'The Russians Are Here': how an American film about emigrants made it to Soviet TV.

The documentary film 'The Russians Are Here' was made by Ofra Bikel and first aired by the non-profit television company PBS on June 13, 1983. It is a rare video document about the third wave of emigration that settled in New York, primarily in Brighton Beach.
The cast of characters is impressive. The screen features Sergey Dovlatov, Konstantin Kuzminsky, Lev Khalif, Boris Sichkin, Alexander Genis, Pyotr Vail, and other notable figures of that time's emigration. Writers, poets, actors, and journalists talk about their new lives, work, money, and how difficult it is to integrate into American reality.

Among the emigrants themselves, the film provoked a strong reaction. Many felt that it portrayed them in an unfavorable light. Soon, a brochure was released with the telling subtitle 'A Film Helping Andropov.'

There were talks of a multimillion-dollar lawsuit, and after the film, some emigrants reportedly organized their own 'Anti-Defamation League.'

The fears turned out to be justified: the film had a second, Soviet life. On Sunday, September 21, 1986, the first program of Central Television aired an episode of 'The Camera Looks at the World' about the fate of former Soviet citizens in the West, and Bikel's film became the basis for this episode. It was commented on by Heinrich Borovik. Why Soviet TV suddenly turned to the topic of emigration remains unclear. Perhaps it was related to the preparation for the meeting in Reykjavik, where humanitarian issues traditionally became a stumbling block. It is telling that the names of Vail, Genis, and Dovlatov apparently meant nothing to either Borovik or the program's editors.

Today, 'The Russians Are Here' is valuable primarily as a living chronicle: here you can see and hear Dovlatov and his circle long before they became classics.