May 06,2011. St.Petersburg,Russia. Pictured: French actor Gerard Depardieu as Rasputin while filming a new movie in Peter and Paul Cathedral of St.Petersburg. French film director Josée Dayan has started to shoot a film about Grigory Rasputin. Gerard Depardieu,the French actor, is to play the lead role of Rasputin in a new film about the life and times of the eccentric Russian monk Grigory Rasputin.