Long before Madonna, the world was Gaga for Nazimova. PLACES is the story of trailblazer Alla Nazimova: 1920s silent screen icon, Broadway legend, and probably the most famous star you’ve never heard of. From a Jewish immigrant fleeing Tsarist Russia to the highest paid movie star in Tinseltown, Nazimova was the first female writer, director, and producer in Hollywood. With her visionary film Salome, art house cinema was born. Nazimova’s infamous all-women’s ‘sewing circle,’ a term she coined to describe her underground meetings of lesbian and bisexual film actresses in Hollywood, defied the moral and artistic codes of her time–and eventually forced her into obscurity. Romy Nordlinger’s multimedia solo performance reimagines one of the most daring and censored artists of the 20th century.

Chances are you haven’t heard the name Alla Nazimova. The Broadway star and Hollywood legend’s story is largely forgotten, but writer/performer Romy Nordlinger is determined to bring it back to life in her multimedia, one-woman show Places. Nordlinger, as Nazimova, tells the fascinating, salacious and somewhat tragic story of a woman born ahead of her time. Terrorized by an abusive father and abandoned by her mother, the Jewish Nazimova fled Tsarist Russia in 1905 with her boyfriend at the time, actor Pavel Orlenev, whom she met while studying with the great acting teacher Stanislavski. They moved to New York City and started a Russian-language theatre company, which did not meet great success. What did, however, was Nazimova’s Broadway career, where she impressed the likes of Henry Miller and the Shuberts, who named a theatre after her. Bolstered by her success on Broadway, Nazimova moved to Hollywood and began appearing in silent films. A trailblazer for women in business, Nazimova was the highest paid actress of her time and wrote, directed and produced her own movies, a first in Hollywood. Unfortunately, Nazimova’s career met an untimely end when her experimental film Salomé, b …Read more