 He was a member of the Moscow Art Theatre from 1924 through 1972.Livanov was born in Moscow into a family of the well-known Russian actor Nikolai Alexandrovich Livanov (1874—1949), a Volga Cossack from Simbirsk who moved to Moscow and performed under a pseudonym of Izvolsky.When Boris was 16, he ran away from home and joined the Red Army to fight Basmachi in Turkestan, but soon returned to Moscow and enrolled in the 4th Studio of the Moscow Art Theatre to study acting.