Russia will finally have its own screen version of Boris Pasternak's Doctor Zhivago. This novel by the outstanding Russian poet and writer, which ran counter to the Party ideology and praised nothing but life itself, was never filmed in the Soviet Union. However, on October 3 Moscow director Alexander Proshkin started shooting a Doctor Zhivago TV series.

The 1958 Nobel Prize winner is one of the best novels about the Russian intelligentsia caught in the turmoil of the Bolshevik Revolution and ensuing Civil War. However, Pasternak was forced to decline the award under the threat of exile from the USSR. Doctor Zhivago was published in this country only 30 years later, in 1988, during perestroika. However, the country's intelligentsia, whose voice the prohibited novel echoed, already knew it very well.

Rare foreign editions of the novel "smuggled" into the country and unofficially produced copies were passed from hand to hand in Moscow, Leningrad (the Soviet name for St. Petersburg) and other cities. The story of the struggle of a defenceless man against a cruel age, creation against war, love against hatred was one that many people could relate to. Yuri Zhivago's lyrical diary, verses which Pasternak "yielded" to his hero, were quoted by heart. Under the direction of Yuri Lyubimov, Moscow's notorious oppositional Taganka Theatre, which provided consolation to many intellectuals, always began its productions of Hamlet with Pasternak's eponymous poem. This Russian epigraph to the English tragedy was not only a tribute to Shakespeare, whose plays the poet brilliantly translated, but also a confession of the intelligentsia that had been crucified by the Revolution and the Soviet regime.

Thousands of articles were published about Doctor Zhivago in the 1990s. Studies and TV programmes tried to solve the same riddle: who was the real Lara, the subject of Yuri's love? Pasternak's son Yevgeny tried to persuade readers that the doctor and poet from the legendary novel was the least autobiographical of his father's heroes. Philosophers continued to deliberate on the topic "Man and Historical Ordeals."

While recognising the talent of Egyptian-born star Omar Sharif who played Zhivago in David Lean's 1965 classic movie, Russians saw only a faint resemblance to Pasternak's hero. The British mini-series made in 2002 had even less in common with the outstanding historical novel. It was a trivial love story full of archaic myths about Russia.

One of Russia's most talented middle-aged actors, Oleg Menshikov, the star of the Oscar winning Burnt By The Sun and laureate of many film awards, will play Doctor Zhivago in the Russian version. Pasternak's admirers and film fans have already breathed a sigh of relief. Menshikov has played many remarkable roles both on screen and in the theatre: ranging from Emperor Caligula to the dancer Vaslav Nijinsky, or from a white emigrant returning to Russia to a federal soldier fighting in Chechnya. He has trodden boards in Britain and acted in a movie directed by France's Regis Wargnier. Menshikov's creative possibilities are endless, as he can play the piano, sing and dance, while he also stages productions that are highly popular with Muscovites.

The role of Doctor Zhivago demands an intellectual actor and director Alexander Proshkin chose Menshikov without hesitation. "Doctor Zhivago is a story about the Russian intelligentsia, which does not live by some practical goals, but by feelings and love," the director says. "The role of the Russian intellectual needs instinct and a human mystery. This is Oleg's forte."

Alexander Proshkin already made a successful screen version of a literary classic. His movie The Russian Riot, which was based on Alexander Pushkin's story The Captain's Daughter about a bloody 18th-century peasant uprising, won prestigious awards. However, the director prefers contemporary plots. A recent film, Trio (2003), told the story of policemen working undercover as long-distance truckers to catch robbers on the road.

Poet and philosopher Yuri Arabov, known for his long screenwriting relationship with Alexander Sokurov, the champion of highbrow cinematography in Russia, wrote the screenplay for Doctor Zhivago. Arabov is known for his daring and profound interpretations of historical subjects, including the films Moloch (about Adolf Hitler's love and death) and Taurus (about the last days of Vladimir Lenin).

"Doctor Zhivago is a story about the Russian soul," says Alexander Proshkin, who intends to complete filming in March. "The figure of Zhivago is relevant at all times."