Olga Vladimirovna will celebrate her 85th birthday in six months. They say about the actor from St. Petersburg Arkady Koval, who turned 65 last week, that as soon as you see him on the screen, your mood lifts. It was like meeting an old friend.
– Arkady Konstantinovich, how did you celebrate the anniversary?
– I played the play and then performed it with my colleagues. My closest friends are Yura Galtsev and Andrey Urgant. Andryushin’s son Vanya Urgant invited the three of us – me, dad and Yura – to his television program “Smak”. But I didn’t go. He said: “Let’s better be at home, without cameras, let’s cook something and chat.” Ivan is an excellent cook. What a dad and husband he is! Lives and works for the sake of his family. I always communicated warmly with his late mother Valeria and grandmother Nina Nikolaevna. Oh how quickly life has flown by.
– Do you regret becoming an artist?
– Who else could I become? I come from an acting family; from the age of four I sat in the orchestra pit at the Taganrog Theater while my parents worked.
Arkady Koval (right) with his best friend Andrey Urgant
– After you graduated from LGITMiK 40 years ago, the city on the Neva forever became home to you. And practically, like all the actors from St. Petersburg, they starred in “Streets of Broken Lanterns.” The project, which is now celebrating its 25th anniversary, saved many of your colleagues from lack of money during difficult years. Express Newspaper has now prepared an entire special issue about the stars of the series.
– I had a very small role there. In the series “Housing Problem” he played a drunk. He was framed for the murder of his wife, but the poor fellow had no alibi. I also starred in the New Year’s episode, where some of our singers were invited – Tanya Bulanova and Igor Kornelyuk.
Volkova with her daughter Katya
– They say you have several marriages behind you?
– I was married three times. First on Anzhelika Nevolina (stepdaughter of “Shurik” from Soviet comedies, actor Alexander Demyanenko.). She is a very good actress. But she thought only about roles, and motherhood passed her by. In 1986, at the birthday party of the famous actress Olga Volkova, I met her daughter Ekaterina. The celebration took place in the Palace of Arts, we performed and congratulated the hero of the occasion. Katya, by the way, is a hairdresser, although her mother tells everyone that she is an artist. We got married in 1987, and six years later Yana was born to us. By the way, she became an actress. For example, she starred in the TV series “Balabol”. And since 2000 I have been married to Nadyusha. She is a make-up artist at the Lev Dodin Theater of Europe, where we once met. We have two sons. Ivan is 21 years old and works with me in the theater. The youngest Petya is 16.
Photo source: Ruslan Shamukov/TASS, Personal archive, Globallookpress.com/© Anatoly Lomokhov
