Selected text
My father didn't want me to remain poor like him and he did all he could so that I could be an accountant like my uncles. I graduated with excellent marks in 1931 and I really started to work as an accountant in a Jewish credit co-operative, Malka Kassa, which gave loans mostly to craftsmen. I worked there for two years. Then, by competition, since there was much unemployment and the economic crisis of the 1930s [7], I got a job as a bank clerk in the Jewish bank Atikva. It gave loans to Jewish merchants.
I remember a very interesting episode from the time when I was a bank clerk with the Hatikva bank in 1938-39. At that time I loved theater very much; and I still do. I had two friends - Mair Bivas, whom I had known since the Jewish school and Jacques Behar, whom I met later. He had come with his family to Plovdiv from Yambol [in Southern Bulgaria]. We were friends for 56 years. In 1938 we decided to apply for the position of amateur actors with the Plovdiv Municipal Theatre. There was a hierarchy in the Plovdiv theater with regard to the statute of the actors and the payment. The highest in the hierarchy were the directors, then came the actors, the trainees, the drama actors and lastly, the amateurs.
In 1938 the Plovdiv Municipal Theatre invited as a director the famous actor Georgi Stamatov. [Stamatov, Georgi (1869-1942): actor and director, born in Tiraspol, Russia, died in Sofia, Bulgaria.] He decided to select a team to work with. He announced an audition for actors, who were paid 820 levs, trainees, who received 710 levs, drama actors, who were paid 450 levs and amateurs. No matter that we were all working, we decided to apply for the roles of amateur actors, who usually took part in the crowd scenes and received 20 levs a performance. Jacques worked as a sales assistant in a Jewish textile store, and Mair in another store. The requirement for the audition was to recite a poem by heart and each of us had prepared one.
I remember a very interesting episode from the time when I was a bank clerk with the Hatikva bank in 1938-39. At that time I loved theater very much; and I still do. I had two friends - Mair Bivas, whom I had known since the Jewish school and Jacques Behar, whom I met later. He had come with his family to Plovdiv from Yambol [in Southern Bulgaria]. We were friends for 56 years. In 1938 we decided to apply for the position of amateur actors with the Plovdiv Municipal Theatre. There was a hierarchy in the Plovdiv theater with regard to the statute of the actors and the payment. The highest in the hierarchy were the directors, then came the actors, the trainees, the drama actors and lastly, the amateurs.
In 1938 the Plovdiv Municipal Theatre invited as a director the famous actor Georgi Stamatov. [Stamatov, Georgi (1869-1942): actor and director, born in Tiraspol, Russia, died in Sofia, Bulgaria.] He decided to select a team to work with. He announced an audition for actors, who were paid 820 levs, trainees, who received 710 levs, drama actors, who were paid 450 levs and amateurs. No matter that we were all working, we decided to apply for the roles of amateur actors, who usually took part in the crowd scenes and received 20 levs a performance. Jacques worked as a sales assistant in a Jewish textile store, and Mair in another store. The requirement for the audition was to recite a poem by heart and each of us had prepared one.
Location
Bulgaria
Interview
haim molhov