# Nikolay Cherkasov

Nikolay Konstantinovich Cherkasov (27 July [O.S. 14 July] 1903 – 14 September 1966) was a Soviet and Russian actor. He was named People's Artist of the USSR in 1947.

## Career

He was born in Saint Petersburg (later Petrograd in 1914, and Leningrad from 1924 to 1991) into the family of a railway clerk. From 1919 he was a mime artist in Petrograd's Maryinsky Theatre, the Bolshoi Theatre, and elsewhere. After graduating from the Institute of Stage Arts in 1926, he began acting in the Young Spectator's Theatre in Leningrad.
Cherkasov debuted in film with the supporting part of hairdresser Charles in Vladimir Gardin’s Pushkin biopic The Poet and the Tsar (1927). Cherkasov was one of Stalin's favorite actors and played title roles in Sergei Eisenstein's monumental sound films Alexander Nevsky (1938) and Parts I & II of Ivan the Terrible (1945 & 1946; though Part II was not officially released until 1958 for political reasons). He also played Jacques Paganel in the memorable 1936 adaptation of Jules Verne's The Children of Captain Grant. In the 1947 comedy Springtime Cherkasov appeared alongside other icons of Stalinist cinema, Lyubov Orlova and Faina Ranevskaya. For the role of Alexander Popov in the film Alexander Popov in 1951, he received a Stalin Prize of the second degree. In 1957, Cherkasov portrayed Don Quixote in director Grigori Kozintsev's screen adaptation of the novel.
In 1941, Cherkasov was awarded the Stalin Prize; in 1947, he was named a People's Artist of the USSR. He wrote his memoirs, "Notes of a Soviet Actor" in 1951. He died in Leningrad in 1966 and was buried in Tikhvin Cemetery, the "Necropolis of the Masters of Art", at the Alexander Nevsky Lavra.
The image of Cherkasov in the role of Alexander Nevsky is on the Soviet Order of Alexander Nevsky, because there are no known lifetime portraits of Nevsky.

## Filmography

| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
| 1927 | The Poet and the Tsar | Charles, the barber | |
| 1928 | His Excellency | Tall clown | |
| 1928 | My Son | Pat | |
| 1929 | Luna sleva | Kalugin | |
| 1929 | Rodnoy brat | | |
| 1930 | Vsadniki vetra | | |
| 1932 | Vstrechnyy | | |
| 1934 | Crown Prince of the Republic | Waitor | |
| 1934 | Lyublyu li tebya? | Student | |
| 1934 | Kto tvoy drug | | |
| 1935 | Happiness | | |
| 1935 | Red Army Days | Kolka Loshak | |
| 1935 | Zhenitba Zhana Knukke | Captain Hans Pfal | |
| 1935 | Granitsa | | |
| 1936 | Girl Friends | White army Officer | |
| 1936 | The Children of Captain Grant | Jacques Paganel | |
| 1937 | Baltic Deputy | Professor Dmitriy Illarionovich Polezhayev | |
| 1937-1938 | Pyotr Pervyy (part 1, 2) | Alexei Petrovich, Tsarevich of Russia | |
| 1937 | Za sovetskuyu rodinu | Commander-in-Chief | |
| 1938 | Treasure Island | Billy Bones | |
| 1938 | Alexander Nevsky | Alexander Nevsky | |
| 1938 | Friends | Beta the Ossesian | |
| 1939 | Lenin in 1918 | Maxim Gorky | |
| 1940 | Kontsert na ekrane | Concert MC | |
| 1942 | The Defense of Tsaritsyn | Peasant | Uncredited |
| 1942 | Yego zovut Sukhe-Bator | Baron Ungern | |
| 1943 | Shestdesyat dney | | |
| 1944 1957 | Ivan the Terrible (part 1, 2) | Ivan the Terrible | |
| 1947 | In the Name of Life | Lukich, the attendant | |
| 1947 | Springtime | Arkadi Mikhailovich Gromov, director | |
| 1947 | Novyy dom | Mikhail Kostousov akademik | |
| 1947 | Pirogov | Lyadov | |
| 1949 | Ivan Pavlov | Maxim Gorky | |
| 1949 | Alexander Popov | Alexander Popov | |
| 1949 | The Battle of Stalingrad (part 1, 2) | Franklin D. Roosevelt | |
| 1949 | Schastlivogo plavaniya | kapitan Levashov | |
| 1950 | Mussorgsky | Stasov, the critic | |
| 1953 | Rimsky-Korsakov | Stasov, the critic | |
| 1955 | They Knew Mayakovsky | Mayakovsky | |
| 1957 | Don Quixote | Don Quixote | |
| 1963 | Vsyo ostayotsya lyudyam | akademik Fyodor Dronov | |
| 1965 | Tretya molodost | Gedeonov | |