but
46:48that had never happened before?
46:50Katya, nobody knew me, but I always performed successfully, you see?
46:53And with Yuliy Slobodkin we put together a program.
46:56Two absolutely unknown people.
46:58In little parks, Zhdanovsky Park.
47:00We even opened for Kartsev and Ilchenko, because
47:04nobody else wanted to — it was such a
47:06specific audience.
47:08They came for comedy, for laughter.
47:10And whoever they brought on was completely lost,
47:13because people would just step out to smoke,
47:17or simply walk away.
47:20And when no one else wanted to go on, they thought,
47:22“well, these two unknowns, they won’t care.”
47:25So we went on stage.
47:28And again the crowd started moving, drifting off —
47:31and that’s when my character showed.
47:35I said jokingly — it was a comedy show after all —
47:39“Stop!
47:40Who told you to leave when such brilliant singers are on stage?”
47:44I started making jokes about it.
47:46They laughed, sat back down, and then it was a huge success.
47:51They saw us off with ovations.
47:53That concert stuck with Kartsev, Ilchenko,
47:56and Zhvanetsky, who wrote that program.
47:59After Bulgaria, where Dimitrov brought you flowers
48:03to your hotel room, surprised by the second life of his song — is that right?
48:07He carried us onto the stage. Of course.
48:10He was absolutely shocked, delighted, a wonderful man.
48:15You returned to the Soviet Union a star.
48:17I was so proud, walking with the Golden Orpheus,
48:21though it was in a box.
48:24And the customs officers asked, “what’s in the box?”
48:26I said, “the Golden Orpheus.”
48:29They said, “Golden? Show us.”
48:30I took it out, showed them.
48:33“Oh, an athlete, huh? Go on.”
48:35They thought it was a sports trophy.
48:37Nobody even knew about it at all.
48:39So the contest wasn’t shown on TV?
48:41No, it wasn’t.
48:42It was always shown, but that time, for some reason, they refused.
48:46I don’t know why.
48:47Maybe they didn’t want the success.
48:51An unknown singer — who knows how it might end?
48:53Everyone was afraid of something.
48:55But the Bulgarian authorities insisted on the broadcast.
48:59We were at Mineralnye Vody with Pasha Slobodkin.
49:04We were invited to a party.
49:05Everyone was eating, drinking, watching the Bulgarian festival.
49:10I thought I hadn’t seen it.
49:13So everyone was sitting there, eating.
49:17And then suddenly, silence.
49:22Forks, knives, plates stopped clattering.
49:24They were listening to me.
49:26I glanced over and thought, not bad.
49:31And I relaxed. Good.
49:33And when my performance ended, they looked
49:37at me with different eyes.
49:39That moment I remembered.
49:41They looked at me differently.
49:44And that look became a guide for me.
49:47That’s how people should look.
49:48Alla Borisovna, we’re glad to welcome you.
49:50Hello, hello.
49:53We love you! We adore you!
49:56Happiness, health. Come visit us!
49:58Bravo, bravo, bravo!
50:00Thank you, thank you, thank you.
50:02Well, what more do you need? I’m an introvert.
50:04What do you expect from me?
50:06No one would believe you’re an introvert.
50:08Well, imagine that.
50:09That’s why the stage is my salvation.
50:11Because the people are far away in the hall.
50:14I don’t see them, but I feel them.
50:16I start to love them.
50:18But in real life, I’m wary of crowds.
50:20Or when, you know, you have to attend fashion shows.
50:23Or even step onto a festival stage.
50:25God, 76 years old, and I…
50:29Hello, hello.
50:31I start to feel shy.
50:33Shy, maybe, of some unnecessary attention.
50:36It always feels excessive to me.
50:38But the stage saves me, because there
50:40I’m completely free.
50:43I feel good.
50:45I’m all focused on the fact that everything
50:48I’ve held in when not interacting
50:50all comes out on stage.
50:54I craved that contact.
50:59— Is this your house? — No, of course not.
51:01We’ve been renting it for years.
51:04This is Villa Marta, designed by some brilliant architect.
51:09It’s really something…
51:11Well, the kids got used to this house since they were four or five.
51:15They love it here.
51:17Now it’s harder, of course, because they’re teenagers.
51:19You must be bored now, right?
51:22But when they were little, there was always something —
51:24going to the park, riding the tram.
51:28And now?
51:29Now I just do everything alone.
51:31Skateboard. They have bikes now.
51:35Speedboards, bicycles. I still do it.
51:37Just like last year, but dad
51:40can’t do it now — you never go out.
51:44How can you say I don’t? What are you talking about?
51:46We go for walks together.
51:48Well, we do go out.
51:49But you don’t ride a skateboard.
51:50Are you used to living here now?
51:51Not in Moscow, I mean — not in Russia.
51:54Yes. What does it mean, “to live”?
51:56We live as we always did.
51:58Before this, you lived in a castle in Gryaz, near Moscow.
52:01It’s still there, let it stand.
52:03They always want to confiscate it, take it away, as if
52:08it were something stolen.
52:10I don’t know.
52:11It’s enchanted, you know.
52:13But really, what difference does it make if you live in a castle or not?
52:17What matters is health — the children’s, my husband’s, and happiness in the family.
52:21That’s all you really need.
52:23To be honest, I was never used to any kind of big luxury.
52:26Well, they say Pugacheva is not only the most famous,
52:29but also the richest singer in Russia.
52:32What are you saying?
52:33That’s all relative.
52:36Compared to Madonna, I’m poor.
52:40And for the first 20 years of my already famous career,
52:45I didn’t earn anything.
52:46They just threw us crumbs.
52:49The state took everything else.
52:51The stadiums, the recordings, the records printed in huge numbers.
52:57I’d get maybe 25 rubles.
52:59And can you imagine how much the state took?
53:02I never even thought about it.
53:03They told me to work.
53:05I ran there — paid or not paid — because I lived for it.
53:10But later it got tiring, because
53:13I kept telling Raimonds Pauls and Ilya Reznik,
53:15“Maybe you could share with me?
53:17I still need to live somehow. There’s Kristina, and everything else.”
53:22They said, “No.”
53:23— I said, “At least 2 percent.” — No.
53:26And I thought, if they don’t pay me as a singer,
53:2915 rubles from a stadium show, you know?
53:31Later it became something like 40.
53:33And abroad, it was $200 per concert.
53:35Honestly, I didn’t even know how much, because everything was taken away.
53:39We only got daily allowances.
53:41I remember meeting a Japanese journalist who
53:44afterward wrote that there were two great people:
53:47Can you imagine — Gagarin and Pugacheva.
53:49I almost sank through the floor.
53:51I thought, my God, what will people say?
53:53Then he asked me, “How much do you get for a concert?”
53:56I thought, I’ll tell him something outrageous.
53:59So I said, “I get a thousand rubles.”
54:03And he said, “That’s all?”
54:06I thought, oh no.
54:07That’s when I realized I had to write music, because
54:09the authors made good money.
54:12So I started writing songs.
54:13So the appearance of the pseudonym Boris Gorbonos
54:15wasn’t just a creative mystery, it was also a business project?
54:19Of course.
54:20I’ll tell you, I lived wonderfully.
54:24On Sundays we had shrimp, even meat from the market.
54:28Yes, we did.
54:29Bella Akhmadulina and Yevgeny Yevtushenko came over.
54:31All in my 19 square meters.
54:33But I thought it was amazing.
54:35That apartment was filled with love and creativity.
54:39That was near Yaroslavka?
54:41No, in Vishnyaki.
54:42Reznik slept on the kitchen floor,
54:44and in the morning he’d bring new lyrics.
54:47It wasn’t just life, it was beauty.
54:49I didn’t need anything else.
54:51— Was it a happy time? — Yes, of course.
54:54Very happy.
54:55But foreign journalists, from West Germany and elsewhere,
54:59started pushing to see how I lived, and where could I take them?
55:04I arranged with Zatsepin, since he was my sound engineer.
55:09Svetlana played the role of my maid.
55:12Kristina and I came there.
55:14I told the West German reporters that our apartment was under renovation.
55:17You see, the apartment’s huge, so it would take a while.
55:20“Let’s meet at my studio instead.”
55:22They were amazed.
55:24Zatsepin was such a tech genius.
55:25He invented all sorts of things.
55:27Press a button, and the curtains would open.
55:31For me, that studio was just magical.
55:33I was lucky.
55:34So they filmed me there, at the studio.
55:37Then others wanted to as well.
55:40And I said to Joseph Kobzon, “What should I do?
55:43Film at your dacha?”
55:44He said, “No, mine’s not great either.”
55:47So we went to Kolomin at the city hall.
55:51Joseph Kobzon explained the situation,
55:54and they were shocked:
55:56“How? This is the foreign press!”
55:58And they gave me that apartment on Tverskaya-Yamskaya.
56:01Back then it was called Gorky Street.
56:03Well, they gave it to me.
56:05But it still had to be furnished.
56:06So, well, friends helped…
56:11They just staged it for me.
56:13Then I finally relaxed.
56:14Everyone came, everyone liked it.
56:16Rumors. Is it true that the plumbing for that apartment
56:20you got in exchange for performing at the opening of Hotel Cosmos,
56:23where you sang with Joe Dassin?
56:26Of course.
56:26He got a pile of money, and you got a toilet and a bathtub.
56:29That’s not how it was. I performed with him.
56:32We kind of became friends there and talked a lot.
56:35After the show he found out that I hadn’t gotten money,
56:38but a lighter with “Cosmos” written on it.
56:41— Thank you. — Can you imagine?
56:44Why did you even tell him that?
56:46He said, “I’ll give you a present.”
56:48And so he arranged it.
56:51And they sent me this gorgeous set, custom-made,
56:54because I never saw anything like it at Cosmos.
56:57Of course it was luxurious, and then they even sent
57:01a French plumber to install it all.
57:04You had to see and hear it.
57:05It was an amazing exchange.
57:09A hilarious dialogue.
57:10He was working, tinkering away.
57:12And he says, “Listen, Joe Dassin, you need thicker pipes.
57:15You don’t know our water, our system.
57:17It’ll burst everything.”
57:18“No, no, no,” Joe Dassin replies to him in French.
57:27And the plumber, not understanding, goes, “Well, you could’ve just said so.”
57:30That’s how it happened.
57:31In our apartment — a gift from Joe Dassin.
57:35But you never admitted to anyone
57:37that you lived in hardship, that even after performing
57:40at Golden Orpheus and becoming hugely popular, you had nothing.
57:43I read in Reznik’s memoirs
57:45that he came to see you in Vishnyaki
57:47and saw you only had a mattress.
57:50But you created this legend about living in luxury.
57:53I like those legends.
57:55Katya, it’s so nice.
57:57Even today they write that I have a luxurious villa in Caesarea.
58:01A villa somewhere in Tel Aviv. A chic apartment.
58:04It’s nice.
58:05Nice?
58:06Well, of course it’s nice that they think I have it.
58:11What am I supposed to say, that we rent from my brother?
58:14I love when people make things up — as long as it’s not nasty.
58:17And nasty things? Now they call you a traitor.
58:19And what exactly am I supposed to have betrayed?
58:21They say you betrayed Russia, left it, didn’t stay.
58:25And now live outside it.
58:26And your husband is a “foreign agent,” if you didn’t know.
58:30No, wait.
58:31Yes, they say I ran away.
58:33Ran.
58:33With my heels flashing.
58:35How little must you respect your country to say
58:37that someone “ran away” from it?
58:38What is it, some kind of prison?
58:39No. I think the real subtext was that
58:43the country fed me, clothed me, pampered me, cherished me,
58:49gave me some awards.
58:50And then I supposedly turned my back and left.
58:53As if I’d been lying since childhood
58:55on a soft couch, and the country had been
58:59spoon-feeding me all my life.
59:01And the fact that I worked, that I studied—
59:04that doesn’t seem to count.
59:05It’s strange, really.
59:07And besides, a person has the right to leave
59:10so as not to be insulted.
59:12And if you’re insulted out of nowhere, honestly…
59:15Well, I was shocked at such insults.
59:18Yes. Just shocked.
59:20— But not very surprised. — Why?
59:23Because I knew it would happen.
59:26In my youth, when I was starting out, I was surrounded by
59:29very smart and talented people.
59:32Like Lidia Ruslanova, Muslim Magomayev,
59:36Klavdiya Shulzhenko.
59:37They all lived very modestly.
59:39And when I talked with them,
59:43Muslim Magomayev told me, “Leave at sixty.”
59:46Why at sixty?
59:47I said, “Why not sixty-one?”
59:48He said, “I swear, after sixty it will be terrible.
59:54They’ll belittle you, erase you.”
59:56Lidia Ruslanova said, “The sooner, the better.
1:00:00Do your job and run".
1:00:01Well, she had her own business to attend to, adding:
1:00:03“If you say anything else, you’ll be arrested.”
1:00:05Klavdiya Shulzhenko used to say,
1:00:09“As long as I could bow to the ground like this, I could sing.
1:00:15The moment I realized I couldn’t
1:00:18make such a bow, that meant it was over.”
1:00:22I believed her.
1:00:24And I don’t regret it one bit, you know.
1:00:27Because now I fully understand that you need to leave the stage
1:00:30and even the political arena in time.
1:00:35Just in time.
1:00:36Otherwise, they’ll turn against you.
1:00:38Traitor.
1:00:39But what exactly did I betray?
1:00:40I said long ago that I could leave my homeland,
1:00:43which I love deeply, only in one case.
1:00:46If my homeland betrayed me.
1:00:48And it did betray me.
1:00:50But I am not betrayed by the millions of fans,
1:00:55in Russia and abroad.
1:00:57As long as they are alive, as long as this era,
1:01:01this living generation, exists, I will always enjoy
1:01:05hearing their declarations of love, watching the videos they send.
1:01:09Even from abroad, like my friend in India,
1:01:12who sent me a clip of people driving, while an Indian man
1:01:16was singing “a million, a million, a million.”
1:01:18So, I have no reason to feel down about that.
1:01:21As for those, what do they call them, bots?
1:01:24Who write God knows what, well, over my life
1:01:26I’ve received so many scars on my soul
1:01:29that I’m practically invulnerable.
1:01:31Russia is the kind of country where there must always be
1:01:34one main writer, one main artist, one main singer.
1:01:37And even when you yourself said
1:01:39that you no longer perform, you still remained
1:01:42Alla Pugacheva, the main singer on that stage.
1:01:44Now that you are no longer in Russia,
1:01:46it’s as if there is no Prima Donna anymore.
1:01:48Oh, for God’s sake, for God’s sake.
1:01:52God, how I hate it when they call me Prima Donna.
1:01:55“Prima Donna” is the title of a song.
1:01:57From the very beginning, I said I am neither queen nor empress,
1:02:00“I am a woman who sings.”
1:02:03And I don’t care with what voice I will sing.
1:02:06But I will sing, I’ll even whisper, you see?
1:02:08And I can do that because I am not the Prima Donna.
1:02:12“I am a woman who sings.”
1:02:14But now Nadezhda Kadysheva is taking her turn.
1:02:17—Well, thank God. —Tatiana Bulanova.
1:02:18Well, I’m happy for Nadezhda.
1:02:20Very happy, very happy, because I remember
1:02:24many years ago, there was an anniversary of the magazine "Rabotnitsa".
1:02:27Most likely an anniversary of the magazine "Rabotnitsa",
1:02:31at the Rossiya Hotel, with many guests.
1:02:33And a girl in a leather jacket was singing songs.
1:02:36It was so cool, so striking, that I remembered her from back then.
1:02:42And now when I see that the very same songs
1:02:45have lived such a long life,
1:02:47and that people still love them, the time has come.
1:02:50And is there some explanation for that?
1:02:52Of course there is.
1:02:53A time machine back?
1:02:54It’s all driven by people.
1:02:57Whatever they lack, that’s what they seek on stage.
1:03:00Of course, they lack optimism, they lack
1:03:03faith in something, they lack simple joy,
1:03:06a chance to forget everything that’s happening,
1:03:09to rest a little.
1:03:11And that’s Nadezhda Kadysheva.
1:03:13I’d run to her myself, I swear.
1:03:19Nadezhda is wonderful.
1:03:21And of course, it’s amusing how they now discuss Bulanova with her dancers.
1:03:26Tatiana, don’t get rid of those dancers.
1:03:29It’s so original, so unexpected,
1:03:33unpolished, but it feels like people just stepped out of the audience
1:03:36and started dancing for you.
1:03:38There’s a real charm in that.
1:03:41Tatiana, soon people will come just to see them.
1:03:45Bravo, guys.
1:03:47So, onward with your song.
1:03:50Are you speaking sincerely now?
1:03:52Max and I discussed it yesterday.
1:03:53Can you imagine, as someone already older,
1:03:56Tatiana too.
1:03:57She doesn’t throw these people away, you see?
1:04:00Because they’ve all been with her together.
1:04:02That’s what? “We don’t abandon our own.”
1:04:06And what’s wrong with that?
1:04:11By the way, I do listen to the president.
1:04:15I noticed.
1:04:16I used to have doubts about some things.
1:04:19Well, let’s say, about life’s various issues.
1:04:22And suddenly I hear.
1:04:23“The president says we need people.
1:04:27The kind who are fed, drunk, and with their noses in snuff, or even cocaine.
1:04:33But the smart ones are harder.
1:04:36The former are easier, the latter are harder.
1:04:39They can influence opinion.
1:04:42We don’t need those.”
1:04:44And a weight fell off my chest.
1:04:48— Do you follow this closely? — Well, of course I do.
1:04:50By the way, Shaman is your protégé.
1:04:52Well, Shaman, yes.
1:04:57And you gave him a ticket to life. Well, it wasn’t me.
1:05:00Well, Shaman. Shaman.
1:05:02He couldn’t even support me, at least
1:05:05in one thing, when they said that supposedly I
1:05:09kicked him out of, what was it called, Factor A.
1:05:13Well, just say that’s not true, that in the final jury
1:05:15we weren’t the ones who voted.
1:05:18Yaroslav, remember that.
1:05:20It was a public vote.
1:05:22And they liked not you, but that one—
1:05:25what’s his name, Savin, Savin.
1:05:27Well, what can you do.
1:05:28So I banged the table and said, I knew it.
1:05:30I was absolutely convinced he was a real star.
1:05:35That’s charisma.
1:05:38I wasn’t blind.
1:05:39I could see the voice was strong.
1:05:42The guy was modest.
1:05:43He had an image that really won me over.
1:05:47Well, I did everything I could.
1:05:49And his father, well done, an honest man.
1:05:53He said that I helped, and helped a lot.
1:05:57That was nice to hear.
1:05:58Thank you, Shaman’s father.
1:06:01And I truly believed in him, and I didn’t expect
1:06:03that he would turn into this kind of singer.
1:06:07I thought the whole world would be at his feet,
1:06:09because he performed amazing Russian folk songs.
1:06:13— Right? — Yes.
1:06:14And the whole world would have been at his feet for a long time,
1:06:17because that’s timeless art.
1:06:20And he could even, maybe, have been greater
1:06:21than Sumishevsky, whom I also really like.
1:06:24But he could outsing him, that song, anything.
1:06:28Now of course it hurts to watch, but money beat goodness.
1:06:34I feel sorry, because maybe I hope
1:06:37I won’t cut off his air with these words,
1:06:40but I’ve always said what I think.
1:06:43The man achieved what he wanted.
1:06:45He is a talented person.
1:06:47But I didn’t think he was that pragmatic.
1:06:50And the songs that may be needed, and
1:06:56all the songs he sings, I feel
1:06:59they’re like “a clanging cymbal.”
1:07:02Well, if you don’t understand, look it up: “a clanging cymbal” or
1:07:07“sounding brass.”
1:07:08It’s very well written there.
1:07:10There is success, there is beauty, there are, let’s say,
1:07:15songs, money, fame, everything, but there is no love in the person.
1:07:22When he sings those loud songs like “I Am Russian”
1:07:25or “We Will Rise,” works that are indeed
1:07:28patriotic and necessary in people’s view.
1:07:34But then he starts singing other songs, and I
1:07:37immediately understand, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
1:07:39He most likely won’t even understand what I’m saying.
1:07:41That’s the real tragedy.
1:07:43I’m not talking about carnal love.
1:07:44Love is God, it’s something sacred,
1:07:48and songs are not just words and music.
1:07:52If you don’t add love into them,
1:07:55it won’t reach people anyway.
1:07:57No matter how hard you try, how loudly you sing,
1:07:59how much you move around,
1:08:01and no one will tell him, no one will hint, and I won’t either.
1:08:04It’s not just about crossing yourself in church, you must
1:08:08sanctify every song with your soul, with love for the audience.
1:08:12Not for success—success will come anyway—
1:08:15but with love for the people you sing to.
1:08:19As they’d say now, “those who feed you, give you drink,
1:08:24and you don’t sing songs about love,”
1:08:27or you’ll run off somewhere else.
1:08:28Who knows where, but I know where he might run off to.
1:08:31A candidate for deputy—that’s the lesser case.
1:08:35He’ll already be Minister of Culture
1:08:39or head of the presidential administration.
1:08:42Yes-yes-yes-yes-yes-yes-yes.
1:08:44But can someone who lives for music, for creativity,
1:08:47be a deputy?
1:08:49Well, Kobzon could.
1:08:51And why should he be any less?
1:08:52Look how people support him.
1:08:54There they are, cheering him on.
1:08:56And with Mizulina by his side, you see.
1:08:59That’s already a very interesting alliance.
1:09:02And that keeps him afloat, and he’ll be judging others for how they sing.
1:09:07And no one will care anymore what Pugacheva said,
1:09:11“that there’s no love. Oh, you old hag.”
1:09:14Listen to me.
1:09:15I don’t say things for nothing.
1:09:18Actually, fame—money a person can endure and get through.
1:09:22As they say, through fire, water, and brass pipes.
1:09:24Poverty a person can endure.
1:09:25But fame—that’s something very few
1:09:28can endure without serious distortions.
1:09:31Did you ever catch yourself thinking
1:09:33you were going overboard?
1:09:37Well, yes, there was a moment.
1:09:39I thought I could get away with it.
1:09:43Like driving off somewhere in a police car, something like that.
1:09:46I don’t remember.
1:09:47Basically, reckless behavior.
1:09:49Like, what could they do to me?
1:09:51I was acting from the heart.
1:09:53Some silly woman’s excuse, you know, who’s lost her head.
1:09:58I didn’t do anything bad, of course, but
1:10:02I’ll admit honestly, I remember that case.
1:10:05Alla, sing something for us.
1:10:08— A little tune? — For Russian people.
1:10:12— Which song? — Any.
1:10:15Oh, frost, frost, don’t freeze me.
1:10:22Why don’t you sing yourselves?
1:10:25Don’t freeze me, don’t freeze my horse.
1:10:31There, that’s a Russian person.
1:10:32So, they say you have no voice.
1:10:35— Me? — Yes.
1:10:36I have one, I just don’t want to show it much.
1:10:39I’m tired of it.
1:10:40I want some new colors.
1:10:42Even in a whisper, with rasp, with something different.
1:10:48I won’t tell.
1:10:50Well, I want to sing, but I won’t say.
1:10:53I have some ideas, even just so people won’t recognize me.
1:10:58Like, “the aunt is having fun.”
1:11:01I read somewhere that the city you toured most often
1:11:03was Tyumen.
1:11:05Well, not that often, but for me it’s a sacred city.
1:11:10Why?
1:11:11Because we were there with
1:11:13the youth agit-brigade, under the toughest conditions,
1:11:16but we met amazing people.
1:11:19Raul–Yuri Ervier, Farman Salmanov—what men they were.
1:11:23They believed in me so much,
1:11:26they loved the way I sang, and I celebrated
1:11:29my 18th birthday beyond the Arctic Circle there.
1:11:31My God, the things they said would happen with me —
1:11:33it was amazing, “if anything, we’ll help.”
1:11:37They were the first fans who made me believe
1:11:40that I truly had to do something.
1:11:42And then you got fans in Ostankino, I’d say.
1:11:46No, that was Trifonov, Ivanov, that was before.
1:11:50That was actually my very first appearance.
1:11:52I remember we didn’t have telephones,
1:11:55you could only send a telegram.
1:11:57I woke up and my mother said,
1:12:00“You got some strange telegram.”
1:12:01I said, “What?”
1:12:03I looked, it said, “Good morning, could you appear”
1:12:07at such-and-such time for a meeting with Vladimir Trifonov.
1:12:12I said, who’s Vladimir Trifonov?
1:12:14He was one of the editors of “Good Morning.”
1:12:15Yes, yes, Dmitry Ivanov and Vladimir Trifonov.
1:12:18They liked the song "Robot," so they asked me to record it.
1:12:21That was my first recording.
1:12:24My God, my legs were shaking, there’s even a photo online
1:12:28where I’m in a little dress, with short black hair.
1:12:34So funny.
1:12:36By the way, that’s my elder son’s favorite song of yours.
1:12:40"Robot"?
1:12:40Well, Lord, I didn’t even realize it was such an ironic song.
1:12:45I was suffering. "But you were a man."
1:12:47Listen, now that we’re all talking to GPT,
1:12:49I think that song is very relevant.
1:12:52Now it’s relevant.
1:12:52I quarreled with it yesterday.
1:12:54— Why did you quarrel with it? — It was rude.
1:13:00Unbelievable.
1:13:01I’m afraid to use it because people say
1:13:03so many strange things about it.
1:13:06Yes, you shouldn’t get too close to such a person—
1:13:10or whatever he is, a robot.
1:13:11Maybe he really was a man.
1:13:13Were there any singers you wanted to see yourself alongside?
1:13:18Not alongside. I just admired them.
1:13:21And they were a life lesson for me.
1:13:24Like beacons I should follow and look up to.
1:13:29Klavdiya Ivanovna Shulzhenko, Édith Piaf, and Elena Kamburova.
1:13:33I used to run to Lena’s concerts.
1:13:35When I was a student, I was amazed.
1:13:38I thought, what an actress, what command of her voice.
1:13:41And she seemed to do nothing.
1:13:43She just stood there.
1:13:44She was like Édith Piaf for me.
1:13:46And Klavdiya Ivanovna—such a unique woman.
1:13:50She always said,
1:13:51I asked, “You performed during the war, in those brigades.
1:13:55My mother too. What did you sing?”
1:13:57She said, “What do you mean? About love.”
1:14:00I said, “And Blue Scarf?”
1:14:01She said, “That’s about love too.”
1:14:03They didn’t sing those so-called morale-boosting songs.
1:14:08And everyone was happy, and sometimes the boys, the soldiers, cried.
1:14:13For them it was as if they were home again.
1:14:17She told me then, “Sing about love.”
1:14:21Yes, that’s what she said.
1:14:23Before that,
1:14:24you should’ve heard me when they forced me to sing Soviet songs.
1:14:28Songs that were very, even industrial.
1:14:31About mentors, for example.
1:14:33“My mentor, my friend.”
1:14:37Well, what did you expect? I was searching for myself.
1:14:40I realized it wasn’t mine, but I couldn’t not sing anymore.
1:14:46They asked, I sang.
1:14:48Was there a singer whose voice you envied?
1:14:51Or an image you envied?
1:14:53Or you looked and said,
1:14:54“My God, I want that, but I can’t do it.”
1:14:56Many won’t believe me, but I don’t know what envy is.
1:15:00I don’t understand that feeling.
1:15:01I know it exists.
1:15:03I know many even suffer from it.
1:15:06But I don’t understand what it is.
1:15:08There’s the feeling of frustration.
1:15:10I had that when I imagined
1:15:13what I would be like, what songs I’d sing.
1:15:16I must’ve been 19 or 18.
1:15:20And suddenly on TV they showed Caterina Valente.
1:15:24Yes, I think she even came to the Soviet Union.
1:15:28She began performing, singing, sitting on a high stool.
1:15:32And I saw the songs she sang, the way she was dressed.
1:15:36And I realized, excuse me, it was all already done.
1:15:41I cried for two days, you know?
1:15:44Then calmed down, I’d find my own way.
1:15:47Oh no, no, no, no, no.
1:15:49Hello there.
1:15:50One-armed bandit.
1:15:52Sit with us. Let’s relax together.
1:15:54I’m without a microphone.
1:15:55Oh, you’re on cushions, you’re comfortable.
1:15:57Listen, while you’re here, I want to recall
1:16:00the name of that architect who designed
1:16:04this villa, and what else he built?
1:16:06— What was it, Gerher? — Meinhard von Gerkan.
1:16:09He built this villa around the old one, the old villa is over there.
1:16:13And he built this one, the big one.
1:16:16Yes, Gerkan.
1:16:18He also built Sheremetyevo-2, he built
1:16:20Hamburg Airport, Stuttgart Airport, and
1:16:24Alla performed at the Tempodrom in Berlin, a big concert venue,
1:16:28a sort of tent, also his work.
1:16:31And I performed at the concert hall in Bielefeld, also his.
1:16:35And now you walk around with that little net bag.
1:16:38You know everything.
1:16:39Meinhard von Gerkan.
1:16:43I’m heading out.
1:16:45Did you say something nice about me?
1:16:46We said you’re the breadwinner.
1:16:48Ah, yes, I’m off to provide.
1:16:50Shall I help you up?
1:16:52No need, I’m a sporty breadwinner, it’s fine.
1:16:55Just in case, I’ll walk backward,
1:16:57I don’t know what might have left a mark.
1:17:00Go that way.
1:17:01I don’t even know how to get in there.
1:17:03Oh well, I’ll go.
1:17:04Yes, fine. Done.
1:17:06Nothing left a mark.
1:17:08— You’re in a white coat. — Perfect.
1:17:12Is this happiness?
1:17:14This is happiness, true happiness.
1:17:18I can’t even talk about it.
1:17:21He has an incredible gift of l oving me, loving the family,
1:17:25and protecting me. You see?
1:17:28I’ve had quite a few marriages.
1:17:30— Five. — Hold on.
1:17:35Two real marriages.
1:17:37The first with Mikolas and the last with Max.
1:17:42And those three in the middle were helping a friend.
1:17:46— Really? — Yes.
1:17:47Stepanovich needed residency registration.
1:17:50To get that, you had to live three years in Moscow,
1:17:53married, so he had to marry someone.
1:17:56And Derbenev advised him and asked me
1:17:59to enter into such an official marriage.
1:18:02And the story that he left his fiancée
1:18:04and you left Orbelyan because
1:18:06you loved each other so much, is that not true?
1:18:08You have to know Sasha.
1:18:10Good Lord, if he wrote scripts,
1:18:12then in his own life he certainly wrote one.
1:18:14How could he have made me a singer,
1:18:17when I was already a singer, you know?
1:18:21And already quite famous.
1:18:22And he didn’t invent your image, as they say?
1:18:24Of course not, why invent it,
1:18:27when you’ve worked in the same image all your life?
1:18:29It’s all nonsense.
1:18:30He was always afraid that, as he said,
1:18:33“Pugachevochka, I have one idea, you know,
1:18:36they could catch us for a fake marriage.”
1:18:39And it really was strict back then if anything was off.
1:18:41“Let’s sit at the table now.”
1:18:44So we sat in the kitchen.
1:18:45“Let’s write love notes to each other and put dates.”
1:18:48I said, “Why?”
1:18:49He said, “Well, why? As proof.”
1:18:51I said, “Alright then.”
1:18:53We wrote each other some silly little notes.
1:18:57And I forgot about them.
1:18:59And only recently remembered.
1:19:01I thought, my God, what a clever, cunning guy.
1:19:07And suddenly I had done him such a kindness.
1:19:10Exactly three years—we got married at Christmas,
1:19:14and three years later at Christmas we divorced.
1:19:17And even celebrated it with Vysotsky.
1:19:20And some other friends were there.
1:19:22And instead of thanking me—
1:19:23I did everything I could for him, you see.
1:19:26Really, everything.
1:19:28Knowing we were going to divorce, he withdrew all the money from my accounts.
1:19:33And back then, excuse me, it was 47,000 rubles—
1:19:36enough to buy three Volga cars.
1:19:37And after that he stunned us all.
1:19:43Friends and acquaintances— he started dividing up property.
1:19:46— Yours? — Mine.
1:19:47And just try to say something.
1:19:49Was there a marriage? There was.
1:19:51By law?
1:19:52He brought in some people who appraised everything.
1:19:55I was just so shocked by all this.
1:19:58I thought, how is this possible?
1:19:59Naturally, the trial began.
1:20:02I had to fight for every single little thing.
1:20:06The funniest episodes were when he appraised some rug made of dogs.
1:20:13It had been gifted to me somewhere, God knows where, beyond the Arctic Circle.
1:20:18So we found the man.
1:20:19— Who gave it? — The lawyer, yes.
1:20:21And he testified in court.
1:20:23“I gave it. These are my ten beloved dogs.
1:20:26I can name them: Zhuchka, Puchka, and the others.”
1:20:30Both laughable and shameful.
1:20:32Humiliating.
1:20:33Then he had some extra notes, apparently he had them.
1:20:38Some kind of evidence, I remember he had.
1:20:41That even before this sham marriage, we already knew each other...
1:20:45That’s what he explained.
1:20:47So he said, “She was my woman.
1:20:50So this property was already given back then. That’s it.”
1:20:53We had to call in people.
1:20:56Reznik came in and said, “We need witnesses now.”
1:21:02It’s funny to remember now.
1:21:06Orbelyan came in and said, “Don’t lie. I lived with her.”
1:21:10Looked at the note. “This year and that year.”
1:21:13Then out comes Stas Namin.
1:21:15“Why does he say they were together in Poland?
1:21:19He wasn’t there at all. I was with Pugacheva.
1:21:22I even have two keys to the hotel room.
1:21:25Mine and hers. We lived together.”
1:21:27In short, it was like Fellini.
1:21:31An absurd film.
1:21:32With your passion for mystifications.
1:21:34His fantasy.
1:21:36And it produced some incredible result.
1:21:37Because I’ve read so many biographies of you - they’re all different.
1:21:40He’s an interesting person, I have to give him that.
1:21:44He was very well-read.
1:21:45The only thing he gave me was to read Mandelstam.
1:21:48He was a terrible anti-Soviet.
1:21:50I said, how do you know all these laws?
1:21:52“Pugachevochka, I hate the Soviet Union so much
1:21:55that I memorized all these laws by heart.”
1:21:59He introduced me to the artist Anatoly Brusilovsky.
1:22:04I adored him.
1:22:05He really gave me a lot.
1:22:07He introduced me to artists.
1:22:09He introduced me to a magazine against censorship, I forget its name.
1:22:13“Metropol.”
1:22:14They were all very interesting people.
1:22:16I sat there in awe of them.
1:22:18Limonov, of course, was there…
1:22:20You never had an affair with Limonov?
1:22:21I feel like you two really…
1:22:23Me and Limonov?
1:22:24He was crazy, come on. I’m a woman with taste.
1:22:26I’m a woman of taste.
1:22:27But he was charismatic too.
1:22:29Charismatic, yes.
1:22:31But what affair?
1:22:32He already had a wife then.
1:22:34Or someone, I don’t know. They left.
1:22:36Then Natasha Medvedeva appeared.
1:22:39Another colorful, talented girl.
1:22:43I felt so sorry for her.
1:22:44Now she would have been interesting,
1:22:47just like Chelobanov, who was of no interest to anyone.
1:22:49And now suddenly he’s interesting.
1:22:51What a voice!
1:22:52And where were you before?
1:22:54Where were you before, when from some
1:22:56alcoholic and drug addict Senka, as everyone called him,
1:23:01we had to create Sergei Vasilievich Chelobanov.
1:23:03But he’s a grateful man, truly.
1:23:05He remembers it all and knows it.
1:23:07And to invent, in particular, this passionate affair
1:23:11That never existed?
1:23:11It never happened. Well, sometimes I…
1:23:14A traveling wife, I always said.
1:23:15Felt like, “who’s around? Okay, this one.”
1:23:17Well yes, I don’t hide it.
1:23:20For health.
1:23:22What can I say?
1:23:23I was a young woman, you see?
1:23:24Why should I care?
1:23:26But that wasn’t love, of course.
1:23:28And the funniest thing was that in my apartment
1:23:31there was this beautiful mirror, he brought it from Leningrad,
1:23:35and two plump little golden angels, gilded.
1:23:41They were on either side of the mirror.
1:23:44And when the divorce was over, and he had
1:23:46to take his things, the mirror was lying on the balcony.
1:23:50And at that moment, Nikita Mikhalkov was sitting with a friend.
1:23:54Sasha says, “Where’s the mirror?”
1:23:56I say, “On the balcony.”
1:23:57Nikita says, “We’ll carry it out, and you sit at the piano and play something.”
1:24:01And they carried it out to Chopin’s Funeral March, everyone singing along.
1:24:10They carried it out.
1:24:13A large, round mirror. Yes.
1:24:17And he carried those little angels.
1:24:19Like this.
1:24:21Well, we started laughing, because it was
1:24:23the buttocks of those angels.
1:24:27Big, gilded ones.
1:24:29He stood there with these two little butts and said,
1:24:32“I wish you happiness, Pugachevochka, in your personal life.
1:24:37Forgive me if I did wrong. Nothing personal.”
1:24:39I said, “That’s true.”
1:24:42Well, of course we roared with laughter, fell under the table.
1:24:45When he turned to leave, the angels’ butts were waving at us.
1:24:52My God. And the most interesting thing is that in one
1:24:55of his last two TV interviews,
1:24:58he was walking down the Ostankino corridor and said to me,
1:25:03“Pugachevochka, forgive me.
1:25:07That’s just how it turned out.”
1:25:08And he asked forgiveness through friends,
1:25:13because I didn’t want to see him, and then he died.
1:25:16See, he managed.
1:25:18Did you forgive him?
1:25:19Yes, of course, my God.
1:25:20This is my life. This is my script.
1:25:23Any film, good or bad,
1:25:26if you made it yourself, you love it.
1:25:28— Do you forgive easily? — Easily.
1:25:32Later forgiveness I don’t want to talk about now.
1:25:35— And Zhenya Boldin. — Boldin, yes.
1:25:37Yes, we were together for, what, 10 years?
1:25:40Yes, indeed.
1:25:40Yes, we had a good relationship, and such closeness.
1:25:44I adored him. He was so handsome.
1:25:47Also not quite love.
1:25:48We weren’t exactly suited to each other, but we had a good life.
1:25:52And then he was no longer allowed abroad.
1:25:54We went to the Oktyabrsky district party committee and asked,
1:25:56“What happened? Why isn’t he allowed abroad?”
1:25:59“You are setting, by your example, the wrong lifestyle
1:26:02and a bad example for young people, musicians, because
1:26:06you’re not married,” and so on.
1:26:07It was around half past four, maybe four o’clock.
1:26:12I said, “Until what time do you work?”
1:26:14They said, “Until 7.” I said, “Okay.”
1:26:16We went, called friends, they became witnesses.
1:26:20We went, arranged it.
1:26:22And we got married and ran back to the party committee
1:26:25and said, “So you would have let us out if we were husband and wife?”
1:26:32They all said, “Of course! Of course!”
1:26:35I said, “Just because of that?” “Of course!”
1:26:37And so we…
1:26:41Here’s the document, the marriage certificate.
1:26:46You should’ve seen their faces.
1:26:47How did you manage, where, how? They let us go.
1:26:51That’s why we…
1:26:52Well, really, it was a joke.
1:26:53Yes, we got married because of that, but honestly, we didn’t plan to.
1:26:57We were fine, and I was already disappointed
1:27:02in the institution of marriage by then.
1:27:04But as the years went by, I saw that he liked
1:27:07completely different women, I kept quiet, I understood that
1:27:11maybe we weren’t right for each other.
1:27:14But we were friends, that’s all.
1:27:16He’s a good guy, well done.
1:27:18The only thing I won’t forgive him for, but that’s not for…
1:27:24For some reason, I imagined that the song
1:27:25“Don’t Hurt Me” was about him.
1:27:27— Actually, yes. — Really?
1:27:29Yes, because once we met again,
1:27:31I don’t remember in which city, maybe Dnepropetrovsk or something.
1:27:35And he said, “Well, that’s it, let’s say goodbye, and I doubt we’ll…”
1:27:41“I mean, we’ll see each other, but I already know where I’m headed, that’s it.”
1:27:44And from the hotel window you could see a park,
1:27:49and a path, such a beautiful path, even visible in the dusk.
1:27:56And I stood at the window, and he walked away down that path.
1:28:00Such a beautiful image.
1:28:01And every time I sang that song, I remembered
1:28:04him walking down that path.
1:28:07He didn’t really hurt me.
1:28:08My God, what would he hurt me for?
1:28:09Well, it’s just a song, kind of for everyone.
1:28:13Who actually hurt me?
1:28:16— Many hurt you? — Many, of course.
1:28:18I’m already invulnerable, because there were so many.
1:28:21I won’t list them now, but there was the “Baltic story,”
1:28:24how many nerves it cost me.
1:28:25— With the hotel? — Yes.
1:28:27All over nothing.
1:28:28Just tell me straight, “We don’t want to let you go abroad.” That’s it.
1:28:32Why make up all this nightmare,
1:28:35these articles, “Leningradskaya Pravda,” calling me anti-Soviet, and so on.
1:28:40And I answered them, “Moskovskaya Pravda.”
1:28:43Nothing is simple.
1:28:45Nothing is straightforward, you see?
1:28:47There’s always some story that can be spun.
1:28:50But back then there was a wonderful man, Aleksandr Nikolaevich Yakovlev.
1:28:54And of course he sorted it all out.
1:28:57And I went on tour with Udo Lindenberg.
1:29:01They thought he was some kind of fascist youth,
1:29:04and that his song was against the Soviet Union.
1:29:07But he didn’t have a single one like that. Can you imagine?
1:29:11But!
1:29:12You should’ve seen how I was received in any German hotel.
1:29:16Everyone stood at attention. They didn’t want a scandal.
1:29:18They had read everything.
1:29:21Oh, and when I arrived, and when I left.
1:29:23“Leave us a note that everything was fine.”
1:29:25Well, that was Boldin.
1:29:27To this day, we’re still friends.
1:29:30His wonderful wife, Marinka.
1:29:31And then the third.
1:29:34At that point, in fact, that’s when we met.
1:29:37And back then I was very young.
1:29:39And I was interviewing you.
1:29:41And you told me, “Ask something about Philipp.”
1:29:43And I was so embarrassed.
1:29:44I said, “Why did you marry him?”
1:29:47Do you know what you answered me then?
1:29:49What? I don’t remember.
1:29:50You said, “Because he promised to make me happy,
1:29:53but let him try.”
1:29:55That struck me so much.
1:29:57Because I thought one could only marry
1:30:00Philipp Kirkorov out of despair.
1:30:02Well, basically, yes.
1:30:03I was worn down.
1:30:04My mother, while she was alive, said, “Help little Philipp.”
1:30:07His grandmother, who was friends with my mother, said, “Help little Philipp.”
1:30:12Why? Was he in need?
1:30:13Sort of young, talented.
1:30:15And this goes back to his teens.
1:30:17And you were friends with his mother?
1:30:19Well, I knew her, of course, yes.
1:30:21I didn’t like Bedros, but Viktoria was, of course,
1:30:25a grand woman.
1:30:26She had cancer.
1:30:28And her crazy, supernatural love for Philipp,
1:30:34even back then I couldn’t understand, and now, like I
1:30:37love my Harry, it amazed me, really amazed me.
1:30:42And that’s a special kind of story too,
1:30:44because she was dying, and I came to see her.
1:30:49She put on a cassette for me, and he was singing some song in polka-dot pants,
1:30:55feathers here, something else there.
1:30:57She said, “What is this?
1:30:59Tell him something, give him some advice.”
1:31:02So I would visit her, and later, when she
1:31:04was really very ill,
1:31:06she said, “I beg you, don’t abandon him, help him, be with him,
1:31:11be like a mother to him.”
1:31:12Oh, it’s hard to remember all that.
1:31:16And when they were taking her away for surgery,
1:31:20her last glance was at him. Yes, it was very hard.
1:31:25And so somehow it was decided that I would help him.
1:31:31I thought that in three years I’d raise him up.
1:31:34But couldn’t you not marry him?
1:31:36Well, how?
1:31:37You see, the thing is,
1:31:39if they say, “An affair with Pugacheva,” everyone knows it.
1:31:42But this was marrying Kirkorov.
1:31:44Who is he? What? How’s that possible?
1:31:47And everyone was talking about it.
1:31:49And it immediately drew attention.
1:31:51It was a primitive move, of course,
1:31:54but it worked really well at that time, at least.
1:31:56It works now too, back then as well.
1:31:58Well, that’s how it happened.
1:32:00He can’t hold a grudge against me. I gave him everything I could.
1:32:03And he to you?
1:32:04— What could he give me? — Well, thanks.
1:32:06Well, I don’t know.
1:32:07He only makes fun of it on KVN or something.
1:32:12But basically, it’s clear he’s grateful to me.
1:32:16As far as I understand. Isn’t that so?
1:32:18And after those three “help a friend” marriages,
1:32:20how do you explain to Maksim that this one was for love?
1:32:23Make it possible for him to believe it?
1:32:26I couldn’t care less whether he believed it or not.
1:32:28I fell in love, that’s it.
1:32:30I realized that this was what I needed. And he did too.
1:32:32It was strange.
1:32:34Even sometimes I myself didn’t understand how it turned out
1:32:38to be absolute harmony from similar family backgrounds.
1:32:41Well, I earlier, of course, he later.
1:32:44But exactly the same upbringing, the same attitudes, nobility.
1:32:51Not just sexual connection, you see,
1:32:53that you can’t do without it.
1:32:54But also friendship, understanding, and support.
1:32:59That’s what family is.
1:33:01It’s not just about sex, right?
1:33:03Is there a private life after fifty?
1:33:05Yes.
1:33:05And there are different ways so that age doesn’t get in the way.
1:33:09Well, to enjoy yourself.
1:33:14You’ll tell me about that later.
1:33:16That’s something you also have to prepare for.
1:33:19Well?
1:33:21Well, if you want it all, then fine, take it all.
1:33:24I don’t even know, I can’t find the words.
1:33:25What’s always in my head now is
1:33:27this talk in Russia about
1:33:29family values, family bonds, family traditions.
1:33:36Instead of setting an example, they still somehow…
1:33:40Ah, I don’t want to talk about this.
1:33:42We’re happy, thank God.
1:33:45May they be healthy, because I can’t
1:33:46imagine what I’d do without him.
1:33:48I pray every evening and morning
1:33:51that everyone stays alive and well under a peaceful sky.
1:33:55You see, that’s so important to me.
1:33:58I told you how when I was about 12 or 13, on Christmas Eve,
1:34:04my grandmother tied a key to my finger
1:34:09and put a lock under my pillow.
1:34:12She told me to say, “My betrothed, reveal yourself.”
1:34:18I said it, of course, without giving it meaning, and fell asleep.
1:34:23In the morning, with the cheesecake she baked,
1:34:26a kind of curd pastry, I was supposed to go outside
1:34:28and ask the first man I saw his name.
1:34:32And I went out, it was freezing, no one in our little alley.
1:34:36And suddenly I saw some man with a briefcase coming from the next yard.
1:34:40I said, “Wait, wait,” chasing after him,
1:34:41and he for some reason ran from me, and I after him.
1:34:44I said, “Please wait.”
1:34:45I said, “Sir, it’s Christmas Eve, I congratulate you on the holiday.”
1:34:49“I have a cheesecake here.”
1:34:51“I need to know your name.”
1:34:53He said, “My God, why do you need my name?”
1:34:55I said, “Well, that’s the custom.
1:34:57Then your name will be the name
1:35:00of my destined one.”
1:35:03He said, “Georgiy.”
1:35:04— And left. — So?
1:35:06And I never had a single Georgiy.
1:35:08There were a few “Zhoriks,” but never a real Georgiy.
1:35:13I was strangely surprised that everything in that dream came true,
1:35:16but this one part somehow didn’t.
1:35:19And only when Max bought a sculpture of Saint George
1:35:23for the castle grounds did I realize
1:35:27that he had been with me all along, protecting me.
1:35:30There he is, Saint George.
1:35:31And there was also Saint George on the house.
1:35:33And now I pray to him: “Saint George, this and that,” I say.
1:35:40In Russia they usually think you’re either happy at work,
1:35:42successful in your career, or happy in your personal life.
1:35:46Wait, I haven’t told you about dreams.
1:35:47For me they’re very important events in my life.
1:35:50There were five episodes. I woke up in the morning and remembered them.
1:35:54But then I immediately forgot.
1:35:56I only recalled them when they happened in my life.
1:36:01Like a staircase with a little dent in it,
1:36:03I was climbing it, painted with linseed oil,
1:36:08a door on the right, a door on the left, you open it, and in the corridor
1:36:11some students are running around.
1:36:13And a ladder of logs leaning up to the attic.
1:36:19When I came to my first almost-fiancé,
1:36:22Valerka Romanov, I thought, “How strange, the staircase.”
1:36:29And I remembered that dream.
1:36:31But there was no door to the right, and the staircase was iron along the wall.
1:36:36You open the door, there are students.
1:36:38I said, “Valera, you know, in my dream
1:36:41maybe you really are my destiny.”
1:36:44But when Valerka left for his Suez Canal job,
1:36:47I met Mikolas at the music school.
1:36:52And before that I had gone to the poetess
1:36:55Karina Filippova and the composer Kirill Akimov.
1:36:59He was supposed to give me the sheet music for a song.
1:37:01I came, rang the bell, and he said, “Quiet.”
1:37:08I thought, what is it?
1:37:09“My wife is opening something today.”
1:37:12— I thought, “My wife?” — His wife, Karina Filippova.
1:37:16What a sight that was.
1:37:18A tiny apartment, a piano, a couch where she sat
1:37:23with long hair.
1:37:25Just sitting there like this, that kind of woman.
1:37:28Beautiful.
1:37:30In front of her were some silver spoons.
1:37:33I walked in, and suddenly she shouted,
1:37:36“Ahhh! Oh, Kirill! Kirill, look!”
1:37:41Kirill: “What? What do you see?”
1:37:44“A star has come! Do you understand? A star!”
1:37:47“You can’t imagine what a star she will be!”
1:37:49I thought, “She means me? Or what’s wrong with her?”
1:37:52And I needed to go to Gutse to get a job as an accompanist.
1:37:57I thought, “Uh-huh, a star, sure.”
1:38:00And she also said, “The first man you meet
1:38:04will be your husband.”
1:38:05Of course, I went there curious.
1:38:07I arrived, and right on the steps jumps out Oleg Nepomnyashchy.
1:38:12Curly! With olive-shaped eyes.
1:38:15And he said, “Ah, wonderful, great!
1:38:18Oh, we’ve been waiting for you! Waiting! Come on!”
1:38:21Then we went in, and he shouted, “Mikolas, take
1:38:25our accompanist, I’m off to get the keys.”
1:38:28I went up to the second floor, there was a niche, and a door.
1:38:32And we stood facing each other.
1:38:34I said, “How interesting.”
1:38:36He said, “What?”
1:38:37I’d gone to a fortune teller, some witch.
1:38:41She told me, “The first man I meet
1:38:43in this school will be my husband.”
1:38:47And Mikolas said, “I’m the first man.”
1:38:50So we laughed.
1:38:52And so it turned out, you see.
1:38:53It’s simply amazing.
1:38:55All those dreams came true, because
1:38:57that staircase—he invited me to the dorm,
1:39:00Mikolas did, and I tripped, just like in the dream.
1:39:04— On that little step? — Yes.
1:39:06That was exactly like in the dream.
1:39:08You see how I walked in there?
1:39:09Can you imagine, I had goosebumps all over.
1:39:12And is it true that your great-grandmother, Marina, was a witch?
1:39:15Well, she was.
1:39:17I don’t know if she was a witch or a healer.
1:39:19She healed people, and lived to 95.
1:39:24Everyone adored her, she helped people.
1:39:27She was still running to someone when she dropped dead.
1:39:29So at 95, she was still running.
1:39:31Yes, but then the younger ones knew a bit of the knowledge.
1:39:36And they told me different things that could
1:39:40have been useful in my life.
1:39:41But I only remembered how to remove warts.
1:39:43But rumors say you can do things with your hands.
1:39:46And not only with my hands.
1:39:47That’s not something you talk about. You see?
1:39:49You don’t say that.
1:39:51Probably yes, because I’ve been on stage for half a century.
1:39:54And my hands are very important to me.
1:39:58If anyone noticed, I basically hold all the weight in them.
1:40:04For me it feels like some kind of jelly,
1:40:08I don’t know, airy.
1:40:10Yes, that’s exactly the feeling.
1:40:12But I won’t say what it is.
1:40:13I’m not Katya Lel, to talk about UFOs.
1:40:15Maybe she saw them, I didn’t.
1:40:16And here I don’t know. Maybe it’s real.
1:40:18Or maybe not.
1:40:19I supported my mother.
1:40:21She believed I could.
1:40:23She had five heart attacks.
1:40:25And each time I pulled her through.
1:40:27But the last one, you see, I didn’t make it in time.
1:40:30Orpheus, was that the moment when you told yourself,
1:40:33“Now I can sing what I want, choose what to sing,
1:40:38and behave on stage the way I think is right”?
1:40:41First of all, I never even thought
1:40:43about how to behave “right.”
1:40:44Did you talk to people from the stage?
1:40:46That wasn’t really accepted in the Soviet Union?
1:40:48Well, first of all, I was a very shy person.
1:40:51Quite insecure.
1:40:53I was afraid of the stage my whole life.
1:40:54Backstage, I’d be gathering myself, calming down.
1:40:57“God, why me, why me, Lord.”
1:41:00And I needed three songs to get steady.
1:41:02On those I had to calm down.
1:41:04After that I had to say something.
1:41:06I would just take it out of the air.
1:41:09I felt that’s what I had to tell them.
1:41:11About what was happening in the world, in the country.
1:41:15And joke about it.
1:41:16I was almost like Galkin.
1:41:19No one taught you that?
1:41:21And no one suggested that image to you?
1:41:22No, no, it was all improvisation.
1:41:24If only I could have recorded what I said
1:41:26and how I talked—it would have been interesting.
1:41:28That was how I tuned myself and the audience.
1:41:33I really needed it.
1:41:34I felt, here I need to say something.
1:41:37And from the very first solo concert, I’d say at the end:
1:41:40“If something stays in your hearts,
1:41:42then I couldn’t wish for a greater reward.”
1:41:46That was like an amulet for me.
1:41:47I always went on stage as if it were the last time.
1:41:51I thought, if something goes wrong, they’ll kick me off this stage.
1:41:57Well, it was that time.
1:41:58Say the wrong thing, sing the wrong song.
1:42:01“Kings Can Do Anything”—they banned me from singing it.
1:42:03I’d already won the Grand Prix, and they still banned it.
1:42:08But I sang it anyway.
1:42:10They bribed the sound engineer, he “accidentally” pressed play.
1:42:12But often you were criticized for your shows
1:42:15being too intimate, your behavior too candid.
1:42:18Mine? I don’t remember that.
1:42:20I don’t live by that now.
1:42:21Maybe I sang a song?
1:42:23Even in Rostov, you sang and cried.
1:42:25— Oh, you mean in a song? — Of course.
1:42:27Ah, I thought I just walked out and cried.
1:42:28Well, it’s not good to cry on stage.
1:42:31Better when the audience cries.
1:42:33But sometimes it got to me.
1:42:35Yes, with the song “Loving, One Does Not Renounce” it could happen.
1:42:49But my task wasn’t to show that I was crying,
1:42:54but to bring people to tears of joy.
1:43:00And in general, I always lived in such a way
1:43:04as to make someone just a little bit happier.
1:43:08Not only the audience, but in life as well.
1:43:11I never really spoke about it.
1:43:13Probably saying it for the first time now.
1:43:15And Max and I were just sitting here, and I suddenly realized
1:43:19that, as it turns out, my whole life I’ve lived for others.
1:43:24I’d never thought about it before.
1:43:27Probably because it’s easier for me to live that way.
1:43:30And it’s a pleasant goal, a doable task
1:43:35for me then and always.
1:43:37And even now, it keeps me afloat.
1:43:40What’s the point of living just
1:43:42for myself, for my own pleasures?
1:43:44Max is the one who brings that into my life—
1:43:47joy, gifts, little things.
1:43:50He tells me stories, shows me things.
1:43:52He takes care of me.
1:43:54I feel that someone is living for me, too.
1:43:58Perhaps for the first time in my life. Interesting.
1:44:01When did hate enter your life?
1:44:02After Orpheus, too?
1:44:04Or was it even earlier?
1:44:05It started when I became popular.
1:44:08When those robes appeared and all that.
1:44:11“A sack with a shaggy head,” “vulgar,” “one-song singer,”
1:44:16“don’t pay attention to her.”
1:44:18I wasn’t allowed on “Song of the Year” until 1979.
1:44:23With “Arlekino” it never happened.
1:44:24But in 1979, I think, the song “What Else Is to Come.”
1:44:30Funny story—when I came early, as always.
1:44:34And Silantiev, the conductor, he knew me well.
1:44:39He said, “Why did you come so early?”
1:44:41I said, “Well, I need to prepare.”
1:44:43“So that no one sees you.
1:44:45You’re a star, you must be late.”
1:44:48It was the first time I’d heard that.
1:44:50I said, “Why?”
1:44:51“Listen carefully. Be ten minutes late, that’s all.”
1:44:57Turns out there were rules back then.
1:44:59It was easier in the robe, because it always adjusted to me.
1:45:05I didn’t want wet clothes, so we designed it that way.
1:45:11Slava Zaitsev made it black in the spots where you sweat.
1:45:15Why say this?
1:45:17A robe is a robe, but it was a work costume, so it helped me a lot.
1:45:22And many singers adopted it, especially opera ones.
1:45:25And not only in Russia.
1:45:26Scatter my red curls On stage, as always,
1:45:32And, perishing, I’ll survive again, To return here once more.
1:45:36It was in this period, when Pugacheva equaled herself,
1:45:40before she ever announced leaving the stage.
1:45:43At that time, what was your happiest day?
1:45:46The birth of my daughter.
1:45:47The happiest day of my life.
1:45:49Kristina—for me, after 60, happiness is my years with her.
1:45:55And before 60, it was of course her birth.
1:45:58Did you struggle internally while Kristina was growing up,
1:46:01and you were on tour, basically
1:46:03not seeing her grow?
1:46:05Not that I didn’t see her.
1:46:07How long do tours last? Sometimes a year.
1:46:09No, no, of course not.
1:46:11For her sake, I shortened tours, so that naturally
1:46:17I could be within her sight and raise her somehow.
1:46:23But of course, a mother is one thing, a grandmother is another.
1:46:26A mother is a mother.
1:46:27She cannot be resentful of me.
1:46:29But do you feel guilty?
1:46:31Children will always find something to tell a therapist.
1:46:33I don’t know. At some point I thought I gave her too little.
1:46:38Then I thought, how too little?
1:46:39I gave her life and the chance
1:46:41to do something—so no, I don’t feel guilty.
1:46:45Did you talk about it when she grew up?
1:46:47There were jokes.
1:46:49Jokes?
1:46:50I even remember saying at her birthday:
1:46:52“Give the floor to the Mother-Echidna.”
1:46:57By the way, how did you react when
1:46:59Kristina couldn’t come, couldn’t bring your granddaughter?
1:47:04It’s sad not to see Klava, but there are other cities
1:47:07where we can meet.
1:47:10Thank God, freedom.
1:47:11It’s a strange situation, though understandable to me.
1:47:16Understandable how?
1:47:17There’s anxiety in the country.
1:47:20Do you know from what?
1:47:22There’s anxiety, and people try to show the authorities how
1:47:26they safeguard the country’s peace and security.
1:47:28Kristina just got caught in that.
1:47:31Though legally it’s wrong.
1:47:33She’s an EU citizen.
1:47:34But still, it’s not her problem.
1:47:36It’s the state’s problem, always restless.
1:47:41It’s a pity for the fans, the audience, who won’t see this show.
1:47:45A wonderful one.
1:47:46I think that’s the main problem—
1:47:48that the program is in Russian.
1:47:53They’d rather it not be.
1:47:54Does the question of fairness arise here?
1:47:57Not at this time.
1:47:59Everyone looks out for themselves by any means.
1:48:02Nothing you can do.
1:48:05But Kristina went on a wonderful journey.
1:48:09I think she’s already shown Klava half the world.
1:48:13Do you feel resentment toward Latvia over this?
1:48:15It would be absurd to hold a grudge.
1:48:19I don’t see my granddaughter.
1:48:21I wasn’t allowed to meet her in Latvia.
1:48:22But on Instagram I see their travels.
1:48:26It’s so beautiful.
1:48:27Perhaps I’ll get over some barrier and finally
1:48:31fly to them in America.
1:48:33We’ll gather together. You too.
1:48:35Yes, we’ll gather and go.
1:48:37In America you also have another protégé of yours.
1:48:41There’s Nikita.
1:48:43He deserves a separate conversation.
1:48:45A separate one indeed.
1:48:47And a very serious one.
1:48:49He’s a very talented person.
1:48:50What’s your merit in that?
1:48:52My merit is that I scolded him
1:48:55back when he lived with us in Berezhki, on the Istra.
1:48:59I overheard him swearing with his friends.
1:49:03That’s when he got it.
1:49:04Because I believe swearing is from the devil.
1:49:06All of that.
1:49:08Do you swear?
1:49:10Of course I can. I know how.
1:49:11That doesn’t mean I should speak that way.
1:49:14I think it’s funny when swearing is in ditties or jokes.
1:49:18If my musicians ever hear me swear at rehearsal— that’s it.
1:49:25They know it’s the limit.
1:49:26They say, “Okay, okay.”
1:49:29I use two words.
1:49:31But what I hear now is basically Russian as a swear language.
1:49:37Instead of… Like when something comes flying at you.
1:49:42We’d say, “My God, what is this?”
1:49:46And they curse. You see?
1:49:50How can that be?
1:49:52To use it sometimes, I get it, it’s our quirk.
1:49:55But to just talk constantly in swear words?
1:49:59That’s degrading the language.
1:50:01And your own personality too.
1:50:03It means your vocabulary is so small
1:50:05that you can’t explain yourself otherwise.
1:50:08But back to Nikita.
1:50:10Let’s not get back to Nikita.
1:50:12I adore him so much. We all love him dearly.
1:50:15We wish him…
1:50:16Do you see a great creative future for him?
1:50:18I see that he should have such a future.
1:50:22But he’s completely inert when it comes to acting for himself.
1:50:27But in that way, he takes after me a bit.
1:50:30But you really fought for yourself, didn’t you?
1:50:34You mean, in my career?
1:50:36No, what fight? I just sang and sang.
1:50:38Who came up with the phrase, “You’ll hear from me yet”?
1:50:40That was me.
1:50:41When I was first taken on tour—
1:50:4330 concerts: Kirov, Perm, Sverdlovsk, Omsk.
1:50:48With Livshits and Livenbuk.
1:50:50And they had a manager, Uncle Lyonya.
1:50:52Of course, for a 17-year-old girl, it was hard.
1:50:56But I never complained.
1:50:57My tears froze in those cold buses.
1:51:01The steppe roads got stuck somewhere in the fields.
1:51:04That awful stage full of holes.
1:51:07Those little cold hotels.
1:51:10I had to endure it all, but I thought,
1:51:12this is the real artist’s life. The right one.
1:51:15And then, after all that, I suddenly hear
1:51:17they were listening to another singer, a very good one.
1:51:21I realized they wanted to replace me with him.
1:51:25I came to Leonid Abramovich, and he starts roundabout.
1:51:32“Tell me, where do you live in Moscow?”
1:51:35I said, “I live at Krutetsky Zastava.”
1:51:38“Where’s that?” “It’s a district in Moscow.”
1:51:40“There’s a watch factory there, right?”
1:51:43“Listen, go work at that factory.
1:51:46Make watches and sing in the amateur club.”
1:51:50And suddenly I grew up ten years at once.
1:51:53“If you want to replace me with this singer, just say so.”
1:51:58He said, “No, not now. You’ll finish this run.”
1:52:01I said, “But I’m not going to that watch factory.”
1:52:04And for some reason I told him, “You know, Leonid Abramovich,
1:52:08six years from now you’ll hear from me again.
1:52:12You’ll be asking me to sing where you want,
1:52:15and I won’t go,” and I left.
1:52:19I took off that brocade dress they made me wear, backless.
1:52:24Took off the heels, put on a black skirt, a white blouse.
1:52:29And suddenly I told the musicians, “May I do it myself?”
1:52:33I sat at the piano and began to sing songs.
1:52:36It was a success.
1:52:38For the first time on the whole tour.
1:52:39I played Vysotsky. - Vysotsky?
1:52:42Vysotsky, then my own song.
1:52:44I was a hit.
1:52:46What was Livshits’s face like?
1:52:48He was a bit different.
1:52:49And what about Livenbuk’s?
1:52:52He stood there going, “Bravo! Bravo! Bravo!”
1:52:57That was the Pugacheva-style rebellion: “You’ll hear from me yet.”
1:53:01That’s what I made everyone on “Factor A” do.
1:53:05Of course, people get upset when they’re told, “You’re out.”
1:53:09I made them all say,
1:53:12“You’ll hear from me yet.”
1:53:14You always sang from a woman’s perspective,
1:53:17a woman singing.
1:53:19Which means that 90% of your audience were women
1:53:21who projected their own fate onto yours.
1:53:25And that’s right.
1:53:26Is Russia a women’s country?
1:53:30I just think there’s no country in the world
1:53:32where women aren’t as vital.
1:53:35Generation after generation, women raise children alone.
1:53:39And they pass on that experience as heritage.
1:53:42It’s a strange thing, when you’re not even sure
1:53:44if your mother loves you.
1:53:46Because she has endless daily struggles,
1:53:48having to replace both father and herself.
1:53:50That’s not your case, but in Russia it’s common.
1:53:52I know, because I’ve always been,
1:53:55so to speak, a supporter of women’s rights.
1:53:58So much depends—banal but true—
1:54:01on education.
1:54:02The education of women and men alike.
1:54:07Because an educated person is more inclined
1:54:11to value family.
1:54:13While a less educated person just lives
1:54:16by whatever knowledge life happens to give them.
1:54:21And that knowledge can be twisted any which way.
1:54:24What should your wife be like?
1:54:26“I think, if anything, hit her with your fist.”
1:54:30A woman’s duty is to give birth.
1:54:32Yes, especially priests push that.
1:54:35It terrifies me. Such obscurantism.
1:54:37My God, what nonsense is this?
1:54:39What do they want to make of women?
1:54:40I’m not talking about women who should be allowed everything.
1:54:44There are boundaries of decency, family, dignity, honor.
1:54:49That too exists. But what’s happening now?
1:54:52I don’t even want to talk about it. It’s a very serious topic.
1:54:57A woman should be cherished, cared for, her health watched.
1:55:01If you want them to give birth— this call to “give birth”—
1:55:06telling schoolgirls to “give birth.”
1:55:09Who comes up with this? What are they smoking?
1:55:12I can’t understand.
1:55:14Just give families stability,
1:55:17and then they’ll want children.
1:55:20And they say,
1:55:21“Well, you didn’t have stability and still gave birth.”
1:55:24Why? Because I had somewhere to bring the child, basically.
1:55:27But some people have no home, no money.
1:55:30Young people don’t want to just have a baby
1:55:33and then not know what to do with it.
1:55:34Why? To raise it and send it to the front?
1:55:36Oh, don’t even start with me on that.
1:55:38It’s horrific.
1:55:39How would I live in Russia with such calls?
1:55:44And tell Liza, for example, “Quick, go give birth.”
1:55:48Mom, I got pregnant, you know, in 9th or 10th grade.
1:55:52I’d tell her, “Don’t you dare!” - But in Russia: “You must give birth!”
1:55:54What is that? Abortions? Yes, they’re bad.
1:55:57Girls must be taught how to live.
1:56:01That’s a whole school of life to start with.
1:56:03But instead they just order them to give birth.
1:56:05And these unattractive people say it all.
1:56:08And with such arrogance.
1:56:12Oh, awful, awful.
1:56:14Since this interview is about truths.
1:56:16The song “Maestro” wasn’t about Raimonds Pauls.
1:56:19It was dedicated to Arbelian.
1:56:21Well, maybe I once said it was for Arbelian.
1:56:23But how do you feel?
1:56:24Do you mean literally, that
1:56:26it’s the image of a young singer standing there
1:56:31dreaming of the stage, guided by her teacher—Pauls, Arbelian?
1:56:36It’s a composite image.
1:56:38I was supposed to dedicate it to Arbelian.
1:56:40No, the story goes that you gave him a poster
1:56:44signed “we share one sacred love for music.”
1:56:48Tell me, dear, when was that?
1:56:51I don’t even remember what I sign.
1:56:53But I always sign the truth.
1:56:55No idea what poster you mean.
1:56:58If it pleased him, why not?
1:57:01Because I love him.
1:57:03He’s wonderful.
1:57:04The music of Raimonds Pauls “A Million Scarlet Roses” had lyrics by Andrei Voznesensky.
1:57:08A man who wasn’t really a lyricist for pop songs.
1:57:11How did you get Voznesensky to write words for a pop hit?
1:57:15I didn’t. He just wrote them.
1:57:17I was the one forced to sing it.
1:57:19I didn’t even like it much.
1:57:22It was originally a Latvian song.
1:57:24They just translated it into Russian.
1:57:26In Latvian it wasn’t even about “a million roses,” was it?
1:57:29No idea, but certainly not that.
1:57:31And yet he wrote those lyrics. Imagine.
1:57:33Then Voznesensky tormented me, saying,
1:57:36“Listen, what if we increase the sum each verse?”
1:57:41I said, “What do you mean?”
1:57:42“Well, the first verse ‘a million,’ the second ‘a trillion.’”
1:57:47I said, “Please, let me sing it as is. A million is enough!”
1:57:53And you didn’t like it?
1:57:54I was just in a phase
1:57:56when I wasn’t into such songs.
1:57:58I wanted something deeper,
1:58:00and this was all la-la-la.
1:58:02But I realized it was a hit.
1:58:04I had a cassette with me in Yugoslavia.
1:58:07And a very gloomy driver took us around Yugoslavia,
1:58:10through all the mountains and towns.
1:58:13I’d play the cassette sometimes, just to check if it was good.
1:58:18He’d listen.
1:58:19Then one trip I didn’t put it on.
1:58:22He said, “Million.”
1:58:23I asked, “You like that song?”
1:58:28“Million.”
1:58:30So we drove all over Yugoslavia with that “Million.”
1:58:34Tell me about Akhmadulina.
1:58:36She was a woman of great impression.
1:58:40Her way of speaking was impossible to imitate.
1:58:44It couldn’t be acted—it was real inspiration, her own philosophy.
1:58:49She could throw out the strangest phrases.
1:58:55And when indignant, she’d breathe and say,
1:58:58“How could you, Alla, how could you sing that song,
1:59:03‘When I Become a Grandma’?”
1:59:07Based on Marina Tsvetaeva’s poetry.
1:59:10A song called “When I Become a Grandma.”
1:59:15“That mustn’t be sung. It’s sacred. It was wrong.”
1:59:21She was like that…
1:59:26I’d look at her and say,
1:59:28“All right, I’ll try not to repeat mistakes.
1:59:31Advise me, whom should I sing?”
1:59:34“Sing me.”
1:59:39She was unique, amusing in her way.
1:59:44She could look at me and say:
1:59:46“I remember you in red socks.”
1:59:49- What socks? - Red ones.
1:59:52In “The Half-Baked Wizard” you wore red socks.
1:59:55Really? I didn’t even realize.
2:00:00Wonderful people.
2:00:01Okudzhava—it’s amazing we never really met,
2:00:06but he knew of me, he followed me.
2:00:11And when I wrote the song “Autumn, Red-Haired Friend”…
2:00:30I wrote it for his birthday.
2:00:33And since there was no music yet,
2:00:36I just played it.
2:00:37“Autumn, Red-Haired Friend.”
2:00:39Like the bards love.
2:00:40He was thrilled.
2:00:42For me it was like a medal.
2:00:44And those lines are so important to me.
2:00:48How they…
2:00:50They always wrote them down. Always.
2:00:54I still carry them with me.
2:00:55I’m afraid to ever misquote them.
2:01:03“Maybe you won’t be a winner, but at least you’ll die as a human.”
2:01:08Just four lines, you see, very important ones. Just four lines, but so meaningful.
2:01:10And I was just creating something, wrote some verses.
2:01:13- You? Now? - Yes.
2:01:15Sometimes it just comes over me like that.
2:01:16I want to record a song about what’s going on in show business.
2:01:21And it has some lines.
2:01:22Oyster on a platter, tatata and bananas, People are dying, nobody gives a damn.
2:01:27That’s important, you see?
2:01:28I mean, well, it’s really such a tragedy, you could say,
2:01:31both in the country and all over the world.
2:01:34You know, you think, somewhere out there it’s happening.
2:01:38And Okudzhava, did you sing it to him on the phone?
2:01:41How did you sing it to him?
2:01:42I passed it on, they recorded me on tape.
2:01:44- Ah! - They gave it to his wife.
2:01:47That’s nice.
2:01:48Well, I always loved bards.
2:01:50From the later ones, like Sashka Rozenbaum,
2:01:53he still remained a bard in essence.
2:01:56Since I’m from Rostov, in Rostov always,
2:01:59well, everyone, no other word, went crazy over
2:02:02the fact that the main Cossack songs, the most accurate
2:02:05Cossack songs in this country were written by a Jew.
2:02:08Well, maybe more precisely, when you fall in love with this theme, and you sing it honestly.
2:02:15I’m not a circus performer either, but with
2:02:16such love I sang “Arlekino,” you see?
2:02:18Well, at least you have circus training.
2:02:21I’m not Jewish, though, although I think
2:02:24Valentina Talyzina, she insisted it was funny.
2:02:28She even donated blood.
2:02:30I always wanted to be, I said, “Max, I’m so smart,
2:02:33so talented, surely I must be Jewish.”
2:02:38He said, “Oh shut up, what kind of Jew are you.”
2:02:40I said, “let’s check.”
2:02:43And from America Kristina brought us this tube,
2:02:47so you had to spit in this tube, and they’d
2:02:50send you back what kind of blood you have.
2:02:52I’m not Jewish, but it turns out I’m half Polish.
2:02:55And now I understood why I have relatives in Belarus,
2:02:59because apparently they somehow came from Poland,
2:03:02and stayed there in Belarus.
2:03:04And I wondered why in my family tree there were names like Jadwiga,
2:03:07or some other Polish names in my whole damned lineage,
2:03:13you see, honestly, it was always hidden.
2:03:15I thought maybe it was because
2:03:17those white, red, old albums,
2:03:20they just disappeared somewhere.
2:03:22I always wanted to look, but they told me “nothing for you there.”
2:03:25Well, maybe noble origins, maybe something else.
2:03:27That’s what my grandfather and grandmother feared since then.
2:03:31And grandmother was also a Bukharin, who knows where from.
2:03:35Indeed.
2:03:37As if being Pugacheva wasn’t enough, there was also something Bukharin.
2:03:41But they didn’t let me search anymore, and there’s no way now.
2:03:44So, taking advantage of the situation, I’ll ask you a few questions
2:03:47about my very favorite songs.
2:03:49About which one?
2:03:50“Airplanes,” which you wrote yourself. Both music and lyrics.
2:03:54Well, sometimes I do that.
2:03:56You do that often, but this is my absolute favorite song.
2:03:59Of course, I have some story under every song.
2:04:03“Three Happy Days,” that’s “Three Happy Days” in France.
2:04:07Because there was a man, such a smart one from
2:04:12some company, Russian steel, I don’t know, “Stankoimport,” I think.
2:04:16He was an amazing, educated man, who knew
2:04:19France, Paris, at least.
2:04:22And he gave me those “Three Happy Days.”
2:04:24He showed me museums, showed me painters,
2:04:28showed me restaurants, showed me the Eiffel Tower.
2:04:31Well, he showed me all of Paris.
2:04:33And I told this to Ilyusha Reznik, who basically lived with us.
2:04:38And he wrote that wonderful song.
2:04:40There’s a story behind every song.
2:04:42But “Airplanes” you wrote yourself.
2:04:44Well, yes, but that was during Radio Youth times.
2:04:48And somehow we became very close on a human level.
2:04:52I adored Boris Vakhnuk.
2:04:56And he adored me.
2:04:58The program was “Hello, Comrade.”
2:05:00And he started writing me letters.
2:05:02I had a whole stack. Don’t know, I can’t find it.
2:05:05Each of our letters began with “Hello, Comrade.”
2:05:12And all in verse.
2:05:13Those letters were unique.
2:05:16I won’t survive if I don’t find them. It’s just awful.
2:05:19And of course, I answered him too.
2:05:21Also in verse.
2:05:22One of Borya’s replies
2:05:24began, of course, with “Well, hello, comrade.”
2:05:27And airplanes are flying away. Clouds melt.
2:05:30I shrink inside one of them.
2:05:36I suffer, hiding tears in my fists.
2:05:43And, by the way, I smile.
2:05:50I’m afraid, afraid not to smile.
2:05:57Because it’s the first time I try
2:06:05to force myself not to return.
2:06:09And this song had a second birth when
2:06:11Manizha sang it at Gogol Center at the “Our Alla” concert.
2:06:16Oh, well Manizha is simply a genius singer. Brilliant.
2:06:19And it doesn’t matter how she looks, unlike today’s singers
2:06:23who think little about what they sing, about the meaning.
2:06:28And most of all—what they wear.
2:06:31Figures and all that.
2:06:33But here is such talent.
2:06:34And she, of course, could become a singer even of international level.
2:06:51Had you heard her sing this song before, at that concert?
2:06:55No. But I really loved the concert itself.
2:06:57I think they’re planning to do it again somewhere.
2:06:59Kirill Serebrennikov called, said so.
2:07:01Oh, so many people.
2:07:02Were you the person who came to Kirill
2:07:05when he was under house arrest?
2:07:07- Yes. - Weren’t you afraid?
2:07:09Of course, you don’t know me the way others might.
2:07:13I didn’t even think about it.
2:07:15I couldn’t.
2:07:17I just went to see a talented person who was suffering.
2:07:21- Was it your initiative? - Yes. Of course.
2:07:25And they would let him out for 15 minutes.
2:07:28He was allowed to walk.
2:07:29And we had such a lovely walk.
2:07:31I’m happy I took photos with him.
2:07:35Beautiful photos.
2:07:36And is it true that back then you were to be given some order?
2:07:41And you said, “No order, let one guy go free.”
2:07:44Well, that happened too. Everything happened.
2:07:46- But they didn’t agree? - I won’t say.
2:07:52Now I know you’re sending letters to Zhenya Berkovich.
2:07:56Yes.
2:07:56She asked me to pass on a big thank you.
2:07:59Zhenya, I’m here. Don’t worry.
2:08:04I’ll help however I can. To your daughters too.
2:08:08There’s also another girl, Petreichuk.
2:08:11I try to help her too.
2:08:13And how else, Katya?
2:08:16Well, how else could it be?
2:08:18- Now I already know it could be otherwise. - It could.
2:08:21I was raised on this. I lived by it. And I will live by it.
2:08:25However much life I have left, I will live only this way.
2:08:28A question from Zhenya.
2:08:28Which of your songs do you sing when you’re alone
2:08:31with yourself, and you’re happy?
2:08:33I don’t sing, I play the piano.
2:08:36- And what do you play? - I improvise.
2:08:38Because just like my little mood sketches,
2:08:41which I sometimes draw, the instrument for me
2:08:45is just a moment of mood.
2:08:49If I’m sad, I go there. If I’m happy, I go there.
2:08:54My son knows.
2:09:02And today the sun is shining.
2:09:03Again the sun? You conjured it all.
2:09:06There’s a connection.
2:09:07Isn’t the sun too much in your eyes?
2:09:09Doesn’t matter. Let the sun be in my eyes.
2:09:12It lifts the mood.
2:10:05When you listen to your songs in a row.
2:10:09“Robot,” something else, something else, little by little.
2:10:12Such a voice, you can hear it’s incredible, but
2:10:15that voice doesn’t yet know what it can do.
2:10:18And then suddenly the voice starts doing
2:10:21what it thinks is right.
2:10:23Not asking anyone for permission.
2:10:25That was around, probably, ’77–’78 and on.
2:10:29For me the voice is like a little person inside me,
2:10:32sometimes sick, sometimes unwilling,
2:10:34then suddenly I order it, and it says, “I want to or I don’t want to.”
2:10:37Like some little person.
2:10:39I never analyzed how I sing, with what I sing, what I sing.
2:10:44Everything I sing, I analyzed.
2:10:46But my voice itself I never analyzed.
2:10:49But when it was all over, I realized that
2:10:51it was an amazing state, because I wasn’t thinking about the voice.
2:10:55I was thinking about what I was singing, and
2:10:57the voice itself came out exactly as it should.
2:11:02That is, I wasn’t controlling it.
2:11:04Like, here you need to take a breath, here you need to pull yourself together.
2:11:09No.
2:11:10And did you take care of it?
2:11:11No, I didn’t, because I never thought about it.
2:11:14I just knew it was there, that’s all.
2:11:15And I could sing in a very low voice, you see.
2:11:18And I wanted it so much, I achieved it.
2:11:21And also with a very high voice.
2:11:23But there was a moment when I recorded a song
2:11:25for a movie with Zatsepin, the song “Shaman,” by the way.
2:11:32“Shaman lives in some land.”
2:11:36And there was a very high note there… And I hit it.
2:11:39Even though I came sick.
2:11:41They said, “We need it urgently.”
2:11:43I said, “But how?”
2:11:44And Derbinov said, “I know what to do.
2:11:46You need to sniff tobacco.”
2:11:47I said, “Why sniff it?” I was already smoking it then.
2:11:50It was a special kind of tobacco, you had to sniff it.
2:11:53He gave it to me, you know, like in those old movies, the countesses,
2:11:56yes, like that to me…
2:12:00I sneezed, coughed, cried everything out, and
2:12:04the voice came back.
2:12:06How I hit that note…
2:12:33Do you love me?
2:12:42Of course, I lost my voice. I couldn’t sing for two months.
2:12:45Were you scared?
2:12:46No, well, I thought, I’ll just treat it.
2:12:48Well, those high notes were gone.
2:12:52But the low register appeared.
2:12:54And I was thrilled, because I could even
2:12:56sing other songs, more mature, more sensual.
2:13:00I wasn’t the Prima Donna, “I’m a woman who sings.”
2:13:04So how does she sing? Why does she sing? With what does she sing?
2:13:08And who came up with that phrase?
2:13:10Well, first of all, from the film The Woman Who Sings,
2:13:14and I liked the poems.
2:13:16There was “The Woman I Love.”
2:13:18So I, like in the film, changed it a bit.
2:13:21And that’s how it stuck.
2:13:23When we talked with Lenya, she said,
2:13:26“That’s what it should be called, this woman who sings.”
2:13:28And since then, “I am a woman who sings.”
2:13:30The way your repertoire changes in the 90s, was that a conscious decision?
2:13:34- Did it change? - Yes.
2:13:36I never thought about it either.
2:13:38Songs fit the times.
2:13:40That’s exactly what I mean.
2:13:41I especially liked how my musicians sort of accidentally found “Nyam-nyam-nyam.”
2:13:47Yes, yes.
2:13:47We weren’t used to it.
2:13:49“Nyam-nyam-nyam, and Boris comes to you.”
2:13:56Variety stage, let’s call it that. I won’t say show business.
2:13:59- "Show business" is such a stupid word. - Yes.
2:14:01Variety stage is a mirror of the times, you see?
2:14:04Everything that was done there, everything that happened.
2:14:08But I tried this way.
2:14:09If it was a very sad time for people,
2:14:11I sang more cheerful songs.
2:14:13Like how Kadesheva is needed now, badly.
2:14:16And if it was too rowdy, I, on the contrary, made people think.
2:14:21Well, that’s me, you see, what kind of authority I am, you know?
2:14:25All this was invented, of course, but there were more opportunities, of course.
2:14:31That’s when we did a concert with Troitsky in
2:14:34Chernobyl, dedicated.
2:14:35Let’s start from the beginning then.
2:14:371986, April, the Chernobyl nuclear power plant accident.
2:14:42You and Kuzmin end up at a concert for the “liquidators” on Channel One
2:14:47Right there, at the reactor.
2:14:49No, it wasn’t just Kuzmin and my musicians.
2:14:51There was also a completely charming boy f rom Belarus.
2:14:55My fan and a journalist.
2:14:57He was the first to die after that.
2:14:59Did you go there at the call of your heart or by party order?
2:15:02Well, I went by the call of my heart.
2:15:03Although we were warned, we didn’t understand anything.
2:15:06Only Igor Nikolaev didn’t go,
2:15:08because he understood it was dangerous.
2:15:10So you wouldn’t go sing for the military,
2:15:12but you went to the Chernobyl NPP…
2:15:13Well, how could I not, Katya?
2:15:15Can you imagine, in front of me sat doomed men.
2:15:18- Did you realize that? - Well, of course.
2:15:20But by then we couldn’t go back.
2:15:22Because people were asking for oranges and Pugacheva.
2:15:25And I realized that people were in a hard situation,
2:15:28such a catastrophe.
2:15:29I didn’t fully understand, but I did understand.
2:15:32And I couldn’t refuse anymore.
2:15:33They even scared us so much: this is forbidden, that is forbidden.
2:15:39Did anyone talk to you about how dangerous it was?
2:15:41Well, did at least someone speak with you?
2:15:44- Yes - What did they say?
2:15:45I won’t say it wasn’t dangerous.
2:15:49It was dangerous.
2:15:50Although it was all in a zone between some petals.
2:15:55It was called a daisy.
2:15:57That you would be between these petals.
2:15:59First, don’t eat anything they offer there.
2:16:02Bring something with you, crackers or so. By the way, I lost weight in 3 days.
2:16:07And don’t walk on the grass.
2:16:10They’ll run to you with flowers. Don’t take the flowers.
2:16:13Well, lots of such warnings.
2:16:16But of course, we went out. Everyone ran to us.
2:16:20Everyone ran, and as always, I couldn’t resist.
2:16:22Well, you can’t ignore someone with flowers.
2:16:24And I always had this phrase from childhood,
2:16:30“Do what you must. And let it be what will be.”
2:16:34I thought, I can’t run away from a person bringing flowers.
2:16:37So the guys also came back. Took the flowers.
2:16:40Barykin was there too.
2:16:42When you returned, you and Troitsky organized the first
2:16:45charity concert in the USSR. A huge one.
2:16:48Where you raised almost more money than the budget.
2:16:51Yes, yes, yes.
2:16:53That, of course, was Artemy Troitsky’s brilliant idea.
2:16:58And Alexander Nikolaevich Yakovlev helped us a lot.
2:17:01But nothing like that had ever happened in the Soviet Union.
2:17:04Troitsky knew that people did that elsewhere.
2:17:06There was the idea. We made it real.
2:17:08With such soul, such heart, and on
2:17:11live connection we organized a conversation with those people.
2:17:16It was an amazing event in my life. Amazing.
2:17:19And it didn’t matter what the consequences were.
2:17:21Barykin’s were worse. He stayed there longer.
2:17:24And what about him?
2:17:25He had terrible problems w ith his voice too.
2:17:29- And you? - Mine came later.
2:17:32Well, because of my thyroid.
2:17:34And it affected that.
2:17:36From the thyroid to the hormones, that’s how they explained it.
2:17:39But later, well, no, I can still sing.
2:17:42Maybe not like before, but I can.
2:17:43But speaking is harder. That’s why I keep silent.
2:17:48- Did you regret going there? - No. Not for a second.
2:17:52You can’t imagine what it felt like,
2:17:55when you sing with them, when you hug them.
2:17:58I even danced with one.
2:17:59Those tears in their eyes.
2:18:01Those tired faces that by the end brightened completely.
2:18:05They literally became bright.
2:18:07Such joy it was.
2:18:09In fact, all I got after that trip
2:18:12was a scolding for singing with a big black bow.
2:18:16Who scolded you?
2:18:18Well, as always, someone from the party organization.
2:18:20They gave me a cap, of course.
2:18:22Everyone was in white caps. Everyone.
2:18:24Well, and we were, of course, heroes.
2:18:26I said, "let’s do it this way.
2:18:27This doesn’t suit me at all, I don’t know how to sing in this cap.
2:18:31I’ll tie a bow, it’ll be cooler than your cap."
2:18:34I tied a bow, and they said, "yes, yes, fine."
2:18:37And then they picked on that bow.
2:18:40No one cared what we did, what
2:18:42our heroism was, what our weakness was.
2:18:44“She sang in black, with a black bow on her head.”
2:18:50You see? What a horror.
2:18:52Always something forbidden.
2:18:54To live in a country of bans for 76 years.
2:18:57Well, there were glimpses, of course,
2:19:00when Gorbachev’s thaw came, not Khrushchev’s.
2:19:02- Khrushchev’s doesn’t count? - Well, no, that was okay too.
2:19:05Everyone breathed easier when he suddenly
2:19:08started to suddenly understand something in art and creativity.
2:19:12He was probably afraid of American influence, as always in Russia.
2:19:15I don’t remember how old I was and
2:19:17what year it was, but under Khrushchev
2:19:21relations with America got more cheerful, and in
2:19:24Sokolniki there was an American exhibition.
2:19:27It was an event.
2:19:29Not only did they sell Coca-Cola there, there was a line.
2:19:33I thought, what an interesting drink, I want one too.
2:19:36We stood in line, mom, dad, me, brother.
2:19:38And then I saw, they weren’t drinking Coca-Cola, they were keeping the cups.
2:19:42Because we didn’t have those plastic cups.
2:19:45And the whole line stood not really for
2:19:47Coca-Cola, but for those cups.
2:19:49When our turn came, I tried it and thought, well,
2:19:52it’s like shoe polish, just shoe polish.
2:19:55And so I absentmindedly threw it away, cup and all.
2:19:59My mom said, “Why did you do that?”
2:20:02Can you imagine?
2:20:04There were also these big, round pins.
2:20:07We didn’t have those either.
2:20:09So beautiful.
2:20:10And for the first time we saw colorful plastic bags.
2:20:14And of course, we saw color television.
2:20:17So they wouldn’t get broken, they were placed up high.
2:20:21And everyone stood like this, mouths open, staring.
2:20:24How’s that? A television? In color?
2:20:28And then people walked over, and down below there was rock-n-roll dancing.
2:20:34And everyone waited for him to flip her over to see her panties.
2:20:38That’s how innocent and pure people were.
2:20:44And so…
2:20:45They had such curiosity about all of it.
2:20:47And of course, at that exhibition there were
2:20:49abstract sculptures on display.
2:20:51That interested me.
2:20:52How they made a human figure out of just one stone.
2:20:55And apparently it interested people so much that when
2:20:59a wave of abstract art appeared here, our
2:21:03leader got scared.
2:21:06And so they bulldozed such a good exhibition.
2:21:09Those poor artists defended their paintings.
2:21:11But in life, despite all the bans, there were interesting things.
2:21:15At the Mayakovsky monument we always went to listen to poetry.
2:21:18- And you went too? - Of course.
2:21:20It was wonderful.
2:21:23Although later they dispersed them and all that.
2:21:25But again, a ban…
2:21:26A ban makes it even more interesting, as always.
2:21:29Stilyagi.
2:21:29Watch the film about the stilyagi, it’s all true.
2:21:32But those bans, especially later, when the stilyagi were around,
2:21:35boys weren’t allowed to have long hair.
2:21:39They’d cut it off in the street.
2:21:41Or take them to the police and cut it off there.
2:21:44They also banned reading Solzhenitsyn.
2:21:47And I found that book at my parents’ under the linens.
2:21:51And I really wanted to read it. And I did.
2:21:53And what did you think?
2:21:54Well, that’s a subject not really for teenagers.
2:21:58And what was it? The Gulag Archipelago?
2:22:00The Archipelago. Prison.
2:22:04I wondered why it was banned.
2:22:05When did Gorbachev come?
2:22:07You were already an adult.
2:22:09What was it like?
2:22:10It was such a breath of freedom.
2:22:14Not freedom in everything, not permissiveness, but
2:22:17the freedom to say it’s freedom of your thinking,
2:22:20the freedom of a desire, that you want to do
2:22:23but were forbidden, and now you can.
2:22:25It was such a wonderful time.
2:22:27And before Gorbachev we were basically hated
2:22:29in the West.
2:22:31But we had to go there.
2:22:33And we felt it.
2:22:34We even tried not to speak Russian too much.
2:22:37- Like now? - Yes, yes, yes.
2:22:39It was already like that.
2:22:40And then suddenly perestroika, and we went to
2:22:43a rock festival with musicians, and we saw, my God, such happiness!
2:22:48They hugged us and shouted “Perestroika! Perestroika!”
2:22:52That is, people wanted to be friends with us and love us, you see?
2:22:56Well, and such happiness it was that it happened.
2:22:59And then we still showed them “Kuzka’s mother.”
2:23:02Is it true that in 1996 you refused
2:23:04to take part in the “Vote or Lose” tour?
2:23:06- To vote for whom? - For Yeltsin.
2:23:08Well, when I wanted to vote, I voted, I wanted to.
2:23:11But this time I didn’t feel like it.
2:23:13Later we met when he had already left office.
2:23:16So Igor Krutoy and I went to visit him.
2:23:19And then, honestly, after that meeting we got drunk.
2:23:22And we said, “What a cool guy!” said Krutoy.
2:23:28“He’s so cool!” Cool or not cool,
2:23:31but you had such a role as a ruler, so to speak.
2:23:34Rulers also make mistakes, but some rethink them,
2:23:37and some don’t.
2:23:39Some don’t have the courage to admit mistakes.
2:23:43No courage for repentance.
2:23:45That is a magnificent, noble quality.
2:23:49But so far I don’t see any like that.
2:23:51And what about Gorbachev?
2:23:53Well, he, yes, he was the kind of person
2:23:55who could make mistakes and did, but he rethought
2:23:59it all and said, “No, that’s not right, that’s wrong.”
2:24:01So, well, that was fine.
2:24:03Well, maybe he lacked something
2:24:04like a mind-blowing kind of genius,
2:24:08but he truly wanted people to have a good life.
2:24:10A peaceful, happy, and joyful one.
2:24:13Some things didn’t work out, some did, but
2:24:15we had time to rejoice.
2:24:17It was a time of joy and creation.
2:24:21To hurry, maybe this time would pass,
2:24:23to create something, to make things. Ah!
2:24:27Well, maybe I’ll live to see such a time again.
2:24:30That Gorbachev, with his last decree, gave you the title of People’s Artist.
2:24:33Oh, don’t remind me, can you imagine?
2:24:35I was surprised, but of course it was pleasant, very symbolic.
2:24:39You know, when he was just elected president, the phone rang,
2:24:45I picked up and heard.
2:24:47And they said, “Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev would like to speak with you.”
2:24:52I said, “Couldn’t you come up with something better?”
2:24:56Though there weren’t such scammers back then.
2:24:58Anyway, they connected me with Mikhail Sergeyevich.
2:25:00He said, “I’m so glad to hear your voice.”
2:25:04And many compliments and all that, then he said,
2:25:07“You know, I have one request.
2:25:09Can we meet?
2:25:10I have questions about how to conduct discussions, debates.
2:25:15I basically learned from your interviews.”
2:25:19That struck me so much.
2:25:21He said, “I have a question, but I don’t want to discuss it on the phone.”
2:25:24It was so nice, I remembered it well.
2:25:26And you went to him?
2:25:27Yes, we met and just chatted, honestly.
2:25:31I said, you already have everything, just be open and honest.
2:25:34That is, if you don’t understand the question,
2:25:35you ask again.
2:25:38“I don’t understand, I don’t agree with you.”
2:25:41“Thank you very much, your question showed me something.”
2:25:45That, I said, is essential for you, for
2:25:47your role now in the state.
2:25:50He looked at me. “I understand.”
2:25:53He was a wonderful man.
2:25:55Raisa Maksimovna, she was quite different.
2:25:58In my opinion, she was a little uptight and reserved.
2:26:01She wasn’t pretending to be like that.
2:26:03She really was.
2:26:04We were once at her birthday.
2:26:07She greeted everyone like this.
2:26:09Well, I thought, all right, let’s sit through this, endure it.
2:26:12And suddenly at the end she comes to the table,
2:26:15opens her handbag, takes out some candy, puts it inside,
2:26:21and looks at me.
2:26:22“Mikhail Sergeyevich loves these candies very much.”
2:26:27She closed the bag. “A bear up north.”
2:26:31That touched me so much, you see.
2:26:34I began to see her with completely different eyes.
2:26:37It really stayed with me.
2:26:38In fact, she was probably the only one,
2:26:40at least in Soviet times, the ruler of our country
2:26:43for whom love was more important than power.
2:26:47Yes. And I think we had a lot in common.
2:26:51And when he was already very old, he invited me, 3021 02:26:55,210 --> 02:25:57,210 but I couldn’t go, and I regret it.
2:26:57I came to the funeral.
2:27:00Did you ever want to be close to power?
2:27:03Never.
2:27:04I always told others,
2:27:06“Don’t be friends with them. That’s a kind of friendship.”
2:27:09For an artist it was an obligation.
2:27:11A concert for Police Day, another concert.
2:27:14Police Day was the best concert.
2:27:16It was broadcast live.
2:27:18And I strove to be on that show.
2:27:20So much so that even one of my songs got through thanks to the live broadcast.
2:27:24- Which one? - “Guardian Angel.”
2:27:26But everyone was outraged, because I had sung
2:27:30“Kings Can Do Anything,” and they called me back for an encore.
2:27:33But I wasn’t going to repeat “Kings Can Do Anything.”
2:27:35I said, if you want, I’ll sing you a song.
2:27:37“Guardian Angel.”
2:27:39And the cameramen were already panicking, because
2:27:41“Kings Can Do Anything” was always shown to Shchelokov.
2:27:44And they were terribly afraid that “Guardian Angel”—
2:27:47since it was about a policeman, it was all right.
2:27:50But they didn’t think about the real angel.
2:27:53We must meet.
2:27:55And bring each other more joy.
2:27:59Maybe because of that the Earth will become stronger.
2:28:03And the heavens above it, which lately are all full of holes.
2:28:10The swamp of spaceships.
2:28:12The swamp of curses we send from Earth.
2:28:15Born of human malice, of wars.
2:28:21Brothers and sisters, we are human beings.
2:28:25Yet sometimes we behave like animals.
2:28:29I wish that time would come sooner,
2:28:33when all our human malice would remain only in the rhythms of music.
2:28:41And all we’d have left is peaceful skies above us
2:28:44and happy, healthy children.
2:28:47Well, it passed.
2:28:50It’s gone, flown by.
2:28:51Come on, were you really planning to show up at Police Day like that?
2:28:54A dress that unbuttons with snaps, and nothing underneath.
2:28:58- Panties. - Ah, so panties after all.
2:28:59Well, of course, but pretty ones.
2:29:02Because I was already so fed up
2:29:04with being called vulgar, punished.
2:29:07Banned from television for two years.
2:29:09So I thought, fine, I’ll show you what vulgar really means.
2:29:13Brezhnev didn’t let me do it.
2:29:16I had that dress made, beautiful, all with snaps.
2:29:19And the panties too.
2:29:21Not some sexy kind, just very simple ones.
2:29:26Pretty, decent.
2:29:28- Respectable. - Yes, respectable.
2:29:29We had even rehearsed it.
2:29:32Who was there? Borya Moiseyev, someone else too.
2:29:35Everyone was trembling.
2:29:36He saved me, you see — he died.
2:29:41And that concert was canceled.
2:29:45And you say higher powers intervene.
2:29:49The universe hears me.
2:29:51Where’s the line between being folksy and being vulgar?
2:29:53Well, it has to be natural.
2:29:55When people say freedom, it’s not permissiveness.
2:29:58When they say modesty, it doesn’t mean
2:30:01you must wear armor and hide everything.
2:30:05Everything should be in moderation.
2:30:07So the only serious time you entered politics
2:30:09was when you supported Mikhail Prokhorov?
2:30:12Well, yes. It seemed necessary.
2:30:15And why necessary?
2:30:16Well, in all these elections you had to.
2:30:19We supported him.
2:30:21And someone told me,
2:30:23“Even if he doesn’t get elected, you should support him.”
2:30:26We understood perfectly it was unlikely. That’s the way it worked.
2:30:29And we were friends with Makarevich, with Mikhail Prokhorov.
2:30:33So it wasn’t a commercial story?
2:30:35No. He always helped me. Always.
2:30:38“Christmas Meetings.”
2:30:40Because before he came along, to make
2:30:43a quality show, you had to spend money.
2:30:47I poured all my money into it.
2:30:49- Your own? - Well, of course.
2:30:52And at first we didn’t even know what a sponsor was
2:30:54when the “Christmas Meetings” began.
2:30:57Later a sponsor appeared, some company, I don’t remember.
2:31:03And he paid us with televisions,
2:31:07which we gave to an orphanage.
2:31:09But the “Christmas Meetings” still brought no money.
2:31:11No, I invested my own, what are you saying?
2:31:13- Then why did you do them? - For beauty.
2:31:16In the ’90s a new period began in your career.
2:31:19That moment when you could already organize
2:31:22events, “Christmas Meetings,” on a grand scale.
2:31:25You could already make decisions.
2:31:28You were already becoming an authoritative figure in show business, right?
2:31:32Of course, if I did a lot, I had authority.
2:31:34- And did you like that? - Like what?
2:31:37Being someone who could decide people’s fates.
2:31:38I never thought about that.
2:31:40I had the opportunity to help people.
2:31:42And that was important to me.
2:31:44Now it’s so nice that I could afford
2:31:48to do it, and I did.
2:31:49The ’90s. What were they like for you?
2:31:52Well, first of all, money appeared.
2:31:54Royalties, and concerts suddenly became more expensive.
2:31:58It was happiness, because I could buy something, like furniture.
2:32:04In everyday life it was very good.
2:32:07And if we talk about the criminal world?
2:32:09They respected me. What can I do?
2:32:13They respected Lyubov Uspenskaya.
2:32:15Like she used to say.
2:32:17And they respected me.
2:32:19And they had rules —
2:32:21not petty pickpockets, rapists, and the like.
2:32:25There was a certain code, like no touching children.
2:32:29That’s not allowed.
2:32:30So, by and large, I knew these people.
2:32:33By and large.
2:32:35But when Listyev was killed, you came the next morning?
2:32:38It was the first Sunday of spring.
2:32:40We found out.
2:32:42I was, of course, in some kind of hysterical state.
2:32:45I roughly know why.
2:32:49It was a financial matter, basically.
2:32:51You understand? The division of everything.
2:32:53But still. I felt so sorry for him.
2:32:56He was such a wonderful man.
2:32:57Well, you came there and said very important things.
2:33:00Why did you call the journalists yourself?
2:33:02There are journalists.
2:33:03- So what should we do? - Do?
2:33:05I don’t know what to do.
2:33:06We have to live, but live by some rules, some laws.
2:33:09Sacred laws.
2:33:11That must still exist in something.
2:33:13Well, that’s the way I was.
2:33:15And you said the time was coming when all the colorful ones,
2:33:17all those who stood out, would be killed and eliminated.
2:33:20But you can’t shoot everyone.
2:33:23Yes, you can’t shoot everyone.
2:33:25I’m about to cry.
2:33:27Because that stayed with me.
2:33:30This moment just brought it back.
2:33:33So even if they had taken me away after those words, I would have said them.
2:33:36Because it was such an explosion of emotions,
2:33:39so unexpected.
2:33:41And in fact, I had an idea of what was happening.
2:33:44It made me terribly indignant.
2:33:46It was grief on the first Sunday of spring.
2:33:48And since then we stopped walking the streets.
2:33:51We only gathered together.
2:33:52Is it true that when you were, by the way,
2:33:54a member of Russia’s Public Chamber, you pushed for pension increases?
2:33:58Yes, we pushed. At least something.
2:34:02But basically, I left because I went broke.
2:34:06Went broke?
2:34:07Well, because I got bags full of letters.
2:34:10“We don’t have a TV, help us. We don’t have this, help us.”
2:34:14I thought the Public Chamber would give some money for help.
2:34:18That’s how it seemed.
2:34:20And I sent everything to everyone — a TV to some, something else to others.
2:34:26One girl asked for mascara. I still remember.
2:34:30“Otherwise I don’t know what I’m using on my lashes.”
2:34:34But people go into the Public Chamber to promote laws, don’t they?
2:34:38Well, there were different people.
2:34:39We were doing this kind of thing.
2:34:42Gathering help, people’s requests.
2:34:45And in the end pensions were raised.
2:34:47Did you ever have the idea to go into big politics?
2:34:49I’d vote for you.
2:34:51Oh no, no, no.
2:34:52I remember, there was what they now call a flash mob.
2:34:57Suddenly they decided I should become president.
2:35:02That started.
2:35:04Even at kiosks, they said, “Come vote here.”
2:35:07They collected signatures.
2:35:09I said, “What, are you all crazy?”
2:35:10You mustn’t do that.
2:35:12You have to know the person.
2:35:13I wasn’t a professional in this at all.
2:35:17In short, I was indignant.
2:35:19And someone hinted to me, “Better refuse.”
2:35:23- I said, “Why?” - Or they’ll remove you. You’re in the way.
2:35:26It was such a time, you know?
2:35:28- Was that in the ’90s? - Well yes, back then.
2:35:31I think you tried almost everything that was popular in the ’90s.
2:35:34You had your own chips, your own shoes.
2:35:37Oh, let’s not talk about that. My shoes...
2:35:40Still have them?
2:35:41Let’s not talk about shoes, it doesn’t matter.
2:35:42I still have everything. No chips though.
2:35:44- Radio Alla? - Radio Alla, yes, I was scammed.
2:35:47I don’t regret anything.
2:35:49And you did it because you wanted to make money,
2:35:51or because you were curious to try?
2:35:53Well, first of all, I was curious to try.
2:35:55I knew I could help many people.
2:35:56There were such segments.
2:35:59Bublik, see how popular he became after that.
2:36:04- I really liked it. - Did you?
2:36:06Yes, I really loved that program.
2:36:08And I so enjoyed talking, interviewing, like you’re sitting here.
2:36:12I liked getting to know people better.
2:36:15It was great.
2:36:16Radio was very interesting.
2:36:17I even got an award for it,
2:36:19a journalism award.
2:36:20And what do you listen to now?
2:36:22Just don’t tell me “the sound of the sea.”
2:36:24You’ll be surprised.
2:36:25I play recordings of forest birds, field birds,
2:36:32morning, evening… the nightingale, rarely.
2:36:35But I feel so good.
2:36:37That’s my music these days.
2:36:40It’s so interesting when the morning itself wakes up.
2:36:44Not me waking up, but the morning waking up.
2:36:47Some sounds.
2:36:48We have seagulls screaming under the window all the time.
2:36:52Every evening, every morning.
2:36:54But once, around five in the morning, a bird sings.
2:36:59Just one, the only one.
2:37:00And it’s so wonderful, so beautiful.
2:37:03And I get up with that bird and just walk around the house.
2:37:08Or come in here. No one around. Silence.
2:37:11And such unity with nature, it’s amazing.
2:37:14So beautiful it brings tears.
2:37:19Haven’t there been any new performers on the Russian stage
2:37:22in recent years who impressed you?
2:37:25Anyone who would be in your playlist?
2:37:26I don’t really follow who’s around now, I sometimes watch.
2:37:31But I don’t quite understand what they’re singing.
2:37:34Because the words are all unclear.
2:37:35But I see the audience knows these songs.
2:37:39And sings along.
2:37:40So it must be needed.
2:37:43Maybe if I don’t like it, it doesn’t mean it’s bad.
2:37:47For me, my favorite male singers in Russia are
2:37:50those whose singing I enjoy, like Stas Piekha.
2:37:55Just an amazing singer.
2:37:56But very inert when it comes to himself.
2:38:01Anatoly Tsoy.
2:38:02Oh, what a singer that guy is.
2:38:05Dima Bilan.
2:38:06A wonderful singer.
2:38:07Among the young ones, some have started to interest me.
2:38:11I picked Bravo, George Granzh.
2:38:15I’ve already set my sights on him, this young boy.
2:38:18Well, no shame in that.
2:38:20I can… There are no other topics, you know?
2:38:24I just can’t support anyone else.
2:38:26Anastasia Sadkovskaya, very strong.
2:38:28And George Granzh. He’s finding himself.
2:38:31Now is such a time...
2:38:33They used to call it the soap-bubble era.
2:38:35But it’s a period when the old ones are still singing,
2:38:39and the very young, really talented ones haven’t quite appeared yet.
2:38:43So this space is filled by interesting,
2:38:47but short-lived people, so to speak.
2:38:48Because this period lasts about four years.
2:38:51Which is enough, actually.
2:38:52Then others will come who approach this time more consciously.
2:38:58Understanding that you don’t sing just for a hit,
2:39:00but addressing people’s hearts, their souls.
2:39:04So that they realize it helps them.
2:39:07That it preaches something.
2:39:09In any style.
2:39:10Rock, hip-hop, whatever you like.
2:39:12That’s what Western music has always had.
2:39:16Because they always had meaning.
2:39:17And in about five years, say, a girl like Alisa Golomysova will grow up.
2:39:23There are such talented teenagers.
2:39:25And then they’ll be calm, no need to convince anyone,
2:39:27they’ll just sing from soul to souls.
2:39:31Do you like Monetochka?
2:39:33Very interesting.
2:39:34Very smart, very distinctive.
2:39:38How can anyone silence her?
2:39:40On the contrary, you should listen to her as a clue.
2:39:43Like how they treat those comedians.
2:39:45It’s terrible. I don’t get it.
2:39:50It’s always been like this, and always will be.
2:39:52But I just don’t understand.
2:39:53Smart kings always had jesters.
2:39:57Not to entertain them, but so they could tell the truth.
2:39:59So they could speak the truth to them.
2:40:04What could they do there, you see?
2:40:06They knew what was being said, what the situation was.
2:40:11And when they came with news to the tsars, and
2:40:14he asked, "So, are they telling the truth or not?"
2:40:18Should this be done?
2:40:19The wisest people were jesters.
2:40:21I wouldn’t advise getting rid of them.
2:40:24- Do you like Morgenshtern? - Yes.
2:40:25I’ve always liked him.
2:40:26He’s incredibly talented.
2:40:28And self-directing.
2:40:30His delivery is interesting, everything about it.
2:40:34At first, maybe he showed off with it, as always, overdone, excessive.
2:40:38He wanted to be remembered exactly that way.
2:40:41I get all that.
2:40:42You remind me of that now, because
2:40:44I don’t think much about it these days.
2:40:46Who else among the girls...
2:40:48There’s a lively one.
2:40:50Mia Boyka, right?
2:40:51Not just Boyka, but boykaya, you see?
2:40:53A grabby girl. She’ll grab what’s hers.
2:40:56She sings well, but hasn’t chosen what yet. In three chords it was wonderful.
2:41:04But then I listened to what she does on stage.
2:41:06Such a huge contrast.
2:41:08You can’t sit on two chairs at once.
2:41:11You’ve got to work this youth audience, and also
2:41:14this other one, that’s already...
2:41:16That’s why I say, it’s just that kind of time.
2:41:18You have to guess right now.
2:41:20In 2012 on Pozner’s show you said,
2:41:23"that we’re standing on the edge, I feel that
2:41:26something is about to start happening, something
2:41:28is hanging in the air, and how to get out of this
2:41:31shit, literally, you don’t know."
2:41:33I don’t know.
2:41:34But you really felt something?
2:41:35Yes.
2:41:36And what was it connected to?
2:41:37That Putin and Medvedev switched, and
2:41:39Putin went for a new term?
2:41:41That there were these election stories?
2:41:43What was it?
2:41:44I wasn’t thinking about them at all.
2:41:47Putin, Medvedev.
2:41:48I was friends with Dima, because he...
2:41:50With Medvedev?
2:41:51Yes, but because Dima and Sveta I liked very much.
2:41:56Dmitry Anatolyevich is a different person today.
2:41:59I don’t recognize him.
2:42:01Even like Putin, Vladimir Vladimirovich, I didn’t expect that.
2:42:04They’re just different people now...
2:42:07I had a gut feeling, you see?
2:42:09I’ve lived a long time, and when this comes, I feel it.
2:42:12I won’t explain how.
2:42:13Because when that scum of informers appeared,
2:42:16that was the beginning, you see?
2:42:17And this is just the end.
2:42:19It’s such a disgrace.
2:42:21I was born under informers.
2:42:24Turns out I’m living under informers too.
2:42:26It’s disgraceful.
2:42:27It’s the fungus of the country, you see?
2:42:29Where informers appear.
2:42:31It must be cleaned out, cleaned out.
2:42:32But if they’re allowed, it’s the end.
2:42:36They’re in the Justice Ministry, in the investigative committees, everywhere.
2:42:40I think it’s ridiculous for them.
2:42:44Honestly. It’s just horrible.
2:42:47Disgusting. Shameful.
2:42:48But if you have this gut feeling, what’s next?
2:42:50I have no right to say.
2:42:52I know, but I have no right.
2:42:53That’s for my committee.
2:42:56Let’s live to see 2027.
2:42:58Remember. 2027.
2:43:09That’s Lighthouse.
2:43:10We’ve already gotten here.
2:43:13At your pace, I’m surprised we’ll be going on for long...
2:43:15What pace? I crawl like a snail.
2:43:18Then they’ll say my legs don’t work.
2:43:20But they do.
2:43:25Oh, Lord.
2:43:27I don’t care what people say, but it’s funny,
2:43:29that sometimes they hit the mark.
2:43:31And I’m sorry they notice it.
2:43:34For example?
2:43:35Well, it’s obvious my back hurts.
2:43:38So I walk like this.
2:43:39Especially when I’m walking with kids, I usually talk like this.
2:43:44Just to look them in the eyes.
2:43:46And that’s when they film me, and I look like this.
2:43:49Listen, after so many years you still haven’t gotten
2:43:51used to it, don’t you just not care?
2:43:53Hello. That’s why I’m telling you, I don’t care.
2:43:56Otherwise, I wouldn’t have said anything.
2:43:58I’m fine.
2:44:00Like others know how to say.
2:44:02No, I’m fine.
2:44:04We even say yes, you mustn’t slouch.
2:44:07But I always do.
2:44:08I tell Garik, and he tells me.
2:44:09But I’ve been slouching since childhood, unfortunately.
2:44:12Because when I started school in first grade,
2:44:16I was the tallest.
2:44:18- You? - Yes.
2:44:20In first grade, second, third,
2:44:23fourth, I was the tallest.
2:44:26Then they started catching up.
2:44:28And when I went to college, they all turned into beanpoles.
2:44:32I came to a reunion of some kind.
2:44:35I saw they were all so tall, so big.
2:44:39And I was so small.
2:44:40What a joy, I was a different person then.
2:44:44By the way, I always thought you were really tall.
2:44:47Well, everyone thought I was tall, big.
2:44:53Oh! Well, okay.
2:44:55Listen, all the youth magazines of my time were about
2:44:59how you fought with excess weight.
2:45:04You did?
2:45:05Of course, I did. I was sick from childhood.
2:45:07I’d faint from dyes, colors, fabric quality.
2:45:11Only certain black fabric worked for me.
2:45:13Even at school they let me have
2:45:20a uniform tailored for me, not the store-bought one.
2:45:23The illness tormented me, and they took me to Botkin Hospital.
2:45:28Because they said there’s a woman, Faina,
2:45:31an acupuncturist.
2:45:33But acupuncture was forbidden.
2:45:35It was underground, in Botkin Hospital.
2:45:39I said, what needles?
2:45:40Come on, I know nothing.
2:45:43But if she trusted the person, well,
2:45:45her grandfather had been in China, learned acupuncture.
2:45:50And those golden needles remained, gorgeous, the proper kind.
2:45:55I cried, said, “I suffer so much.”
2:45:57And I was already performing on stage.
2:46:01“I can’t wear anything but black.
2:46:04White, at best.”
2:46:05She kept looking at me.
2:46:07Said, “Well, you need 15 sessions.”
2:46:10I said, “Even 20.”
2:46:12And Kristina was about that age then.
2:46:18I went, but she warned me,
2:46:22“I’ll cure you. This illness will leave you.
2:46:27But you’ll gain 20 kilos.”
2:46:29And for me, 20 kilos was like this:
2:46:32I come from the market with 10 kilos in one bag,
2:46:34potatoes in the right hand and 10 in the left.
2:46:38And I stomp home, you see?
2:46:41So I didn’t care much.
2:46:4320 kilos more, fine.
2:46:45And after the treatment, some time later
2:46:48I sang in a dress with open sleeves.
2:46:52Kristina was in the audience, it was filmed.
2:46:55When I saw myself, my arms were so fat,
2:46:59I was like—ugh!
2:47:02I hated it, I was so upset.
2:47:05And since then, I’ve been fighting those 20 kilos all my life.
2:47:08But at least I was cured.
2:47:09When my heart hurt, when I met Max,
2:47:13I was really overweight.
2:47:15I never thought it affected the vessels, everything, so much.
2:47:19It was hard for me to walk.
2:47:21And after the bypass surgery,
2:47:26I just deflated. That’s it.
2:47:29I was so happy.
2:47:30At what age did you like yourself physically the most?
2:47:34I never thought about it.
2:47:36At any age.
2:47:38I’d look at myself and think, yes.
2:47:43And then say, everything’s fine.
2:47:45One more song I want to ask about.
2:47:48On the way here, we listened to Shakespeare’s 40th sonnet.
2:47:52Not every pop singer would sing songs
2:47:56to Shakespeare’s poetry with Khrennikov’s music.
2:47:58You robbed the beggar of his bag. But I forgave the captivating thief.
2:48:12How did that come about?
2:48:14He just asked me to sing for his film.
2:48:18But I never thought about it.
2:48:20I just sang, the way I liked.
2:48:24Katya!
2:48:25You were supposed to sing in Alfred Schnittke’s "Faust."
2:48:28Yes. But it was forbidden.
2:48:30We prepared so much.
2:48:31The Devil’s Aria.
2:48:34God steered me away from it, you see.
2:48:36It was interesting, the symphony orchestra and my band,
2:48:40and it all blended, rock with classical.
2:48:44And so I sang there.
2:48:48It was amazing.
2:48:49- I didn’t want to sing it. - Why?
2:48:52Because I was nobody to our classical composers.
2:48:58And I started to be afraid.
2:48:59Alfred Schnittke called me.
2:49:00He said, "Nothing strange happens to you at night?"
2:49:02I said, "Yes, suddenly all the candles blow out.
2:49:06As soon as I start rehearsing."
2:49:08They blow out. I think, what is this?
2:49:10No wind, nothing.
2:49:12When I went to bed and started rehearsing with the score,
2:49:15lying there.
2:49:17Someone walking on the balcony.
2:49:19Almost knocking.
2:49:20At first I wondered, what’s going on?
2:49:23And then when Alfred Schnittke called, he said,
2:49:26"The same happens to me."
2:49:28I said, it happens to me too.
2:49:30He said, "That’s what the Devil’s Aria means."
2:49:34Don’t fall for it.
2:49:36I really wanted to refuse, but couldn’t say no to him.
2:49:39Then the composers’ union gathered
2:49:43and said, "We don’t need this. We don’t need Pugacheva."
2:49:47So not the opera, but not Pugacheva?
2:49:49Not Pugacheva.
2:49:50They replaced me with another singer.
2:49:52But amazingly, when it was at
2:49:55the Tchaikovsky Hall, and the concert went on, I was walking.
2:49:59It was winter. I walked around.
2:50:01I was drawn to it.
2:50:03I didn’t go inside, but I walked around.
2:50:06That was a rather scary story.
2:50:10What was it like working with Alfred Schnittke?
2:50:11He was amazing.
2:50:13A bit withdrawn, but when he opened up,
2:50:18his eyes would change.
2:50:21You could see on his face, yes-yes-yes, like that.
2:50:24As if every half hour he was struck by inspiration.
2:50:29It was always on his face.
2:50:31Though he was a very reserved person.
2:50:33And he apologized to me so much.
2:50:35I said, "I beg you, I’ll sing something next time."
2:50:40But inside I thought, thank God, thank God, thank God.
2:50:43That’s the story.
2:50:45Schnittke is a recognized genius.
2:50:46But about Khrennikov, for example, they always say
2:50:49he was just a functionary in the Composers’ Union,
2:50:51but he was also a great composer.
2:50:53Of course. Every era is great, and you can’t deny it.
2:50:56Always great, in its own way.
2:50:58Great.
2:50:59In one way or another, by different things.
2:51:02Our country is like that.
2:51:04A great power, though the one thing it lacks
2:51:07is magnanimity.
2:51:08A great power is magnanimity.
2:51:12Then it’s truly a great power.
2:51:14Well, so be it.
2:51:16Great people never thought of themselves as great.
2:51:19That never crossed their minds.
2:51:21But the great craftsmen, they always flaunted it.
2:51:25"I’m great, everyone, look."
2:51:28No, great people are the most humble ones.
2:51:32Geniuses are more complicated.
2:51:33Why did Khrennikov decide you should sing the Shakespeare sonnet?
2:51:37Because he loved me.
2:51:38He really did, you know, he liked everything.
2:51:40I think he was thrilled to find something for me to sing.
2:51:44He was such a nice guy.
2:51:46Igor Nikolaev loves to recall that because
2:51:49we added sound effects like wind.
2:51:51And Khrennikov had never seen that.
2:51:54During all our recordings, he stood there watching
2:51:57how it was done.
2:52:00He said, "What’s this, where’s it from?"
2:52:02And Igor showed him.
2:52:03Here’s wind, here’s rain, here’s a dog barking.
2:52:07He said, "Well, that’s genius."
2:52:09So all the arrangements were Nikolaev’s work, right?
2:52:13Well, yes. Igor is a talented man.
2:52:15Do you still keep in touch with him?
2:52:17I don’t really feel like it.
2:52:19He doesn’t really reach out either, well, kind of does,
2:52:21but going on TV about his work,
2:52:26there was a show once hosted by Maxim Galkin,
2:52:30then, I think, Nikolay Tsiskaridze.
2:52:32He just came, they told him not to mention Pugacheva and Koroleva.
2:52:38And he said, "Alright."
2:52:40If they told me, "Come to the show,
2:52:43we’ll even pay you.
2:52:46But just don’t mention Igor Nikolaev."
2:52:48I wouldn’t go.
2:52:51You know, and for me as a person, he just became...
2:52:57Well, never mind.
2:52:59I’ll always forgive, because we did so much together,
2:53:01he grew up before my eyes.
2:53:03That time was important to me because
2:53:06it revealed people’s true essence.
2:53:08Very much so.
2:53:09And I don’t judge the people around me,
2:53:13some of my fellow performers.
2:53:15It never even crosses my mind.
2:53:16I might criticize them for something or
2:53:19give advice, but to condemn them for something—
2:53:21that’s their life, their conscience, their business.
2:53:27And when I think that money has defeated kindness,
2:53:32I pretty much agree.
2:53:36Because all people talk about is how much someone makes.
2:53:41Or how this artist got a bigger paycheck.
2:53:44Or where the money went—palaces, and all that.
2:53:49Honestly, I couldn’t care less.
2:53:53Why did it never occur to you
2:53:55to start your own charity foundation?
2:53:57I know many urged you, because
2:53:59it would’ve brought both charity and respect.
2:54:03And you could have centralized the help, distributed it.
2:54:05But if something went wrong,
2:54:08they’d accuse you of stealing money.
2:54:10No-no-no, I never deal with finances at all.
2:54:14Charity foundations.
2:54:16I never told anyone, never said anything.
2:54:19But trust me, I did a lot
2:54:23for charity.
2:54:24Why should I trust you?
2:54:25I know quite a lot.
2:54:26As a person, I’m still a believer.
2:54:29I felt relief, some kind of repentance,
2:54:32if I felt some sin weighing on my soul.
2:54:35I really purified myself that way.
2:54:37I don’t know, it seemed so to me. It made me feel better.
2:54:40Have you always been a believer?
2:54:42- Well, no, of course not. - When did it come?
2:54:44Well, in adulthood.
2:54:46But you don’t talk about that.
2:54:48When it came and said, "We are with you."
2:54:51So it was a specific event?
2:54:53Not just life experience, but a specific event that
2:54:57influenced you?
2:54:57Yes.
2:54:58No one is obliged.
2:55:00One must want it.
2:55:01That’s why I never saved money, honestly.
2:55:04It’s not good to say, but
2:55:06I never understood the value of suddenly having money.
2:55:11I didn’t realize it.
2:55:13My father always told me, "Save for a rainy day."
2:55:15I’d say, "Dad, what rainy day? What are you talking about?"
2:55:18And whenever I had money, I spent it on helping others.
2:55:24An apartment for someone, a car for someone, costumes, guitars.
2:55:33An orphanage.
2:55:33Yes, of course, an orphanage.
2:55:35Once I saw a boy who was very sick.
2:55:38I called Emma at the Oktyabrsky Hall in St. Petersburg.
2:55:41I said, "Emma, I have the money, just give it
2:55:43to this grandmother, pass it on, they’re bringing me to Petersburg now,
2:55:46so that the boy survives."
2:55:48But the boy didn’t survive.
2:55:50The chief doctor called me.
2:55:52What a pity, he was such a good kid.
2:55:55- I said, "What, he died?" - "Yes."
2:55:56- "And what about the money?" - "Leave it to the grandmother." Well, so be it.
2:56:00On one hand, it’s nice to remember
2:56:03that I wasn’t clutching, hoarding a chest of gold.
2:56:08And it’s not really scary that we poured everything into that house, in the village of Gryaz.
2:56:15It’s a pity people behave so strangely, so inhumanly.
2:56:19They say, "We’ll confiscate it."
2:56:22Well, dear Lord.
2:56:23I read they wanted to demolish it.
2:56:25They did, well, let them, what can you do.
2:56:27We won’t lose anything.
2:56:29Won’t it hurt?
2:56:30It’s not a loss, it’s a release.
2:56:32Just like with those friends who tucked their tails right away.
2:56:36It’s not a loss. We got rid of them.
2:56:38I watched a video of Maxim’s birthday five years ago.
2:56:42It was full of people.
2:56:43We welcomed everyone gladly,
2:56:47but I was already not a very trusting person.
2:56:50I understood perfectly that the people around us—
2:56:53it was interesting and pleasant with them,
2:56:55but it was also a convenient acquaintance.
2:56:58We’re gone, they’ll find another convenient acquaintance.
2:57:02I’ve lived long, you see?
2:57:03It’s happened before.
2:57:04Only the truest friends remain.
2:57:07Even though as soon as I got
2:57:09money, people suddenly started coming to me.
2:57:12We used to gather 20–30 people.
2:57:15And then it turned out there was no money.
2:57:18None. Just no money.
2:57:20But everyone still came every Saturday.
2:57:22They’d say, "Come on, pour, let’s have a drink already."
2:57:25And Lyusya, who worked with me, would say, "And did you bring something?"
2:57:29- What do you mean? - That’s how it was.
2:57:32Take what’s given.
2:57:34I had some beer, soup,
2:57:36we cooked soup from processed cheese,
2:57:40so tasty, and pasta.
2:57:42She said, "Run to the store for some booze,
2:57:45pasta, we’ve got pickles, pour that
2:57:48soup over the pasta and you’ll have Italy."
2:57:52After that, no one stayed.
2:57:54And I even stressed, "I’m afraid I’m screwed,
2:57:58no money for a long time."
2:58:00That was the test.
2:58:02The only ones left were Svyatoslav Fedorov and Yevtushenko.
2:58:06I won’t list them all.
2:58:08Good people remained.
2:58:10So I was ready for anything.
2:58:12It was such an interesting time, it revealed people’s true essence.
2:58:16There was war, it was hard, but God must have needed it.
2:58:21That’s how it was.
2:58:22I thought for a long time, but Putin is not a stupid man.
2:58:25I knew him.
2:58:27You even campaigned for him.
2:58:28Not campaigned, I voted for him.
2:58:31I was thrilled.
2:58:33I thought, finally!
2:58:34What did you like?
2:58:35First of all, he said all the right things.
2:58:38Even about Ukraine, look at what he said.
2:58:41He said, "There will never be a war
2:58:43between Russia and Ukraine."
2:58:44Everything I thought, he said it.
2:58:47He was an idol. What a man.
2:58:50Of course, now it’s a shock.
2:58:52But wait, you say you understand people.
2:58:54How did you not see anything in him?
2:58:56You saw him, like me. He gave you an order.
2:59:00When he gave me the order, I already...
2:59:01Already saw it.
2:59:02I waited three hours and realized something was wrong.
2:59:07Joke.
2:59:08Be late, Vladimir Vladimirovich, be late.
2:59:10But stop it already. Enough.
2:59:13Of course, it was a shock for me.
2:59:15Suddenly… I had this thought.
2:59:18I won’t elaborate now, but it was terrible.
2:59:20Everyone knows I’m against the war.
2:59:23And I believe our country has suffered greatly.
2:59:27Secondly—
2:59:28First of all, I feel sorry for Ukraine.
2:59:30It’s like explaining with fingers that some people
2:59:33don’t want to live in a communal flat.
2:59:35They want their own apartments.
2:59:36That’s understandable.
2:59:38And when they say they want independence, that’s it.
2:59:42No.
2:59:42"But that’s your brother."
2:59:44I had a brother too, he wanted independence. Fine.
2:59:49I helped him in everything, though it was unbearable.
2:59:51He’d come and shoot at the ceiling.
2:59:53He was a very sick man.
2:59:55Still, I helped his children.
2:59:58That’s what people should do.
2:59:59They should, above all, talk. Negotiate.
3:00:04They should smile.
3:00:06They should think about the future. Not only of their children.
3:00:09That’s how I see it.
3:00:11And a person, besides fighting, kills.
3:00:17Now it comes from the other side. Everyone suffers.
3:00:22It’s hard to make things right.
3:00:24There must be some business in it.
3:00:25But I don’t understand it.
3:00:27And how many people suffer.
3:00:29At what point did you realize about him
3:00:30that he wasn’t the man you
3:00:33wanted to vote for and support?
3:00:35It really shook me.
3:00:36I got tense when the Kursk sank.
3:00:41I thought, he’ll rush here.
3:00:42Poor man, he must leave Sochi and comfort everyone.
3:00:47But he didn’t come.
3:00:48You can’t imagine how sorry I feel
3:00:51that this is happening.
3:00:52And later everything will end. Things will be fine, right?
3:00:55But you can’t bring people back.
3:00:57Broken lives.
3:00:59Traumatized children.
3:01:02It’s a tragedy.
3:01:02And so, I can’t say.
3:01:04I can’t help in any way.
3:01:07And that kills me, truly kills me.
3:01:10And even having an opinion now is criminal.
3:01:13Your point of view.
3:01:14You can’t even say it.
3:01:16By the way, foreign agent Galkin, right?
3:01:20The funniest thing.
3:01:22How could they think about Galkin, about me,
3:01:25about the guys who left, Makarevich.
3:01:28All these “foreign agents,” that our opinions are paid for.
3:01:34Some foreign agencies, or whatever they call them.
3:01:37They pay us to say this,
3:01:40to think this way.
3:01:41How is that possible?
3:01:44They implant this in people.
3:01:46And they believe it.
3:01:47How do you shield your children from the internet?
3:01:50Especially the internet that came after you left.
3:01:54They simply don’t have it, you see.
3:01:55- Internet? - Yes, no Instagram.
3:01:58And online, I don’t know, they’re not really interested.
3:02:02Why keep track?
3:02:03But everything Russian politicians,
3:02:06journalists and so on said about you — does it reach them?
3:02:08Well, yes.
3:02:10We explain it all with laughter,
3:02:12so they laugh too.
3:02:14I always tell them, "Only people
3:02:17who are worse off than us talk like that."
3:02:20So you think when Margarita Simonyan comes out
3:02:22and says you don’t have a real family,
3:02:25she’s worse off than you?
3:02:26What did Simonyan say?
3:02:28That your family isn’t real, that
3:02:29Maxim, and now in Russia it’s a criminal offense.
3:02:33- Gay, you mean? - Yes.
3:02:33Call me a pot, just don’t put me in the oven.
3:02:37What do I care, it’s their favorite topic.
3:02:39Who isn’t gay these days?
3:02:40Feels like everyone is.
3:02:42Whatever blog you open, it’s
3:02:44“this one’s gay, that one’s gay, hey-hey-hey.”
3:02:48It doesn’t concern us.
3:02:49Let them say what they want.
3:02:51And you’re not going to respond?
3:02:53Absolutely not.
3:02:54As long as we’re fine.
3:02:56They can say whatever they like.
3:02:58You portray people so well, I think
3:03:01you could star in more than one big comedy film.
3:03:05Right.
3:03:06Have you been offered roles?
3:03:08You mean the comic old lady again?
3:03:10Nikita Mikhalkov always told me,
3:03:14"I’ll cast you as a comic old lady."
3:03:18A long wait.
3:03:19Back then you couldn’t just slap on makeup, do something.
3:03:22Then years went by.
3:03:23I said, "Remember the comic old lady?
3:03:25Remember you have to age for that?"
3:03:29After you sang “Madame Brushkina” into his ear?
3:03:32That was such a fun, unexpected bit.
3:03:35He went along with all the improvisations.
3:03:37You know, I adore him.
3:03:40I love him.
3:03:41Despite everything he says about you?
3:03:43Yes, of course.
3:03:44That’s also a forced life and position.
3:03:48Do you think he says things he doesn’t believe?
3:03:51No, of course not.
3:03:51He’s much subtler. He takes after his father.
3:03:55Maybe he didn’t believe, but he supported it all.
3:03:58He knew that’s what had to be done.
3:04:00Still, I think he treats me well too.
3:04:04Despite what he says.
3:04:06But times are like that.
3:04:09Nikita Sergeyevich, Nikitushka, I love you very much.
3:04:12Don’t be ill.
3:04:13I know something’s hurting there.
3:04:15Don’t be ill. Stay healthy.
3:04:18And be more joyful.
3:04:19- I’m about to fall off my chair. - Why?
3:04:21It seems there’s nothing you couldn’t forgive.
3:04:25There are things.
3:04:26But I won’t name them, or they’ll do it out of spite.
3:04:28In 2007 you said you were retiring.
3:04:34The word “retire” was used.
3:04:35Yes? Ugh, what an awful word.
3:04:38What is retirement made of? Does it even exist?
3:04:40You can’t keep working
3:04:42when you don’t feel harmony within yourself.
3:04:45If something is off.
3:04:46That means you’re either
3:04:49suppressing something in yourself, or you want
3:04:52to burst off in a completely different direction.
3:04:54And since all my life I’ve been
3:04:57a seeker, I realized the moment had come.
3:05:01I didn’t retire, I went into unrest.
3:05:04Because I’m interested in some new current
3:05:08in my soul, some new moods.
3:05:12I have plans that have nothing to do with singing.
3:05:16That’s rejuvenating.
3:05:17Because it feels like the beginning of a new life,
3:05:19the beginning of some inner mood. I like this state.
3:05:24I even went through such periods of change,
3:05:27because I wanted change inside myself.
3:05:30My dear Raimonds Pauls used to say,
3:05:33"She’s in her youth period."
3:05:35Yes. Because I wanted that.
3:05:38Life is so short, you need your desires.
3:05:40Even if you can’t fulfill them, the desire itself —
3:05:43there’s no magic fish, but you still have to wish.
3:05:47And for something new.
3:05:49In short, I like it.
3:05:50And then this harmony, it’s like merging with nature,
3:05:53both human and earthly nature.
3:05:57It’s such a state, Katya, that means everything is ahead of you.
3:06:00I think you’re the same way.
3:06:02I really look forward to it.
3:06:03On the other hand, I’m afraid, because what if
3:06:06in that “peace” I stop being interested in anything.
3:06:09Or I stop being myself.
3:06:10No, you must remain yourself.
3:06:13In any image.
3:06:14Especially in Russia, where after 60
3:06:16it’s considered you don’t exist.
3:06:18Seriously?
3:06:19I think there’s a main law in Russia.
3:06:22If you’re a former champion, former star, former president,
3:06:26then no one needs you anymore,
3:06:28they treat you differently.
3:06:30And you felt that?
3:06:31Of course, certain groups did everything to make me feel it,
3:06:36but I live with such support,
3:06:39millions of people.
3:06:40That really sustains me.
3:06:43That love shown to me, wherever I go,
3:06:46wherever I am.
3:06:49People really want to, they try, they say something nice.
3:06:54I consider myself a very happy person.
3:06:57And I have a very interesting life, very.
3:07:00How do you live now?
3:07:02When there are no stadiums, no daily glory
3:07:06at your fingertips, when you gave it up voluntarily?
3:07:09Do you miss it?
3:07:10I gave it up voluntarily.
3:07:12Obviously, I feel good.
3:07:14My thoughts are completely different.
3:07:17I freed myself from that constant pressure, that on stage
3:07:21you must do this, learn that, do this, do that.
3:07:25Everything has its time.
3:07:26But in Russia, people don’t leave the top positions.
3:07:29Not in politics, not in art.
3:07:32Well, that’s a mistake.
3:07:33There are artists who sing into old age, and
3:07:36of course, politicians who do too.
3:07:39How is it not hard for them?
3:07:41I don’t know.
3:07:44Everyone said I was cutting off their oxygen.
3:07:47- And were you? - Me?
3:07:49Of course not.
3:07:50They were the ones cutting off my oxygen all the time.
3:07:52Because I was always being talked about.
3:07:55And it was all wrong.
3:07:56A wrong performance, in a short skirt — banned for two years.
3:07:59Only that all-union contest saved me,
3:08:02where I sang “Let’s Sit and Cry a Little.”
3:08:03I wore a horrible green dress with a polka-dot tie.
3:08:07But they liked it.
3:08:08And the skirt was beautiful, short.
3:08:10I remember I sang Shainsky’s song “The King, the Flower Girl and the Jester.”
3:08:16That’s what it was called.
3:08:18Long, long ago, In some kingdom,
3:08:21A merry, merry beauty lived. And word spread, and word spread,
3:08:26That the most beautiful of all Was that young beauty,
3:08:31That young beauty.
3:08:35Good evening.
3:08:37Thank you, we’re with you.
3:08:40We’ll live some more.
3:08:42Yes, we’ll live.
3:08:44We’ll live some more with you.
3:08:46We surely will.
3:08:47- I know you. - Really?
3:08:50- I follow you. - Seriously?
3:08:52Ah, well, I’ll follow you back.
3:08:54I was constantly banned, constantly.
3:08:58Somehow I broke through, I don’t know how.
3:09:00That’s why I know what bans are and what they mean.
3:09:03And above all, who’s saying it.
3:09:05Who?
3:09:05Well, I even counted it. Zarubina.
3:09:09I don’t even know what Zarubina sang.
3:09:11But she has some interview where she says
3:09:13that I had some kind of catastrophe.
3:09:17The playback stopped.
3:09:18And now I’m banned from TV for it.
3:09:21And she left for America.
3:09:22But what do I have to do with that?
3:09:24Then there was Gulkina. You know her?
3:09:27From the group “Mirage.”
3:09:27Well, I wasn’t interested in “Mirage,” you see?
3:09:30At all.
3:09:31But did you even have the authority to ban someone?
3:09:34- Back in the 90s? - What authority?
3:09:35I was afraid to even go to TV somewhere.
3:09:37There were people sitting there who would ban you
3:09:39right away just for showing up.
3:09:41What, am I crazy or something?
3:09:42Then, let me list them for you.
3:09:44Zarubina, Gulkina, Muromov took back his words,
3:09:49that I supposedly shut him down.
3:09:50He said, "How can anyone shut me down? I’m a star." Good for him.
3:09:53Legkostupova said something.
3:09:54But Legkostupova had nothing to do with it.
3:09:56Her sister, I think, said there were no conflicts at all.
3:09:59No conflicts, nothing.
3:10:00And besides, why would I ban her?
3:10:02Then there was...
3:10:03Ah, yes, who popped up…
3:10:05Igorek Nadzhiev.
3:10:08He said I banned him because
3:10:13I was helping Kirkorov, and so that he wouldn’t be
3:10:17Kirkorov’s competitor, I supposedly got rid of him.
3:10:20But let me tell you, Igorek, let me remind you.
3:10:22You came to our theater.
3:10:24What did I tell you?
3:10:26That you had to work on your image.
3:10:28Because you always said, "I want to be like
3:10:30Leontiev, I want to be like Kirkorov."
3:10:34I bluntly told you then — what do you mean, like?
3:10:37You’ll crush everyone only if you find
3:10:39your own image and your own repertoire.
3:10:41Did you forget?
3:10:43Just two months later, your father came
3:10:45and asked me how long it would take
3:10:49for Igor to become a star.
3:10:51Naively, I said, from a year and a half to three.
3:10:55And how can that be taken?
3:10:58Of course, as a contract, even a commitment.
3:11:00Because to really make an artist famous
3:11:03is such work.
3:11:06He had to be himself, he was a handsome guy,
3:11:09and he needed a special repertoire, not to be
3:11:13like Leontiev, not like Kirkorov, but
3:11:16like Igor Nadzhiev.
3:11:17So I told his father, from a year and a half to three.
3:11:20He said, "Oh no, that’s too long to wait."
3:11:23And he took you away, Igorek.
3:11:24Did you forget that?
3:11:27Aren’t you ashamed?
3:11:28What a case.
3:11:29Well, Antsiferova, yes, she started first, but then realized
3:11:31it wasn’t true, because when
3:11:33I quarreled with Zatsepin, and I had already recorded
3:11:38all the songs for the film "July 31st", he gave them to Antsiferova.
3:11:44I calmed down too, thought, well, she’s a good singer,
3:11:47so I didn’t let him down.
3:11:50I was happy.
3:11:52Who else?
3:11:53Well, anyway…
3:11:53Wait, do you follow this?
3:11:55Does it hurt you?
3:11:56No, I just recently decided to look at who’s
3:11:59saying this, because it’s ridiculous.
3:12:02Usually it’s said by competitors I supposedly destroyed,
3:12:06wrote denunciations against, but they weren’t competitors to me.
3:12:11And who was?
3:12:11I never understood competition.
3:12:14They were my colleagues, so to speak.
3:12:16Well, there was Sofia Rotaru.
3:12:17And since childhood it was always either Tsvetaeva or Akhmatova,
3:12:20for Pugacheva or for Rotaru.
3:12:21No, she and I were always friends.
3:12:24It was strange, Stepanovich started that story.
3:12:27You see, because I refused to act in his film,
3:12:30which was supposed to be called "The Voice."
3:12:31He renamed it "The Soul."
3:12:33And probably thought he was doing me harm.
3:12:35No, he just needed that star.
3:12:39Sonia and I still keep in touch,
3:12:41we support each other as best we can.
3:12:43That’s about it.
3:12:44So, that’s all.
3:12:46Who came up with the idea of your duet with Rotaru?
3:12:49We just somehow came to it,
3:12:51I don’t know, we often chat, talk.
3:12:54I said, “We should sing something together.”
3:12:57What song is there?
3:12:58Either I said, or she said,
3:12:59“Let’s do this one, ‘They Won’t Catch Us.’”
3:13:01- Won’t catch us. - Won’t catch us.
3:13:03And we really liked it.
3:13:06And we sang it decently.
3:13:08No, they won’t catch us.
3:13:09No, they won’t catch us.
3:13:12No, they won’t catch us.
3:13:16The sky will drop the night into our palms — they won’t catch us.
3:13:22They won’t catch us.
3:13:23There are so few reasons to have fun.
3:13:26We need to find them.
3:13:28Well, and "The Prima Donna" with Lyudmila Gurchenko.
3:13:30Yes, that’s sacred to me.
3:13:33I’m so glad Bondarchuk still convinced her to take part.
3:13:37For me, she is the Prima Donna.
3:13:39My God.
3:13:47She behaved like a Prima Donna all her life.
3:13:50She lived like a Prima Donna.
3:13:52And what does that mean?
3:13:53I am the main one in your life.
3:13:57I am the main one in this whole acting world.
3:14:03Even if I’m not recognized, I’m the first and
3:14:08the last, at least for myself.
3:14:11That’s a Prima Donna.
3:14:12So that’s not me.
3:14:14“I Am a Woman Who Sings.”
3:14:16Was it easy to be friends with her?
3:14:18Yes, but not exactly friends — it wasn’t friendship.
3:14:20I respect so much those who are older than me,
3:14:24who have done more, who have been through more.
3:14:26What kind of friendship?
3:14:28We just liked going to the same restaurants.
3:14:31You know, the ones with all those pizzas.
3:14:34Yes, and do you know how much she ate of
3:14:36those steaks?
3:14:37I asked her, “How do you manage that?”
3:14:40She said, “It all burns off for me.
3:14:43The food, the troubles, everything burns away.”
3:14:46You see, she was amazing, of course.
3:14:49Though I understand how much she went through.
3:14:51She had a love of life.
3:14:52What really hit her was when she didn’t act for a long time.
3:14:56Everyone has their own fate.
3:14:57And the sacrifices she made in the name of,
3:15:00let’s call it art.
3:15:02But she wasn’t just some actress,
3:15:04she was of a special kind.
3:15:07Unfortunately, in our country there are so few
3:15:10films where she could show her talent.
3:15:14Well, "Carnival Night", you know, but where else?
3:15:16But she showed herself even in dramas.
3:15:19Like "Five Evenings"?
3:15:20How I love that film.
3:15:22How I love her in it, adore her.
3:15:24- "Twenty Days Without War." - Yes.
3:15:26Everyone thought, well, since you were in "Carnival Night",
3:15:28we won’t give you roles like that,
3:15:31and if we do, only something trivial.
3:15:33Of course that’s unfair. But oh well.
3:15:35And in that sense, your stories are very
3:15:37similar, at least in the beginning, when there was that
3:15:39article about how everyone
3:15:40feared a cult of personality around Pugacheva.
3:15:42Because they always thought, and still think,
3:15:45that if a person is famous, they can influence the masses.
3:15:49But why would I want to influence the masses?
3:15:52It’s the masses that influence me.
3:15:53What to sing, how to behave, all of that.
3:15:56But for me the main thing was
3:15:59to be happy myself on stage and
3:16:02to make someone in the audience just a little happier.
3:16:07But it was always like that, I don’t know why.
3:16:09Some people think differently.
3:16:11The person who truly was your friend —
3:16:13Galina Borisovna Volchek.
3:16:14- That’s when you were friends. - Yes.
3:16:16Do you often think now about what choice
3:16:18she would have made in 2022?
3:16:20I don’t think about that at all.
3:16:22I think about how sad it is that she’s gone.
3:16:25Choice, choice.
3:16:26I think she would have done what was best for the theater.
3:16:29She had her age, her responsibility for the theater.
3:16:33She probably wouldn’t have gone against the grain.
3:16:35So what? There’s your choice.
3:16:37She had done so much, she wouldn’t have needed to choose anymore.
3:16:40She would have just lived on.
3:16:42That’s what I think.
3:16:43Maybe she would’ve been offended if she heard me say that.
3:16:46That’s what I think.
3:16:47But I have an amazing woman, Tatyana Tarasova,
3:16:50who, my God, knows how to support.
3:16:53And directly so.
3:16:56- Fearlessly. - Fearlessly.
3:16:57Now, unfortunately, in our country, in Russia,
3:17:00people are driven by fear — fear of humiliation, fear of loss.
3:17:06But how not to understand that?
3:17:07It’s understandable, though some live differently.
3:17:11But why destroy, humiliate someone who wants
3:17:13to live differently, to think differently?
3:17:16Everyone has their own point of view.
3:17:18I respect yours, why don’t you respect mine?
3:17:21Well, maybe that will come.
3:17:22I’d like to live to see a world
3:17:27that’s changed for the better — peaceful, kind,
3:17:31intellectual, decent — where people wouldn’t count others’ money,
3:17:38but would earn their own beautifully and with dignity.
3:17:42But not like it is now.
3:17:44Now it’s like, “Oh, you’re rich, let’s quickly…”
3:17:47No, but there are still differences, like,
3:17:49those who support get paid more, and
3:17:53those who don’t should starve.
3:17:55It’s all fine when Gazmanov does push-ups on Red Square,
3:17:58on stage, where they’re all cheering the annexation of Crimea.
3:18:02Gazmanov always did push-ups and supported
3:18:07where there was power and money.
3:18:09Always, as long as I can remember, he’d support a mayor,
3:18:12like when there were mayoral elections, different candidates,
3:18:16and Luzhkov told me, “Clever guy, he made money off me
3:18:18to support me, and guess what,
3:18:21he also made money off others to support them too.”
3:18:25Honestly, I even envied that he could do that.
3:18:30Well, that’s Olezha for you, that’s Olezha.
3:18:32The fact that he talks badly about our family
3:18:35does surprise me a bit.
3:18:37He’s not such a primitive person, you see, to just
3:18:41say outright, “They can’t be supported, I won’t support them.”
3:18:44I won’t support them.
3:18:45I immediately think, really, do you have nothing
3:18:48good to say about us?
3:18:50Even about me personally.
3:18:52Because when I first met him, he was the one
3:18:54who brought me two songs — “Yesaul”
3:18:57and another one he sings.
3:18:59“Squadron of My Wild Thoughts.”
3:19:00I said, “These songs you brought me?
3:19:03I don’t know yet, I’ll try them on,
3:19:05but honestly, I don’t know how I’d sing them.
3:19:08It’s not quite me, don’t be upset, Olezha.”
3:19:10And he said, “Well, if it works out, then maybe.
3:19:15If not, well then no, but I’d be happy if it did.”
3:19:18I’d be happy if it did.
3:19:20And what’s with your voice?
3:19:21“My voice is gone, I don’t know why.
3:19:24For years I’ve been speaking like this, and
3:19:27it’s just hard for me to talk at all.”
3:19:29I said, “Let’s go.”
3:19:30And I took him to the Bolshoi Theater clinic,
3:19:33they had such wonderful specialists there,
3:19:36and after a while they restored his voice.
3:19:38I was very happy for him, and of course
3:19:42he came back and said, now I can sing.
3:19:45I gave him those songs, even backed him up
3:19:48— I sang backing vocals on his recording.
3:19:51So I don’t know why talented people
3:19:56aren’t talented in how they treat others.
3:20:00If someone ever did something for me in life,
3:20:02even if something later happened to them,
3:20:04I’ll still remember it,
3:20:06and every time say, well, I don’t demand
3:20:10that people talk about it, but at least remember,
3:20:12remember — for me it’s strange otherwise.
3:20:15Do you think talent and kindness are connected?
3:20:18Ranevskaya already said that.
3:20:20I look — a fool through and through, yet talent like a pimple on the nose.
3:20:23And what to do?
3:20:25I love him and will support him.
3:20:28I believe talented people should be protected.
3:20:32But could it be that the Lord takes away
3:20:34a person’s talent for bad deeds?
3:20:36Honestly, I suppose that could happen.
3:20:39When commandments are broken, probably,
3:20:41God does punish somehow.
3:20:43I know such examples, but I won’t
3:20:44name those vile names.
3:20:46I think we just thought of the same one.
3:20:48Well, I always wish people health, even if
3:20:53what they did was disgusting.
3:20:55Health is so precious, especially with family, children.
3:20:58But yes, you’re right.
3:21:01For me, it was psychologically very important when
3:21:03you had already sort of left, but still
3:21:06you returned to Russia for one day,
3:21:09for Yudashkin’s funeral.
3:21:11Why?
3:21:12Because he was my closest friend.
3:21:15I adored him, and he adored me too.
3:21:18And he came to Israel to say goodbye, because
3:21:21he said, “I’ll be leaving soon,” and we took a picture.
3:21:25He said goodbye, left, and died.
3:21:28I couldn’t not go.
3:21:31But your coming wouldn’t change anything for him.
3:21:34So it was for you?
3:21:35Who knows?
3:21:36Maybe he would have been upset if I hadn’t come.
3:21:39- Were you afraid to go back? - No.
3:21:41What should I be afraid of?
3:21:42What did I do that I shouldn’t return?
3:21:44I often went home to my village, Gryaz,
3:21:49just to tidy things up a bit.
3:21:51So I’d stop by, check, and leave.
3:21:54But now there’s nothing for me to do there.
3:21:56Why would I go?
3:21:57- When was the last time you were there? - Long ago.
3:21:59I think last summer I stopped by the studio.
3:22:02Ah, so all these songs were recorded in Russia at the studio?
3:22:05Yes.
3:22:05But I have a secret way.
3:22:07Once I broke it, with that studio,
3:22:09a mistake happened.
3:22:11They saw me.
3:22:12Otherwise, no one noticed.
3:22:14Those two songs you recorded —
3:22:17“Mama” and “Kiss.”
3:22:18Yes.
3:22:19Why?
3:22:20Those verses “Mama” just suddenly came to me.
3:22:24Well, obviously, it’s the war, and
3:22:26I felt sorry for the people, for the mothers, for the sons.
3:22:30That situation itself — I always relive it.
3:22:33From the bottom of my heart I feel it’s wrong, wrong, wrong.
3:22:36And so I wrote the verses.
3:22:39And I wanted to write them very simply.
3:22:42So it would sound like just
3:22:43a person talking.
3:22:45Without any elaborate poetry.
3:22:49And it turned out that I…
3:22:51Where was it, Liza?
3:22:53Where?
3:22:55- In Cyprus or where? - In Cyprus.
3:22:56Yes.
3:22:58And I read that poem to our
3:23:02assistant Oksana.
3:23:04And I saw how deeply it moved her, and it moved me too.
3:23:08Just by looking at her.
3:23:10And when Andrey Misin suggested composing music for it —
3:23:14he’s a genius.
3:23:15You see?
3:23:16He’s a genius.
3:23:17It’s not so much the text, but the music,
3:23:21the music he put under it.
3:23:23Every time I listen, I cry.
3:23:25Every time.
3:23:26Everyone who hears it cries.
3:23:28Yes. That’s it.
3:23:30No exceptions.
3:23:32And you know, that’s good.
3:23:33Sometimes people need to cry to a song.
3:23:37I don’t read the comments about it, but
3:23:39I just judge by the people who have heard it.
3:23:43In front of me, and then they’d call later.
3:23:46And especially that song struck a chord, oddly enough.
3:23:48"Believe it or not."
3:23:49Honestly, I already…
3:23:52Hello, hello.
3:23:54I sang it a bit later, because I had to.
3:23:57It’s a sacred holiday for me, Victory Day.
3:23:59And I thought I should dedicate something.
3:24:02Believe it or not, Wings are easy to fold.
3:24:11Some fear death, And some fear to live.
3:24:18How they always called themselves —
3:24:20The men. The veterans.
3:24:23I don’t really count on whether it will be accepted or not.
3:24:25At least not right now.
3:24:28The main thing for me is that it exists.
3:24:30And maybe people liked it.
3:24:32I only listen to what people around me say.
3:24:36The military.
3:24:38They asked my friends to tell me
3:24:41that it was just amazing.
3:24:42It was nice. That pleased me.
3:24:43I thought it wouldn’t land.
3:24:44If we talk about three happy days, then
3:24:48in this third age, which few
3:24:50know well, what was the happiest day?
3:24:54The third age is when you’ll interview me at 100.
3:24:57Or 99.
3:24:59- That’s extra? - No.
3:25:01Like a bonus, right?
3:25:02But one should aim for it.
3:25:04I can’t answer that question,
3:25:06because I am happy.
3:25:08I have those days as they should be.
3:25:11They exist.
3:25:12I don’t have that “Oh! Finally!
3:25:16I’m happy!
3:25:17Happiness has come to me!” I’m happy all the time.
3:25:21They don’t really stick out for me.
3:25:24It’s like a little bubble.
3:25:26Happy days.
3:25:28I even have a song like that.
3:25:30“Happy Days.”
3:25:31If I say “home” to you now,
3:25:32what comes to mind right away?
3:25:34- The first thing. - We have one home.
3:25:38The village, Gryaz.
3:25:39It still doesn’t fade away.
3:25:41Why doesn’t it fade?
3:25:42Who would erase it? Why erase it?
3:25:47Especially since I walk there with Liza.
3:25:50What home?
3:25:51Home is where there’s family.
3:25:53Yes. Where there’s family.
3:25:54Ah, so that’s another, mobile version of home.
3:25:58Mobile in what sense?
3:26:01That’s how I always hear about this house.
3:26:05They don’t let me forget it.
3:26:07But why? It just stands there.
3:26:09And why did they decide we should sell it?
3:26:14First of all, they won’t even let us sell it.
3:26:16But do you believe you’ll return there someday?
3:26:19I don’t make such predictions at all.
3:26:21We live on.
3:26:23I think one day the children will visit the house.
3:26:27They’ll make a museum of love there.
3:26:28Plenty of photos. Not for free.
3:26:31Admission will cost a little money.
3:26:35Motherhood at 20, and motherhood at 60 —
3:26:38how are they different, apart from age?
3:26:42Probably age makes the difference, because you
3:26:46value those moments more.
3:26:48You’re not in a hurry.
3:26:50You’ve done everything.
3:26:51You can give yourself to your children completely.
3:26:56With Kristina, it was hard, because even though
3:26:58I loved her, I still raised her
3:27:00in such a way that, God forbid,
3:27:02if something happened to me — I was always flying —
3:27:04she wouldn’t be traumatized.
3:27:08She knew she had to keep living, doing things.
3:27:11Otherwise what?
3:27:12That I loved you in vain, that you’re so weak?
3:27:16That I’ll watch from heaven and be glad.
3:27:20So that’s how you see it?
3:27:21- How else? - That’s far too farsighted.
3:27:23You see, I had cases in life when,
3:27:28at school, I saw how
3:27:31when one boy’s mother died,
3:27:34he was so attached to her, he nearly killed himself.
3:27:37He stopped going to school.
3:27:38And I, and his classmate, told him,
3:27:42"How can you let your mom down like that?
3:27:44She’s still alive.
3:27:45She has another life now, she sees you.
3:27:47Why would you upset her like that?
3:27:50We don’t know how it is there.
3:27:51I only know one thing — that your mother sees, hears, and feels it.
3:27:56How can you do that?"
3:27:57And it was like he woke up.
3:27:59He was like…
3:28:01“Mom, that’s it! Enough!”
3:28:04I can’t even recall it without tears welling up.
3:28:07They just come to my eyes.
3:28:09And you decided to carry this experience into your own life?
3:28:12Yes, more with Kristina, let’s say, because,
3:28:15well, here too I always tell them,
3:28:18"Whether I’m here or not, I need to know
3:28:20that you, as I say,
3:28:22I must have time to tell you how to live."
3:28:27He says, "Why are you nagging?"
3:28:29I say, "I must have time."
3:28:31So no, we talk about it calmly.
3:28:34And it even prolongs my life.
3:28:36It makes me calmer.
3:28:38- Are you afraid of death at all? - No.
3:28:41Why should I be afraid? No.
3:28:43I don’t want to be helpless, and I don’t want
3:28:46to be in terrible pain.
3:28:48That I don’t like.
3:28:49But otherwise?
3:28:50I would like — well, who knows what I want —
3:28:52but beautifully, in old age, among my loved ones,
3:28:57to fade away like a candle.
3:29:01- Beautifully? - Very.
3:29:03That’s how it will be.
3:29:04With what music playing?
3:29:06Just not my own songs.
3:29:08No. Why?
3:29:11But what then, really?
3:29:12Well, Mozart’s "Requiem," something like that.
3:29:15- Whoa! - What?
3:29:17Yeah, that’s cool.
3:29:22I think that’s what heaven looks like.
3:29:24Yes, like that, divine.
3:29:27- Divine. - Yes.
3:29:28See? It’s just the refraction of light.
3:29:31And what do you think? What’s after death?
3:29:33Life.
3:29:34- What kind? - A new one.
3:29:36Were you in doubt?
3:29:37I don’t know.
3:29:39No one knows.
3:29:40No one’s returned.
3:29:41No one knows, but you know, when I really want it
3:29:45to be that way, it will be.
3:29:48I don’t even doubt that the soul is immortal.
3:29:51Anyway, we’ll sort it out there.
3:29:54I think otherwise it would be…
3:29:55I’ll send you a note, tell you what it’s like.
3:29:58So what turned out to be the most important in life?
3:30:00Love, of course. Family.
3:30:03Family, love, fans, the audience.
3:30:08That’s all. Love is God.
3:30:10That’s everything, you see?
3:30:12And if you have that, then that’s happiness, of course.
3:30:15And do you still have any unforgiven things, unresolved grievances?
3:30:20No.
3:30:21And how can you take revenge?
3:30:23Simply by not being like them.
3:30:26That’s a good way to take revenge.
3:30:28Not being like them, that’s all.
3:30:30Life is beautiful, honestly, in all its forms.
3:30:35It’s beautiful even in sorrow and in everything,
3:30:38because you realize that even some kind of
3:30:42emotional trauma forces you to defend against it,
3:30:46and you gradually become stronger, stronger, stronger.
3:30:52And now your connection with your audience —
3:30:54do you think you’ve lost it?
3:30:56If you could say something to them,
3:30:59to the people in Russia who still love you,
3:31:02and who, by the way, now in some sense
3:31:04risk prosecution, remember they wanted to criminalize
3:31:07listening to your songs?
3:31:09Beat your own so others are afraid.
3:31:12And to my audience I can only say,
3:31:16thank you for the happiness of sharing with you.
3:31:22Thank you for mutual love and support through all the years,
3:31:25through all these five decades.
3:31:28Thank you for still being with me now.
3:31:32And you don’t even need to say it, be silent, I know it.
3:31:35It’s hard.
3:31:37I love them.
3:31:38I love them and I suffer because of them.
3:31:43Because I worry for them, you see.
3:31:46How can they live like this?
3:31:50They’re told that this is good.
3:31:54And they take pride in it.
3:31:58They don’t know history.
3:32:00They take pride in history.
3:32:02They don’t know that we have no medicine, no drugs.
3:32:07They take pride in healthcare.
3:32:09All this showiness.
3:32:11It’s a tragedy, of course.
3:32:13We’re for, we’re for, we’re yes.
3:32:17Guys, learn to tell the truth.
3:32:21Learn to strive for what’s good, kind, and beautiful.
3:32:27There’s no need to destroy.
3:32:29You need to create, create.
3:32:31You need to pray for peace, not savor war.
3:32:36And don’t think badly of people,
3:32:39if you don’t know them.
3:32:44There was a joke back in Soviet times.
3:32:47Not today’s.
3:32:50They announced all over the country that at 7–10 in the morning
3:32:53everyone must be on Red Square.
3:32:55“What’s going on?”
3:32:56“We’re going to hang everyone.”
3:32:58- Any questions? - Yes.
3:33:00“What’s the question?”
3:33:02“Should we bring our own ropes or will they be provided?”
3:33:08That’s such a patient people, ready for anything.
3:33:12Please choose: justice or mercy?
3:33:16Justice.
3:33:18Because that’s mercy too, you see?
3:33:21How can you be merciful if you’re not just?
3:33:25For me it’s not a choice.
3:33:26Justice and mercy go hand in hand.
3:33:29Freedom or security?
3:33:31Freedom, of course.
3:33:35But again, freedom, when you feel
3:33:38that your freedom is in danger, then naturally
3:33:41the desire to safeguard your freedom is there.
3:33:47I can’t choose like that.
3:33:49I’m a person of nuance.
3:33:52For me it’s very important, as an artist, Luiza Elber,
3:33:57I always said I am not singer Alla Pugacheva,
3:34:02I am artist Luiza Elber, avant-garde artist
3:34:07from Champagne province.
3:34:08It came to me like a vision, many know this,
3:34:12fans know this.
3:34:13When’s the exhibition?
3:34:14For it to happen, it needs to start.
3:34:18Garik and I have already agreed, he’ll try everything in the club.
3:34:22Truth or safety?
3:34:24Again this danger, not danger, everything is danger.
3:34:27Everything right — justice, happiness, and
3:34:34safety — are things to strive for,
3:34:37not choices to make.
3:34:39How can you choose?
3:34:41That’s the scariest question.
3:34:42Homeland or truth?
3:34:43Homeland.
3:34:45And where there’s homeland, there must be truth,
3:34:48so it’s not forbidden.
3:34:49You see?
3:34:50That’s important.
3:34:52Where can you hide from truth?
3:34:55So homeland can wait, of course.
3:34:59Even if it doesn’t wait for me, let it know
3:35:02that I loved Russia with all my heart.
3:35:08I love it.
3:35:15Well, I’ll say it later.
3:35:20It’s just a mood.
3:35:22When I’m sad, then I’m sad.
3:35:26It flows out by itself, you see?
3:35:29No need to play anything by the notes.
3:35:57I loved everyone.
3:35:58I liked everything so much.
3:35:59And I can’t keep in my heart
3:36:02any vengeance or hatred, because it’s very
3:36:05bad for your health, for your mind.
3:36:07So I don’t recommend it to anyone.
3:36:09You need to rejoice, rejoice.
3:36:11Every moment of this life.
3:36:13Who knows what you’ll see tomorrow.
3:36:16And of course, over these years, if at least
3:36:20something remains in your hearts,
3:36:28then I wish for no greater reward for myself.
3:36:35Don’t worry about me.
3:36:39I am calmer than ever.
3:36:42I just dreamed of a battle.
3:36:46In it, you carried me out of the fire.
3:36:50Don’t worry about me.
3:36:52I am ready for any fate.
3:36:57What is given by God cannot be changed.
3:37:01And you cannot betray yourself.
3:37:07Do you see the wings behind my back?
3:37:11I always fly toward the light.
3:37:15Because, because I have no other path.
3:37:22Do you see the wings behind my back?
3:37:26I will not throw myself down like a stone.
3:37:29Because, because I live for an encore.
3:37:40Don’t worry.
3:37:43I live for an encore.

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