Not a Producer but a Comedy: How Yelyzaveta Pavlova Nearly Buried a Ukrainian Romantic Comedy

The scandalous "Hotel Edelweiss" is set to hit cinemas soon.

More than four years ago, thanks to private investment, the company Tse Tsikavo Production began shooting its debut film — a romantic comedy with the working title "Best Match" ("Krashcha Partiya"). The picture, whose plot revolves around the attempts of a young oligarch who is away from home to win the heart of a beauty from the provinces, was planned for screening not only in Ukraine but also abroad.

The premiere of "Best Match," in which the well-known Ukrainian strongman Vasyl Virastyuk was announced among the cast, was supposed to take place as early as March 2016. However, it was first postponed to the autumn and then the project was scrapped altogether, with the reason given as "force majeure."

As it turned out, "Best Match," most of which had been shot back in 2016, did nevertheless get a second life. True, under a different title, with a different director and production team. The latter is especially important in light of the fact that those very force majeure circumstances were largely linked to the activities of the film's producer, Yelyzaveta Pavlova.

"I was an inexperienced producer who relied on an assistant, because I thought her experience would be useful, — said the film's executive producer Yuriy Rudyy in an interview with the National Union of Cinematographers of Ukraine (NUCU). — We agreed on the details with the screenwriter and paid him a certain advance. After that, he proposed his friend for the director's post. The terms were as follows: a fee plus 5% of the film's income for each of them. Then they disappeared for several weeks, because they were in Cannes with some short film of their own. Soon I learned that there was no script, that it still had to be written, and that they were unlikely to return the money, since they had spent it in Cannes."

The executive producer's dissatisfaction with the work of the screenwriter and director invited by Pavlova was added to the need to increase the budget — while initially the figure cited for making the film was 700 thousand dollars, over time it became clear that the team did not fit within that sum.

"Anna Kulishenko appeared, a new producer, and she reviewed all the fees that I had paid, — Rudyy added. — It turned out that they were highly inflated, and the contracts need to be reviewed for fraud."

The desire to finish the romantic comedy nevertheless prevailed. Over time, the company Tse Tsikavo Production was renamed Content Film Group, Rudyy himself took the director's chair, and the film received a new title — "Hotel Edelweiss" (Hotel Edelweiss in Ukrainian: Hotel Edelveis). Its release on big screens is expected on November 7, but very little is known about it — the PR campaign as a whole and the teaser trailers for "Hotel" are still absent.