SEVEN DOORS TO SIN Nicholas Dunaev -1st/1st 1953 HCDJ - Signed- Kolya

$225.00
Dunaev was born on May 26, 1884 in Moscow, Russia as Nicholas Dunay. He was the son of a Czarist nobleman, former Lord Mayor of Moscow, and a graduate of the University of Moscow Law School. Active in the Russian revolution in 1917, he was an associate of Alexander Kerensky, head of the provisional government which was toppled by the Bolshevik revolution. He was arrested and sent to Siberia in exile, from where he escaped. He made his way to France, where he married novelist Edith Donnerburg; she died just two years later. He once penned “The act of killing the spirit in a man, of obliterating all sense of honor, faith, and a desire for better things, is as surely homicide as through the man's soul were taken from his body.” Dunaev came to the United States in 1919 to work as a writer, actor, and director at the Vitagraph Corporation, one of the first motion film companies. To his new American friends, he was known as “Kolya,” short for his Russian accent pronounced ‘Nicholas.’ With the advent of “talkies,” Dunaev moved to Hollywood to work for the World Film Corporation where he earned another nickname “the strongman from Moscow.” He starred with Otis Skinner in the original “Kismet.” His self-written play “The Spider” starred himself, and played on Broadway in the 1920s.
Dunaev was born on May 26, 1884 in Moscow, Russia as Nicholas Dunay. He was the son of a Czarist nobleman, former Lord Mayor of Moscow, and a graduate of the University of Moscow Law School. Active in the Russian revolution in 1917, he was an associate of Alexander Kerensky, head of the provisional government which was toppled by the Bolshevik revolution. He was arrested and sent to Siberia in exile, from where he escaped. He made his way to France, where he married novelist Edith Donnerburg; she died just two years later. He once penned “The act of killing the spirit in a man, of obliterating all sense of honor, faith, and a desire for better things, is as surely homicide as through the man's soul were taken from his body.” Dunaev came to the United States in 1919 to work as a writer, actor, and director at the Vitagraph Corporation, one of the first motion film companies. To his new American friends, he was known as “Kolya,” short for his Russian accent pronounced ‘Nicholas.’ With the advent of “talkies,” Dunaev moved to Hollywood to work for the World Film Corporation where he earned another nickname “the strongman from Moscow.” He starred with Otis Skinner in the original “Kismet.” His self-written play “The Spider” starred himself, and played on Broadway in the 1920s.