A start to life: how the Mari actor became famous throughout the country
“A Start to Life” is the first Soviet feature film. One of the roles in it was played by the Mari actor Yyvan Kyrla.****
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Yyvan Kyrla's real name is Kirill Ivanovich Ivanov. His pseudonym translated from Mari means “Kyrla, son of Yyvan” (“Kirill, son of Ivan”).
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The actor and poet was born on March 17, 1909 in the village of Kupsola into a peasant family. His father was killed with fists, leaving his mother alone with three children. ****
****From an early age, Yivan Kyrla began to work. He first studied in Marisola, then in Sernur. In the fall of 1926, he went to study at the Mari department of the workers' faculty at Kazan University. ****
****Already in his youth he developed an interest in poetry, music, theater and cinema. Teachers noticed his talents, and in the fall of 1929, Kyrla entered the acting department of the State College of Cinematography. ****
****During his student years, he was invited to participate in crowd scenes during the filming of the first Soviet feature film, “A Start to Life,” which tells about the re-education of street children in the first years of Soviet power. ****
****When director Nikolai Ekk saw Kirla in one of the scenes, he realized that this cheerful guy with mischievous eyes should play the role of the leader of the street children, Mustafa, nicknamed “Fert”. Many of his hero's lines have become sayings, for example, “Sleight of hand and no fraud.” ****
****After graduating from college, Yivan Kyrla starred in the film “Buddha’s Viceroy” directed by Evgeny Ivanov-Barkov. In 1937, he returned to Yoshkar-Ola and became an artist at the Mari Drama Theater. ****
****In the spring of that year he lived at the Onar Hotel. In the hotel restaurant on April 18, he had an argument with student Nikolai Gorokhov. During the conflict, Kyrla hit him on the head with a bottle and said that the Mari were forbidden to speak their native language. On April 23, he was arrested, and on August 13, he was sentenced to ten years in forced labor camps. ****
****According to historians, the last years of Kyrla’s life are little known. There were rumors that he died in the war, but official sources claim that he died in a Ural camp in the summer of 1943 at the age of 34. In 1956 he was posthumously rehabilitated. ****
****Residents of Mari El honor the memory of a talented fellow countryman. In 1969, a street was named after him in Yoshkar-Ola. ****
****A full-fledged monument to Kirle appeared in 2009 on the station square of the capital, where he is depicted in the image of Mustafa. ****
****In our small homeland, the memory of Yyvan Kyrle is especially reverently preserved. On the building of the Sernur Museum there is a memorial plaque with the inscription: “In this school in 1924-1926. famous film artist and poet Yyvan Kyrlya studied there.” ****
****In addition, in the Marisolinsky rural settlement of the Sernur district there are three memorial places associated with his name. ****