Mikhail Romm recalled how, during the filming of his 1934 debut, "Boule de Suif", after the story by Guy de Maupassant (itself, incidentally, a debut), two acknowledged beauties of the day came into collision on set: Galina Sergeyeva, who played the lead…

The young actresses were both 20 years old, and both were fresh and lovely. But it so happened that all the men of the film crew showed an interest in only one of the two girls: Okunevskaya captured the whole of the male attention. And this upset Sergeyeva greatly, the more so as Okunevskaya was playing a blonde and Galina Yermolayevna a brunette, and she was convinced that a brunette set against a blonde could only ever be a secondary character.

This threatened to wreck the shoot, for Sergeyeva was at the same time filming for Simonov and playing in the theatre, scarcely sleeping, snatching an hour's rest now and then in the breaks. And on top of that, nervous distress!

Mikhail Romm gave secret instructions to the camera assistant Suren Kafafyan, a stately Turkish Armenian with broad shoulders and a narrow waist: he was to court her, that is, to stand with arms folded on his chest, gaze at her with a fiery eye, now and then approach Sergeyeva and, stretching out a hand towards her very low neckline, say "take that away a little, mmmm" and withdraw. And Sergeyeva blossomed!