Beth Holmgren - Starring Madame Modjeska: On Tour in Poland and America

Publication of this book is made possible in part with the assistance of a Challenge Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, a federal agency that supports research, education, and public programming in the humanities. Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

This book is a publication of

Indiana University Press
601 North Morton Street
Bloomington, Indiana 47404-3797 USA

iupress.indiana.edu

Telephone orders 800-842-6796
Fax orders 812-855-7931

2012 by Beth Holmgren

All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The Association of American University Presses Resolution on Permissions constitutes the only exception to this prohibition.

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1992.

Manufactured in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Holmgren, Beth, [date]
Starring Madame Modjeska : on tour in Poland and America / Beth Holmgren.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-253-35664-2 (cloth: alk. paper) 1. Modjeska, Helena, 18401909.
2. ActorsPolandBiography. 3. ActorsUnited StatesBiography.
4. Shakespearean actors and actressesUnited StatesBiography. I. Title.
PN2859.P66M6255 2012
792.028092dc23
[B]

2011022597

1 2 3 4 5 17 16 15 14 13 12

For my stars, Jess and Mark

1
Debut

2
The Making of a Polish Actress

3
Warsaws State of the Stars

4
A Colonial Party and the California Dream

5
On the American Road

6
The Roles of Madame Modjeska

7
The Polish Modjeska

8
Farewell Tour

As I grew more involved with Helena Modjeskas life and work, I regretted the fact that I could not interview her or spend an hour or two in her presence. But researching and writing this book introduced me to so many other Modjeska enthusiasts and experts that I feel I have been reveling in Modjeskas circle for years. Modjeska has made my life rich in friendships as well as the knowledge of her fascinating life in context.

I am grateful to Anna Frajlich-Zajc and the Kociuszko Foundation for sponsoring my first forays into this books topic. I thank Boena Shallcross and David Ransel for recommending me to Indiana Universitys Institute for Advanced Studies; that fellowship equipped me with the time, resources, and impetus to begin serious research. I thank the UNC-Duke Center for Slavic, Eurasian, and East European Studies for a travel grant to Poland in summer 2004, where I took up the Modrzejewska trail.

The very generous leave time I received from Duke Universitys Dean of Arts and Sciences literally enabled me to review years of research work and draft the manuscript; the research funds that the university awarded me paid for further work in Poland and subsidized purchase of book illustrations.

Other colleagues and the venues they offered have helped me to test out my main hypotheses along the way: Bill Johnston and Indiana Universitys Polish Studies Center; Halina Stephan, Irene Masing-Deli, Yana Hashamova and the Midwest Slavic Conference sponsored by The Ohio State University Center for Slavic and East European Studies; Donna Buchanan and the University of Illinoiss Russian and East European Studies Center; Margarita Nafpaktitis and the University of Virginias Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures; Carey Baughman and Marshall Duell and the Old Courthouse Museum in Orange County, California; Linda Plochocki, Krystyna Stamper, and Yvonne Boehm of the Modjeska Foundation; and Agata Grenda and the Polish Cultural Institute in New York. I thank them and the audiences at these talks for their generosity and constructive feedback. I am indebted to George Gutsche, who graciously furnished me with hard-to-get materials. I also thank Basia and Leonard Myszyski of OC Influential Productions, who invited me to participate in their documentary on the great actress and whose award-winning film ModjeskaWoman Triumphant is a beautifully made, eye-opening testament to Modjeskas person and achievements.

I had the good fortune to work with expert curators, librarians, and scholars on both sides of the ocean. I thank the librarians at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts for their help; Georgianna Ziegler and Nadia Sophie Seiler at the Folger Shakespeare Library for their bibliographic advice; Raymond Wemmlinger for his special assistance at the Hampden Booth Library housed in New Yorks Players Club; Anna Chen for her enthusiastic retrieval of materials from the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas-Austin; and Kristin Kulash for her expertise and advance collection of materials at the Harvard University Libraries. I owe an ongoing debt of gratitude to Erik Zitser, Duke Universitys fantastic Slavic bibliographer, and to the hardworking Interlibrary Loan staffs at both University of North CarolinaChapel Hill and Duke University.

In Southern California, Bill Landis and other staff members in the University of California-Irvines Special Collections and Archives helped me enormously in sorting through their rich cache of Modjeska materials; my thanks to Steve MacLeod and Andrew Jones at UCI for further help in sorting out illustrations and permissions. Sue Hodson was a generous, gracious Curator of Literary Manuscripts at the Huntington Library. Jennifer Ring, the Bowers Museum registrar, has been a wonderful resource and colleague from the moment I inquired about visiting the museums substantive Modjeska collection. Her expertise and efficiency and the commitment of Peter C. Keller, the museums director, helped to realize the first Polish-American Modrzejewska/Modjeska exhibit in 2009. Ellen K. Lee, the greatest Modjeska advocate in California, was kind enough to give me a privately guided tour of Arden in 2001; her death in 2005 impoverished Modjeska enthusiasts everywhere. I was lucky to keep learning about Arden and its visitors from Diane Wollenberg, the Orange County Parks ranger who knows and has served this historic site so well.