- Vera Komissarzhevskaya
Vera Fyodorovna Komissarzhevskaya ( _ru. Вера Федоровна Комиссаржевская,
November 8 ,1864 ,St. Petersburg -February 23 ,1910 ,Tashkent ) was the most celebratedRussia n actress at the turn of the twentieth century.Vera Komissarzhevskaya was the daughter of
Fyodor Komissarzhevsky , a high-profile tenor of theMariinsky Theatre , and sister ofTheodore Komisarjevsky , a famous theatrical director. At the age of 19 she married Count Muravyov but preferred to keep her stage name after the marriage. Since 1896, she worked in theAlexandrine Theatre ofSt Petersburg . Her greatest triumph was the role of Nina Zarechnaya in the premiere ofChekhov 's "The Seagull " in 1896.In 1904, Komissarzhevskaya established her own theatre, which proved immensely popular with the
Russia n aristocracy in promoting the ideas ofRussian Symbolism . The theatre was directed byVsevolod Meyerhold in 1906, but his idiosyncratic approach led to Komissarzhevskaya's rupture with him the following year.Vera's death of
smallpox during a tour inCentral Asia shocked many of her admirers and occasioned some poignant lyrics fromAlexander Blok . One of major St Petersburg theatres still bears her name.There was a biographical film about her, "Ya - aktrisa" ("I am an actress"), released in the
USSR in 1980, starringNatalia Saiko as Komissarzhevskaya.External links
*imdb title | id=0232970 | title=Ya - aktrisa
*ru icon [http://www.peoples.ru/art/theatre/actor/komissarzhevskaya/ Brief biography]
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