The theatre, "Unzer vinkl
(Our Corner)"" was founded in Kharkov, Ukraine, in 1918,
through the initiative group that originated from the
executive members of Yiddish artists and chorister's
union: I. L. Boymvol, M. Rafalski, Wolf Zilberberg and
Nakhum Stutkatch. The idea for the theatre came from
that the cooperative troupes, which were created at the
Kiev conference, were eyntsikvayz (due to the
frequent military revolutions) territorial, became
interrupted from Kharkov, and after that the lone
literary troupe which the association had founded, was
shown to be a moralistic and financial failure.
With much effort is the
initiative - Group successful in concentrating Around a
young creative powers at Yiddish theatre, that seriously
strove to transfer the old Yiddish theatre, and
together, per the friendly elements, the theatre opened
in the Yekaterinski Theatre. The beginning was with the
staging of artistically designed miniatures of known
Yiddish writers and translated scenes, also for the
first time there was staged Yiddish folk songs. the
theatre had a non-kshdikn financial success.
The theatre later went over
to the staging of entire plays, and among them was Dr.
Max Nordau's play "Dr. Kohn", which had a great deal of
success. Soon, however, again there came a military
upheaval after the other, and the troupe fell apart.
Boymvol and Epstein went away to Kiev and were killed on
the way. Others were driven into other turmoil, but
after the conditions became a little more tranquil,
those remaining renewed their work, tsugetsoygn
several articles regarding communal activity, which
founded a "small theatre", which founded a "theatre
committee", which took over the complete financial and
business of the theatre, urging the "small theatre" on
Zhotkinski Pereulak, characteristic of the needed
settings, and with the assistance of several Russian
regisseurs from Sinelnikovs city theatre, performed the
work on a large scale. Through this time there was
staged a range of plays from Asch, Weiter, Goldoni,
Moliere et a. The theatre thus performed for several
years until the Polish offensive against Russia in 1921.
Not being able to in the various upheavals that Kharkov
had again lived through, going over from one power to
the other, the troupe again performed, being part-time
forced to interrupt their productions for several
months.
The "Theatre Committee",
which previously had consisted of the Kharkov Jewish
bourgeois, followed the control of a worker's committee,
which the Jewish socialistic association had created,
and then under the supervision of Naroobroz (People's
Educational Committee), but every one of the committees
hadn't any impact or effect, in the artistic side of the
theatre, what was staged by the Dryers Committee:
Rafalski, Zilberberg and Stutchkoff. When the Bolsheviks
began their counter-offensive against Poland and about
to occupy Vilna, the troupe, which already had possessed
a greater previously performed repertoire, felt that to
make it a bit fresher, they needed to go out on tour and
guest-star, and so it (charged with all that was needed)
set forth in two wagons under the protection of the
Minister of Education Lunacharski. The guest
performances in Vitebsk were received with enthusiasm.
Their fame thus spread to other regions, so that the
troupe was subsequently invited to, but the troupe had
planned to perform in Moscow, but on the way the troupe
performed in Minsk and also there became taken with
excitement.
It had, however, started
with difficult times: Hunger ... three Yiddish troupes
were imported into one theatre. Also the Soviet powers
began to mix in the artistic directors and issued
several demands, to which the troupe did not want to
agree to them, until a certain day [in 1921] when the
name of the troupe 'Unzer vinkl' was taken off the
placards, and the theatre was transformed into a state
theatre.... Under the new circumstances, the actors lost
interest in the type of theatre and were driven in all
directions: to Poland or to Moscow.
The actor Benzion Palepade
in his memoirs stated that on arriving in Kiev he
happened upon about four hundred Jewish actors who
thither traveled together, fleeing due to the unrest
from the small towns:
"There were two theatres
then in Kiev; one art theatre under the name 'Unzer
vinkl', and the other, a cheap theatre that had played
in Podolia.
In 'Unzer vinkl' there was
Esther Rukhl Kaminska, Zigmunt Turkow, Y. Libert, H.
Vaysman, the sister Eidelman and Epstein, a fine actor
who later was tragically killed by raging bands, and a
new, young talent with the name of Sheinberg. The art
theatre had actors under the direction of the then known
author and regisseur Boymvol, and the troupe was a great
one."
The repertoire that was
performed in the theatre consisted of: "God of
Vengeance", "The Time of the Messiah" and "Landsman" by
Sholem Asch, "A Faraway Corner" and "Nevula" by Peretz
Hirshbein, "The Family" by H. D. Nomberg, "Yankel the
Blacksmith" by David Pinski, "The Mute" by A. Veyter, "Yankel
Boile" by Leon Kobrin, and from translations: "Dr.
Cohen" by Dr. Max Nordau, "Jan and Madlena" by Octave
Mirbeau, "Interesn shpil" by Benevento, "Di hotel virtin"
by Goldoni, and ""Skopens shtik" by Moliere.
According to other
information, thre also was staged: "Dos khprh-hindl", a
comedy by Volter, freely adapted by N. Stutchkoff. The
regisseur Tarkhanov staged Zuderman's "Heimat", and the
production "The Eternal Wanderer" by Osip Dymov was done
through Lishin and Shriftzetzer.
In the span of the existence
of "Unzer vinkl", they had at various times changed its
members, which consisted of: I. L. Boymvol, Brown, Rose
Birnbaum, Betty Dalska, Leon Dushman, Chana Dobrovinska,
Vayshof, Wolf Zilberberg, Zigmunt Turkow, Rosa
Yermolina-Vaysman, Marco Milner, Nachum Stutchkoff, Yoel
(Grisha) Epstein, Pikelchik, Sarah Finich, Kaizer, Ida
Kaminska, Steinberg, M. Rafelski, and Leib Shriftzetzer.
Sh. E. from
Nachum Stutchkoff.
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