Pyotr Mamonov (Russian: Пётр Никола́евич Мамо́нов) (born April 14, 1951) is a former Russian rock musician and songwriter, former frontman of the Moscow band Звуки Му.
Mamonov was one of the few rock musicians from former USSR who managed to achieve recognition abroad, through his collaboration with Brian Eno in the late 1980s. Around the same period he started acting in film, and over the next decade wrote, produced and acted in several one-man theatrical performances establishing himself as a cult figure in Russia.
Mamonov’s best-known film appearance was in the leading role in Pavel Lungin’s 1988 Taxi Blues. His works for theatre include Is There Life on Mars?, an absurdist take on Anton Chekhov’s A Marriage Proposal, and Chocolate Pushkin, which makes a comical reference to (but doesn’t cite) the Russian national poet Alexander Pushkin Piotr explains the name for the album as his own comparison to a popular DJ who calls himself “Black Elvis” and also describes the genre on this record as “lit-hop” (literature hip-hop).
In the 1990s, Mamonov converted to Orthodox Christianity, left the capital, and settled in a village. He returned to play the lead role in Pavel Lungin’s religious film “The Island” (Russian “Остров”), which closed the 2006 Venice Film Festival. His acting in the film was praised by Alexis II, Patriarch of Moscow, and won him a Best Actor Nika Award. |
