Maurice Schwartz: A Daughter’s Recollection
by Robin Whiting
(based on the recollections of my mother, Risa Whiting, this was published in New York’s Yiddish Theater: From the Bowery to Broadway)
Risa Whiting was born Fanny Englander to Polish emigrants Abraham and Chawe in Antwerp, Belgium. In 1942, Abraham and Chawe were among the many Jews who were sent by train, then killed, at the Auschwitz concentration camp. Fanny and her brother Moses were rescued before transport, and Moses was sent to an orphanage, while Fanny was placed with a foster family who gave her the name Marcelle. When Moses was eventually chosen for adoption, Marcelle was taken from her erstwhile family to be reunited with her brother.
On October 17, 1947, a little more than a month before my eighth birthday, I arrived, with my nine-year-old brother, at LaGuardia Airport. Born in Belgium and orphaned by war, we walked off the plane and into the world of our new adoptive parents Maurice and Anna Schwartz — crowds of reporters with cameras flashing and an entourage of actors and fans.
My only exposure to Americans had been the Jeep-driving GIs who’d given me chewing gum and Hershey bars after the war. I’d seen Movietone documentaries from Hollywood and I’d seen Walt Disney’s Pinocchio, but although they were made in English, the versions I saw were dubbed in French. That was it. I had never seen a theater production in my life.
As we walked down the steps, toward the tarmac, and the crowd of people speaking a language we couldn’t understand, something strange happened. The actor we later knew as Anatol Winogradoff asked us in French — the only language we knew — to go back up the stairs and come down once again. This second take — to give the photographers a chance to get just the right shot — was our grand entrance into our new family and way of life — the Yiddish theater.
I’d learned from my foster parents, and later, in the orphanage, that life was easier if I followed directions and did what I was told. Sure enough, once I descended from the plane for the second time, I was hugged and kissed by Maurice Schwartz who, at the time, I only knew as a man whose day-old stubble scratched my skin and whose words (in English and Yiddish) were incomprehensible.
After a year with my new parents, during which I had learned both English and Yiddish, I learned more about the drama the Schwartzes experienced on the day of our arrival. Because Anna was afraid of flying, she wanted us to be transported to New York by ship. But Maurice was impatient to see us as soon as possible, so he prevailed, and we were sent by plane.
The night before, Maurice and Anna found out that the Sabina flight we were on was delayed by fog. Because it had been his decision to put us on a plane, Maurice felt anxious that he’d make the wrong decision and spent a sleepless night worrying about our safety. In the morning, the Schwartzes arrived at LaGuardia, ready to receive us. But because of the fog, our flight had been re-routed to Newark, so everyone — Anna, Maurice, the fans, the actors and the reporters — had to get back in their cars and drive to a different airport. Fortunately, we landed without a hitch, unlike the next Sabina that was scheduled to land at LaGuardia, which we later found out, crashed.
Tragedy, suspense, drama, and a happy ending — there was nothing mundane about our introduction to Maurice Schwartz…or our lives in the Yiddish theater.
Risa Schwartz went on to tour with Maurice Schwartz’s Yiddish Art Theatre throughout the U.S. Canada, South America and South Africa, performing as well as stage managing. Her acting career continued after she left the Yiddish theater. In 1959, she opened in Broadway production of The Tenth Man by Paddy Chayefsky. Among her other roles was an off-Broadway production of Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard.
