Wikipedia Ekaterina Nikolaevna Stulova Russian theater and film actress

Ekaterina Stulova: general information

• Full name: Ekaterina Nikolaevna Stulova
• Date of Birth: March 23, 1977
• Place of birth: Moscow, Russia
• Height: 174 cm
• Weight: 64 kg
• Short biography: Ekaterina Stulova – film actress, graduate of GITIS. She gained great fame in the country thanks to her work in the TV series “Beetles” and “Kotovsky”.
• Education: In 1998 she graduated from the Russian University of Theater Arts (GITIS), Goncharov’s course.

Stulova Ekaterina actress filmography

Actress Ekaterina Stulova biography

Ekaterina Stulova is a Russian actress known for both theatrical work and extensive filmography. The artist is subject to all genres – frivolous comedies, detective series and arthouse auteur cinema.

Childhood and youth

The future actress appeared on March 23, 1977 in Lobnya near Moscow, which received the status of a city 2 years before Katya was born. Now in the city, located 15 km north of Moscow, there are 2 theaters, and the population of Lobnya is 90 thousand people. Katya’s mother was in charge of a kindergarten, her father worked as a driver.

In high school, a girl who studied without triples became interested in classes in a theater studio and decided to become an artist. To get closer to her dream, Stulova began attending preparatory courses at the Moscow Art Theater School. Ekaterina’s determination helped her to enroll immediately in the second year of GITIS. Andrey Goncharov was the university mentor of the native of Lobnya.

Ekaterina Stulova actress personal life

Within the walls of GITIS, Stulova met her future husband, a native of the Samara region, Maxim Lagashkin. With her husband, Catherine formed a strong union, the strength of which is confirmed both by the birth of 2 children (sons Savva and Luka), and the joint work of the married couple in cinema and on television.

One of the first major roles in the actor’s biography – Vera Razuvaeva – the actress played in the 4-episode adventure thriller “Breed”, produced by Lagashkin together with a friend – actor Alexander Robak. The joint filmography of the spouses includes dozens of films: from Sergei Ginzburg’s fantasy thriller The Ghouls to Pavel Ignatov’s melodrama The Elephant and the Pug.

Many years of being shoulder to shoulder in the frame and behind the scenes did not dull the sharpness of Stulova’s feelings for her husband. On the page on Instagram, Ekaterina calls Maxim her support and guiding star, publishes joint photos in which she appears in swimsuits. As a child, the eldest son of the couple, Savva Lagashkin, starred with his father in the 8-episode military drama of the Russian-Ukrainian production “Kochubey’s Detachment” and appeared in the series “Kotovsky” with both parents.

In her youth, Ekaterina took part in three tapes with Vladislav Galkin, who was a friend of their family, in particular in “Truckers-2” and the miniseries “I’m not me.” The series “Kotovsky”, where Galkin played the main role, and Stulova played Antonina, became one of the last film works of the artist, whose life was cut short under circumstances that were not fully clarified in February 2010. After the death of a friend, Ekaterina starred in a number of documentaries about the actor, the first of which was the tape of the Rossiya channel Vlad Galkin. It’s hard to be a hero.”

Among Stulova’s hobbies are dance, vocals, tennis and karate. The actress does not forget about good deeds, posting photos of children in need of foster parents on her Instagram account.

Theater and films

Having graduated at the age of 21 from the forge of acting personnel, Ekaterina, together with her husband, joined the troupe of the Vladimir Mayakovsky Theater. Stulova’s artistic career was not hindered even by the birth of her eldest son a year later. It was the adaptation of the play “Rosencrantz and Gilderstern Are Dead” based on the absurdist tragicomedy by Tom Stoppard, in which Katya created the image of Ophelia, that became the first appearance of the actress on the screen.

Andrei Goncharov attracted his student to participate in his productions on the Mayakovka stage: “As You Like It”, “Vanyushin’s Children” and “Victim of the Century”. Subsequently, Stulova also began to collaborate with the Center for Drama and Directing, founded in 1998 by Alexei Kazantsev and Mikhail Roschin, where she shone in the performances The Descent from Mount Morgan, Divorce Like a Woman, Illusion and Love Synthesizer.

In 1999, Ekaterina was lucky enough to star in the same film with Oleg Yankovsky, Anna Samokhina and Bogdan Stupka – Vitaly Moskalenko’s musical comedy “Chinese Service”. In the film, the action of which takes place during the celebration in Nizhny Novgorod of the 300th anniversary of the Romanov dynasty, Stulova played the role of a baroness.

In the filmography of the native of Lobnya there are several Russian-Ukrainian projects (the family saga “Prodigal Children”, the adventure drama “The Island of Unnecessary People”), as well as the Ukrainian crime melodrama “The Maid”. In the last of these tapes, filmed in 2017, Stulova was not the only Russian guest star. One of the main roles in the series was played by Roman Polyansky. Svetlana Zelbet, who has been living in Kyiv since 2013, also flashed there.

In 2019, Ekaterina, her husband, and family friend Alexander Robak began acting in the beloved serial comedy “Beetles”, which tells about a trinity of Moscow programmers hiding from military service in a remote village. Stulova appeared as the wife of Tolik, masterfully played by Vladimir Epifantsev, the eldest son of the legendary actor Georgy Epifantsev. Lagashkin reincarnated as the village district policeman Sergei Maslov. The series starred actress Irina Grishina, who in her youth shone with the performance of the main roles in the films “Your Boyfriend” and “You Are Appointed as a Granddaughter”.

Ekaterina Stulova now

In 2020, Ekaterina, like her husband, starred in the 2nd season of Zhukov, which premiered in the spring of 2021. The biographies of several actors who played in the series were tragically cut short. In January 2021, the artist and stand-up comedian Alexander Chaliapin passed away, humorously shading in the project the image created by Vladimir Epifantsev, whom he looked like. Earlier, in September 2020, Vladimir Chuprikov died of a heart attack in his dacha, reincarnated as a colonel in Zhuki.

Chuprikov crossed paths with Stulova in another tape – the serial detective story “Snoop-4”, which premiered on April 6, 2020 on Channel One. Both actors had relatively small but vivid roles – Catherine, as in the 3rd season of the series, played Stella, and Vladimir played Marina’s father. In the project, even minor characters were played by stars – in particular, Evgenia Lyutaya and Igor Filippov. Also in 2020, Stulova replenished her filmography with the detective series Death in the Lens, in which Maya Gorban and Pyotr Nesterov played the main roles, and Anatomy of a Murder – 3.

In 2021, the actress played one of the central characters in Anna Zaitseva’s thriller “#want to play”, starred in the film “Alice’s Dreams” and the TV series “Partners”, located at the intersection of the genres of comedy detective and action movie, in which Sergey Sharifullin flashed . Together with her husband, Ekaterina had a chance to star in the comedy for the whole family “My dad is not a gift” (the film was produced with the support of the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation).

Interesting Facts

• Ekaterina was born on the same day and year with the Olympic champion, two-time winner of the world figure skating championships Maxim Marinin.
• Many viewers note the similarity between Stulova and her colleague Victoria Isakova. The actresses are the same height (174 cm), and the age difference between them is only 5 months. The artists played together in the series “Prodigal Children”. Both Ekaterina and Victoria had a chance to act with Alexander Yatsenko. Stulova played with Alexander in the film Arrhythmia by Boris Khlebnikov, and Isakova in the TV series Epidemic. It is curious that in both projects Yatsenko created the image of an ambulance doctor who sacrifices his personal life for the sake of fulfilling his medical duty.
• The age difference between Catherine’s sons is 14 years.

Ekaterina Stulova in social networks

• Instagram https://www.instagram.com/katerina_stulova/
• Facebookhttps://www.facebook.com/stulovaekaterina

Interview with Ekaterina Stulova and Maxim Lagashkin

Interview from 02.07.2021

This year Maxim Lagashkin and Ekaterina Stulova celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary. Although the very fact of their marriage, the actors never tried to advertise. “It happens that we, without agreeing, accidentally try out for one project, and not everyone knows that we are married,” they say. On the eve of the premiere of the film “The Damned Official”, in which Maxim played the main role, the couple told us about working together, raising sons and secretly marrying.

Katya and Maxim’s family life began along with their professional life: having met when they entered GITIS, they no longer parted. Over the years, they both built a successful career in film and theater, gave birth to two sons. After the release of the popular TV series “Beetles”, in which Lagashkin and Stulova starred together, they started talking about their family and creative tandem with renewed vigor. Now Maxim and Katya live according to insane work schedules, which are very rare to reduce. Therefore, our interview, which was conceived as a joint one, was given by the actors separately, intersecting for just a couple of minutes only at the very end.

Katya, now in a conversation with your agent you said that today you were preparing to “play along with your wife” to Maxim – is this a familiar scenario for you at the moment?

Support your husband? Certainly! In our family, there are periods when the husband supports his wife, there is a period when the wife supports her husband. At the moment, I decided that I support. This does not mean that I have faded into the background, that I do not take care of myself, no – I always take care of myself, work, children. But today I thought that it would all be solely for the sake of Maxim, and, as always with joy, I was ready to support him.

Over the past few years, the name Lagashkin has become louder. Although at the beginning of your career you starred together in Vadim Vernik’s program “Who is there…”…

.which was dedicated to me! Then Maxim “played along with her husband.” (Smiling.) It would be very interesting to watch this story now.

Both of you then just graduated from GITIS and were accepted into the troupe of the Theater. Mayakovsky. I know that Maxim was fond of theater since childhood. You too?

No, I was going to be a stuntman in the first grade! (Laughs.) Then, as I grew older, my preferences changed: in the third grade I wanted to be an actress, then a journalist, model, dancer and even a flight attendant. In the end, I thought, why not combine all this in the acting profession, and entered GITIS. At the same time, my parents did not know where I was going. Mom thought that I was preparing for journalism or pedagogical. She said: “Katya, you will come to school on September 1, everyone will meet you with flowers!” To which I answered her: “And on September 2 you will be called to the police, because your unrestrained daughter will yell at the children.” (Laughs.) My mother is a cook, my father worked as a power engineer, I am from an ordinary simple family. But my older brother then said: let the only person in our family do what he loves.

What does it mean – your unrestrained daughter?

I have always been very emotional, and I remain so. I even tried to somehow fight it, because on the stage and in the cinema I like this emotionality of mine, but in life it sometimes gets in the way. My eyes betray everything that happens to me, I can’t lie absolutely. I’m a neurotic, I’m always very nervous before a performance, before the first day of filming. People who feel good about me say: when Katya enters, you can light a cigarette – such an amount of energy accumulates around. Maxim is also a very emotional person, but inside the family we either have one phone and the other is calm, or vice versa. On the court, if Maxim does not like something, he always speaks directly, and I can keep silent, hide, swallow. And he often reminds me that I should finally learn to express everything that I don’t like, because after the shift I come home and pour it all on him, in a good way – just share what bothers me. Therefore, we first let one of us win back and pour out, and then the other.

Synchronize unconsciously.

We live with an open heart, we are always honest with each other. Everything always happens very naturally, we do not read books about how to live and save marriage. This does not mean, of course, that we constantly do nothing but laugh. We just live and understand each other when we can.

And when you can’t?

We swear. Then we make up, laugh, hug and move on hand in hand. We somehow initially intuitively decided to live and develop together. Watch how our lives change over the years, children grow up, with the advent of which we have also changed a lot – we have become more responsible. We look at each other and rejoice in our successes in family life, in the profession. Plus, our sense of humor often saves us in everything. But this does not mean that we do nothing and are always in a state of “let it be as it is.” We also make a lot of efforts, but they are pleasant, we are ready to listen to each other and make concessions. It happens that today, for example, Katya has such a day – today is “Katya on a broomstick”. That’s what I say: I’m on a broomstick! So, you have to wait, let me exhale. We had many different events in our lives when we just joined hands and moved on, because at that moment only we could help each other. And when after a while you turn around and see that you have already overcome it, you understand that yes, it was difficult and difficult then, but how much you gained thanks to this experience! That this is a new step on which you have risen higher.

Your eldest son Savva is also studying to be an actor.

Yes, he is 21 years old, and right now he is graduating from the university in London. When he tells me that he can marry an Englishwoman, I answer: my God, we don’t know English! (Laughs.) And he also says that I will be the youngest mother-in-law, because there, at my age, they are just starting to give birth and start a family, and we already have such an adult son.

He was born to you…

.immediately after graduation. I went to work when Savva was 18 days old, played the play “Dog Waltz” at the Theater. Mayakovsky. By the way, when they filmed that issue of “Who is there.”, I was still very nursing. And during the filming of the performance, my chest fell out of the corset! I was terribly worried then, I was ready to fall through the ground! Now, of course, I remember it with humor. (Smiling.)

You met Maxim at the entrance exams.

Goncharov then did the addition of the course, Maxim and I came on the same day. I saw him at the entrance, where he was sitting a little sad, and thought: God, how similar to Agutin! (Laughs.) And then they took us both, we became very good friends. A few months later they became husband and wife.

How quickly everything started spinning for you!

At first, for some reason, we decided that we were brother and sister! But after a few days, all this brotherhood ended and the romance began. Everything was very natural and fast.

Have you ever doubted your decision?

Both of us were always in great demand, there was no time to sit and think: what would happen if. Because if you are not acting in films at this moment, then you are working in the theater. Maxim decided to leave the theater when Savva appeared and he understood that he needed to feed his family. What else exactly is there in Maxim besides his wonderful sense of humor and talent – he is very brave and always says very confidently: it will be so. We came to the second year as volunteers, there were fifteen or twenty of us, of whom we had to choose five for enrollment in the course. And a month before this decision, Maxim told me: we will be enlisted. I then thought: what a brazen and brave guy! And we were enrolled. And so in everything. I am usually brave when I need to protect my family and children, I am such a she-wolf. But when I need to protect myself, my courage disappears somewhere. And Maxim in this sense helps me a lot. Although I don’t look timid at all, somewhere inside I am a little girl – Alice, who blinks her eyes and flies into the well. And at that moment I understand that now my husband will support me, who will say: get up and go, everything will be fine.

A few years ago, the troupe of the Theater. You also left Mayakovsky…

I left the theater five years ago, but I remember the time spent there with great gratitude. Of course, the theater does not have the freedom that exists outside of it. In the theater there is such a thing as a regime, not without reason there is an expression “to serve the theater.” I cannot serve. I want to act in films, travel. Repertory theater is all the same devotion. But I had a great time there for almost twenty years.

Why did you leave?

Because the love between me and the Theatre. Mayakovsky. For some time after the birth of my second child, I sat on maternity leave and dropped out of work, Mindaugas probably did not agree with something (Mindaugas Karbauskis – artistic director of the Mayakovsky Theater. – Approx. O K!). It’s just the way things were. I wanted to leave a little earlier, but then they didn’t sign the documents for me, and I stayed. And, apparently, I myself was not yet ready to leave. And when everything came together, so many doors immediately opened in front of me! I began to act more, released two entreprises, after some time I was offered to play in the Yaroslavl Chamber Theater, and now I go there with great pleasure to play two performances every month. At the same time, I am absolutely free, I can say: sorry, I can’t play on this day, I have shootings. And they fit under me. A Theatre. Mayakovsky gave me a lot, a lot! We happened there as artists, there were our first roles, first steps. I am very grateful to the master who took us to the course and then took us to the theater, this, of course, is worth a lot. We had a great master and wonderful teachers who loved us – this is very important. Maxim has always been and remains an excellent theater actor! I was very worried when he left the theater, and I still dream that he would play something else on stage, because he does it incredibly talentedly. It’s just that there’s no way to make money.

And when you have a child who needs to be raised and fed, properly educated men take responsibility for the family to the fore. Therefore, at that moment, Maxim could no longer afford to be an actor only in the theater, he and Sasha Robak went into free swimming, shot many films.

…in which you also participated.

Yes, and always through tests. I even jokingly said to Maxim: that’s all their wives are just removed, and I have samples. (Laughs.) The fact is that the channel very often approves the artists. And in order to get a role, you still need the approval of the channel. Therefore, I always tried honestly. Once, probably, there were times when husbands could drag their wives through. But now only samples work, and I like it so much! Finally, everything is fair. Before, you could have played, but someone brought their man. Now you’re playing because you had the best tryouts. For this I am very grateful to the TNT channel, which re-opened me and Maxim. Because they needed just samples and just such artists.

You are now talking about the series “Beetles”.

Yes, this is the project that has moved us forward. There were trials lasting almost a year. Then we filmed the pilot, and a year later, the first season. And all this is done very talentedly, incredibly creative people work there, who love their artists, hear them. Moreover, I was the first to be approved, and Maxim was wildly worried, because both of us really wanted to get there. At that time we had just returned from Spain, after my decree, there was not much work. We kind of started from scratch. When you are out of the profession for a certain time, you are quickly forgotten. And suddenly, after our return, various proposals rained down. I prepared very seriously for all the tests – I took costumes and props with me from home. I understood that I was somehow embarrassed, because I am an actress who has already done something in the profession, and suddenly two steps back. And I said to myself: “Katya, are you embarrassed? Yes. But do you want a role? Yes. Well then go ahead and do it. Here is the dress, here are the seeds, here is the lipstick – and think about how and what you will play tomorrow. And it worked. Again they began to notice and invite, we began to work again.

And how did you end up in Spain?

After the birth of Luka, we went there to rest for a month, we even took return tickets. Then we decided to stay a little longer and ended up staying for two and a half years. At first, we thought that we could live there and work here, it was such a dream. But it turned out to be very difficult. I periodically went to auditions, Maxim to shooting, all this, of course, was very expensive and not very convenient, and at some point we realized that it was time to return. That our life is here, parents are here, friends, everything is here. And work is here too. And for both of us it is very important to work, we love our profession, it is important for us to be in demand. But it was a good time there – Savva went to school, learned the language, Luch breathed in the sea air. Then in Moscow I saw snow for the first time – probably, I also got used to my homeland for some time. Now he is already an absolutely Moscow guy, in September he will go to the second grade. But for a while, he probably thought he was Spanish. (Laughs.)

As far as I understand, your professional ambitions did not subside either after the birth of your first or after the birth of your second child…

Never! I really love my profession and am proud of it. I get great pleasure from the process – both in cinema and in the theater – and I want to work until my last breath. (Laughs.) I never wanted to change it for something else, except to acquire some skills – to learn how to sing cool, for example. But suddenly becoming a housewife is not. Baking cakes and posting on Instagram is not for me. The decree was enough for me. I love to be creative, I can sign up for dancing, I once mastered riding a motorcycle.

For a role or for yourself?

For myself. I rode a motorcycle for some time, but at some point Maxim became very worried about me, and I stopped practicing it. (Smiling.) In addition, our profession is so deep, it changes with us, along with age. You switch to other roles, to other volumes, you fill up all the time. It can take a very long time to develop. You live some other life in parallel with yours.

In the last interview, Maxim told us that he is more comfortable working with you on the set than with other partners…

We became actors together, and being in the frame together is always a joy for us. When we played in the play “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead”, Maxim had two roles there at once. And I loved it more when he played my father (he was given senile makeup), because I knew: looking Maxim in the eyes, I would get more from him than from anyone. And in the cinema, if there are some touching scenes where you need to gain emotions, of course, it’s easier for me to look Maxim in the eyes. We do not strain each other, we do not teach to play, we do not climb. If you want to suggest something, you can gently whisper. It’s great that on joint shootings we have the opportunity to spend a little more time with each other, sometimes we even bring children to the site.

At this moment, Katya goes into the frame (our conversation took place during photography), and Maxim joins the conversation.

Maksim, on June 24, the film “The Damned Official” is released, in which you played the main role. Cursed or Cursed – which is correct?

We decided that it was right this way and that, but since he was cursed according to the plot, it’s more correct to say damned.

How did you come to this project?

Everything happened so fast that I didn’t have time to blink an eye. There were no auditions, because Sarik Andreasyan and his company really wanted to shoot me in this role. To be honest, I didn’t like the script right away. But I still came to the reading, one of the authors was there, I expressed all my fears and doubts. Then Sarik assured me that they would be taken into account, and so it happened, an understanding was reached. A week later, we had a general reading with the artists, and we filmed everything easily and very quickly – some of our shifts ended before lunch! Once, in my opinion, we had a full 12-hour shift when we were filming at the cemetery, where the weather changed very often: sometimes snow, sometimes rain, sometimes sunshine. But this did not frighten us, because it fit well into the mystical scenario. To be honest, I haven’t seen the film yet, but I always watch duplicates on set and very rarely watch movies with me. It’s enough for me to look at the shooting to understand how it will be. With Yuri Alexandrovich Kuznetsov this year we are already filming in the second picture – this is a great pleasure: not a partner, but a song. He is from that category of artists when there is no need to explain anything, we just start to pronounce the scene, and everything is already clear. I’m talking, and I get goosebumps, because I love such partners. Liza Arzamasova, Lyosha Maklakov, Volodya Sychev. Well, we have known Volodya for a hundred years, we also starred with Petya Buslov, and we crossed paths somewhere else. In general, everything was very easy, fun, with humor, no conflicts. The group did a great job.

Not confused by the word “official” in the title? You yourself have noted more than once that the roles of deputies, policemen fit perfectly on you – everyone sees such characters in you …

It’s such a thing: it’s worth filming somewhere once, as if in the subcortex, somehow unconsciously directors and producers postpone it, it’s in the air. It doesn’t upset me at all and doesn’t care, because first of all I play different people, and what kind of profession and what rank they have is secondary. Anyway, a person is always different, it does not happen that people are unambiguously good or unambiguously bad. I’m interested in these characters. True, Katya and I will now star in a film where we initially came up with a very interesting idea: all the characters are negative. (Laughs.)

How is it?

Those who seem to be good are considered as such simply because they are injured. But in fact, they are the same creatures as the person who caused them to suffer. It’s such a black comedy, you might say. But now I’m getting ahead of myself a little, because we’re just getting started.

Katya didn’t mention it, but you did.

Yes, because it’s impossible, but I’m so talkative, I took it and told it. We have a joint work in “Beetles”, but there we have little overlap as characters, but here there will be a direct partnership.

Were you purposefully wanted to shoot together?

No, there were auditions. I auditioned for two characters at once, one of which is like this. A bit of a goof. It was very interesting for me to play it, but in the end I was told that I still have a confident look. (Laughs.) It’s not that Katya and I wanted to shoot together somewhere at the same time, no. Many different artists tried out there, there were many competitors for both me and Katya. To be honest, sometimes it happens that we are called somewhere at different times for the same project, where we find out that we will be filming together. And not everyone knows that we are husband and wife. Yes, we never really advertised it.

Do you remember what you thought at the moment when you first saw Katya?

Honestly, no, because then I came to the second wave of the competition – Goncharov cut me down on the first wave. And Sergei Anatolyevich Golomazov arranged for me to be looked at again in a week. I don’t remember at all how this week went, because I was in such nervous tension: it was autumn, I had to act. There was no way back at all – if I had not entered, I would have ended up just nowhere. I could not allow this and internally knew that I would do something. And Katya was just in that stream, where for me there was a second wave. I remember she was in such high spirits, but I was not, I was very nervous. She got me at the service entrance of the Theater. She somehow kicked Mayakovsky as if we had known each other for a long time, apparently trying to cheer him up. For some reason she said that I looked like Agutin. And at that moment I could only think about entering.

And when did the introductory passion subside?

Others have begun. (Laughs.) A spark quickly jumped out of me and hit me hard on the head – I just made a decision in a second and made Katya an offer. It’s always like this for me: if something has got into my head, I decide in a second that it needs to be done now. I don’t put it off until tomorrow, I can’t. Maybe sometimes you need to think, but I can’t do it. Therefore, he went, did it, immediately received consent. As, in fact, I always behave myself – I never hear the word “no”.

She just had no options, I understood.

You know how Al Capone said: “I never heard the word “no”, except perhaps: “No, please don’t kill.” (Laughs.) Well, Katya didn’t even have questions, she just asked: “When?” I said: “Let’s make it warmer, let’s go to May.” And so, between the exam in acting and the exam in stage speech, they quickly got married.

Wow, just a wedding!

Yes. Moreover, at first they did not want to marry us, because there was no stamp in the passport, it was a problem. We traveled to several different churches, and in one, at the Nikitsky Gate, we were allowed. And they put the stamp when Savva was born. He was three years old, and he had to go somewhere, that is, purely because of the documents. We jumped at the “River Station” to the registry office and signed in just 15 minutes. My attitude to the wedding is not from a religious point of view – it is a slightly different quality of strength, a different level, it was such a way to hold us together. Therefore, like this: they changed clothes, ran in, got married, then changed clothes somewhere in the entrance, ran to the run of the performance, took off the rings – like we are on the cipher in front of everyone. We flew to the run, the whole text completely jumped out of my head. I stood, smiled and could not say anything.

And how long did you encrypt?

Long. Not only that, we were encrypted in front of classmates. Of course, they already understood that we were together, they just didn’t want to advertise such things. The parents didn’t know either. True, my friend from Samara, whom I asked to be a witness, in his naivety came to my mother, asked for money for a train ticket to Moscow and blabbed. But my mom and dad didn’t tell me anything. And Katya then took the documents to her parents, and we went on a honeymoon trip to Lazarevskoye, rented a hut there, some kind of hut. When they returned, it turned out that Katya’s mother was cleaning up and found a package in which the documents were lying. Then Katya’s dad told her not to pay attention that these were documents for the performance, and her mother told him: “No, Kolya, this is not for the performance, this is life.” (Laughs.)

It’s amazing how serious decisions you make so quickly and confidently!

It may sound silly now, but I look at many things not with my mind, I intuitively feel them and trust this more. Human things must be measured by feelings.

Soon your eldest son was born, and this prompted you to leave the theater …

I was very happy, his birth inspired me, gave me more energy and joy to do something. And pushed to leave the theater, yes. Sasha Robak and I left to invent our own lives, to make films. But now both I and Sasha have a crazy acting schedule. This does not mean that we do not have some ideas and thoughts that we would like to implement. When all this converges in heaven, we will gather and do it.

Katya said that both of you are very emotional people and she periodically “goes on a broom”.

She is often on a broom, the broom is a built-in function. (Smiling.) But I learned to read it quite quickly, almost immediately. It’s like in a movie: when you’re filming with a partner, you’re coming from him, and he’s from you, it’s the same here. Of course, it happens that both of us can suddenly take off on broomsticks, like at Hogwarts, throw fireballs at each other. But for the last five years, both of us have been so busy that when we are together, these selfish flights have turned into a calm existence, we just want to be around.

Katya, Maxim, you recently celebrated your 25th marriage anniversary…

M.: For the first time in my life.

K .: We celebrated with friends before, of course, but we gathered for the first time with such a large company. Usually we immediately take this date and fly away somewhere together, but this year it did not work out.

After so many years, there are moments when you suddenly look at each other in a new way?

M.: Constantly.

K.: In the profession, with each role something opens up, some new colors. Max, tell me, you keep saying: “Wow, what did my wife do!” (Laughs.)

M.: I say, of course, but that doesn’t mean it’s true. Kidding! (Laughs.)

K.: We praise each other, celebrate professional victories.

M.: It’s like a matter of course.

Pride and admiration are present.

M.: Of course, there is no admiration, but there is pride. (Laughs.)

K.: This is how we will have an interview now: all giggles and hakhanki.

M.: Yes, we already have giggles and hahanki all the time!

Are there serious disagreements? In raising sons, for example?

K.: No. First, we listen to children.

M.: I took it off my tongue.

K.: Of course, when the eldest son had a transitional age, hormonal changes, we were nervous, conflicts happened. Maxim in this sense is wiser than me, he said: “Let’s relax, let’s see where it will lead.” We have a rather big difference in the age of the children, and thanks to the experience gained with the older one, we try not to repeat any mistakes with the younger one. But all the same, we periodically step on some kind of rake, all living people.

It is important that you are one team.

M.: Yes, we are a team.

K.: Hurricane!

Photos of actress Ekaterina Stulova