Sanaev, Vsevolod Vasilevich

Born Feb. 25, 1912, in Tula. Soviet motion-picture actor. People’s Artist of the USSR (1969). Member of the CPSU since 1955.

Sanaev graduated from the State Institute of Theatrical Arts in 1937 and worked in the Moscow Art Academic Theater and the Moscow Soviet Theater. His first major film role was that of Dobriakov in The Girl Friend (1940). Later he played the Bolshevik Emel’ianov in Stories About Lenin (1958), Sergeant Major Kozlov in Five Days and Five Nights (1961), Major Sazonov in This Happened in the Militia (1967), Colonel Zorin in The Return of “St. Luke” (1970) and The Black Prince (1973), and Colonel Lukin in Liberation (1973). Sanaev is especially successful with dramatic roles of men who have matured through life. He creates precise and lifelike psychological portraits. He has played roles in several films directed by V. M. Shukshin, including Sergei Fedorovich in An Unfortunate Acquaintance (Pechki-Lavochki, 1972) and Ermolai Voevodin in Your Son and Brother (1966). He has also depicted negative characters, such as the anarchist Siplyi in An Optimistic Tragedy (1963) and Gomozov in Out of Boredom (1968).

Sanaev has been awarded the Vasil’ev Brothers State Prize of the RSFSR (1967).