Case, Bertha

First Mexican-American actor to win an Academy Award, Anthony Quinn's most notable film roles were the title character in Zorba the Greek for which he received his fourth Oscar nomination and the circus strongman in Fellini's La Strada. He had a prolific career on film playing especially villains and a wide variety of ethnic types. On Broadway he replaced Marlon Brando in A Streetcar Named Desire and played opposite Laurence Olivier in Thomas Becket. Quinn was also a painter and writer.

From the guide to the Anthony Quinn letters to Bertha Case, 1963-1976, (The New York Public Library. Billy Rose Theatre Division.)

Bertha Case was the literary executor of the estates of Berthold Brecht and Kurt Weill.

From the guide to the Bertha Case collection, 19--, (The New York Public Library. Music Division.)

Known professionally as an authors' and artists' representative, Bertha Case worked to promote and establish the literary works of a variety of authors, playwrights, and performers. According to her 1984 obituary in The New York Times, Case worked in the literary and film industries for Hollywood's A. S. Lyons Agency and New York's M.C.A. agency before establishing her own agency in New York in the 1950s.

Notably, Case acted as the literary representative of the estates of German playwright Bertolt Brecht and composer Kurt Weill.

Source: "Bertha Case," The New York Times, December 13, 1984. Accessed July 2012. http://www.nytimes.com/1984/12/13/obituaries/bertha-case.html.

From the guide to the Bertha Case papers, 1932-1985, 1963-1984, (The New York Public Library. Billy Rose Theatre Division.)