“You Know Yourself in the Theater”: the actor Nodar Mgaloblishvili died in Tbilisi

Nodar Mgaloblishvili, People's Artist of the Georgian SSR, died in Tbilisi in the 88th year of his life.

Over the past few months, Mgaloblishvili was seriously ill. The date and place of the funeral of the artist is not specified.

Georgian artist Gogi Toradze called the death of the artist a great loss. According to the cinematographer, Mgaloblishvili was an outstanding actor who gained popularity in several countries.

“The name of Nodar Mgaloblishvili is forever in the history of cinema and theater, he played significant roles in dozens of Georgian films, as well as in Russian films and television series,” said Toradze in an interview with TASS, noting that Mgaloblishvili was “an excellent mentor and teacher.”

As the Russian director and screenwriter Dmitry Svetozarov emphasized, Mgaloblishvili was an artist of great talent and intuitively understood all the tasks.

“He is talented by nature. He immediately understood all the tasks and existed in this complex role already like a fish in water. As a director, I had only (as a conductor - a wand) to make several gestures. I remember him as an amazing and very peculiar artist, ”Channel 5 quotes Svetozarov.

A man without a star

Nodar Mgaloblishvili was born in Tiflis (as Tbilisi was previously called). From childhood, he dreamed of becoming an actor, but decided to enter the Georgian Polytechnic Institute. However, he failed the entrance test in mathematics and then applied for the acting faculty at the local theater institute.

In the mid-1950s, Mgaloblishvili was accepted into the troupe of the Academic Theater named after Marjanishvili in Tbilisi. In it, the artist served all his life. The most famous performances with his participation - "At the bottom" by the play of Maxim Gorky, "Khaki Azzba", "Othello", "The collapse", "Baron Munchausen", as well as "Cyrano de Bergerac" and "Pygmalion".

• Nodar Mgaloblishvili
• © Scene from the film “Formula of Love” (1984)

In the late 1950s, Mgaloblishvili made his debut in cinema - the first films in his filmography were The Last of Sabudar and The White Nights.

The characteristic character Mgaloblishvili played in the continuation of the famous Soviet-style detective "Petrovka, 38" - "Ogareva, 6". In this tape he worked together with such artists as Vasily Lanovoy and Georgy Yumatov.

All-Union glory to the actor was brought by Mark Zakharov’s comedy “Formula of Love”, in which Mgaloblishvili embodied the image of Count Cagliostro.

Also, the audience remembered the role of Mgaloblishvili in the fairy tale “Miracles in Reshetov”. According to the actor Alexei Panin, who also starred in this picture, Mgaloblishvili was made a modest and simple person, although he was widely known.

“Nodar was a man without a star. Absolutely simple, little man - everyone was surprised that he was short, that he was so thin. I can remember him with tenderness. On the set, he was even, perhaps, touching, ”Panin said in an interview with RT.

Recalling the joint work, the artist added that acquaintance with Mgaloblishvili was an important experience for him.

“We worked in one picture, it was a long time ago - I was 22-23 years old. Since I am a man from the generation of the 1990s who found the Soviet Union, for me he was a man whom I had known since childhood. Naturally - Count Cagliostro. The film "Formula of Love" I watched as a child. Since my career was just beginning, meeting with such people was exciting. I always treated the actors of the older generation with trepidation, I really appreciated when I came across adult artists with whom I could communicate and absorb life experience, ”the artist said.

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Among the most famous cinema works of Mgaloblishvili of the Soviet period are Katala, directed by Sergey Bodrov, and The Pilgrim's Captain, Andrey Prachenko. In the 2000s, Mgaloblishvili participated in the filming of the Russian TV series "On the Name of Baron", "Diversant", "Special Forces" and "Special Forces 2".

In 1979, Mgaloblishvili was awarded the title of People's Artist of the Georgian SSR. Later - in 2001 - he wanted to present one of the highest awards in Georgia - the Order of Honor. However, the artist stated that he would not accept the order and would not go to the awards ceremony. He explained this by the fact that in his search for work and film roles he was forced to turn to colleagues from Russia.