Chairman of the State TV and Radio Sergei Lapin. Sergey lapin, head of state television and radio

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Sergei Georgievich Lapin(1912-1990) - Soviet party and statesman.

Chairman of the State Committee on Radio and Television under the Council of Ministers of the USSR (since July 5, 1978 - USSR State Television and Radio Broadcasting) (April 17, 1970 - December 16, 1985) - Hero of Socialist Labor (1982). Member of the Council of the Union of the USSR Armed Forces of 8-11 convocations (1970-1989) from the Saratov region.

Biography

Carier start

Born on 2 (15 July) 1912 in St. Petersburg in a working class family. In 1929-1931 he worked as a postman and loader at Krasnoe Selo station. In 1930-1932 he studied at the editorial and publishing department at the Leningrad Historical and Linguistic Institute, graduated from 2 courses. In 1932-1940 he worked as a literary officer, executive secretary, deputy editor in newspapers in Leningrad and the Leningrad region. In 1939 he joined the CPSU (b) and in next year was sent to study at the Higher Party School under the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks), after which in 1942 he was transferred to the apparatus of the Central Committee of the Party. In 1942-1944 he was an instructor, head of the press department of the Propaganda and Agitation Directorate of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks. In 1932 - 1940 he was a journalist in Leningrad and the Leningrad region.

In 1942 he graduated from the Higher School of Art at the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks.

From 1944 he worked in the State Committee for Radio and Radio Broadcasting under the Council of Ministers of the USSR ("Radio Committee"), by the end of the 40s he became deputy chairman of this organization.

In 1953 he was transferred to diplomatic work, which was a demotion for him. He was an employee of the office of the High Commissioner of the USSR in Germany (195), adviser to the USSR embassy in the GDR (1953-1955), head of the 3rd European department of the USSR Ministry of Foreign Affairs, secretary of the party committee of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (1955-1956). In 1956-1960 he was the USSR Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to Austria.

It is believed that he received this post thanks to the patronage of the then Minister of Foreign Affairs of the USSR M. Molotov, who sympathized with him, but soon fell into disgrace. For S.G. Lapin, this trip turned out to be successful, and upon returning from it, in 1960 he was appointed first deputy chairman of the State Committee of the USSR Council of Ministers for cultural relations with foreign countries, and soon returned to diplomatic work, having made a good career in this field ...

1960-1962 - Minister of Foreign Affairs of the RSFSR. In Soviet times, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of a union republic, even such as the RSFSR, did not play a special role in international issues - all foreign policy matters were decided in the USSR Ministry of Foreign Affairs. So this position was decorative, but still quite prestigious. For some diplomats, it was a sinecure before retirement, for others, it was a transition platform for a new career breakthrough. WITH Lapin the second happened - the head of the "big" Union Foreign Ministry A. A. Gromyko took him to his deputy.

In 1965 he left this post as ambassador to the PRC. At the height of the Cultural Revolution, when relations between the Soviet Union and China became extremely complicated, the post of ambassador to China became extremely important and responsible. It was during his work in Beijing that Lapin became one of the favorites of the recently come to power General Secretary Leonid I. Brezhnev, whom he first met while working in Vienna, when Brezhnev was chairman of the Presidium of the USSR Armed Forces.

Upon his return to Moscow in 1967, Lapin is waiting for a new appointment - the general director of TASS.

On April 15, 1970, Nikolai Mesyatsev, chairman of the State Committee for Radio and Television Broadcasting (the new name of the former Radio Committee), was dismissed. On April 17, 1970, Sergei Lapin was appointed to his place.

The period 1970-1980 is known as the time of global reorganization, political and technological restructuring of the central heating system of the USSR. Average daily broadcasting increased from 1,673 hours in 1971 to 3,700 hours in 1985. For the Moscow Olympics, a new television center OTRK (Olympic Television and Radio Complex) was put into operation, after which the television center in Ostankino became one of the largest in the world at that time. In the second half of the 1970s, the Raduga, Ekran and Gorizont satellites were added to the Molniya satellite, which significantly increased the possibility of space television broadcasting. All these innovations are directly related to Lapin's activities as chairman of the State Committee for Radio and Television Broadcasting.

Lapin became notorious for his political decisions.

His name is associated with the introduction of more stringent censorship on radio and television than in the years of the "thaw". Many programs and films were seriously revised, sometimes canceled entirely. Already in 1972, the live broadcast of the Club of the cheerful and resourceful was discontinued. The most popular program "Kinopanorama" was taken off the air for a long time, when it was hosted by Alexey Kapler.

Entertainment and variety shows were thoroughly tested for ideological "purity". A system of prohibitions was introduced. For example, Lapin did not allow people with beards to appear on the TV screen. Male presenters were forbidden to go on the air without a tie and jacket. Women were not allowed to wear trousers. Lapin forbade to show on TV a close-up of the singer Pugacheva, singing into a microphone, as he considered it reminiscent of oral sex.

Lapin was a staunch anti-Semite

Therefore, Lapin's reign also became known as the period of anti-Semitism on the USSR Central Television. Such popular performers as Vadim Mulerman, Valery Obodzinsky, Maya Kristalinskaya, Aida Vedischeva, Larisa Mondrus, Emil Horovets, Nina Brodskaya gradually stopped filming on television.

Lapin was categorically against the candidacy of Vladimir Vysotsky for the main role in the series "The meeting place cannot be changed", which Stanislav Govorukhin was going to shoot in 1978. It was possible to circumvent the ban only thanks to Govorukhin's perseverance and wit.

At the same time, Sergei Lapin was characterized by exemplary erudition and deep knowledge in literature and art.

I was amazed then at Lapina - this was the first time I had met such an educated boss. But I was even more amazed at how in one person, along with a love of poetry, with a fine taste, erudition, prohibitive tendencies coexist.
Eldar Ryazanov

Lapin had a developed sense of humor. Anatoly Chernyaev, a party worker, recounts in his memoirs how the issue of embezzlement in transport was discussed at a meeting of the secretariat of the Central Committee. Everyone was horrified by the numbers: the number of thefts doubled in a year, 40 percent of the thieves are the railroad workers themselves. Chernyaev writes: “The discussion struck me with complete helplessness. The secretaries of the Central Committee grumbled and gasped. Ponomarev suggested: "We must mobilize the masses to fight this vice!" At this moment Lapin said loudly: "Well, if we also mobilize the masses, then all the trains will arrive empty." Those sitting nearby giggled. Ponomarev angrily squinted at the chairman of the State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company "

Lapin's career did not end with the death of Leonid I. Brezhnev, however, with the coming to power of Mikhail S. Gorbachev, he did not last long in his post - on December 16, 1985 he was retired. Lapin's permanent deputy Enver Nazimovich Mamedov was also dismissed. He died on October 4, 1990 in Moscow. He was buried on October 7 at the Kuntsevo cemetery.

Awards and titles

Hero of Socialist Labor (1982).
four Orders of Lenin
Order of the Red Banner of Labor
Order of Friendship of Peoples
medals
Honored Worker of Culture of Poland

SERGEY LAPIN

Since that ill-fated May, when I went through "purgatory" in connection with a terrible mistake, the next three months in the editorial offices of newspapers, on television and radio, at party meetings, they discussed in detail the "historical flaw" in Truda.

Mikhail Sergeevich Gorbachev bided his time for the dust to settle, as he put it in a conversation with me. But already on August 4, 1991, I was presented at the Collegium of the USSR State Radio and Television as First Deputy Chairman.

A short commentary on this issue was made by the Chairman of the State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company Sergei Georgievich Lapin: “Some of those sitting in the hall today remembered, of course, the mistake in Trud. But this does not change the essence of the matter. I am sincerely glad that Leonid Petrovich is back on television. You know him well too. So good time! "

Sergei Georgievich shook my hand firmly and patted me on the shoulder.

In fact, I was nervous and perfectly understood that he was not at all happy about my return. As he later admits, in my appointment, he saw that big changes were coming in the USSR State Radio and Television, and he himself was already a political figure leaving the stage.

In order to draw such a conclusion, one had to know Sergei Georgievich well. He was, of course, a man of strong will, strong political convictions, great erudition. He had vast experience in international political activity, led TASS, was ambassador to China and Austria, deputy minister of foreign affairs of the USSR, spoke foreign languages. In addition, for the past 15 years, he headed the State TV and Radio, carried out several major reforms in television and radio, and was able to powerfully strengthen the material and technical base of television and radio. It was during his time that space television developed rapidly, the creation of a harmonious "Orbit" system, and the development of radio relay lines. Again, thanks to his international experience, he quickly managed to establish cooperation with the countries of the Intervision and Eurovision system.

All this long-term experience (15 years is a whole epoch) he has consistently realized through many creative endeavors. He appreciated music and literature on television. He was the initiator of the creation of many talented serials of feature films and documentaries. He was an avid theater-goer, and dozens of famous theatrical and television films appeared on Soviet television.

And at the same time he had a difficult, capricious character. Rarely could anyone convince Sergei Georgievich if he had already made an unambiguous decision for himself.

In politics, Lapin consistently defended party positions and in this regard, as a rule, took conservative positions.

Prior to joining the leadership of Mikhail Gorbachev, Sergei Lapin had strong support in the country's top leadership.

Here is what the famous Forbes magazine wrote about Lapin in early 1986, when Sergei Georgievich was leaving his post:

“Politically, Lapin is an absolutely reliable party member who can be classified as a 'Stalinist'. In negotiations, he was firm, at times it was difficult to approach him. He has always been an excellent professional in his field, and, consequently, a large figure who commands respect for his brilliant knowledge of the matter. He knew how to be caustic and wayward, even rude, and then, with his characteristic charm, again win the sympathy of the interlocutor. Of course, this is a person with whom subordinates and partners in negotiations had a hard time ”.

I'd also like to add that he was a man with a high artistic taste. He, like a magnet, attracted gifted and talented people to himself and did not tolerate vulgarity, primitivism, bad taste. I confess that if he were alive and directed modern television, then 3/4 of the current serial films and entertainment programs would never appear on television. But here's the paradox, he would never have supported most of those new television program cycles that I happened to create together with my colleagues during the years of Gorbachev's perestroika.

Many of these words turned out to be prophetic.

... But back to August 4, 1985. After the presentation, Sergei Georgievich called me into his office and organized small men's gatherings. It turns out that he went on vacation the next day and decided to take advantage of two reasons: to "wash" my position, and at the same time his vacation.

We sat together for an hour, and Sergei Georgievich gave a lot of practical advice. I listened to him attentively, but to myself, by a sinful deed, I thought: “Well, you are cunning, Sergei Georgievich, in fact, you are throwing me into a huge TV-radio furnace, where a total of 96 thousand people worked throughout the country, 130 television and radio centers, 2 large enterprises, one of which, the Ostankino television center, was the largest in Europe. More than 9000 people worked on it. There were also 4 large scientific centers in the Gosteleradio system. In addition to television and intra-union radio, there was a powerful structure - foreign broadcasting. It is a two thousandth army of creative and technical staff, providing round-the-clock broadcasting in 83 languages of the world.

That's what kind of colossus immediately fell on my shoulders, but what can you do: vacation is vacation! At that moment I was sure that it was not accidental that Lapin immediately threw me into the "solo voyage". Different thoughts came, including the following: if he does, he’s well done, and if not, the mistake of the top leadership, preparing Kravchenko to replace Lapin, will be revealed.

I am almost sure that this is exactly what Sergei Lapin thought. But I did not disappoint him or myself.

Every day, according to a schedule drawn up in advance, I had meetings with large creative teams - editorial offices. These were brainstorming sessions that spilled over into three-hour open debates about the present and future of television. And most importantly, that it must be immediately changed, which new cycles of programs to open in order to change the "television" repertoire. In accordance with the spirit of the times and the political reform of publicity and democratization conceived by Mikhail Gorbachev.

At these creative meetings, I suggested imagining modern television from a clean slate, as it were.

At that time, few people believed in my promises of a total software update.

And nevertheless, in the course of brainstorming, it was possible to propose about 70 new cycles of programs. The most important decision was to switch to open live broadcasting of the majority of public affairs programs. This meant that political broadcasting was becoming uncensored. Such a thing could never have been dreamed of in a bad dream before.

We began with radical changes in the main political program Vremya. She was distinguished by praise, dazzled with quotation books from all sorts of welcome telegrams and speeches of party leaders. In the economic block, loud messages about production successes were constantly heard, technology was shown more often than people. There was simply no real critical analysis of the state of affairs in the economy.

I had to break a lot and quickly. At the same time, we proceeded from the fact that the Vremya program, like all social and political broadcasting, should be guided by a deep objective analysis of all aspects of our life. Publicistic research of the facts and phenomena of reality must be carried out with interest, unconventional, if necessary - sharply critical and uncompromising, but under any circumstances optimistic, constructive in spirit and adequate to the essence of what is happening.

In general, I went to television with the prevailing idea that a bold, sharp, tough statement of questions was needed, which would ensure social protection of people. And what did you find on television?

People saw it as a means of entertainment, and no one saw TV as emergency social assistance, as a means of protection. From what? Yes, because at that time there were no serious programs on television with the analysis of economic and social problems, which would be designed to ensure the protection of the interests of various social groups. Therefore, when plots of this kind appeared on the Vremya program, it caused an immediate response from viewers. A lot of people began to send their letters with requests to help, protect, go to the place, send on a business trip, shoot some kind of story. It was pleasant, it was expected.

Perestroika demanded a passionate citizenship from TV journalists, otherwise the topicality and depth of the topic could be deceiving. What is hidden behind the surface of a fact, an everyday occurrence, an industrial situation, what moral and social springs determine the actions of people? How to overcome the inertia of thinking? So far, unfortunately, a superficial presentation of these problems has been felt on the TV screen. It was necessary to reach a new level of television journalism, developing a modern theme. But here's the trouble: for long years In the minds of journalists, stable stereotypes were formed, the fear of overcoming the internally built "fence" made it possible to determine with difficulty what is and is not allowed, rigid self-censorship constrained the work of the TV journalist.

And when, unexpectedly for the country, from the very first minutes, sharp social stories from the provinces about human woes appeared on the Vremya program: about the disorder in housing, low wages, poor medical care, bureaucratic red tape, unfair dismissals of people, administrative abuses of presumptuous bosses - even some kind of shock. Thanks to Gorbachev, at that moment he saved both the program and the television management from rude pressure from above. It was with the direct participation of Gorbachev that serious experiments took place in the Vremya program during these first months. One of his first speeches, outlining his own vision of perestroika and democratization in the country, took place in Leningrad. Moreover, all attempts to negotiate with Gorbachev about the live broadcast of his speech were unsuccessful. And then we went for a dangerous risky option. Only one camera was able to record the speech of the secretary general, while the sound of the speech was recorded directly from the camera. Therefore, it turned out, as it were, an underground unauthorized recording of Gorbachev's speech on television. It was, without any exaggeration, bright emotional, acutely critical. In the course of the speech, the economic, political and international policies of the former leadership of the country were subjected to a critical analysis.

With great difficulty, we managed to persuade Mikhail Sergeevich to agree to the evening show in full of this performance. The show was technically imperfect, but in terms of content, this broadcast made a tremendous impression with the depth and frankness of assessments, the absence of any prepared texts. There was a kind of political explosion in society. And when, a week later, Gorbachev gave another such bright impromptu speech in Minsk and we again managed to show it almost illegally in the recording as part of the Vremya program, it was a huge success for the already renewed TV.

A little later, Sergei Georgievich Lapin, who returned from vacation, appreciated our unusual experiment, looked at me slyly and joked: “Leonid Petrovich, are you in a hurry, you never know what personnel changes may still occur ... ... ".

I reassured him by admitting that I myself was very upset. But when Gorbachev approved, the passions subsided. But now I have other problems - much more complicated. And he told Sergei Georgievich about his "brainstorming" in the main editions. Here, I say, in my notebook I have already accumulated about 50 interesting proposals from TV journalists. They offer very interesting bold projects. "Maybe we will consider it at the Collegium of the State Committee?" - I suggested Lapin, leafing through my plump notebook.

Without looking at me, he put a blank sheet of paper in front of him and began to draw devils on it. Everyone knew about this habit. They knew that he did this every time if he was very nervous. Then he raised his eyes to me and, in turn, asked: "Maybe while out of these 50 projects we will push at least one through the College?"

There was a heavy pause, after which, once again looking at me carefully, he said: “Okay, go ahead! Apparently, your time has come. I think they won't let me work here for more than three months. Act, but no adventure, and consult more often! "

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Chairman of the State Committee for Radio and Television under the Council of Ministers of the USSR (since July 5, 1978 - USSR State Television and Radio Broadcasting) (April 17, 1970 - December 16, 1985). Hero of Socialist Labor (1982).

Biography

Carier start

According to the official biography, he was born into a working class family.

He spent the years from 1932 to 1940 working as a journalist in Leningrad and the Leningrad Region.

In 1939 he joined the Bolshevik Party, and in 1942 he graduated from the Higher Party School under the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks.

In 1941, despite the draft age (29 years) and the difficult situation at the front, he did not go to the army.

In 1953, he unexpectedly went to work at the USSR Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which was a demotion for him. In 1956 Lapin was appointed USSR Ambassador to Austria.

In 1960 he became Minister of Foreign Affairs of the RSFSR, and already in 1962 - Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the USSR. In 1965 he left this post as ambassador to the PRC. It was during his work in Beijing that Lapin became one of the favorites of the recently come to power General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev, whom he first met while working in Vienna, when Brezhnev was chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR.

Upon his return to Moscow in 1967, Lapin is waiting for a new appointment - the general director of TASS.

1970-1985

Lapin became notorious for his political decisions. His name is associated with the introduction of more stringent censorship on radio and television than in the years of the "thaw". Many programs and films were seriously revised, sometimes canceled entirely. Already in 1972, the live broadcast of the Club of the cheerful and resourceful was discontinued. The most popular program "Kinopanorama" was taken off the air for a long time, when it was hosted by Alexey Kapler.

Entertainment and variety shows were thoroughly tested for ideological "purity". A system of reasonable bans was introduced. Lapin did not allow, for example, people with beards to appear on the TV screen. Male presenters were forbidden to go on the air without a tie and jacket. Women were not allowed to wear trousers. Lapin forbade to show on TV a close-up of the singer Pugacheva, singing into a microphone, as he considered it reminiscent of oral sex.

Lapin's reign also became known as the period of anti-Semitism on USSR Central Television. On television, they gradually stopped filming such popular performers as Vadim Mulerman, Valery Obodzinsky, Maya Kristalinskaya, Aida Vedishcheva, Larisa Mondrus, Emil Horovets, Nina Brodskaya ..

At the same time, exemplary erudition and deep knowledge in literature and art coexisted in the character of Sergei Lapin.

Lapin's career did not end with the death of Brezhnev, but with the coming to power of M.S. Gorbachev, he did not last long at his post - on December 16, 1985 he was sent to retire. Lapin's permanent deputy Enver Nazimovich Mamedov was also dismissed. Died on October 7, 1990 in Moscow. Buried at the Kuntsevo cemetery.

Awards and titles

Hero of Socialist Labor (1982).
Chevalier of 6 Orders of Lenin.

E. KISELEV: I greet everyone who is listening to the radio station "Echo of Moscow" at this moment. This is really the program "Our Everything" and I, its host Yevgeny Kiselev. We have been writing the history of our fatherland over the past hundred years. Since 1905, we have been writing history in faces, we go alphabetically from A to Z, for each letter, with some exceptions - so far, with the exception of the letter K, where we had 9 heroes, and for all other letters we have three heroes. And so we finish the letter L. One hero was chosen on the Internet - Academician Landau. You have already heard about it. Live, during the voting, the famous aircraft designer Semyon Lavochkin was chosen. And we have already presented this program on the air. And today the last program with the letter L. It is dedicated to the hero whom I chose myself - let me remind you that I have the right to choose one hero. And I chose a person who, when voting on the Internet, turned out to be, oddly enough, an outsider. This, as someone said, is a "Soviet-era media mogul," such a Soviet-era tycoon in the field of mass media - Sergei Georgievich Lapin. And, as always at the beginning of our program, a portrait of our hero.

PORTRAIT IN THE INTERIOR OF THE EPOCH. SERGEY LAPIN
Sergei Georgievich Lapin, whose name is almost forgotten today, was actually one of the most prominent statesmen in his own way. Soviet era in the field of media ideology and propaganda. Behind Lapin's nondescript appearance and short stature was a man who instilled superstitious horror in his subordinates. He with an iron hand ruled television and radio in the USSR for almost the entire period that remained in the history of our country under the name of "stagnation" - from 1970, when Brezhnev was still young, until 1985, when Mikhail Gorbachev came to power, ending his Lapin career. Little is known about the youth of our hero. His official biography only said that he was born in St. Petersburg in 1912 into a working class family. As for the latter, we note that in that harsh time, when young Seryozha Lapin had to fill out Soviet questionnaires for the first time, many of his peers were ready to write down in the column "Social origin" - "from workers", and the then personnel officers often could not double-check this. Anyway, for ex-boyfriend of proletarian origin, who did not graduate from anything except the Higher Party School of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, Lapin was suspiciously well educated and well-read, knew Russian literature perfectly, therefore quoted the Silver Age by heart, and was well versed in painting. Although, whatever happened then with young people. Among them were both talented self-taught and cynical traitors to their class. Unlike some Soviet-era media leaders, who were sometimes chosen among people far from journalism, Lapin was not at all alien to this profession. Again, according to the official biography, he spent the years from 1932 to 1940 as a journalist in Leningrad and the Leningrad Region. Then, after graduating from the Higher School of Art, he transferred to the apparatus of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks. At the front, mind you, he was not - it means that he was already on a special account and was considered a valuable person. In the 44th he was appointed to the Radio Committee, and by the beginning of the 50s he became the deputy chairman of this organization. By that time, its full name was the State Committee for Radioification and Radio Broadcasting under the Council of Ministers of the USSR. At that time, television was still so small that it was not even reflected in the name of the Committee. Here the career of the future chairman of this Committee suddenly makes an unexpected turn - he moves to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to a lower position - the head of one of the departments of the Soviet Foreign Ministry. Old-timers of the State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company said that this happened because Lapin left his first wife, which at that time was considered a serious offense for a leader of this rank and was often punished by a reprimand on the party line, demotion and even dismissal. However, as the old people argued, Lapin was sympathetic to the then Minister of Foreign Affairs, Molotov, who helped him continue his state career in a new field. Looking ahead, we will say that there is another legend - that in the early 80s, Molotov, already a very old man who was still in deep disgrace, turned to Lapin with a request to write his oral memoirs on television - if not for immediate display, then although would be for future generations. Lapin allegedly did not answer his former benefactor in any way. It was believed that it was thanks to Molotov's patronage that in 1956 Lapin was appointed Soviet ambassador to Austria. The trip was successful in the early 60s, when Molotov, after an unsuccessful attempt to oust Khrushchev, was already removed from all posts, expelled from the party and sent to exile near Moscow to a dacha in Zhukovka, his former protégé Lapin, upon returning from Vienna, became Minister of Foreign Affairs of the RSFSR ... Then this position was decorative, but quite prestigious. For them, it was a sinecure before retirement, for others, it was a transfer site for a new career breakthrough. The second happened to Lapin - he soon became deputy minister in the big all-Union Foreign Ministry, and from this post in 1965 he left as ambassador to Beijing. This was at the height of the Cultural Revolution, when relations between the Soviet Union and China became extremely complicated and the post of ambassador to Beijing became extremely important and responsible. Not only in the sense of monitoring the events unfolding on the territory of a great neighboring power and the plans of its leadership in relation to the USSR - numerous projects of Soviet-Chinese cooperation were curtailed, it was necessary to ensure the safety of property, equipment, real estate, to organize, in fact, urgent, like in a war, the evacuation of hundreds of thousands Soviet specialists, advisers, members of their families, students from Beijing to Moscow. Apparently, Lapin coped with his mission. It was rumored that it was in the Peking years that Lapin, who regularly reported personally to Brezhnev on the development of the situation in China, became one of the favorites of the secretary general, who liked Vienna at the very beginning of the 60s, where Leonid Ilyich came on an official visit in his then capacity as Chairman of the Presidium Of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. Be that as it may, upon returning to Moscow in 1967, Lapin was appointed general director of TASS, which was then considered much more responsible and prestigious than today. And in the 70th he finally returned to the USSR State Radio and Television as chairman. At that time, within the walls of the State Television and Radio Committee, one could still feel the last warm whiffs of the Khrushchev's "thaw" that was receding into the past, the sixties sedition had not yet been overcome, frivolous programs like KVN still appeared on the air. The Club of the Merry and Resourceful fell one of the first victims of Lapin - he began to mercilessly root out all dissent and the slightest liberties on radio and television, up to the then fashionable miniskirts of young employees and long hairstyles a la Beatles from young employees. At the same time, Lapin, this tough, if not to say cruel, man with an authoritarian style of management, sometimes showed unexpected liberalism and with a broad gesture allowed the showing of programs or films that seemed doomed to lie on the shelf. An ideological grip and a devoted servant of the regime got along well in Lapin with a versatile educated cultured person who possessed an artistic taste, knew how to appreciate real art, and distinguish talent from mediocrity. In addition, it was believed that sometimes Lapin could afford a lot thanks to a close personal acquaintance with Brezhnev, to whom he, if anything, could go directly, bypassing his other bosses from the Politburo and the Secretariat of the Central Committee of a lower rank. When Brezhnev died, many thought that Lapin's days were numbered. There were rumors that the new secretary general Andropov was very disliked by the chairman of the State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company. At the suggestion of his long-time liberal advisers and assistants like academicians Arbatov or Bogomolov or Izvestia political observer Bovin, Andropov was the flesh of the system and, guided by the well-known wisdom “The old horse does not spoil the furrow,” did not touch Lapin, one of its pillars. Sergei Georgievich outlived Andropov and Chernenko, was sent to retire only under Gorbachev. And he died soon. Perhaps not having survived all that he had to hear about him with the beginning of Gorbachev's perestroika and the glasnost of the just and the unjust.

E. KISELEV: And now I want to introduce my guest. Alexey Kirillovich Simonov, chairman of the Glasnost Defense Fund, is taking part in our program today. Aleksey Kirillovich worked under Lapin at the State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company, if I am not mistaken, all 15 years while Sergei Georgievich was in this post. To be honest, while working at the State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company, I only met Sergei Georgievich for the last year and a half. Of course, I have a lot of memories, and since my friends, relatives, and acquaintances worked at the State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company, and I heard many stories from them, but still I would like to listen to a person who really is, as they say, Lapin time let it pass through myself and experienced it on my own skin. What was it like?
YU.SIMONOV: This is, in fact, a story, you know how it happens - about time and about yourself. Because Lapin - it was rather our attitude to Lapin. Lapin was a television Stalin whom no one saw or only saw in portraits, but who influenced everything that happened even on the sidelines of this very institution. It was very interesting. I saw Sergei Georgievich personally several times, I visited him, I had a very definite and unambiguous family account for him. In the 49th year, heading Litdramveschenie, Sergei Georgievich fired my mother Evgenia Samoilovna Laskina for being Jewish from this very Litdramveshenie, after which she remained unemployed for 7 years and could not find a job until she started working in the newly formed Moscow magazine. Therefore, Lapin seemed to me to be an absolute evil. Then, while working on television - I worked at the Ekran creative association, I came there in 1970, that is, practically at the same time as Lapin - I often dealt with his deputies. It was a very interesting team, because until Kravchenko came, he did not tolerate in the swing of people applying for the first position - just as Stalin did not tolerate them. They must have had some very noticeable flaws with very high merits.
E. KISELEV: Yes, there is such a legend that he fired his first deputy, Georgy Ivanov, who later worked in the Ministry of Culture and, in my opinion, headed the management of theaters - there is a memoir of Ion Druta, where he tells this story, hard and rough. Ivanov was late for the first meeting of the Collegium; so raunchy? " He replied - "I am actually your first deputy." He says - "You are no longer my first deputy." Ivanov: "Sorry, this appointment is not yours, but the nomenclature." "I am removing you from your duties by my decision."
YU.SIMONOV: Well, for example, he was - he is still alive, I still sometimes meet him, he somehow still continues to cooperate with the news agency - Enver Nazimovich Mamedov ...
E. KISELEV: The most striking figure.
YU.SIMONOV: An extremely colorful figure, a person with a strange skull, as they say, a KGB general, while a person with a completely pronounced flaw, that is, a drinker and, as they said, prickly, and they said this at a time when it was not common phenomenon. In any case, I personally saw Enver Nazimovich walking from the entrance of this very building to Korolev Street to the elevator - there, if you remember, is a very wide foyer - that literally carried him from one edge of the foyer to the other. I saw it.
E. KISELEV: Legends told about this too. But at the same time, legends were told about his amazing intellectual abilities.
YU.SIMONOV: Quite right. That's exactly what I meant. He was a man whose professional comments on his picture - I made a movie - I still remember. He looked at my first fictional picture - "Game Arctic" - looked at me with a languid gaze of an oriental man and said - "Well, where is the transparent romanticism of Gorbatov's prose?" It was absolutely certain. This was the task that I set myself - to remove this romanticism and make a tough picture. But one had to grasp this, and for that one had to at least read the stories. He knew all this.
E. KISELEV: I myself have never met Enver Nazimovich Mamedov, Lapin's first deputy and in fact the head of the central television, but the current head of VGTRK Oleg Dobrodeyev told me that at the beginning of his television career, it was the first half of the 80s, he worked alone from the editors of the "International Panorama", and suddenly he was summoned with an on-air folder, where the program had already been folded, to Mamedov, and Mamedov received him in his office, as Oleg Borisovich said, almost lying in an armchair, in the position of "feet on the table" ... Well, let's just say, in a very informal pose. I asked for this folder, flipped through it, gave it to Dobrodeyev, thought, and then suddenly, than he was shocked by, he named exactly the page number and the paragraph that should be cut out when editing the program, although there was a complete feeling that he was just flipping lazily, skimming over each page ...
YU.SIMONOV: No, on the one hand, he was a hard-core professional, but on the other hand, he had that drawback that definitely did not allow him to take Lapin's place. That's what interests me. In this sense, he is a dictator, and in this sense they are all the same - they never keep equal people around them, this is dramatic for a dictator and impossible for a dictatorship. Lapin was an absolute dictator. At the same time, we must pay tribute to him that he had exquisite tastes ...
E. KISELEV: There was also a legend about this.
YU.SIMONOV: This is not only a legend, it is without any legends. These are people who more or less communicated with him - I cannot attribute myself to these people - who talked about his ability to quote the classics of the Silver Age and Soviet literature of the early period. It's fantastic. He had an amazing library, which he could replenish, including through his stay abroad, which not everyone succeeded in, to put it mildly. And secondly, he really loved it.
E. KISELEV: They say that he even had something like such an informal literary salon at home, because there were figures of the humanitarian creative intelligentsia who came to his house. I remember, I met, I don’t remember, in the staff I worked or collaborated freelance, but I met such a man in a luxurious fur coat, and then looked closely and realized that it was Ilya Glazunov, who was going to Lapin and was terribly indignant - “how is it I was stopped by a policeman, he would not let me see Sergei Georgievich, but Sergei Georgievich was waiting for me - we have a friendly meeting with him. "
YU.SIMONOV: Well, to name Ilya ... although this is the beginning of the 80s - he is already in force, but in general, in fact, he was, to put it mildly, not entirely from the creative intelligentsia in his initial period, although as an artist he was the initial period was interesting. Well, that's okay.
E. KISELEV: Well, in general, many artists have gone, you know, the path from dissidence to conformism.
YU.SIMONOV: I understand. But the trick is this: I have a feeling that these are all legends. Few people were going to see Lapin. It was, if I understand correctly, a very closed person and a closed house. But there was a key to Lapin, and a very curious one. He adored people of the old culture. The first time I ran into the editorial staff of Sergei Georgievich was when I was shooting a picture about Leonid Utesov. By the way, just a day ago she was on the air. That is, she was not on the air - they took her and made something different out of her, but half of the material in this film about Utesov is my material. This means that the picture ends, and they begin to cut out my favorite pieces from it, and this was my first independent picture on television - it was the 71st year. And I come to Utesov and say - “Leonid Iosifovich, I beg you very much, call Lapin. He will certainly listen to you. " I've been working on television for only a year, and everyone already knows that if Cliffs call him, Plyatt or, God forbid, Ranevskaya, he will break into a cake, give any amount of film, any number of episodes, and include it in the plan. It was his exhalation on television. And now his cliffs, after much persuasion and refusals and the like, finally approached the phone, dialed the number I gave and said, “This is the people's artist of the cliffs speaking. I would like Sergei Georgievich. " Connected immediately. “Sergei Georgievich, hello, this is Utesov speaking. Do you know why they cut me off a second time? " And I can see from his absolutely stone face that exactly the same reaction is taking place there. "I have seen. I like. Yes, good, thank you very much. " He said not to be circumcised without him. This is how I encountered Lapin's editing for the first time. Lapin looked at the picture. All the stories we were talking about remained. A piece was cut out of the song about Odessa. Just abruptly, scissors in the copy is cut out cheeky, which illustrated the song about Odessa. They just cut it out and that's it. I saw this only on the air. That was Lapin's editing.
E. KISELEV: Interesting. Well, say, Kapler? He is also a man of the old culture, who was mercilessly removed. The first presenter of "Kinopanorama", who was suspended with an iron Lapin hand.
YU.SIMONOV: First of all, let's put it this way - Kapler was taken, because this is also not the last thing - I do not mean that I know how he was taken, but he was taken precisely because he was a man of the old culture. And another conversation - that he began to bend in the wrong direction. This is a completely different story. Excuse me, this is access to the body, not creative ... When pictures were launched so that Ilyinsky could read his favorite works, they could be produced for hours. He was ready to watch it himself and, accordingly, was ready to show it. But if Ilyinsky were to be asked to read Platonov at this time, I am not at all convinced that Lapin would have accepted this. You see, here's something else. In fact, it was such a spiritual generosity at the expense of the state, but at the same time it was very strictly ideologically limited. Because it was understandable. After all, the horror lay in the fact that in the State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company the absolute majority of the bosses did not think whether they saw a good or bad movie in front of them. They thought about how the eyes of the authorities would watch this movie, sometimes imagining themselves in the place of Mamedov, and sometimes imagining themselves in the place of Lapin. Depending on who was next to watch. And it took away their inner personal responsibility, making them simple chain dogs... This is the main thing in this Lapin atmosphere - the depersonalization of his own bosses, whom he put there.
Е. starting with live broadcasts, he banned KVN - one of the cliches that always pop up in the head of any person who has some kind of history on television and remembers Soviet times - Lapin banned KVN. But after all, there were many striking works on television under Lapin.
Y. SIMONOV: For example?
E. KISELEV: Well, for example, Ryazanov's films, right? "The irony of fate" appeared under Lapin.
YU.SIMONOV: Yes. But these are not Ryazanov's films, this is one Ryazanov's film. Quite what is called ...
E. KISELEV: But there were other films as well. Well, for example, Lapin gave permission to shoot the film “Say a Word about the Poor Hussar,” which, in my opinion, they did not want to be filmed anywhere else. Under Lapin the difficult way, but still the film "The Pokrovskie Vorota" was aired. Under Lapin, after all, there were "17 moments of spring", no matter how you relate to them.
YU.SIMONOV: Well, that's a different story. This is already an ideology. After all, I am firmly convinced that he kept his artistic taste on a chain like a chain dog. But he had it. This is unconditional. For me, this is a person who knew exactly who Grant was in the culture and who was Rastignac. He knew that very well. And therefore he was rarely very wrong in this sense. The question is that ... by the way, he had an absolutely fantastic memory, which, in my opinion, sometimes even replaced his conscience. When I got to his office for the first time, he said - "Ah-ah-ah-ah, you are the son of Evgenia Samoilovna Laskina." And I, who would like to say - "And I curse you for 20 years," - smiling politely, said "Yes, of course."
E. KISELEV: At this point we will interrupt for mid-hour news on Echo of Moscow. And in a minute or two we will continue our conversation.
NEWS
E. KISELEV: We are continuing the next release of the Our Everything program. Today it is dedicated to the head of the USSR State Television and Radio Broadcasting, the longtime leader of Soviet television and radio, with whom an entire era in our radio and television journalism is associated - Sergei Georgievich Lapin. And Alexey Kirillovich Simonov, head of the Glasnost Defense Fund, shares his memories of this time and this person with me today. So we stopped at your meeting in Lapin's office, when he instantly remembered that you are the son of your mother, Evgenia Samoilovna Laskina, whom Lapin fired in 1949 for being Jewish. This was the era of the struggle against cosmopolitanism. Was he an anti-Semite at all?
Y. SIMONOV: I don’t know.
E. KISELEV: We talked a lot about this.
Y. SIMONOV: I don’t know, I don’t think so.
E. KISELEV: So ideological, I mean it as an anti-Semite.
Y. SIMONOV: I suspect not. Because an ideological anti-Semite, of course, makes exceptions for outstanding cultural workers, but if you take, say, as I said, Utesov, Ranevskaya, these are people, when he called, he answered the phone immediately, regardless of anything. Another person could not get through to him for hours, days, whatever. And these are people who penetrated instantly. And these were all not just Jews, but prominent Jews of the Soviet Union. So I think his anti-Semitism is greatly exaggerated. I think that his anti-Semitism was as much a tribute to the times as much else in his politics, in his appearance, in his way of communicating with people. It was all - like I clean myself under Lenin, they cleaned themselves up under Stalin. And it was so strong that ... Stalin in everyday life was also not such a morbid anti-Semite. It was rather a general idea, a theory ...
E. KISELEV: But nevertheless, one of the authors of the film epic “Our biography - do you remember such a documentary epic?
YU.SIMONOV: Of course, but of course.
E. KISELEV: I just, to my shame, forgot when, for what anniversary it was done.
YU.SIMONOV: In my opinion, it was made for the 60th anniversary in the 77th year.
E. KISELEV: Yes, to the 60th anniversary of the October Revolution. So, when they did the year 1967, which, of course, should have included the footage of the Six-Day War between Israel and the Arabs. There were footage of Israeli tanks going on the offensive, sweeping away everything in their path.
Y. SIMONOV: Sweeping away the Soviet tanks on the way, on which the Arabs fought.
E. KISELEV: There was stormy music, and when Lapin watched this fragment, he suddenly looked angrily, as the memoirist claims, at the author of this series and said - “What? Are yours coming? " - the authors, frightened, threw it out themselves.
YU.SIMONOV: Oh, here! I'm talking about this. You see, what a thing - Lapin had the ability to create this aura that acted on yourself. I cannot say that Lapin forced me to be polite and casual about the fact that he remembers my mother so well. Accordingly, I could not remember anything good about this. But I smiled politely, said "Yes," and shut up. Why? So it was not in Lapin, but in me. And I think that very often he got pleasure when he saw that people themselves - he only has to frown, and they already react to it attentively. Fortunately, I did not give Lapin a single painting specifically. My films have never been the vanguard of Soviet television cinema, and they have always stopped somewhere, in extreme cases, at the level of Khesin or at the level of Mamedov.
E. KISELEV: Lapin, they say, did not like Ostankino, did not like Central Television in general. He was unpleasant in a sense, such a relaxed creative environment, which was on television. In any case, he liked to sit in the building on Pyatnitskaya, 25, his main office was there - firstly, it was a stone's throw to the Kremlin, to Old Square. At that time, there were no today's traffic jams, and you could get to any of these addresses in literally a matter of minutes. But I remember, since I started working on foreign broadcasting, Brezhnev had already died, Gorbachev was about to come, I came to work on foreign broadcasting in 1984, but still there was an atmosphere - despite the fact that creative people also worked there, but there was an atmosphere of a bureaucratic institution. And remember, for example, it was strictly forbidden for women to wear trousers at one time?
YU.SIMONOV: Yes.
E. KISELEV: Women in trousers were not allowed, it was like that. Lapin did not like men who wore beards very much.
Y. SIMONOV: In general, the campaign against churches, with beards, a church in the frame ...
E. KISELEV: The church could be shown without crosses.
YU.SIMONOV: Well, yes.
E. KISELEV: Well, if it gets into the frame - for God's sake, if there is nowhere to go, but so that the crosses are stabbed.
YU.SIMONOV: Well, yes. And for men, if a beard gets in, then it should also be cut off. There were also some bans, I'm afraid ...
E. KISELEV: Some checks were arranged like at a defense enterprise - whoever was a minute late, everything was already, could get a reprimand, although a journalist sometimes, you know, goes on a mission. Correspondents also worked there, and they had to make excuses - “Well, you know, I was on the report”, they wrote explanatory notes.
Y. SIMONOV: I already had more decent and more personal relations in the more liberal era with the arrival of Kravchenko. Here was a funny story. Because when he first came as the first deputy, they began to introduce him to the team. We, the creative association "Ekran", once gathered - Kravchenko did not come, two gathered - Kravchenko did not come, the third time we have been sitting for half an hour - finally Kravchenko and Khesin appear. Kravchenko made a small speech from the throne, and then asked if there were any questions. I asked the first question: “You didn’t come twice, having gathered us, and once you were half an hour late and began your speech to the throne without apologizing. Will it be our style or is it an accident and are you ready to apologize? "
E. KISELEV: Did Kravchenko come under Lapin?
YU.SIMONOV: Yes.
E. KISELEV: But apparently, he, as they say, was launched from above as a television reformer. Was it not Lapin who chose the first deputy for himself?
YU.SIMONOV: No. And I think that in general, despite the fact that I fully believe in the legend about Ivanov, I still think that the first deputies ... well, how to say? You know, Lapin was, of course, a big player on the stock exchange of the Soviet party apparatus. I think that he was not the last apparatchik in this sense, and his opinion mattered in the choice or in the appointment, not least of all. But sometimes, as they say, you win, sometimes you lose. This is such a game. It's called a hardware game.
E. KISELEV: You know, I remember one case that I witnessed. In general, very often, as veterans of the State Television and Radio Broadcasting recall, suddenly rumors began to crawl from time to time that everyone, Lapin was in disgrace, Lapin was being removed, and someone had already seen how they rolled up the sign and took out personal belongings from the same office on the 4th floor in building on Pyatnitskaya, 25. But now, I remember very well, Andropov died, Chernenko came to Andropov's place, and for several months there was such an agonizing pause in connection with the arrival of Chernenko - will Lapin stand or not? Well, a new broomstick always sweeps in a new way, even if it is in the hands of a completely decrepit and practically dying general secretary. And just then I came to work at the State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company. It was the summer of 84. And literally, almost a few days later, they finally suddenly announce - "Everyone who can go to the conference hall - Lapin will speak." And again - along all the corridors, on all floors, "Shu-shu-shu, says goodbye to the team, leaves." The crowd was seemingly invisible. Sergei Georgievich comes in, he was so small, completely nondescript ...
YU.SIMONOV: Do you know what we called him? He had a nickname - "Baibak" - a large gopher, but a small rodent.
E. KISELEV: Absolutely unremarkable appearance, eyes only, perhaps. There were legends about how heavy, steel, unblinking eyes he had. Rises to the podium and says - "I must tell you about my meeting with the General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee Konstantin Ustinovich Chernenko, which took place the other day." The silence is such that a fly will fly by - you will hear. “Konstantin Ustinovich thanked me for the work that our entire staff of the State Committee on Television and Radio Broadcasting is doing and set new tasks that we, comrades, must solve. And now I will tell you a little more about these tasks ”. And everyone understood that Lapin was staying.
YU.SIMONOV: It didn’t happen.
E. KISELEV: It did not take place, yes. But nevertheless, it all ends. And the 15-year era of Lapin ended.
YU.SIMONOV: Well, apart from everything else - in my opinion, it was at the end of his era that there was a personal tragedy ...
E. KISELEV: Yes. This is truly a terrible tragedy.
YU.SIMONOV: It knocked him down a lot.
E. KISELEV: In my opinion, it happened in 1982.
YU.SIMONOV: I have a feeling that it was the beginning of the 80s.
E. KISELEV: When his daughter died in a completely terrible way, she fell into the elevator shaft, and she fell with the child, and since she was entering the elevator with her back, the doors of which opened automatically, she did not see that there was no elevator. Some kind of automation malfunction has occurred. And then she pulled the stroller behind her, falling, and the child miraculously survived. But this is, of course, a terrible story.
YU.SIMONOV: Firstly, this is a terrible story in itself, which you cannot even wish on the enemy. But she, of course, undermined it very much. Well, how can I say ... You see, balance depends on the environment, and suddenly when under the left heel - it doesn't seem to matter, but a spike appears under the left heel, you can't walk anymore. And that's all.
E. KISELEV: Let me remind you - today we recall the outstanding television and radio man of the Soviet era - Sergei Georgievich Lapin, who headed the Soviet ministry for 15 years, in fact, in all matters related to television and radio broadcasting - USSR State Television and Radio Broadcasting since 1970- go to the end of 1985. Shortly before the New Year, Gorbachev dismissed Lapin. Today we recall this with the head of the Glasnost Defense Fund Alexei Simonov. Alexey Kirillovich - for those who do not first listen to our program, I will remind you that all these 15 years I worked with the State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company under Lapin. Probably, that special role that Lapin played, and his relative political longevity, after all, there were people who headed different ministries and departments for much longer - remember, Efim Slavsky, who, in my opinion, for almost 30 years headed the Ministry of Medium mechanical engineering? Baybakov, others were ministers who had been in their posts for decades, but nevertheless, there was such a legend that Lapin was allowed what others were not allowed due to his special relationship with Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev.
YU.SIMONOV: I don’t know anything about this, because in fact, when you call Lapin “an outstanding figure in television and radio broadcasting,” I get a feeling of protest. He is an outstanding director of television and radio broadcasting, and as for the figure ...
E. KISELEV: The amendment was adopted.
YU.SIMONOV: Good. Simply because, in fact, I am absolutely convinced that although Lapin understood radio technology and worked for many years in radio and even before his diplomatic career he managed to do both a lot of good and a lot of bad, so I don't think ... and he did not understand television very much at all, he rather understood the result and did not feel the process at all.
E. KISELEV: He understood, probably, in political information, first of all, in propaganda.
YU.SIMONOV: He brought up - both literally and figuratively - a fairly significant number of people. Moreover, in the literal sense, these are people who have learned to do what, they imagined, the authorities want from them. And the second category of people - who have learned to do what the authorities would definitely not allow to do.
E. KISELEV: And under him the Vremya program appeared, and the school of the Vremya program was, of course, formed under the great influence of Lapin. And this school is still alive and sits in the brains and subcortex of many television men, who to this day lead this direction of television journalism.
YU.SIMONOV: Yes. To call this direction of television journalism, to put it mildly, pleasant or progressive or seriously claiming the objective control of human minds would be a great exaggeration.
E. KISELEV: But, nevertheless, in our main editorial office - I started my television career in the main editorial office, that is, in the Vremya program, and it was written - The main editorial office of the central television - Vremya program ...
YU.SIMONOV: Is it at Letunov's? Or was Fokine?
E. KISELEV: No, Fokin is the "Relay of news", it was before the program "Vremya", then there was Letunov, then there was Lyubovtsev, and I came at a time when it was already led by Grigory Shevelev. Under Shevelev, I came there. So, we had a late journalist there, he was the main release when I worked - Leonid Khatayevich. So he had a wonderful metaphor, I love to quote it. He spoke it in such a circle ... when they drank vodka in the kitchen: “Our program reminds me of the tractor that we have in the screensaver“ News from the Fields ”... - remember, there the operator runs into large tracks of a tractor that is crawling along the cultivated arable land, crushing under yourself some last year's tops, the remnants of the unharvested crop? So, our program - in the same way - is such a huge clumsy tractor that crawls, crushing facts, destinies, the truth of life. " And so he crawled to 2008.
YU.SIMONOV: Well, in fact, it was only in the Vremya program that such eagles could exist as, say, the nightingale of the General Staff, Leshchinsky, who, for some reason, told each time that there was something here the day before yesterday or the third day. Such a strange quality was characteristic of his reports from Afghanistan, where he was always two days late. That is, this style of the "Time" program was created - where events take place, we will tell you about the consequences of these events.
E. KISELEV: It's true. But at the same time, I must say that a huge number of decent people and good journalists worked in the main editorial office of the information, and the paradox, for example, of the Vremya program is that Vladimir Molchanov's wonderful program Before and After Midnight was also a product produced in program "Time". That is, as they say, in isolation ...
YU.SIMONOV: On the next table.
E. KISELEV: An absolutely wonderful program was being made on the next table, which lasted from 1985 to 91, practically all the time of Gorbachev's perestroika, which printed many topics on television. It was not as popular as Vzglyad, but in its journalistic qualities and in the boldness of posing questions, it seems to me that it was in no way inferior to Vzglyad.
YU.SIMONOV: It is no coincidence that Volodya Molchanov was the founder and member of the first board of the Glasnost Defense Fund.
E. KISELEV: I hope he hears us. The Look, of course, was more popular, because it came out every week, and Molchanov's program came out once a month. Although, on the other hand, it was licked and polished in a journalistic way - every reportage contained frame to frame, sound, editing, requirements were at the highest level. Well, for example, we did the International Panorama program, which, when it was hosted by Alexander Evgenievich Bovin or Nikolai Shishlin, when it was hosted by smart, knowledgeable, competent people in international affairs, it was just interesting to watch at that time.
YU.SIMONOV: Well, in general, in fact, there is such a category of people - I think this reasoning of mine is not new, I have been thinking about this for a long time - who grew up near the window. These are people, either knowledgeable foreign language, either criticizing this foreign life, or exposing these foreign intrigues, but these are people who lived near the window in the "Iron Curtain".
E. KISELEV: These are people, sometimes really talented, who looked desperately mediocre when they had to serve out a propaganda number. A wonderful journalist was Georgy Zubkov, who always came out into the frame and said that spring had come to the Parisian boulevards. Once a year he went out, made a stand-up, as we are now talking about, that is, in the frame he told about the fact that spring had come to Parisian boulevards, but far from the spring mood among the Parisian workers, among the French workers. And then suddenly - once! - a wonderful documentary film appears Zubkov. I don’t know, you remember - “Paris. Why Mayakovsky? " - just take it dumbfounded. Turns out.
YU.SIMONOV: You see, this is precisely one of the main lessons of Lapin's life - that one must be able to preserve oneself. You can't give your life to it. It is necessary, as they say, even in those situations when you do what is unpleasant for you, to keep in yourself ... not to obey this, even what you are doing. Unfortunately, this is very relevant today.
E. KISELEV: Yes. We live in a new era of Lapin, what do you think?
YU.SIMONOV: Well, I believe that we are already living in the old Lapin era.
E. KISELEV: Already in the old one?
Y. SIMONOV: Of course.
E. KISELEV: So you think that the current customs on state television, on the radio ...
Y. SIMONOV: Almost all our televisions are state-owned.
E. KISELEV: Almost everything. There are also islands.
Y. SIMONOV: There are also islands. We all know - it's like a special cage in a zoo - look, here we have Freedom of Speech. It's just that there it was possible to entrust it to Lapin alone, and now this requires a whole cohort of people. Lapin alone is missing, but Lapin's atmosphere is already there.
E. KISELEV: Lapinskaya's atmosphere has ordered to live a long time for several years. I do not know what to take as a starting point, but probably by the end of the 80s there was such a freeman on television that only the Vremya program was the last bastion of the Lapin order. Now, what do you think?
YU. SIMONOV: I think that it is exactly the same now. As soon as a person goes into the out-of-the-way business ... well, let's say, the profession of a reporter - so he left the frame and went into the profession of a reporter - and it turns out that he is a capable person, who knows how to see, sees some things even through and through, who knows how to tell it, who knows how explain, knowing how to understand it, which is even more important. And then he again enters another frame in the information program, and there is a feeling that he grew up with me at the same time and studied with Sergei Georgievich.
E. KISELEV: But the students of Sergei Georgievich will lead a new "thaw" on television, do you think, sooner or later?
YU.SIMONOV: Sooner or later it will be obligatory. A country cannot live with Lapin television if it is not the Soviet Union.
E. KISELEV: That is, those who have just tightened the nuts will then begin to unscrew them together and run in front of the locomotive?
YU.SIMONOV: Well, we saw it. After all, at the very least, Leonid Kravchenko, who was sent to change the face of television, was the man who launched the Swan Lake ballet on all channels. Therefore, in fact, I am afraid to predict the future of television. It's just that there is still a huge number of talented people on television, who today are very poorly demanded by the products they produce. And as long as this persists, there is hope.
E. KISELEV: I would like to thank Alexey Kirillovich Simonov, my guest today, head of the Glasnost Defense Fund. With him today we recalled the Lapin times and the person with whose name these times are primarily associated - Sergei Georgievich Lapin, who for almost all the years of the Brezhnev stagnation, from 1970 to 1985, headed the USSR State Radio and Television. See you live.

ITAR-TASS

Chapter from Yuri Bogomolov's future book about television

Sergei Lapin directed Soviet television for 15 years - from 1970 to 1985. Under him, TV became the powerful propaganda mouthpiece that we see it now. COLTA.RU publishes a chapter from a future book by TV critic Yuri Bogomolov, dedicated to Sergei Lapin.

Television leaders are mirrors in which the administrative structure of TV, and its creative atmosphere, and other specific features of this complexly organized machine are reflected. Sergei Lapin more vividly than others symbolized the era of Soviet TV.

The history of our TV is original already in that over the course of several decades it developed under a totalitarian regime with all the ensuing features: strict censorship, strict ideologization, hypertrophy of the propaganda function of political broadcasting to the detriment of communication, lack of competition in the airspace. Feature broadcasting was optional. Here the political leash was somewhat lengthened, and the ideological collar was slightly weakened - so much so that experiments sometimes became possible.

Only, perhaps, at the beginning of the 60s of the last century, the party and the government fully realized the importance of television as an instrument of power. It was in 1962 that the Committee on Radio and Television was headed by the historian Mikhail Averkievich Kharlamov, long time climbing the career ladder associated with party propaganda activities in the apparatus of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b): lecturer, head of the Department of Propaganda and Agitation, head of the subdivision of external relations. For a couple of years, from 1949 to 1951, he worked as deputy chairman of the Radio Broadcasting Committee under the USSR Council of Ministers, in which television broadcasting took first place. And it seemed so important from the point of view of its role as a state institution that the removal from office of one head of the department and the appointment of another in his place was carried out as a deeply secret operation. The same as the displacement of Nikita Khrushchev from all posts.

At midnight on October 13, 1964, the secretary of the CPSU Central Committee L.F. Ilyichev and N.N. Mesyatsev arrived at the building of the State TV and Radio on Pyatnitskaya, 25. At two o'clock in the morning Ilyichev introduced the new chairman of the State Committee to the urgently gathered members of the board.

He didn't go home that first night, he stayed at his workplace. I watched the programs of all three types of broadcasting, paid attention to the fact that Khrushchev was not mentioned in them until the end of the Plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU - he was warned about this in the Central Committee of the party. He also spent the day of October 14 and the following night in the committee. Everything here is clear and transparent: the motives for which one chief is deprived of his position and another is appointed, the priorities in the chief's work, the meaning of which is to track internal political information ...

An important TV functionary sits and all night obliterates the figure of the ex-general secretary and the shadows cast by him - his statements, orders, orders ...

It is clear that the situation was an emergency for Mesyatsev. At the top of the imperious Olympus, a change of scenery and a changing of the guard took place. In such cases, there are also personnel shifts at the lower levels of the power pyramid. The fact that the new leadership of the country considered it necessary, first of all, not only to block possible attempts of resistance from the loyal to the ousted general secretary of power structures, but also to change the leadership of TV, testified to the understanding at the very top of the role of TV - at least as a translator of supreme decisions. It suddenly became clear that from now on, if the question of seizing power, the seizure of bridges, the post office and the telegraph could not have been limited, had arisen squarely. From now on, control over TV was required first of all.

They met and became friends in Vienna, where Lapin, being ambassador to Austria, often communicated with the then Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, Brezhnev.

By the end of the 60s, the situation at the top again aggravated, as a result of which a group of party functionaries led by Alexander Shelepin was ousted from the main levers of governing the country. This, in turn, predetermined the fall of Nikolai Mesyatsev. This is how he himself describes his deletion.

“In April 1970, I was also relieved of my duties as chairman of the Radio and Television Committee. And this is how this release was arranged. In a conversation with me, Brezhnev praised me for my work on the committee, said that the appointment as ambassador to Australia was a temporary matter: it was necessary to strengthen the "diplomatic front", and so on. But all this was obviously false, especially since he knew that my wife was ill and was not able to go with me. Brezhnev also refused my request to stay in Moscow as a teacher (I did not need leadership positions).

I looked at Leonid Ilyich, who, looking out the window, was smoking a cigarette. Everything was clear. I, too, began to look at the doves cooing on the windowsill. The conversation lost all meaning. My destiny was a foregone conclusion. "

The fate of Comrade Mesyatsev was a foregone conclusion not because he could not cope with his duties, and not because the line of the leadership of television turned out to be insufficiently verified in ideological terms. It's just that a long-standing, but unofficial principle of personnel policy in the Land of Soviets came into force - the principle of personal loyalty of a lower boss to a higher one. It is strange that such an experienced party functionary as Mesyatsev did not understand this. Or he understood, but could not believe that he personally, Mesyatsev, could become his victim.

Whatever the doomed head of TV Mesyatsev may think, the new secretary general chose Sergei Georgievich Lapin, with whom he had long-standing friendships.

They met and became friends in Vienna, where Lapin, being ambassador to Austria, often communicated with the then Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, Brezhnev. Becoming the general secretary of the CPSU, Brezhnev sent Lapin to work for an important area of foreign policy at that time - as an ambassador to China, where the "cultural revolution" was raging at that time. Then he returns him to Moscow and puts him on such an important media facility as TASS, and a couple of years later appoints him head of the department, whose political weight is growing by leaps and bounds.

Sergey Lapin and Vladimir Pozner
From the archive of V. Pozner

His political biography is a typical biography of a "party soldier" with some unexpected changes. Lapin's social background is from the workers. So it was written in the questionnaire. He himself, in personal conversations, mentioned more than once that he came from an orphanage. Labor activity started out as a teenager, working as a postman. The official profile is silent about his specialized higher education. True, there is a short mention of the fact that in 1932 Lapin Sergey Georgievich graduated from two courses of the Leningrad Historical and Linguistic Institute (why only two courses?). Further, it is known that he took up journalism, publishing in the publications of Leningrad and the Leningrad region. Then he joined the party, and in 1942 he graduated from the Higher Party School (HPS), which, as usual, opened the way up for its graduates along the party-state path.

The period of the war is not entirely clear in the biography of the future head of TV. It is known that, being a devout communist, he did not rush to the front line; settled in the State Committee for Radio and Radio Broadcasting, where by the end of the war he rose to the position of deputy chairman of the committee.

After the end of the war, his career took off. In 1953, he went to work at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. And after three years he becomes Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to Austria, where his fateful meeting with the future Secretary General Brezhnev took place.

* 1960 - Minister of Foreign Affairs of the RSFSR.
* 1962 - Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the USSR.
* 1965 - Ambassador to China.
* 1967 - General Director of TASS.

By 1970, Sergei Lapin had gained, so to speak, serious political weight. With him, he ascended to the television throne of the Land of the Soviets. And here are the traces of the TV industry's achievement under his rule.

Official reference

The period 1970-1980 is known as the time of the global reorganization, political and technological restructuring of the central heating system of the USSR. Average daily broadcasting increased from 1,673 hours in 1971 to 3,700 hours in 1985. For the Moscow Olympics, a new television center OTRK (Olympic Television and Radio Complex) was put into operation, after which the television center in Ostankino became one of the largest in the world at that time. In the second half of the 1970s, the Raduga, Ekran and Gorizont satellites were added to the Molniya satellite, which significantly increased the possibility of space television broadcasting.

It was a completely non-public TV director. Non-public in the sense that he was not personally heard, and even less visible on TV. The shoemaker preferred not to wear boots.

There is only one video recording of his appearance to the people in the Vremya program. This is where Brezhnev presents the star of the Hero of Socialist Labor to the chairman of the State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company. And then there was an embarrassment. The award presented by Brezhnev slipped out of the hands of the recipient. Lapin knelt down, raised the order and reassured Leonid Ilyich: "Never mind, our guys will cut it out."

On the Internet, the recording was miraculously preserved in its original form. Those who are curious can find it here at this link.

Already in the post-Soviet period, a documentary film was created about him with the eloquent title “Behind the Iron Mask. Sergey Lapin ". He is compared there to the Great and Dreadful Goodwin.

The authors of the film about the ruler of Soviet TV Sergei Lapin, by the way, remembered that the chairman personally took care of the creation of the full-length animated film "The Wizard of the Emerald City". He loved the tale of a man who created a city out of artfully colored paper, cardboard and papier-mâché. It was a fairy tale about a separate artificially created world in which its creator settled. Perhaps this is how the new head of TV understood his task, sitting on the throne of the television kingdom, becoming the new Great and Terrible Deceiver Goodwin.

One amendment was made by television Goodwin in the animated version - the citizens of the Emerald City do not wear green glasses. So that the allusion is not so transparent. So that the similarities between a fairy tale and special television are not so striking.

The great and authoritarian ruler of TV, already at the first collegium, fired his first deputy, Georgy Ivanov. Evgeny Kiselev told about how this happened on the air of Ekho Moskvy: “Ivanov was late for the first meeting of the board, got stuck, in my opinion, in the elevator, burst in breathless when Lapin had already started the meeting, and Lapin looked:“ Ah who are you? So raunchy? " He replied: "I am actually your first deputy." He says: "You are no longer my first deputy." Ivanov: "Sorry, this appointment is not yours, but a nomenclature one." “I am removing you from your duties by my decision.”

There is another story about the administrative decisiveness of Comrade Lapin. A young journalist drops into the building of the TV and radio committee on Pyatnitskaya, 25. Employees of the institution crowd in all the elevators in the spacious lobby. And only about one person is worth. A journalist joins him with the words: “What a disgrace! There are so many people on the committee and so few lifts. We need more lifts! " To which I heard in response: "We need not more elevators, but fewer people." The next day, they say, an order was issued, signed by Lapin, to reduce the staff by 1,500 people.

ITAR-TASS

Having come to TV, the new boss replaced all the chief editors. The employee was five minutes late, followed by his dismissal. He cut and shaved all the long-haired and mustachioed ones. Forbidden women to appear at work in short skirts and trousers. On his initiative, singers and singers Vadim Mulerman, Valery Obodzinsky, Maya Kristalinskaya, Aida Vedishcheva, Larisa Mondrus, Emil Horovets, Nina Brodskaya were expelled from the air ... Most likely because of the fifth point.

His strong-willed, without explanation, decision removed from the air the program “Club of the cheerful and resourceful”, which was popular at that time. They were also denied access to the television house for the host of "Kinopanorama", the favorite of the Soviet people, Alexei Kapler, after which the program itself was looking for a new host for a long time, until, having tried a dozen candidates, it settled on Eldar Ryazanov.

To get some idea of the style of television management, let us turn to the memoirs of one of the responsible telefunctions of that time, Vilen Egorov:

“The next day after the elections to the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, a board of the State Television and Radio Broadcasting took place. I was then responsible for the live broadcast from voting points in Moscow and other cities of the country. This first meeting could be the last. By that time, almost all of my colleagues - editors-in-chief of Central Television - had already been removed from their posts by the new chairman, and that day a stream of his harsh accusations fell upon me, the essence of which boiled down to the following: why did you show the half-empty polling station where you voted for Leonid Ilyich, and the overcrowded halls in Kharkov and Chisinau, where people festively supported future deputies? After all, this was the only live broadcast about the elections in the country, which was accepted by the whole of Europe. With your program you have quarreled television with party activists ... And then, what kind of text is this: "I am going to the polling station, and there are new houses and shops on the street." Who needs this window dressing? I cheerfully blurted out in response: “I walked along the street where there were new buildings. We must choose the roads that lead to the elections. ” Silence reigned, and I continued: “It was impossible to broadcast such a program at two o'clock in the summer, in the heat, when it is known that the voters have already left for their dachas. And the time of the broadcast was chosen by the leadership ”. Silence again. Then came the Lapin conclusion: "Either you, Comrade Yegorov, answer personally to me for every word on the air, or we don’t work with you." I just had time to say "okay", got up - and to the door. Suddenly I hear: "Stop!" He turned and barely resisted not to ask: "Well, what else?" And he left the table, held out his hand to me and simply said: "Goodbye." E.N. Mamedov, Lapin's first deputy and one of the cleverest heads of the State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company, threw after me: "Wait in the corridor." Then in his office, Enver Nazimovich said: “In my opinion, Lapin thinks that you are an honest guy.”
(Memories of Vilen Egorov. Internet TV Museum.)

“Sergei Georgievich, hello, this is Utesov speaking. Do you know why they cut me off a second time? "

"Honest guy" soon proposed the idea of a new program with the participation of the best people Labor - interviews with outstanding personalities called "Straight Talk". It seems that you can't get under the ideology. Lapin undermined: “So, your program is a frank conversation, and the rest of our television is an open conversation ?! No, comrade Egorov, we will not follow you " (ibid.).

Lapin is responsible for the closure of the Find a Person program. Now this administrative gesture seems especially symbolic. This program helped family and friends find each other after many years. The presenter Agnia Barto went to explain herself. Like, how can it be? After all, it is so important when people find each other after dozens of years. You yourself have lost your relatives, would you really not like to meet with them? “I wouldn’t want to,” was the answer. - Yes, and it is not necessary. I am a different person, they are different people. This is not necessary. "

... Vladimir Voroshilov first came up with a show called "Auction", with the help of which it was supposed to promote consumer goods to the buyer. Lapin did not like the presenter's physiognomy, the program was closed. A little later, Voroshilov made a TV game from a children's toy called the "spinning top" and adult intellectual riddles. The first ten years the game was recorded. And only when the tele-bosses were convinced that the "CHKG" did not question the foundations of the Soviet system and did not shake its cornerstones, did it allow this fun to be broadcast live.

The first live broadcast of the Central Television "Auction". Project author and host - Vladimir Voroshilov
ITAR-TASS

Although one person nevertheless discerned a "counter" in her and guessed her harmlessness. That was, of course, Lapin, with whom Voroshilov once had a frank dialogue. Vladimir Yakovlevich himself told about him on the air of "Echo of Moscow". I quote from the site: "" What are you doing in your show? " I, then a young man, answered: "We teach people to think, to solve problems." He says, “Here. You are a state criminal! " "How?" - I was taken aback. “Look here. You teach people to think, they think about this question. Look outside. Life also poses questions to them. And God forbid, they will start thinking there, on the street, over the questions that life puts them! It will turn out to be nonsense. ”

And now one can marvel at how deeply one of his faithful sons, Sergei Lapin, has mastered the essence of the Soviet regime. He correctly understood his super task - to deprive people of the skills of thinking about the past, present, and even more so the future, if possible.

... The most idiotic order of the mighty Goodwin, which would have done honor to Mrs. Mizulina, was the prohibition to shoot Alla Pugacheva in close-up. The singer brought the microphone too close to her lips, which caused an association with oral sex.

... Film director Alexei Simonov, who worked in the Ekran association in the 70s, spoke on the Echo of Moscow radio broadcast about his direct encounter with a man whom he and his colleagues called not Great and Terrible Goodwin, but a boobak. It is such a large marmot, but a small rodent.

Simonov made a picture of Utesov and Odessa. The picture was heavily bitten by chiefs of different levels and ranks. The author could not stand it and rushed to the hero of his film. Further I quote the site of the radio station:

“And now Utesov, after long persuasions and refusals and the like, finally came to the phone, dialed the number I gave and said:“ This is the people's artist Utesov speaking. I would like Sergei Georgievich. " Connected immediately. “Sergei Georgievich, hello, this is Utesov speaking. Do you know why they cut me off a second time? " And I can see from his absolutely stone face that exactly the same reaction is taking place there. "I have seen. I like. Yes, good, thank you very much. ” He told me to be circumcised without him. This is how I encountered Lapin's editing for the first time. "

Some clarification is required here. Lapin, for all his radical authoritarianism, within the framework of his department, had a great weakness for high culture. And this was not a myth. Too many living testimonies have survived.
Journalist Andrei Malgin recalled:

“Somehow Zasursky (Dean of the Faculty of Journalism of Moscow State University. - Yu.B.) invited Lapin to a meeting with students of the Faculty of Journalism. I remember her well. This was around 1976. The audience was packed to capacity: everyone wanted to see Satan alive. Lapin turned out to be an ironic, educated person, he said some very bold things. He recited forbidden poetry by heart, for example. We all couldn’t believe our ears. ”

Eduard Sagalaev has a story of how he happened to go on a business trip with Lapin, how they all night long read to each other poems by Tsvetaeva, Pasternak, poets of the Silver Age ...

And everyone who had a personal acquaintance with "television Stalin" - as he was also called - never tired of admiring the literary erudition of a high-ranking boss.

Here, apparently, is the key to the riddle of why Lapin gave the go-ahead for the filming of "The Irony of Fate", while the head of the cinematographic department, Philip Yermash, categorically obstructed this.

He hindered it precisely because there were too many lyrics in the script, and even not pop and therefore suspicious. And for exactly the same reason, the script for "Irony" looked to Lapin. And Lapin made a rather strong impression on Ryazanov in person:

“I was amazed then at Lapina - this was the first time I had met such an educated boss. But I was even more amazed at how in one person, along with love for poetry, with a fine taste, erudition, prohibitive tendencies coexist. " (I quote from the film "Behind the Iron Mask. Sergei Lapin").

In the same way, one can be amazed that such an educated person was also known as a desperate anti-Semite. This was also legendary. There were also convincing examples, one of which was shared by Evgeny Kiselev.

A documentary review film about the 67th year was filmed. Well, it was impossible to get around the Six Day War between Israel and the Arabs. There were footage of Israeli tanks going on the offensive, victoriously sweeping away everything in their path. And behind the scenes, bravura music sounded. While watching, Lapin turned to the authors, his eyes were angry: “What? Are yours coming? " (site of "Echo of Moscow"). The authors, frightened, threw it out themselves. That is, they were cut off. It is unclear what time: the first time? Or is it in the second?

One could not be surprised at the compatibility of taste, erudition with prohibitive tendencies in Soviet times. It was, and still remains a matter of everyday life. It's just that many people then put sound and lightproof partitions inside themselves: here I am a voluptuous bibliophile, and here I am an adamant ideological guard.

When TV was innocent like a child, it seemed that it was invented for Irakli Andronikov and his stories about the masters of culture and also for broadcasting football and hockey matches. That TV is such a technical invention that in itself guarantees the veracity of what it shows. It guarantees by virtue of its immediacy. And that you can't lie in front of the TV camera. That is, you can lie, but TV will betray you more than any lie detector.
The first researcher of Russian TV, Vladimir Sappak, even took the liberty of formulating: "Television is an X-ray of character."

About character - maybe this is an exaggeration. But they did not lie about the sincerity and naturalness of a person in the frame of a TV screen at the time of their inception. It was still very innocent - again due to its immediacy. Therefore, the Soviet government reacted with great caution to this achievement of the human mind. She is like that court lady from Schwarz's "The Naked King" who stopped the naive Princess as soon as she opened her mouth: “I beg you, keep quiet. You are so innocent that you can say absolutely terrible things. "

Just the most "terrible truth" for the Soviets was their pathological deceit. Therefore, the authorities had to be very careful and be on the alert all the time until the video recording technology appeared.

However, even without it, Soviet TV eventually learned to reliably lie. It was all the easier for him to do that, over the decades of living in lies, the taste for the authenticity of a fact, an event and the human character itself had noticeably atrophied among the mass public. And when the video recording technology appeared, which made it possible to first fix the reality, and then edit it, then there were no problems. Moreover, the possibilities of manipulating the "picture" and creating ideological mirages from ideological clichés have expanded.

The trick, however, is that Soviet TV, deceiving viewers, could not completely deceive Life. In life, there are always naive swineherds and innocent babies who inadvertently say "terrible things", that is, the truth.

At the farewell meeting, the omnipotent head of the Central Television said: "I have served my time faithfully, I wish to serve you - yours."

Lapin was mistaken. He served not time, but temporary workers. He was in power while they were strong, and instantly weakened, as soon as the Soviet regime ceased to be an "iron mask" for him. It was then that it became clear that the formidable leader was not the Great and Terrible Goodwin, but the Great and Terrible Deceiver.

When Gorbachev came to power, he sent the Wizard of the Emerald City to retire. And the Emerald City itself, rebuilt by Lapin, ordered to live for a long time. No longer than the Soviet Union lived. And he fell to pieces. But here's the problem: its population has not gone anywhere. It was necessary to work with him somehow. And rebuild television reality.

And then it turned out that the former service was just a service. The real service is ahead, and in order to meet it, the TV goodwins must take the risk of working without iron masks.

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Lapin was a staunch anti-Semite

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1970-1985

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