Zinaida Zhdanova: Life and miracles of the Blessed Elder Matrona

Actress Zinaida Zhdanova: A LIFE-LONG PROFESSION

From culinary to theatrical

Zinaida Zhdanova gave 40 years of her life to the stage of the Buratino theater. The images she created, the number of which has long exceeded a hundred, have repeatedly made Magnitogorsk theatergoers laugh, cry, and empathize. And only close friends know: acting is far from the only talent of the famous artist.

Everyone who is part of the Zhdanov-Bondarevsky family is well familiar with the phrase “Come in, guys! Now I’ll assemble it for the table!” This is how the actress greets colleagues, friends and just acquaintances who have dropped in for a moment. There are no unexpected guests in the house. In half an hour, as if on a self-assembled tablecloth, a mini-banquet is organized on the table. Pies with cabbage, baked chicken and newfangled cheesecake - everything comes together in the hands of the artist Zhdanova. This is because the stove is not just a mistress, but a master. Few people know that Zinaida Viktorovna’s first education is as a cook. Although, since childhood, the girl from the Perm village cherished a completely different dream.

“I knew even in my mother’s womb that I would be an artist. I always knew that’s how it all happened! But not right away, of course,” says Zinaida Zhdanova.

After 8th grade, the amateur performance “star” sets off to meet his dream - he goes to enter the Sverdlovsk Theater School. However, it does not pass the competition. This will happen three more times.

Achieving her goal, the girl simultaneously graduates from the Tyumen culinary school. After another refusal in the capital of the Urals, he leaves for Baikalovo to work in the house of pioneers, masters grades 10-11 as an external student and decides to conquer St. Petersburg.

At the institute, they are eliminated in the last round, and the Cultural Education School declares: “We don’t take non-locals.” However, the young lady’s persistence finally brings results.

“After a long ordeal, they finally took me.” But enrollment was preceded by a very funny story. When they told me that visitors were not accepted there, I started going to school every day! I probably went for a week to get my documents accepted. I come again, and they tell me that the director has died. My God! I decided that it was I who drove him to the grave (editor’s note Laughs). I cried so much! I sincerely believed that the tragedy happened because of me. Well, in the end they took me,” the actress recalls.

Conquering the theater and Magnitogorsk

The first year of study was fun and carefree. Having completed the first year, a student who is successful in her profession goes home for the holidays and decides to try her luck again: she applies for the fourth time to the Sverdlovsk Theater and finally hears: “You have been accepted.” A dream come true! Years of study flew by like one day. The aspiring actress was predicted to have a future at the Yekaterinburg Theater. However, among the graduates, the bright girl is noticed by Viktor Shrayman, the founder of the Buratino theater, which has already made a lot of noise. From that moment on, a significant chapter in the actress’s life began—Magnitka.

New city, new theater, new place of residence. An inspired Permian woman arrived for permanent residence with a small suitcase with iron corners, wearing a gray fur coat and high heels. First I stopped by the theater to get ready, as they say. Then to a 3-room apartment, which for several years became home not only for our heroine, but also for seven other visiting artists.

When she first met her future colleagues, Zinaida Zhdanova’s first profession came in handy.

“I walked in and said: “Hello, I’ll live with you!” I met him and immediately went and bought a huge cast iron frying pan. And she prepared it for everyone.

Zinaida Viktorovna remembers that time with special trepidation. They lived in close quarters, but in harmony. Dinner parties were held on oilcloth laid on the floor until they acquired a large table. And they worked very hard. Youth, enthusiasm, talent - everything was embodied in “that” “Pinocchio”.

High-profile productions, foreign tours, widespread recognition, this was the theater of the 70s and 80s. However, the main asset has always been the team.

— We didn’t think about salaries. There was frantic enthusiasm and inexhaustible energy. Wise leader. We were practically in the theater for days, we spent the night there. We wanted to work so much. It was amazing, simply amazing. Everything, everywhere is prohibited, and we skillfully break taboos.

Zinaida Viktorovna remembers how she crammed huge roles so as not to fall under the hot hand of a strict director. And he, without letting her utter a word, made fun of her, shouting: “You don’t know the text!” Sometimes it got to the point.

— I found all the backstage in the theater. I was very worried about failures. I often got it, especially at the beginning. And I cried. She probably cried the most.

Milady never played

In addition to the unique “Buratin” atmosphere, the amazing generation of ideas, interesting work, disappointment in this profession cannot be avoided. She worked for five years as a “fire engine,” which is what the theater calls the artists involved in almost all performances. Stationary productions, performances in villages and boarding houses. I returned home after midnight and got up at six in the morning. And she was happy, the actress admits. Of course, there were roles that were desired but not played.

— When they decided to stage “The Musketeers,” I approached the director and begged him to allow Milady to play. I was simply on fire for this role. I really wanted to play her for a long time. But, alas, the refusal was categorical. No - that's all. I was worried, of course. I already had this role in my head, I knew how to create the image. There is no way in our profession without this,” the actress laughs.

New twist of fate

But Zinaida Zhdanova knows a lot about acting; for 40 years she has been on stage almost every day. The excitement has not gone away over the years. However, the bright emotions have diminished, or at least that’s what it seemed to the born artist until recently. But fate took a sharp turn again. The Magnitogorsk puppeteer was invited to star in a full-length film.

The infamous director Vasily Sigarev is directing a comedy. The film “Entertaining Ethology” features: Yana Troyanova, Inna Churikova, Gosha Kutsenko, Svetlana Kamynina and Zinaida Zhdanova. A small role in a big movie was not easy for an experienced actress.

- In the cinema everything is different. Not like in the theater. Of course, I was confused. For example, we recorded 36 takes of the table scene! 36! This is a nightmare! The whole group has already learned the text. They are already exchanging my phrases with each other. And I just apologize, they say I’m delaying. They looked at each other in bewilderment and assured me that this was a normal filming process.

The filming process was preceded by only a single rehearsal on Skype and the actress was approved for the role. Almost immediately, makeup tests and costume fittings took place in Yekaterinburg. Filming has already begun in January. Zinaida Viktorovna admits that she began to move away from the rapid development of events only recently. The stress was colossal, but it turned out to be necessary - it encouraged me to take on a new job. And I couldn’t have expected such a present for the 40th anniversary of my creative activity.

The film will be released in December this year. And the actress, beloved by Magnitogorsk audiences, continues to remain swan-likely faithful to her craft and once and always on the once chosen stage.

- I only have work in mind! As long as I am in demand and needed by the theater, I will work! Necessarily!

Canonized sorceress

Matrena Dmitrievna Nikonova was born in 1881 in Tula province. She died on May 2, 1952 in Moscow.

In 1999, she became a locally revered saint of the Moscow diocese, and in 2004, the church-wide glorification of Blessed Matrona of Moscow took place.

The “Decree on the canonization of the Blessed Matrona of Moscow (Matrona Dmitrievna Nikonova, 1881-1952)” dated May 2, 1999, contained an order from Patriarch Alexy II “to print the Life of the Blessed Matrona of Moscow for edification in piety.”

In 2006, [future] Patriarch Kirill shared his memories of how “the fame of her prayerful help spread more and more, which, in turn, made it necessary to study her life and exploits. And the result of this has already been the church canonization of the righteous woman.”

What did “the study of her life and exploits” lead to?

No good. Blessed Matrona was catastrophically unlucky with her life.

At the time of the glorification of Matrona, a book by Zinaida Vladimirovna Zhdanova, in which Matrona Nikonova is presented in the image of a healer, was distributed in huge editions. In 1993, the circulation of the first edition exceeded 150 thousand copies. Later, this collection of occult fables went through several reprints. The Holy Trinity Novo-Golutvin Convent was especially distinguished in this matter, through whose efforts the odious “Tale of the Life of the Blessed Elder Matrona” was republished from year to year.

Having examined the ascetic life and feat of piety of Matrona Nikonova, popular veneration and miracles, the Commission for the Canonization of Saints of the Moscow Diocese found no obstacles to her glorification among locally revered saints. The glorification was solemnly performed on May 2, 1999, on the anniversary of her death.

It is officially stated that “numerous evidence of these miraculous events has been preserved.”

In fact, no study of life and exploits took place.

The very similarity of the legendary images of Pelageya of Ryazan and Matrona of Moscow convinced church specialists that they were not dealing with a real life story, but with a mythologeme. According to the Doctor of Theology, Rev. Georgy Mitrofanov, who was a member of the Synodal Commission for Canonization from 1993 to 2013, “there is no exact information about Matrona’s lifestyle; her biography is overgrown with myths, for example, about her meeting with Stalin. There is a lot of paganism in her veneration.”

The Apostolic Epistles of the New Testament instruct us to turn away from “worthless and old woman’s fables (μύθους)” (1 Tim. 4.7), and to rely only on the testimony of eyewitnesses as the basis of faith: “we made known to you the power and the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, not following cunning fables (μύθοις) but being eyewitnesses of His majesty” (2 Pet 1:16). It should be noted with what tenacity the apostles ordered bishops and all Christians “not to listen to fables (μύθοις) and decrees of people who turn away from the truth” (Titus 1.14). However, they foresaw that “there will be a time when they will abandon sound doctrine and surround themselves with a whole bunch of teachers, eager to hear what they are eager to hear. They will stop their ears to the truth and turn away from it to listen to fables (μύθους)” (2 Tim 4.4).

In the 21st century The Russian Orthodox Church canonized Matrona, although in fact there was no trust in the only source of information about the life of the real Matrona.

It was a collection of women's fables, myths and fables.

At the same time, some admirers of Matrona decided to enrich themselves by creating her cult with relics. I admit that they succeeded. The family of Abbess Feofaniya, abbess of the Pokrovsky Convent in Moscow, where the relics of St. Matrona of Moscow are kept, are one of the largest beneficiaries of the cult of the saint, earning money by supplying icons, church utensils and souvenirs to the monastery shops. In the late 1990s, Feofaniya began to seek the canonization of the blessed old lady Matrona of Moscow: in particular, the abbess reported to Patriarch Alexy II that Matrona’s prayers helped her in restoring the monastery. In 2021, the monastery's monthly income was estimated at $500 thousand.

The information that Abbess Feofania purchased a Mercedes-Benz S-Class car in her name for almost 10 million rubles received a wide response in the media and social networks. Then “Patriarch Kirill blessed the abbess of the Intercession Monastery in Moscow, Abbess Feofaniya (Miskina), for the sale of a Mercedes Benz S-Class car in her possession and indicated that donations to the monastery should be used for social and charitable purposes.”