Fania Marinoff

Fania Marinoff (March 20, 1890 – November 17, 1971) was a Russian-born American actress whose Broadway career spanned from 1903 to 1937. Born in Odessa in the Russian Empire, present-day Ukraine, she was the thirteenth child and seventh daughter of Mayer and Leah Marinoff, the latter of whom died shortly after her birth. Raised in a Jewish household, Marinoff was six years old when she was smuggled aboard an overcrowded passenger ship bound for America, arriving in Boston in conditions of poverty and without formal education. At age eight she was sent to live with her older brother Michael, in whose home she endured prolonged mistreatment, including being confined for hours in dark, rat-infested rooms. A year after moving in with him, she made her stage debut playing a young boy in a production of Cyrano de Bergerac at the El Itch Theater, beginning a performing career that would last nearly five decades.

Marinoff went on to play supporting and lead roles in dozens of Broadway productions between 1903 and 1937, among them Antony and Cleopatra, Times Have Changed, Judgment Day, Christopher Comes Across, and The Bride the Sun Shines On. Her stage work also included the lead role in the original production of Karen in 1918 and a role in Pillars of Society in 1931. Her prominence on stage grew further when she became a lead actress with the Greenwich Village Players. Alongside her theatrical work, she appeared in seven American silent films between 1914 and 1917, as well as three short films in 1915. Her film credits included One of Our Girls (1914), The Galloper (1915), and Life's Whirlpool (1917). During her career she took an eight-year hiatus, which she attributed in an interview to heavy drinking. In the final years of her active career, from 1942 to 1945, she volunteered at the Stage Door Canteen entertaining military troops.

In 1914, Marinoff married American writer and photographer Carl Van Vechten. The two had been introduced through mutual friends in New York City in the summer of 1912 and formed a close bond in the period that followed. Despite the recognition Marinoff had earned before their marriage, she came to be widely identified in social circles primarily as Van Vechten's wife. Together, the couple played a prominent role in the Harlem Renaissance. Author Nella Larsen dedicated her novel Passing to both Marinoff and Van Vechten. After Marinoff retired from acting, she and her husband remained engaged in artistic circles. She died on November 17, 1971, in Englewood, New Jersey, from pneumonia.