page_title: Abraham Goldfaden
section_title: Bucharest
hierarchical_section_title: Abraham Goldfaden / Bucharest
caption_attribution_description: Romanian-language poster for the Abraham Goldfaden play A Xa poruncă sau Raiul şi Iadul at "Gradina Lieblich Theatru Isralit": The Tenth Commandment [Thou Shalt Not Covet] or Heaven and Hell at Lieblich Garden Israelite Theater. Partial transcription: GRADINA LIEBLICH THEATRU ISRAELIT Sub conducearea renumitului autor A. GOLDFADEN Regisor M. Segalescu Astă-zi LUNI în 6 Julie şi mâine MARŢI 7 Julie 1892 se va representa PENTRU a 3-a şi a 4-a OARE A Xa PORUNCA SAU RAIUL ŞI IADUL לא תחמד ... Mare Oper[illegible] [illegible] A. GOLDFADEN Dec[illegible] Garderoba cu totul nouă Orchestra sub conducerea renumitului Capelmaistru D[-nu] A. PERLMU[missing, presumably "TER"] Preciuri reduse Loja - 12 lei — Stal I - 3 lei — Stal II - 2 lei — Tribună - 1 leu — P[illegible] - 15 bani Inceputul Orchestrei la [illegible, presumably 8] şi jumatate Seara care va [illegible]la overture şi Ridicarea cortenei la 9 ore precis Biletile se gasesc de acum la Casa Liblich N.B. Toate Intr[illegible]ile de favori sunt refu[missing] AVIS: D-nu Perlmuter capelmaistro [illegible] [illegible] schimbul unul onorarie foarte[illegible]
context_page_description: Abraham Goldfaden was a Russian-born Jewish poet, playwright, stage director and actor in the languages Yiddish and Hebrew, author of some 40 plays. Goldfaden is considered the father of modern Jewish theatre.
  In 1876 he founded in Romania what is generally credited as the world's first professional Yiddish-language theater troupe. He was also responsible for the first Hebrew-language play performed in the United States. The Avram Goldfaden Festival of Iaşi, Romania, is named and held in his honour.
  Jacob Sternberg called him "the Prince Charming who woke up the lethargic Romanian Jewish culture." Israil Bercovici wrote of his works: "we find points in common with what we now call 'total theater'. In many of his plays he alternates prose and verse, pantomime and dance, moments of acrobatics and some of jonglerie, and even of spiritualism..."
context_section_description: Buoyed by his success in Lvov, he returned to Bucharest in 1892, as director of the Jigniţa theater. His new company again included Lazăr Zuckermann; other players were Marcu (Mordechai) Segalescu, and later Iacob Kalich, Carol Schramek, Malvina Treitler-Löbel and her father H. Goldenbers. Among his notable plays from this period were Dos zenteh Gebot, oder Lo tachmod (The Tenth Commandment, or Thou Shalt Not Covet), Judas Maccabaeus, and Judith and Holofernes and a translation of Johann Strauss's Gypsy Baron.
  However, it was not a propitious time to return to Romania. Yiddish theater had become a business there, with slickly written advertisements, coordinated performances in multiple cities using the same publicity materials, and cutthroat competition: on one occasion in 1895, a young man named Bernfeld attended multiple performances of Goldfaden's Story of Isaac, memorized it all (including the songs), and took the whole package to Kalman Juvilier, who put on an unauthorized production in Iaşi. Such outright theft was possible because once Ion Ghica headed off on a diplomatic career, the National Theater, which was supposed to adjudicate issues like unauthorized performances of plays, was no longer paying much attention to Yiddish theater. (Juvilier and Goldfaden finally reached an out-of-court settlement.)
  Cutthroat competition was nothing to what was to follow. The 1890s were a tough time for the Romanian economy, and a rising tide of anti-Semitism made it an even tougher time for the Jews. One quarter of the Jewish population emigrated, with intellectuals particularly likely to leave, and those intellectuals who remained were more interested in politics than in theater: this was a period of social ferment, with Jewish socialists in Iaşi starting Der Veker (The Awakener).
  Goldfaden left Romania in 1896; soon Juvilier's was the only active Yiddish theater troupe in the country, and foreign troupes had almost entirely ceased coming to the country. Although Lateiner, Horowitz, and Shumer kept writing, and occasionally managed to put on a play, it was not a good time for Yiddish theater – or any theater – in Romania, and would only become worse as the economy continued to decline.
  Goldfaden wandered Europe as a poet and journalist. His plays continued to be performed in Europe and America, but rarely, if ever, did anyone send him royalties. His health deteriorated – a 1903 letter refers to asthma and spitting up blood – and he was running out of money. In 1903, he wrote Jacob Dinesohn from Paris, authorizing him to sell his remaining possessions in Romania, clothes and all. This gave him the money to head once more to New York in 1904.
caption: This Romanian-language poster for The Tenth Commandment offers an alternate title Heaven and Hell.
exif: {}