M. was born on 26 March 1904 in Warsaw, Poland, to poor parents. From age seven until ten he learned in Lublin, where he had moved to. Then he learned for four years in a Polish-Yiddish school. Encouraged by his father (a frequent theatre attendee and a member of the dramatic circle), M. founded at the age of fifteen a children's troupe, which had on each Sabbath afternoon in a wedding wall, acted for children their repertoire, which they had seen in the theatre, or in drama circle. An impresario soon took over the children's troupe to act in a theatre which adults visited) and shortly thereafter the troupe toured across the province.

At the age of sixteen M. was an errand boy for the Yiddish troupe of Hershkovitsh, where he became a year later the scenarist, then prompter and in the end regisseur., also receiving small roles from time to time.

After being two-and-a-half years in the troupe, with whom he also toured across the [rand] areas, M. went to Warsaw, where he in 1923 entered into the troupe of Zigmunt Turkow and Ida Kaminska as a actor. He acted with them for six months in the Vilna region and later in Warsaw's Central Theatre (until May 1924), toured then with "Vik't" (until May 1926) across Poland and Rumania. There he went over to the Vilna Troupe, and he participated in a troupe with Potocka across the Polish province. In 1930-31 he acted in the "Meutis Theatre" in Riga (Lettland), in 1931-32 in Warsaw's "Yiddish Dramatic Theatre" (Leader -- Dr. M. Weichert).