Abraham Littman
Abraham Littman (אברהם ליטמאן) (December 11, 1880 – August 10, 1962), born in Borisov (Barysaw), in the Russian Empire, was a Yiddish-language theatrical producer, director, and impresario active in the United States.
[1] Born in Minsk Guberniya of the Russian Empire in 1880, Littman immigrated to the United States with his sister at the age of fifteen in 1895.
[2] He began working in textile industry sweatshops, but found himself attracted to the thriving Yiddish theatre scene on New York's Lower East Side.
Littman began his Yiddish theater career as an actor but quickly found that his poor eyesight did not permit him to continue in that position.
[5] Though the theater had hosted touring companies operated by managers such as Leon Krim, no Yiddish-language theatrical troupe had yet made Detroit their permanent home.
[2]: 38 Littman and Fishzon renamed it to the Yiddish Playhouse and began theatrical productions for the 1924–25 season to great acclaim with a troupe recruited from the Hebrew Actors' Union.
A reviewer in the Detroit Jewish Chronicle remarked after a performance by the Vilna Troupe in March 1926 that:The depressing inadequacies of the Circle Theater .
Despite every effort to concentrate upon the delightfully spoken lines, one could not but feel the synagogue walls were crowding the congregation out of the place.
The theater's attic was repurposed as an area for the cast to dress and makeup, requiring actors to make a grueling climb up and down three flights of stairs for every change of costume.
These leaders, including Rabbi Morris Adler of Congregation Shaarey Zedek, raised money in hopes of keeping Littman's open permanently.
[12] During 1942–43, the Guild put on productions of Peretz Hirschbein's famed play Green Fields starring Jacob Ben-Ami.
Despite the best efforts of the Guild's executive committee, contract negotiations with Hebrew Actors' Union director Reuven Guskin failed due to budgetary concerns and the project quickly ran out of money.
[14] By this time Yiddish theater in general was in decline as the Jewish community had become significantly more assimilated to American culture and language.
