In Moscow, at the age of 88, actress Margarita Zhigunova of the Pushkin Moscow Drama Theatre passed away. However, her main role turned out to be in life - she was the wife of the great Riga native, ballet soloist Maris Liepa for eighteen years and became the mother of his children, also ballet artists Ilze and Andris Liepa.
Margarita Ivanovna was born on February 20, 1937, in the village of Knyazevo in the Tver region and passed away in February 2026. Even ten days after her departure, it is unclear where she was buried. Andris and Ilze remain silent. It is unlikely that she will be buried at Vagankovsky, in the grave with Maris, where he was laid to rest after his sudden death at the age of 52 in March 1989. Perhaps she will be buried near the Diveyevo Monastery, of which Andris is a parishioner and where he lives.
Latvian Premiere
In 1959, she graduated from the legendary school-studio of the Moscow Art Theatre and from 1960 was an actress at the Pushkin Theatre. She repeated the fate of the actress of the same troupe Vera Alentova, who recently passed away - she graduated from the same school and worked in the same theatre for over sixty years. However, unlike Vera Valentinovna, she did not become a star of theatre and cinema.
Although it all started almost triumphantly - in 1959 she debuted at the Riga Film Studio in the title role of the film "Ilze" directed by Roland Kalniņš based on the novel by Latvian writer Anna Brodele "With the Blood of the Heart." The film is set in 1947 in one of the Latvian villages. Ilze is deeply in love with Rudis, although he is the son of a kulak and various rumors circulate about him. The party organizer Rutinsh is killed, the best foreman is slandered, and various troubles occur. According to the plot, the heroine Ilze also saved a French pilot, who said Būs labi (“It will be good”) with an emphasis on the last syllable.
Second After Plisetskaya
And everything was fine - after the premiere of the film at the "Riga" cinema, Margarita flew to Moscow on a plane, where she met Maris Liepa. Even then, the star could not help but notice the beauty, and soon they got married. She became Liepa's second wife (the first was, by the way, Maya Plisetskaya, but that marriage lasted only three months).
Soon Margarita and Maris had two children. Ilze was named after the heroine of Margarita in the Latvian film.
Zhigunova essentially voluntarily stepped into the shadow of her great husband, understanding his significance in the arts. She chose the role of a mother, although she played roles in the theatre and had small roles in films - some remember her from her participation in the films "Cruelty" (Yulka Maltseva), "Oblomov" (Lidochka), "The Legend of Tyl" (Philip's mother). Then there was a pause, and only in the 2000s did she return to the screen, playing small roles in the series "Tango of Love," "Psychics-Detectives," "The Return of Mukhtar-7."
Romance with Galina Brezhneva
Their life is shrouded in mystery, but it can be safely assumed that Margarita steadfastly endured her husband's infidelities. Maris's romance with the daughter of the bushy-browed general secretary, Galina Brezhneva, is widely known, who gifted him rings and Polaroids. Again - constant trips abroad, which at that time was a privilege of the chosen few.
By the way, Liepa often came to Riga with Galina - in her black "Volga."
But then there was a serious infatuation of Liepa with the ballerina of the Bolshoi Ballet, Nina Semizorova, whom he married immediately after the divorce in 1980. It should be noted that Maris acted nobly, leaving the apartment to Margarita Zhigunova and the children, leaving the family with virtually nothing. The apartment was on Bryusov Lane, a five-minute walk to the Bolshoi Theatre and the Kremlin, where only greats lived - Shostakovich, Khachaturian...
In this apartment, Ilze now lives, the space is literally stuffed with the antiques collected by Liepa, icons, and his works (Maris was good at sculpting and was passionate about sculpture).
Is There Life After the Stage
Margarita forbade Maris from communicating with the children. However, Maris met with Andris and Ilze, and in recent years lived... in a small apartment of his civil wife (he soon divorced Semizorova too!) Yevgenia Shultz, a costume designer at the Bolshoi Theatre. And in 1979, a daughter, Maria Shultz-Liepa, was born from this union, who later became an opera singer. Maris was amorous.
The tragic end of Maris's fate is well known. He lost the battle with the chief choreographer Yuri Grigorovich, who fired Maris from the theatre. In 1986, he came to Riga, hoping to become the chief choreographer of the Latvian Opera - he was not approved.
For one season, he headed the ballet troupe in Bulgaria in Sofia. It seemed like a good position, but something did not work out, and by the way, in Sofia, he had an affair with a Bulgarian ballerina.
There was a time when the great artist lacked money, and he sold rings from Galina Brezhneva. It seemed that the only thing that could support him was still the successes of his son Andris and the agreement to open the troupe "Maris Liepa Ballet" in Moscow. The great artist did not live to see the opening of his own troupe by a little - he died in an ambulance. Many knew that he, alas, drank heavily.
Not Our Business
It should be noted that in the early 2000s, Margarita appeared in Riga - at an evening in memory of Maris at the Latvian Opera, which was then held annually on Liepa's birthday in July.
Moreover, in one of these concerts, Maria Shultz-Liepa sang, who managed to befriend her half-brother and half-sister.
As for what happened between Maris and Margarita - that is no longer our business. We can only hope that the heavens will unite and reconcile them.
“Creating His Beloved Woman”
In one television interview, Ilze Liepa said that the twenty years of her parents' marriage were still happy. "We saw our father's immense tenderness," she said. "Everything we wore, from shoes to hats, was brought by him. Before tours, father carefully measured us, made casts of our feet, and brought clothes several sizes ahead. And how lovingly our father dressed our mother! It was such a sea of love and adoration. It is rare to meet a man who will love so much, or rather, create his beloved woman."
However, everything collapsed. Ilze added that her father was very upset about the separation from the mother of his children, trying to ask for her forgiveness through them, as Margarita Ivanovna no longer wanted to see him. She even agreed to come to her son and daughter's wedding only on the condition that their father would not be there.
"Father quickly realized that a tragedy had occurred, that he had lost everything. He was losing his world, which was created for him by the stage, the Bolshoi Theatre. For him, the Bolshoi Theatre was air. It is a pity that such an artist could not become a teacher. For him, the Bolshoi closed, and he realized that he had lost the ground under his feet. When we secretly met - and mom did not want us to meet with him, she was a wounded woman - he always begged: 'Talk to mom, maybe she could forgive me...' He asked for forgiveness through us. And mom never gave any interviews after that, I am very grateful to her for that. This is a special feminine nobility. Perhaps because of this, she found happiness in another marriage.
