Famous Soviet tennis player and commentator Anna Dmitrieva died at 84 -year of life. Sports correspondent talks about how this amazing woman will be remembered.
Wimbledon final on the first try The generation who fell in love with tennis during the Soviet period, no doubt, remembers Dmitrieva primarily from television reports. Considered a bourgeois sport during the days of major tournaments, nevertheless, at least for half an hour, at least for an hour, it found a place in the broadcast grid. And it was a window into an unknown world. With her soft, insinuating voice, Dmitrieva, as if in a trance, immersed the viewer in the atmosphere of events that only a few lucky people could touch live at that time.
She talked about tennis in such a way that it seemed like it was you, without leaving your small apartment near Moscow, either sitting on the Wimbledon stands under a green and white striped umbrella, waiting out the boring London rain, or enjoying at the same time acrobatic tricks at the net of Boris Becker and delicious strawberries with cream.
Of course, Dmitrieva knew firsthand what Wimbledon was, since she herself played in this tournament. In general, she was probably the first Soviet tennis prodigy — a kind of predecessor of Maria Sharapova, Anna Kournikova and all those who already achieved significant success in adolescence. Dmitrieva began playing in adult competitions at the age of 16, although she first picked up a racket only at 12. And at the age of 17, Dmitrieva became one of the first players from the USSR who, after the country joined the International Tennis Federation, had a chance to try out the Wimbledon courts. And it’s not easy to try — on her first try Anna reached the final of the junior tournament!
Tennis players from the USSR could not fully participate in the professional tour until almost the end of the 80s. So one can only speculate hypothetically about what success Dmitrieva could have achieved if she had constantly played with the strongest in the world. But even in infrequent trips abroad, she achieved significant success. She has dozens of victories in tournaments in countries friendly to the USSR. And at the stages of the Grand Slam, her best result is reaching the fourth round, both at Wimbledon, and at Roland Garros, and at the US Open. In the Soviet Union in the 60s, Dmitrieva reigned almost unchallenged on the tennis throne. She became the national champion in singles five times, nine times in doubles, four times in mixed.
Dmitrieva successfully combined her sports career with her studies. It couldn’t have been otherwise — Anna was born into an intelligent family of the Moscow Art Theater’s chief artist Vladimir Dmitriev and actress Marina Pastukhova-Dmitrieva, from childhood she was familiar with many Moscow celebrities from the artistic community, and, naturally, education was no less important for her than sports. Dmitrieva graduated from the Faculty of Philology of Moscow State University. But after finishing her sports career, she eventually went to work on television — on the advice of her friend, the famous writer Yuri Rost.
Tennis on TV and a happy marriage Dmitrieva did not immediately begin commenting on tennis — after all, this sport simply did not exist on Soviet TV at that time. She said that she once met Anatoly Gromyko on the court, the son of the famous Minister of Foreign Affairs, whom she knew from meetings in London, where he worked at the embassy. Gromyko jokingly asked: “When will our television start covering Wimbledon?” Dmitrieva answered as a joke: “When the powers that be decide.” Accident or not, very soon Soviet television acquired the rights to show the oldest tournament in the world.
And in the 90s, Dmitrieva began to make this very television herself. It was Anna Vladimirovna who stood at the origins of the first Russian specialized channel about sports — NTV Plus Sport. From the first days of its work in the fall of 1996, she was the artistic director, and after the death of the channel’s director Alexei Burkov, she headed it, and worked in this position until 2010.
Of course, Dmitrieva did not forget about her favorite tennis. It was at this time that her commentary duet with the 1973 Wimbledon finalist Alexander Metreveli formed. Dmitrieva spent many hours broadcasting major tournaments with him. And from time to time she experimented with partners — for example, football commentator Vasily Utkin sometimes reported with her from Wimbledon. It was Dmitrieva who accepted him into the sports editorial office and spent a long time in the role of both a leader and a mentor to the future star of commentary art.
Creative people often have a difficult personal life, but Dmitrieva turned out to be a happy exception. Although Anna lived with her first husband, the grandson of the writer Alexei Tolstoy Mikhail, at the age of 18, for only three months, her second marriage became successful. Dmitrieva married Dmitry Chukovsky, the grandson of the famous children's writer Korney Ivanovich Chukovsky. Their family had two children and five grandchildren.
In the 70s, Anna Dmitrieva’s book “Play Your Game” was published. In it, she teaches sports wisdom, but it’s safe to say that Dmitrieva’s whole life has become her game. Alas, according to inexorable logic, every game, unfortunately, has an end. The honesty, openness, and endless intelligence of this woman are what we will all miss from now on.
