RE: Yiddish Musical Theatre/Info. needed

[Reyzl Kalifowicz-Waletzky <reyzl...>]

What I can tell you was important to this theater department head was 
having the prompt books of the performed plays.  The prompt books are 
important because they contain the actual instructions and directions of 
who was to stand where and say and do what at each moment in the play. 
 This way you can tell exactly how the play was played and, theoretically 
at least, reconstruct the production.

Someone who is a theater historian AND AND AND someone who speaks Yiddish 
WELL should work with Seymour.  You will forgive me, but I put no stock in 
German film crews to know what they are doing.   What is needed is scores 
of hours of careful scholarly work and not performers who think that if 
they know how to ask some questions they are scholars.   This is especially 
so, since the theater was such a competitive place and the last thing one 
wants is for your informant to reduce or create a history to what fits his 
ego.  The scholar has to know to ask the same questions and go over the 
same material with at least two other witnesses to those same events to get 
even a partial telling of what it was really like.  Remember he is over 80 
and almost everybody else is dead.  So he can claim anything and make up 
whatever he wants up depending on whom he liked and whom he didn't like.

This archive belongs in YIVO and not in Brandeis because the archive of so 
many Yiddish theater stars, composers and directors will sitting right 
nearby to make easy, doable, check-outable research that is possible only 
when you have two different texts sitting next to each other - with or 
without Seymour Rexite in the year 2,000.  A scholar would miss an awful 
lot if he or she would have to travel back and forth between Brandeis and 
YIVO to compare little bits of detail.   It would be highly inefficient and 
little would get accomplished.  Whatever Brandeis has of Yiddish theater 
pales with what there is already in YIVO.

Hankus, don't you think that we should let theater people raise money for 
theater (all those Hollywood and Jewish stars) and let the Klezmer 
Conservatory Foundation raise money for Yiddish music?   Many of these 
actors were directly effected by Yiddish theater, or else know well the 
direct influence the Yiddish theater had on the development of Broadway, so 
let them give to that.  Talking to them to raise money for this very 
important archive would be great I think.

As for the Klezmer Conservatory Foundation, please forgive me for 
expressing my unasked for opinions, but I think that important projects for 
them would be among the following: getting various American Yiddish field 
recordings published, getting an archive of Yiddish radio programs on the 
web (as I have already discussed with you), getting Russian Jewish field 
recordings from the important expeditions published, getting the many 
transcribed Yiddish songs that sit and rot in YIVO out, recording wonderful 
Yiddish actresses such as Shifra Lehrer who knows many unrecorded songs,  
 etc., etc.  There is more than enough money in Hollywood, especially this 
year, for the Yiddish Actors Union archive and it should not be very hard 
to get, e.g., all those who studied with Stella Adler.   (It just so 
happens that Shifra Lehrer sang on WEVD's Forwards Show yesterday.)

I say all this, because five years ago, I offered two different YIVO 
chairmen that I should go myself and raise money for the film archive among 
the many Jewish New York and Hollywood film industry people we know to make 
a real YIVO film archive.  It would be an archive that will at least have 
safe copies of the rare films and maybe even rentable copies for YIVO to 
earn money from their collection.  Although they were very pleased with my 
offer, they never got around to this matter.  All I asked for is 3 pages 
that will describe the present archive and a copy of YIVO's film catalogue 
to have in my hand when I go ask for money.   I got Barbara Streisand to 
contribute a nice chunk of money to YIVO just by telling her how important 
YIVO was at a lunch I had with her when Josh was working as music and 
script consultant on Yentl.  I was willing to try more fundraising among 
our Hollywood connections.   I recently told the new YIVO head this old 
frustration of mine and he has promised to prepare the little bit of paper 
I need to do this fundraising.   Well, he is overwhelmed with his new job. 
  When I will finish with the film archive, I will think about other 
fundraising.


Reyzl




----------
From:  HNetsky (at) aol(dot)com [SMTP:HNetsky (at) aol(dot)com]
Sent:  Saturday, January 08, 2000 3:20 PM
To:  World music from a Jewish slant
Subject:  RE: Yiddish Musical Theatre/Info. needed

This is a very significant matter.  I have sat down with Seymour on several 
occaisions to discuss his remeniscences, and intend to do it more, but time 
is of the essence.  I know that Seymour spent some time with a German film
crew recently, but I don't know how much documentation they did.  I will 
also
discuss the larger issue with folks at Brandeis and with Seymour; perhaps 
we
can do some fundraising through the Klezmer Conservatory Foundation. 
 Anyhow,
Reyzl, thanks for bringing it up.  --Hankus



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