Background
Salomea Deszner, née Teschner, Teszner, was born in 1759 in Bialystok, at that time Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. Her father Adam Teschner worked as a court espalier in the household of the hetman Branicki family.
Deshner
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Salomea Deszner, née Teschner, Teszner, was born in 1759 in Bialystok, at that time Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. Her father Adam Teschner worked as a court espalier in the household of the hetman Branicki family.
Salomea received an excellent education of that time. She spoke several foreign languages, danced well, knew court etiquette, was good in literature and art, played several musical instruments.
Salomea was noticed by the king and engaged at his theater when her father worked for the hetman Branicki family. In 1777, the king recommended her for the National Theater in Warsaw (Teatr Narodowy), the largest in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth at that time. The Head of the National Theater was a well-known Polish actor, playwright and memorialist of the Polish Enlightenment Wojciech Bogusławski, who became Salomea’s first theater teacher and biographer.
She became one of the stars of the Warsaw stage very soon. Salomea performed different roles, but was best-known as soubrette. She got very beautiful voice thanks to her classes with the best musicians of the theater. Deszner traveled a lot with the Bogusławski’s troupe and performed at many theatrical stages of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. She was very popular actress in Lublin, Krakow, Vilnius and other large theaters. She performed several times in Grodno, Belarus, as well. Salomea worked at the National Theater in Warsaw in 1777-1785 and in 1789-1796, and in the theater in Vilnius in 1785-1789 and 1796-1801. As an actor, she was regarded as belonging to the Polish elite, and she played in tragedy, comedy and opera, was famed in breeches roles, and particularly known for the part of Minna von Barnhelm. She participated in the first opera buffa in Poland “Dla miłości zmyślone szaleństwo” in 1779.
In 1800 (or 1801), Salomea decided to establish her own theater in Grodno (today’s Belarus). It wasn’t easy without having own group of actors. She also had to deal with the competitors. Solomea secretly bought over impresario Nowicki’s head, his troupe who previously performed in Bialystok. Soon, Deszner came in touch with her other competitors Szymanski and Turovski. They agreed to perform alternately, but finally all competing with her entrepreneurs left to the provinces, leaving Solomea Deszner the only one theater director in Grodno. She was the director of the theater in Grodno from 1802 until 1806, and as such in 1803 got authority from Russian governors over the theatrical policy in the entire Grodno region.
