Algis Arlauskas: Movies & Box Office

Algis Iozasovich Arlauskas Pinedo (born 7 August 1957 in Moscow, then part of the RSFSR, USSR) is a multifaceted Soviet‑born Spanish actor, film director, screenwriter and theater educator whose career spans five decades across three continents. He grew up in a family marked by historic upheavals: his father, Juozas Mikaloyusovich Arlauskas, was a Lithuanian communist leader condemned to labor camps, while his mother was a Basque evacuee from Bilbao who fled the Spanish Civil War in 1937. After completing secondary education, Arlauskas entered the prestigious Boris Shchukin Theater Institute, graduating in 1978, and later honed his directorial skills at VGIK’s Film Directing faculty, finishing in 1987 under the mentorship of A. Kochetkov. Between 1978 and 1983 he performed with the Moscow Young Spectators Theater, showcasing a command of the Stanislavski system that would define his later teaching philosophy. From 1989 to 1995 he served as a professor of film directing and screenwriting at VGIK, influencing a generation of documentary filmmakers. In 1991, following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, he returned to his maternal roots in Bilbao with his then‑wife, actress Marina Shimanskaya, and their two children, to produce the documentary series Living and Dying in Russia about the children of the Spanish Civil War, a project that anchored his permanent residence in the Basque capital. Since then Arlauskas has alternated between Spanish television productions—such as Los Hombres de Paco, El Barco, El Ministerio del Tiempo and the Netflix series In from the Cold—and Russian film initiatives, even revisiting Russian projects in 2008. Fluent in six languages—Russian, Spanish, Basque, English, Italian and Portuguese—he seamlessly bridges cultural narratives, making him a rare transnational voice in contemporary cinema. His enduring commitment to both performance and pedagogy continues to enrich the artistic landscapes of Russia, Spain, and beyond.