Russia actor Yevgeny Mironov will play well-known cosmonaut Alexei Leonov, the first man to carry out a spacewalk, in a new film.
Timur Bekmambetov, who directed the supernatural thriller "Night Watch," will be co-producer along with Mironov, the Metro newspaper reported.
Russia is currently marking the 50th anniversary of Leonov's spacewalk, which took place on March 18, 1965.
Leonov's spacewalk was far more precarious than was reported at the time. His space suit started to deform, making it impossible for him to get back inside the Voskhod-2 spaceship. Leonov did not report to earth about the problem, but managed to fix it himself.
"Imagine if I had started to report on an open channel to the whole world that I had a problems. I did not want panic on earth. Nobody could help me anyway," Metro quoted Leonov as saying.
Mironov said that he fell in love with the story after seeing a documentary about Leonov.
"I'm certain that Hollywood would have used it if it was their victorious story," he said.
Mironov went to Star City, where Leonov lives, to meet him and persuade him to act as a consultant on the film.
"Before me stood a tall, smooth-faced handsome person in a tracksuit with shiny Prada sneakers. It was impossible to confuse him with anyone — it was Leonov," said Mironov.
The young Yury Bykov, who has won praise for his gritty dramas "Major" and "Durak" about contemporary Russia, will direct. Mironov said that he chose Bykov as he is a tough man like Leonov who will know how to tell the story right.
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