Gambashidze, Shalva Ksenofontovich

Gambashidze, Shalva Ksenofontovich 

Born July 20 (Aug. 1), 1899, in Zestafoni; died May 18, 1955, in Tbilisi. Soviet Georgian actor. People’s Artist of the Georgian SSR (1939). Member of the CPSU from 1940.

Gambashidze graduated from the G. Dzhabadari Drama Studio in Tbilisi in 1920. From 1920 he worked at the Sh. Rustaveli Georgian Theater under the supervision of the director K. Mardzhanishvili. He became an actor at the K. Mardzhanishvili Georgian Theater in Tbilisi in 1928 and was its manager and artistic director from 1937 to 1947. His roles included Esteban in Lope de Vega’s The Sheep Well, Kakuta in Kakabadze’s Kvarkvare Tutaberi, de Silva in Gutzkow’s Uriel Acosta, Borodin in Afinogenov’s Fear, Zabelin in Pogodin’s Kremlin Chimes, and Kutuzov in Samsoniia’s Bagrationi. Gambashidze also staged several plays. He was awarded two Orders of Lenin, the Order of the Red Banner of Labor, and medals.

REFERENCE

Gugushvili, E. “Shalva Gambashidze.” In her book Teatral’nye portrety. Tbilisi, 1968.