PETER USTINOV TAKES US ON A TOUR OF RUSSIA, 1985 (92)

of our profile of this 64 year old whirlwind is particularly apt for we filmed it in Russia the site of his latest venture when a black charcoal sedan like this one is seen truly through the streets of Moscow it's best not to inquire just who is within certainly official possibly KGB it is wisest to give it the widest berth not so with this chugga there are no idle moments in the life of Peter Ustinov if there is an audience there will be a performance Peter Ustinov is a European cocktail both parents were half Russian and parts German French and Italian he was conceived in Russia born in Britain educated to be a proper English gentleman instead became an actor at 17 a star at 18 a playwright at 19 and a producer at 20 and at 21 a private in the British Army his commander noted on no account is this man to be put in charge of others being in charge of all those Osten AUVs was enough inside that jolly head lurk a hundred goofy character said what are you doing you are picking up the dime you're a pretty vice president of what Amala now you don't to pick up here I see how do you make a Russian sound in English well that's very easy because very soft you know like the other his colleague said to me every morning good morning good morning I said to him oh well good morning because I wish to be fine and everything is soft like that so then when they take the telephone and say how you are are you they were she laughing now because here I realize what I'm saying a big truth big truth not comedy or fiction is the purpose of Astana in Russia he is here making a six-part documentary on the history of Russia his view of it adapted from a book he wrote called my Russia it is a gargantuan task to reduce the mystery of this universe of a country to the plain language of television if China was awesome because of a huge population Russia was awesome by virtue of its enormous size I mean the United States and Canada huge countries both have four and four and a half times infinity the Soviet Union has a level number and covers more than 1/6 of the Earth's surface boost enough and his crew have traveled all over the country in every season with of course Soviet cooperation they hope to sell the broadcast all over the world including the Soviet Union it is Austin auvs view that through history the russians have good reason to be suspicious of the west they are more the misunderstood even eccentric empire than they are the evil empire this calm consideration of the Russians that you make in the book and are making in your television program has not won you a lot of friends in the West there's been a lot of criticism of the book that you done a kind of an apology for the Russians I think that's the result of an appalling lack of self confidence in the West if you don't mind my saying sir I've I've known some of these rather hysterical comments from people that should really have known better and it has proved to me how right I am we get the impression you know when reading these reports of either from our press often there's here that people spend their whole time thinking about politics and talking about politics which is absolutely untrue yet in its own way Austin Hobbes history is quite political and quite blinkered not just to Soviet imperialism but to their abuses of the Russian people his Soviets are well-meaning but blundering social experimenters who act the way they act only because they feel so threatened I think the Russians themselves regard us with considerable suspicion and considerable fear and I think there's really more historical justification for their attitude than ours after all they'd been invaded far more frequently than they have themselves invaded one forgets that there have been major invasions of Russia in 1812 and after the end of the First World War when they were British French a Canadian American and Japanese troops on Russian soil trying to overthrow the Soviet government it's it's at its inception are we forgotten all that it's never taught in our schools at least not in mine because defeats are not popular and small boys in point of fact Russia has always been considered an enemy and peace to a potential enemy in peacetime and has practically always been an ally in war for his documentary the Russians provided some of the Soviet Union's most celebrated actors who took the parts of some of the Giants of Russian history Peter the Great and Tolstoy and Ivan the Terrible sighs I busting off shambles through that history as an inquiring reporter with Ivan as a terrified reporter Caesar of all the Russia's a splendid array of Russia's past was made available to him Stalin of course was touched on but definitely not portrayed old palaces and country houses were opened up and as seriously as he takes his work he is the writer and the star of this series there is always the slightly lunatic boost enough being unsuccessfully subdued mr. struggle he didn't he had to continue along it's chosen bow that's the way old war films begins terrible terrible cliches the Russia of Austin Hobbs tour is a country that has changed extraordinarily in only the past few years every visitor notices it a lot of the grayness has gone out of the landscape clothes and cars and people have a little more Flair people seem as doer and suspicious as ever but there is a something a sense of possibilities I think already the arrival of Gorbachev has made an enormous difference because they were so used to these geriatric cases one after the other that in one day I would put it this way Gorbachev gave them someone to weep for if he should suddenly die and I think it gives a kind of personality to the leadership and a personality which is experienced for the first time in what other people are like where the Russians are absolutely deplorable is in public relations they have no sense of it whatsoever at a period in which everybody else it gives the impression of sometimes having nothing else but that I did a film for UNESCO which was a Christmas greeting thing from all sorts of people and there was a wonderful sequence which I wish had been shown more of Brezhnev with his granddaughter sitting on his knee and the granddaughter was bored stiff and he was trying to concentrate at the same time trying to keep her in order which was one of the most human and one of the things are you talking little no questions are cervix look so good first time he went on this divided attention which if it had been more widely diffused would have melted hearts cuz it was a grandfather who was seeming to say even do this to your father but not even grandfather not until every children wonderful how Russian are you well I feel I understand them very well if you treat them with openness they will tend to treat you with openness I described Russia the other day as a pill in which the sugars and the middle because many people get put off by this austere outside and the questioning outside and and almost a look of hunting dogs they it's almost an accusing very pale look you get occasionally but it means absolutely nothing you it's very affectionate on the whole what about those restrictions on people I mean why will may not let people who want to leave Leave I think they regard the country and I've heard this several times from authority to people as an enormous laboratory in which they are trying out a huge social experiment which is not yet finished and I think that they feel they're on to something they feel their system is the best possible and they feel that eventually when it all works perfectly they'll have something to teach they are people who are put on their door the tradition little thing you get in hotel saying please do not disturb but I don't see why one has to take itself seriously as to call this an evil empire which it patently is not hosting odd is quite celebrated in the Soviet Union Soviet writers seek him out in his hotel among them a poet named Austin of a distant cousin of his of his great literary output only selected works are published in Russian when a play of his is performed it attracts an enormous audience whatever the Russians may be they have a great appetite for the arts the arts are almost a substitute for religion the Moscow Philharmonic and its conductor have the status we'd give stars there is extraordinary reverence for the Arts in this country why is that different well my grandpa great-uncle who was one of the founders the Russian ballet called it an attitude of piety towards the Arts they regard talent to something quite exceptional and coming from nowhere they can explain and also there is a general fear the influence of the artist to the extent that he sometimes put into prison or worse the fate of Solzhenitsyn was one thing but the fate of Dostoevsky under the Tsar's was really rather worse Dostoevsky was arrested for reading subversive material and sent to Siberia for four years and into the Army for another eight wasting twelve years of his life Lenin suffered internal exile on several occasions under said Samuel why do they brutalize themselves so much they don't they don't really brutalize themselves I think that you could get a terrible unimaginative police inspector saying if we hadn't have done that to dust esq weirwood Crime and Punishment be I feel responsible for that fine book you know you couldn't easy for him to say easy for him to say I'm not suggesting he's right for a moment but but what I'm getting at in Soviet Union no one would doubt the Russian Asst of a Sakharov or Essos in its in what was their sin I think the reason if you can put this all in terms of a school that certain boys are punished because they should have known better and if you're an author you should have known better than to do that instead of having a free spirit and writing whatever you like in the long run they appreciate the free spirit more I saw a wonderful Russian film the other day wonderful film I said what's gonna happen to this film because it had engendered some opposition like anything wonderful anywhere and they said we don't know yet it'll either be quite withdrawn from the cinemas or it'll win the Linnaean prize well this is the answer to everything but a point of fact it's not so very far from us it is of course a million miles from us which is why so many of the freer Russian spirits spirits not unlike Peter Ustinov either leave or try to leave Ustinov whose own talent thrives in the uncontrolled haphazard Garden of Western culture is perhaps rather too kind to a system that will not allow such freedom of expression perhaps it's his own Russian Asst getting in the way of his objectivity telogen man has a weak spot after all but that's a problem for instead of the historian the other year's club all those other Ustinov remain a delight to all the senses don't shoot very bad

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Keywords: PETER USTINOV (FILM ACTOR)

Id: Y0vhpgit8c8

Length: 14min 12sec (852 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 19 2016