25 minute read
Two Jews Walk Into A War...
IN MEMORY OF BRUCE A. COHEN
Theater J dedicates this production of Two Jews Walk Into A War… to the memory of Bruce A. Cohen who passed away on November 11, 2022.
Bruce was a dedicated Theater J Council member and beloved member of the greater Washington theater community, sponsoring productions at Signature Theatre, Studio Theatre, and Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company and attending plays, musicals, operas, and concerts at venues throughout the region, all over the United States, and around the world.
Born and raised in Charleston, WV, he moved to Washington to attend The American University, Washington College of Law. Following law school, he worked on the Hill for Rep. Philip Ruppe and Sen. Philip Hart, both of Michigan. The bulk of Bruce’s legal career was spent at the Department of Labor, Office of the Solicitor, from which he retired in 2006.
Bruce served on the board of Family and Child Services (Washington, DC) and was a volunteer at Children's National Medical Center, where he interacted with infants in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. He was also known as an accomplished gourmet cook – providing many delicious baked goods to share with theater artists and staff on his many visits to rehearsals.
Bruce was predeceased by his parents Saul Cohen and Helen L. Marshall and his adored brother-in-law, the late Judge Robert E. Ginsberg. He is survived by his sister Gail Ginsberg, nieces Deborah and Dana Ginsberg, grand-nephew David Ginsberg and grand-niece Aurora Buntain as well as "dozens of cousins" and innumerable dear friends.
May his memory be a blessing.
LETTER FROM THEATER J'S MANAGING DIRECTOR
Dear Friends, Happy New Year!
It feels wonderful to welcome you back to the theater with Two Jews Walk Into A War… With this production we also welcome veteran Theater J actors Bobby Smith and Sasha Olinick. It’s great to have them back on our stage. It’s also delightful to have Adam Immerwahr back in the building, helming this show. The reunion is joyous.
Two Jews Walk Into A War… Seth Rozin thought that the title alone is a great punch line, and the play tackles so much more than a good joke and good timing.
This comedy keeps with a great Theater J tradition, the opportunity to laugh as we wrestle with existential issues: faith and friendship, loss and community, grief and life.
Jews have long sought to understand great tragedy through comedy, an art rooted in deep discomfort and the need to explore boundaries. By letting go and laughing, we find an opening, a portal to empathy.
Our world at times seems unrecognizable. So, it feels good to laugh, and better yet, to laugh out loud.
I hope we can continue to laugh and be provoked and engaged for the rest of the season. We have two shows left to close out our 22-23 season, the urgent Gloria: a Life and the explosive dark-comedy One Jewish Boy. I hope to see you at the theater!
Yours, David
David Lloyd Olson, Theater J Managing Director
THANK YOU TO OUR SEASON SPONSORS
LEADING PRODUCER
Covenant Foundation
Arlene and Robert Kogod National Endowment for the Arts
SPONSORING PRODUCER
DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities
Susie and Michael Gelman, The Morningstar Foundation
The Government of the District of Columbia Norbert Hornstein and Amy Weinberg
Sari R. Hornstein
The Marinus and Minna B. Koster Foundation Nussdorf Family Foundation Revada Foundation of the Logan Family Kay Richman and Daniel Kaplan Share Fund
The Shubert Foundation
SUPPORTING PRODUCER
Bruce A. Cohen*
Dianne and Herb Lerner Alfred Munzer and Joel Wind Helene and Robert Schlossberg
THANK YOU TO OUR PRODUCTION ANGELS
Mara Bralove and Ari Fisher
Bunny Dwin Marion Ein Lewin
Ellen and Gary Malasky Paul and Zena Mason
Howard Menaker and Patrick Gossett
Elaine Reuben, The Timbrel Fund Mita M. Schaffer and Tina M. Martin
This production is supported in part by the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, an agency supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.
THEATER J
David Lloyd Olson, Managing Director
TWO JEWS WALK INTO A WAR...
By Seth Rozin
JANUARY 11 – FEBRUARY 5, 2023
Director…........................................................Adam Immerwahr^
Set Design…………...........................................Jonathan Dahm Robertson+
Costume Design…....................................….Ivania Stack+
Lighting Design….........................................Alberto Segarra+
Sound Design…..........................................…Sarah O’Halloran+
Props Design……............................................Pamela Weiner
Cultural Competency Consultant…........Humaira Ghilzai
Violence Consultant…................................Cliff Williams III
Casting Director…....................................….Jenna Place
Production Stage Manager……................Anthony O. Bullock*
Assistant Stage Manager…...................….Allison Poms-Strickland
Assistant Stage Manager…….................…Margaret Warner
Cast (in alphabetical order)
Zeblyan…....................................................….Sasha Olinick*
Ishaq……….......................................................Bobby Smith*
Two Jews Walk Into A War… runs approximately 80 minutes with no intermission. The video or audio recording of this performance by any means is strictly prohibited.
Produced by special arrangement with Playscripts, Inc. (www.playscripts.com)
*Appearing through an Agreement between this theater, Theater J, and Actors’ Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers in the United States.
^The Director is a Member of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, a national theatrical labor union.
+Member of United Scenic Artists Local 829
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Sasha Olinick (Zebylan) is excited to return to Theater J where he has previously performed in: Our Class, The Hampton Years, Yentl, Life Sucks, G-d’s Honest Truth, The Last Schwartz, Last Night of Ballyhoo, and Love Sick. Other DC area credits include Hub Theatre (company member), Arena Stage, ExPats Theatre, 1st Stage, Folger Shakespeare Library, Imagination Stage, Kennedy Center, MetroStage, Mosaic Theater Company, Olney Theatre Center, Rep Stage, Round House Theatre, Spooky Action, Solas Nua and Studio Theatre. Regional Credits: American Shakespeare Center, Bald Mountain Theater, Merry Go Round Playhouse, Ocean State Lyric Opera, Trinity Rep Company, and Vermont Stage. Film and Television Credits: Enemy of The Reich: The Noor Inayat Khan Story, Minyan Duty, VEEP. Sasha holds an MFA in acting from The Trinity Rep Conservatory and teaches acting at Montgomery College, the National Conservatory of Dramatic Art, and with the Educational Theatre Company.
Bobby Smith (Ishaq) Broadway: Crazy For You. Off Broadway: Forever Plaid (original cast), Kander and Ebbs' The World Goes ‘Round, and the revival of George Gershwin’s' Of Thee I Sing National tours include Brigadoon and The World Goes ‘Round. Solo performances include The National Symphony Orchestra with maestro Kent Nagano; The Richmond Symphony under the direction of George Manahan, The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra Jack Everly Conductor and The American Pops Orchestra with Luke Frazier. After relocating to Washington DC, has been the recipient of 3 Helen Hayes Awards for outstanding performance by a leading actor. Most recently he was one of five artists to be honored with The AndersonHopkins Award recognizing actors and artists of the DC theater community whose creative lives demonstrate great accomplishment to date and promise for the future. Regional: Signature Theatre La Cage aux Folles (Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding Actor), and Spin (Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor). Studio Theatre: A Class Act (Helen Hayes Award nomination for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Resident Musical), Paula Vogel’s' The Long Christmas Ride Home, Caroline or Change, Grey Gardens. Mr. Smith has had the pleasure of working with students for over ten years including at the Kennedy Center where he is the co-chair and instructor for the American College Theatre Festival musical theater fellows. He has also worked at Montgomery College, University of Alabama, Peabody Conservatory, Baltimore School of the Arts, and The Talent Machine in Annapolis, a free program producing 3 theatrical productions yearly focusing on artistic enrichment for young artists and their families.
Seth Rozin (Playwright) is the author of more than a dozen plays, including Men of Stone (produced by Theater Catalyst, nominated for a Barrymore Award for Outstanding New Play), Missing Link (produced by InterAct Theatre Company, nominated for a Barrymore Award for Outstanding New Play), Reinventing Eden (produced by InterAct), Black Gold (National New Play Network rolling world premieres at InterAct, Phoenix Theatre, Prop Thtr, Arts West), The Three Christs of Manhattan (produced by InterAct), and Human Rites (produced at Phoenix
Theatre & InterAct; winner of the 2018 Brown Martin Philadelphia Award). Seth has also written the book, lyrics and music for a musical entitled A Passing Wind: The (Mostly) True Story of Joseph Pujol, which received its premiere at the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts’ inaugural Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts in 2011. He is the recipient of two playwriting fellowships from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, NNPN’s Smith Prize, as well as a new play commission from the Foundation for Jewish Culture. Seth is the founder and Producing Artistic Director of InterAct Theatre Company in Philadelphia, where he has directed over 50 productions, including 35 world premieres, and he has twice served as President of National New Play Network from 2002-2006 and 2014-2016.
Adam Immerwahr (Director) is the former Artistic Director of Theater J. Currently, he serves as Artistic Director of Village Theatre, a four-theater, two-city musical theater producing company in Washington state. He has previously served as the Associate Artistic Director at McCarter Theatre, a Tony Award-winning theater in Princeton NJ, and as Resident Director of Passage Theatre, in Trenton, NJ. Adam’s producing credits, several of which have transferred to Broadway or off-Broadway, include new works by Edward Albee, Christopher Durang, Danai Gurira, Fiasco Theater, Will Power, Stephen Wadsworth, Tarell McCraney, and Ken Ludwig. As a director, Adam’s work has been seen at some of the top theaters in the country, including The Public and Theater Row (both for Summer Play Festival), Ensemble Studio Theatre, Walnut Street Theatre, Woolly Mammoth, McCarter Theater, Cleveland Play House, Theater J, Passage Theater, Luna Stage, Hangar Theater, Bristol Riverside, and many others. Internationally, he directed the African premiere of The Convert (nominated for Zimbabwe’s National Arts Medal). He serves on the Executive Committee of the Board of the Alliance for Jewish Theater and is an inaugural member of the Drama League Director's Council.
Jonathan Dahm Robertson (Scenic Designer) is a scenic and projections designer for opera, theater, and events. Selected Opera credits: Nixon in China, Fidelio, Peter Grimes (Princeton Festival); Candide, Un Ballo En Maschera, Cosi Fan Tutte (Opera in the Heights); The Consul (A.J. Fletcher Opera Institute). Selected Theater credits: Nollywood Dreams (Round House Theatre); Day of Absence, Blood at the Root (Theater Alliance); The Agitators, Oh God, (Mosaic Theater Company); The Christians (Theater J); The Mamalogues, Broadway Bound, Member of the Wedding (1st Stage); Coolatully, The Frederick Douglass Project (Solas Nua); The Small Room at the Top of Stairs (Spooky Action Theater Company); Footloose, the Sound of Music, Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, Murder for Two, One Slight Hitch, Jesus Christ Superstar (Totem Pole Playhouse) and many more. Member USA829. www.jdahmrobertson.com
Ivania Stack (Costume Designer) is delighted to return to Theater J. Her Regional and DC area theatre credits include: Arena Stage, Seattle Repertory Theatre, Philadelphia Theatre Company, Baltimore Center Stage, Gulf Shore Playhouse, Asolo Repertory Theatre, Everyman Theatre, The Wilma Theatre, The Karski Project, Andy’s Summer Playhouse, The Second City, The Contemporary American Theatre Festival, Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company (Company Member), Ford’s Theatre, Round House Theatre, The Kennedy Center, Signature Theatre, Imagination Stage, Studio Theatre, Olney Theatre, Pointless Theatre, Theatre Alliance, Rorschach Theatre, Metro Stage, and Gala Hispanic Theatre. She has an MFA in design from the University of Maryland, College Park.
Alberto Segarra (Lighting Designer) (he/him/El) is a Washington DC – based lighting designer. Recent selected DC credits include: The Till Trilogy at Mosaic Theater Company; The Joy that Carries You and Thanksgiving Play at Olney Theater Center; Acoustic Rooster and Beastgirl at The Kennedy Center TYA; Elegies and Yoga Play at Keegan Theatre; Quixote Nuevo at Round House Theatre; La Revoltosa at GALA Theatre; Blood at the Root at Theater Alliance (Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding Lighting Design); and An Act of God at Signature Theatre. Regional credits include: The Great Leap at Hangar Theater/ Portland Stage; The Three Musketeers at Cleveland Play House; 1776 and The Gift Horse at New Repertory Theatre and Priscilla, Queen of the Desert at Blue Barn Theatre. He holds a MFA in lighting design from the University of Maryland, College Park. Mr. Segarra is a USA 829 union member, and Faculty Member at Duke Ellington School for the Arts in Washington DC. Upcoming projects include: Incognito at Constellation Theatre; Passing Strange at Signature Theatre; and Native Gardens at GALA Theatre. albertosegarra.com.
Sarah O’Halloran (Sound Designer) is a sound designer and composer. Her theater credits include Theater J: Compulsion, Nathan the Wise, Talley’s Folly; Woolly Mammoth/The Second City: She the People: The Resistance Continues; 1st Stage: The Phlebotomist, The Brothers Size, Swimming with Whales, Trevor, and When the Rain Stops Falling; Studio Theatre: Cry it Out; Rep Stage: The Glass Menagerie; E2, The 39 Steps, The Heidi Chronicles and Things That Are Round; Everyman Theatre: Sense and Sensibility, Be Here Now, Proof, Dinner with Friends; Mosaic Theater: In His Hands and The Return; Olney Theater Center: The Humans, Our Town and Labour of Love; Theater Alliance: A Chorus Within Her; Forum Theatre: Nat Turner in Jerusalem; What Every Girl Should Know, and Dry Land.
Humaira Ghilzai (Cultural Competency Consultant) (she/her) is a sought-after cultural expert, speaker, and writer with a mission to unveil the beauty, poetry, and humanity of the Afghan people through stories. Humaira made her Broadway debut in 2022 with the production of The Kite Runner. Other Theatre Credits: US and UK tours of the theatrical adaptations of Khaled Hosseini’s A Thousand Splendid Suns and The Kite Runner; J.T. Roger’s Blood and Gifts (La Jolla Playhouse); Gabriel Jason Dean’s Heartland (off-Broadway); Sylvia Khoury’s Selling Kabul (Seattle Rep & Signature Theatre); Composer Sheila Silver's world premiere of A Thousand Splendid Suns Opera (Seattle Opera) Kevin Artigue’s The Most Dangerous Highway in the World (Golden Thread Productions). Film & TV Credits: Little America, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, and Merry Friggin Christmas.
Anthony O. Bullock (Production Stage Manager) is the Resident Production Stage Manager for the 22-23 season. Past Theater J projects include Intimate Apparel, Nathan the Wise, Compulsion or the House Behind, Tuesdays with Morrie, The Wanderers, Sheltered, Occupant, Love Sick, The Jewish Queen Lear, and Actually. NYC credits include The School for Lies with Classic Stage Company and workshops with Project Springboard: Developing Dance Musicals. DC credits include Shakespeare Theatre Company (Red Velvet, Our Town), Arena Stage (The Pajama Game), Baltimore Center Stage (SOUL: The Stax Musical, Twisted Melodies), Signature Theatre (Billy Elliot), and Studio Theatre (The Children, The Hard Problem, Cloud 9, Hedda Gabler, Moment, Between Riverside and Crazy, Chimerica, Jumpers for Goalposts, Laugh). Other regional credits include Barrington Stage Company, Williamstown Theatre Festival, McCarter Theatre, TheatreSquared, among others. He received his BFA from Oklahoma City University. He is a proud member of AEA.
THEATER J LEADERSHIP
David Lloyd Olson (Theater J Managing Director) has spent over a decade managing nonprofit theaters, most recently serving as managing director of Quintessence Theatre Group in Philadelphia where he oversaw the organization’s largest ever fundraising campaign and the doubling of their annual foundation support. He was manager of the executive office and board engagement at the Shakespeare Theatre Company where he supported the transition of the theater’s artistic directorship from Michael Kahn to Simon Godwin. He was a founding company member of Pointless Theatre in Washington, DC, where he served for ten years as managing director, during which time the company was awarded the John Aniello Award for Outstanding Emerging Theatre Company at the Helen Hayes Awards. He was an Allen Lee Hughes management fellow at Arena Stage and served as a Fulbright English teaching assistant in Valmiera, Latvia. He has twice been the recipient of a DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities fellowship program grant and was on the host committee of the 2016 Theatre Communications Group national conference. He attended the University of Maryland where he received a B.A. in theater from the College of Arts and Humanities and a B.A. in government and politics from the College of Behavioral and Social Sciences. He is a member of Adas Israel Congregation.
TWO JEWS WALK INTO A WAR... STAFF
Electricians: Logan Duvall, Michael House, Rex Hsu, Alex Monsell
Light Board Programmer: Mikayla French
Sound Engineer: Levi Manners
Assistant Costume Designer: Julie Cray Leong
Load-in Crew: Tyra Bell, Clare Cawley, Tad Howley, Justin Metcalf-Burtin, Abigail Olshin, Johnny Robertson, Meaghan Toohey
EDLAVITCH DCJCC LEADERSHIP
Edlavitch DCJCC
Chief Executive Officer: Jennifer Zwilling
Chief Financial Officer: Craig Mintz
Chief Operating Officer: Bini W. Silver
Senior Director of Institutional Advancement: Emily Jillson
THEATER J STAFF
Managing Director: David Lloyd Olson
Producing Director: Kevin Place
Associate Artistic Director: Johanna Gruenhut
External Affairs
Development Manager: Emily Gardner Director of Patron Experience: Jasmine Jones
EDCJCC Arts Marketing Coordinator: Lena Barkin
EDCJCC Arts Outreach Coordinator: Jacob Ettkin
Ticket Office Manager: Tabitha Littlefield
EDCJCC Creative Director: Molly Winston
House Managers and Ticket Office Associates: Mitchell Adams, Cristen Fletcher, Regev Ortal, Robert Reeg, Hadiya Rice, Kaneeka Rice, Sam Rollin, and Mary-Margaret Walsh
Production
Resident Production Stage Manager: Anthony O. Bullock
Director of Stage Operations: Danny Debner
Technical Director: Tom Howley
Head Electrician: Garth Dolan
Resident Casting Director: Jenna Place
Resident Props Designer: Pamela Weiner
Education & New Play Development
Education Programs Assistant: Jen Jacobs
Expanding the Canon Rosh Beit: Sabrina Sojourner
Expanding the Canon Commissioned Writers: Zachariah Ezer, Harley Elias, Carolivia Herron, Jesse Jae Hoon, MJ Kang, Thaddeus McCants, and Kendell Pinkney
Yiddish Theater Lab Commissioned Writers: Lila Rose Kaplan, Caraid O’Brien, and Aaron Posner
Teaching Artists: Dr. Debra Caplan, Evan Casey, Sarah Corey, Felicia Curry, Kimberly Gilbert, Eric Hissom, Naomi Jacobson, Chad Kinsman, Kate Eastwood Norris, Cody Nickell, Tracy Lynn Olivera, Jenna Place, Aaron Posner, Howard Shalwitz, Dani Stoller, Holly Twyford, Erin Weaver, and Em Whitworth
Founding Artistic Director: Martin Blank
ABOUT THEATER J
ABOUT THEATER JTheater J is a nationally-renowned, professional theater that celebrates, explores, and struggles with the complexities and nuances of both the Jewish experience and the universal human condition. Our work illuminates and examines ethical questions of our time, intercultural experiences that parallel our own, and the changing landscape of Jewish identities.
As the nation’s largest and most prominent Jewish theater, we aim to preserve and expand a rich Jewish theatrical tradition and to create community and commonality through theatergoing experiences.
The Edlavitch DCJCC embraces inclusion in all its programs and activities. We welcome and encourage the participation of all people, regardless of their background, sexual orientation, abilities, or religion, including interfaith couples and families.
ANTI-DISCRIMINATION
Theater J and the Edlavitch DCJCC commit to being an inclusive, safe, and welcoming space for all. This institution does not tolerate discrimination or harassment based on race, color, religion (creed), gender, gender expression, age, national origin, disability, marital status, sexual orientation, or military status, in any of its activities or operations from either patrons or staff. Please visit our website at theaterj.org to learn more about our policies and procedures.
LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
Our building sits on the traditional homeland of the Nacotchtank (Anacostan), farmers and traders who lived along the banks of the Anacostia River. Beginning in 1608, European settlers decimated the Nacotchtank with disease, warfare, and forced removal. By the 1700s, the survivors fled to join other tribes to the north, south, and west, including the Piscataway Peoples, who continue to steward these lands from generation to generation. We know this acknowledgement is only a small step towards justice, and we ask that all of us learn about the past and present and invest in the future of our country’s Indigenous communities wherever we are.
TRADITION!
LOOKING AT A PLAY THROUGH JUDAISM'S LENS
By Johanna Gruenhut, Associate Artistic Director
A SPIRITUAL AND PHYSICAL BINDING
Tefilin are the black boxes tied with leather straps that congregants adorn during morning prayer services. They have an English name, ‘phylacteries’, from the Greek root for ‘to guard or to protect.’ Inside the boxes are small parchment scrolls inscribed with the Shema, perhaps the quintessential Jewish prayer, taking its name from the Hebrew for ‘to hear,’ and beginning with the incantation, ‘Hear oh Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is one.”
Where does this practice come from?
Like so many commandments, tefillin source to the five books of Moses (the Torah), and as with so many commandments, the instructions provided are rather vague, even cryptic.
The Jewish people are told to bind the Torah closely to their hearts and minds. The Rabbis, it seems, took these words quite literally, creating a viscerally physical and material symbol of the spiritual fulfilment intended to come through prayer.
Rabbi Aviva Richman, the head of Yeshiva Hadar sees the purpose somewhat differently, though. She reflects as follows:
“The idea is that the divine-human encounter, where God meets world happens through our bodies. God does not meet world on somebody else’s body… and not only in our disembodied souls. God’s presence in the world happens through my body. On my arm, and the work of my hands, and on my head in the depths of my thoughts.”
In other words, during prayer, during a time explicitly marked for inward focus and meditation, Jews are commanded to adorn a reminder that action is necessary to bring holiness into the world.
This is a message that resonates deeply with Two Jews Walk Into A War… Neither of the titular Jews has his tefillin. Yet they share a longing for them. One mimes the motion of putting them on, while the other shares that his grandfather used shoelaces to approximate the wearing of tefillin while in a concentration camp. Indeed, stories from the camps are filled with tefillin—smuggled, hidden, shared, fashioned from anything and everything—providing hope, inspiration, resolve, and under Rabbi Richman’s reading, a call to action.
The resolve of Ishaq and Zablyan, our characters, is to bring a Torah and with it some spiritual wholeness back to their lives.
AN INTERVIEW WITH SETH ROZIN
Associate Artistic Director, Johanna Gruenhut, and playwright, Seth Rozin, corresponded over email about Two Jews Walk Into A War….
JG: Where did the idea for Two Jews Walk Into A War… come from?
SR: I was in rehearsal for a show in 2006 when an actor brought in a newspaper article with the headline something like “The Last Two Jews of Afghanistan,” suggesting I might find this to be fodder for a play. Not only was he right, but after getting started on it and doing some research, I discovered that there were already two other plays inspired by the same article! Both plays had been produced, though neither seemed to set the world on fire, I’m guessing because they both seemed to stick very closely to the real-life story. While I was initially discouraged, I decided to use the real story as a departure point for a more absurd allegory about community, tradition, belief, faith, and survival.
JG: How and why did the true events speak to you?
SR: I found two things quite extraordinary, and incredibly well-suited for a play, in the real-life situation: First, that there were now just two Jews remaining in Afghanistan, after a robust community of 30,000+ had thrived there for many decades. And second, that these two remaining Jews, who shared a commitment to rebuilding the Jewish community in Kabul, hated each other. In those two facts, there was so much pathos and humor. It felt like the beginning of a Jewish joke, which is how I ultimately set out to write the play and why the title is what it is.
JG: What do you hope your play will say to or spark for others?
SR: As with most of what I write, I set out to ask a question in the hope that the play might offer an answer. My question was “why would anyone continue to still believe there was a god with a plan for them and their people after so many generations of enduring such inhospitable circumstances and such unrelenting persecution?”
JG: I guess this leads to my next question – How do you see these characters? How do they see themselves? Sometimes it’s hard to parse– do Zeblyan & Ishaq see themselves as Afghani, or Jewish or Afghani-Jews – can you explain the subtle differences, if any exist?
SR: Ishaq and Zeblyan, while born in Afghanistan, were raised by parents from other (East European) cultures, and their families never felt fully embraced by the local Afghans. They were, as Ishaq says, a "tolerated minority," stuck in a situation that was not of their choosing and which has yielded considerably more hardship than prosperity. I have tried to write them to identify as Jewish first and Afghan second, so they have a complicated relationship to their home country, not unlike marginalized or oppressed communities in other countries. And, of course, there is a certain degree of risk that comes with identifying as Jewish first.
JG: Two Jews Walk Into A War… is a comedy! And, obviously, there’s some serious stuff going on in the play. How do you straddle those two worlds?
SR: One of my favorite things to write is the juxtaposition of the highbrow and the lowbrow, the sublime and the ridiculous, big ideas and normal human foibles. Once I arrived at the conceit of telling this story as a kind of absurd vaudeville I felt liberated to use a lot of humor to offset the very human, ultimately tragic circumstances of these two characters. So, the play includes arguments about the rules of life in Leviticus along with jokes about pork and masturbation; moments in which the characters wistfully imagine a life free of persecution along with moments when they bicker over why rock badgers, but not elephants, are mentioned in the Torah. Even many of the jokes in the play are punctuated by gunshots, instead of rimshots.
A TORAH COMPLETED HERE: THE BET MISHPACHAH HOLOCAUST MEMORIAL SCROLL
The Edlavitch DC Jewish Community Center has been home to many Mitzvot, but among the most unique and poignant were those performed this September by members of Bet Mishpachah congregation who wrote in their Sefer Torah as part of its repair.
The scroll, which originated in the Czech town of Dolni Kounice, has been on permanent loan to the congregation since 1979 and was sent away to be restored. Once it was nearly finished, the scroll was brought back to the EDCJCC where members of the congregation were invited to join the Soferet (scribe) in completing the project, thus fulfilling what the Rabbis consider the last of the 613 Mitzvot: to write your own Torah.
Bet Mishpachah is an LBGTQ+ congregation founded in 1975 that hosts weekly services and many events in the EDCJCC building.
Al Munzer and Joel Wind, two long-time members, share of their experience with the Soferet, “Both of us have suffered the loss of family members to the Shoah. As we held a quill to write a few letters in a Torah scroll that had been rescued from the fires of the Shoah, we could not help but remember the people of Dolni Kounice who had held, read from, and revered this scroll. We prayed that the world might yet heed their call for a world free of the hate, prejudice, and bigotry that robbed them of their lives.”
Westminster Synagogue in Knightsbridge, London acquired 1,564 rescued Czech Torah scrolls and has loaned most of them to synagogues around the world. The Bet Mishpachah scroll was originally created for the Jewish community in Dolni Kounice sometime after its founding in the 14th century. Over the years, the community faced perils including the destruction of their synagogue, laws limiting the number of Jews allowed to live there, a fire in the 1830s, a devastating flood in 1862, and the forced deportation of the town’s entire Jewish community to the Auschwitz death camp. The only survivor was the Torah scroll.
Tell your story on the stage of Gloria: A Life
Gloria: A Life by Emily Mann is a celebration of human connection, and we need your help to demonstrate that connection in our community.
Five decades after Gloria Steinem began raising her voice and championing the voices of others, her call for equality is as urgent as ever. The play Gloria: A Life is one part history—an exploration of the iconic feminist’s extraordinary legacy and the women who inspired her (including Dorothy Pitman Hughes, Flo Kennedy, Coretta Scott King, and Wilma Mankiller)—and one part conversation. The second act of the play invites audiences to share their reaction to the play, their own story, and their thoughts for the future.
The conversation will actually begin, however, before audiences set foot in the theater. Director Holly Twyford and scenic designer Paige Hathaway, the team behind Becoming Dr. Ruth's tower of boxes, plan to cover the walls of the auditorium with stories, reflections, and testimonials.
We need your help to assemble these stories. Please take a moment to visit our survey link via the QR code or website below and respond to as many or as few questions as you wish. You may respond anonymously or with your name. We will take as many of your words as we can fit and assemble them into an immersive display.
Gloria Steinem’s stirring and uplifting narrative is a necessary reminder of the importance of speaking up and speaking out. Please join us in doing so now.
Visit theaterj.org/gloriasurvey
Gloria: A Life runs March 8 – April 2, 2023. Tickets are available at theaterj.org.
