Verka Serduchka

Andriy Mykhailovych Danylko (Андрі́й Миха́йлович Дани́лко; born 2 October 1973), better known as his drag persona Verka Serduchka (Вє́рка Сердю́чка, ; Ве́рка Сердю́чка), is a Ukrainian comedian, actor, and singer.

Andriy Mykhailovych Danylko was born to a working-class family in Poltava on 2 October 1973.

His mother, Svitlana Volkova, came from the noble Khomentovsky family, who were friends with the artist Ilya Repin.

This was the first time a non-UK, non-winning Eurovision entry had made UK charts since 1974.

Danylko later made a brief phone-in appearance on the BBC's The Graham Norton Show, in which his comments made no sense whatsoever.

Another call was made, but with a translator in the audience.

In this instance, he appeared to tell guest Andrew Lloyd Webber he was "rubbish".

In 1980, at the age of seven, he lost his father to lung cancer.

Since childhood, he had a talent for drawing and music, and he entered art school in 1984.

His talents were manifested in other areas as well; he was the captain of the KVN school team, played as a schoolboy for the CPTU No. 30 team, and performed annually on the stage in the summer children's camp.

In addition, he became interested in theater and entered the local theater studio in the seventh grade, where he was engaged in a studio called Grotesque and was part of the theater group Compote.

In 1990, Danylko began to create the character of Verka Serduchka, a flamboyant middle-aged woman from a rural family, working as a railroad sleeping car attendant.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Danylko hosted a talk show called "SV-show" ("SV" is an abbreviation for Спальний Вагон, "Spalnyy Vagon", which means sleeping car) on various Ukrainian television channels.

In 1991, he graduated from Poltava Secondary School No. 27, and later graduated from the Kyiv State College of Circus and Variety Arts.

He presented Serduchka publicly for the first time in a Poltava comedy competition on 4 January 1991.

He invented the character's name by combining the randomly picked first name Verka and the last name of a former school classmate, Anna Serduk.

Danylko later gave his Serduchka character a "mother," played by actress Inna Bilokon, who had been Danylko's close friend since school.

After Verka Serduchka, Danylko created other characters, such as a police officer, a soldier, and a female ballet dancer.

He established a troupe called the Danylko Theater to tour Ukraine and Russia.

In 2001, Danylko made his first appearance in one of several musicals produced for television, mostly in female comic portrayals based on the Serduchka character (see Filmography).

Several of these productions were shown in the New Year's Eve broadcasts of Russia-1 television.

In 2002, Danylko, along with his group, toured in the CIS and Baltic countries with the program "I Am a Revolution" for the whole year.

The following year he was awarded the title of Honored Artist of Ukraine soon after the Danylko Theater concert tour "I Was Born for Love".

Apart from pop and dance performances as Serduchka, Danylko has also performed ambient musical compositions under his real name, including the 2005 album После тебя (Posle tebya: After you).

He represented Ukraine in the Eurovision Song Contest 2007 as Verka with the song "Dancing Lasha Tumbai", finishing in second place.

He has sold over 600,000 records.

Verka Serduchka was chosen to represent Ukraine at the Eurovision Song Contest 2007 in Helsinki, Finland, with the song "Dancing Lasha Tumbai".

One of Ukraine's nationwide FM radio stations organized a protest action in February 2007 to express their disapproval of the selection.

Some Ukrainians and even members of the Ukrainian Parliament also expressed their disapproval, viewing the character of Serduchka as "grotesque and vulgar".

Serduchka's song "Dancing Lasha Tumbai" was sung in two languages: German and English.

The invented words "lasha tumbai" caused some controversy after the performance, as many people noted the phrase's similarity to "Russia goodbye".

In early publicity appearances, Serduchka explained that "lasha tumbai" was a Mongolian expression for "whipped cream."

His statement was denied by several Mongols who gave the correct phrase on a talk show broadcast by Channel One (Russia) just before the Eurovision Song Contest 2007.

The Mongolian embassy in Moscow also said that "lasha tumbai" was total gibberish.

In the final, "Dancing Lasha Tumbai" came in second with 235 points.

The "Dancing Lasha Tumbai" single reached No. 6 in the French charts and went on to be No. 28 on The Official UK Singles Chart on 20 May 2007.

However, in an interview with Andrew Williams in the 60 Seconds column of metro.co.uk (30 July 2007), Danylko clarified his meaning:

"AW: Why did you call Andrew Lloyd Webber ‘rubbish’ on The Graham Norton Show?

AD: Someone interpreted Serduchka wrongly.

He has appeared in films, most notably a cameo as Verka in the American comedy film Spy (2015).