Departures

Mark Zakharov, the renowned head of Moscow’s Lenkom Theater known for directing romantic Soviet-era parables, has died at 85 after a long bout with pneumonia.

Zakharov is best known for Soviet classics of the 1970s and 1980s, including a mini-series adaptation of Ilf and Petrov’s 12 Chairs. Though he is not well known outside Russia, his films To Kill a Dragon, An Ordinary Miracle and Formula of Love – all made for TV – turned him into a national icon; lines from his films regularly turn up in everyday conversation. Meanwhile Lenkom, which he led starting in 1973, is considered one of the capital’s finest theaters.

Zakharov’s family history was not conducive to success in the Soviet state: both of his grandfathers were officers in the Tsarist army, and one of them even fought in the army of Alexander Kolchak, who led the White movement battling the Bolsheviks (see Chronicle, page 22). His interest in the dramatic arts began with a love for puppet theater, and he entered the GITIS drama school after failing to enter military school and an architecture institute.

Zakharov was married to actress Nina Lapshinova for nearly six decades; she died in 2014. Their daughter Alexandra also went into acting.

The Lenkom Theater announced that its new director will be Mark Varshaver, who worked with Zakharov for 40 years and was asked to take the post by the theater’s storied troupe.

Georgian composer Gia Kancheli, best known in the former Soviet Union for his music in the films of Georgy Danelia, passed away at the age of 84.

“The world has lost a musical colossus,” the Gramophone classical music website wrote of the Tbilisi-born Kancheli, praising in particular his “remarkable series of symphonies.”

Kancheli moved to Europe in the 1990s and was promoted there by musicians of global renown, including Gidon Kremer and Mstislav Rostropovich. He stopped traveling to Russia several years ago due to political differences with the Kremlin (including over the brief war with Georgia in 2008 and the annexation of Crimea in 2014). Kancheli continued to compose into old age; his latest orchestral work, Nu.Mu.Zu., was performed in the US in 2015.