Sergei Bondarchuk

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Bondarchuk as Pierre Bezukhov in War and Peace

Sergei Fedorovich Bondarchuk (IPA: [sʲɛrgʲeɨ bondærtɕuk], Russian: Серге́й Фёдорович Бондарчук; Ukrainian: Сергій Федорович Бондарчук September 25, 1920 – October 20, 1994) was a Soviet film director, screenwriter, and actor.

Sergei Bondarchuk spent his childhood in the cities of Yeisk and Taganrog, graduated from the Taganrog School Num.4 in 1938. His first performance as an actor was onstage of the Taganrog Theatre in 1937. He continued studies in the Rostov on Don theater school (1938-1942).

At the age of 32, he became the youngest Soviet actor ever to receive the top dignity of the People's Artist of the USSR.

Bondarchuk's western fame lies with his epic production of Tolstoy's War and Peace. This film, which on original release totaled more than ten hours of cinema, took seven years to complete, and won Bondarchuk, who both directed and acted the role of Pierre Bezukhov, the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1968.

Bondarchuk's last feature film was an epic TV version of Mikhail Sholokhov's And Quiet Flows the Don, starring Rupert Everett. It was filmed in 1992-1993 but premiered on Channel One only in November 2006.[1]

Sergei Bondarchuk is buried in the Novodevichy Cemetery, Moscow. His daughter Natalya Bondarchuk is remembered as a star of Tarkovsky's Solaris, while his son Fyodor Bondarchuk is a popular Russian film actor and director best known for his box-office champion 9th Company (2005).