Michael Tilson Thomas

She wanted to know everything about the structure of the theater, and she became a very effective producer and manager and someone who paid far more attention to the whole business and organization aspect of the theater than my grandfather did, who was the kind of big dreamer and partier.

And

That was so unusual for a woman of those days.

I have some correspondence of hers where she's writing to some people who put into an ad in some big paper that she was going to be a part of some season they were doing.

And she writes to them saying that she absolutely has not agreed to do this.

And these are the conditions which they must immediately fulfill in order for this to happen.

It's really very, very tough and straight forward.

And there's a lot of stuff about her I didn't have room for in the show.

Remarkable things like when she was arrested by Theodore Roosevelt.

This happened in this way in New York.

There were blue laws at the time, meaning that performances were forbidden on Sunday.

But of course...

In the Yiddish theater, Sunday was a very big day because Saturday was the Sabbath.

So they played on Sunday.

And at one point when T.R.

was police commissioner of New York, he and some of his men raided one of the Tomaszewski's theaters and he came in.

He saw Bessie, who was very young and who looked much younger than she was always.

And he said, look out, little girl.

And she said, little girl, my ass.

I'm the star here.