Ruth Maleczech

Life and career

Maleczech was born in Cleveland, Ohio as Ruth Sophia Reinprecht, to Frank Reinprecht (1912–1982) and Elizabeth Marie (née Maletich) Reinprecht (1914–1996), Catholic Yugoslavian immigrant parents, a steel worker and a seamstress, respectively. She was raised in Phoenix, Arizona. Maleczech was the first in her family to attend college, beginning theater studies at UCLA at 16. From there she went to San Francisco to work, first, with Herbert Blau at The Actor’s Workshop, then with Ronnie Davis in what became the San Francisco Mime Troupe.

In San Francisco, she met and lived with Mabou Mines co-founder Lee Breuer. In 1964, they went to Paris and for six years earned money dubbing films, sufficient to fund their burgeoning theatrical experiments. In Europe, Maleczech and Breuer met David Warrilow and fellow ex-pats JoAnne Akalaitis and Philip Glass. In France, Maleczech and Akalaitis studied with the Polish director and drama theorist Jerzy Grotowski; Maleczech also spent a month in East Berlin studying, observing rehearsals and attending performances by Bertolt Brecht’s storied Berliner Ensemble. Returning to the U.S., Maleczech co-founded the experimental N.Y.C. theater company Mabou Mines, in 1970, along with Akalaitis, Breuer, Glass and Warrilow. Shortly thereafter they were joined by Fred Neumann, whom they had known and worked with in Europe. Maleczech collaborated on nearly every piece Mabou Mines produced. She adopted a phonetic spelling of her mother's maiden name as her professional name (Maletich → Maleczech).

She directed/adapted several works: Wrong Guys, from the hard-boiled novel by Jim Strahs; Vanishing Pictures, based on Poe's Mystery of Marie Roget; Samuel Beckett's Imagination Dead Imagine (as a hologram); The Bribe by Terry O'Reilly; her own Sueños, inspired by the life of Sor Juana Inez de la Cruz; Belén: A Book of Hours, written by Catherine Sasanov; and Song For New York.

In addition to working together for a half century, she and Breuer had two children. Breuer and Maleczech legally married in New York in 1978.

Outside of Mabou Mines, Maleczech created Fire Works with Valeria Vasilevski and collaborated and worked with, among others, Peter Sellars, Frederick Wiseman and Martha Clarke. She appeared in numerous feature films, commercial and independent, and on television in Law & Order and ER. In 2012, a year before her death, Maleczech began developing a new work, Imagining the Imaginary Invalid, using the structure and characters from Molière’s The Imaginary Invalid. Her daughter, performer/director/choreographer Clove Galilee, will continue developing the work as director.

Death

Ruth Maleczech died at age 74 from breast cancer at the home of her son Lute in Brooklyn. She is survived by her husband, son (Lute Breuer), daughter (Clove Breuer) and a granddaughter (Bella Breuer). Maleczech was also survived by her younger siblings, Francis Reinprecht and Mrs. Patricia Adams, and various nieces and nephews.

Obie Awards

Villager Downtown Theater Awards

Other Awards