Evgeniya Brik

Evgeniya Brik (Евгения Брик, Khirivskaya (Хиривская), 3 September 1981 – 10 February 2022) was a Russian film and theater actress.

Evgenia Vladimirovna Khirivskaya was born on 3 September 1981 in Moscow.

She was named after her paternal grandfather Yevgeny Abramovich Krein, who was a famous journalist.

The actress took the surname Brik in honor of her paternal great-grandmother Sofia Brik, as a stage name.

However, despite marriage and adopting a stage name, she never changed her legal documentation, thus keeping her maiden last name.

She has Polish and Jewish ancestry.

At the age of 5, she successfully completed tryouts and was invited to work as a child model at the All-Union House of Fashion Design.

In elementary and middle school, she focused on learning English, before applying for and graduating from a theater prep school.

She also graduated from a music school as a classically trained pianist.

She studied at the Russian Academy of Theatre Arts and obtained her diploma in 2004.

She gained popularity with such films and television series as Stilyagi (2008), The Geographer Drank His Globe Away (2013), Thaw (2013), Yolki 1914 (2014), Adaptation (2017), and Odessa (2019).

She is also known for playing Kalinka character in the Belgian television series Matroesjka's.

In Russia, her breakthrough role was Katya, a university Komsomol unit leader, in the 2008 musical comedy-drama Stilyagi.

Brik was married to director Valery Todorovsky, with whom she had a daughter, Zoey Valeryevna Todorovskaya, born in 2009 in Los Angeles.

Zoey had her acting debut as young Prairie Johnson in The OA, a 2016 Netflix Original series.

Brik died from cancer on 10 February 2022, at the age of 40.

Brik was a winner of the Golden Eagle Award (2020) and a nominee for the Nika Award (2009).