Stella Adler

Stella Adler was born February 10, 1901 to a family of actors. Her parents, Sara and Jacob Adler, ran their own theatre company, where she made her debut at four years old in the play Broken Hearts. She was brought up in the theatre, and learned by watching her parents and participating in their productions. Adler had one child, Ellen, with her first husband Horace Eliascheff. Later, she married Harold Clurman, one of the founders of the Group Theatre. They divorced in 1960; she later married Mitchell A. Wilson, a novelist. He died in 1973. She continued teaching, and in 1988 published The Art of Acting. In 1992, Adler died of heart failure in Los Angeles.

Key Dates & Events

• 1905 - Adler makes her stage debut in one of her parents' plays
• 1922 - Adler sees Stanislavski's American tour of the Moscow Art Theatre
• 1934 - Adler travels to Moscow to work with Stanislavski
• 1949 - Adler founds the Stella Adler Conservatory of Theatre