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Angelina Stepanova was a distinguished actress of the Moscow Art Theatre, recognized for her role as Anna Sherer in Sergey Bondarchuk's 1965 film War and Peace.
Born Angelina Iosifovna Stepanova on November 23, 1905, in Nikolaevsk-na Amure, Russian Empire (now Russia), her father Iosif Stepanov worked as an insurance agent, while her mother Maria Vladimirovna was a dentist. Between 1921 and 1924, she studied acting under Evgeni Vakhtangov at the 3rd Studio of the Moscow Art Theatre, debuting on stage in Vakhtangov's production of Carlo Gozzi's comedy Princess Turandot. In 1924, she was invited to perform in A.K. Tolstoy's Tsar Fedor Ioannovich alongside Konstantin Stanislavski.
From 1924 until 1994, Stepanova was a permanent member of the Moscow Art Theatre (MKhAT) troupe. Her stage partners included renowned Russian actors such as Ivan Moskvin, Nikolay Khmelyov, Nikolai Sosnin, Alla Tarasova, Anatoli Ktorov, Olga Androvskaya, Anastasiya Georgievskaya, Mikhail Yanshin, Aleksey Gribov, Boris Livanov, Mikhail Kedrov, Viktor Stanitsyn, Vasili Toporkov, Mark Prudkin, Mikhail Bolduman, and the subsequent generation of MKhAT actors including Oleg Efremov, Innokentiy Smoktunovskiy, Oleg Tabakov, Kira Golovko, Nina Gulyaeva, Tatyana Lavrova, Iya Savvina, Olga Barnet, Irina Miroshnichenko, Anastasiya Voznesenskaya, Andrey Myagkov, Vladimir Kashpur, Vladlen Davydov, Viktor Sergachyov, Vyacheslav Nevinnyy, Stanislav Lyubshin, Sergey Sazontev, Avangard Leontev, Igor Vasilev, among others.
Stepanova served on the board of the Moscow Art Theatre. Her most celebrated stage roles included Irina in The Three Sisters (1930), directed by Konstantin Stanislavski, and Betsy in Tolstoy's Anna Karenina (1937), which earned her critical acclaim during a Paris tour. She excelled in both leading and character roles. In the 1950s through the 1970s, her notable performances featured classic Anton Chekhov plays: Arkadina in The Seagull, Avdotya in Ivanov, Irina in The Three Sisters, and Ranevskaya in The Cherry Orchard, a role previously held by Olga Knipper-Chekhova. In the 1980s, following the division of the Moscow Art Theatre into two companies, Stepanova joined Oleg Efremov's troupe. Her final public appearance was in 1998 at the Moscow Art Theatre's Centennial Anniversary.
During Stalin's era, Stepanova was infrequently cast in Soviet films, reportedly due to Stalin's influence over Moscow Art Theatre actors. She made her film debut in 1946 when the Soviet state permitted filming of Moscow Art Theatre stage productions, portraying young Anya, Ranevskaya's daughter, opposite Olga Knipper-Chekhova. In 1953, she appeared with Alla Tarasova in Anna Karenina (1953), another film adaptation of a Moscow Art Theatre stage production. It was not until age 60 that she achieved her best-known film role as Anna Sherer, a noblewoman in War and Peace (1965) directed by Sergey Bondarchuk. Later, she co-starred with Boris Babochkin and Donatas Banionis in Begstvo mistera Mak-Kinli (1975) and had minor roles in several other Soviet films.
Stepanova was awarded the Stalin Prize in 1952 and was honored as People's Artist of the USSR in 1960. She received the USSR State Prize in 1977, was named a Hero of Socialist Labour in 1975, and earned numerous other Soviet and Russian state honors. She was married to writer Aleksandr Fadeyev, whom she met during her first Paris tour in 1937; the couple had two sons, Shura Fadeev and Mikhail Fadeev. Angelina Stepanova passed away from natural causes on May 18, 2000, in Moscow and was buried beside her husband Aleksandr Fadeyev in Novodevichy Cemetery, Moscow.
