Anna Sten

I was born in Ukraine. When I was 12 years old I went to Moscow. I did not understand Russian then, I spoke Ukrainian…

Anna Sten

Anna Sten (real name: Anna Fesak) was the star of the first European sound films and the first Ukrainian movie star in Hollywood.

She was born in Kyiv to a choreographer and a ballerina. She got her professional education at the Kyiv Higher Theater College. She worked as a reporter and acted in the Kyiv Maly Theater. In 1926, she passed the exams for the First Workers’ Theater of the Proletkult in Moscow. She also began her film career there, debuting in “The Girl with a Hat Box” (1927). Her second work was the lead role in the social drama “Land in Captivity” (1927). In 1930, the actress traveled to Germany as a member of a professional exchange program. One of the first sound films, “The Murderer Dmitri Karamazov” (1931), was shot with her participation. The film was a great success in Europe and the United States. Given this, the Soviet authorities began persecuting Anna Sten, which is why she never returned.

In 1932, the actress received an invitation to Hollywood. The producer Samuel Goldwyn, co-owner of the Metro Goldwyn Mayer film company, intended to make her “the second Greta Garbo.” However, none of the three films released with the actress (“Nana”, “We Live Again”, and “The Wedding Night”) were successful among the audience, so Goldwyn canceled the contract with the actress. Gradually, Anna Sten moved away from cinema and took up painting quite successfully, and her paintings were exhibited at the Boston Museum. The actress died in 1993 in New York. In her numerous interviews, she always emphasized her Ukrainian origin.