Lyudmila Savelyeva is a renowned Russian actress, best known for her iconic portrayal of Natasha Rostova in the epic film adaptation of Lev Tolstoy's masterpiece, War and Peace (1965).
Born Lyudmila Mikhailovna Savelyeva on January 24, 1942, in Leningrad (St. Petersburg),she grew up during the heroic Siege of Leningrad during World War II. Savelyeva's early life was marked by a strong foundation in the arts, as she studied acting and ballet at the prestigious Vaganovoy Academy of Russian Ballet from 1950 to 1962, graduating as a ballerina in 1962.
That same year, she became a member of the Kirov Ballet at the Mariinsky Theatre in Leningrad (St. Petersburg),and made her film debut in Sleeping Beauty (1964). Savelyeva's breakthrough role came in 1965 with her portrayal of Natasha Rostova in War and Peace (1965),directed by Sergey Bondarchuk.
The eight-hour epic film, produced over seven years at an estimated cost of $100,000,000 (approximately one billion dollars adjusted for inflation in 2010),set several records, including involving over three hundred professional actors from several countries and tens of thousands of extras from the Red Army in the filming of the two-hour-long episode about the historic Battle of Borodino against Napoleon's invasion.
Savelyeva's natural beauty and effortless style earned her numerous accolades from international critics, and she was chosen by the Soviet Union's communist government to represent the country at various film festivals across the world. In 1969, she was sent to the Academy Awards ceremony in Hollywood to represent War and Peace (1965),which won the 1969 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
After co-starring in a few less successful movies, Savelyeva disappeared from public view during the 1990s, only to re-emerge after a ten-year hiatus in Nezhnyy vozrast (2000) and later appear as Countess Scherbatskaya in the 2009 TV mini-series "_Anna Karenina_".
Outside of her acting career, Lyudmila Savelyeva is known for her passion for collecting rare books, having amassed a significant private library. She has been married to fellow actor Aleksandr Zbruev, and the couple resides in Moscow, Russia.
