Pati Behrs Eristoff (February 13, 1922 – July 4, 2004) was a
Russian American
Russian Americans ( rus, русские американцы, r=russkiye amerikantsy, p= ˈruskʲɪje ɐmʲɪrʲɪˈkant͡sɨ) are Americans of full or partial Russian ancestry. The term can apply to recent Russian immigrants to the United Stat ...
prima ballerina
A ballet dancer ( it, ballerina fem.; ''ballerino'' masc.) is a person who practices the art of classical ballet. Both females and males can practice ballet; however, dancers have a strict hierarchy and strict gender roles. They rely on yea ...
and actress.
Biography
Pati Behrs Eristoff was a prima ballerina and a grandniece of
Leo Tolstoy
Count Lev Nikolayevich TolstoyTolstoy pronounced his first name as , which corresponds to the romanization ''Lyov''. () (; russian: link=no, Лев Николаевич Толстой,In Tolstoy's day, his name was written as in pre-refor ...
. She is perhaps best known as the first of
John Derek
John Derek (born Derek Delevan Harris; August 12, 1926 – May 22, 1998) was an American actor, director, screenwriter, producer and photographer.[Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...](_blank ...<br></span></div>'s wives. She was born in Turkey to Russian émigré parents. Her family fled to <div class=)
after her father refused to partake in
pogroms
A pogrom () is a violent riot incited with the aim of massacring or expelling an ethnic or religious group, particularly Jews. The term entered the English language from Russian to describe 19th- and 20th-century attacks on Jews in the Russian ...
. She survived
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
and
Occupied France
The Military Administration in France (german: Militärverwaltung in Frankreich; french: Occupation de la France par l'Allemagne) was an interim occupation authority established by Nazi Germany during World War II to administer the occupied zo ...
by dancing in Parisian nightclubs, while at the same time doing all she could to hide
Russian Jews
The history of the Jews in Russia and areas historically connected with it goes back at least 1,500 years. Jews in Russia have historically constituted a large religious and ethnic diaspora; the Russian Empire at one time hosted the largest pop ...
and
gypsies
The Romani (also spelled Romany or Rromani , ), colloquially known as the Roma, are an Indo-Aryan ethnic group, traditionally nomadic itinerants. They live in Europe and Anatolia, and have diaspora populations located worldwide, with sign ...
from the
Nazi
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...
s.
Receiving a Hollywood contract after the war, she emigrated to the United States. Behrs had a brief first marriage to George 'Gogi' Tchitchinadze (1917–1970), a host at the
Bel-Air Hotel.
[Carroll, Harrison (October 19, 1948)]
Behind the Scenes in Hollywood
''The Daily Clintonian''
In December 1947 she met
John Derek
John Derek (born Derek Delevan Harris; August 12, 1926 – May 22, 1998) was an American actor, director, screenwriter, producer and photographer.[screenwriter
A screenplay writer (also called screenwriter, scriptwriter, scribe or scenarist) is a writer who practices the craft of screenwriting, writing screenplays on which mass media, such as films, television programs and video games, are based.
...](_blank ...<br></span></div> in an acting class, and they married on October 9, 1948. The couple had two children: son Russell Derek (1950–1999) and daughter Sean Catherine Derek (born 1953), who became a <div class=)
. Behrs and Derek separated in September 1955 and divorced in April 1956.
In 1975, she married pediatrician Dr. Lucius Lindley (1919–1986), who predeceased her.
She became a grandmother in 1969, and a great-grandmother in 1996. She died on July 4, 2004, aged 82.
Philosophical and/or political views
An animal-rights advocate, she presente
Actors and Otherswith her 1926
Steinway
Steinway & Sons, also known as Steinway (), is a German-American piano company, founded in 1853 in Manhattan by German piano builder Heinrich Engelhard Steinweg (later known as Henry E. Steinway). The company's growth led to the opening of a ...
baby grand piano. Her daughter, Sean, requested it be sold to help as many animals in need as possible.
Filmography
See also
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List of people from California
This is a list of notable people from the U.S. state of California. It includes people who were born/raised in, lived in, or spent portions of their lives in California, or for whom California is a significant part of their identity. This list ...
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List of prima ballerinas
This is a list of people who have been awarded the title prima ballerina, the second highest title that can be awarded to a ballerina.
"''Prima ballerina'' literally translates to “first principal dancer” from Italian and, in the United St ...
*
List of Russian people
This is a list of people associated with the modern Russia, Russian Federation, the Soviet Union, Imperial Russia, Russian Tsardom, the Grand Duchy of Moscow, Kievan Rus', and other predecessor states of Russia.
Regardless of ethnicity or emi ...
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Behrs, Pati
2004 deaths
1922 births
20th-century American actresses
Actresses from California
American ballerinas
American film actresses
Turkish emigrants to France
French emigrants to the United States
Leo Tolstoy
Dancers from Paris
Prima ballerinas
20th-century American ballet dancers