Georgiy Daneliya

Her sister (Daneliya's aunt) Veriko Anjaparidze was a popular Georgian stage and cinema actress who was married to Mikheil Chiaureli, a prominent Soviet film director.

It was based on the popular novel of the same name by a prominent Soviet writer Vera Panova and featured Sergei Bondarchuk and his wife Irina Skobtseva in the leading roles.

By that time Shpalikov had already fallen out of favour for writing Ilyich's Gate, a movie which Nikita Khrushchev compared to an ideological diversion.

[5] To avoid censorship, Danelia paid a visit to Vladimir Baskakov, one of the head officials at the State Committee for Cinematography, and assured him they had nothing tricky on their minds.

[3] They ended up with a movie Walking the Streets of Moscow inspired by the French New Wave, similar to Ilyich's Gate in style and mood.

Nevertheless, Daneliya's next work Thirty Three, a satirical comedy that made fun of the Khrushchev era, wasn't tolerated and became quickly banned from theaters after its initial release in 1965.

According to Daneliya, it was still showed at small theaters and various clubs throughout the 1970s, so that by the time the so-called glasnost was proclaimed, it turned out that "everyone had managed to watch my super-banned movie".

Among his most famous works were Afonya (1975) about an unlucky plumber, Mimino (1977) about a Georgian pilot's adventures in Moscow, The Autumn Marathon (1979) about a translator vacillating between his wife and mistress, it won the main prize at the San Sebastian Film Festival.

Between 1957 and 1984 Daneliya lived in a civil union with an acclaimed Russian actress Lyubov Sergeyevna Sokolova who appeared in a number of his movies.

[12] Shortly before his death Daneliya left the family for Galina Ivanovna Yurkova (born 1944), a film director and his regular collaborator since then.

[citation needed] In 1980, Georgiy Daneliya survived a clinical death after being diagnosed with peritonitis and spent a year in hospital.

[3][13] Similar to Leonid Gaidai and Eldar Ryazanov, Daneliya co-wrote screenplays to the majority of his movies (sometimes uncredited) and introduced many distinguishing trademarks in the process.

[3] Starting with Don't Grieve (1969) every one of Daneliya's movies also featured a mysterious man named R. Khobua listed in the "Credits" section among episodic actors.

Rene Khobua was in fact a simple Georgian builder whom Daneliya and Gabriadze accidentally met while working on the screenplay for Don't Grieve.

After several days of intensive "testing" it turned out that Khobua didn't understand a thing because of his poor Russian, and that he arrived with an urgent task from his employees, but was too shy to mention it.

The thief nicknamed Kosoi from Gentlemen of Fortune makes a cameo appearance in Nastya where he is also performed by Savely Kramarov in one of his last roles.

The catchphrase "It's not wine, it's vinegar" from Don't Grieve was later repeated by the only Georgian character from Kin-dza-dza!, and the troll song from Tears Were Falling could be heard in Daneliya's latest film Ku!