obituaries : Alexander Kaidanovsky

Alexander Kaidanovsky remains unforgettable for his appearance in the title-role of Andrei Tarkovsky's film Stalker (1980).

He became famous for the role even before the film opened, after Tarkovsky showed it privately to colleagues and friends. Stalker portrayed the Soviet Union as a mass concentration camp; Kaidanovsky and his fellow actor Ivan Laptev represented the country's conscience - namely Alexander Solzhenitsyn, who had just been put on a plane by the KGB and forced into exile, and the physicist Andrei Sakharov, who had been harassed by the KGB.

Later, it became clear that the film was dedicated to Solzhenitsyn and Sakharov. It stood little chance, and was banned in 1978 by Leonid Brezhnev's Goskino (the state cinema organisation), acting on a decision from the highest level of the Politburo. The Soviet press made a ferocious attack on Tarkovsky and Kaidanovsky and the Strugatsky brothers, who had written the script. But this did not stop a copy of Stalker reaching the 1980 Cannes Film Festival, where it was shown to great acclaim. It was briefly released in Moscow, and then disappeared.

A graduate of the Shchukin theatrical school in Moscow, Kaidanovsky made his debut at the Eugene Vakhtangov Theatre in 1969. Shortly afterwards he was invited to join MKHAT, Moscow Arts Theatre, the best classical theatre in Russia, a rare privilege for a 25-year-old graduate. He made his film debut in Yours Among Strangers and a Stranger Among Yours (1974), and over the next few years appeared in some two dozen films, including the satirical comedy Diamonds for Dictatorship of the Proletariat (1976) and The Life of Beethoven (1980), but remained comparatively unknown.

Tarkovsky, meanwhile, was Russia's most celebrated film director. His second film, Solaris, had been banned after its sensational reception at the 1972 Cannes Festival, while The Mirror (1975) had been slammed by the Soviet press. Tarkovsky habitually used the same actors, but, impressed by the looks and the acting technique of Kaidanovsky in Diamonds, invited him to play the title-role in his new film.

Stalker was to be based on Picnic on the Road (1972) by the Polish science fiction writer Stanslaw Lem; Solaris had been taken from another of his books. The script was adapted by the Russian science fiction writers Arkady and Boris Strugatsky. Tarkovsky was an exacting director, who paid great attention to detail and controlled every movement of his actors. The making of the film took four years.

After Stalker's release, Tarkovsky left the Soviet Union at the invitation of RAI (Radio Televisiona Italiana) to film Nostalgia. He was never to return; his passport was removed by the Kremlin and he became an exile. The Strugatsky brothers found it difficult to find a publisher, and Kaidanovsky received no more parts from Russian film studios. But he was invited by the Poles to Warsaw, where he was greeted as a hero and offered a role in a film, The Interrogation of Pilot Perks.

In 1980 Kaidanovsky returned to Moscow and, avoiding publicity, was offered some small parts. Between 1981 and 1991 he acted in two dozen more films, but never repeated his earlier success. He turned to directing films, the most interesting of which was Just Death (1993), about the death of Leo Tolstoy. In November he finished filming in Alexander Khvat's The Train Arrives, which is dedicated to the centenary of Russian cinema.

Jeanne Vronskaya

Alexander Leonidovich Kaidanovsky, actor, director: born Moscow 23 June 1946; died Moscow 2 December 1995.