William Shust papers

William Shust (originally spelled Szust, Ukrainian Василь Шуст/Vasyl' Shust) was born January 14, 1928 in New York City to Ukrainian immigrant parents, Olga and Nicholas. He had an older sister, Mary; another sister, Melanie, died at birth. Shust grew up among other Ukrainian immigrant families in the area of Manhattan’s East Village known as “Little Ukraine,” where he attended St. George’s Ukrainian Catholic Church and was a member of the church’s drum and bugle corps. Upon graduating from Seward Park High School in 1945, he attended Fordham University, where he earned a B.S. in Marketing in 1949 and an MFA in Theatre in 1954. While at Fordham, Shust acted in numerous theatrical productions and hosted programs for the campus radio station. He also designed publicity materials for plays and other events he participated in, something he would continue to do throughout his career.

After Fordham, Shust worked at CBS before leaving to pursue acting full-time. His career as an actor lasted for over six decades, during which he was actively involved with Broadway and Off-Broadway theater in New York and regional theater across the United States and Canada. Notable productions include Bertolt Brecht’s Arturo Ui (first production on Broadway, directed by Tony Richardson), The Owl and the Pussycat (Broadway, directed by Arthur Storch), Clifford Odets’ The Country Girl (Broadway, directed by John Houseman), The Misanthrope (Theatre East), Right You Are, Ghosts, Lovers (Roundabout Theatre), Julius Caesar (New York Shakespeare Festival), Agamemnon, Electra, Trojan Women (Theatre Marquee), Look Back in Anger (41 Street Theatre), Count Dracula (Equity Library Theatre), Hedda Gabler (The Cubiculo Theatre Company), The Taming of the Shrew (Phoenix Theatre), and The Scarlet Letter (Gene Frankel Theatre). He received great acclaim in the early 1960s for playing the leading role of Emile in the first-ever production of The Egg in the United States; theater critic Henry Hewes named The Egg the best play of 1961-1962 on the strength of Shust’s performance. He also acted in various films, television programs, and commercials, including small roles as the psychologist Dr. Fisher in Dark Shadows and Patrick Henry in the 1976 PBS historical drama miniseries The Adams Chronicles.

Being Ukrainian was an important part of Shust’s personal identity as well as his professional work. Beginning in 1949 and throughout the 1950s, he had a regular column called “Impressions” in The Ukrainian Weekly. His involvement with St. George’s Ukrainian Catholic Church included narrating a two-hour radio broadcast of a Ukrainian Christmas church service — the first time a full liturgy at the church was recorded. Shust frequently performed in Ukrainian productions and at various Ukrainian cultural events, including speaking at the dedication of the Taras Shevchenko Memorial in Washington, DC in 1964. Taras Shevchenko was also the inspiration for an original television script written by Shust, though it was never produced.

One of Shust’s most notable successes was his longtime portrayal of Anton Chekhov, a Russian writer with Ukrainian lineage, in the one-man show Chekhov on the Lawn, written and directed by Elihu Winer. Beginning in 1972, Shust performed Chekhov on the Lawn across the United States and Great Britain for close to two decades, earning rave reviews and winning the Best Performance Award at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1980. In 1990, he became the first American actor to perform in Yalta (present-day Russian-occupied Crimea) when the USSR invited him there to perform Chekhov on the Lawn.

In addition to being a longtime member of SAG, AFTRA, and Actors’ Equity, Shust was actively involved in The Players, a membership club for artists and art lovers, and the Episcopal Actors’ Guild, a charitable organization that provides emergency financial aid and other support to professional performers in need. He held leadership roles in both organizations at various points in his life and also wrote a regular column called “Musing” for the Episcopal Actors’ Guild newsletter, The Eaglet.

William Shust passed away on March 14, 2018 at the age of 90. He lived in “Little Ukraine” for his entire life.