Ben Bonus | |
|---|---|
בען באָנוס | |
| Born | Baruch Bonus (1920-11-09)November 9, 1920 Horodenka, Poland |
| Died | April 6, 1984(1984-04-06) (aged 63) Miami, Florida, USA |
Ben Bonus (Yiddish:בען באָנוס, November 9, 1920 – April 6, 1984) was a prominent AmericanYiddish theatre andBroadway actor andYiddish language singer of the twentieth century. He and his wifeMina Bern were credited with keepingYiddish theatre alive inUnited States during the 1960s and 1970s.[1]
Bonus was born as Baruch Bonus on November 9, 1920, inHorodenka,Stanisławów Voivodeship,Poland,[2] which had until the end of theFirst World War been part ofGalicia,Austria-Hungary. His parents were Meier Bonus and Sheyne Reyzl "Rosa" Katz. His father was a baker who later became a fruit seller.[3] During this time he learned to sing with private lessons.[3] He studied inCheder until the age of 12 and then studied in the local PolishGymnasium; during this time he began to perform in children's troupes.[3] For a time he also apparently ran away from home to live inLvov, singing in courtyards for money, and toured for a bit with Shtshogol's troupe before going home to finish his studies at the Gymnasium.[3] Although his obituary in theNew York Times as well as theLexicon of Yiddish Theatre state that he was brought to theUnited States in 1929 by an aunt who visitedPoland, this appears to be incorrect.[2][3] He is listed as arriving in the United States in May 1938 on thePolish shipPiłsudski at age 17, under the care of his aunt Mary Schachter, who was a U.S. citizen.[4] His aunt operated a successful bedding business in theBronx.[5] Bonus's parents and siblings were subsequently killed in theHolocaust in Horodenka.[6]
Not long after arriving in theUnited States, Bonus performed with the Goldfaden Theatre (funded by the International Worker's Order), and started to give concerts and singYiddish songs on the radio withArnold Jaffe.[3] Apparently Bonus learned a lot from the actorJacob Ben-Ami during this time.[6]Herman Yablokoff also later said in his memoirs that he had been a theatre teacher to Bonus, and had been astonished by his voice at a young age.[7] He also met his first wife, Pepie Bonus (née Sonnenreich) in an acting class; they married in 1940 and were listed in the census of that year as residing in theBronx with Pepie's two brothers Morris and Jack.[8] That year his first son was born.
In 1942 he joined theBen Ami troupe inDetroit (managed byAbraham Littman) and performed the works ofPeretz Hirschbein,Henrik Ibsen andHenri Bernstein, and subsequently did a nine-month tour with theFolksbiene inLos Angeles.[3] During this time he also performed for the Jewish Workers' Committee and for theHistadrut.[3] In 1945, Ben's second sonJack Bonus was born. He would go on to play as a session musician in the "Grateful Dead" scene. In 1946 Ben founded his own troupe, the "Yiddish Mobile Theater".[2] The group was successful and toured over seventy cities.[9]
He then returned toNew York City and started acting inVaudeville theatre there, including inIsrael Rosenberg's theater on Clinton Street.[3] In 1949 he became a member of the Yiddish Actors' Union.[3] In that year he also met his future second wife,Mina Bern, while performing together in a show called "Shalom, Tel Aviv".[10] They would end up performing and creating shows together for decades to come. Bonus would divorce his first wife Pepie in 1951 and remarry in 1952.
In 1952 he became co-manager of the National Yiddish Vaudeville Theatre inNew York City withHenrietta Jacobson and Abraham Littman.[3] In the late 1950s, he toured with an artist group funded by the Farbad-Labor Zionist Order, which included Bonus andMina Bern,Lily Lilliano,Leon Liebgold and the pianist S. Fershko.[11] The troupe continued to tour into the 1960s and a later version added the comedianShmulik Goldstein and the pianistPaula Kadison.[12] The group touredSouth America for a number of years as the Farband Players, visitingChile,Bolivia,Ecuador,Brazil,Colombia,Argentina, andVenezuela.[9]
It was only in 1964 that Bonus returned toNew York City and started performing there regularly again.[9] In 1966 he established aYiddish language theater in the Borough Park Theater inBrooklyn.[2] That same year he performed onBroadway with "Let's Sing Yiddish", a revue of various songs byItsik Manger,Mordecai Gebirtig,Morris Rosenfeld and others, staged by Mina Bern.[13] The following year he performed his act "Sing, Israel, Sing".[2] In 1970 he performed "Light, Lively and Yiddish" on Broadway.[2]
Bonus died unexpectedly on the street inMiami on April 6, 1984.[2]
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