December 8, 2022 6pm
An unexpected twist of fate changed all plans.
Artist Boris Sichkin was remembered by most viewers for his role as Buba Kastorsky in The Elusive Avengers. The fate of a talented actor could have been less dramatic if not for his conflicts with the Soviet authorities.
The reason for his hatred of officials lay in the fact that Sichkin once had to serve a sentence in prison for nothing. In 1973, the actor was accused of illegally profiting from “leftist” concerts. Sichkin was allegedly paid a thousand rubles more than he was owed. So the artist ended up in a pre-trial detention center, where he spent a whole year. It later turned out that there were no overpayments, and all charges against Sichkin were dropped. But the release did not save the actor’s reputation, because prison became a dark point in his biography. After his release, Sichkin starred in only one film, The Cook and the Singer, shot at the Tajikfilm film studio.
The actor played a cheerful but cunning director of the House of Life, nicknamed Barmaley. And, although he played his role masterfully, it was obvious that this year the artist had clearly aged, and his gaze became much more severe than before. In the 70s Sichkin emigrated to the United States, where he lived until the end of his days.
