Renata Litvinova: “Everyone sets a goal in life for himself”

It was a real epic – to arrange an interview with Renata Litvinova. She agreed – and took a break for a few weeks, quickly arranged a photo session and disappeared again, offered to answer questions in writing – and at the last moment nevertheless made an appointment in a cafe. Exquisitely polite and unexpectedly direct, unrecognizable and similar to her film image. The mission seemed almost impossible to me: to try to see the world through the eyes of a woman-myth, idol and ideal of thousands of fans.

You once wrote: “I did not perceive the other as either an enemy or a victim. I began to see people primarily as a child. What did you mean?

Renata Litvinova: If a person starts not to suit me, I peer and try to look at him simply, without all these delivering moments. Once he was defenseless, and of course, he remained so inside himself. Maybe approach him from the other side and not spend money on being annoyed. Spending on the negative is unconstructive, unproductive and unprofitable. All this must be skipped. Let go of resentment. When someone hurts you, be able to let it past you, not get upset, not offended. It helps.

Do you feel like a child in yourself?

R. L .: I know that people show themselves either as children, or as parents, or as old people, it always seems to me that I am between a parent and an old man. I don’t need to be looked after. My model of behavior and attitude towards people is this: I have a need to guide a person. For a very long time I do not interrupt, for example, some kind of working relationship, because I think that people themselves should break away from me. I have to walk a certain path with a person, spend some time so that he himself moves away from me. Breakup doesn’t have to be violent. But it is also impossible to indulge people who make mistakes.

Women sometimes tolerate when they are offended. But in this way they indulge in villainy. I see in this not softness of character, but weakness: not to tell a bad person or someone close to you that he is behaving badly. He was rude, he offended, he was aggressive, greedy, insensitive, callous – by swallowing this, we indulge the fact that he will do even worse. What if the person hit someone? And then he makes excuses. You can’t skip this.

Do you know how to say so that a person accepts it?

R. L .: Yes, with age, I even really know how to say it. Although in my personal life I am ready to compromise. I don’t like compromises in my work. If you love, then you accept a person, if you love, then you still feel sorry for him. I myself hate the moment when they control me, do not let me breathe freely. It’s not love, it’s just captivity.

Are you kind to yourself or are you too strict?

R. L .: God knows, I am both. It seems to me, of course, you need to love yourself. But on the other hand, I want to work on myself. And personal relationships are always work. But not only from my side. While giving, I still expect that there should be an exchange.

In 2000, you made the film “No Death for Me” – the monologues of actresses who were then already many years old. Do you like talking to old people?

R. L .: I love talking to older people. They always have a story to tell. When I was filming No Death for Me, some were so reluctant! But I persuaded them. Nonna Viktorovna Mordyukova fell in love with me, with whom I later became friends. But Tatyana Okunevskaya never forgave me that there were so many Mordyukova in the film: “I don’t understand why there are so many of this boring and monotonous Mordyukova.” Straight jealousy, personal scores!

Okunevskaya was a woman to the end. There are people who like to belong, but she, on the contrary, loved to possess. Was the owner. Passions boiled in her – one can envy. And for the first time I came to Lidia Smirnova, like a fool, in a red dress, with lipstick, with makeup … And that’s all: she hated me all the way. Then, somehow, on the set, I was already so exhausted, smoky, that Mordyukova did not recognize me. Says: “Where is Renata?” She thought I was Litvinova’s daughter.

I also hardly recognized you at our first meeting – nothing to do with a bright screen image! You have said many times that you don’t want to be like everyone else. What do you have in mind?

R. L .: I just don’t like the people who edit you. Here, they say, you will be condemned! Or they told me: “You have to give a refutation. And then you never know what they think about you? Yeah, I don’t care what they think of me. I won’t make any comments. What kind of life I live, with whom, where … – no!

I later learned that women who were born in my year of the Fire Horse were burned – they were unfit for family life. Apparently, I’m not good enough. I want freedom, I don’t want to fit into these foundations. Not that everyone is ordinary, but I am extraordinary, no. You be who you are – do not dictate to me what I should be. Do you understand?

Do you remember something you did against the current, against the odds?

R. L .: That’s when I got divorced, there were all sorts of rumors – I did not give a single comment. Because I didn’t want to make excuses or explain the situation. I consider it absolutely beneath my dignity.

Have you ever been told “don’t take it off”?

R. L .: That’s just about “There is no death for me.” The producer called in a terrible panic, directly shouting into the phone: “What are you filming? You’re filming talking heads! It’s not a montage! After that, I did not show the material at all. They also gave me an operator. I tell him: “Put the camera like that,” but he does not listen to me: “This is wrong, we will shoot from afar!” Well, then I told him: “Tra-ta-ta, you will put the camera the way I say.” And he quickly understood me.

Then I edited the picture, gave it to them, they called me: “We decided to give you an award!” They immediately began to give this picture to all festivals. I was offered to show how these grandmothers cut the salad in the kitchen. And I wanted them to be stars, divas. Beautiful. We painted them, set the light for a hundred hours, filters … I tried to shoot them as beautifully as possible.

What do you like more: filming, filming, writing your own scripts, stories?

R. L .: I love to shoot and I love to write. And draw more. If I didn’t have the need to shoot my lyrics, I would never do it. The very process of filming brings me great pleasure, the process of “writing” what I can translate into an image. Both the dialogues spoken by the characters and the image itself are equally important to me. I don’t like filming at all. This is just a nightmare for me. I really enjoy being behind the camera. I love it.

… To build, control, do everything in your own way?

R. L .: Yes, when I create my second reality. This is the most exciting. Cinema should be your personal, author’s. The other person cannot see it that way. This is probably why I am not interested in social cinema, documentary, everyday and not cut off from dull everyday life.

In my cinema, the most important thing for me is to show my version of a dream about life. I can see life itself. From the window, for example, or on the street, where only “dodge the fuss, attacks and aggression.” Although I love to be interested in people and their stories, I have no barrier – suddenly talking to a stranger. Especially if this person leads some kind of non-trivial lifestyle, has experienced a shock or a journey.

But after all, a film about the fate of star actresses was a documentary project, right?

R. L .: Anyway, I did not plunge them into reality! I made each make-up, image. During the make-up, they prepared themselves for the fact that they are stars, divas, and not some old women who have to cut vegetables in the kitchen. This, in my opinion, is of no interest to anyone.

How do you imagine your old age?

R. L .: Free. Still, the main thing is free. I once told my daughter: “I won’t live with you, you are too powerful for me.” I’m almost fifty, and she told me – “Where have you been? What time did you come home? Who were you with? What is it, I say. I will be old, thin, and you will torment me like this: “When will you return home?” And maybe I want to take a walk, meet some old people, you never know … I generally think that parents should live separately from their children. Well, if you are not sick and are not completely in a state of paralysis.

Did you manage to let your daughter go?

R. L .: I did not let her go, but tore her from my heart. Of course, she also “suffered” a little, but she survived the separation relatively easily. In Moscow, she changed one school, the second, the third … And now she likes everything, she is good at the French school. She is completely independent, 14 years old, an adult, she has her own understanding, her own concepts. I respect her very much.

She, for example, tells me that children should not dress in brands. She is friends with a girl who is extremely modestly dressed, and her father is the owner of a chain of stores that even we have. And you will never in your life think that this person is a millionaire.