The Mystery of Olga Chekhova Read online

  Aunt Olya, see Knipper Chekhova, Olga

  Baake, Major von

  Baarova, Lida

  Babel, Isaac

  Baklanova, Sofya

  Baku

  twenty-six commissars

  Baldanov, General Nikolai

  Bandrowska-Turskaya, Ewa

  Barbarossa, Operation (1941)

  Battle of Britain (1940)

  Bifreite Hände

  Bel Ami

  Berezhkov, Valentin

  Beria, Lavrenty

  persecutes Meyerhold

  makes Rybkina Olga Chekhova’s controller

  violates women

  in Great Terror

  Beria, Lavrenty - cont.

  interviews Janusz Radziwill

  establishes spy network

  and Mariya Melikova

  disbelieves war reports on German advance

  restores order in wartime Moscow

  reaction to German invasion

  and risk of air attack on Moscow parade

  and assassination plot against Hitler

  and Lev and Mariya’s bogus defection to Germans

  as Olga Chekhova’s protector

  sadism

  on Olga Chekhova’s diary

  orders Olga Chekhova’s return to Berlin

  considers Olga Chekhova’s future

  and newspaper attacks on Olga Chekhova

  destroys Abakumov

  seizes control after Stalin’s death

  arrested

  Berlin

  Olga Chekhova first arrives in

  Kachalov group visits

  Russian émigré community in

  Moscow Art Theatre touring company plays in

  Olga Chekhova’s life and homes in

  Nazi unpopularity in

  bombed

  Olga Chekhova moves from during war

  and Red Army advance

  Olga Chekhova returned to (1945)

  women in

  airlift (1949)

  Olga Chekhova and family move house to Charlottenburg

  Berliner Renaissance-Theater

  Bertensson, Sergei

  Berzarin, General Nikolai

  Blaufuchs, Der

  Blok, Aleksandr The Rose and the Cross

  Blum, Vladimir

  Bock, Field Marshal Fedor von

  Bolsheviks

  and February revolution

  takeover in Moscow (1917)

  low vote in 1917 election

  dominance

  White Army’s detestation of

  Boner, Georgette

  Borzhomi, Georgia

  bourgeoisie

  repressed

  Braun, Eva

  Brennende Grenze (Burning Frontiers)

  Brest-Litovsk, Treaty of (1918)

  Brussels

  Bulgakov, Mikhail

  Days of the Turbins

  Burgtheater

  Byron, George Gordon, Lord Cain

  Cagliostro

  Casablanca

  Chaliapin, Feodor

  Chaplin, Charlie

  Cheka (security police); see also NKVD, OGPU

  Chekhov family

  Chekhov, Aleksandr (Anton’s brother)

  writing ambitions

  marriage to Natalya Golden

  character and behaviour

  decline and death

  Chekhov, Anton

  The Cherry Orchard

  ill-health (consumption)

  relations with Knipper family

  Nemirovich-Danchenko supports

  The Seagull

  love affair and marriage with Olga Knipper

  The Three Sisters.

  medical training and practice

  royalties

  Olga Knipper-Chekhova reminisces about

  Lenin appreciates plays

  effect on émigrés

  celebrations for twentieth anniversary of death

  house and museum

  leaves Gurzuf house to Olga Knipper-Chekhova

  death

  Chekhov, Ivan (Anton’s brother)

  Chekhov, Mikhail (Anton’s brother)

  Chekhov, Mikhail (Olga Chekhova’s husband; ‘Misha’)

  in Hollywood

  birth

  precocity and instability

  acting career

  and father’s death

  meets Olga

  drinking

  frightens Masha with pretend drunkenness

  womanizing

  marriage to Olga

  conscription deferred

  indifference to political upheavals

  marriage relations

  nervous breakdown

  in Bolshevik revolution

  and Volodya’s suicide

  Olga Chekhova leaves

  carves wooden chessmen

  second marriage (to Xenia)

  opens acting studio

  plays leading roles for Moscow Art Theatre

  Chekhov, Mikhail - cont.

  organizes acting workspace in Moscow

  plays Hamlet

  fame and reputation

  at Konstantin Knipper’s death

  honoured in USSR

  stars in The Government Inspector

  and daughter’s departure for Berlin

  counter-revolutionary views

  leaves Russia

  in Berlin and Paris

  Le Château s‘éveille (with Georgette Boner)

  wartime US film

  death

  Chekhov, Nikolai (Aleksandr’s son; ‘Kolya’)

  Chekhov, Pavel (Anton’s father)

  Chekhov, Sergei (Misha’s cousin)

  Chekhov, Volodya (Ivan’s son)

  visits Misha

  meets and falls for Olga

  Misha quarrels with

  suicide

  Chekhova, Ada (i.e. Olga; Misha and Olga Chekhova’s daughter), see Rust, Ada

  Chekhova, Evgenia (Anton’s mother)

  death

  Chekhova, Mariya (Anton’s sister; ‘Aunt Masha’)

  painting career

  introduces Misha to Olga Chekhova

  and Misha’s pretend drinking

  in Moscow

  and Olga Chekhova’s marriage to Misha

  letters from Misha

  typhoid and poverty

  letters from Olga Knipper- Chekhova

  reports Evgenia’s death

  Olga Knipper-Chekhova visits in civil war

  earnings from Chekhov plays abroad

  Lev and Olga Knipper- Chekhova visit in Yalta

  as director of Chekhov house-museum

  testifies that Chekhov family of Russian Orthodox descent

  in Yalta during war

  Olga Chekhova writes to from post-war Berlin

  Chekhova, Olga

  career in Germany

  honoured and exploited by Nazis

  attends 1945 Moscow production of The Cherry Orchard

  education

  marriage to Mikhail/Misha Chekhov

  theatrical ambitions

  meets Misha

  studies art in Moscow

  claims to have acted with Moscow Art Theatre

  pregnancy and child

  relations with mother-in-law

  marriage relations

  looks after daughter

  leaves Misha

  relations with Jaroszi

  claims to carve chess pieces

  remains in Moscow (1917—18)

  early film roles in Russia

  life after revolution

  daughter fails to recognize

  leaves Russia for Berlin

  German films

  learns German

  meets Olga Knipper-Chekhova and Lev in Germany

  life and homes in Berlin

  collaboration in Soviet intelligence work

  reputation and success in Germany

  avoids romantic relationships

  stage acting

  filming in Italy

  w
elcomes family to Berlin

  travels

  expensive lifestyle

  learns English

  makes talking pictures

  travels to USA

  helps Misha on arrival in Berlin

  and Nazi anti-Jewish actions

  association with Hitler

  marriage to Marcel Robyns

  retains German nationality

  success in Der Blaufuchs

  sends presents to family in Russia

  safeguards daughter’s status in Germany

  Olga Knipper-Chekhova visits on return from Paris tour (1937)

  affair with Raddatz

  divorces Robyns

  love affair with Jep

  visits German armed forces

  introduced to Merkulov

  on German campaign in Russia

  Lev and Mariya Garikovna told to make wartime contact with

  wartime German sympathies

  Chekhova, Olga—cont.

  sends help to Chekhov house and museum

  in wartime Berlin

  rumoured to have arranged Vadim Shverubovich’s escape

  moves out of wartime Berlin

  romance with Sumser

  role in Germany questioned

  on arrival of Red Army in Berlin

  returned to Moscow and interrogated (1945)

  Abakumov’s treatment of

  Beria orders return to Berlin

  loses contact with Lev

  denies newspaper accounts of collaboration

  in conquered Berlin

  moves to West Berlin (Charlottenburg)

  and Beria’s plan to reunify Germany

  post-war films

  sets up film company

  forms and runs cosmetics company

  Frau ohne Alter

  Ich verschweige nichts

  death from leukaemia

  Chekhova, Sofya (Volodya’s mother)

  Chekhova, Vera (Olga Chekhova’s granddaughter), see Rust, Vera

  Chekhova, Xenia (nee Ziller; Misha’s second wife)

  Choral von Leuthen, Der

  Churchill, Winston

  Ciano, Count Galeazzo

  Comintern activities in Germany

  Committee on Un-American Activities (USA)

  Cossacks in civil war

  Crimea

  in civil war

  Lev visits

  purges in

  in Second World War

  liberated

  see also Yalta

  Dekanozov, Vladimir

  Demyanov, Aleksandr

  Denikin, General Anton

  Deutsche Wochenschau (Nazi newsreel)

  Dickens, Charles

  The Cricket on the Hearth

  Dietrich, Marlene

  Dimitrov, Georgi

  Djugashvili, Jakov (Stalin’s son)

  Don Army

  Drei von der Tankstelle, Die

  Duse, Eleanor

  Dzerzhinsky, Feliks

  Ehrenburg, Ilya

  Einstein, Albert

  Eitingon, Nahum (‘General Kotov’)

  Elbrus, Mount

  Essentuki

  Fairbanks, Douglas

  Favorit der Kaiserin, Der

  February revolution (1917)

  Fike, Lamar

  Forst, Willi

  Franco, General Francisco

  Frederick II (the Great), King of Prussia

  French Revolution (1789)

  Frischauer, Willi

  Fröhlich, Gustav

  Fuchs von Glenarvon, Der

  Galland, General Adolf

  Garbo, Greta

  Georgia

  Germany

  capitulates (1945)

  defeat (1918)

  cinema in

  Soviet intelligence operations in

  economic disorder (1920s)

  participation in Spanish Civil War

  pact with Russia (1939)

  as threat to Russia

  invasion and advance in Russia

  Beria’s plan to reunify

  see also Berlin

  Gesse, Natalya

  Gest, Morris

  Gestapo and censorship of letters

  Glazunov, Boris

  Gnesina, Yelena

  Goebbels, Josef

  Olga Chekhova likens to Kerensky

  and low Nazi vote in Berlin

  interest in cinema

  Olga Chekhova meets

  invites Olga Chekhova to reception

  promiscuity

  breach and reconciliation with Hitler

  and Olga Chekhova’s German nationality

  Olga Chekhova visits

  and Olga Chekhova’s divorce from Robyns

  entertaining

  on Italian interference

  and German advance in Russia

  speech on fall of Stalingrad

  refuses extra petrol ration to Olga Chekhova

  and children’s future

  destroys papers on Red Army advance

  boasts of troops’ ascent of Mount Elbrus

  Goebbels, Magda

  Gogol, Nikolai

  The Government Inspector

  Golden, Anna

  Golden-Chekhova, Natalya (Misha’s mother)

  marriage and children with Aleksandr

  and Misha’s acting career

  and Misha’s marriage to Olga Chekhova

  relations with Olga Chekhova

  death

  Jewish origins

  Göring, Hermann

  entertaining

  Radziwill warns against attacking Russia

  at reception for Soviet delegation (1940)

  blows up house before fall of Berlin

  Gorky, Maxim

  watches Olga Knipper perform

  and Olga Knipper’s marriage

  on February revolution

  writes dedication for Olga Knipper-Chekhova