Playing Dreidel with Judah Maccabee, a Hannukah play: the intro essay

My new book, Playing Dreidel with Judah Maccabee (a Hannukah play), is out and available!  For those who want a sneak preview, here is the intro essay to the book:

            Who was Judah Maccabee?

            What was his world like during the time he led a war to take the temple back?
            How did that war become a holiday celebrated by lighting candles, playing dreidel, singing songs, eating latkas, and giving presents?
            When I decided to write a play about Hannukah, I started thinking about the fact that I never really knew the answers to any of those questions as a child.  I knew that Judah Maccabee was a hero, and that his name was mentioned in a few songs.  And I knew he had something to do with getting the temple back.  But beyond that, I didn’t know or really wonder much else.
            So who was he?
            Judah Maccabee lived in a time when most Jews believed that Judaism could not be practiced outside the ancient temple. Yet the temple had been taken away, so those Jews found themselves unable to observe Jewish rituals in the way they felt those rituals should be observed.
            This was before there were rabbis, or the Talmud.  The seeds of the rabbinic movement perhaps started in those days without the temple, but it would take 200 years for that change to truly happen.  In Judah Maccabee’s time, 165 BCE, there were only priests, and priests needed the temple.
            As far as Judah Maccabee was concerned, the survival of the Jewish religion was at stake.  In essence, Judah Maccabee was a soldier, a man driven to lead a rebellion against his Hellenistic rulers because he believed that otherwise, his religion would be destroyed.
            What is remarkable is that, against all odds, he won.  He regained the temple.
            Then, 200 years later, the temple was destroyed.
            So why the celebration?
            According to the Book of Maccabees, an eight-day celebration was held after the altar was rededicated.  This may have been a belated celebration of Sukkot.  There is no mention of lighting candles, or even the miracle of the oil lasting.  But in some ways, perhaps, the Maccabean celebration of their victory could be considered the first celebration of Hannukah.
            It wasn’t until 250 years later, after the destruction of the Temple, that we can find a passing mention of the holiday (just known then as “The Festival of Lights.”) And it was 600 years before instructions about how to celebrate Hanukkah appear in the Gemara (part of the Talmud).
            So perhaps Hanukkah is a reminder of what the Temple once meant to Judaism, rather than a simple celebration of a victory. After all, the menorah deliberately resembles the Eternal Light, a seven-pronged golden candlestick that once stood in the sanctuary. And the story of the oil lasting is certainly another reminder of days when the Temple was the center of Judaism.
            But the dreidels, the latkes, the songs, the presents: they all belong to a different, more modern tradition. A tradition that would be almost incomprehensible to Judah Maccabee if he saw it.
            Would it even feel like the same religion, I wondered?
            That was the question that inspired me to write this play. The answer I came up with involves a common theme, a theme that I feel connects Judah Maccabee’s battles with more modern Jewish struggles.
            In the end, there is no way to truly know who Judah Maccabee was, or what he would think of our world and Judaism today. When grasping at the tiny bits of information that still exist about a man who lived over two thousand years ago, all one can truly do is imagine. I based my tale on facts, but I also based it my own imaginings. Judah Maccabee the character may or may not be anything like the real Judah Maccabee who lived over two thousand years ago. But this is how I imagine him.

Director's note for Pangs of the Messiah

Theater is about building up and tearing down.  It is the most ephemeral of art forms, not just because it only exists live and in the moment, but because it must be literally destroyed after every production.  I have spent weeks upon weeks of 18 plus hour days building a set, only to have to tear it into nothingness when a production is over.

I hate the destruction.  I hate creating something that’s beautiful, that’s mine (or more correctly ours, as theater is also about that collaboration), and then having to demolish it at the end.  I know it will happen, from the time I begin creation.  But when that moment of destruction comes, it hurts.

How much more would that destruction hurt if it were the home I built, that I had lived in for 40 years?  Or my family had lived in for 200 years?  Or 2000?

The West Bank settlers are people who, for the most part, are living out their utopian philosophies.  They arrived believing that they are fulfilling a mission both political and religious, that they are bringing the Messiah and redemption by their very presence.

Some, probably most, still have that utopian hope.  But regardless of what might have brought them to the West Bank initially, houses that have been built cannot easily be destroyed.  It has happened—even recently, during the disengagement from Gaza in 2005.  But it wasn’t easy then, and should the West Bank settlements be abandoned, it will almost certainly be harder.

It seems fitting that one of the sticking points in the struggle for peace is about a much more ancient land dispute.  For if the Messiah is to come, it is believed, a new Temple will have to built, and it will be built on the Temple Mount.  Right now, another building stands there: the Dome of the Rock, built originally in the 7^th Century on the advice of a former rabbi who had converted to Islam.  This too was both a political and religious act, and the relationship to the ancient Temple was no coincidence.

But whatever the circumstances under which the mosque was built, it is now a fact.  It is an incredible building, representing the work and beliefs of people going back nearly 1,400 years.  It is another utopia, one in which only those of the Muslim faith are allowed.

The Messiah waits for the rebuilding of the Temple because the wound from that destruction from 2000 years ago still hasn’t completely healed.   Here in New York, we are only 10 years away from the destruction of the Twin Towers.  That was enough to start a war or two, for us.

When this show is over, some pieces of it will disappear into storage.  And some will be destroyed forever.  It is expected.  My own utopian vision allows for it; I believe in the power of theater, and I know that part of that power lies in its ephemeral nature. 

But if I believed that the destruction of my set would also mean the destruction of my utopia, the destruction of my ability to work in the theater, I don’t think I could bring myself to allow it.  No matter what the general good.  No matter how strong the arguments for it.  I would not allow it.

Even if someone else’s utopia was destroyed instead.

My day in the West Bank settlements

An account of my day in one of the West Bank settlements with Motti Lerner, the playwright of Pangs of the Messiah.  I decided to be deliberately vague about which settlement and the rep there whom we met—since I didn’t tell them I would be blogging, I think it would be unfair print a public account that mentions them by name.

It was an early morning for me and Motti, 6am so we could get to the settlement in time for our 10am meeting.  We drove to Jerusalem and took the bus from there; Motti had had a bad experience once getting lost driving in the West Bank and he thought a bus was safer.

The bus drive went through empty, dry dessert.  Motti said that it could be as green as the roads around Jerusalem if trees were planted, but aside from the occasional olive grove, there was no greenery.  There was also little sign of civilization after we passed the dividing wall.  The road deliberately avoided the Palestinian towns, to avoid creating  further tensions.  Still, the bus was heavy with protective armor and bullet proof glass.

Motti explained that we were on a “Jewish” road, and that Palestinians had there own roads.  Although I understood the reason for the separation, I must admit I found the designation of a road just for Jews disturbing—both for Arabs and in light of my own associations with Jewish history (This is a bit of another subject, but I have really come to realize how Israeli Arabs and Jews live in totally different worlds—different schools, different laws…this is a choice on the part of the Arabs as well)

After driving on the winding road for a while, we finally came to the settlement.  We were early, so we stopped at the gas station and Motti grabbed a coffee.  Four soldiers with machine guns were also on line for a snack.

We headed inside and got stopped at the gate by a guard who was suspicious of my camera. Motti explained...something to the guard, who seemed to eventually accept it.  Then we went in.

The first thing we encountered was basically a trailer park for settlers, making a small neighborhood.  These, I was later told, were settlers waiting to be allowed to build homes.  The government had halted construction, and indeed the Supreme Court had ruled that some recently constructed homes needed to be dismantled.

Then we hit an area of pretty little houses on paved roads.  They all looked exactly alike-- red shingles, white walls, white tile floors.  The song Little Boxes came to mind, and indeed it turned out that the first fifty houses has been ordered en mass, as pre fab housing.  They wanted something quick and utilitarian which also conveyed the idea that here, no one is richer or poorer than anyone else, we are all equal and in this together.

We went to the Community Office and said hello to the secretary there.  She showed us a map of the settlement and we saw that the file on Motti had been pulled; they had reviewed it before he came. The secretary said the whole settlement was in mourning—a  young man from there had been among those recently killed.  The funeral was set for Thursday.

We also saw an exhibit on the Indian immigrants who recently joined the settlement and were in the process of being formally converted.  This particular settlement, we were told, is full of immigrants.  Part of their mission is to bring Jews in from around the world.  These Indian Jews said they had ancient Jewish origins.  The government accepted that and gave them citizenship, but at the settlement they were converting them just to be sure.

We left the offices after that and went to visit J—, a settler activist and former head of the regional council.  The rabbi who had been our original contact had cancelled, using the upcoming funeral as his excuse. Motti suspected the rabbi had simply had second thoughts.

J— was very welcoming and eager to talk.  He reminded me, in an odd way, of the Mormons I recently encountered during my brief stopover in Salt Lake City.  He, too, seemed eager to spread the Word.  The word for him was that all Jews must work together in order for the Messiah to come.

J—’ s home was full of simple, pre fab furniture to go along with the pre fab house.  Utilitarian and modest, except for the many books, mostly religious, that filled the shelves.

J— eagerly grabbed a book and an article about a document that was found, dating back to 500 BCE.  That document seemed to him to predict the Messiah in our age, though God needed all Jews, not just some, to do righteous deeds, and then and only then would the Messiah arrive.

This is why, he explained, it was so important to him to reach out to all aspects of Israeli society.  Some settlers had become isolationists he said, they refused to even pray for Israel, because they were so angry about the disengagement from Gaza.  But he sees things differently—in fact, he has become deeply involved with the general housing crisis.  He thinks the same technique used to build in the settlements could be used to create cheap housing—it is 300,000 to buy a home (was he referring to dollars or sheckels?  I wasn’t sure—take the number and divide by three if it’s sheckels), but it costs only 100,000 to build a new home, he calculated.

What he was suggesting sounded to me sort of like the projects, Israeli style.

Motti asked him what he would do if he had to abandon his settlement, because of a peace accord.  I would leave, said J—, the unity of the Jewish people is more important to me than the settlement, the most important is that all Israel feels like one.  And what, Motti asked, if part of the agreement would be allowing 40,000 Arabs the right of return (this number comes from the agreement Ehud Barak was ready to sign at the summit with Clinton, though ultimately Arafat refused).  40,000 would be too many, J— said at first.  But then he relented.  The unity was all, he said.

But then, he continued confidently, it won’t happen.  The Arabs will never agree.  He hoped instead that Jordan’s King would be overthrown and that the people, who are 70% Palestinian, would make Jordan into a Palestinian state.  Then, why would any Arab want to go to Israel?

There was another solution to the whole problem, of course.  If the Messiah came, it would all be moot, anyway.  But Jews had to be unified and righteous.

J— got a call, one of the unending series of phone calls he was fielding as he spoke to us.  He had to leave, but wanted to drive us back to Jerusalem.

We accepted.  He took the Jewish road, of course, but took a quick detour to a winery in the midst of the West Bank.  I made this, he told us proudly.  My last act as Head of the Regional Council.

It was a beautiful winery, stuck in the middle of the dessert.  He took us down to see the barrels.  Even Motti lit up, with all his doubts (he will not buy any products made in the West Bank, on principal),  Motti’s family has a history of working in wineries, and being in one was exciting for him.

Then, J—’s assistant switched on a film for us to watch.

It was the sort of propaganda film that verged on parody.  Stirring music played, the ancient history of Samaria and Judea was recounted (these being the regions of the West Bank), then the modern history of pioneers who have reclaimed and tamed the land into producing wine grapes was extolled.  Jews toiled—hard work, but so fulfilling.  The future never looked brighter for this land.

The film ended.  That was a bit ridiculous, said Motti.  Yes, said J—.  But he was beaming.

Where were the Palestinians?  Motti asked.  You had a whole film about the history of the region, and you didn’t mention the Palestinians once.

I guess we should have, said J—.  Maybe you’re right.  It didn’t occur to us.

Later, Motti commented, who would believe this film, anyway?  Not even those who support them.

They believe it, I said.  Couldn’t you see how much J— and his assistant loved it, how proud they were?  This film is not to convince others.  It is to convince themselves.

Motti agreed.

After the film, J— asked if we wanted to have a wine tasting.  Motti said he was too sleepy and would have to drive later.  So instead, J— drove us into Jerusalem and offered us a warm goodbye.

Such a nice man, said Motti.  Really nice.  But this is the paradox.  All his life, he has been doing nothing but building settlements  Such energy and leadership.  But he has done more to destroy Israel than anyone I know.

Impressions from a day in Israel

I am staying at the house of Motti Lerner, a playwright and the author of Pangs of the Messiah, which I am directing in October/November.  Staying here is very different than being a tourist.  I haven’t seen any sites, I haven’t done anything I would usually do while traveling.  I have been working on the play.  I have been meeting Israelis.  And my experience so far has made me feel like I have a different understanding of what it is to be a country involved so deeply in war.

Of course, I am investigating political issues and working on a very political play.  Which heightens my awareness of that aspect of the Israeli experience.  When I was last in Israel, that was far from my mind.  I was 13, celebrating my bar mitzvah, and excited to be out of the country for the first time in my life.  I felt like I was on the set of a movie, I could hardly believe that Jerusalem was an actual place.

It was also a different time, perhaps.  So I have been told, and true, the issues facing Israel were different at the time.  Though looking at the overall history of Israel, I wonder how different.

Motti is a peace activist, but to understand what that means here requires also to understand context.

My room (in Motti’s house) is a safety room.  It is legally required here that every house has one.  So in essence, I am living in a bomb shelter.

Yesterday, while in London, I heard the news about the terrorism attack in Eilat (in southen Israel).  It registered, but very abstractly.  After all, terrorism is an occasional fact nowadays, even outside of Israel.  I also heard about the bombing reprisals in Gaza, and the Egyptians killed.  Still, that didn’t seem like a major escalation.  When I look at cnn or msnbc online, I get that same impression.  An event, but not a major event.

Yet the response at Motti’s dinner table was to the news was: well, the war is starting at last.  I had the feeling that sentence had been said before.  But it didn’t mean that in some ways, it wasn’t believed, each time.  For one of these days, it’s sure to be true.  Perhaps this time.

Motti’s son and daughter are soon entering the army, as required.  Motti’s other son is just finishing his service.  And even though Motti considers himself a peace activist, he too served in the army.  He chose the artillery, as he would have been required to spend more years in the non-combat divisions.

As it happens, the end of service was set for a week before the Yom Kippur War.  He was recalled, and because of his experience, given a position of authority.  For many days, he thought they had lost, that there would be no state of Israel anymore.  He was in charge of setting up headquarters in the Sinai for phase two of the war, should Israel survive that long.

The war ended before the headquarters in the Sinai was necessary.  Israel survived.

Today, work with Motti consisted partly of revising the script, partly in taking a crash course in the history of the settlements.  We talked the messianic ideals that led Hanan Porat to become a settler.  We talked about how the local government there worked, interior politics, and I got to marvel (and envy a little) that even vets are socialized in Israel.

Then we had dinner with former settlers, a married couple and friends of Motti.  The wife had been the Secretary of the Community Council, basically the mayor of the settlement town.  The husband came from a very far right family; his parents had a poster of  Yigal Amir on their war—the man who murdered Yitzchak Rabin. The settlement leaders eventually forced them to take the poster down, it was too much even for them.  His brother had been a member of the Jewish Underground, the group who, under the leadership of Yehuda Etzion, had planned to bomb the Dome of the Rock.

He himself had left the settlement years ago.  He was a writer with radical, or at least secular, ideas.  He wrote an article once, blaming God for the Holocaust.  To Yehuda Etzion, that was too much.  He wrote a letter in code, using a quotation that referenced a passage in the Torah, in which a heretical man was killed. Motti’s friend’s parents contacted Yehuda Etzion, and asked him to remove the hit, for essentially that’s what the letter was.  Etzion agreed to withdraw it.

The couple left the settlement soon after.  The husband said, it was uncomfortable for people to overlook their secularism.  He wasn’t exactly left wing, still.  He considered himself independent, but found it hard to connect to the settlers anymore.

His ambivalent feelings were clear.  When the settlements were dismantled in Gaza, he went for a vacation in Vienna, because he couldn’t bear to watch.  Then he went to Switzerland, which was experiencing some student protests.  He was warned it might be dangerous to travel, which made him want to laugh.  When I asked him if he would trade the settlement he lived in for peace, he said yes, of course.  If the peace were the same sort of peace as between the United States and Canada.  If the Arabs could be trusted, which they probably could not.

He talked about joining the settlement.  I wanted my life to mean something, he said.  I wanted to change the war, so that Israel was no longer being attacked, so that all the animosity would be directed against the settlements.  And we did that, he said, a bit proudly.

Tonight, when I arrived back at Motti’s we heard that 60 rockets had been sent from  Gaza.  Someone had been killed.  Motti shook his head.  It will just escalate from here, he said.  Netanyahu has to negotiate.  But no one trusts anyone.

Tonight, back in the safety room for some sleep.  Tomorrow Tel Aviv.  Between meetings, I'm hoping to be able to drop by the beach...

Drs. Jane & Alexander - bloggers go for free!

My newest show, Doctors Jane and Alexander, is opening this Saturday, in the Festival of Jewish Theater and Ideas. Details below (or follow the links to our exciting new website!)

All bloggers who want to drop by and write about the show are invited for free!

Doctors Jane and Alexander
written and directed by Edward Einhorn
Music by Alexander S. Wiener and Henry Akona
Untitled Theater Co. #61, New York
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, 3rd Floor

with: Timothy Babcock*, Peter Bean*, Talaura Harms*, Jason Liebman*, Josh Mertz, Phoebe Silva*, Alyssa Simon*, and Maxwell Zener* on May 23

WORLD PREMIERE

Sat 5/23 @6:00, Mon 5/25 @7:30 (followed by a discussion), Thu May 28@9:00, Sun 5/31@5:00, Sat 6/6 @8:30, Sun 6/7 @7:30, Mon 6/8 @7:30, Fri 6/12 @9:00, Sat 6/13 @6:00, Sun 6/14 @1:00

Tickets $18

BUY NOW ONLINE!

or call 212-352-3101

Using found, fabricated, and occasionally finagled text, the playwright explores the life of his grandfather Alexander S. Wiener, the co-discoverer of the Rh factor in blood, through interviews with his mother, a psychologist who recently retired due to a debilitating stroke. An examination of art, science, ambition, and achievement, told with humor and song.

Shows announced for Festival of Jewish Theater and Ideas!

We are working hard on the website, but for those who read my blog, here's a preview! Here are all the shows in Untitled Theater Company #61's upcoming Festival of Jewish Theater and Ideas!

The Burning Bush
by Tracey Erin Smith
directed by Anita La Selva
Burning Bush Productions, Toronto, Canada
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, near 8th Ave.

Tickets online or at 212-352-3101

Wed 6/3 @9:00, Fri 6/5 @8:30, Sat 6/6 @11:00, Thu 6/11 @10:00

Yentl meets Showgirls in this award winning one-woman traveling spiritual roadshow. Rabbinical student Barbara Baumowitz teams up with exotic dancers to spread their religion in this new version of an old-time revival. Critics Pick in Backstage, Audience Choice Award in Frigid NYC and Best of the Toronto Fringe Festival.

Burning Bush Productions has produced award-winning theatre in New York City and across Canada. BBP also delivers workshops across North America in creating solo theatre based on personal life experience for both professional artists and lay people. We are currently developing our first feature film, based on ‘The Burning Bush!’ with Mr. Jackie Mason on board to play himself.

Cities of Light
assembled by Rebecca Joy Fletcher
directed by John Richard Thompson
Open Hart Productions, New York
at 92Y Tribeca and the Center for Jewish History
WORLD PREMIERE

Wed 5/20 @7:00 at 92Y Tribeca, 200 Hudson St Tickets online or at 212-415-5500

Tue 5/26 @7:00 & Sat 5/30 @8:30, Don’t Tell Mama, 343 West 46th Street Tickets online or at 212-757-0788

Wed 6/10 @6:30 at Center for Jewish History. 15 W. 16th St Tickets online or at 212-352-3101

Light and dark in 1930’s Berlin, Yiddish Warsaw, Paris & Tel Aviv. Blinding lights, brazen comedy, cabarets of yearning and bite. An astounding era; a time of Jewish artists on the move. No need to brush up on your languages; these songs are mostly in English!

Open Hart Productions is the brainchild of playwright, performer, cantor, and scholar Rebecca Joy Fletcher. Founded in 2007, Open Hart is dedicated to researching and reviving the lost art of International Jewish cabaret. Currently focusing on Warsaw's and pre-state Tel Aviv’s cabarets, Open Hart also presents lectures and workshops. Fiscal Sponsorship: The Field. .

The Dig: Death, Genesis & the Double Helix
by Stacie Chaiken
What’s the Story?, Los Angeles
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, near 8th Ave
WORLD PREMIERE

Tickets online or at 212-352-3101

Wed 6/3 @7pm, Fri 6/5 @10:30, Mon 6/8 @10:00, Thu 6/11 @3:00

An American archaeologist is summoned to a dig in the ancient Arab-Hebrew town of Jaffa. They've found something big—something that could change everything—and she's the only one who can tell them what it is. And her mother just died. And there's a lizard in her bathtub. The Middle East. Matriarchs. Cruelty. It's a comedy.

What's the Story? was founded in 2001 as a workshop for writers and performers who are struggling with personal story for the stage, the page and the screen. The workshop produces a biennial festival of new solo plays, regular public showings of works-in-progress. As of April 2009, What's the Story? is in residence at the Odyssey Theatre is Los Angeles.

Doctors Jane & Alexander
written and directed by Edward Einhorn
Music by Alexander S. Wiener and Henry Akona
Untitled Theater Co. #61, New York
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, near 8th Ave
WORLD PREMIERE

Tickets online or at 212-352-3101

Sat 5/23 @6:00, Mon 5/25 @7:30, Thu May 28@9:00, Sun 5/31@5:00, Sat 6/6 @8:30, Sun 6/7 @7:30, Mon 6/8 @7:30, Fri 6/12 @9:00, Sat 6/13 @6:00, Sun 6/14 @1:00

Using found, fabricated, and occasionally finagled text, the playwright explores the life of his grandfather Alexander S. Wiener, the co-discoverer of the Rh factor in blood, through interviews with his mother, a psychologist who recently retired due to a debilitating stroke. An examination of art, science, ambition, and achievement, told with humor and song.

Untitled Theater Company #61 is a Theater of Ideas: scientific, political, philosophical, and above all theatrical. Past projects include the Ionesco Festival, the NEUROfest, the Havel Festival, and the Off-Broadway production of Fairy Tales of the Absurd. Most recently, they produced a calypso musical version of Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle.

Emma
by Howard Zinn
directed by Martina Plag
stadium-praxis, Philadelphia
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, near 8th Ave
NEW YORK PREMIERE

Tickets online or at 212-352-3101

Thu 6/4 @7:00, Sat 6/6 @3:30, 6/7 @5:00

This toy-theatre adaptation uses wit and humor to illuminate history from below. Through innovative storytelling and theatrical devices everyday objects transform to reveal and celebrate the life of the remarkable “Emma” Goldman; the anarchist, feminist, and free-spirited thinker who was exiled from the United States because of her outspoken views.

stadium-praxis Strives to explore the point where theory and practice intersect to [in]form action. We create puppet artistry for adult audiences. As an art rich in ancient, folk and popular theater techniques, we use puppetry to address contemporary issues and advocate social change and awareness. We approach the puppet as metaphor.

Hard Love
by Motti Lerner
directed by Susan Reid
Genesis Stage, Atlanta
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, near 8th Ave

NEW YORK PREMIERE

Tickets online or at 212-352-3101

Fri 6/5 @6:00, Sat 6/6 @5:30, Wed 6/10 @3:00, Thu 6/11 @7:30

In this fiercely romantic drama, Hannah and Zvi are reunited after divorcing twenty years earlier. Raised in Jerusalem’s ultra-Orthodox Mea Shearim, the couple ended their marriage when Zvi turned his back on Judaism and Hannah did not. Now the teenage children from their second marriages have become romantically involved, forcing Hannah and Zvi back into each others’ lives The first-ever full staging in New York of the work of noted Israeli playwright Motti Lerner.

Genesis Stage produces works of theater which are relative to the Jewish experience and reflective of the universal human condition. Genesis strives to challenge, enlighten, and entertain Atlanta audiences with world and regional premieres, as well as seldom-seen plays, which investigate the past, reflect on the present and envision the future.

The Jewbird
Created by the Northwoods Company
based on the story by Bernard Malamud
directed by Annie Levy
Northwoods Theater, Conover, Wisconsin
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, near 8th Ave

Tickets online or at 212-352-3101

Fri 5/29 @5:30, Sat 5/30 @5:00, Sun 5/31 @2:00

In this modern fable originally penned by Malamud, an unexpected visitor flies through the fifth floor Lower East Side apartment window of Harry and Edie Cohen and their young son Maurie. The small, scrawny bird plops down on the kitchen table in the middle of dinner, and begins to speak. What follows exposes the family’s uneasy tension between Jewish identity, past and present.

Northwoods Theatre Company is an ensemble group dedicated to creating and developing new work relevant to the Jewish experience of all ages. By treating source texts as it would sacred texts and working them into the script, Northwoods Ramah Theatre Company aims to make the connection between the story and Jewish teachings more apparent and accessible.

Jolly Good Fellows
by Steve Feffer and Tucker Refferty
directed by Mark Liermann
Whole Art Theater, Kalamazoo, MI
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, near 8th Ave
WORLD PREMIERE

Tickets online or at 212-352-3101

Fri 5/29 @7:00, Sat 5/30 @11:00, Sun 5/31 @3:30, 6/1 @7:30

A dark comedy about two immigrant actors from New York in the 1890’s who make their living performing a stereotypical “Jew” and “Irishman” in the grotesque styles of the variety stage. They enter into a contract of convenience to keep up with the changing times, despite the personal costs of such performances. Songs and sketches from the period are included.

The Whole Art Theatre Company offers unique theatrical experiences, including the fostering of new work, that brings socially significant issues to the forefront. In 2007, they received a Foundation of Jewish Culture grant for Steve Feffer’s new play Ain’t Got No Home, the true story of the legendary Chess Records.

Laughing Fools
“Laughing at the Speed of Light”
written, illustrated and performed by: Flash Rosenberg
“Village of Fools”
adapted, directed and performed by: Stephen Ringold and the Grand Falloons
From stories by Isaac Bashevis Singer
at JCC Manhattan, 334 Amsterdam Avenue, near 76th St

Tickets online or at 505-5708

Mon 6/8 @8:00, Tue 6/9 @8:00

Flash Rosenberg and Stephen Ringold mingle their two distinct shows into one tasty evening. By the same unlikely logic that landed smoked fish in a bagel, Ringold’s vaudeville puppet theater “Village of Fools” will suddenly be served in the middle of Rosenberg’s comic slide romp “Laughing at the Speed of Light” to create a posh nosh and frolic of Jewish culture.

The Grand Falloons is an ensemble of theatre, vaudeville, and design professionals who have all worked with the Big Apple Circus for 20 years, as well as on the New York stage, on national television, and in opera houses, schools, museums and theaters across the country.

The Legacy Project: Echoes
Featuring the WORLD PREMIERE of Tikkun with choreography by Carolyn Dorfman and music by Greg Wall
Carolyn Dorfman Dance Company and Bente Kahan, New York
at NYU Tisch, 111 2nd Ave, 5th floor

Tickets online or at 1-800-838-3006

Fri 5/29 @7:30, Sat 5/30 @7:30

The Carolyn Dorfman Dance Company and actress/vocalist Bente Kahan present The Legacy Project: Echoes, an evening of dance, theater and live music incorporating the best of the artists’ individual repertoires, their collaborative piece Silent Echoes and featuring the world premiere of Tikkun with commissioned score by renowned jazz and Klezmer musician Greg Wall.

Since 1983, Carolyn Dorfman Dance Company’s high-energy and technically demanding repertory uses movement as metaphor to take audiences on “intellectual and emotional journeys” (Observer Tribune). Led by artistic director Carolyn Dorfman and her creative drive to communicate human experiences, interactions perceptions, and truths, CDDC’s twelve dancers display extraordinary physical, technical and dramatic range.

Mentshn
by Sholem Aleichem
Translated by Ellen Perecman & Yermiyahu Ahron Taub
Adapted by Ellen Perecman & Clay McLeod Chapman
Directed by Marc Geller
New Worlds Theatre Project, New York
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, near 8th Ave
ENGLISH-LANGUAGE PREMIERE

Tickets online or at 212-352-3101

Sat 5/23 @8:30, Tue 5/26 @7:30. Fri 5/29 @9:00, Wed 6/3 @5:00, Sat 6/6 @2:00, Wed 6/10 @10:00, Fri 6/12 @7:00, Sat 6/13 @2:00

On playwright Sholem Aleichem’s 150th birthday, the first English translation of an old play: Jobs are hard to come by, so Madame Gold’s servants have limited options. To keep their jobs, they have to be willing to maintain the status quo by relinquishing their self-respect and free will. But how much abuse can they be expected to tolerate? Servants are people too, aren't they?

New Worlds Theatre Project is dedicated to bringing imagination and artistic excellence to English adaptations of Yiddish plays, and in so doing, to bringing dignity to the literary legacy of Yiddish culture.

The Most Radiant Beauty
written and directed by Tanya Khordoc & Barry Weil
Evolve Company, New York
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, near 8th Ave
WORLD PREMIERE

Tickets online or at 212-352-3101

Sun 5/24 @3:00, Wed 5/27 @7:00, Thu 5/28 @7:00, Sat 5/30 @8:30, Thu 6/4 @9:00, Sun 6/7 @3:00, Wed 6/10 @ 8:00, Sat 6/13 @10:30

A one-act to be performed with Six Scenes from a Misunderstanding (below).

God said “Let there be light.” Einstein showed us what it could do. In this multimedia collage, puppeteers Khordoc and Weil use found text to explore Einstein, Genesis, the Atomic Bomb and the life-altering power of knowledge.

Evolve Company has been playing with puppets very seriously since 1996. Productions include Evolution, Brains & Puppets and Secrets History Remembers. They were also given the honor of creating the world premiere production of Motormorphosis, a play by former Czech President Václav Havel, as part of UTC #61's Havel Festival in NYC.

Rat Bastards
by Julia Pearlstein
directed by Eureka
Dixon Place, New York
Theater THE, associate producer
at Dixon Place, 161 Chrystie St., near Delancey

Tickets online or at 212-219-0736

Wed 6/3 @8:00, Thu 6/4 @8:00, Fri 6/5 @8:00, Sat 6/6 @2:00 & 8:00, Sun 6/7 @5:00

Venice, 1630. First it was the Jews, now the Muslims are moving in—and they're threatening to interbreed! If the Inquisition won’t stop them, Arlecchino will. When plague breaks out, holy hell breaks loose. A new Commedia on an old theme … because some things never change. With scene design by artist Philip Pearlstein.

Dixon Place is a home for performing and literary artists, is dedicated to supporting the creative process by presenting original works of theater, dance and literature at various stages of development. An artistic laboratory with an audience, we serve as a safety net, enabling artists to present challenging and questioning work that pushes the limits of artistic expression.

Scenes from a Misunderstanding
by Carey Harrison
directed by Henry Akona
WalkingShadow, New York
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, near 8th Ave
WORLD PREMIERE


Tickets online or at 212-352-3101

Sun 5/24 @3:00, Wed 5/27 @7:00, Thu 5/28 @7:00, Sat 5/30 @8:30, Thu 6/4 @9:00, Sun 6/7 @3:00, Wed 6/10 @ 8:00, Sat 6/13 @10:30

A one-act to be performed with Most Radiant Beauty (above)

The simmering differences between two professors come to a head: has one of them delayed replying to a letter on the subject of religion, or did the original letter-writer delay posting it? What would such delays signify? From humble beginnings, titanic quarrels are born - especially when the aggravated parties are Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung.

10 Imaginings of Sarah & Hagar
by Gabrielle Kaplan-Mayer
music by Juliet I. Spitzer
directed by Deborah Baer-Mozes
Theater Ariel, Philadelphia
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, near 8th Ave
WORLD PREMIERE

Tickets online or at 212-352-3101

Sun 5/24 @7:00, Sat 5/30 @6:30, Tue 6/2 @7:00, Tue 6/9 @7:30, Wed 6/10 @6:00, Sat 6/13 @4:00

A theatrical interpretation in ten scenes (“imaginings”,) of the story of the mothers of two great nations. Sarah and Hagar. 10 Imaginings is journey through the complex relationship between these two women, their man and their sons, exploring themes that continue to take center stage in the world today.

Theatre Ariel is dedicated to illuminating the rich social, cultural, and spiritual heritage of the Jewish people. Theatre Ariel produces work that serves as a prism through which we can view the varied colors of the American Jewish experience and new work that draws its inspiration from classic Jewish texts or contemporary Jewish literature: reflecting on the past, examining the present and envisioning the future.

To Pay The Price
by Peter-Adrian Cohen
Directed by Robert Kalfin
Theatre Or, Durham, North Carolina
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, near 8th Ave
WORLD PREMIERE

Tickets online or at 212-352-3101

Sat 5/23 @10:00, Sun 5/24 @5:00, Wed 5/27 @9:00, Sat 5/30 @2:00, Sat 6/6 @Noon, Tue 6/9 @9:30, Sat 6/13 @8:30, Sun 6/14 @3:30

Based on the life of Yoni Netanyahu, killed in action at age 30, the play illuminates the toll to a nation of a never-ending war.

Theatre Or (“or” means “light” in Hebrew) is a North Carolina-based professional theatre company developing a niche for producing American premieres of Israeli plays. Chicago's Tony Award recipient Victory Gardens Theater hosted Theatre Or's North Carolina English language premiere of Motti Lerner's Hard Love in 2006 as well as their OnStageIsrael Festival of staged readings of Israeli plays in 2008.

Readings:

Golem Stories
written and directed by Edward Einhorn
at the Center for Jewish History, 15 W. 16th St, near 5th Ave

RSVP online or at 212-352-3101

Wed 5/27 @7:00

A retelling of the legend of a clay man in 16th century Prague. Rabbi Loew creates a Golem to defend the Jews, but this Golem seems more interested in listening to the Rebbetsin's stories and falling in love with the Rabbi's daughter. Is he the reincarnated spirit of her murdered lover? Or does his childlike façade hide the face of a demon?

Pangs of the Messiah
by Motti Lerner
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, near 8th Ave

RSVP online or at 212-352-3101

Sun 5/31 @7:30

Set in 2012 amidst the signing of a peace treaty between Israel and the Palestinians, this is an apocalyptic yet fiercely humane drama about eight West Bank Jewish settlers pitted against an Israel they feel betrayed by.

Playwright’s Forum
Various playwrights and directors
at Marymount Manhattan, 221 E 71st, near 3rd Ave

RSVP online or at 212-352-3101

Sun 6/7 @ 7:00
Seven minute excerpts of plays by member playwrights of the Association of Jewish Theater

Talk:

How Some Jews in Chicago Re-Invented Comedy in Time For the Sixties
Presented by Jeffrey Sweet
at Theater Three, 311 W. 43rd St, near 8th Ave

RSVP online or at 212-352-3101

Tue 6/9 @6:00

Jeffrey Sweet (author of SOMETHING WONDERFUL RIGHT AWAY, an oral history of the Compass Players and Second City) gives a funny talk about how and why Paul Sills and some other young iconoclasts who hung out in Hyde Park (Mike Nichols, Elaine May, Barbara Harris, and Shelley Berman among them) created modern improvisational theater and changed the look of American comedy.

Fundraiser for Festival of Jewish Theater & Ideas!

Come out tomorrow night to 45 Bleecker for our pre-Passover bash to raise money for the Festival of Jewish Theater & Ideas!

Starting at 7pm and going until 10:30ish...

Music of:

Randy Stern
d00d
Little Bear and The Bad Touch.

Food

Sandwiches from Crosby Sandwiches
Brownies from Little Muse
Assorted other homemade items

OPEN BAR!

$25

Only $20 if you buy in advance with the code "Chametz"!

Buy tickets here!

Several responses to Seven Jewish Children

The debate about Seven Jewish Children rages on...I am not going to dwell on it too much longer. I keep getting sucked into debate about, partly because I feel like I am the only one providing an even somewhat contrarian view, on the blogosphere.

I was tempted to enter the sub-genre of those who parody the play with their own versions - Seven British Children came to mind, which would trace the British relationship with Jews to modern day. Or Seven Jewish Children I know, which would contrast the reactions among Jews I have met with the assumed reactions expressed by the play.

The play is easy to parody, because of its form. But in the end I chose not to, because - well, I have enough projects to do. And the play is rapidly losing interest for me.

But the one thing that gets me upset is the bullying that goes on against those who express doubts about the piece. And I must again talk about how that bullying is particularly ominous in England, where a word said against the work or even in perceived defense of Israel can be met with a torrent of anger, and where being Jewish has never been a simple thing, in the way, I would argue, it can be in New York.

I bring this up because I was once again contacted by someone who works at a University in England (someone we would term a professor, they would term a lecturer), who has written a response of her own. She has asked me to publish it for her, because she is afraid of the backlash if she should publish it on her own.

I just feel like I should do my best to allow her not to be "censored" (if Rachel Corrie can be called censorship, I can be a little slippery about the term here). Or maybe I mean bullied. This is not someone I've met or know personally. Just someone who noticed my comments on a few blogs. She calls it The More Things Change. It goes a little through the history of theater and how it has interacted with Jews.

THE MORE THINGS CHANGE

After Caryl Churchill’s Seven Jewish Children: A Play for Gaza

No Jews appear in the play. The speakers are actors, and if you like, writers, directors, literary managers and focus groups. The lines can be shared out any way you like, once the directors, literary managers, and focus groups come into existence. The characters are different in each small scene as the time, thespians, and audiences are different. They may be played by any number of actors.

1.

Tell them it's a game
Tell them it's serious
But don't frighten them
Don't tell them we'll kill the Persians.
Tell them the gods will.
Tell them it's important to be quiet.
Tell them they'll have dance, if they're good.
Tell them to sit quietly as if they're in the temple on the Akropolis
But not to sing.
Tell them not to stand up.
Tell them not to interrupt, even if they hear shouting
From the place behind the back wall
Don't frighten them.
Tell them not to interrupt even if they know a secret that Oedipus needs to know.
Tell them the gods will be watching.
Tell them something about the Persians.
Tell them they're bad
In the eyes of the gods.
Tell them it's history.
Tell them the Persians will be our slaves.
Don’t tell them that.
Tell them the Persians will make us their slaves
Unless we enslave them first.
Tell them it's magic.
Tell them not to sing.

2.

Tell them this Scaena will show The Massacre of the Innocents
Tell them they died
Tell them they were killed
Like this, exactly
But without the gold paint nor the Cartwrights’ Guild’s wagon.
Tell them Kyng Herod was a Jewe
Like the ones in Lincoln who killed little Saint Hugh.
Frighten them.
Tell them we acted as Christians.
Don't tell them what we did.
Tell them we were brave.
Tell them that Jewes teach their children to make cakes
Of the blood of English children
But don't tell them English:
This Play’s about the Holy Land, not here.
Tell them how many children Kyng Herod slewe.
Tell them the Jewes are danger.
Tell them there's no danger
If they accept Christ as their Saviour
And good King Edward
And this our Playe.

3.

Tell them it's about Venice.
Tell them it's a Comedy.
Tell them Mirror up to Nature: Jewes covet blood.
Tell them: "The Quality of Mercy is not Strained...”
Don't tell them Religion.
Don’t tell them that Jessica's great great lots of greats grandfather lived in Europe too, in Spain.
Don't tell them he was driven out.
Don’t frighten them:
Tell them there are no Jewes in England.
Don’t tell them Old King Edward drove them out.
Tell them the Spaniards would drive us into the sea
if they could.
Don’t tell them that.
Tell them it's a Comedy.
Tell them to laugh.

4.
Tell them something.
Tell them he's an anomaly. The rest of us are decent men.
Tell them a Jewess hid him in her house
In the days before his trial
From the anger of the mob
Which explains a lot, really.
Tell them we never liked him anyway.
Tell them he criticized the Liberal Unionists
And they didn’t even get it!
Don’t tell them we got it.
Tell them he was foreign, like Ibsen
And Madame Sarah, his Princess of Judea.
Don’t tell them that.
Tell them we'd never have guessed:
He sounded English. He’s a father of two.
Tell them it’s an illness, so we advocate mercy
And hospitalisation.
Don’t tell them that!
Tell them we’ve closed both his comedies.
Tell them we’re rehearsing a new one
About the Suffragette Hysteria.
And the Censor found it decent
And the Queen is amused.

5.

Tell them to use allegory and metaphor and fantasy
So the Censor won’t get it.
Tell them to use slogans
And keep it simple
So The People will get it.
Don’t tell them that!
Tell them that art is the lie that reveals the truth
And theatre must fling together different perspectives
And cause people to be uncertain
And turn themselves inside out by their eyeballs.
Tell them the writers do this to themselves
If they’re brave.
Don’t tell them that.
Tell them the brave writers are steadfast in belief:
Men for All Seasons
And, once or twice a season,
A woman
If she’s good.
Tell them that the theatre must tell the news
Because The People don’t read.
Don’t tell them that the people who don’t read
Don’t go to the theatre either.
Tell them we know how The People think.
Tell them we concede we’re not The People:
We’re not that stupid.

6.

Tell them not to use allegory nor metaphor nor fantasy
Because the people won’t get it
And Censorship is ancient history.
Tell them there can be no art after the Holocaust.
Don’t tell them that!
Tell them the theatre must tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but.
Tell them about the Holocaust.
Tell them: Jews covet blood because they have been bled.
Don’t tell them that.
Tell them the Jews think the Arabs are Nazis
Because Nazis are all Jews can think about.
Tell them this Jewish hysterical fixation with Nazis is not a crime, nor a sin, but an unfortunate and probably incurable illness, so we advocate pity and prescribe a grain of salt.

7.

Tell them the Jew deals in slogans
And simplified history
And talks in tongues
And thinks she is Special
As did the Nazis.
Don’t tell them Nazis.
Tell them the Jew tells lies
That do not reveal the truth
To her own children
To herself
And the world.
Tell it in ten minutes.
Tell it For Gaza, but show just The Jews.
Keep it minimal, using no names
Because The Jews are really all the same.
Not people, but A Noble Ancient People,
Just like The Palestinians.
Don’t tell them that!
Tell them the new Censor is The Jew
And the theatre exists To Articulate Moral Outrage.
Tell them it’s magic.
Tell them not to laugh.

Seven Jewish Children at NYTW

I was in attendance last night at an invitation only premiere of Caryl Churchill's latest show at New York Theater Workshop...unfortunately, that play was Seven Jewish Children.

For those of you not up to date on the hubbub about this 10 minute play, Churchill wrote this piece in response to the recent events at Gaza. It's written as just lines, with no assignment to character, but the implication is that the character or characters are Jews speaking to their children at different points in history, spanning from the Holocaust to the recent Israeli conflict. The play may be done for free by anyone, as long as they also raise funds for a Gazan charity at the same point.

My feeling about the play, which I have written about on other blogs, is that the play implicitly tries to stereotype and even demonize Jews as a whole because of Churchill's anger about Israel. It has the "Jew" who is talking to his/her child say things like "Tell her we're the chosen people" and gleefully talk about Palestinian "dead babies" and "children covered in blood". By calling it seven Jewish children, not seven Israeli children, Churchill has chosen a dangerous tactic. Not that the title is inappropriate for the play. Unfortunately.

When talking about the play with an Israeli playwright, interestingly, he told me that he thought the play should be played every day. Much of his work as a writer has protested the policies of the Israeli government, and I immediately understood why in that context he might feel that the play was important to hear.

Churchill, however, wrote this play in England, where it first played at the Royal Court (it preceded a play about the Holocaust - a disturbing choice, I find). In England, she is not voicing an unheard opinion about Gaza. She is reinforcing the prejudices of the great majority of the audience. It is no act of bravery to tell the audience exactly what they want to believe. And at a time when anti-Semitism is on the rise in England (never a comfortable place to be Jewish), I would argue that that these are unfortunate passions to flame.

After writing about my thoughts about the piece on some blogs, I got a couple of emails from Jewish theater practitioners in England. One was a professor. They thanked me for daring to criticize the piece, which they were afraid to openly speak out against in England, because of the wave of anger their objections would be met with. Churchill's play stokes that anger, making it harder for anyone to listen to a dissenting voice.

New York is a wholly different place altogether. The number of Jews here makes the city very complex in its attitudes about Israel, although if there is any place where there is a large number of critics of Israeli policy, it is in the theater. The Rachel Corrie incident demonstrated that the New York theater community is just as capable of knee jerk reactions on the subject as people are anywhere else.

Those critics were definitely the majority in the theater last night, though there was a vocal minority expressing support for Israel, and I'm sure a less vocal minority that are somewhere in the middle (as I feel I am). The program was accompanied by two interesting documents: one a letter from Churchill in response to a letter from Ari Roth from Theater J (which is also producing a reading of the play), and the other a letter from Kenneth Stern, Director of Anti-Semitism and Extremism for the American Jewish Committee.

The reading are going on for three straight nights at NYTW - last night was just the first of them. Each night has a different moderator, who is supposedly moderating the audience in a discussion. Tonight the moderators will be Tony Kushner and Alisa Solomon, a very interesting pair.

Unfortunately, last night's moderator was Lauren Flanders, the host of GRITtv on Free Speech TV, as well as the host of RadioNation. Flanders had a very clear point of view on the piece (that it would finally make people think about the crimes in Israel and the U. S. complicity in those crimes), and she had brought in people in the audience as authorities to support her point of view. She called on them to speak about what she termed the facts around the conflict, in order to educate the audience, and called on them to rebut dissenters.

Which was the main problem with the discussion. It was not about listening and conversation. It was not a discussion at all. Flanders was trying to educate (and bully a little) those in the audience that didn't see things her way. But she was doing it in the guise of a moderator, and of course that sort of "moderation" is both transparent and, in the end, even more polarizing.

But perhaps that is a problem inherent in Churchill's play, which in the end, is a polemic, written in anger. A piece that truly was meant to create empathy for the Palestinians would have Palestinians onstage, true characters with their assets and their faults, struggling in a conflict with no easy answers. This play has generic "Jews" onstage, or what Churchill imagines a "Jew" to be.

I spoke briefly yesterday about the lack of empathy in the play. I felt empathy when they were talking about the Holocaust, Flanders responded. It's true, the play does use the existing empathy about the Holocaust. But it's a ploy, saying, yes, we feel bad about the Holocaust, but you're just as bad, so now we're justified in feeling anger.

In the end, the play creates anger at Jews and anger at those promoting anger against Jews. The Palestinians, as human beings, never exist in that theater at all.

Does that get us any closer to peace?

Why I love (hate) theater festivals

The festival is beginning to really come together, which is exciting.

I am already exhausted.

So much to do - get enough information so that I can set up the web site (almost there).  Put together the fundraiser for April 7 (much left to do, finding food, entertainment, putting online reservations up, etc, etc,).   Work on my own show (haven't started rehearsing, but did script revision).  Schedule rehearsal locations (soon, before they get booked).  Reschedule first read through because of actor conflict (ASAP).  Find interns (some found, others to come).  Put all the box office info online (not yet).  Start scheduling the panels/talkbacks (barely).  Fill in the holes in the conference schedule (75% of the way, but the last 25% is really difficult).  Schedule the dinners/lunches (so much more to do there).  Contact Equity regarding the shows (need to do that soon).  Production meeting about Mint Theater, aka Theater Three (almost scheduled, need one more confirmation).  Send blurb to Museum of the City of New York (have to get on that)  Make contact sheet for all participants (have to get on that too).  Push for more funding (working on it).  Finished revised registration form for conference (75% done, will do by weekend).  Send out notice reminding people to come to conference (not ready for that yet, but soon).  Answer all emails (ongoing).  Talk to stressed out festival participants about schedule/tech times/New York logistics/possibilities of press coming/misc. (ongoing)  Set up two reading for the festival (should have already been done).

Sleep (not an option).

But it's looking good.  Sorry I haven't been blogging much (blog again soon).

Fiddler on the Roof - political theater?

A few weeks ago, I heard Alisa Solomon give an interesting talk at the Jewish Theological Seminary about productions of Fiddler on the Roof in Poland. Shockingly to me, the play was banned for many years there, into the 80's. Almost all Jewish theater was banned in Poland, partly because of Communist anti-religious sentiment, and partly because of general anti-Semitism in the government.

Then recently I read the news that a production in Venezuela has run into trouble - the orchestra has been forbidden to participate in anything Jewish, because one of the bureaucrats involved are afraid of the government reaction.

Anti-Semitism has been on the rise in Venezuela for a while: a synagogue was recently attacked and Chavez (who has sadly been working more successfully towards his dream of being president for life) has a long history, like many totalitarian leaders and totalitarian wannabes, of using old lies and stereotypes about Jews to help him gain power.

But this is about politics and Jewish theater. As I have been working of the Festival of Jewish Theater and Ideas, on a few occasions I have given Fiddler as an example of a stereotype I want to break - it has been so associated with Jewish theater in this country that many assume it is all Jewish theater. I enjoy the show, but I want things I consider more challenging or unexpected. It is one of the last pieces I would think of as political theater.

Yet political theater is all about context. I remember speaking to some Romanian directors who described political theater during the Communist years. Everything was censored, but somehow it slipped through. In one play, for example, they chose to cook eggs live onstage. The smell of those eggs cooking in the theater was a reminder of the deprivation everyone felt and the difficulty there was in even buying something as simple as an egg. So that moment in an otherwise unobtrusive play was transformed and suddenly became political.

It is because Fiddler has become such an icon that it has become political in Venezuela and was political years ago in Poland. When people are deprived of connection to their culture or religion, any connection becomes subvesive. When the government wants to demonize a people, anything that portrays them onstage sympathetically becomes immediately political.

When Fiddler was finally shown in Poland, Solomon reported, the audience was in tears. The irony of repression is that sometimes it makes theater so much more vital than it ever could be. I am thankful that when I see Fiddler, I smile and enjoy it but leave it with a shrug. It is a privledge to be able to say--just another Fiddler.

Jewish Theater and Israel

As I work on the Festival of Jewish Theater and Ideas, I have been struggling to define Israel's role in it.  It looms over the festival in more ways than I would have thought, as my intention is not to do a festival about Israel or Israeli theater.  But as I work, I find the question has come up multiple times.

It has come up in small ways, at times.  People asking, does this festival have a political agenda, by which they mean an agenda about Israel.  It does not, I assure them.  I rarely speak about my own convictions about Israel, partly because they are complex, partly because I feel convinced that hard-liners on all sides would be offended by aspects of what I think.  But mostly because I don't want to make people feel that my own political agenda is going to infuse this festival.

But of course, it is.  It is inescapable.  I am not excluding Israeli artists, which is a political statement.  I am also not interested in excluding critical points of view about Israel, which is another political statement.  I think good art is good art, as long as it is honest, and of course that's another political point of view.

I must admit that I am worried - there is little in the festival that is truly critical of Israel.  Yet there are things that are celebratory of Israel - a cabaret about Tel Aviv before Israel was formed, which despite being pre-Israel and neutral politically, is still, by implication of celebrating the city, pro-Israel.  A play about the raid in Entebbe.

I may have a reading of a play more critical of Israel.  But I am sad that I was unable to find a full production with that point of view.  The Jewish community includes a multiplicity of voices, and since Israel is such a major issue, I would like to include all the points of view.  There is a very mistaken impression among some non-Jews that a Jewish theater festival will, by definition, endorse every Israeli political position, which is of course false.

One of the Israelis involved is Motti Lerner, a well known Israeli playwright who play, Hard Love, will be produced by a theater company called Genesis, from Atlanta Georgia.  Motti's play is set in Israel, but unlike many of his other plays, it is not about Israeli politics.  It is about a romance between someone from the ultra-orthodox community and an atheist.  I am excited to have Moti involved - his plays have been produced around the country, but this will be his first fully staged production in New York.

The possible reading would be of one of Motti's more politically charged plays, Pangs of the Messiah.  It is set in the future, in the West Bank settlements, at a time when Israel has decided to withdraw from the West Bank.  The settlers, of course, resist.  It is a both highly critical and simultaneously empathetic piece.

Of course, Israeli playwrights are often critical of Israeli policy.  Like most artists, they tend to speak from the left.  Motti wrote an interesting essay on Israeli theater and politics, which I recommend.

The Israeli consulate may help bring him here for the festival.  Of course, that has a small political implication as well...

I have more to say about this, and possibly about Caryl Churhill's Seven Jewish Children, which I have written about on other blogs.  I will return to it..

Conference on Jewish Theater

The Association of Jewish Theater has announced its annual conference, which will be happening during the time of Untitled Theater Co. #61's Festival of Jewish Theater and Ideas. UTC61 will be hosting.

For those interested, the registration forms and tentative schedule are online. I include the letter from the AJT below:

We are extremely excited about this year’s conference, "Jewish Theater of Ideas and Beyond," which will be held June 6 – 10, 2009, in one of the hearts of Jewish theater and the world of theater: New York City. Untitled Theater Company #61 will be hosting us. They are presenting their Festival of Jewish Theater and Ideas from May 23 – June 14, parallel to the conference. The festival will include over 100 performances of over 15 productions originating from across the United States and the world, at numerous venues throughout the city.

This year’s conference takes advantage of New York City, highlighting Jewish theatre and culture each day:
• Sunday at Marymount Manhattan College, the college whose Jewish theater festival, in 1980, inspired the creation of AJT.
• Monday at 92Y Tribeca, the new hip downtown venue for Jewish arts.
• Tuesday at the stately Museum of the City of New York where, with other conference activities, we will get a private tour of the theatre archives, the largest collection of its kind in the world, including Jewish and American theater in the United States.
• Wednesday will be at the Center for Jewish History, which houses six different major Jewish organizations, including YIVO with its Yiddish Theater collection.

Conference Fees and Registration Information:
Being in New York, we expect more registrants than usual, and there are space limitations. Early-bird registrants receive a $50 discount. The conference fee is $350 for early-bird members and $400 for non-members. After April 20th the fee will be $400 and $450 respectively, so book early. There will also be day passes for guests and others wishing to attend for single days.

Registration includes three kosher meals from great New York dining venues, free tickets to UTC61’s production of Doctors Jane and Alexander, five other plays of your choice at the Festival, and of course workshops and panel discussions.

Playwrights and Solo Performers:
Playwrights will once again have the very popular Playwrights’ Forum, where we will present seven-minute excerpts of your plays, performed by professional actors and staged by professional directors. Playwrights please note - if you are interested in participating in this forum we can only accept the first 15 scripts submitted. The deadline is April 20. So please be sure to get your play in early.

Solo performers will once again have a solo showcase. You must be registered for the full conference to participate in either program. Please refer to the registration forms for more instructions

Housing:
Two housing options are available now for those who require New York accommodations: The Muse, our main hotel, is an elegant and trendy boutique venue in the heart of midtown with a rate of $259/room or $130/night if you plan on sharing (a very low rate for a 4* hotel in New York). For those on a budget, we have an amazing deal through a partnership with NYU/Tisch School of the Arts; and have arranged for NYU dormitory room, at $60/single and $40/double per night. If you are interested in booking or sharing a room, contact Kayla as soon as possible: kayla@afjt.com and she will add you to the rooming lists. Don’t delay: we have guaranteed only a small number of booked rooms. We are in the process of reaching out to donors for subsidies for students. We will keep you posted.


Join us and celebrate a new year for Jewish theatre!

Theater as commentary - the tradition of midrash

Irecently completed Playing Dreidel with Judah Maccabee (at least for now - there is some possibility of future productions), and I'm back to reading submissions for the upcoming International Festival of Jewish Theater and Ideas.

A few of the submissions I am reading fall clearly into the area of midrash - which Judah Maccabee did, as well. According to the Zohar (one of the main books of the kabala), The Torah was written with black fire upon white fire. The black fire is the written word. The white fire is midrash. The midrashim are commentaries, sometimes in the form of laws and interpretations, and very often in the form of aggadic midrash—stories that expand on the writings. For example, The Haggadah, as you can tell from the name, is one long aggadic midrash. It also is part of a long tradition that stretches into contemporary Jewish theater—exploring the world of ideas through storytelling.

The Hebrew word drash means, literally, to seek, so a midrash is a seeking of sorts. It is a seeking for answers, a seeking for insights, and ultimately a seeking for even more questions. Midrashim often don’t agree—they are there to inspire discussion, but never provide a final answer, because a new midrash can always be written that says the opposite of the last.

There is something pre-postmodern about a midrash. Postmodernism takes everything, from pop culture to ancient literature, and uses all these sources to comment on each other. Midrash is a commentary that makes the ancient stories relevant to contemporary life.

I work a lot with midrash, in my theater. Sometimes I comment directly on the Bible, or even on the midrashim that already exist in the Talmud. Sometimes I comment on the legends that exist in Judaism. Sometimes I comment on Shakespeare, or the Wizard of Oz, or whatever intrigues me about a noteworthy work of literature. It is not uncommon to do so, in theater nowadays. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead is a midrash of sorts about Hamlet, and Wicked is a midrash on the Wizard of Oz.

Of course, these plays are not written exclusively by Jews (though interestingly, Tom Stoppard is of Jewish descent and so is Stephen Schwartz, one of the main creative voices behind the musical). But I find it a particular appealing and relevant approach to bring to Jewish subjects.

My book of plays, The Golem, Methuselah, and Shylock, contains four midrashim, of sorts. Golem Stories is not only a midrash on the ancient legend, but it also uses and comments on midrashim (which the Rebbetzin tells) throughout the text.

The Living Methuselah is a more straightforward midrash, riffing on the Biblical characters of Methuselah and Serach, the two longest lived people in the Bible. A Shylock comments, of course, on the Merchant of Venice, and One-Eyed Moses and the Churning Red Sea is a more traditional midrash again.

What they all try to do is examine an idea that lies buried within the original story. Theater is best when it challenges people’s ideas, and often those ideas come from the stories and traditions of the culture. What better way to examine the entrenched, almost unconscious assumptions that we all make, then to examine the stories that those assumptions originate from? What better way to both celebrate and question, two things that so near to the heart of both theater and Jewish thought?

When I was writing A Shylock, I realized that though what I wanted to say something about The Merchant of Venice might be original, the idea to write a midrash about it was far from new. I saw two productions based on the character, and read about many more. What better way to deal with such a thorny character, one that may not have been written by a Jew, but has been so intertwined with Jewish identity over the years? What better way to simultaneously acknowledge both the anti-Semitism and the oddly sympathetic speeches Shylock is given to say?

For Purim, the tradition is to write a satiric plays, "spiels," which are in essence dramatic midrashim about the Book of Esther. Taken in its original form, the Book of Esther can be disturbing at times. Without midrash, we would be left with a story in which, for one thing, a woman is punished for not dancing on her behest of their drunk, unreasonable husband. Midrash makes it possible to charge that portrayal, to comment on the portrayal, and yet to preserve what is interesting and relevant about the Megillah today.

In the end, I would argue, most theater has an element of midrash to it. No play can exist in a vacuum. Every play must in some way acknowledge the wealth of what has come before, and in acknowledging that, its story in some way comments on the stories that already exist, both ancient and modern.

Santa Claus vs. Judah Maccabee

I am taking a break from the serious business of theater to tackle an even more serious business that occupies all minds as we approach the day when Christmas and Hanukkah both fall.  Who would win, in a fight between Santa Claus and Judah Maccabee?

An article in Slate addressed the question of which Christmas specials were best for Jewish children.  The decision (the Grinch and Charlie Brown)  is something I can't help but agree with.  But she never addressed the core issue her child asked: who would win?

SC obviously has the weight on JM, but JM has the youth and the soldier's training.  Years of fighting the Seleucids can't help but leave JM in fighting trim.

But Santa has a backup band of vicious reindeers, not to mention a whole army of elves at his beck and call.  Once again, JM would be fighting against the odds while a bloated general called the shots for his massive army.

When I was young, my brother told me that Judah Maccabee came to every Jewish child's house and put presents under every child's pillow (it wasn't till I was an adult that I realized that putting presents under the pillow was a family tradition, not a universal one).    I envisioned a rather serious looking man, with a much lower budget than Santa was privy to.

Older, I envisioned Judah as a man I would not particularly want to meet on a street corner, a man good at fighting but not much else.  Now, probably thanks to my play (and Peter Brown's portrayal), my image has softened a little, to a reluctant warrior who perseveres.

And Santa may have the better presents and the better press, but I'm sorry, it's Judah Maccabee, hands down.

Can one make money in theater? A call for Hanukkah gelt...

Note: this post has become quite popular, so I wanted to mention that I tackle the questions of making money in theater and the arts much more in depth in my comparison of the salaries of artists vs. non-artists.  Actual statistics from a semi-scientific survey included!  Read it.

I've been so preoccupied with the readings of Rudolf II and Golem Stories (both of which went very well, I think), that there's been no time to blog. I wonder if there will be any time during the International Festival of Jewish Theater and Ideas. We'll see...

But for the moment, back to Playing Dreidel with Judah Maccabee, which is still going on. I have a few new photos: one of a scene from the play, one of Evolve Company's shadow puppets (which occur inside the ark you can see in the first photo). The shadow puppets are a peek inside the ancient temple in Jerusalem. The man on the left is the High Priest, wearing the breastplate described in the Old Testament (a little detail that I doubt anyone at the show quite registers, but makes me happy).

One thing writing and directing the play has made me realize is that the story of Hanukkah is really about perseverance. Which I would think would not be a revelation, after all this time, but somehow is. The fun for me was in the rituals, and there was this little story about light lasting for eight days. As a friend wondered the other day - so what? What's so special about extra light? The legend of the light, actually, existed well before the events with the Maccabees, and only later were the two things put together. Why that connection?

The obvious answer, though I'd never stopped to ponder it before, is perseverance. The Maccabees should never have survived their battles, lasted as long as they did, but nonetheless they did. And of course perseverance is a theme in Judaism in general. To keep surviving, despite impossible odds. "To always be on the edge of defeat, yet never to be defeated," as I have Judah Maccabee say.

Watching the shows, I started wondering how growing up with that philosophy might have influenced my going into theater. Because theater is truly a profession with impossible odds. My friend Henry has posed the question of whether it is actually possible to make a living as a director, in today's theater. Maybe. Maybe not. But it's almost impossible. The point was driven home to me the other day when another friend, an actor, turned to me and said, with surprise, "You never expected to make money doing theater, did you? I mean, it's possible, but the likelihood is so small..."

But I did expect it. I have always expected it. Even though I wonder, still, if it's possible. When in college, when people asked me what I would be, I said "A starving artist." It was a joke that was not quite a joke. Yet underneath there was a certainty that no matter how difficult, it was possible to persevere, and overcome those odds. Was that something that came from Jewish culture, from Hanukkah, or just my own hubris?

I ask this at a point when I have become concerned about my own finances and the affect they will have on my career. I need to make more money than I'm making, and yet the career I have thrown in my lot with doesn't necessarily offer much, especially in these times. But what to do if I don't have the finances to sustain what I'm doing? Sadly, running a theater company, writing, directing, etc, is more than a full time job. I am so busy day to day that I barely have time to do what I need. I make some money at it all, but small sums.

I feel simultaneously very optimistic about my projects and very worried about how much longer I will be able to sustain myself financially. Is perseverance enough? How many days can the light stay lit?