Georgy Taratorkin fell in love with Ekaterina Markova at first sight. She was inflamed with feelings for him, seeing Lieutenant Schmidt in the image. Their happiness lasted almost half a century, not overshadowed by scandals, rumors, or betrayals.
And only the actor’s death could separate this beautiful couple.
Love at first sight
Ekaterina Markova.
Irina Korotkova, with whom Ekaterina Markova was friends, starred in Yulia Solntseva’s film “Unforgettable” together with actor Georgy Taratorkin. It was Irina who initiated the acquaintance of Yura and Katya, dragging the latter to visit the film’s cameraman.
Georgy Taratorkin.
Georgy Taratorkin was working at the Leningrad Youth Theater at that time and was filming Crime and Punishment in Moscow. He picked up his friends by taxi and immediately fell under the charm of his new acquaintance. Later, telling his children the story of his acquaintance, he will say that he fell in love with Katya’s touching freckles when he saw her in a fur coat, a hat that constantly fell over her eyes and with mittens with an elastic band. Catherine herself will protest violently and will confirm only one fact from this legend: the hat falling over her eyes.
While visiting, Georgy sat down on a hot radiator and began to tell Catherine something. He didn't even feel how hot it was to sit. He simply talked and talked, looking into the huge brown eyes of his interlocutor. He talked about filming with Kulidzhanov, about the Leningrad Youth Theater, about his roles played and not yet played.
Georgy Taratorkin as Raskolnikov.
Katya herself was not at all fascinated by this pleasant, handsome young man. He was nice, the attention flattered him. After the first meeting, he began to call her every day. They talked until five in the morning, and by seven he was already on his way to the set. And then he invited her to Leningrad to watch a performance with his participation.
She left the auditorium, filled with new feelings. And she tried to figure out who she fell in love with: Yura or his hero, Lieutenant Schmidt?
Ekaterina Markova. My angel
One day Faina Georgievna Ranevskaya asked: “Katyusha, tell me, is Yurochka a believer?” - “I don’t know, Faina Georgievna. This is very personal. " - "And I know. Believer. Because the sky is reflected in his eyes. This is very noticeable - after all, in most eyes only puddles are reflected. »
Olya Ostroumova likes to remember this story. Yura, as George’s relatives call him, had a few free days, and he came to Karelia, where the film crew was working. And the dawns here are quiet.” The episode of the death of Gali Chetvertak was filmed. Here is my heroine jumping out of hiding, shouting “Mom!”
runs, exposing his back to German bullets. Automatic fire, Jackdaw falls face down on a moss-covered hillock. One take, two, three. Director Stanislav Rostotsky announces a break, after which filming of the episode will continue. As soon as the operator turned off the camera, Yura climbed up the hill and began collecting pebbles, cones and sharp twigs. The people looked at the “cleaning” with round eyes, and Olga even suspected Taratorkin of showing off: “I remember thinking then, “Wow!” He pretends to care, he works for the public!” And after serving in the theater with Yura, I realized that there was not an ounce of demonstration. He's like this in life. Angel. Katyusha was very lucky.”
Right, a hundred thousand times right. And the fact that Yura is an angel, and that he was lucky. No one else could stand my monstrous, “scorpio” character for even a month, but Taratorkin has been putting up with it for forty years.
And in all these decades we have never quarreled. I “ran into trouble” more than once, but it is simply IMPOSSIBLE to quarrel with Yura! As for the profession, it is difficult to find a tougher and more irreconcilable person than Georgiy Georgievich, but at home. Sometimes you really want him to object, to enter into a discussion - but no! “Of course, Katyusha,” “You’re right, Katyusha,” “Do as you see fit, Katyusha.”
Even during my school years, I constantly heard from my mother: “I would like to see that fool who will marry you!” This was said on various occasions. Let’s say I commanded: “We’re going to the Maly Theater on Ostrovsky this weekend. His plays are performed best there.” Mom got tickets and took me to Maly.
I watched the first act tensely, without taking my eyes off the stage. And during intermission she said:
- Well, in general, everything is clear here. Let's go home.
- How “home”?! - Mom gasped. - Two more acts!
“I said: everything is clear here.” Let's go!
- But I want to watch it!
“Next time you’ll come without me and watch it.” I won't sit here.
- God, what horror! Nightmare! - Mom whispered furiously, pulling on her coat. - No, what a character! You don't know what to expect in the next minute! Like a powder keg!
This is interesting: How to Take a Married Man Out of the Family Psychology
What followed was a sacramental phrase about a fool who would decide to connect his life with me.
Agniya Aleksandrovna Kuznetsova and Georgy Georgievich Taratorkin fell in love with each other at first sight.
In addition to admiration - “Clever girl! Handsome! Talent! Manners like an aristocrat! Economical, homely! — in my mother’s attitude towards her son-in-law there was always compassion: they say, it’s amazing how the guy got into trouble by falling in love with Katka! And Yura never tired of repeating: “I never understood the jokes about my mother-in-law. The situations described in them had nothing to do with mine. Our passionate romance with Agnia Alexandrovna lasted all our lives.”
If my mother saw Yura’s merits, as they say, right away, then it took me a while to see the light. Which, however, there was a good reason for, which I have never talked about before.
This happened six months before I met Taratorkin.
Platform wedding
Ekaterina Markova.
Katya stayed in St. Petersburg at George's house. She felt embarrassed that she had embarrassed the whole family. Nina Aleksandrovna, the actor’s mother, gave the girl a whole room, and she slept in the room with Yura and his sister Vera. At the same time, the mother looked at Katya searchingly, as if she was trying to understand whether her son would be happy with this capital beauty.
On her second visit to St. Petersburg, Katya became seriously ill with the flu and was unable to return to Moscow with Georgy. Nina Alexandrovna and Vera carefully looked after their son’s chosen one. They talked for a long time and Catherine discovered more and more sides of her beloved’s soul. She realized how devoted Yura could be, how much he loved his profession, how much he valued family relationships.
Georgy Taratorkin and Ekaterina Markova.
In the summer of 1970, Georgy Taratorkin and Ekaterina Markova became husband and wife. Katya was released from her native Moscow Youth Theater for just one day. After the registry office, sitting in a restaurant, she constantly looked at her watch, afraid of missing the train. When the guests got pretty tired of this, they collected all the food, grabbed a festive tablecloth from the table and went with the newlyweds to the station.
They laid out right on the platform, pouring champagne to everyone who came up to congratulate the bride and groom. The wedding at the station turned out to be noisy, generous, and fun. That evening she left for Moscow alone; her young husband was busy in a play in St. Petersburg.
Then they lived in different cities for several more years, reuniting completely only after Yura became an actor at the Mossovet Theater.
Family portrait
Georgy Taratorkin and Ekaterina Markova with their son. It was not for nothing that Ekaterina Markova called her husband her angel in an interview. Being principled, even tough in everything related to work, the actor in the family was surprisingly gentle, caring, and flexible. He became her friend, adviser, reliable shoulder and amazing father to their children Philip and Anna.
Georgy Taratorkin and Ekaterina Markova with children.
Their first child was diagnosed as “non-viable” immediately after birth, and Ekaterina fought for his life and health for many years. Georgy Taratorkin worked almost around the clock, trying to provide his family with a decent existence. They were able to overcome the terrible diagnosis, Philip grew up to be a completely healthy and very smart young man.
Anna was born completely healthy, but her parents had yet to reconcile her older brother with having a sister, and not a brother, Sashka, as he had dreamed.
Georgy Taratorkin and Ekaterina Markova with children.
Anna, who became an actress, often says in interviews that she and her brother were constantly bathed in the love and care of their parents. Despite both of them having a fairly busy work schedule, the children always knew that mom and dad always had time and warmth for them.
Eternal separation
Georgy Taratorkin.
Georgy Taratorkin passed away on February 4, 2020. He had been seriously ill for a long time, without showing anything that he was suffering. He hid his illness from the general public, and Georgiy Georgievich’s diagnosis is known only to the attending physician and relatives.
Georgy Taratorkin and Ekaterina Markova.
His last role was the physicist Repin in “The Mysterious Passion.”
Ironically, the actor’s last hero dies in the hospital from cancer... Continue reading →
Mossovet Theater and other significant stages
The first role on the Moscow theater stage was the same Rodion Raskolnikov, directed by the artistic director of the theater himself. Georgy Georgievich’s work in “Petersburg Dreams” was recognized by critics as stunning in its sincerity and depth, and the actor himself was called the artist who most subtly understands the works of Dostoevsky. For more than ten years, Taratorkin played in the production of “Petersburg Dreams,” invariably arousing the admiration of the theater audience for his performance.
Young Georgy Taratorkin
The role of Rodion was not the last of the works of the Russian classic; Georgy Georgievich also played Ivan in The Brothers Karamazov, Stavrogin in The Possessed. The actor himself has repeatedly said that he is grateful to fate for the opportunity to embody on stage such ambiguous, complex characters of the “sons of our Fatherland.” The actor’s participation in the plays “They Fought for the Motherland” and “The Living Corpse” was also notable.
Georgiy Georgievich has few films, but, as always, they are bright and memorable from the first minute. Many viewers remember his role as the White Guard Makashev in the film “Winner”, Vitaly Dudin in “Translation from English”, Robert Warbeck in the detective story “A Purely English Murder”, Evgeniy Pavlovich in “Affairs of the Heart”. These roles are united by the similarity of character of the characters, which Taratorkin perfectly expressed - conscientiousness, the experiences of a subtle, intelligent soul because of other people's and their own sins and mistakes.
Memorable for fans of the acting talent of Georgy Georgievich and his work in Alexander Khvan’s films “Dying is Easy” and “Dyuba-Dyuba”, the action movie “24 Hours” and the film “Deviation – Zero”, the role of Dmitry Lvov in “Open Book”, the main role in the television performance "Cyrano de Bergerac".
Still from the television play “Cyrano de Bergerac”
Another interesting “historical-acting” turn in the career of Georgy Georgievich is his debut in cinematography was the role of the revolutionary Ignatius Grinevitsky in “Sofya Perovskaya” (1967), who attempted the life of Emperor Alexander II, and in 2003 in the film “The Emperor’s Love” Taratorkin had to play the autocrat for whom the bomb was prepared.
In the 1970-1980s, Georgy Georgievich often performed on the radio and stage reading poems from the “Silver Age” and especially his beloved Alexander Blok. His declamatory talent and ability to convey the beauty of language to the listener were often used when dubbing cartoons (“The Nutcracker and the Mouse King” and “Churidilo”).
Georgy Taratorkin reads poetry by Fyodor Tyutchev In 1992, Georgy Georgievich, already People's Artist of the RSFSR (since 1984), tried his hand as a director of the film “The One That Wasn’t There.” Four years later, in 1996, the talented actor recruited a course of future actors, and in 2002 he created a theater workshop for them. In the same year, he received the post of first secretary of the Union of Theater Workers of Russia.
The actor was also involved in the currently popular genre of serial melodramas. Taratorkin took part in the filming of the television series “Chronicle of Love and Death”, “Savior under the Birches”, “Chess Player”, “Tender Monster” and “Don’t Be Born Beautiful”.
Georgy Taratorkin. My hero In 2010, the actor again had to return to the image of the Soviet classic Maxim Gorky in the film “Capture of Passion”; the following year, Georgy Georgievich starred in the detective series “Where the Motherland Begins.” In 2020, he appeared on the stage of the Mossovet Theater in the new play “Roman Comedy”, and also took part in the filming of the films “Ban” and “Mysterious Passion”. During this period, the actor, together with Evgenia Simonova and Chulpan Khamatova, was involved in the production of “Sylvia” by Peter Stein.
People's Artist and Teacher
The talent and skill of Georgy Georgievich Taratorkin have been repeatedly awarded with awards and titles. He is People's Artist of the RSFSR, laureate of the State Prize named after. Vasiliev brothers for the role of Rodion Raskolnikov, a member of the Union of Cinematographers of the Russian Federation. Among his awards are the Order of Merit for the Fatherland and the Badge of Honor, as well as the Order of the St. Petersburg Classic Foundation.
As president of the Golden Mask Association, Georgy Georgievich contributed to the preservation of a unified space for theatrical art in Russia.
In 2020, together with Konstantin Raikin and Igor Kostolevsky, Georgy Georgievich defended the honor of the Golden Mask award after statements by the First Deputy Minister of Culture of the Russian Federation V. Aristarkhov about the Russophobic and provocative productions of the festival.
“Theater Living Room” with Georgy Taratorkin In the fall of 2020, he became a member of the new secretariat of the Union of Theater Workers of Russia, as well as a member of the jury of the IX International Festival of Amateur Theaters “The Theater Begins...”.
In October 2020, the series “Mysterious Passion” (based on the novel by Vasily Aksenov) was released, in which Georgy Taratorkin played Georgy Repin. Behind every fictitious name there was a real character.
