HESTER STREET
USA, 1975 [restored 2021]
Directed by Joan Micklin Silver
Starring Carol Kane, Steven Keats, Mel Howard, Dorrie Kavanaugh
When Joan Micklin Silver wrote the script she would direct as "Hester Street," her adaptation of Abraham Cahan's 1896 novella re-focused the story to center a newly-immigrated young mother rather than the "oysgegrint" [already-assimilated] husband. Jake had been the title character in Abe Cahan's publication "Yekl: A Story of the New York Ghetto," yet it was Carol Kane's portrayal of his wife, the greenhorn Gitl, which brought the movie its Oscar nomination. (Cahan's own English-language text was based in turn on his original serialized Yiddish 1895 work, "Yankel der Yankee.") The film, made in black & white with a mix of Yiddish and English dialogue, faced many obstacles to production and distribution, since Hollywood did not welcome such pointedly Jewish material, let alone directed by a woman. Producer Raphael Silver, the director's husband -- and himself the son of a prominent Cleveland rabbi -- brought together investors, and this feature joined the fledgling indie film industry as a pioneering effort self-distributed to the commercial US market, thanks also to pointers from John Cassavetes. While some in the cast were native speakers of mameloshn (with notable cameos by longtime stars Zvee Scooler as the rabbi, Eda Reiss Merin as the rebetsin, and Leib Lensky as the peddler, as well as Doris Roberts in her supporting role as neighbor Mrs. Kavarsky), other actors including Kane and her co-star Steven Keats were non-Yiddish speakers coached by Michael Gorrin, himself a veteran of Yiddish ARTEF theater and cinema ("Grine Felder" [Green Fields] 1937), as well as many English productions on stage, screen and TV. Mel Howard, playing the boarder Bernstein, a last-minute cast recruit from the production crew, serendipitously had been raised in a Lubavicher family.
TRAILER Cohen Films re-release 2021:
https://youtu.be/D1TROnPKe_4?si=rDLzoYKZaXsRdpmy The program will include a discussion of the film and Q&A with
Rukhl Schaechter (Editor of the Yiddish Forverts) moderated by YNY film curator
Eve Sicular.
