Is it true that Ukrainian refugees in Italy beat the granddaughter of Joseph Brodsky?

In April 2022, Russian media reported that the granddaughter of the famous poet living in Europe was attacked by refugees from Ukraine. We have verified the accuracy of such publications.

On April 23, 2022, numerous materials appeared in the media dedicated to the beating of actress Agnia Mishchenko-Brodskaya. According to these publications, the woman was beaten near her home in Italy by Ukrainian refugees, and the conflict was allegedly caused by the fact that Mishchenko-Brodskaya is a “Russian Jew.” Similar notes and stories were published, in particular, "Rossiyskaya Gazeta", "Channel Five", Lenta.ru, "Moskovsky Komsomolets", Life, "Gazeta.ru" And "Ren-TV". Some publications, in particular "Tsargrad", "Komsomolskaya Pravda", "Arguments and Facts" and newspaper "Sight", reported in their headlines about the “beating of the granddaughter of Joseph Brodsky.” Writer and TV presenter Zakhar Prilepin in his Telegram channel suggested, that the conflict may be associated with “very angry poems about quasi-Ukrainian independence” written by the Nobel laureate (probably meaning poem "For the independence of Ukraine").

Let's start with the fact that Agnia Brodskaya is the creative pseudonym of the 42-year-old actress. At birth she received name Daria, her father is an actor and director, Honored Artist of Russia Vasily Mishchenko. In 2008, the actress, when asked by an interviewer, “You have so many first and last names... How should we still call you?” answered: “I wanted them to remember forever: Agnia Mishchenko-Brodskaya. My parents named me Daria, but my grandfather (Joseph Brodsky - author's note) gave me the name Agnia at baptism. And since I lived with him all my life in Italy, the second name turned out to be much closer to me. Only my dad called me Daria, or rather even Dusya.” Now in the description of a woman’s Instagram profile* indicated name Agniya Brodskaya.

At the same time from interview Vasily Mishchenko is known that he was born in the Rostov region into a family of miners, and his wife and, apparently, Daria’s mother, director Olga Vikhorkova, were born in Dolgoprudny. In the same interview, Vasily Mishchenko told how he “bombed” a Zhiguli car from early morning in order to “bring money to his daughter” for lunch by the third lesson.

Authoritative sources say nothing about the connection of the Mishchenko family with Joseph Brodsky. Two children of the Nobel laureate are known: born in Leningrad in 1967 Andrey Basmanov and was born in New York in 1993 Anna Brodskaya-Sozzani. Also Brodsky's daughter counts translator Anastasia Kuznetsova.

Let's return directly to media reports about the beating of the actress. The publications were based primarily on two videos compiled from Mishchenko-Brodskaya’s Instagram stories*. One of them is 23 seconds long published in its Telegram channel Izvestia. In this video, the actress addresses the Ukrainians (Izvestia itself has already written about refugees) and asks: “What have I done wrong to you?” In its post, the publication also states: ““I remember the whole chronology, the statement to the police, the beatings were removed, so let the law enforcement agencies sort it out,” the victim told Izvestia.” Second video published, in particular, the Ren-TV channel. It lasts six seconds longer; at the beginning of the video, Mishchenko-Brodskaya says: “Only because I am a Russian Jew, and I was ******** (beaten - Ed.) in front of my house.” The following video coincides with that published by Izvestia. We were unable to find the corresponding videos on the actress’s social networks.

April 24, the day after publications in the media, Mishchenko-Brodskaya published another video on Instagram*, at the beginning of which she stated that she was “stunned by our media.” The actress said that “a really unpleasant thing happened to her” and, “being emotional and in a state of passion,” she “published the story thoughtlessly, somewhere infantile.” Mishchenko-Brodskaya also stated that she did not have time to delete the video because she was busy filing a statement with the Roman police and going to the hospital, and fell asleep immediately after that.

According to the actress, the next morning she received numerous requests for comment from Russian media. Mishchenko-Brodskaya responded to all these requests with an “absolute refusal” and deleted the stories themselves. She called the information about Ukrainian refugees a “gag” of the Russian media: “These were not Ukrainian refugees. We have a very large community of Ukrainians from Western Ukraine. Of course, it’s terrible what happened, but I didn’t give anyone the right to draw conclusions for me. I forgive these people. The degree of aggression that is in the air can upset anyone. I’m alive, healthy, I have some bruises, swelling, but there are no fractures or anything,” said Mishchenko-Brodskaya.

The actress also disputed the reasons for the conflict presented in Russian media publications: “I was beaten not because I am a Russian Jew. I said in the video that I’m not only Russian, but I’m also Jewish, and it’s scary if we now get to what happened with the Jews. <…> I do not support anyone, neither Russians nor Ukrainians. I support the Italians because I am a citizen of this country, I am married to an Italian, all my earnings are in Italy.” The woman in the video kept silent about other details of the incident (including the circumstances in which the fight occurred).

Thus, although actress Agniya Mishchenko-Brodskaya did report on the conflict with Ukrainians living in Italy, she never spoke about refugees. Considering that, according to the woman, she refused all media comments, the quotes published on her behalf also seem implausible. Apparently, the media incorrectly indicate the reason for the fight. Contrary to the headlines of a number of publications, Agnia Mishchenko-Brodskaya is not related to the famous poet.

*Russian authorities think Meta Platforms Inc., which owns the social network Instagram, is an extremist organization; its activities in Russia are prohibited.

Mostly not true

What do our verdicts mean?

Read on the topic:

1. Is it true that Ukrainian refugees killed a German volunteer who spoke to them in Russian?
2. Is it true that the UK plans to deport Ukrainian refugees to Rwanda?