For a number of years, the Museum of
the Yiddish Theatre has been conducting extensive research
into the history of the Yiddish theatre, e.g. the people who
were involved with it, the theatres, the productions, the
actors, the playwrights, the composer and lyricists et al, and
its overall history.
The Museum has a list of nearly
20,000
Yiddish theatre productions once staged in North America.
When available, the list includes the following information: the actor or actress in a
particular play, the date the play opened, the name of the
play, the name of the theatre in which it was staged, and
its location, the name of the author, the composer, the
lyricist, the director and more.
The Museum also has a large collection
of Yiddish theatre photographs. As the Museum's founder is
the archivist for the Yiddish Theatrical Alliance (the
mutual aid society for Yiddish theatre actors and the like),
the collection has been augmented.
With the assistance of many
organizations that hold much material on the Yiddish
theatre, e.g. the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, the
American Jewish Historical Society, the New York Public
Library, Fulton History, as well as the Museum of the City
of New York, not to mention other online resources, the
Museum has been able to conduct a great deal of research,
although there is always so much more research that needs to
be done. The research is ongoing.
Online databases will be created so the
public can freely search for various information regarding
Yiddish theatre, which will be part of the Museum's
Education and Research Center. Until this is done, one may
choose to learn about the lives and tragic ends of some of
those brave angels of the Yiddish theatre, who were killed
or otherwise died as a result of the Holocaust. This is an
ongoing project, to translate nearly five hundred
biographies from volume 5 (the "martyrs volume") of
Zylbercweig's "Lexicon of the Yiddish Theatre," which is
more than sixty percent complete. You can read the English
translations of these "Lexicon" biographies at:
www.museumoffamilyhistory.com/moyt/lex/V5.htm.
The Museum offers to the general public
the opportunity to ask it questions about the Yiddish
theatre, its personnel, etc. If the Museum can be of
assistance, it will gladly do so.
You can contact the Museum at
research@moyt.org.
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