Rubchak, Ivan

Rubchak, Ivan [Рубчак, Іван; Rubčak], b 7 March 1874 in Kalush, Galicia, d 11 May 1952 in Lviv. Actor and singer (bass); husband of Kateryna Rubchak. He worked in the Ruska Besida Theater (1894–1914), Ternopilski Teatralni Vechory (1916), the Theater of the Legion of Ukrainian Sich Riflemen (1916–18), the New Lviv Theater (1921–3), Vasyl Kossak’s troupe (1920), the Ukrainska Besida Theater (1921–3), the Ruthenian Theater of the Prosvita Society (1924–6), Yosyp Stadnyk’s touring troupe (1927–8), the Tobilevych Theater (1928–38, with interruptions), the Kotliarevsky Theater (1938–9), the Lesia Ukrainka Theater (1939–41), the Lviv Opera Theater (1941–4), and the Lviv Ukrainian Drama Theater (1944–52). During his stage career he played and sang over 500 character, comic, opera, and operetta roles, including Karas in Semen Hulak-Artemovsky’s Zaporozhets’ za dunaiem (Zaporozhian Cossack beyond the Danube) and the title role in Johann Strauss's Der Zigeunerbaron.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 4 (1993).]