London — A revealing look at the top-secret military complex where the former Soviet Union trained its cosmonauts during the space race in the 1960s. That's what the series that has just arrived on the Apple TV platform promises: Star City . Star City (or Zvyozdny Gorodok, in Russian) was precisely the name of the area, kept isolated on the outskirts of Moscow to ensure the secrecy of operations.
With a focus on espionage, the production is a spin-off of For All Mankind , a science fiction series released in 2019 that reimagined what would have happened if the Soviet Union had won, landing the first man on the Moon, instead of the United States with astronaut Neil Armstrong on July 20, 1969, during the Apollo 11 mission.
Although For All Mankind presented an alternate reality, the series focused on the more obvious side, that of the Americans. More specifically, on the strategic decisions stemming from the frustration of having lost the space race to the then Soviet Union, in the midst of the Cold War.
But a degree of realism was added to the plot. Mainly with the inclusion of historical figures, such as astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin and NASA aerospace engineer Wernher von Braun, which brought a certain familiarity to the series.
“What most differentiates Star City from For All Mankind is precisely the secrecy, the intelligence, and the voyeurism,” stated Ben Nedivi, one of the creators and showrunners of both series, at a press and audience meeting in London, which NeoFeed attended.
“We want the Star City audience to feel like they are spying on the development of the Russian space program. We watch a scene as if we were looking through a window, with the feeling that we shouldn't be watching what's happening there,” said Nedivi, noting that the inspiration didn't come from traditional spy titles, like those starring characters such as James Bond or Jason Bourne in the movies.
Star City evokes the atmosphere of the German drama The Lives of Others (2006), winner of the Academy Award for Best International Feature Film. Set in East Berlin in 1984, the film follows a secret police officer whose life is transformed after spying on an intellectual couple.
The comparison makes sense insofar as everyone is spied on in Star City , which apparently is not a figment of the creators' imagination.
Everything concerning Star City, which to this day houses the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center, was based on research conducted by the production team. And, according to the findings, the cosmonauts and scientists lived under the relentless and invasive surveillance of the KGB, always on the hunt for potential traitors.
In the eight-episode series, what stands out is the isolation of the program's participants and the climate of paranoia in Star City. Fearing that members would abandon the mission or reveal space secrets to the Americans, they were spied on in their homes, in apartments bugged by the KGB.
According to historical records, some participants were still forced into marriage by the State, which sought to control their public image. This was the case of astronaut Valentina Tereshkova, represented here by the character Anastasia Belikova (Alice Englert), who was subjected to an arranged marriage and transformed into a government propaganda tool, conforming to what was expected of the perfect Soviet woman.
“For For All Mankind , we researched the American program, which has always been the subject of many documentaries, films, articles, and books. But we also unearthed the Soviet trajectory, about which we know little. And we were fascinated by that city in the middle of nowhere, which didn't appear on any maps, and by the stories of those who risked everything to go to space while facing an authoritarian and oppressive system,” said Matt Wolpert, another creator and showrunner of the series.
“Many events here are based on real facts, such as those suggesting that the risks were even greater on the Soviet side, with questionable working conditions. As we have shown, there was even a forced landing in the middle of Siberia, where the astronauts were surrounded by wild animals,” he added.
For Nick Murphy, one of the directors of Star City , perhaps the most interesting aspect of presenting the space race from the Soviet perspective is realizing "where the danger lay on the other side": "Although space is hostile by nature, in this new story the greatest threat lies on the ground."
