Grishaeva Recalls 'Welcome to Hell' on Daddy's Girls

The role of the mother in the cult sitcom «Daddy»s Girls« (12+) brought Nonna Grishaeva nationwide love, but few know what professional nightmare she had to endure on set. On »Shou Voli« (16+), the actress spoke frankly for the first time about why her first working day began with a frightening prophecy from Andrey Leonov, how the popular series turned into an exhausting conveyor belt for its stars, how many scenes they had to deliver under the cameras every day, and which of her on-screen daughters she is still friends with.

In the storyline, Grishaeva«s character (mother Lyudmila Vasnetsova) suddenly returns to the family from Canada, after which the hero of Andrey Leonov (the father) must pack up and leave. To make the scene convincing, it was important for the actress to establish personal contact with her on-screen husband right before the camera rolled.

When Grishaeva entered the dressing room to introduce herself, Leonov was sitting in makeup incredibly happy, since for him it was the final shooting day before a long break. Nonna introduced herself and reminded him that she would be playing the mother who abandoned him with five daughters. In response, Leonov turned around and with a smile uttered his prophetic phrase: «Welcome to hell!»

— And he turns like that and says: «Welcome to hell!» Why? I thought, how can that be? Well, after some time I understood why, — the actress said.

The meaning of his words reached her very quickly, as soon as the work process began. By her admission, the sitcom was shot at a frantic, exhausting pace. Each day the actress had to perform at least 12 scenes, and on peak days the load rose to 15 shooting scenes per day.

Nonna noted that it was after this that she realized why Leonov was so sincerely happy about his «send-off» from the set. Nevertheless, the actress added that the project brought her a lot of good: for example, after filming ended, she kept very warm and close relations with her on-screen daughter Elizaveta Arzamasova.

Incidentally, Ekaterina Starshova, who played Pugovka, also recently spoke about how the shoot was not easy — several years after the series ended, the girl explained why her role drove her crazy.