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Depardieu holds his passport after he was registered as a resident of Saransk, Russia, on Saturday. (AFP)
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Moscow, Feb. 23 (Reuters): Actor Gerard Depardieu has registered as a resident of the provincial Russian city of Saransk, where he plans to open a restaurant far from the high taxes of his French homeland, Russian media said today.
The 64-year-old star of Cyrano de Bergerac and Green Card was in Saransk today to receive a residency stamp in his newly-issued Russian passport, at a lavish ceremony attended by local officials and singers in traditional folk costumes.
Depardieu first moved to Belgium last year to avoid a planned 75-per cent tax on millionaires and has since continued east to Russia, where President Vladimir Putin granted him citizenship in January.
Depardieu has said he did not leave France for tax reasons. Russia, where the actor has appeared in advertising campaigns for ketchup and a film about the monk Grigory Rasputin, has a flat tax of 13 per cent on income.
“For me registration here isn’t a formality. I intend to come here often,” Depardieu said after the ceremony, adding he planned to open “an eatery, where working people will go to snack”.
Saransk, which largely consists of run-down Soviet apartment blocks, is an industrial centre noted for its machine building. Depardieu used to live in a mansion on the Left Bank of the Seine in Paris. Russian media cited the region’s press minister as saying Depardieu also planned to build a small house in the countryside. For now, Depardieu is registered to reside in an apartment in the city.
Located on the Volga river some 620km east of Moscow, Saransk is the capital of Mordovia, a republic in central Russia that was quick to try and persuade Depardieu to set up residence.
France’s constitutional council last month blocked the planned 75 per cent tax rate on income over $1.32 million in December, but the government has said it will press ahead with a redrafted tax on the wealthy.
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