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Famous actor dies with no family mansion handed down to heirs

The actor would not like the mansion to be turned into a restaurant or any such thing

MOSCOW, April 18 (Itar-Tass) —— On Wednesday Moscow paid last respects to famous actor Alexander Porokhovshchikov who died after months of illness at a Moscow hospital on April 15.

Lawyer Sergei Zhorin, who represents the actor's family, told journalists that the actor never learned about the death of his wife who was driven to despair, seeing her husband failing, and committed suicide shortly before the actor passed away. There was neither TV nor newspapers in his hospital ward intentionally, none of the actor’s relatives or friends told the actor about his wife’s death, the lawyer said.

The family mansion situated in the very center of Moscow is a municipal property on lease registered as owned by a commercial entity, and therefore, it is not inherited by direct descendants, the lawyer said. The actor would not like the mansion to be turned into a restaurant or any such thing, the lawyer stressed. The actor wanted it to be a monument of culture. Now, the mansion is in municipal properly, and I hope the city will find a worthy person to rent the building, the lawyer said.

After a mourning ceremony for the actor held at Pushkin Drama Theater, where the actor had worked last, he was buried in a cemetery near his mother’s grave in the settlement of Rozhdestveno.

Alexander Porokhovshchikov was born on January 31, 1939. Upon graduation from the Shchukin Theater School in 1966 Porokhovshchikov joined the company of Satire Theater. Afterwards the actor worked at Taganka Drama Theater and in 1981 joined the company of Pushkin Drama Theater where the actor gained recognition for parts in the Optimistic Tragedy, the Moon in the Window, the Cry and the Government Inspector plays.

Alexander Porokhovshchikov was also a popular movie actor. The parts of Captain Nemo and a police officer in the Voroshilov Sniper film are the actor’s excellent roles remembered best.

Yevgeny Pisarev, Chief artistic director of Pushkin Drama theater, said that "Porokhovshchikov's death was not a mere loss of a splendid actor; we have lost a worthy, honest and a kind person."