Vladimir Akimovich Kurochkin

Born May 7, 1922, in Astrakhan. Soviet Russian actor and director of operettas. People’s Artist of the USSR (1978). Member of the CPSU since 1949.

Kurochkin studied at the Sverdlovsk Music School; he graduated from the studio of the Sverdlovsk Drama Theater in 1946 and from the Higher Courses for Directors of the State Institute of Theatrical Arts in Moscow in 1962. In 1946, Kurochkin became an actor at the Sverdlovsk Theater of Musical Comedy; he was named principal director there in 1963. He has directed productions in many musical theaters in the USSR and abroad.

Kurochkin directed the first Soviet production of R. Strauss’ Arabella, at the Sverdlovsk Theater of Opera and Ballet in 1973. He has also directed such works as Listov’s Sevastopol’ Waltz, Khrennikov’s White Night, Muradeli’s The Blue-eyed Girl, Shcherbachev’s The Tobacco Captain, Fel’tsman’s Let the Guitar Play, Pozhlakov’s Shine, Shine, My Star, Offenbach’s La Belle Héléne, and Herman’s Hello, Dolly! From 1964 to 1974, Kurochkin taught at the M. P. Mussorgsky Urals Conservatory.