Jewish theater in Vienna between 1900 and 1938 is inconceivable without women actors. A total of 112 people were active in the Viennese Yiddish theaters, of whom 37 were women. Actors such as Pepi Litmann, Molly Picon, and Mina Deutsch popularized “trouser roles” in which women depicted men as well as playing strongly typified female characters.

Women have always been important as both Yiddish theater audiences and actors. For a decade and more, most American Yiddish actors were immigrants, as were their audiences. Often families played in the same company, such as the famous Adler family. Now, as Yiddish theater has become attenuated, the loyalties and memories of women are important for its survival.

Jewish women on stage in America took on a variety of musical roles and performed all kinds of songs, including religious hymns and liturgical chants. In its heyday, the Yiddish stage mirrored American Jewish life. An amazing range of women’s woes were highlighted, discussed, and often resolved across the footlights, presenting the reality that immigrant women faced to an extent not paralleled in the English-language theatrical world during those years.

American Yiddish films captured the language, lifestyle, values, dreams, and myths of Yiddish culture, which resonated deeply with many Yiddish immigrant communities in New York City. Yiddish film reached its “Golden Age” between 1936 and 1939, and many influential women graced the Yiddish screen, including Moly Pico, Celia Adler, Jennie Goldstein, Lili Liliana, and Berta Gersten. 

Jewish women in vaudeville helped to cultivate a unique American Jewish identity. Headliners Sophie Tucker, Belle Baker, and Fanny Brice were prominent, as were performers such as Nan Halperin and Nora Bayes. Molly Picon was a star of Yiddish theater, and Sarah Bernhardt a star of the stage. The reign of Jewish female vaudevillians ended in the 1930s, but their voices continue to be heard.

For over a hundred years, Jewish women have been involved in the American theater as writers, actors, directors, designers and producers. The vitality of the Yiddish theater, the splendor of Broadway, the rich tapestry of the regional theater, and everything in between, all owe a debt to the Jewish women who have given of their talents, their energy, their drive, and their dreams.

Jewish women have had a long-standing, complex, often fraught relation to American television. They have had to battle a male-dominated production system and sexist stereotypes, but also have seen significant advances, in front of and behind the screen, resulting from the cable and streaming revolutions and third-wave feminist activism.  

A lively comic actress, Molly Picon brought Yiddish theater to a wider American audience. She acted in the first Yiddish play ever performed on Broadway and insisted on performing in Yiddish on a 1932 tour of Palestine. Filming on location in Poland, on the eve of World War II, Picon captured a view of shtetl life soon to be erased by the Holocaust.

With suffragist spirit and comedic skill, Bessie Thomashefsky adapted great American and British plays for Yiddish-speaking audiences. Thomashefsky performed Yiddish adaptations of plays by Chekov, Wilde, and Shakespeare, as well as modern Yiddish creations at the People’s Theater in New York, playing many strong female characters. From 1915 to 1919, she ran the People’s Theater and renamed it for herself. 

Bella Bellarina was beloved on the Yiddish stage, but her lack of English prevented her from transitioning to the mainstream theater. Bellarina was discovered by David Herman and performed with his Vilna Troupe for several years. She was known for her range, playing the mischievous tomboy Tsine in Grine Felder and the reserved, ladylike Leah in The Dybbuk.