The name of Igor Fesunenko is well known to the older generation of people throughout the post-Soviet space. A talented journalist passed away in April 2016 at the age of 83. After the collapse of the USSR, Igor Sergeyevich disappeared from television screens, where he hosted the popular programs International Panorama and Camera Looks into the World. The last twenty years of his life, a political observer has devoted pedagogical activity, transferring his knowledge and experience to novice word masters at the Department of Journalism at MGIMO.
Igor Fesunenko: biography and stages of creative development
The future journalist was born in Orenburg on January 28, 1933. Igor Sergeyevich’s childhood passed in Moscow and Zaporozhye, where he moved with his parents. The Great Patriotic War found a family in one of the Ural cities.
At 22, Fesunenko graduated from the Historical Archive Institute in Moscow and went to military service. After the military debt was paid back to his homeland, Igor Sergeyevich entered the General Archives Directorate, began a freelance collaboration with the Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper, and made radio reports.
The beginning and sunset of a television career
In 1960–1970 Igor Fesunenko, thanks to his demonstrated journalistic talent and knowledge of languages, as a correspondent of the USSR State Radio and Television, works in Latin America, covering political and cultural events taking place in Portugal, Italy, Brazil and Cuba. He was personally acquainted not only with Soviet leaders, but also with political figures in many foreign countries.
The collapse of the Soviet Union led to a change of power not only in the country, but also in the media. In the 90s, old-school journalists began to be forced out of print publishing houses and television channels. Igor Fesunenko also fell under this oppression. In private conversations and in interviews with young colleagues, he repeatedly expressed regret that he could not fully realize himself in his favorite business.
Health and life risk reporting
Igor Fesunenko repeatedly incurred the wrath of the television authorities when he edited news releases at his discretion. For example, in 1964, during a visit to the USSR by Fidel Castro, a journalist reduced the time of a Cuban leader’s speech at the Ivanovo weaving factory from 40 minutes to 20. Fesunenko considered that the commandant’s speech would benefit from the removal of extra staff, but the officials had a different opinion.
And in 1974, Igor Sergeyevich had to fill the time of a live television broadcast with a story about the sights of Havana for a long 6 minutes while waiting for the government motorcade to leave on the main square of the Cuban capital, in one of whose vehicles was L. I. Brezhnev. Although the journalist’s speech was unprepared, the audience didn’t notice anything, but the resultant cover turned out to be a great nervous strain for Fesunenko. At the end of the broadcast, he literally fainted.
There were episodes in his career that could have cost his life. As Igor Sergeyevich recalled, once he almost blew up a mine shell during coverage of events in Mozambique. And in 1974, Fesunenko, being with a group of Soviet journalists in Lisbon during the coup d'état there, managed to negotiate with the rebels with difficulty and thereby avoid execution.
Brazil, football, Pele
Of all the countries where Igor Fesunenko had to work, Brazil enjoyed his special love. Knowing perfectly the Portuguese and Spanish language, the journalist, by his own admission, felt at home there.
In 1968, Fesunenko was the first Soviet reporter to interview the world famous player, the king of football Pele. Igor Sergeyevich not only managed to overcome the numerous bureaucratic obstacles that separated the athlete from communication with the press, but also had a heart-to-heart talk with him, and even recorded two songs on the recorder performed by the Santos striker.
At the same time, friendly relations were established between Fesunenko and Pele. When the great football player came to the Soviet Union, he always asked that the journalist accompany him during his visits and press conferences as an interpreter. Fesunenko himself was a passionate football fan, giving preference to Moscow CSKA and the Brazilian club “Botafogo”.
