Hebrew Players Plan Arts Center

The Hebrew Actors' Union is planning to erect a performing arts center here next year.

This was reported yesterday by Seymour Rexsite, president of the union. He said the center would contain a theatre for the presentation of Yiddish classics, a museum for stage memorabilia and two schools, one for acting and one for musical compositions. A campaign to raise $500,000 will soon get underway, he said.

The union, which was founded in 1900, has now more than 250 members. In its heyday -- the nineteen-twenties and the early thirties -- the enrollment was 1,500. Twenty-one theatres presenting Yiddish productions flourished then in New York and on the road.

For this season, only three playhouses will be available, one fewer than last season. To spread employment among its members, the union is subsidizing the Jewish Folk Theatre troupe, formed by Max Bozyk and Isidore Lipinsky.

The first presentation, "Both Kuni Lemels," will open Oct. 10 at the Educational Alliance Playhouse, 197 East Broadway. Previews begin Oct. 3. Performances of the musical, written by Abraham Goldfaden and M. Kurshner, will be given on Saturday nights and Sunday afternoons an evenings. Mr. Bozyk, who will be the director, and Mr. Lipinsky, will be the mainstays of the acting company.

The Anderson Yiddish Theatre, 66 Second Avenue, will open its doors Oct. 17 with "Good Luck," a musical by Sholom Secunda and Jacob Jacobs. And the Folksbiene will start operating Nov. 17 at 175 East Broadway with "The Enchanted Melody," a musicl fantasy by Izik Manger and Henoch Kon. Their source was works by Mr. Goldfaden.

In memory of 320 Yiddish actors who were killed by the Nazis, the Hebrew Actors' Union will publish a book entitled "Kedoishim" ("The Martyred") in December. The Yiddish text is by Zalmen Zylbercweig.