Motel the Operator
Released: January 15, 1940Runtime: 88 minLanguage: YI
Motel, a poor laborer, loving husband and new father, leads cloakmakers in a strike for better working conditions. When he is severely injured by strikebreakers, his wife, Esther, and infant son are left destitute. Desperate to save her starving child, Esther gives him up for adoption to a wealthy couple, and then commits suicide. The richly-rendered beautiful Yiddish songs by Sholem Secunda featuring Cantor Leibele Waldman and Joel Feig's famous choir are a good example of the bittersweet melodrama in the finest tradition of the Yiddish theater.
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Top billed cast
Chaim Tauber
as Motel Friedman
Seymour Rechzeit
as Jacob 'Jack' Rosenwald
Yetta Zwerling
as Chane Belle 'Annabella' Frumkin
Jacob Zanger
as Jacob 'Joseph' Frumkin
Maurice Krohner
as Benjamin Rosenwald
Izidor Frankel
as The Boss
Berthe Hart
as Rebecca Rosenwald
Gertrude Krause
as Ruth Frumkin
Malvina Rappel
as Esta Friedman
Herman Rosen
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