Jiří Voskovec

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Jiří Voskovec

Born	Jiří Wachsmann 19 June 1905(1905-06-19) Sázava, Czech Republic
Died	July 1, 1981 (aged 76) Pearblossom, California, U.S.
Other name(s)	George Voskovec
Spouse(s)	Christine McKeown (?-1981) (his death) Anne Gerlette (?-?) (her death) 2 Children

Jiří Voskovec (pronounced [ˈjɪr̝iː ˈvoskovɛts] (help·info)) (June 19, 1905 near Benešov as Jiří Wachsmann – July 4, 1981 in Pearblossom, California, U.S. as George Voskovec^[1]) was a Czech-American actor, playwright, dramatist, director, translator, and poet. Throughout most of his career he was associated with Jan Werich. He attended school in Prague and in Dijon, France, and became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1955.

In 1925, together with Werich, he founded the Osvobozené divadlo (Liberated Theater), which after two years ultimately changed into a center for Czech clownery, a reaction to contemporary political and societal problems. Their performances were strictly anti-fascist, which led to the closure of the Liberated Theater after the Nazi occupation in 1938.

Both Voskovec and Werich fled to the United States in early 1939. For the rest of his life, Voskovec lived primarily in the United States, interrupted only by brief stays in Czechoslovakia in 1948 and in France from 1948 to 1950. Until the mid-1940s Voskovec worked and wrote mostly with Jan Werich, but after Werich's return to communist Czechoslovakia, they met only a few more times. After his return to the United States in 1950, Voskovec was interned at the Ellis Island for eleven months for his alleged sympathy for communism.

Although Voskovec lived in three countries and his maternal grandmother was French, he always maintained that "I am a born and bred Czech." In 1955, he became an American citizen. As a result of his naturalization, he is sometimes referred to as "George Voskovec".

Voskovec acted in 72 movies. Only the first five of these were Czech; the rest were American or British. His most famous American movie was 12 Angry Men with Henry Fonda, and his most famous British film being The Spy Who Came In From The Cold. His last movie was Barbarosa, with Willie Nelson and Gary Busey. In 1975, he published the Czech spoken LP record "Relativně vzato", where he reflects on his life and world in general. A sleeve note for this LP was written by another notable Czech émigré, author Josef Škvorecký. Voskovec also appeared in the 1978 TV-film The Nativity and the 1980 film Somewhere in Time, starring Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour.