On the screen, Koreneva and Kindinov played a couple in love.
Photo: frame from the film.
The plot of the film is generally simple: the main characters Sergei and Tanya love each other very much. But then he goes into the army, where he almost dies. Well, Tanya marries another person, thinking that Sergei died after all. After a while, Sergei returns. His beloved did not wait for him…
The unusual thing about the script was that the romantic melodrama was told in blank verse. The poetic text was written by playwright Evgeny Grigoriev and he brought it to Mosfilm. And there his script gathered dust on the shelves for two years. Everything seemed pretentious: even the original title was “The Romance of Hearts in Love.” And the plot seemed old-fashioned and even fabulous. And dialogues written in blank verse. Its heroes had to sing. In real life, ordinary people do not speak like that. It was not clear how, despite this convention, to achieve artistic truth so that the audience would perceive this story as reality.
The film’s director, Andrei Konchalovsky, later recalled that the first pages of the script gave him the feeling that he was reading some nonsense. But gradually an emotional mood emerged: “And when I arrived at the place of the hero’s death, I could not hold back my tears. I already felt that I could not help but make this film.”
They began looking for actors to play the lead roles.
The plot of the film is generally simple: the main characters Sergei and Tanya love each other very much.
KINDINOV HAD TO LOSE WEIGHT URGENTLY
Moscow Art Theatre artist Evgeny Kindinov was one of the first to audition for the role of the main character Sergei. But the attempt failed: Konchalovsky refused the auditions; Kindinov seemed too old for this role. The artist was almost 30 years old. He was 10 years older than his hero. Moreover, he is not a singing actor (Alexander Gradsky sang for him in the film).
Konchalovsky looked closely at the handsome Vladimir Konkin. I literally fell in love with him. His photo portraits were in the acting archive of the film studio. Konkin’s physical appearance seemed ideal for the leading role. Although Konkin had no experience in filming. Konkin was not only handsome, but also arrogant. And he also did not like the script, which he said – “some kind of romantic nonsense.” In addition, he had already been invited to shoot his first film – the six-episode television film “How the Steel Was Tempered.” And this proposal seemed more promising from the point of view of acting career and recognition. Konkin promised Konchalovsky that he would attend the filming of “Romance…” after finishing work on the picture of Pavel Korchagin. But he did not keep his promise, saying that he was too exhausted and could not immediately take on the new leading role. One of the candidates for the role of Sergei was Mikhail Boyarsky. For the film it was important that he was a singing artist. However, Boyarsky was lured by the Moldova Film studio with a large sum. And he flew to Chisinau to play the role of a Moldovan villager.
And then there was no choice but to return to Evgeniy Kindinov’s tests. Konchalovsky approved him on the condition that Kindinov urgently lost 10 kilograms. The actor had to look younger than his age, like a schoolboy from yesterday.
Well, Konkin still played a small role in “Romance…” as Sergei’s younger brother. The role of the middle brother was played by Alexander Samoilov, who also auditioned for the role of Sergei (and passed the vocal audition perfectly), but was rejected for inconsistency with the external type.
A ROMANCE WITH THE DIRECTOR
Even more difficulties arose with the search for an actress for the role of Tanya. Konchalovsky was looking for some kind of mature nymphet. The director’s assistants set to work looking for young actresses who would meet this request. But no one suited the director. Elena Koreneva turned up by chance. Alexander Adabashyan advised him to invite her to audition. He recalled that the casting director (as they would say today) Natalya Andreevna Koreneva has two daughters of the right age. Moreover, one of them studies at the Shchukin Theatre School.
When 19-year-old Elena Koreneva came to audition, Konchalovsky immediately saw in her the main character, Tanya.
On the screens, Koreneva and Kindinov played a couple in love, and behind the scenes, a student of “Pike” began a whirlwind romance with the director. At that time, Konchalovsky was 35 years old and was married to a Frenchwoman, Vivian Godet. But she lived in France. And she did not interfere in the personal life of her beloved husband, who, on the set of each film, started a new romance with the actress who starred in it. And not by force. The actresses really fell in love with him.
Behind the scenes, a “Pike” student started a whirlwind romance with the director
The next romance usually ended with the end of the shooting. Everyone knew about it. Including Elena Koreneva, who grew up in a film family. And yet I could not resist the incredible intellectual charm of Andron Konchalovsky. In his autobiographical book, he said: “He had a desire to teach, educate, introduce into the cultural stratum, bring to another level of social and internal freedom all those around him while working together on the picture… Having wrapped my arms around his head, I felt as if I was hugging the computer, which suddenly began to malfunction because of the new program offered to it. It seemed that I was a representative of earthly civilization, participating in an experiment: some alien, a robot, a titan, wishing to suffer from human diseases…”
Going to Serpukhov, where the filming of “The Romance of Lovers” began, she faced a double task: to play Juliet of the 70s and to take on the role of Konchalovsky’s new love. And it was not so easy for the young actress, who was watched by two of the director’s former lovers, who this time also starred with him – Irina Kupchenko (her romance with Konchalovsky broke out on the set of “The Noble Nest”) and Iya Savvina (they had a romantic story on the set of the film “The Story of Asya Klyachina, Who Loved but Did Not Marry”). In “Romance of Lovers” Savvina played the mother of the heroine Koreneva. She treated Elena, her young “successor”, to put it mildly, cruelly. When Savvina was supposed to give Koreneva a light slap (according to the script), she slapped her so hard that Elena burst into tears from pain and resentment.
Irina Kupchenko
But the summer filming is over. Konchalovsy were supposed to fly to Crimea for a month to film episodes without Koreneva’s participation. He told her before leaving: “Summer is over, we lived it together. You are my favorite bunny, I was happy with you!” It sounded like goodbye. True, their romance continued for about a year. And both remember it as a happy time in their lives.
In Romance of Lovers, Savvina played the mother of the heroine Koreneva.
BERNARDO BERTOLLUCHI SHARED
Konchalovsky offered to write the music for “Romance…” to 24-year-old singer and guitarist Alexander Gradsky, who is known in narrow circles.
Gradsky not only wrote the music for the film, but also performed all the male vocal parts together with his rock group “Skomorokhi”, which he created when he was 16. And he earned a whopping (at that time) 6 thousand rubles from “Romance of Lovers”. With that money he could buy a Zhiguli car.
Zoya Kharabadze (soloist of the Accord Quartet) and young Valentina Tolkunova provided the female vocals. She performed “Lullaby” at the end of the film.
The episodes in which Sergei, who has lost his love, begins to live a normal life, were filmed in black and white. At the end, the characters switch to normal speech and the music, which previously played almost continuously, disappears. Color and music return in the final frames of the film, depicting the rebirth of love.
At the Karlovy Vary Film Festival, “The Lovers’ Romance” won the first prize. Elena Koreneva enjoyed incredible popularity. Evgeny Kindinov became a new Soviet sex symbol, he received letters in bags from girls who were in love with him, fans guarded the service entrance of the theatre. They did not suspect that Kindinov had long been happily married to his classmate at the Moscow Art Theatre School.
When Konchalovsky brought Romance of Lovers to Italy, Bernardo Bertolucci scolded him: “Andron, you annoy me so much. Here in Italy we are fighting against the dominance of Americanism, and your heroes wear jeans, play rock guitars, and you have elevated this to the level of an ideal.” But the melodrama was a hit with viewers: during the year of its release, Romance of Lovers was watched by 36.5 million viewers.
