Valentin Katayev’s Comedy The Path of Flowers on the American Stage of the 1930s

The study focuses on the problem of the stage existence in the USA of Val­entin Katayev’s comedy The Path of Flowers (Doroga tzvetov, 1933). It presents documents confirming Katayev’s planned visit to the United States in the 1930s as well as traces the key milestones of his The Path of Flowers’ American stage productions: at the Workers’ Theatre in Chicago (1934), at the New York Experi­mental Theatre as part of the Federal Theatre Project (1936), and at the University Theatre of Michigan (1937). The second of these American stage adaptations is analysed in more detail. Documentary material is used to prove the fact that the Soviet writer approved of this production; it is suggested that in New York it was initiated by the translator of the play, Irving De Witt Talmadge. His brief creative biography is given, and the most representative examples of the discrepancies between his translation and the Soviet original are demonstrated. The study is based on the materials from the Houghton Library (Harvard University), the New York Public Library for Performing Arts, the Library of Congress (Washington D.C.), as well as documents from the Museum of the Evgeny Vakhtangov State Academic Theatre (Moscow). The study is aimed at expanding the understanding of the stage history of the Russian drama in America.