Max Angorn

Max Angorn (b. **/**/1902 – d. 09/07/1985) was a stage and film actor.

Biography

In the 1930s, Max Angorn ran a dry-cleaning business in East London, but had a passion for the theatre. As an amateur, he formed the Jewish Dramatic Circle with which he toured the smaller towns in the Eastern Cape, performing a series of Yiddish plays. In 1938, the East London Jewish Helping Hand and Burial Society, of which he was a member, arranged a farewell for him upon his imminent departure for Johannesburg. Between July and November 1938 he used the name Max Shadovich(?) to act with the Cape Jewish Dramatic Society. He subsequently joined Ossip Runitsch’s Yiddish Art Theatre and became a member of Sarah Sylvia’s Yiddish company made up of refugee artists that visited Cape Town in 1939/1940. In 1944, he was back in East London to produce Shliomke un Rikl and during that time he also performed at the Port Elizabeth City Hall.

He was married to Helen Goldberg and they had two children. His son, Israel (Bunny) Angorn, became a distinguished Professor of Surgery at the University of Natal.

Stage roles

Over the years he appeared in many plays, including High School (1961), staged by Cecil Williams at the Library Theatre (with Sarah Sylvia), A Flea in her Ear and Fanny (both 1968), staged by Albert Ninio at the Alexander Theatre, and played the Rabbi in Taubie Kushlick’s production of Fiddler on the Roof (1969) at the Empire Theatre in Johannesburg. In addition he acted in several films. (FO)