Ninotchka

Ninotchka is a stage version of the film script by the Hungarian playwright and screenwriter Melchior Lengyel (Menyhért Lengyel) (1880-1974).

The original text
The original idea for a romantic comedy about a Russian spymaster who falls in love on a visit to Paris, was proposed by Melchior Lengyel in 1937, then converted to a screen play for the Garbo film Ninotchka (1939) by Billy Wilder, Charles Brackett and Walter Reisch. Melchior was nominated for an Oscar for his original story.

Translations and adaptations
Adapted for the stage by Marc-Gilbert Sauvajon and first performed in French as Ninotchka at the Théâtre du Gymnase in Paris on April 4, 1950 with Sophie Desmarets and Henri Guisal. Published Ninotchka: comédie en 3 actes in Paris by Persan-Beaumont in 1950. Adapted/translated into an Afrikaans in 1953 as  Nina, Verlief in Parys ("Nina in love in Paris"), a stage play by an unnamed translator. Possibly a translation of the 1950 French three-act play by Marc-Gilbert Sauvajon.

Adapted to the stage musical 1955 Broadway musical Silk Stockings, and filmed under this title in 1957.

In 1960 an ABC Special television production of Ninotchka, was aired.

In 1961 the Dramatists Play Service published an English version called Ninotchka: a stage comedy by Menyhért (Melchior) Lengyel.

South African performances
1953: Produced by the National Theatre Organisation in Afrikaans as a stage play entitled Nina, Verlief in Parys, playing for 63 performances. Directed by **, with Petro van der Walt, Gerrit Wessels, **.

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