Who invented the gene and Cheburashka. Cheburashka's birthday: how Ouspensky found the unusual name of his favorite character
I must say that this simple question (or rather, the answer to it) is not so unambiguous as it seems at first glance. funny hero literary works, cartoons, concurrently being the official symbol of the Russian team at the Olympic Games, at one time became a stumbling block in several litigations at once. About why this happened, and who actually invented Cheburashka, we will try to tell in our article.
literary character
On the one hand, this is a bookish image. And the writer Eduard Uspensky came up with it. Yellow eyes (like an owl). Round big head (like a hare). The tail is fluffy and short (like a little bear). By the way, in the first editions of the book about Cheburashka and Crocodile Gena, published even before the appearance of the famous cartoon in 1966, the animal looked different. So his image was seen by two other artists Alfeevsky and Kalinovsky. In short, we can say: not at all similar!
cartoon character
The bright and unforgettable image of Cheburashka from the Soviet cartoon, published in 1969, was created by the animator Leonid Shvartsman (real name is Israel Aronovich Shvartsman). And after that, in all the other cartoons about Cheburashka, it is this brilliant soviet artist created the characters. So the right to the cartoon animal belongs to him.
Name origin
According to Uspensky's tale, an unknown animal, when transported along with oranges, strove to “cheburah”, that is, to fall, simply speaking. Hence the name - Cheburashka. In Dahl's dictionary, the concept of "cheburakh" is described as: "crash", "stretch", "fall". And the word "cheburashka" means: a doll like a roly-poly, which, no matter how you throw it, gets to its feet.
Brand Sharing
Litigation between Uspensky and Shvartsman began after the collapse of the USSR, in the nineties. The peak was in 2004-2007. The artist drew attention to the fact that the image of Cheburashka in the first editions of the books differs significantly from the cartoon character drawn later. And there is clearly a difference. Therefore, it is still reasonable to talk about two different author's characters: a cartoon character and a literary hero.
Eduard Uspensky died on the evening of August 14 in a private house in the village of Puchkovo, which is part of the Troitsky administrative district of Moscow. On August 9, it was reported that the writer became ill in his house. He lost consciousness, and his wife called the doctors, Izvestia writes. Earlier it became known that the writer was diagnosed with a malignant neoplasm.
The writer was born in Yegorievsk near Moscow on December 22, 1937. He began to publish his first poems for children in Literaturnaya Gazeta. He is known as the author of children's books that have become real hits - "Crocodile Gena and his friends", "Vacations in Prostokvashino", "Kolobok is on the trail."
Based on the scripts and works of Uspensky, 60 cartoons were shot. The writer's works have been translated into more than 25 languages. Also, Eduard Uspensky was one of the creators of the programs " Good night, kids! and "ABVGDeika".
The heroes and works of the writer Eduard Uspensky entered the cultural code of several generations of Russians, Georgy Urushadze, director of the Center for the Support of National Literature, told TASS. According to him, Ouspensky was a favorite writer of children born in the 1970s and 1990s and was a "living classic". His creative life was incredibly productive.
Works by Eduard Uspensky:
Crocodile Gena and his friends (1966, 1970)
"Colorful family" (1967)
"That's So School" (1968)
"Crocodile Gena" (1970)
"Balloons" (1971)
"Down the Magic River" (1972)
"Ice" (1973)
"Bahram's Legacy" (1973)
"Uncle Fyodor, a dog and a cat" (1974)
"Academician Ivanov" (1974)
"Vacation of Crocodile Gena" (1974)
"Guarantee Men" (1975)
"Crocodile Gena" (1975)
"It's All Right" (1976)
"Repeat" (1976)
"The Amazing Thing" (1976)
"Crocodile Gena" (1977)
Crocodile Gena and Other Tales (1977)
"Down the Magic River" (1979)
"Clown School" (1981)
"Ice" (1982)
"If I were a girl" (1983)
"Holidays in Prostokvashino" (1983)
"Above Our Apartment" (1980, 1981, 1984)
"Vera and Anfisa in the clinic" (1985)
"Vera and Anfisa meet" (1985)
"Clown Ivan Bultykh" (1987)
"Kolobok follows the trail" (1987)
"25 professions of Masha Filippenko" (1988)
"About Sidorov Vova" (1988)
"Fur Boarding School" (1989)
"Sage"
"Red Hand, Black Sheet, Green Fingers" (1990)
"Uncle Fyodor, a dog and a cat (dialogues on political issues)" (1990)
"Uncle Fyodor, a dog and a cat, and politics" (1991)
"Lectures of Professor Chainikov" (1991)
"Literacy: A book for one reader and ten illiterates" (1992)
"The Business of Crocodile Gena" (1992)
"Underwater Berets" (1993)
"Uncle Fedor's Aunt, or Escape from Prostokvashino" (1995)
"Winter in Prostokvashino" (1997)
"Favorite girl of Uncle Fyodor" (1997)
"New order in Prostokvashino" (1997)
"Uncle Fyodor goes to school, or Nancy from the Internet in Prostokvashino" (1999)
"False Dmitry II, real" (1999)
"Spring in Prostokvashino" (2001)
"Mushrooms for Cheburashka" (2001)
"Crocodile Gena - police lieutenant" (2001)
"Pechkin vs. Khvatayka" (2001)
"Kidnapping of Cheburashka" (2001)
"Holidays in the village of Prostokvashino" (2001)
"Trouble in Prostokvashino" (2002)
"The Case with Stepanide: Stories" (2002)
"Viper Sting" (2002)
"Treasure from the village of Prostokvashino" (2004)
"Mystery Guest from Space" (2004)
"Birthdays in Prostokvashino" (2005)
"Acid rain in Prostokvashino and other funny stories" (2005)
"New life in Prostokvashino" (2007)
"The error of the postman Pechkin"
"Cheburashka goes to the people"
"Ivan - king's son and the Gray Wolf
"About Vera and Anfisa"
"Zhab Zhabych Skovorodkin"
"Son of Toad Zhabych"
"The Story of the Sparrowhawk"
"The investigation is conducted by Koloboks"
"Magnetic house near Vladimir"
"Household dog on a Belarusian farm"
"Incidents in Prostokvashino, or the Inventions of the Postman Pechkin"
"Stories about a girl with strange name» (2009)
"Guarantee Men Return" (2011)
"The story of Geveichik, the gutta-percha man" (2011)
"Ghost from Prostokvashino" (2011)
Scenarios animated films Edward Uspensky:
"Antoshka" ("Merry Carousel", No. 1, 1969)
"Crocodile Gena" (1969)
"Cheburashka" (1971)
"Destruction" ("Merry Carousel, No. 3, 1971)
“Red, red, freckled” (“Merry Carousel”, No. 3, 1971)
"Loser" (1972)
Shapoklyak (1974)
"Bird Market" (1974)
"Painting. Vanya rode (1975)
"Inheritance of the Magician Bahram" (1975)
"Wonderful Day" (1975)
"Elephant Dilo Senok" (1975)
"Uncle Fyodor, a dog and a cat: Matroskin and Sharik" (film one, 1975)
"Uncle Fyodor, a dog and a cat: Mitya and Murka" (film two, 1976)
"Uncle Fyodor, a dog and a cat: Mom and Dad" (third film, 1976)
Octopuses (1976)
"Three from Prostokvashino" (1978)
"Uncle Au" (film one, 1979)
"Uncle Au's Mistake" (film two, 1979)
"Uncle Au in the city" (film three, 1979)
"About the refrigerator, gray mice and warranty men" (1979)
"Olympic Character" (1979)
"Holidays in Prostokvashino" (1980)
"Blob" (1980)
"Canoeing" (from a series of microfilms about sports for the Olympics-80, 1980)
"Judo" (from a series of microfilms about sports for the Olympics-80, 1980)
"Equestrian Sports" (from a series of microfilms about sports for the Olympics-80, 1980)
"Artistic gymnastics" (from a series of microfilms about sports for the Olympics-80, 1980)
Race Walking (from a series of microfilms about sports for the Olympics-80, 1980)
"Field Hockey" (from a series of microfilms about sports for the Olympics-80, 1980)
"Baba Yaga against!" (films one, two, three, 1980)
"Plasticine Crow" (1981)
"Ivashka from the Palace of Pioneers" (1981)
Teleeye (screensaver for a series of programs on economy, 1982)
"Cheburashka goes to school" (1983)
“Koloboks are investigating” (puppet cartoons, films one, two, 1983)
"New Year's Song of Santa Claus" (1983)
"Winter in Prostokvashino" (1984)
"About Sidorov Vova" (1985)
"Academician Ivanov" (1986)
"About Vera and Anfisa" (1986)
“Koloboks are investigating” (drawn cartoons, films one, two, 1986, films three, four, 1987)
"About Vera and Anfisa: Vera and Anfisa put out the fire" (1987)
"About Vera and Anfisa: Vera and Anfisa at a lesson at school" (1988)
"Riddle" ("Merry Carousel", No. 19, 1988)
"Today in Our Town" (1989)
Happy Start 1, Happy Start 2, Happy Start 3, Lake at the Bottom of the Sea, Miko - Pavlova's Son, Iceberg Surface, Secret Ocean Dump, Happy Start 4, "Underwater Berets" (films about dolphins, 1989-1991)
Cheburashka is a character in Eduard Uspensky's book "Crocodile Gena and his friends" and the film "Crocodile Gena" by Roman Kachanov, based on this book in 1969.
He gained wide popularity after the release of this film on the screens.
Outwardly, it is a creature with huge ears, big eyes and brown hair, walking on hind legs. The image of Cheburashka, known today, first appeared in Roman Kachanov's cartoon "Gena the Crocodile" (1969) and was created with the direct participation of the film's production designer Leonid Shvartsman. After the release of the film on English language originally translated as "Topple" (Topl), into German as "Kullerchen" (Kullerhen) and "Plumps" (Plumps), into Swedish as "Drutten" (Dryutten) and into Finnish as "Muksis" (Muksis).
Character origin
According to the preface to the book “Gena the Crocodile and His Friends”, Cheburashka was the name of a defective toy that the author of the book had in childhood, depicting a strange beast: either a bear cub or a hare with big ears. His eyes were large and yellow, like those of an owl, his head was round, like a hare, and his tail was short and fluffy, such as is usually the case with small cubs. According to the book, the author's parents claimed that this is an animal unknown to science that lives in hot tropical forests. Therefore, in the main text, whose heroes are, according to the writer, the children's toys of Eduard Uspensky himself, Cheburashka is really an unknown tropical animal that climbed into a box of oranges, fell asleep there, and as a result, along with the box, ended up in Big city. The director of the store in which the box was opened called it “Cheburashka”, since the animal, which had eaten too many oranges, was constantly falling (cheburah):
He sat, sat, looked around, and then he took it and cheburahnulsya from the table to the chair. But he did not sit on a chair for a long time - he cheburahnulsya again. On the floor.
- Fu you, Cheburashka what! - the director of the store said about him, - He can’t sit still at all!
So our animal found out that his name is Cheburashka.
The origin of the word "cheburashka"
The version about a defective toy, set out in the introduction to his book, is rejected by E. N. Uspensky as composed specifically for children. In an interview with a Nizhny Novgorod newspaper, Uspensky says:
I came to visit a friend, and his little daughter was trying on a fluffy fur coat that was dragging along the floor, The girl was constantly falling, stumbling on a fur coat. And her father, after another fall, exclaimed: “Oh, she’s gone crazy again!”. This word stuck in my memory, I asked its meaning. It turned out that "cheburahnutsya" - it means "to fall." And so the name of my hero appeared.
IN " explanatory dictionary living Great Russian language" by V. I. Dahl is described as the word "cheburakhnutsya" in the meaning of "fall", "crash", "stretch", and the word "cheburashka", defined by him in various dialects as "a checker of a burlak strap, hung on the tail ”, or as “roly-poly, a doll that, no matter how you throw it, gets up on its own”. According to Vasmer's etymological dictionary, "chebura? hnut" is formed from the words chuburo?k, chapuro?k, chebura?x - "a wooden ball at the end of a burlak towline", of Turkic origin. Another related word is "chebyrka" - a whip, at the end of which there is a ball on the hair.
The origin of the word "cheburashka", in the sense of a tumbler toy, described by Dahl, is due to the fact that many fishermen made such toys from wooden balls, which were floats for fishing nets, and were also called cheburashka.
Plot and characters
They try to place Cheburashka in the zoo, but they did not take Cheburashka to the zoo, because they did not know where to put the unknown animal; he was eventually assigned to a discount store. Cheburashka meets the crocodile Gena, who worked as a crocodile in the zoo and, being lonely, like Cheburashka, began to post ads looking for friends. Together they look for friends, including the lion Chandr, the puppy Tobik and the pioneer Galya, and help other characters - people and talking animals. They are opposed by the old woman Shapoklyak and her pet rat Lariska.
Books
The story about Cheburashka was written by Eduard Uspensky, and the plays, together with Roman Kachanov:
"Crocodile Gena and his friends" (1966) - story
"Cheburashka and his friends" (1970) - play (together with R. Kachanov)
“Vacation of Crocodile Gena” (1974) - play (together with R. Kachanov)
"The Business of Gena the Crocodile" (1992) - a story (together with I. E. Agron)
"Crocodile Gena - police lieutenant"
"Cheburashka goes to the people"
"Kidnapping of Cheburashka"
"Cheburashka and his new friend Chekrezhik "(2008) - a story (together with Yu. A. Dubovskikh)
cartoons
Based on the book, director Roman Kachanov created four cartoons:
"Crocodile Gena" (1969)
"Cheburashka" (1971)
Shapoklyak (1974)
"Cheburashka goes to school" (1983)
The films were shot by Roman Kachanov according to a script written by him together with Eduard Uspensky. The production designer is Leonid Shvartsman, the music for the film "Gena the Crocodile" was created by Mikhail Ziv, the rest - Vladimir Shainsky. Operator - Iosif Golomb ("Crocodile Gena"), Teodor Bunimovich (other films). Cheburashka was voiced by Clara Rumyanova, Crocodile Gena by Vasily Livanov, songs for Crocodile Gena were performed by Vladimir Ferapontov, Shapoklyak by Vladimir Rautbart ("Crocodile Gena"), Irina Mazing ("Shapoklyak"). Other characters were voiced by actors Vladimir Kenigson, Yuri Andreev, Georgy Burkov.
In 1990, a plasticine cartoon " Gray wolf End Little Red Riding Hood ”, in which Cheburashka and Crocodile Gena were episodic heroes.
Cheburashka in Sweden
A little-known fact is that in the 1970s, several cycles of children's entertainment television and radio programs featuring the characters Cheburashka and Gena the crocodile came out in Sweden. Based on the materials of such programs, records were released, Cheburashka and Gena also appeared in magazines. The characters owe their origin to the dolls of Cheburashka and Gena, which someone brought from a business trip to the USSR, so in their appearance they were completely the same Cheburashka and Gena. The Swedes recognized them as Drutten och Gena - that is, they called Cheburashka Drutten in Swedish, which in meaning is a fairly successful adaptation of the Russian name: a word derived from the Swedish colloquial drutta (fall, stumble, thump, screw up).
But the similarity was limited to the look and names. Swedish characters talked and sang about other things, lived on a bookshelf, TV shows used not puppet animation, but puppet puppets. Fragments of Soviet cartoons about Cheburashka and Gena were broadcast on Swedish television, but this happened rarely and randomly, so despite the fact that even now many Swedes recognize Cheburashka perfectly, they know him as Drutten, who is practically not associated with that character in any way , which is familiar to children from the post-Soviet space.
Cheburashka in Japan
In 2001, Cheburashka gained great popularity in Japan.
In 2003, at the Tokyo International Animation Fair, the Japanese company SP International acquired from Soyuzmultfilm the rights to distribute cartoons about Cheburashka in Japan until 2023.
On October 7, 2009, the Japanese TV Tokyo channel began showing an animated series about Cheburashka from director Susumi Kudo called "Cheburashka Arere?" one episode per week. 26 episodes planned at that time, lasting 3 minutes each, have already been shown.
In May 2010, several new cartoons about Cheburashka, Crocodile Gena and their friends were presented in Japan. puppet cartoons were filmed by a team of Russian, Japanese and South Korean animators, directed by Makoto Nakamura. The cartoon "Gena the Crocodile" was shot again, and two completely new cartoons "Cheburashka and the Circus" and "Shapoklyak's Tips" were made.
White Cheburashka in the form of the Russian Olympic team
On summer Olympic Games 2004 in Athens was chosen as the mascot of the Russian Olympic team. At the 2006 Winter Olympics, Cheburashka, the symbol of the Russian Team, changed into white winter fur. At the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, Cheburashka was "dressed" in red fur.
At the 2010 Winter Olympics, Cheburashka the mascot won blue fur.
Computer games
Cheburashka in the city of mechanical men (2006)
Cheburashka. House for Cheburashka. Logic 1 (2007)
Cheburashka in the zoo. Logic 2 (2007)
Letter for Cheburashka (2007)
Cheburashka. Eared Stories (2007)
Cheburashka teaches English (2008)
Cheburashka. Kidnapping of the Century (2010)
Monuments to Cheburashka
Crocodile Gena and Cheburashka (Khabarovsk city ponds)
Shapoklyak and rat Lariska (Khabarovsk city ponds)
The monument depicting Cheburashka, the crocodile Gena, the old woman Shapoklyak and the rat Lariska was erected in 2005 in the town of Ramenskoye near Moscow (sculptor Oleg Ershov). It was also planned to erect a monument to Cheburashka in 2007 in Nizhny Novgorod.
May 29, 2008 in the territory kindergarten number 2550 in the Eastern Administrative District of Moscow, the Cheburashka Museum was opened. Among its exhibits - typewriter, on which Eduard Uspensky created the history of Cheburashka.
Another monument to the crocodile Gena and Cheburashka, along with sculptures of other heroes of cult Soviet cartoons, is installed in Khabarovsk near the city ponds, not far from the Platinum Arena.
Also, a monument to Cheburashka and Gena the crocodile was erected in Kremenchug.
Sculptures of Cheburashka and crocodile Gena are installed in Dnepropetrovsk in the park named after. Lazar Globa.
Reminds me of Lenin, and showed what he looks like new hero Cherry, developed by him by order of the Japanese.
War
In the first days of the war, I did not die thanks to chance. A believer would certainly see divine intervention in such a combination of circumstances. But I'm an atheist, an agnostic, whatever you want to call it, and I think it's just a coincidence.
In the summer of 1941, I turned 21, then it was just the draft age. I studied in Leningrad, at a school at the Repin Academy of Arts. In May I received a summons. I come to the recruiting office, a huge room of the military registration and enlistment office, full of people, they call everyone, but I'm not there. I go up to the window, I say: “Why don’t you call Schwartzman?” And a young man in civilian clothes answered me: “Don't make noise, brother. Just between us: looks like we lost your case. When we find you, they will call you with a new summons.” Thanks to this clerical error, I am still alive today. If I had been called then, I would have died in the first weeks of the war. All my close friends my age died then.
On June 22, the radio message about the beginning of the war, Molotov's speech, sounded completely unexpected. Everyone knew that we had a non-aggression pact with Germany, and this was such a stab in the back. It became clear that it would be bad, but then I could not imagine what awaited my family.
I realized that I needed to help my family with food, so I became a turner's apprentice at the Kirov Plant, formerly Putilovskiy. Immediately began to receive more bread, it was then the main thing.
Leningrad was quickly surrounded. My mother and sister remained in the city with her husband and small child. I realized that I needed to help my family with food, so I became a turner's apprentice at the Kirov Plant, formerly Putilovskiy. Immediately began to receive more bread, it was then the main thing.
First, my four-year-old nephew Alik died: he contracted meningitis in a bomb shelter and literally burned out in a few days. Then my sister's husband died. In November, the Kirov Plant was evacuated to Chelyabinsk and I was evacuated along with it. There I already worked as a turner, turning rollers for heavy tanks IS - "Joseph Stalin". From my brother's letter, I learned that my mother died of starvation.
I was often sent from the factory to work outside the city - to dig anti-tank ditches. In early September, we were digging in the Strelna area, it was getting dark early, and suddenly we see an amazingly beautiful glow over Leningrad in the rays of sunset. It soon became clear that it was the Germans who bombed the Badaev food warehouses. From that moment hunger began: they immediately cut the norm on cards. Workers received 500 grams of bread, employees - 300. Then even less. First, my four-year-old nephew Alik died: he contracted meningitis in a bomb shelter and literally burned out in a few days. Then my sister's husband died.
In November, the Kirov Plant was evacuated to Chelyabinsk and I was evacuated along with it. There I already worked as a turner, turning rollers for heavy tanks IS - "Joseph Stalin". From my brother's letter, I learned that my mother died of starvation. And then I worked for 14-16 hours in a cold shop, where the metal literally froze to my hands. Hungry, naturally. I don't know how long it would take me. But in the spring, the administration of the plant found out that I was an artist, and I was instructed to work on visual agitation: to make posters, slogans, portraits of leaders. For example, on the anniversary of Kirov's assassination, on December 1, I made a huge portrait of him, five meters by three, it was hung over the entrance. This transfer to the work of the artist, in fact, saved me: some rations began to be given out, attached to another dining room.
In 1945, in the spring, when it became clear that the war would soon end, I wrote to the Leningrad Academy of Arts, but received no answer. I also sent a letter to VGIK, they had just returned from the evacuation of the art department. The war is over: victory! And I receive a letter from Moscow: "Come to us to take entrance exams." It was very difficult to leave the factory, but I was lucky. The deputy party organizer who oversaw my work signed my application. I received a passport from the personnel department and went to Moscow to enroll.
All the relatives who remained in the city died, all childhood friends. I couldn't find anyone.
Later I happened to visit Minsk, where I spent my childhood. The area in which I lived - Rakovskaya Street, Nemiga - was turned into a ghetto under the Nazis. All the relatives who remained in the city died, all childhood friends. I couldn't find anyone.
"Soyuzmultfilm"
I passed the exams at VGIK and became a first-year student. He lived outside the city, in a hostel in Mamontovka: on the train as a hare to the platform "Severyanin", there he crammed onto the bus to VDNKh - and to classes, at VGIK. And all this was running and running, all with evading the controllers, there was no money.
Soyuzmultfilm was our home, a huge family of five hundred people. The atmosphere of friendship and brotherhood united us all. Modern people, even creative professions, is little known. There we had loves, and marriages, and carnivals, and funerals. What kind of people were there!
In The Snow Queen, Schwartzman created the images of all the characters, except for the robbers.
Starting to work, he moved to Moscow. I didn’t even rent rooms, but corners: in the area of lanes not far from Sretenka, on Kirov Street, now it’s Myasnitskaya. So I lived until 1951, when I married my beloved Tatyana and moved to her in a communal apartment on the corner of Herzen Street and Garden Ring, in a two-story house that had been preserved from Napoleonic times. We lived there for eleven years until we got a cooperative apartment, and it was very, very difficult conditions. Suffice it to say that for 25 people there was one restroom, in which our neighbor Vanya liked to drink, huge growth loader. He did not open the door until he had drunk his half liter, and it was a tragedy for the whole apartment. Our other neighbor, one-armed Zhora, liked to beat his wife after drinking. She, excuse me, in a jumpsuit regularly broke into us, and my wife and I had to save her.
Of course, Tanya and I disappeared day and night at Soyuzmultfilm, it was our home, a huge family of five hundred people. The atmosphere of friendship and brotherhood united us all. Modern people, even creative professions, are little familiar. There we had loves, and marriages, and carnivals, and funerals. What kind of people were there!
In the cafe there was a machine of a rare model, where you could throw a token bought at the checkout, and he poured you a glass of wine. It was called "throwing the disc". Men, first of all, of course, it was they who, at the beginning of the day, went to “throw the disc”, and only then, having warmed up, lukewarm, they sat down to work.
Studio "Soyuzmultfilm" is located near the metro station "Novoslobodskaya". There was a small stadium nearby and a glass pavilion of a cafe, where there was such a machine of a rare model, where you could throw a token bought at the checkout, and he poured you a glass of wine. It was called "throwing the disc". Our men, first of all, of course, it was they who began their day with a trip to the machine. “Throwed the disc”, and only then, warmed up, lukewarm, they sat down to work.
When I graduated from VGIK in 1951, Lev Konstantinovich Atamanov invited me and Vinokurov, with whom we studied together, to be production designers. For me, these first ten years were the happiest years of my work at Soyuzmultfilm. It was an amazing time. How long did we sit, doing a selection of materials for sketches, in Leninskaya public library, in the theater library, where I later transferred many of my storyboards. We made cartoons, at the same time we worked on the Filmstrip. Traveled all over the country to festivals, traveled. When they filmed snow queen”, Of course, they could not go to Copenhagen. But we found all the necessary nature in Riga, Tallinn and Tartu and had a great time there.
Cheburashka
In 1966, Kachanov invited me to his place, and so I ended up in puppet animation. Our first work, “Granddaughter Lost”, came out very nice. After that there was "Mitten", I think - best movie that we created together.
Copies of dolls of Shvartsman's heroes made in the workshops of Soyuzmultfilm are on a shelf in his office.
And then off we go, "Crocodile Gena and his friends" began. Amazing story connected with how this book by Uspensky generally got to Soyuzmultfilm. My director, Roman Kachanov, wanted to enlist the support of Khrushchev's son-in-law, Alexei Adzhubei. And asked him to write us a script. Adjubey then worked as the editor-in-chief " Komsomolskaya Pravda”, visited many countries, often traveled to Africa, and in 1969 he wrote us a script,“ Rivals ”, in my opinion, not very successful. About African football players and some monsters.
I began to draw Cheburashka's ears: at first they were at the top, then gradually began to slide and grow.
We started making this film, Adzhubey began to go to the studio, and Kachanov - to Adzhubei, who had two little sons. And somehow, while visiting, Kachanov saw that they were reading a book with enthusiasm. It was Ouspensky's Gena the Crocodile and His Friends. The next day, he bought the same book in the store, brought it to Soyuzmultfilm and said: "That's it, we're making a film based on it."
I got the crocodile pretty quickly. It was written in the script: “The crocodile worked at the zoo as a crocodile. And when the working day ended and the bell rang, he put on his jacket, hat, picked up the phone and went home. This was enough to give me the image of a gentleman with a bow tie and a white shirt-front.
With Shapoklyak, too, everything turned out simply. Shapoklyak is, as you know, the name of a folding cylinder. This is the 19th century, and everything else came from here: a black strict dress, a frill, white lace cuffs, pumps with heels. Since she is such a naughty grandmother, I made her a long nose, rosy cheeks and a prominent chin. A White hair and I borrowed the bundle from my mother-in-law, from Tanya's mother.
It was Leonid Shvartsman who came up with how the crocodile Gena, Shapoklyak and Cheburashka would look like. The dolls for the cartoon were made in 1968 according to his sketches. In the photo: work on the film "River of the Crocodile Gena", February 1974.
Vladimir Rodionov / RIA Novosti
Five months is the preparatory period for the film, and half of all this time I was busy with Cheburashka. His eyes immediately turned childish, surprised, human. Although large, but not "like an owl." Ouspensky, in his “preface, which is not necessary to read,” says: “When I was little, my parents gave me a toy: fluffy, shaggy, small. With big eyes, like an owl. With a round hare head and a small tail like a bear. All. Not a word about big ears.
I began to draw Cheburashka's ears: first at the top, then they gradually began to slide and grow. Kachanov regularly came to me, I showed sketches, we discussed them, argued, he expressed his wishes, I redrawn them. Thanks to such joint efforts, the final sketch arose, it is kept at my house, signed in 1968. On it, however, Cheburashka still has a bear's tail, which was then greatly reduced. And the legs were longer at first, but Norshtein advised me to make them small, as they are now. After creating a sketch in color, I made a drawing, and the puppet masters made Cheburashka, and he began to live his own life.
Nakamura asked me to draw the main character. This is the heroine's favorite toy, also "an animal unknown to science", which can become big or small. I drew this character, he will be called Cherry. The Japanese made a doll, everything has already been filmed, now they are voicing it. When they finish it, they bring it, they show it to me.
Sergey Melikhov / MOSLENTA
The Japanese fell in love with Cheburashka, they call him Chebi. You probably know that several new episodes have been released based on their scripts, but with our characters. They were made by director Makoto Nakamura, he came to Moscow and visited me. Now he does new job, and asked me to draw the main character for him. This is the favorite toy of the heroine, a little girl. Like Cheburashka, “a beast unknown to science”, and besides, he knows how to become either big or small. I drew this character, he was called Cherry. The Japanese made a doll, everything has already been filmed, the twenty-minute film is over, now they are voiced. When they finish it, they bring it, they show it to me.
Parrot and Ilyich
There was a period when I simultaneously worked on hand-drawn and puppet animation. In 1976, director Ufimtsev invited me to be a production designer for the TV series 38 Parrots. And at the same time, Atamanov invited me again, we began to shoot "A Kitten named Woof." And both series are scripted by Grigory Oster.
Then I made sketches all the time: in the subway, and in the tram, and in the yard, and on the boulevard. He loved to draw small children and animals. All my life I went to the zoo, drew from life - it was necessary to create characters. But I can't stand snakes. And yet, when I started creating characters for 38 Parrots, I had to constantly draw a boa constrictor from nature. This character did not work out in any way, at first he was very unpleasant. And only when I pulled out his face, drew a nose, freckles and made the eyebrows a house, he healed with me, became a dreamer, a philosopher.
Norshtein said: "The tail is in the way, it must be removed." They removed it, and immediately the parrot became nimble, began to walk vigorously in the frame, he appeared oratorical gestures. We began to think, who is this? At first we decided that this was our director, Boyarsky. And then they realized, no, take it higher - Ilyich! And we began to make and shoot it like that, with all the Leninist habits.
1968. And before that, Lamis Bredis made a cartoon about the Marshall Plan, where Marshall was portrayed as a boa constrictor, and European countries- like rabbits. He, too, was closed. I don't remember any other such cases.
It helped that they didn't take us seriously. In the ministry, they patted on the shoulder and said: "Go, play your dolls." We had only internal censorship. Hence the quality. Our cartoons were watched and loved not only throughout Soviet Union. Back in the days iron curtain Pope Pius XII said that children should be raised on Soviet cartoons, because they are good and teach only good things.
The writer, who left us on August 14, called the birthday of everyone's favorite eared animal August 20, 1966, the day when the book "Crocodile Gena and his friends" was published.
It so happened that Eduard Nikolaevich before the holiday Cheburashki. But, according to the established tradition, the birthday will still be celebrated and, of course, they will remember the one thanks to whom Cheburashka "was born."
species unknown to science
As soon as our Cheburashka is not called abroad! Drutten, muxis, Plumps, Kullerchen, Topple, Kulverstukas… Where did his original name come from? Edward Uspensky told a sweet story about how his friend's little daughter was constantly falling, stepping on the edge of her mother's fur coat, in which she wrapped herself up while playing.
When she's in Once again flopped, dad said: “Oh. Again cheburahnul. As the writer later found out, to cheburah means to “fall”, “thump”, “crash”. The writer liked the word, and he applied it, inventing one of the most famous cartoon names.
But in the preface to the children's book, Uspensky said that one of his children's toys was called Cheburashka. The toy was defective and looked like an ugly animal unknown to science kind. Yellow owl eyes, big ears, a small tail - neither a bear, nor a hare, it is not clear who.
When the child asked who it was and where it lives, they told him a fairy tale that it lives in the tropical jungle, eats oranges and is called Cheburashka.
Interestingly, in the 1965 edition, Cheburashka is not at all like the one we know from the cartoon. And he created a familiar image for all of us Leonid Shvartsman.
The word "cheburashka" is also in the dictionary Dalia. There, one of the meanings is a tumbler doll that gets up “on its feet” from any position. But Cheburashka got a name when he did everything the other way around: no matter how they planted him, he fell all the time, cheburah, overeating oranges and falling asleep. From the table to the chair, from the chair to the floor.
Cheburashka walks the planet
Especially loved the funny animal in Japan. When Cheburashka appeared on Japanese TV screens in 2001, the country's puppet industry experienced a production boom. Images of Cheburashka were everywhere: on packages, bags, clothes, milk packaging.
In the form of Cheburashka, chocolate was produced and restaurant dishes were served. It got to the point that the figurines of Cheburashka were placed near the house “for good luck” along with traditional sculptures from Japanese mythology - dragons and kitsune.
In the new series of "Cheburashka" Japanese crocodile Gena reads Japanese basho and is considered a Russian intellectual. And in 2009, the whole series “What kind of Cheburashka?” Was released, consisting of 26 three-minute episodes.
A frame from the Japanese animated series "What kind of Cheburashka?" year 2009.
