in her new home, kalich set out to emphasize her dramatic skills over her musical talents, working hard as a proponent of the yiddish theater movement, hoping to help the theatres gain credibility in addition to notoriety. anti-semitism in america had initially led audiences to believe that jewish immigrants were incapable of producing anything more than low-brow, minstrel entertainment, but thalia had made a name for itself with its revolutionary yiddish-language translations of shakespeare. kalich played a number of roles in these landmark works, even beating out the other male stars for a chance to play the coveted role of hamlet.