Beginning
Baku, 10 February 1948
Alexander Yakovlevich Sharovsky was born on 10 February 1948 in Baku — a city that in those years spoke several languages at once. He grew up in an old Baku quarter, in one of those courtyards where doors were never locked and the neighbours' holidays belonged to everyone.
He would later call it his real school: not an institute or a studio, but a courtyard where from childhood you hear different speech and learn to understand people without translation. That experience stayed in his productions — there is almost always room in them for everyone.
At school he took part in the drama club, but never thought seriously about the theatre: a boy in post-war Baku had another dream — sport.
Beginning
FootballFootball
The national squad, Dinamo, Lokomotiv — and an injury
Sharovsky played football seriously and was a member of the Azerbaijani national squad; he appeared for Baku's Dinamo and Lokomotiv. This was not an amateur story but a professional path.
In 1966, in a match against Baku's Spartak, he suffered injuries that were followed by a grave illness. His sporting career ended before it had truly begun — and the void it left was very soon filled by the theatre.
He never called it a tragedy. In interviews he spoke of his arrival at the theatre as luck: “It all began with love.”
Youth TheatreYouth Theatre
1967: he came because of a girl and stayed for good
In 1967 the nineteen-year-old Sharovsky found himself at the Azerbaijan State Theatre for Young Spectators, led by Zafar Pashayevich Neymatov. He told the story of his arrival without any pathos: a girl he liked worked there.
Neymatov took him into the company. He started with small parts — and almost immediately understood that he would never leave the theatre.
Fame came with the role of D'Artagnan in “The Three Musketeers”, staged at the Youth Theatre by Yuli Gusman. For young Baku of the early 1970s the production was an event, and his D'Artagnan became a city legend.
Russian DramaRussian Drama
1976: the theatre he never left again
From 1976 Alexander Sharovsky worked at the Azerbaijan State Academic Russian Drama Theatre named after Samad Vurgun. First as an actor: he played leading roles and learned from the masters of the company, among whom he named Vera Shirye and Anatoly Falkovich.
From 1978 to 1990 he was an assistant director, including on productions of Rustam Ibragimbekov's plays. He had no formal training in directing — he learned the profession from the inside, standing next to those who staged.
On 11 June 1991 he was formally listed as a production director. A year and a half later, in March 1993, he became the theatre's chief director.
Cinema is a separate line in his biography: he appeared in four films, the best known being “Don't Be Afraid, I'm With You”, where Sharovsky played the engineer Petrov.
“For me the theatre is an island of rescue, a place where you can invent life.”
Alexander Sharovsky
The manThe man
A teacher by diploma, a director by calling
He graduated from the Azerbaijan State Institute of Foreign Languages (faculty of English language and literature) and was a teacher by training. English, languages, literature — all of it stayed with him in his work with text and translated drama.
In interviews he spoke of his wife, the actress Natalia Sharovskaya, and of his son. His parents were at first against the theatre; his mother came to one of his performances only when he was already working at the Russian Drama — and after that she stopped arguing.
About age he spoke calmly and briefly: “I treat my age as something detached.” He worked until his final years, leaving the post of chief director only in February 2026.
The plain facts
A biography in dates
- Born
- 10 February 1948, Baku, Azerbaijan SSR
- Died
- 9 September 2026, Baku, in his seventy-ninth year
- Education
- Azerbaijan State Institute of Foreign Languages, English language and literature (1973); teacher
- Youth Theatre
- from 1967 — actor at the Azerbaijan State Theatre for Young Spectators
- Russian Drama
- from 1976 — actor; 1978–1990 — assistant director
- Production director
- from 11 June 1991
- Chief director
- from March 1993 to February 2026 — 33 years
- Cinema
- four films, among them “Don't Be Afraid, I'm With You” (the engineer Petrov)