{"@context":"http://iiif.io/api/presentation/3/context.json","id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/iiif/hx15m62v9p/manifest","type":"Manifest","label":{"en":["Salzman, Esta"]},"logo":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/115/original/Boxed_Milken_Center_logo.png?1628711583","metadata":[{"label":{"en":["Preferred Citation"]},"value":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eSalzman, Esta. 2005. Interview by Neil W. Levin. Milken Archive Oral History Project. 26 May.\u003c/p\u003e"]}},{"label":{"en":["Publisher"]},"value":{"en":["Milken Family Foundation"]}},{"label":{"en":["Rights Statement"]},"value":{"en":["\u003cp\u003e© Milken Family Foundation. Unauthorized use is prohibited. For inquiries, please contact info@milkenarchive.org.\u003c/p\u003e"]}},{"label":{"en":["Agent"]},"value":{"en":["Salzman, Esta (Performer)","Levin, Nevil W. (Interviewer)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Date"]},"value":{"en":["2005-05-26 (interview)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Coverage"]},"value":{"en":["New York, NY (Place of Recording)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Language"]},"value":{"en":["English (Primary)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Description"]},"value":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eOral history interview with Esta Salzman, actor, singer, and dancer in the American Yiddish theater.\u003c/p\u003e"]}},{"label":{"en":["Format"]},"value":{"en":["Beta SP"]}},{"label":{"en":["Subject"]},"value":{"en":["Theater, Yiddish -- United States (Topical Term)","Jews--Music (Topical Term)","Vaudeville (Topical Term)","Oral Histories","Olshanetsky, Alexander, 1892-1946 (Person or Corporate Body)","Yablakoff, Hermann, 1903-1981 (Person or Corporate Body)","Meisel, Bella, 1902-1991 (Person or Corporate Body)","Lebedeff, Aaron, 1873-1960 (Person or Corporate Body)","Kalich, Bertha, 1874-1939 (Person or Corporate Body)","Jacobs, Jacob, 1890-1977 (Person or Corporate Body)","Adler, Jacob Pavlovich, 1855-1926 (Person or Corporate Body)","Rechtzeit, Seymour, 1908-2002 (Person or Corporate Body)","Rumshinsky, Joseph, 1881-1956 (Person or Corporate Body)","Schwartz, Maurice, 1890-1960 (Person or Corporate Body)","Skulnik, Menasha, 1892-1970 (Person or Corporate Body)","Secunda, Sholom, 1894-1974 (Person or Corporate Body)","Zwerling, Yetta, 1894-1982 (Person or Corporate Body)","Singing (Topical Term)","Improvisation (Acting) (Topical Term)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Keyword"]},"value":{"en":["A Freylekh Mishpokhe, A ganeydn far tzvey, Aaron Lebedeff (1873-1960), ABC, Abraham (Abe) Ellstein (1907-1963), Abraham Goldfaden (1840-1908), “A gute heym,”Akeydos Yitskhok, Alexander Olshanetsky (1892-1946), Anna Lucasta, Annie Thomashefsky, Arnold Perlmutter (1859-1953), Baltimore, Maryland, “Bay mir bistu sheyn,” Bella Finkel (1898-1971), Bella Meisel (1902-1991), Berele Tremp (1921), Bertha Kalich (1874-1939), Bessie Thomashefsky (1873-1962), Billy Crystal (1948-Present), Boris Thomashefsky (1866-1939), Borscht Belt, Boston, Massachusetts, Broadway, Brooklyn, Bruce Adler (1944-2008), Café Royal, Catskill Mountains, Chicago, Chicks and Boy Chicks, Chorus girls, Circus Girl, Come Blow Your Horn, Concord Hotel, Conway Tearle (1878-1938), Danny Kaye (1911-1987), Dave Lubritsky (1903-1959), David Meyerowitz (1867-1943), De Galitzianer Rebbe, De Goldene Kaleh, De Vilna Balabassel, Denver, Michigan, Der Katerinshtshik (1933), Detroit, Di Circus Meydl, Dora Weissman (1855-1936), Drama, Esther Salzman, Europe, Fannie Lubritsky, Farblondzshet Honeymoon, Florida, Folksbiene, Gary Society, Gertrude Berg (1899-1966), Go Fight City Hall, Godfrey Tearle (1884-1953), Goldie Lubritsky, Hal March (1920-1970), Hannah Hollander, Hayntike meydlekh, Hebrew Actors Union, Henrietta Jacobson (1906-1988), Herman Wohl (1877-1936), Herman Yablokoff (1903-1981), Hollywood, “Ikh bin a ‘boarder’ bay mayn vayb” (1922),“Ikh bin farlibt,” Ikh hob dikh tsufil lib (1934), Improvisation, In gortn fun libe, In nomen fun got, Incidental Music, Irving Jacobson (1898-1978), Isidore Lilian (1882-1960), Itzik Feld (1897- 1943), Jack Kreitzberg, Jack Lemmon (1925-2001), Jacob Jacobs (189-1977),  Jacob Pavlovich Adler (1855-1926), Jennie Goldstein (1895-1960), Jetta Goudal (1891-1985), Joseph Rumshinsky (1881-1956), Joseph Sheingold, Julia Adler (1899-1997), Julius Adler (1906-1994), Keystone comedy, kunst theater, Lasky Studio, Leb un lakh (1941), “Lebn Zol Columbus,” Lennox Theater, Leo Fuchs (1911-1994), Liberty Theatre, Lillian Lux (1918-2005), Lisa Lubin, Litvish, Los Angeles, Louis Gilrod (1879-1930), Luba Kadison (1906-2006), Lucy Levin (1906-1939), Lyric Theater, M’ken lebn nor m’lost nit, Majority Of One, Malvina Lobel, Man of La Mancha (1965), Martyn Green (1899-1975), Maurice Schwartz (1890-1960), Menasha Skulnik (1892-1970), Michael Burstyn (1945-Present), Michal Michalesko (1888-1957), Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Mina Bern (1911-2010), Miriam Kressyn (1910-1996), Miss Sparkle, “Mit dir in einem,” Molly Picon (1898-1992), Montreal, Moscow, Muni Serebrov (1895/97-1975), Murray Rumshinsky, Musical Comedy, Nathan Goldberg, National Roof Garden, National Theatre, New York, “Nu, zog mir shoyn ven” (1935), Oscar Ostrov, Ottawa, Oy, Iz Dos a Meydl, Papirosen, Paramount Theater, Paul Muni (1895-1967), Paul Muni (1895-1967), People’s Theatre, Philadelphia, Phyllis Diller (1917-2012), Pinsk, Pirates Of Penzance, Radio City Music Hall, Rebecca Weintraub (1873-1952), Repertory theater, Richard Kiley (1922-1999), Richard Tucker (1913-1975), Robert Merrill (1917-2004), Rose Greenfield, Rosie Goldberg, Salome of the Tenements, “Samet un zayd,” Samuel Goldenberg (1886-1954), Schmendrick’s Kalle, Scholem Asch (1880-1957), Second Avenue, Segel Theater, Seymour Rechtzeit (1908-2002), Sholom Secunda (1894-1974), “It Shouldn’t Happen to a Dog,” Silent movie, Singing, Sivilla Rayz, Summer Stock, The Civic Opera House, The Clinton Theater, The Kiddush Hashem, The Kosher Widow, The Liberty Theater, The Parkway Theater, The People's Theater, The Zulu and the Zayda (1965), Toronto, Ulysses, Uncle Willie, Uptown, Downtown, Vaudeville, Virginia, “vo seh ikh yetz,” Vos meydlekh tuen, William Siegel (1893-1966), Williamsburg, Yetta Zwerling (1894-1982), Yossel und Zayn Vayber, Zayn yiddishe meydle, Zero Mostel (1915-1977)"]}}],"summary":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eOral history interview with Esta Salzman, actor, singer, and dancer in the American Yiddish theater.\u003c/p\u003e"]},"requiredStatement":{"label":{"en":["Attribution"]},"value":{"en":["\u003cp\u003e\u0026copy; Milken Family Foundation. Unauthorized use is prohibited. For inquiries, please contact info@milkenarchive.org.\u003c/p\u003e"]}},"provider":[{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/aboutus","type":"Agent","label":{"en":["Lowell Milken Center for Music of American Jewish Experience"]},"homepage":[{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/","type":"Text","label":{"en":["Lowell Milken Center for Music of American Jewish Experience"]},"format":"text/html"}],"logo":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/115/original/Boxed_Milken_Center_logo.png?1628711583","type":"Image"}]}],"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/collection_resource_files/thumbnails/000/110/802/small/Esta-Salzman1.jpg?1618940762","type":"Image","format":"image/jpeg"}],"items":[{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802","type":"Canvas","label":{"en":["Media File 1 of 1 - L3914_Esta_Salzman_Combined_Final.mp4"]},"duration":4537.00267,"width":640,"height":360,"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/collection_resource_files/thumbnails/000/110/802/small/Esta-Salzman1.jpg?1618940762","type":"Image","format":"image/jpeg"}],"items":[{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/content/1","type":"AnnotationPage","items":[{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/content/1/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"painting","body":{"id":"https://aviary-p-milken.s3.wasabisys.com/collection_resource_files/resource_files/000/110/802/original/L3914_Esta_Salzman_Combined_Final.mp4?1616173997","type":"Video","format":"video/mp4","duration":4537.00267,"width":640,"height":360},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802","metadata":[]}]}],"annotations":[{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877","type":"AnnotationPage","label":{"en":["Interview with Esta Salzman [Transcript]"]},"items":[{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"OPENING GRAPHIC","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=0.0,14.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/2","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: The Civic Opera House was in 1941, two, three, something like that.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: : Two, I believe.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Forty two.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Or three, three.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: See, you remember better than I do. Was that Maurice Schwartz?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=14.0,29.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/3","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: Maurice Schwartz.  We were doing the Kiddush Hashem. And it was amazing.  We only were there for a weekend, totally sold out at the Civic Opera House.  You know, the capacity that they can accommodate? It was amazing.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: That show had incidental music.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yes.  And, uh, the conductor was Joseph Rumshinsky. He came along with us.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: That's already…like art theater.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Kunst Theater. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Kunst.  \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: So, now the big question is how did you get into the Yiddish Theater at the Second Avenue? How did it all being?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=29.0,71.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/4","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eESTA SALZMAN:\u003c/strong\u003e Yeah.  There was a company rehearsing at the Liberty Theater in Brooklyn. And the company consisted of some of the Jacob P. Adler’s daughters; Julia and Frances, and her husband, Joseph Shayngold. And my father had five other brothers that were in the theater, in the technical end.  My father was backstage while the rehearsal was going on, and, uh, he was painting a set.  'Cause he, that's what he did.  And the company suddenly stopped rehearsal, and they said, “Now, what are we going to do?”  They said, “We have to have a child.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=71.0,116.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/5","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eESTA SALZMAN:\u003c/strong\u003e The child is of utmost importance to be in this play.  What are we gonna do? We need a child.”  So my father walked up to them and said ‘Ikh hob’, translated “I have”.  And he brought me to the theater, and I never left for 75 years after that.  My second experience at the same Liberty Theater was with Bessie Thomashefsky, Boris Thomashefsky's wife.  And what happened, she loved to have a change of costume, and they didn’t know how to work it.  So, she sang the song, and then she went offstage. While she was offstage changing her costume, they put me into the box, like Lincoln  ̶  except I was not shot.  And I sang the same chorus that she just sang, which gave her adequate time to change her costume.  That was number two. I did so many things I can't remember.  I worked with the biggest of them.  Bertha Kalich, who was really the most talented, and her throat was like an orchestra.  She absolutely was fantastic.  I worked with Lobel. I worked with Jenny Valliere. I worked with Menasha Skulnik, Molly Picon and, and endlessly. I'd go on and on and on.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=116.0,209.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/6","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: What was the show at the Liberty?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: At the Liberty Theater?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No, I don’t recall.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And you were just a little girl, you had no training?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: None.  None whatsoever.  We never had training.  The people in the Yiddish Theater didn’t have training.  It was like on the, on the job training. Because I remember very distinctly, they said to me, can you sing? I didn’t have the vaguest idea of whether I could sing or not.  So, I sang.  From then on, I was singing.  They said, can you dance?  I'll tell you how I got into dancing, that's a little bit later on.  But the singing, apparently, they said I had a very good voice.  I had no knowledge of anything.  They used to take me to, uh, homes of very, very affluent people.  And they would bring a lot of people there.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=209.0,260.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/7","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: And they were doing charity work for orphanages.  And they had me sing sad songs, which I did.  And then they accumulated a lot of money, and then I went to the next one.  And that's how I kept going and going and going.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: You were born in New York?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Boston. Boston, Massachusetts.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Your father and mother came from Europe?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: What's the background there?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I don’t know much about it.  They came from Pinsk.  My father studied in Moscow, uh, being an artist.  And he wound up being the technical end of the theater.  My father and brothers did a lot of sets for Radio City Music Hall.  And my uncle was very, very talented, and he built a, uh, electric board for the lights in the theater. It was such a miraculous thing that he did, that they came from Broadway to look at that. And they did this likewise  ̶ they did the same thing  ̶  but 10 times enlarged for the Radio City Music Hall. I had a very talented family.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=260.0,334.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/8","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: And Yiddish was the language at home?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: At home, that's how I learned Yiddish.  And I could read and write, but I never studied.  My father wrote the alef beys, the alphabet, and that's how I studied, and I got the part in Yiddish.  The script.  And then I rewrote it in latein, we called it ‘latein’, in English, so I could read it faster, because my reading of the Yiddish was slow.  And I had a fantastic memory.  I memorized overnight, verbatim.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: How did you, as a child, because from the time you were six years old, or seven, whatever it is you were until a certain age you could be called a child actress. So how did that… how did that mix with your schoolwork and going to school?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=334.0,392.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/9","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: Oh, you had to get permission from the Gary Society. The mayor had to give you permission.  If I had to leave to be at a theater, they let me go home before.  And my mother always had to accompany me, naturally.  But, uh, it, that was no problem.  It got to a point where I used to just go and, and my mother would sign a paper, and I went.  That was it.  But it had to go through the, uh, government, more or less.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And that then became…you never stopped. You went on and on. So, tell me about let’s say the, uh, some of the shows that you were in already as an adult actress, but a young adult actress.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: It got to a point where I became too adult for children's parts, and not enough for an adult part.  So, I joined a chorus.  And I joined the chorus, I believe it was the Segel Theater in Williamsburg.  No, the Lyric Theater, Lyric Theater in Williamsburg, and I learned how to dance.   I, I followed the other girls, what they were doing, and I did likewise.  I, I was very quick at learning.  And, uh, that's how I got my singing and dancing career started in the chorus.  And as soon as I got older enough, I did my tests for the union, the members of all the union.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=392.0,487.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/10","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eESTA SALZMAN:\u003c/strong\u003e And they passed me, with honors.  And then they put me into a show; I don't remember the name.  I was so naive at the time that it didn’t faze me one way or another.  I worked with Michael [Michal] Michalesko, Annie Thomashefsky, Rebecca Weintraub. These were, these were legends, really.  And I was on with, on stage with these stars, you know.  And that's how it all started.  Then I, then I became, um, mostly musical comedy.  I went into that.  And I worked with Menasha Skulnik for years and years. I worked with Molly Picon for very many years, and we became very close friends.  I worked with Herman Yablokoff. I worked with Aaron Lebedeff. You name them, as we called them, the Baeren  ̶  the big shots of the theater.  And I worked with all of them, and I was very privileged.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=487.0,548.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/11","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: You’re a big shot too, I see your name on all kinds of cast lists.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I don’t recall the names of the plays, or anything.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Well, when you do so many. How many shows were you in in your lifetime – Yiddish shows?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Oh my goodness, hundreds.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Hundreds.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Hundreds.  Absolutely.  In fact, I went into Chicago for a season.  They employed me there.  And you know who else was employed?  Uh, an English actor, but he never made it, because while he was rehearsing there, he received a telegram that Hollywood wanted him.  I can't think of his name right now.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: You don’t mean Jack Lemon.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Tony Curtis, Tony Curtis, yeah.  He was gorgeous, he really was.  And they got a letter, so he left the company.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: His name was Schwartz.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Schwartz, originally, yes, yes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: He was originally playing in the Yiddish Theater?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: He, they, supposed to, but he never made it.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=548.0,608.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/12","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: That was in Douglas Park, probably.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Douglas Park Theater.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Lawndale.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Lawndale, absolutely.  No, the, Douglas Park. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: It’s the same thing.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN:  Right. The same neighborhood. So that's where it, and I stayed there for, um, six months.  I must tell you that I think one of the critics, I think he was in love with me.  'Cause he, he referred to me as ‘Miss Sparkle’.  And I got the most fantastic reviews, which I never saved.  I never thought of it in that sense.  And, uh, Jennie Goldstein opened there, with Mikhel Michalesko.  And every time, we called it Gastrolieren.  They brought a star from New York for the company in Chicago.  I cannot begin to tell you how many plays we did there, because we were a repertory theater.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=608.0,661.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/13","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eESTA SALZMAN:\u003c/strong\u003e Mid-week, we could do a different show for four nights. Different shows.  Weekends, the same thing.  And if the play was there for a weekend, maybe, maybe we would do it for three weekends.  And I'll never forget when I returned from Chicago.  I got off the plane, I kept all my parts  ̶  this high.  My mother said to me, in Yiddish, she said, “If you would have studied like this in college, you would have been a professor!”  And it's so true.  I used to memorize, I, my, I'm, my memory was incredible. It really was.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=661.0,699.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/14","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: This was already in the fifties? No, could have been in the forties. Must have been.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Um, forties.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah.  Uh, no.  Yes, you’re right, in the forties.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Douglas Park was finished by the fifties, and the Jews moved out.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Oscar Ostrov (sp?) was the manager.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Where did they put you up?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: What do you mean?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: In hotels?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN:  No, I lived with a family. They, the, this family happened to be a little bit affluent, so they invested in the theater.  That's where I stayed.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And I was going back to some of the…What would you say were a couple of your favorite parts throughout your whole career?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=699.0,754.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/15","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: Well, actually, I did, I did comedy.  I loved the part I did with Molly in Farblondzshet Honeymoon.  It was very successful.  I had a number there; I did a duet with another actor.  And I was, uh, playing a pregnant woman.  I didn’t put a pillow in or anything, but my posture showed the audience that I was pregnant.  And then we sang a song.  I don’t recall the song.  And then we did a little bit of a dance; very gently, lightly. But I was not that way.  So I started to dance, crazy, crazy, crazy  ̶  tore the house down.  That was it. It was wonderful.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN Farblondzshet Honeymoon.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN:  Farblondzshet Honeymoon.  Yeah.  That was that show.  I did a lot of shows with Molly. I did Circus Girl with her.  Kosher Widow with her.  Uh, I can't even remember all the shows.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And with Skulnik.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Skulnik  ̶  for many, many years.  Many years.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Was he funny off stage, too?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No.  Not at all.  Not at all.  Totally different.  Dual personality.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=754.0,836.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/16","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: What other roles did you love, did you look back upon with great fondness?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: You know, I never thought of, I have to admit to something.  I never thought of myself as being an actress or a dancer or a singer, whatever.  And a friend of mine who's an actress said to me, you were never dedicated.  I said, the truth of the matter is, I never was dedicated.  All I knew was I had to get salary and bring it home to Mama.  That’s all I was interested in.  But nevertheless, if there were four theaters going on Second Avenue, I happened to have four offers.  So, I took inventory of myself one night.  I said, I must have something if I get offered from all the theaters, and I had to make a choice for which. And I always chose the right one, fortunately.  But the experience with Maurice Schwartz was very interesting.  He always liked tall women, and I'm certainly not tall.  At that time, I was, like, five two and a half.  Since then, I'm shorter  ̶  naturally.  And, uh, he was very upset, because he wanted me to do the play, and, but he was very disappointed that I was so short.  So, we were doing a dress rehearsal of Kiddush Hashem. And his wife came running up to him and said, “Maurice, Maurice, she looks very tall.”  When I wear, well, I'll tell you the truth, I do.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=836.0,933.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/17","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eESTA SALZMAN:\u003c/strong\u003e When I'm on stage with a long gown, I give a very tall, not very tall, but five six, which was a nice height.  So, she said, “She’s, she looks tall, she looks tall.”  So, he was a little bit satisfied that I looked tall.  Whatever.  But that was a, quite an experience.  I got very good notices for that show, too.  They said that I could be a very, very splendid dramatic actress.  I put no emotion into it.  (laugh) It didn’t faze me one way or another.  I was never into it that much.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=933.0,971.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/18","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eESTA SALZMAN:\u003c/strong\u003e Then I'm going to relate this story to you that I did a silent movie.  And they called the Hebrew Actor's Union to get all the children that they could get.  The car was crowded; it was like a Keystone comedy.  We were about 10 children in one car.  And it so, I, by that time, I was an actress, and my mother bought me  ̶  'cause to be an actress, I have to wear special clothes  ̶  a white rabbit coat.  And it so happens that I had to sit on Seymour Rechtzeit’s lap.  And my coat shed.  He wanted to kill me, 'cause he had the white fur all over his navy blue suit.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=971.0,1011.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/19","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN:  Anyway, I was selected to do the movie; a silent movie  ̶ don’t remember the name of it.  We tried to look it up, my friend Carrie tried to look it up for me.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Salome of the Tenements.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Salome of the Tenements, yeah.  But it's not, it doesn’t exist.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: What do you mean, it doesn’t exist?  It's lost?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: It, it was, yes.  It's so old, and they, the, I think they, they lost all the movies that they did there, in that, from that time on.  It's a long time ago.  It's gotta be 80 some odd years.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: These are silent movies with, um.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I was at the Lasky Studio.  (overlapping) English, but silent.  With, uh, English subtitles. Jetta Goudal was the star, if you ever heard of her.  And the leading man  ̶  there were two brothers, I don’t remember which one, Conway or Godfrey Tearle  ̶  those were the two stars.  So, the director, after, Friday, I ate in the commissary.  My mother, of course, ate a box lunch.  Oh, incidentally, my mother was an extra in that. She got paid, too, 'cause they needed people around pushcarts.  So, my mother was purchasing tomatoes, or whatever.  And, uh, the director came to us after the day's work and he said, “It’s Friday.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1011.0,1099.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/20","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN:  I know we generally don’t work on Saturday, but you have to work on Saturday.”  So, my mother, in her broken English, said to him, “She can't do it.”  He said, “What do you mean, she can't do it?”  “Well”, she said, “she has another commitment.”  “What do you mean?”  “She has a matinee to do tomorrow afternoon with Malvina Lobel.” A fabulous actress.  And I had a contract.  You don’t break contracts.  He said to me, “What are you trying to tell me, I have to cancel everything here because she has a matinee?”  My mother said, “A contract's a contract.  A commitment's a commitment.” He said, “We'll manage somehow.”  I went to work Saturday.  He gave me police escort up to the Lenox Theater on Lenox Avenue. Those are little things that remain with me, you know.  They’re indelibly in my mind.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: So you were in big demand.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I wanna tell you, I wish I made that much money now that I did then.  And for the movie, my family bought a seven passenger Studebaker sedan for the money that I earned in the movie.  Everything is relative, you know.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah, of course. In some shows, you did more singing?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Comedy, singing, and dancing.  Comedy, singing, and dancing.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: The comedies, yeah. Do you remember any of the songs that you particularly loved, that were your favorites?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1099.0,1194.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/21","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: Woch Joch Joch.  It was a song that Olshanetsky wrote.  We had a lot of wonderful music.  In fact, uh, Danny Kaye's agent said to my late husband, if you can try, we used to do an act in the Catskill Mountains, the Borscht Belt.  So, he came to see us, 'cause Danny Kaye was working in another place in the Catskill Mountains.  And he said to my husband, “If you can translate these songs that you do here, I will sign you to a contract.  Can't translate those things.”  Where I would sing, in one song, I was what they call a (speaks in Yiddish) Deaf and dumb.  So, you did it with motions.  You got to the, the storyline.  It was very funny.  And then, and in another he did, he was, um, what they called a ‘stimme je je’.  One that stutters.  Um, so you couldn’t translate those, it loses itself.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah, of course.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah, so unfortunately, we couldn’t do it. Otherwise, we, we would still be working.  But we were very flattered that he made us that offer.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1194.0,1265.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/22","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: So, you were in the theater during the whole arc of its great days and its decline.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Yes, yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And so to you...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I worked with Jennie Goldstein in the People's Theater on the Bowery, and loved that job, because in between the scenes that I had with her  ̶  I played a little boy, newspaper boy, her brother  ̶  there was a stable, with horses, in back of the theater.  So, I used to play, play with the horses in between scenes.  I loved to go there.  I said, “When am I going back to the stable?”  Not to the theater.  When are we going to the stable? Ah, that's it.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1265.0,1301.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/23","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Was your husband involved in the theater?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yes, he was.  We were, we were a team for a while.  Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And his name was?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Lubritsky. And he had two sisters.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Fanny [Fannie] Lubritsky?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Fanny Lubritsky and Goldie Lubritsky, that were in the theaters.  Yes.  And he was Dave Lubritsky.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: So, you were on stage together...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) For many years.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: For shows, and in?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Yeah, many, many shows, yeah.  It was interesting.  We had a lot of fun, we had a lot of heartache.  We had, it was interesting.  As long as I could get the money to Mama.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: How did it…You say you didn’t put much into it, but obviously, this was a way of life.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yes, absolutely.  I had no other profession.  I didn’t know what to do.  I had very little, uh, education.  In those years, going to high school or college, that was a luxury item.  Couldn’t afford that.  Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: But you found a whole life in the Yiddish Theater.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yes, I did.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Was it that way for most people in the theater?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1301.0,1380.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/24","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: I have no idea.  I can't speak for the, for others.  Some of them were very, we had some very, very talented people in the Yiddish Theater.  Very talented.  Extremely so.  And some that were not that great, but they got along  ̶  and so be it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: You could be in a bunch of shows in one year.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Not on Second Avenue.  On Second Avenue, we used to stick, during the week, we also had some repertory. But weekends, if the show was a hit, we could do 26 weeks of a show for weekends.  And then when that was finished, we went to the Borscht Belt to work.  I never remember not working; never remember not working.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: What about Vaudeville?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1380.0,1426.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/25","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: Did vaudeville too.  Clinton Theater, the National Theater.   That's where we, all the vaudeville was.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Wasn't there an outdoor roof garden or something?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Oh, that's the National Roof Garden.  We were doing vaudeville at the National Theater.  Zero Mostel was doing Ulysses at the Roof Garden at the same time.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: In Yiddish?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No, he did English.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I meant in Yiddish theater vaudeville, skits.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yiddish vaudeville, yes, of course.  Richard Tucker started with us.  And, uh, Robert Merrill started with us, in the Yiddish vaudeville, yeah.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1426.0,1464.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/26","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: And, how did you…how did you see it change, in the theater?\u003cbr\u003e\t\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Now?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Well, not now. Now it’s gone, but let’s say…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Well, because of the immigration, that stopped, you know; that's what really did it, did us in.  Um, there's only one Yiddish theater now.  It's, uh, the Folksbiene as you well know.  Um, and they do it now with English subtitles.  But you know, I spoke to Lily (Lillian) Lux today, and I know that Michael, Michael [Burstyn] Burstein came in from California.  He received a Drama Desk Award for doing it on Second Avenue. He was wonderful in it. I went to see it at the Yiddish Folksbiene.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Now?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: A couple weeks ago, yeah.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1464.0,1524.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/27","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: And, uh, and then there's Brucie [Bruce] Adler, that came from not the Adler family, not Jacob Pete [Jacob Pavlovich Adler].  His father's name was Julius Adler, and his mother's name was Henrietta.  Henrietta Jacobson. She was the sister of Irving Jacobson, who did the Man of La Mancha originally with Richard Kiley. You, you remember Irving Jacobson?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Wasn't he involved in Second Avenue before that?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Irving Jacobson?  Sure, he was my boss for many years, too.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yes, he was a producer.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: When you did a big show, whether it was in the Second Avenue Theater or the National Theater, the Public Theater or any of the big theaters, a musical by Olshanetsky. I imagine you probably did a lot of musicals by Olshanetsky.  \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Oh yes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Was he?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: And Rumshinsky.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) And Rumshinsky.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Rumshinsky, Olshanetsky.   (overlapping) It was a Jack, Jack Kreitzberg. Jack.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yes, there was, I know the name. Jack Kreitzberg.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Uh, and lyrics by Isadore [Isidore] Lillian. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Lillian.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Fabulous people, the best.  The best in the business.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1524.0,1597.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/28","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Herman Wohl, do you remember him?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Vaguely, but I know the name.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: He wrote with (Arnold) Perlmutter. That's …\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah, Perlmutter, right.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) You’re too young for that.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Right.  Well, there is something before my time, you know. Not too much, but there is.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1597.0,1611.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/29","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) (Abe) Ellstein, of course.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Oh, I know him very well.  'Cause he did a lot of things for Molly, yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) You must have been in a lot of Ellstein shows.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) I was, yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Singing songs.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yes, I was.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Any way, getting back to a big show…how much rehearsal did you have before big shows?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Two, two and a half weeks, three weeks, tops.  That was it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Tops.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Tops. Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Which is not a lot for a show.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Not a lot, but we, we did it.  We had that training.  We could do it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And the dialogue came from handwritten scripts? Typed scripts, or whatever?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1611.0,1654.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/30","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: No, no, we used the same dialogue in the Yiddish Theater.  It was very peculiar, because when I used to be on stage  ̶  let's say my father was working backstage, technically  ̶  and I, I used the Yiddish that they used in the theater, and then I came off, and I wrote, spoke Yiddish to my father, but with a Litvish. It was so peculiar, how automatically, I went from that to this.  It was so, the, the actors used to think it was, uh, the funniest thing they ever heard.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: You mean you went from...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) From the regular Yiddish that they used in the theater.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Which is like a Galician.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Right.  And my, and my parents were Litvaks, so, that's what I spoke.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: So you didn’t say Duca Maedl.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Right.  Right, exactly.  Exactly.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And you just switched automatically.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Automatically, without giving it a thought.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: …Git? From the git became gut.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Gut.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: From git became gut, which is the correct way.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Exactly, exactly.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Yeah, I mean...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) But if you had to do a part with a Galician accent, you did it.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1654.0,1722.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/31","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) But, everybody spoke that way in the theater, didn’t they?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) We, we could do everything.  The Yiddish, the performers were very versatile.  Versatile.  Very.  And a lot of them were extremely talented.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And what happened to the script? Did you memorize your scripts quickly?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Overnight.  Overnight.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And then what, you threw it away?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: That's it.  Now I don’t recall any of them.  And then, uh, in latter years, uh, I was get, becoming disillusioned with the theater.  It wasn't, it wasn’t to my liking.  So, I did a one woman show, written by Murray Rumshinsky.  Not a one.  Yeah.  Murray wrote six or eight numbers for me, and I did a one woman show.  I did for an hour, an hour and a half, on stage.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: So, this show was by Murray Rumshinsky. You said…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No, No. He wrote special material for me  ̶  songs. And he was very funny. Murray was a very funny fellow. And I did very well with a one woman show. I made a living for myself. I raised my son by myself. It was great.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: This show was done in New York too? Or just in Los Angeles?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) No, no. The show that he wrote for me, I wanted to sort of break it in. I did it in the Borscht Belt, which is a wonderful place. And I did that. And then I worked in a nightclub in Philadelphia. English. Yiddish. I went in there for a weekend and stayed seven; and Montreal, too. I did a lot of that. \t\t\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And did it play in Los Angeles?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1722.0,1824.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/32","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Los Angeles, we did plays when we came, like we did for Farblondzshet Honeymoon, in, in Los Angeles.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: The whole production?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: The whole thing.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: But with Murray...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: With Murray, just a one woman show....\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) This was before he moved out there?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Oh, yes. Way before, yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) I would say that was in, already in the '60s, '70s. Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: He did it in a theater?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) I did it in, in a theater, in, uh, in a social hall...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: ...wherever.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Did he play in it?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: He was a very good pianist.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: He was fabulous.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Wonderful piano player.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) He used to be our pianist when we did the shows.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: He worked with his father.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1824.0,1866.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/33","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: ... Did you ever hear of a show that he wrote called Chicks and Boychiks?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: That was his? Murray’s.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Yeah, yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah, Murray's. I heard of, but I never...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: It’s not really…It’s more for the Borscht..\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Borscht Belt. Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Go Fight City Hall?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No, I never, I never did that.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Did you do shows by his father? Did you do Rumshinsky shows?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Oh, of course.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Sure.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1866.0,1887.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/34","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: A lot of them. Of course, Rummy wrote for Molly. And I did a lot of shows with him. And I can't remember the titles of them. I did a lot with her.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I mean, I’ve got a whole list of titles here. Let’s just see if this rings any bells…De Circus Meydl?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I was in that with her.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: That’s a Rumshinsky show. Yossel und Zayn Vayber.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: That I don’t know.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: De Goldene Kalleh ?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No. De Goldene Kalleh I think had Paul Muni's wife in that.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Maybe. Louis Gilrod wrote it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: He wrote the lyrics, I think.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Oy, Iz Dos a Meydl\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: That I did with her.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Of course, that was with Molly. Moi Mosel Keytag. That was with Jacob Jacobs.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1887.0,1937.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/35","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: I worked with him for years, too  ̶  for years. He had the Parkway Theater.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: His wife...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Betty Jacobs  ̶  Malvina Lobel's sister.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Really?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Rosie Greenfield's sister.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Again...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Mishpokhe, mishpokhe.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Mishpokhe...this is one big family. Everybody was marrying everybody else.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Exactly. And then some.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: It was a world.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: It was. It certainly was; a little world of our own. Yeah. She had, uh, um, I'm trying to, no, uh, Nathan Goldberg was Jacob Jacobs' partner at the Parkway Theater. And he has, his wife was an actress, Rosie Goldberg. And her sister was Hannah Hollander. She was also a Yiddish actress.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Jacobs has a duet with his wife, Betty.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Betty Jacobs, of course.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: What's it called?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yenta Telebenta. Hmm. Yep.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=1937.0,2004.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/36","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: (SOUNDS LIKE De Chazzante)...that was a Rumshinsky show.\u003cbr\u003e\t\t\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: There was Uptown, Downtown, but that’s…Dos Mamme...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: A couple of those things are before my time.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Probably. De Galitziana Rebbe?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I remember the titles, but I don’t...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) (SOUNDS LIKE Berele Tremp)? …Der groesste Sod (?))?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah, the big secret that was......Jennie Goldstein, wasn’t it?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I don’t know. Yes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: How do you like that?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I have to look.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: You're, you're really digging it out of the trunk. Way, way at the bottom of the trunk.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) It's with Jennie Goldstein.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Jennie Goldstein, right.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Di gebrokhene hertser? No, No. That’s Meirovitch.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No. Meirovitch [Meyerowitz].... I know the name, but never...","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2004.0,2054.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/37","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Well, that’s really more…earlier.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: A little bit. There is something from before my time, I told you.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Papirosn. Were you in Papirosn?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yes, I was.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) The show.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Of course. I worked for Herman Yablokoff. That was the show, Papirosn. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And he sang...he probably…no.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: And then he brought Leo Fuchs and I worked with him. Extremely talented young man.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Fuchs? Shmendrick’s Kalle?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Schmendrick’s Kalle. Something rings a bell, a bell about it, but I can't recall.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Me too.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) I can't recall what.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Well, it was a Gilrod. And then…uh. Let’s see if some other shows here. There’s so many. Der katerinshtshik.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2054.0,2113.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/38","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN:  Der katerinshtshik. That was with Luba Kadison, no?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yes. She sang the gypsy woman.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: She sang...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Ikh hob dikh tsufil lib.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Ikh hob dikh tsufil lib. What a beautiful song.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThat was (Alexander) Olshanetsky.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Beautiful.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: In fact, she says she…she had him rewrite the scene to make more sense; to make dramatic sense.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Well, because she, she wasn’t a singer.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Right. It was her first one.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Exactly, exactly.  Exactly.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2113.0,2156.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/39","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Let’s see here…Ah yeah. M’ken lebn nor m’lost nit.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yes, I was in that.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: You were in that?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: That was the famous...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I'm trying to remember what it was about. I know the title, and I know I was...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) What it’s about? (Laughs) They’re all about nothing...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Really. They're just entertaining.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: ... They're all about love stories, and mysteries...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) And drama.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: ... and lost relatives that get found...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: And illegitimate children.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Illegitimate children who turn out to be not illegitimate  ̶  the reverse  ̶  under the chuppah. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Under the chuppah. Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: M’ken lebn nor m’lost nit.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) M’ken lebn nor m’lost nit.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2156.0,2199.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/40","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: That's by (Sholom) Secunda. Bay mir bistu sheyn is in that.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) I was in that too. I told you. That was in the Parkway Theater.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: That’s right.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Originally.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I don’t remember the story.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) It was a love story. And, I think... Who was the one who did it originally? Who did that song originally?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOFFSCREEN WOMAN: Lucy Levin?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: No. She was in it. You’re right. And Aaron..\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOFFSCREEN WOMAN: Aaron Lebedeff.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Aaron Lebedeff! That’s the one. That’s what I was thinking of.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: She’s only in that song for one line.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Lucy Levin?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah. And the way the song goes…Otherwise, it’s a man’s song.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: It’s a man’s song.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And I didn’t record it with the one line because it would sound…on a recording, without the dialogue in the front of it…I felt it would sound funny to have the female voice coming out of nowhere because…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Exactly.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: It’s not set up dramatically.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Exactly.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2199.0,2251.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/41","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: But uh… In gortn fun libe.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: That was with Goldenberg, I think. Samuel Goldenberg.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: You're right! I don’t believe this. You’re absolutely right!\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Some time, yeah. right. That was at the National Theater.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping)  It says Goldberg, but it's Goldenberg?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Goldenberg.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) That’s a mistake.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Samuel Goldenberg.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) And Bella Meisel. And Jacob Jacobs was there...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Bella Meisel, you know, was Olshanetsky’s first wife.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) And the song… the famous song. A gute heym. Which…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) (singing) A gute heym. Da-da-da-da-da-dee.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) That’s right.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (singing) Da ta... mazel tov, mazel tov. Oh my goodness.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: See?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I'm on a roll.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2251.0,2289.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/42","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: A Freylekh Mishpokhe.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: A happy family.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I, that rings a bell, but I'm not sure.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: It's not such a...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSALZMAN: (overlapping) I did so many that I really can't recall.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) It’s not really… It’s a (Sholem) Secunda show. It's got… it was with Willie Siegel.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Willie Siegel's play, yeah. And Secunda music.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) With Itzik Feld. Lucy Levin.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) I never worked with Itzik Feld.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yetta Zwerling.\u003cbr\u003e\t\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I worked with her a lot.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: What was she like?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: She was… Phyllis Diller could take lessons from her. That’s how she was.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: The song there was...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) She was amazing.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2289.0,2328.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/43","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Skrip, klezmerl… A ganeydn far tzvey. That’s a good show.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN:  A ganeydn far tzvey.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: A ganeydn far tzvey. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN:  I don’t know.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: That’s (Aaron) Lebedeff and Bella Meisel. It’s an Olshanetsky  ̶  the song. Ikh bin farlibt. (SINGING) Ikh bin farlibt. Ikh bin farlibt.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: That rings a bell.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2328.0,2354.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/44","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Let’s see here. Zayn yiddishe meydle?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: That song was written by Secunda.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: And my late sister was the yiddishe meydle. She had to walk on stage with a little babushka. My sister was so graceful. She was in the chorus, but Secunda selected her as the yiddishe meydle. And she walked on stage, and that’s when they sang the song that she was the yiddishe meydle. She had nothing to do with the play. She, he just selected her. And I always said to my…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) I can't remember how the song goes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) (SINGING) Mayn yiddishe meydle, zi iz azoy sheyn. Mayn yiddishe meydle, mit ir yidishn kheyn. Fun gold ire herlekh, di tseyner vi perelekh…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I can't recall. But, that’s the song.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I just wrote about it. In fact, we just published it. I’ll give you a copy.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Really? \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: The CD just came out…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) It's a beautiful song.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) And I wrote five pages about this play and this song and I don’t remember it, but you remember it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: At four in the morning, I’ll call you and I’ll give you the balance of the song  ̶  the lyrics.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I’m gonna give you the whole thing. It has the whole song in the end. Willie Schwartz was in that, and Menashe Skulnik, Dora Weissman.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Dora Weissman.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2354.0,2450.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/45","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: And then, of course, Bei Mir Bistu Shein we mentioned. \u003cINAUDIBLE\u003e By the way, you mentioned Shayngold, Joseph Shayngold.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) That was…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: He was married to...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: One of the Adler girls.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: One of the Adler girls. Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Frances.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: He was in a show that opened in Philadelphia called In nomen fun got. I don’t know if it played in New York or not.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Secunda was living in Philadelphia then.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) No, no.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: In nomen fun got. Yeah, because I saw a funny thing. The opening of that show happened to be on Rosh Hashanah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah. Is that so?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) They played on Rosh Hashanah They announced in the newspaper that it would start an hour later for those people who like to go to shul.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2450.0,2486.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/46","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Well, we used to open new shows and new seasons right after Yom Kippur.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: After, yeah. But this…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Right, an hour after. We started, yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: ... actually opened on Rosh Hashanah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: That's surprising.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) It said in the paper that it would start an hour later than usual.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) That’s, is that amazing.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2486.0,2503.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/47","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Yeah. Uh…Leb un lakh.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Live and laugh, of course.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: There was a song Mit dir in eynem (Singing) Mit dir in eynem, something like this.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Keynem… Something. I, yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Bella was in that with Skulnik.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Oh no. This is a film, De Vilna Balabassel, or something else (speaks in yiddish)? Or Hayntike meydlekh?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2503.0,2527.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/48","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Hayntike meydlekh. I did that.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Did you?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: That was with, uh, Jennie Goldstein.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yes. You’re probably right because it sounds like her type of song.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Okay.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Hayntike meydlekh has that song, that very weird song Samet un zayd in it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Silk and satin. Right.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah. They mistranslated in the published version as Velvet and Satin.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Samet un zayd. I think is silk and satin.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) I think they did it deliberately because it sounded better.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Alright, whatever. Okay.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) But, that’s right. That’s Jennie Goldstein. That’s also…I’ll give you the recording. You were in the show?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I think so.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: That show was…it was a Herman Wohl song. But that doesn’t mean he wrote…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I think I was in that show. I was still a child.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: That would have been......a long time ago. Actually, that’s the one they advertised for people to bring their daughters to see this show, so they'd know what happens to a girl who goes bad.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) I'll tell you what, I, I remember vividly, she had a scene with William Epstein. And...... she wanted to hit him with a bottle. And she struck this with a big, big thing on Yiddish theater. She struck the mirror. And every performance they had to replace the mirror. And the audience, oh, they gasped. We never had such a thing happen. That was that show.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah, because...","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2527.0,2623.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/49","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Hayntike meydlekh.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: ... she comes under the spell of a no goodster.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Exactly. Exactly.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Then he leaves her.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Exactly.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) But he gets her into drugs.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Right.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And they bring her to a hospital in the middle of the night in an ambulance.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) If, if I remember correctly, yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) And she sings don’t sell yourself for satin and silk.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Right.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And you were in that show?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) I remember, I remember it vividly, because of the mirror scene.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I was a child. I was very impressed.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I don’t think they played it, they revived it, so you must have been in it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No, I was in it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Either that or because they said take your daughters to see, to see…let it be a lesson.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I was in it. Yes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: It’s an eerie song. We have a very good recording of it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) It was a nice song, I remember. But I can't recall...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) It was a little waltz kind of.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Yeah. More like waltz. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: They all do.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) His, his type.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: It goes something like this. (HUMMING) Not the chorus, but the…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: The verse.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: It’s got some English words in it, but…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Very interesting.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2623.0,2708.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/50","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Well, I told you, Der katerinshtshik, we talked about. \u003cbr\u003eThere were a lot of gypsies on stage for that one. I can’t imagine, from what I read, I see ‘Hundreds of gypsies on the stage, with gypsy camps and fires and…”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: That’s what the review says.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: That’s what the review said.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: They must’ve had the entire stage mirrored. No way.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) They used to have a lot of chorus. They had 14, 16 girls.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) I don’t mean literally hundreds.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Yeah. And, and male chorus, the male, men, they had the fantastic voices  ̶  the male chorus men, fantastic.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2708.0,2741.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/51","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Vos meydlekh tuen.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: What girls do, yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) That was with Molly and Muni.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I don’t recall.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Muni, uh..Muni?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Muni Serebrov.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: But, that’s not the same one who became Paul Muni, is it?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: A lot of people…I almost made that mistake.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I got it.  \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: You corrected it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I corrected it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: See, I think Seymour told me, or, I misunderstood what he said.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah, probably.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2741.0,2773.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/52","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Yeah, that’s an Olshanetsky show. And there’s Nu, zog mir shoyn ven. (singing) Nu, zog mir shoyn ven. (Hums)\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Don’t recall.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN:  And we did a lot of…By the way, with Lebedeff  ̶  you said you worked with Lebedeff.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e00:46:31:00\t\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Not too much; not as much as with Molly, or Menashe.  Not...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Skulnik would do things, these routines. They were not necessarily from a show, or maybe they were, but then they would record them like…”Shouldn’t Happen to a Dog”.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: That was just a number that he did in a play.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Just a number.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Had nothing to do with anything.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2773.0,2818.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/53","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Or… Ikh bin a “boarder” bay mayn vayb?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Bin a “boarder” bay mayn vayb.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Or…ah…he did so many Skulnik.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: A lot, yeah. He was very talented. I always remember, I was a little girl, (cough) excuse me, and, uh, there was a song  ̶  I think Isadore Lillian wrote it  ̶  didn’t remember the melody, but I was so impressed with what he said in the lyrics. And I remembered that line. It's from way, way back when. He said, he finally married this woman. He's been asking her to marry him for the longest time. She kept refusing, refusing. She finally agreed, and she married him. And this was a song about, I got married, (speaks in yiddish sounds like vos ikh zeyn itst), what do I see now.  Halb in bet and halb in  (speaks in yiddish sounds like Bueller)That impressed me so. Never forgot those lines. Half of her was in the bed, and half of her was on the dresser. The teeth were in the dresser, an eye was in, I thought it was so funny.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I may have that song on an old 78...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Really? Could be, could be.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: ...record.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) I thought it was so funny. I always remembered that. Stuck in, indelibly in my mind.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) That's not the one Kalich wrote?  \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No. I don’t think so.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2818.0,2904.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/54","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Skulnik. Did you see him on Broadway?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yes, of course I saw him on Broadway.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) He did a play with no music called Uncle Willie.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No, not, that wasn’t the first one he did on Broadway.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) No, no. It was the first one I saw.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Oh, I see.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Uncle Willie was...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Were you impressed?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah. I was only ten years old, but, it was fantastic.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah. He had the same kind of timing, (cough) excuse me, that the fellow on Broadway now, doing the one man show, 700 Sundays?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOFFSCREEN: Billy Crystal.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2904.0,2943.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/55","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: Yeah. The timing. I, I saw him recently, this young man. I never met a comic that had such timing  ̶  such an artist. And some of the material that he, it's all about his life. Some of it didn’t even make sense, but funny  ̶  the timing, his timing. And Menashe Skulnik had that timing  ̶  was incredible.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah, he did. The last one…Zulu and the Zayda.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I think Molly was supposed to be in that one. Both of them were supposed to be in one play.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: She wasn’t in it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: She left.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: She did, never went...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: ... into it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: They started in Philadelphia.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2943.0,2986.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/56","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Which did you like better, singing or straight acting?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I didn’t care about singing. I thought my, my best, my, to my way of thinking, my dancing was the best of whatever talent I possessed. Dancing, and then I love drama. I love drama. I worked with Bertha Kalich when I was, little girl. And, um, unfortunately she went blind towards the very end of her life. But they gave her a benefit performance at the Parkway Theater. And she was doing Akeydos Yitskhok. And they said, “Who do you want, Madame Kalich?” She said, “Bring me the Salzman girl.” I was a grown up already, but I played Akeydos Yitskhok with her; the last performance she ever did. Bertha Kalich. You didn’t know her, of course.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) No.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Way before your time.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I know the name and…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) You don’t know the name?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I say I do know the name…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Oh, you do know the name.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I do know the name but this was before I was born. No, Akeydos Yitskhok…this was already a serious play.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Yes, it was. She only did serious plays.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) She didn’t do musicals.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No. No. But she had an instrument in her throat. What a voice.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=2986.0,3073.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/57","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Who wrote Akeydos Yitskhok?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I don’t remember. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOFFSCREEN: Goldfaden wrote Akeydos Yitskhok. Would it have been a different one?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: But that’s a musical. That’s an operetta.\u003cbr\u003e \t\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No. No, this was drama…drama.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I think there is another. Could be Sholem Asch.  Could be any one of those people. But, it wasn’t the Goldfaden one?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: That was an opera. A good opera.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No. It wasn’t.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: No. No, I know the one you mean. It’s a very…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: It was a drama.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Powerful drama.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\t\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And those things...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) There was a musical of Akeydos Yitskhok?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: It's an operetta.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: An operetta, I see. Okay.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: They called it operettas, then they called it musicals, but that’s different. No, I know what you mean. This is one of the great playwrights. I can’t think of it.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=3073.0,3119.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/58","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: And, dancing. You didn’t study? Go to ballet school? Work at the barre? \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No, no, no, no. I was so fast on my feet, and I could learn very, I learn very quickly.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Did they employ a choreographer?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Choreographer? Yeah. My late husband used to do that. He used to teach the, uh, choreography for the chorus...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Uh huh.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: In the theater.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: The dancer in the show…on an elaborate show, were the dancers the same people as the chorus?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Absolutely, absolutely. Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: What used to be called chorus girls.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Chorus girls. Yes. They used to sing and dance.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And the men too?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: The men only sang.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: The dancers were all women.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Uh huh.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: They were comparatively much older than the chorus girls, the...men. But, their voices were fantastic. Terrific voices.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Well, they had some good conductors. Someone like Herman Wohl for example, if he would coach them. Because all of these people were also…Secunda…they were all conducting in shul, in synagogue.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Oh, exactly.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: So, they knew how to...","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=3119.0,3209.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/59","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Yeah. Secunda had that big one on Eastern Parkway, not far from the...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: …the Rebbe\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: With Tucker.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Right. Right.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Eastern Parkway or Ocean Parkway?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Eastern Parkway.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) And Olshanetsky was...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Oh, Olshanetsky wound up going to the Paramount Theater. They took him away from the Yiddish theater.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: To the Paramount?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Absolutely.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Was that Vaudeville?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=3209.0,3238.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/60","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: Yeah. That was almost the time of when Sinatra started. They thought he was so talented. They took him, he, he was conducting at the Paramount Theater. Alexander Olshanetsky.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) He died so young.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Yes he did. Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: You know they had a sign for him at the Concord Hotel, where he was also director of music there for their summer stock. So, they had a sign, they had his memorial service there. I think it was there. And the sign said “Olshie, we loved you too much. From the Ikh hob dikh tsufil lib.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: We all called him Olshie.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Olshie.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah. We called him Olshie.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Uh...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) We called Lebedeff… Lebby.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Lebby.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: What about Skulnik?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Menashe.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And you? What did they call you?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I don’t know. They never let me hear what they called me. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Did you have a nickname?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No, no. When I was young, they said I had patience of a saint. I did. But I've learned a lot since.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I think you still probably do.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Well, I hope so. I hope so. You're supposed to live and learn. Every day we learn something.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=3238.0,3311.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/61","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Yeah. Yeah. Did you ever try to write a play yourself?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I'm not capable.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) In those days?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I'm incapable of that. I never tried. I, I never had that ambition.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Tell me about improvising. How much did you improvise? Not you. You and others, too. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Um, when somebody missed a cue, you had to improvise. I had an incident. I remember it very, very distinctly. Um, I have a scene with a man who wants to kill me, and I'm supposed to receive a phone call. And the phone never rang. Now, how do you go into this? So, I got, I got on the phone, I said oh my god, I was just calling you. You have to improvise, so you have to, you have to do something about it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And you…it just hit you on the spot.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Absolutely. They always…said, when, when in doubt, improvise. That’s how we improvised. Now, the phone never rang, he's gonna kill me. The end of the show. We're in the middle. How can we do that? We can't. Anyway, that’s what happened.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Was there probably a lot of that?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Oh, yeah. Oh, yes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I suspect...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: People that didn’t remember the lines.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Was there more forgetting of lines as compared to Broadway?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) With certain actors, yes. Certain...people couldn’t remember lines, unfortunately.  Um, in fact, we used to have prompters during the week. During the week, because we had a different show every night. One day I was a 14 year old, the next day I was a grandmother, you know. So, but I could not stand the prompter. He would annoy me. So, I had to show him that I knew my part by heart. I always, every prompter I worked with said please, don’t prompt me, because he confused me. And in order for them to stop, I had to have, like, a contest. I'll get there before you finish the sentence. So, so it was bad for my performance. So, they, they knew. Prompters never prompted me. They would only confuse me. I knew what I had to say.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I, well, I, I learned a part overnight, verbatim.  I could, 10 pages  ̶  like nothing. Don’t ask me to do it today.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=3311.0,3471.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/62","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: What happened to the scripts?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: To what?\u003cbr\u003e\t\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: To all the scripts. You didn’t need it anymore.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I don’t need a script.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I heard the prompting…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) You did?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: before every line that was…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Very annoying.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Now, no one else heard it. You know, something like a whispering gallery. That one seat, I remember…somehow it was carrying over. And I could hear from the prompter's box.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Isn’t it annoying? \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: It was crazy. And this was already not from the sides. At the opera, the prompter’s box is in the…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) In the front. We had them in the front, too.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) In the footlights?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: With a little...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Hood over it, yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And I could hear. And I said ‘What is that?’ And they didn’t even need it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) The prompters were very good.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: They knew who did know their parts, they knew who didn’t. That’s what they were there for, in case, in case the...","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=3471.0,3525.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/63","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Did you ever see deliberate improvising, perhaps that they saw in the news that day?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: To bring it up to date, you mean?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Not really. If something was really very important, you, you know who had a flair for that? Jacob Jacobs. He really was incredible in his way of doing things. He, he was very timely. So, he was about the only one that I could say, he would do that. He would put it into the show that, like it belonged. But it was actually happening at the present time. He was the only one that I could say was capable of...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) I'm trying to remember, there were certain songs that were actually written that way, but that’s a long time ago, like Lebn Zol Columbus. But that’s 1915.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah. He used to do duets with Yetta Zwerling, Jacob Jacobs. He took all the popular English songs and translated it into Yiddish, with their own storyline. It was the funny; it always tore the house down. Always. He had an incredible way of doing these. It was innate with him. And then he was the only one that also took American plays, and we did it in Yiddish.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Detective Story, Anna Lucasta… uh, the one where the girl is deaf, deaf and dumb.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Helen Keller?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No, not Helen Keller.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) No?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) No, not Helen Keller. Whatever.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: But he brought these things to the Yiddish theater. And we did it in Yiddish. Miriam Kressyn did Anna Lucasta.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) I know.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I can't think of it.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=3525.0,3646.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/64","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Where else did you tour?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: All over. We went, New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Chicago, Milwaukee, Baltimore...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Milwaukee?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Oh, of course. When we finished in Chicago on a Saturday night, we played Milwaukee on Sunday.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: In Yiddish?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: In Yiddish. We always did very well. Very well.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Milwaukee…I’m surprised. I mean, there’s Jews everywhere, but it’s primarily known as a German city.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: We didn’t stay there for a long time. We did two shows, matinee and evening. Period.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) I know. You’re right. I saw Saint Louis on the manifest for one show.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Oh, yeah. We, we hit them all. Detroit, Denver, whatever.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Denver?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: In Yiddish?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah, in Yiddish. Yeah. The only place that we didn’t go was Texas  ̶  any, any city in Texas. Very few, we, we covered it from East Coast to the West Coast, to California.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=3646.0,3708.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/65","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) What years are you talking about, before or after the war?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: After. Mm hm.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: What about touring before the war?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No. I... I was too young then.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: They didn’t take children on the tours.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Right, right. Yeah.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=3708.0,3725.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/66","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Although…that one experience in ’43, by the way you didn’t go to South America?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) No. I was invited to go, and didn’t go...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) What about...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I was invited to go, I didn’t go. I was invited to go to London, I didn’t go.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: What about Canada?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Oh, Montreal, yeah. Montreal. Toronto.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) They had a resident Yiddish theater in Montreal.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) They had a lot of Jews there. Tremendous. Tremendous Jewish population. And we also went to the capital of Canada...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Ottawa.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Ottawa. Yeah, we were all the way. Always.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Was Montreal...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALESMEN: Montreal was very good.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) A regular?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Oh, well, it was, uh, one of the first cities that we hit from New York. Always did, we did very well business wise.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I would think Montreal would be second only to New York.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=3725.0,3776.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/67","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Right, right, mm hm. I did a lot of vaudeville in Montreal.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Really?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) A lot, yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: But you did the same plays you did here and brought them there?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: We brought plays there, but vaudeville was something else. We brought our own music. The numbers that we made popular and famous...And it worked out beautifully. Used to love to go to Montreal.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=3776.0,3801.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/68","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Do you remember the last show you did?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Majority Of One. Not in Yiddish, in English.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) In English.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: So, there’s another side. You also did…you also were...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Not too many.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Did English plays.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSALZMAN: (overlapping) I did Come Blow Your Horn, and I did...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) These are big plays. I think it was Hal March.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I beg your pardon?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Hal March.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Not much?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: No, Hal March. In Come Blow Your Horn.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Hal March?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: This is his name. From Harold. It rings a bell. I don’t remember if he was the producer or the actor.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) No, I don’t, I don’t recall.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Hal March and company?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) But I did it, I guess we were traveling with the show, so we didn’t have the...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) In summer stock?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Uh, more or less, yeah. Summer stock.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=3801.0,3843.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/69","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) When you did Majority Of One...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Molly Picon.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: She did Gertrude Berg’s part. And we did it with several different male leads. But the one that was most interesting, who’s the fellow that did all the, um, um, Pirates Of Penzance? You, he...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Martyn Green?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: ... he, yes. The one that lost his leg.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Martyn Green.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah. He was with us.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) He did that?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Oh, I have a funny story...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) He lost his leg in an elevator accident.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) In an elevator, in garage. He was very funny. We used to travel, so, in the train or whatever, so I'd sit with him. He handed me a card. I read it. It was very funny. I said, the card read, I would like to make love to you tonight. If you refuse me, please return the card, because they're very expensive. That was Martyn Green.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I'm not gonna ask if you returned the card or not.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I did. I, I said you're very chintzy. Here’s your card back. Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I can't think of him doing a show like that...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Oh, he did. Oh, he was wonderful.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: ... I think of him only for the pirate songs.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No, no. No, no. He was wonderful in it. He managed to get down, in the second act, if you remember, the, the scene where she gets drunk?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: He managed to get down on the floor. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) But this was…this was 50s. Mid-50s. Because Gertrude Berg.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: The original was Gertrude Berg.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) She also did summer stock with...what was his name?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: The, the, uh, oh, yes, he was an English actor.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: It was done by several.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Yeah. Many. Even I did it with many.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=3843.0,3958.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/70","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: What was your last Yiddish show?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) The last Yiddish show I did, um...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) The latest.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Could have, could have been Farblondzshet Honeymoon.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: That would have been the '50s.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Late '50s, I would say.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Late '50s?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah. I'm trying to figure out, my son is 59, and my son was a little boy at the time. So, that's...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) But that had some English in it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) Yeah. Mm hm.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yeah, that was, I think it was one of my last, something like that. I'm, I think it was Farblondzshet Honeymoon. Oh, we did that forever. We came to Florida, we had to go, go again, and again, and again, in Florida. It was wonderful.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=3958.0,4032.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/71","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: How many children do you have?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) One, one son.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: You have your son.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Two grandchildren, and a great, one great grand, of two years old.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Are any of them interested in theater?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: My granddaughter is in, in Chicago. She's a producer for ABC.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: What's her name?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Lisa Lubin.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: For ABC?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: She's been with the company five years now.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=4032.0,4070.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/72","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: How was it being in the Yiddish theater at the time? How did you live? Did you live in the Second Avenue area?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) No. I lived in Brooklyn. I remember coming home from New York, playing on Second Avenue, going home in, to Brooklyn, and walking six blocks to where we lived, two in the morning, three in the morning. Thought nothing of it. Lights were on, lights were off, doors were left open. Nobody bothered you. Totally different world that we’re living in now. Yeah.\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And your son didn’t want to be….","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=4070.0,4109.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/73","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) My son is retired. My son is right now on the golf course. If I need him, I have to page him on the golf course. He lives...in Jersey. I don’t have anybody living here with me, or close to me. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Your son lives in New Jersey?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Yes, in Randolph. But it, you know, years back…\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And you have relatives in Virginia?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: My grandson...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Your grandson.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: ...is in Virginia. Graduated as an engineer, hated it with a passion, and he joined medical supplies. Thank god. And, uh, he has a little boy of two years old. I'm, in fact, I'm planning to visit very shortly. I'm getting very lonely for my little baby.  Um, but years back, we were family, and we all got married. We lived one or two blocks away from where mama lived. Friday night we all had to be there for the Shabbes dinner, and the bench licht and the whole bit.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e01:09:32:00\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: What if there was a show?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: We, we worked shows Friday night.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I told you, we went, every time they started a new season, was one hour later for, after Yom Kippur. Yom Kippur.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: On the same night.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Same night.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Just made it a late show.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Right. And mama used to say (SOUNDS LIKE “dafs eppes essen”?) because I used to fast. I always fasted. I said no, mom, I can wait, I can wait. And I did. Didn’t bother me. Now, they tell me I shouldn’t fast because I'm too old. Mayle.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=4109.0,4213.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/74","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: Do you remember the Café Royale?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Of course.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: When is the first time you went there?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Well...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Did they let you in as a little girl?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Not when I was a little girl; when I was, uh, a grown woman and I worked in the, all the theaters on Second Avenue. We used to join, meet there. And you, and you listen to the actors, they said, I killed them tonight. I knocked them out. I said, will you stop with the killing, knocking out? We won't have an audience. They didn’t pay attention to me. They kept raving about their performances. I thought they were insane. How do you talk about yourself? I could never do that. First of all, I never thought I had any talent. But then I figured out I must have had something, because I was, they wanted to engage me in every theater that was open. So, I must have had something to offer. The other day I went to see Mina Bern’s performance, and they were talking about…, so some of them reminded me that they all call me a bren, a fire. I didn’t think I was a bren. I knew I could dance very well. But I never thought of anything about that.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=4213.0,4287.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/75","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: What show is Mina Bern doing?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Mina Bern? She did, uh...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Is she the...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: ... her, a one woman show. She sang songs, she told, and then memories of her life, where she's been  ̶  and, she's been quite a few places. Very interesting. And she's an amazing woman. She's really amazing. She stood up there for one and a half hours, and remembered all the lyrics, and the little patter that she had.  Uh, she was fantastic. Something about being an actress, or an actor, they don’t refer to actresses anymore.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: Yes they do.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: You have to be an actor.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: There's an expression in Yiddish, if you don’t have any real serious problems, you'll make some.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Oh, that's very true...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Or as my mother used to say, You’ll look for trouble.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: That's very true.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=4287.0,4367.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/76","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: The theater is always special, but it seems the Yiddish theater from this decade is even more special.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: (overlapping) More so. More so. I don’t think anybody in the Yiddish theater had any training...formal training for theater.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I don’t think so.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: No, we never did that. They said sing, we sang. Dance, we danced. Cry, we cried. Laugh, we laughed. We just knew how to listen to a director. And give it to him as he wants it, so you don’t have to repeat it. That was very important, to be a good listener.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: It was important to come from parents, or grandparents, because otherwise they didn’t want you in the theater.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Right. But my father, apparently my father had it all planned for me.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: You're lucky.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: I don’t know, I never thought about it. I'll have to try and analyze this.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=4367.0,4444.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/77","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"NEIL LEVIN: How did Esther become Esta?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Um, uh, should I say too Jewish? No, not gonna say that. But...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) Sure you can.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Herman Yablokov said to my husband, what kind of name is Esther Salzman for an actress? She doesn’t look like an Esther Salzman. So my husband said to him, well, what do you think she looks like? Who do you think she looks like? She said, he said to her, she looks like Sevilla, Sevilla. So, my husband said, yeah, sivilla rayz. That was that. But, uh, they all said I should change my name. We never changed our names in the Yiddish theater. We used our regular maiden names.  Um, and Esta became just to shorten it. Esther, Esta. And actually, in Spanish, I found out, that it means this. So, I introduced myself, I'm a ‘this’. That’s it.\u003cbr\u003e\t\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: And it became the...\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: And it became, yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: The trademark.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: And then I had it legalized, so I don’t have any problem.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: (overlapping) First time I saw it, I thought it was a misprint.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: It's not. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEIL LEVIN: I thought somebody couldn’t pronounce it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eESTA SALZMAN: Esta.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=4444.0,4526.0"},{"id":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802/transcript/31877/annotation/78","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"CLOSING GRAPHIC","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://milken.aviaryplatform.com/collections/1159/collection_resources/39423/file/110802#t=4526.0,4537.00267"}]}]}]}