24 minutes ago
Andrey Konchalovsky
During the recent festivities on the Arbat, a bright woman in a hat and colorful beads stood out in the crowd. In the red-haired curly lady, no one recognized the Soviet actress, the star of the film “Vertical Racing” – 68-year-old Irina Brazgovka. The matron, who boldly participated in children’s performances, looked more like a senior pioneer leader.
The situation was clarified by critic Natalya Rtishcheva, who identified the former mistress of director Andrei Konchalovsky in the extravagant person.
– Irina Brazgovka teaches labor at the new school number 91 on the Arbat, – said Rtishcheva. She has her own workshop there. Wards call her Babut – “going for the children.” They sewed all the costumes for Maslenitsa together with her. And the jewelry on Irina is also her work. I remember her, tender and intelligent, in the old film “Vertical Racing” with Andrey Myagkov. Then she had an affair with Andrei Konchalovsky, and he found out about their daughter after 20 years. I thought how good she is. How many screwed up acting destinies that disappeared, ruined only from the inability to accept that you missed something, didn’t try somewhere, didn’t give someone, that your time has passed and you don’t fit into anything, you don’t like it, you’ve grown old. Here is an example – went to school and works.
Irina Brazgovka was honored with a small chapter in Konchalovsky’s memoirs “Elevating Deception”, published a quarter of a century ago:
– … A beautiful, red-haired, gray-blue-eyed, shy Belarusian, Swedish-Irish type, similar to Liv Ullman. She sang in the ensemble of Dmitry Pokrovsky. In companies, she was silent. She was brought to me by Sasha Pankratov-Cherny, who generally knew all the beautiful women that are in the Fatherland … I met Irina on the eve of my departure to America. In relations with women, I am generally active, so our romance began quite quickly. I really liked her, but I understood that we could not have a long-term relationship, which I honestly warned her about. I remember that I invited her to be baptized, called a priest to my house, and he baptized her in the kitchen … Soon I left. Since then, I have not seen her for almost seventeen years, except occasionally, briefly, by chance … Ira is an actress, a wonderful singer. In Soviet times, she lived quite well, in recent years she was forced to work in a pharmacy, selling medicines. She had to rent out her apartment in order to have some money. She lived with her daughters with friends …
Brazgovka not only worked in a pharmacy, but also sold handmade jewelry on the Arbat and on the market in Izmailovo. Her then-husband, the artist Alexander, with whom she has now been divorced for a long time, taught her how to make all kinds of accessories. By the way, he considered Irina’s daughter from Konchalovsky his own. The truth was revealed when Dasha was 17. Having learned about the child, Konchalovsky began to help financially. Then he sent the heiress to study law in America. Over time, Daria returned to her homeland, got married, gave birth to four children and from time to time visits her father at his estate in Nikolina Gora.
Brazgovka combines labor lessons at school with occasional filming. Soon, the fantastic drama Ikaria with her participation will be released on the screens.
