MOST FAMOUS SINGER IN RUSSIA, BUT 'INVISIBLE' IN THE WEST There is a well-known joke in Russia about a new post-Soviet encyclopedia. The editors describe Leonid I. Brezhnev as a ''minor political figure in the time of Pugacheva.'' Alla Pugacheva, a pop singer who burst into stardom in the mid-1970's, is the most famous woman in Russia. Tempestuous and uninhibited even in the strait-laced days of Communist rule, Miss Pugacheva, who is 48 and living with her fourth husband, still flaunts the kind of diva audacity and self-indulgence that shocks and tantalizes her fans. ''She is not just the most popular singer here,'' said Artyom Troitsky, a former music critic who is now the editor in chief of Russian Playboy. ''She is the most popular human being in Russia.'' She has sold more than 100 million records, as many as Michael Jackson or the Beatles, all in the old Soviet bloc. Beloved by millions of Russian fans as a quintessential Slavic artist, all fiery temperament, womanly suffering and soul, she feels invisible in the West. ''Bette Midler, Tina Turner, they are my colleagues,'' she said somewhat plaintively in an interview in her lavish Bel Air-style apartment in Moscow. ''I want them to know I exist.'' Often likened to Barbra Streisand, Liza Minnelli or Ms. Midler, Miss Pugacheva is perhaps the most vivid illustration of a humbling paradox haunting former Soviet artists. Democracy brought down the barriers to financial success and free expression that had existed under the Communist system, but pop music still flows mainly in one direction, from the West to the East. Moreover, the cachet that some Soviet-era pop musicians had in the United States and Europe back when their music was officially frowned upon at home has evaporated. But even as Miss Pugacheva struggles to make her mark in the non-Russian world, she has already almost single-handedly introduced Hollywood glitz and celebrity spin control into her own country. Miss Pugacheva, whose career took off in 1977 with a hit ballad, ''Arlekino,'' was never a dissident, but her mournful love songs, funky pop tunes and sexy stage presence affronted prim Soviet party officials. She was apolitical, but seen as a free spirit in an era when state-approved entertainers were anything but. Now, she is revered as a national, if slightly naughty, icon. She has declared war against Russia's print-anything tabloids while also marketing her fame to sell everything from perfume and designer shoes to President Boris N. Yeltsin, whose re-election she endorsed last summer. Not surprisingly, Miss Pugacheva is also the subject of the first unauthorized biography of a celebrity to appear in Russia. Titled ''Alka, Allochka, Alla Borisovna,'' the book, by Aleksei Belyakov, traces her many professional triumphs, marriages, tempestuous affairs, seething feuds, breakdowns and comebacks. Overall it is a sympathetic portrait. It is a measure of her clout that the editors at Vagrius, a major publishing house, nervously presented her with a first copy before the book was fully printed. As insurance, they also serialized a few anodyne passages in an influential newspaper, Argumenti i Fakti, whose editor in chief, Vladislav Starkhov, is a friend of Miss Pugacheva. ''I was afraid,'' said the book's publisher, Igor Zakharov. ''I had to jump over her.'' Ms. Pugacheva said she had not yet read the book, but would comb through it for mistakes. Asked if she would sue if the publishers refused to cut parts she considered offensive, she tossed her trademark red-blond mane and replied, ''Of course.'' She has already filed a libel suit against Otar Kushanashvili, a freelance journalist who said nasty things about her on a television entertainment program. Not long after that appearance, he was badly beaten up by thugs. He said Miss Pugacheva was behind the beating. She told the newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda that he must have staged it himself but that he thoroughly deserved it. Miss Pugacheva, always the subject of rumors and back-fence gossip, is publicly on a warpath against the tabloids that have mushroomed across Russia in the last few years. Most have retreated under her fire. ''We went too far,'' said Tatyana Filimovona, deputy editor in chief of Ekspress-Gazeta, which published, then retracted, a story about a rival singer who mocked her age and disparaged her morals. ''We are not afraid of her, but we are afraid of losing our readers,'' Mrs. Filimovona said. ''They don't want to read anything too bad about her.'' She sighed. ''Unfortunately, she is the only real star in Russia. We would prefer more of a constellation. Even when we don't want to write about her, our readers demand still more and more.'' At home, in a vast living room cluttered with gilt Louis XV chairs, posters, awards and portraits, Miss Pugacheva seemed fairly relaxed about the coverage. ''I read the tabloids myself; I like them,'' she said. She laughed off tabloid rumors about her husband, Filipp Kirkorov, a pop star who is 18 years her junior. ''They say everything about him -- some say he is gay, others say he is a terrible womanizer. It is useless to deny or try to prove anything. Only I know that he is what I really need.'' Mr. Kirkorov, who is also her publicity agent and manager, organized a lavish birthday tribute to her last week. About 10,000 fans bought tickets costing $6 to $200 to see the top stars of Russia serenade her with her own songs. Politicans ranging from the ultranationalist Vladimir V. Zhirinovsky to the new First Deputy Prime Minister, Boris Y. Nemtsov, lavished her with flowers and praise. Her husband gave her a white 30-foot stretch Lincoln Town Car filled with roses. Mr. Kirkorov, who recently performed at a a sold-out New York concert in Madison Square Garden for an audience mostly made up of Russian refugees, has been urging her to set her sights on the West. Miss Pugacheva laughingly called him ''minister of my fate.'' She stopped giving live concerts a year and a half ago, in an unsuccessful attempt to have a baby and, she said, in solidarity with unpaid workers who cannot afford her concerts. With the birthday tribute as her triumphant comeback, she is preparing to return to the stage. But she puzzled and disappointed many Russian fans when she decided to enter this year's Eurovision Song Contest, an international pop music competition considered hokey and studiously avoided by well-known singers. Prodded by her husband, she recorded the song she wrote for the contest, ''Prima Donna,'' in French and English as well as Russian. ''I probably will not win,'' she said. ''But I will remind people of who I am. Charles Aznavour is famous worldwide. I am known only here.'' By ALESSANDRA STANLEY Все новости и статьи Клуба "Апрель"