She was an Actress with a capital A

On March 27, 2007, the whole world celebrated International Theater Day and so did we. The previous day Kyiv-based actors received special awards, and the Russian Drama Theater hosted its traditional skit. President Viktor Yushchenko sent the theater actors his best wishes on the occasion of their professional holiday. His message read in part: “The contemporary Ukrainian theater is a vital source of national revival, creative exploration, and promotion of universal human ideals.” Referring to the leading actors of Ukraine, the president said: “Even today their heritage inspires us to search for a worthy place in the European and world cultural space.”

It is hard to disagree with this. However, before we determine our place elsewhere, we need to thoroughly understand and remember our own cultural space. A quiet event on Arkhitektor Horodetsky Street was a step toward its expansion.

What do we know about Nataliia Uzhvii, the prima donna of the Ukrainian stage? Few of those who saw her stage triumphs are still alive. Only bits and pieces of her 212 theatrical parts and 24 movies have survived. Poets once dedicated their poems to Uzhvii, playwrights wrote plays especially for her, and painters executed her portraits. Today, when we listen to her recordings and watch films in which she starred, it seems as if the actress crooned rather than spoke.

Theater and film critics of tomorrow are now studying her style in the plays Maklena Grassa, Don Carlos, Beztalanna (The Fortuneless Maiden), Zahybel eskadry (The Destruction of the Squadron), Oi ne khody, Hrytsiu, ta i na vechornytsi (Don’t Go to Parties, Hryts!), Boris Godunov, Ukradene shchastia (Stolen Happiness), Revizor (The Inspector-General), Bez vyny vynuvati (Guilty without Guilt), Postupysia mistsem (Give up Your Place), Retro, Diadia Vania (Uncle Vania), as well as in the legendary movie Raiduha (Rainbow) and others. Thanks to her natural talent and skill Uzhvii performed brilliantly in the most diverse parts, ranging from tragedy to comedy. Her theatrical images include women of noble birth and mean plotters, zealots and good-for-nothings, hope-inspired and shallow women. Her most convincing portrayals were of suffering women. She conveyed a mother’s grief, despair, and pain with incredible emotional force.

Leafing through the yellow pages of her diary, you start hearing her wondrous voice and her characteristic intonations. Behind the facade of well-being and general admiration, the actress lived an intense life filled with mental anguish and things left unsaid. Over the years the name of Nataliia Uzhvii gradually became enveloped in legends.

It is no exaggeration to say that she was carried on hands. Before she met the actor Yevhen Ponomarenko, Uzhvii had several affairs and two unsuccessful marriages. Her son Mykhas was born during her marriage with the futurist poet Mykhailo Semenko. She simply adored her boy. Mykhas was a promising young writer, who was studying international relations at Kyiv University. His sudden death from tuberculosis at the age of 21 dealt a devastating blow to the actress. Her fellow actors remember that she did not come to the theater for an entire month, but stood at her son’s grave in the cemetery or sat at home, gazing at his portrait. She did not even want to hear about the stage, and it took her a long time to come out of her stupor.

Rehearsals began of the play Na mezhi nochi i dnia (Between Day and Night), in which she was playing the role of the mother. The whole company was worried about how she was going to manage the monologue performed in front of the son’s portrait. At one point she staggered but she didn’t shed one tear. She knelt down and suppressed her anguish. In the smash hit Bez vyny vynuvati she played Kruchynina and Ponomarenko played her son. Uzhvii’s acting was inspired and unsentimental, and so moving that it brought the audience to tears.

Uzhvii was fortunate to have her husband and colleague Yevhen Ponomarenko by her side during difficult times. People called them an ideal couple; they were like one and lived in harmony for almost 50 years. Those close to the actress said that in everyday life she was not in the least like a prima donna, and was always dressed in good taste.

Uzhvii had the gift of a perfumer: she would skillfully mix different perfumes and essences to create her own stunning fragrances. She liked to spend time with young colleagues, and actors from the Franko Theater were frequent guests at the couple’s home. Uzhvii wore a business dress and the Hero of Labor Star only when she petitioned high-ranking officials to do a favor for one of her fellow actors. She was not magisterial but had a strongly developed sense of justice.

An unpleasant episode occurred in Uzhvii’s life in 1963, when she was fired from the Franko Theater. She left without a word, without asking anybody for anything, and only her family knew how hard she took this separation from the stage. Shortly afterwards repentant officials came to her, and she ended up performing in the theater for another 23 years. When she was working on a part, she read a lot because she believed that she had to let every word penetrate her heart.

“I was fortunate to work with Natalia Uzhvii in the play Diadia Vania,” Bohdan Stupka, artistic director of the Franko Theater, told The Day. “She played the mother of Ivan Voinytsky (this was her last performance on the stage of the Franko Theater.-T.P.). I remember her inner strength and kindness to her partners, as well as her incredibly demanding professionalism. We were playing a scene when Uzhvii suddenly came up to me, took me by the chin (and I felt lead in her hand), and said: “Look me in the eyes, Bohdanchyk!” After this kind of rebuke, I kept my eyes fixed on her, whether it was necessary or not. We were in Moscow on her final tour. Before coming on stage Uzhvii suddenly complained: “What am I playing here? A tiny part.” After the performance and the ovations, I mentioned these words to her. “This was for my past merits,” was her riposte.

As a true actress, Uzhvii was extremely demanding of herself. Only a woman of her strength could live such a difficult artistic and simply human life. Today we rarely give much thought to how horrible that time was, when people were mere cogs in the wheel. Whether or not you were an Honored or People’s Artist, one careless word could land you in prison. Not everyone was able to go through such a mill and remain a human being.

Nataliia Uzhvii died of cancer in 1986. She was survived by her husband, who outlived her by eight years. He put her archives in order and wrote in his will that he wanted to be buried at the feet of his wife. Relatives carried out the actor’s will: his body was cremated and the urn with his ashes was placed under the gravestone in Baikove Cemetery, where both of them rest in peace.