On January 30, 2022, the director, screenwriter, actor Viktor Merezhko. He was 84 years old.
Victor Merezhko was born on July 28, 1937 on the farm Olginfeld (Rostov region). Parents are rural employees. The family moved many times.
Victor was the middle son in the family. After an unsuccessful attempt to enter the faculty of film engineers at the Kiev Polytechnic Institute, he was engaged in a variety of activities, even being a lumberjack. The second attempt to get a higher education was made in Lvov. Victor Merezhko entered the technological faculty of the Ukrainian Polygraphic Institute and graduated from it.
Merezhko began working at the Molot publishing house in Rostov, but did not leave the dream of cinema. He wrote scripts for a local amateur film studio. Then he sent his works to a competition in Moscow and, although not on the first try, was accepted into the first year of VGIK (1964).
The student’s mentor was first Alexei Speshnev, then Ilya Vaysfeld, who became the “godfather” of Viktor Merezhko in the field of cinema. Under his leadership, Merezhko submitted his first script to Mosfilm, and the film “Zarechenskie grooms” was filmed based on it.
After graduating from VGIK, Merezhko tried to get into a studio for three years, but was refused everywhere. However, with the help of Weissfeld and the playwright Braginsky, he received an order from Lenfilm. So the film “Hello and goodbye” was born. This was the beginning of success: films based on Merezhko’s scripts began to appear one after another.
“Relatives”, “Flying in a dream and in reality” (awarded with the State Prize of the USSR”, “Citizen Nikanorova is waiting for you”, “Under the blue sky”, “Leaving – go away” – a total of 46 films, and each was remembered by the audience. Merezhko also wrote scripts for cartoons, for example – to “Vasilisa the Beautiful”, “Lissa Patrikeevna”, a full-length cartoon joint with a Japanese studio “The Adventures of Lolo the Penguin”. Merezhko also wrote 16 plays.
Viktor Merezhko – Member of the Union of Writers of the Russian Federation, co-founder of the Film Academy “NIKA” and its first president. Co-founder and president of the Anapa film festival “Kinoshock”. Honored Art Worker of Russia.