Vilna Troupe
Distinctly Modernist, and strongly influenced by Russian literature and by the ideas of Konstantin Stanislavski, their travels in Western Europe and later to Romania played a significant role in the dissemination of a disciplined approach to acting that continues to be influential in the present day.
[5] As a tribute to Ansky, the Vilna troupe, under the direction of David Herman, utilised the 30-day period of mourning after his death to prepare the play, which opened December 9, 1920, at the Elysium Theatre in Warsaw.
[9] Their 1923 London production of Sholem Asch's The God of Vengeance at the Pavilion Theatre, Whitechapel was shut down by the censor (who had originally passed it based on an English-language synopsis).
An August 23, 1924 article in the daily newspaper Adevărul noted: "Such a demonstration of artistry, even on a small stage such as Jigniţa and even in a language like Yiddish ought to be seen by all who are interested in superior realization of drama.
Among the latter, he cites Zissu, Benjamin Fondane, Ion Marin Sadoveanu, Armand Pascal, Sandu Eliad, Scarlat Callimachi, Dida Solomon, George Ciprian and various authors affiliated with Contimporanul magazine.
[18] Citing cultural historian Ovid Crohmălniceanu, Cernat also concludes that the branch of Expressionism favored by the company followed a distinct path, having its roots in Hasidic Judaism.
[19] The Vilna Troupe was instantly made notorious by its staging of The Deluge, a work by Swedish-born dramatist Henning Berger, which was positively reviewed by the prominent literary magazine Rampa.
[20] The Deluge was a headliner by the company, until it was replaced by Maxim Gorky's The Lower Depths (August 1924)[20] The artistic praise did not pay the bills, and touring elsewhere in Romania only made the financial picture worse.
[20] Their fortunes were salvaged by a 1925 production of Osip Dymov's Der zinger fun zayn troyer ("The Singer of His Sorrow"), created in collaboration with Jacob Sternberg's troupe.
[22] The production was another critical success: writer Victor Eftimiu called it "a model of stylized realist theater",[23] while dramatist Ion Marin Sadoveanu argued that it was comparable to "the best scenes" produced in France by the acclaimed director Jacques Copeau.
[26] Writing in the Warsaw Yiddish-language Literarishe Bleter during the run of Der zinger fun zayn troyer, Joseph Buloff was amazed at the positive reception that Yiddish theater received among the gentiles of Bucharest.
[24] Following the November 1924 establishment of an Amicii teatrului evreiesc (Friends of the Jewish Theatre) association designed to help the troupe recover from its financial slump,[20] several such clubs were set up by Jews and non-Jews in various Romanian localities.
[29] Directed by Sternberg, and endorsed by writers Arghezi, Felix Aderca and Alfred Hefter-Hidalgo, the Marriage production was also at the center of a dispute in the literary community, due to its innovative aesthetics.
[19] During that period, the staging of Ger tzedek was criticized by Contimporanul chronicler Sergiu Milorian, who saw in it proof that traditional "Yiddishist" plays were "unperformable", while arguing that the contribution of painter Arthur Kolnik in "the science" of scenic design was the show's only merit.
[32] The rest of the troupe returned to Bucharest, and then went to Cernăuți (Czernowitz; Chernivtsi), where A. Stein directed a production of Leonid Andreyev's play "Der gedank" (Thought).
[30] In Lwów David Herman staged and directed Jacob Preger's Der nisoyen (The Temptation), in August 1927; and in October, "Yehudis un Holofernes", a Yiddish adaptation of Friedrich Hebbel's Judith.
[30] The troupe then traveled to Kraków, and finally to Warsaw, where they began performing at the Elysium Theater on 22 March 1928, with the following actors: Miriam Orleska, Dovid Birnboym, Helena Gotlib, Esther Goldenberg, Zalmen Hirshfeld, Jacob Waislitz, Ruth Taru, David Licht, Yankev Mansdorf, Naomi and Simkhe Nathan, A. Samberg, Joseph Kamen and Dina Koenig (Kamen), Yankev Kurlender, Batsheva Kremer, Esther Rappel, Perl Ruth, and Shmuel Sheftel.
[30] In May 1928 Michael Weichert staged and directed an epic production of Sholem Asch's Kidesh hashem, with set designs by Władysław Weintraub and music by Henech Kon; hugely popular with audiences, it was performed about 250 times.
[21] In early 1930, company actors also staged Peretz's A Night in the Old Marketplace, later described by Crohmălniceanu as one of the "memorable dates in the history of European Yiddish theater", alongside 1925's Der zinger fun zayn troyer.
In September 1936, Sonia Alomis, Alexander Asro and Noah Nachbush performed a program of short pieces at the New School for Social Research, which The New York Times said "remind[ed] us that they are still an active force in [Jewish] theater.
[20] During the final stages of World War II, following the 1944 Romanian coup d'état, the project was resumed by Baraşeum and Sebastian, resulting in a loose adaptation based not on Berger's original, but on the text as performed by the Vilna Troupe.
