Nyzhankivsky, Amvrosii

Nyzhankivsky, Amvrosii or Bronyslav [Нижанківський, Амвросій or Бронислав; Nyžankivs'kyj, Amvrosij], b 8 April 1873 in Kolomyia, Galicia, d 7 February 1943 in Kolomyia. Actor and ballet master; father of Dariia Nyzhankivska-Snihurovych and Bohdan Nyzhankivsky. He began his stage career in 1892 as a choir member in the Ruska Besida Theater, continued there as a leading actor until 1914 (with a hiatus in 1896–8), and then acted in Vasyl Kossak’s troupe (1916–22), the Ukrainska Besida Theater (1923–4), Yosyp Stadnyk’s troupe (1924–8), and the Tobilevych Theater (1929–32). Nyzhankivsky’s repertoire of Ukrainian and non-Ukrainian character roles varied from Khoma in Mykhailo Starytsky’s Oi ne khody, Hrytsiu ... (Don't Go to Parties, Hryts ...) to Gesler in Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller’s Wilhelm Tell.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 3 (1993).]