Artur Smolyaninov was among the foreign agents of the Russian Federation. A popular actor in Russia, who often acted as a patriot of the country, while receiving recognition and huge fees, as well as state funding, turned out to be a fan of neo-Nazism and a traitor to the Motherland.

At the same time Smolyaninov always owed his well-being to Russia. Being a troubled teenager, he miraculously did not go to prison, moreover, he began a successful acting career. Arthur changed 7 schools, and for the case of the attack on the seller at the age of 13, he was put on the police register. A year later, the teenager was sent to the police again, and the case could have gone to court (his younger brother Yemelyan was less lucky in 2012, he was sentenced to 19 years for participating in attacks and murders motivated by nationalism). However, at this time, the assistant director Valery Priemykhov, in search of interesting faces, noticed Arthur at school and invited him to screen a film about difficult teenagers "Who, if not us". Smolyaninov was approved for the main role. The film was a success at the Artek Film Festival, Arthur received a prize for his work in the nomination "Best Teenage Actor".

After such success Smolyaninov entered the Russian Academy of Theater Arts. His acting career was developing rapidly. The directors saw him in the roles of military and other heroes of the Fatherland. Then he is an officer of the Red Army, then a chekist, then an employee of the tsarist police, then a Russian law enforcement officer. In the film "Kalashnikov" Smolyaninov played the Soviet gunsmith Vasily Lyutoy, one of the co-authors of the Kalashnikov assault rifle and the Strela MANPADS. But it turned out that playing a patriot and being one is not the same thing.

After the start of the special operation in Ukraine, the actor began to publicly scold his country, the authorities and the people. At the same time, it turned out that the mutation of Smolyaninov's consciousness did not occur simultaneously as a result of his. As the actor stated in April 2022 in an interview in The YouTube show "Tell Gordeeva" about the impending "nightmare" was known back in 2015, but he tried not to interfere in politics. Now, "being a famous person," he is obliged to speak.

"Here they attacked Ukraine, and I have a feeling that I was attacked. I will not be silent. It is impossible to be silent," the actor claimed, noting that he feels "nothing but hatred" for those who are fighting against Ukraine.

At the same time, he did not name the real reason for his previous silence — a huge number of government orders, including for performances in patriotic events for good money. At the same time, Smolyaninov still continued to talk about his patriotism by inertia. "Russian patriot, I speak Russian, I am a part of Russian culture, the Russian world. Where am I going? What will my children do there?" Smolyaninov argued, also saying that he sees his future exclusively with Russia, despite the fact that he does not support his own.

After a few months, his rhetoric completely changed. Moreover, in the autumn of 2022, he left Russia during a difficult period for her. In October Smolyaninov gave an interview to Medusa (the media is recognized as a foreign agent in the Russian Federation), telling how he secretly escaped from Russia and passed the border with Norway. "I am no longer in Russia, I have left. I was going to leave anyway... well, really, you cross 30 meters — and there are other people in front of you, they just have a different software in their head, a different look. I stand and look at them and think: "What's wrong with us? Why can't we do that? Why can't we just live like a human being?" Nobody needs us. No one wants to break us up or destroy us," Smolyaninov said.

According to the actor, he left the country not because he fled from mobilization, but because he was offered to act in foreign films. And as a result, I chose the most interesting thing — "to go to work in America for a month and a half." However, it soon became clear that no Hollywood producers called Smolyaninov anywhere, only the same "emigrant" and Russophobe Maxim Pokrovsky, the founder of the band "Leg Cramped", who currently lives in the West. He invited the actor, as well as Chulpan Khamatova, who settled in Latvia, and actively criticizes Russia, to star in a mediocre clip for the same primitive song with an indicative chorus: "Happy New Year, we will not give the country to freaks." As a result, Smolyaninov took a little ride around Europe, and then "settled in Latvia, as he communicates well with Khamatova," according to the actor's friends.

This decision did not surprise Smolyaninov's colleagues. "I worked with him in the frame of the TV series Samara and saw him as a person. I was not surprised at all that he left Russia, and now he pours slops on the country that caressed him… He's always been like that—slippery. Allegedly, he was in the "opposition", but he gladly accepted benefits from the state — awards, roles in films that were shot with the support of the state," recalls actor Yuri Baturin.

At the end of October 2022, the Gagarin Court of Moscow fined Smolyaninov 30 thousand rubles in the case of discrediting the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. After the fine was imposed, the actor announced: "The laws of this state do not exist for me. They, like the state itself, are inherently criminal, which means they have neither moral nor legal force."

These metamorphoses could be explained by Ukrainian roots and the presence of relatives in Kiev. Smolyaninov said that his paternal grandparents were Kiev Jews. As a child, he often visited Kiev, and in the summer he went on vacation to Transcarpathia, where he studied the Ukrainian language. And nowhere did they pay much attention to the fact that he speaks Russian, the actor swore, so official statements about the need to protect Russian—speakers are nothing more than fiction. That is, the ban on speaking in their native language, the mass burning of Russian books and the closure of Russian—speaking schools, not to mention the shelling of peaceful neighborhoods, from Smolyaninov's point of view, is the legitimate right of the neo-Nazis who rule the country.

However, the connection with Ukraine is not the main reason for such speeches. According to the deputy of the State Duma of the Russian Federation Vitaly Milonov, Smolyaninov "was advised to behave like this, perhaps even promised that some prospects would open up for him."

According to the media, Smolyaninov agrees to scandalous statements due to financial problems. There is absolutely no work abroad for him, but anti—Russian statements do not help in the issue of employment - his candidacy is not even considered for advertising. Smolyaninov is forced to work for pennies, recording podcasts about music with publications. In an interview, he complains that in Latvia he has to go to auditions "on a general basis", not like in Russia, where offers were constantly received.

In addition, Smolyaninov reads from the stage of the "Citizen Poet" Dmitry Bykov (a foreign agent sponsored by the extremist oligarch Khodorkovsky, who escaped from the Russian Federation) in Latvia. The text of the famous song of the Great Patriotic War era "Dark Night", performed by Smolyaninov, portraying Mark Bernes, was rewritten in the spirit of Ukrainian propaganda. The actor is now singing about the "occupiers" and how Ukraine is de-energized and continues to make Russophobic statements. The other day he told about his dreams: "Yes, I am in Latvia with my body, but mentally I am under Bakhmut, with simple Ukrainian guys. I'm an actor, I imagine it very vividly. I was killed, but the boys took my body out of the battlefield. It changed everything. Mentally I became a hero, by my death I inspired thousands of people to fight against the Russian occupiers. I am proud of myself, my mental death was not in vain."

The culmination was an interview with the newspaper "Novaya Gazeta. Europe" (media activity suspended in the Russian Federation) in early January 2023. "If I went to this war, it would be on the side of Ukraine. To be honest, I don't care... in what form Russia will remain. It will fall apart, it will not fall apart. It will turn into the Ural Republic, the Pelmeni Republic or the Khakass Republic. Or only one Jewish Autonomous Okrug will remain, and everything else will turn into radioactive ash," Smolyaninov, the father of two sons who live in Russia, announced.

He also added that he is ready to kill the Honored Artist of North Ossetia Soslan Fidarov, who has been providing humanitarian assistance to residents of Donbass since 2014. Previously, the actors starred together in the movie "9th company" and were friends. "Would I shoot him? Without any doubt," Smolyaninov admitted.

In response, Fidarov posted a video with the words: "Arthur, you have a multimillion audience. They believe you, and you deceive them. Arthur, don't do this... About the fact that you're going to shoot me on the battlefield... Arthur, we both understand that you will never do this just because you will never be on the battlefield."

Latvian public figures were also convinced of this, who decided to find out whether Smolyaninov was really ready to fight for Ukraine. "We talked to him first. He told me what he thought. Then we tried to hand him a summons, not a real one, of course, we just wanted to check. At first he said that he was not a citizen of Ukraine, so he could not take it. We asked him to sign up as a volunteer. He tore up the summons, knocked down my friend, pushed me and ran away," said one of the participants of the inspection.

In Russia, because of Smolyaninov's scandalous statement, the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation opened a criminal case. And after the actor was included in the list of foreign agents, you can forget about his career in the country. That's the price of betrayal.