Ivan Prus recounted how he made $200 by housing a movie star in a dilapidated apartment near a dump in Shabany, furnished with items from his dormitory

Ivan Prus and Alesia Hrybok.

Student film with Hollywood scope

The story took place in 2016 when Prus was a student at the Academy of Arts from the provinces. He had a fee-paying classmate, the son of wealthy parents from Iran, who decided to shoot a full-fledged film as his coursework. He received a budget of several thousand dollars from his father and set an ambitious condition: the main role must be played by Belarusian actress Alesia Hrybok.

At that time, Hrybok was an example of success for acting students in Minsk: she had moved to Moscow, regularly starred in Russian TV series, and earned a living from her profession. "She was a girl who made it," Prus explains.

Ivan's friend, who was the second director on set, offered him the role of administrator. One of his tasks was to find an apartment for the actress and her husband, who were coming for 20 days. A budget of a conditional $500 was allocated for this.

Shabany, dorm bedding, and the stench from the dump

Ivan faced a moral choice: rent a good apartment or save money to keep the difference for himself.

"I started thinking hard about how to save money. I looked for options for daily rentals, but there was nothing. And then I came up with a legend for myself…" the blogger recalls.

Prus decided to rent an apartment long-term, pretending to be a young specialist. His choice fell on a "cozy little apartment in Shabany."

"This is an area located outside Minsk, not far from a dump. The most criminal district of Minsk. It really smelled of a huge dump there," Ivan admits.

The apartment was "more than squalid": it had no dishes, no kettle, no iron, and not even decent bedding. Prus had to bring all of this from his dormitory room.

"I dragged my kettle from the dorm. Well, you can imagine what a kettle in a guy's room looked like? I took my own bedding from the dorm — the kind they issue, with stamps," he recounts.

"Alesia, it's a great area!"

Meeting the actress, Ivan improvised to justify his choice:

"Alesia, you understand, it's summer now, all the apartments are taken! There was an option in the center, but then you wouldn't be able to get to the film set because of endless traffic jams. But here — it's the ring road! There's a shop, a swimming pool, a sauna. In general, it's a great area!"

According to Prus, Alesia Hrybok, although "a bit taken aback," reacted very adequately: she didn't make a scandal and treated the situation with understanding.

"She gets a huge plus for that. She could have wrung her hands and said: 'Guys, have you completely lost your minds?'" says the blogger.

As a result, Ivan earned about $200 from this "scheme." "For me, back then, that was real money. A student in Minsk could easily live for a month on $200," he explains.

The fate of the film, for which all this was done, remained unknown. Prus assumes that the student director never finished the work. And Alesia Hrybok later transitioned from a TV series actress to a popular blogger who films viral TikToks about the secrets of acting.

"Alesia, if you happen to see this clip somewhere, thank you very much for not wringing your hands, for living in Shabany, and for not making a fuss," Ivan Prus addressed the heroine of his memory at the end of the story.

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