Russian President Vladimir Putin reportedly did stunt work at the Lenfilm movie studio in the 1970s when he was a university student — performing on at least two WWII movies.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Putin worked on the 1972 film "Izhora Battalion" and the 1974 movie "Blockade," longtime Putin friend and former athlete Vasily Shestakov, president of the International Sambo Federation, told Russian network Dozhd.
"We were in 'Izhora Battalion' and 'Blockade' together," Shestakov — an old friend of Putin — told the media outlet, THR reported. "We were paid good money for that time. I was paid 110 rubles [a month, around $132] in my engineer's job, but when I was working on movies, I made 75 rubles a day [about $95].
"That was a lot of money," he added.
The Russian media outlet also reported working as a movie extra was a common way of making extra cash for university students in the Soviet Union era; those with an athletic background were eligible for higher-paid stunt work.
Another former athlete, Nikolai Vashshilin, who went on to become a professional stuntman and a stunt coordinator, confirmed to Dozhd that Putin did movie stunt work — and claimed to have a photo of Putin on a movie set, THR reported.
The image was not clear enough to verify if it was Putin, the outlet reported.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Dozhd he was not aware of Putin's stuntman work, THR reported.
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