In modern Russia, as well as throughout the world, beauty contests have been popular social events for many years. Today, when beauty queens are chosen for almost any reason, it is difficult to imagine that in the USSR there were no beauty contests in their modern sense at all. The first one took place thirty years ago in 1988.
With Komsomol enthusiasm
In the Soviet Union, all the undertakings that, in one way or another, were associated with the transfer of the traditions of Western culture to domestic soil, occurred at the suggestion of the Komsomol members. The initiative to hold the first beauty contest in the midst of perestroika was born within the walls of the editorial office of the Moskovsky Komsomolets newspaper, which in those years, as today, was headed by Pavel Gusev. The idea for the competition came up in 1987, after the newspaper decided to present the prize to its most beautiful reader. The photo contest generated a lot of excitement among the newspaper's subscribers, and the proposal to hold a beauty contest arose by itself.
However, the approval of the authorities was required to hold such an event. Oddly enough, but the Moscow City Committee of the Komsomol, which, according to its status, was supposed to protect the morality of young residents of the capital, supported the holding of a beauty contest. Viktor Mironenko, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Komsomol, became one of the main political "locomotives" who lobbied for the holding of this event in the government offices. "Good" was received, the only competition was recommended to be called not in the Western way "Miss Moscow", but in Russian - "Moscow beauty". The Komsomol organization of Moscow paid for the event. Considerable money was allocated for its implementation.
Qualifying round
They chose beauties who were to participate in the competition on the territory of the Park named after M. A. Gorky. Taking into account the enormous public attention paid to the event, it was decided to hold the final of the beauty contest at the Sports Palace in Luzhniki, with a live broadcast on central television. One of the most popular singers of the USSR, Muslim Magomayev, became the chairman of the jury. Among the rank-and-file members of the jury are Anastasia Vertinskaya, Mark Rozovsky, Mikhail Zadornov and other equally respected figures of Soviet culture. Leonid Yakubovich was entrusted to host the event. At the same time, the biggest problem was the choice of the event program, because in the Soviet Union no one knew how these competitions were actually held in the West.
It got to the point that the director of the competition, Maria Parusnikova, as she later said in numerous interviews, went to the Library named after V. I. IN AND. Lenin. Nevertheless, in the end, the competition was no worse than its foreign counterparts. True, the organizers of the competition, without thinking, allowed everyone to participate in the qualifying round, despite their appearance, without checking their marital status and Moscow residence permit. Subsequently, during the finale, such carelessness gave rise to many misunderstandings. According to the rules of the event, only unmarried girls with a Moscow residence permit were to be allowed to participate in the competition.
Final of the competition
Of the nearly two and a half thousand women who filled out the questionnaire, 36 applicants were selected for the final. The girls had to go on stage three times: in swimsuits, national costume and evening dress. Unfortunately, the organizers of the competition did not know that at such events all girls are given the same swimwear. In Moscow in 1988, each of the finalists performed in their own swimsuit.
The scene literally dazzled with different colors and shapes of swimsuits from puritanically closed bodysuits to revealing bikinis. As a result, the jury selected six finalists. But, at that moment, it suddenly turned out that almost none of them can win the competition for reasons far from the essence of the event itself. Ira Suvorova was married and had a child. According to the rules, she should not have been allowed to participate in the competition at all.
Oksana Fandera, who was liked by the majority of the jury members and the public, turned out to be from Odessa without a Moscow residence permit. Lena Durneva had a dissonant surname, and they did not dare to give her the first prize. Lena Peredreeva did not pass because of her frankly model appearance. Masha Kalinina and Katya Chilichkina remained.
Maria Kalinina was chosen for the role of the winner, although the public demanded that the first place be given to Oksana Fandera, who looked much more spectacular. However, the jury did not change their opinion, and in the country they started talking as if Masha Kalinina was chosen only because she, either Kalinin's great-granddaughter, or Ligachev's granddaughter. Of course, these were nothing more than rumors.
