Arshavir
(Asho) Shahkhatouni went down in history as both a star of Russian and
French silent films in the 1910s and 1920s, and as the military
commander of Yerevan during the first Republic of Armenia.
One
would say that it was a genetic trait: his father Vagharshak Shahkhatuni
(1843-1892) was a colonel in the Russian army, and also the founder of
the theater hall of Alexandropol (nowadays Gumri). Arshavir was born in
Alexandropol on February 19, 1885. He spent his childhood in
Alexandropol, Nor Bayazed (Gavar), Gandzak (Ganja), and Yerevan. He
studied at the Mikhailov military school of Tiflis (Tbilisi) and served
in Baku in 1905. After the Armeno-Tatar clashes of 1905, he was expelled
from the army for refusing to fire over Armenians who had found refuge
in a church, as it had been ordered to the battalion he commanded. He
went to work in an office and started developing his love for theater as
an amateur actor in the local Armenian groups. Over the next seven
years (1905-1912), he would gradually become a sought-after name in
Armenian theater, both in Baku and in Tiflis. The first Romeo on the
Armenian stage, Shahkhatouni was considered, together with Hovhannes
Abelian, the preeminent representative of realism in Armenian acting.
In
1913 Shahkhatouni was offered an important role in “Bela,” a movie by
Alexander Gromov. For the next five years, he would live in Moscow,
where he studied at the Artistic Theater and followed the classes of
famous theater theoretician Konstantin Stanislavski. Meanwhile, he
continued his cinematographic career, starring mostly in films with
Caucasian themes, such as Alexander Volkov’s “The Conquest of the
Caucasus,” “The Fugitive,” “Khaz bulad,” as well as others like
“Jealousy,” “Storm,” “Venus’ Fur,” etcetera. He was highlighted as one
of the well-regarded names of pre-Soviet cinema, becoming also one of
the first Armenian actors to appear in Russian cinematography, along
with Hamo Bek-Nazarian and Vahram Papazian.
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| Arshavir Shahkhatouni and a poster of the Yerevan exhibition of one of his Russian films, "Khaz Bulat," in 1914 |
In
the crucial year 1918, Shahkhatouni left Moscow and returned to the
Caucasus. His former military experience would lead him to participate
in the battles of Sardarabad and Pash-Abaran, and after the foundation
of the Republic of Armenia, he was designated military commander of
Yerevan, receiving the rank of colonel.
After
two years of service, in 1920 Shahkhatouni left Armenia and returned to
his old love, theater, this time in Constantinople. He became one of
the prominent names in local Armenian theater, until he left the city in
late 1922, following the nearing occupation by Kemalist forces. He went
to Bulgaria, where he played Hamlet and Othello in Russian with
Bulgarian companies in Sofia and Varna. After a year, in 1924 he moved
to Paris with America in his sight, but he eventually stayed in the City
of Lights, where he became one of the stars of local Armenian theater
during the 1920s and 1930s.
Meanwhile,
Shahkhatouni developed the second phase of his cinematographic career.
In 1926 he was cast in “Michael Strogoff,” a movie by Russian emigré
filmmaker Vsevolod Turzhansky, who knew Shahkhatouni from Moscow. A more
important achievement was his participation in Abel Gance’s monumental
film, “Napoleon” (1927), where he played the role of Napoleon’s
childhood friend and later mortal enemy Pozzo di Borgo. He would become
friends with such famous names as French filmmaker René Clair and
British actor Sir Laurence Olivier. He also participated in five films
from 1927-1929.
Armenian
national hero Antranig passed away in Fresno in August 1928. In the
same year, Shahkhatouni directed and played in “Antranig,” the first
Armenian feature movie filmed in the Diaspora with Armenian subject and
by an Armenian studio (“Armena-Film”). The film was distributed in
several European countries, from Portugal to Sweden, with Turkey
protesting against its exhibition. For this reason, it was never shown
in the United States, except for one showing in Philadelphia in 1938, in
a sound version.
After
sound movies made their appearance, Shahkhatouni’s movie career took a
radical turn. Although he participated in a few films at the beginning,
he could not continue acting, due to his insufficient knowledge of
French. He continued appearing in Russian and Armenian theatrical
performances, and wrote two plays, which were performed in the 1940s.
However, he did not want to sever his relations with cinematography. He
became a make-up expert, and he was credited in many movies of the
1930s, to the point that he was named “a leading professional
cosmetician in the world” by the French Journal de la femme (1939). By 1953, forty out of sixty make-up experts working in French cinema had been Shahkhatouni’s students.
Shahkhatouni,
who always lived with nostalgia for his faraway homeland (he would have
probably shared the fate of so many people who were victims of the
Stalin purges for their participation in the first Republic of Armenia),
suffered a fatal blow after the death of his wife Nina in 1950. He had a
stroke, and for the next seven years he lived in poverty, practically
confined to his home. The fiftieth anniversary of his theatrical career
was commemorated in New York, in 1956. He passed away on April 4, 1957.