It

THE

DETROIT JEWISH CHRONICLE and THE LEGAL

Artistic Phases of the Pageant

COUNCIL'S PAMPHLET
VIEWS ANTI-SEMITISM

The

By KURT PEISER
Executive Director of "The Romance of a People."

CHRONICLE

Saluting—

first of a series of pam-

phlets issued by the National Own-
o 0 f • lewihs Women to provide

its leaedrs with information which

THE PAGEANT, as a phase of theatrical presentation, will assist them in offsetting anti-
is One of the earliest forerunners of dramatic develop Semitic
came from
Symit ic
meat. It reached its zenith in the Babylonian era the
press today. It is called "Anti-
when the entire populace participated in spectacular reli- Semitism -A S Study Outline."
gious pageants. Centuries later, when Inc modern theater
This. with six similar pamphlets
"Contemporary Jewish Prob-
is s till in its infancy, historical and religious pageants on
lens,"
will constitute the course
filled the market place and brought throngs to the villages
of study for a "school" under
with their lavish array of color and drama. But like the Council auspices, plans for which
miracle play of which it was a direct blood and flesh off- were announced a few weeks ago.
spring the pageant was succeeded by more advanced
The pamphlets will be placed in
stage form and was packed off to the historian s ware- the hands of a Committee of One
house for a post mortem. Sophistication came in its place (Thousand prominent Jewish wom-
organized under the chairman-
as the pageant, the embodiment of mass drama, was ban- [en
ship of Mrs. Alexander Kohut of
ished from the public square and the theater was intro- New York City, and after mastet-
' me the text these women will be-
(hived to the early ancestors of the stuffed shirt.
come leaders of study groups i n
The presentation of a pageant in this age is therefore the 2111) cities in which there are
•
fraught with many pitfalls. Not only does it require great Council Sections.
flosses will he open to all Jew- •
ourtge but long and arduous work to make an historical .
people,
both
men
and
women,
j
pageant attractive to the palette of our n modern
I who are deeply interested in cur j ,
tan population.
rent
rent Jewish questions. The course'
y s ever.a!
c
In the first place, there is the problem of the human [
study wil
material. If the theater suddenly decided to return to the [ th s , and it is csu inze st ed that a
ion
pan e l
discuss
pageant as its medium it might be far more effective than)s ymposium
le if)i(f"
e tIosdeis'oTes.
the blue eagle in banishing unemployment from Broadway. the
he program.
nt the (
But only a small number of the thousands of men and
Such outstanding authorities as
women needed for the spectacle have been drafted front Prof. Salo Baron of Columbia Uni-
versity and Henry Hurwitz, Chan-
the professional ranks. The rest, the Children of Israel cellor of the Menorah Association,
of 4,000 years ago, the Roman centurions, the Jewish high were advisers to the committee on
priests, the invading horde,—the many and varied char- preparation of the pamphlets,
acters of ancient times that must provide the warp and which was headed by Mrs. Maurice
Goldman of New York City,
woof of this tapestry of Jewish history, must come front L.
while Dr. David de Sola Pool and
the offices, factories, homes of the twentieth century. The Leo W. Schwarz prepared the ma-
pageant is to be a mass expression and its players have terial.
been recruited from every walk of life.
Phisis Attack Mussolini.
It is not an easy matter to push the clock back forty
BERLIN. IJTA)—For the first
centuries. Much more difficult is it for the modern stenog- time a Nazi newspaper made a
rapher to quit her skyscraper for the ancient Temple of direct attack upon Premier Benito
Solomon, or for the emancipated college youth who ordin- Mussolini and the Italian Fascist
arily basks in the reputation of a football hero to exchange regime.
In a hitter .article, the Dresden I
his pigskin for the beard and raiment of a high priest in Freiheitskampf (Struggle For
the Temple of Solomon. When I first conic in contact with Freedom) derided the Italian Pre-
the raw recruits for the cast, I was quite justifiably dis- mier for appointing Jews to the
Italian Academy of Science, thus
turbed by their histrionic shortcomings. A knowing look demonstrating the difference be-
from the actors in the rehearsal room informed me that I tween the Nazi and Fascist goy-
had their sympathy. I do hope it was not pity. But if eminent.
The Supreme Court will pass
these volunteers had never before appeared behind the
the finding of a Baden state
footlights, a deep-seated ardor and sincerity soon com- upon
Court of Appeals decision that
pensated fur their lack of dramatic savor faire.
Jewish origin may be cited as
Their first gestures were hardly more aesthetic than grounds for divorce.
The state Appeals Court held
the gawky poses of the scare-crow. Yet, though these
stenographers, college students, debutantes and unem- that Aryans could not be expected
to live in marriage with Jews be-
ployed live in a world removed not centuries but aeons
cause such unions were "not only
from the setting of the spectacle, its epic story seemed to undesirable but disastrous and un-
take a complete hold on them and stir in them a spirit of natural."
Minister of Propaganda Joseph
kinship with the past that to me was almost uncanny. What
warned theater, cabaret
was this mystic tie which their participation in the pageant Goebbels
and vaudeville managers to dis-
forged with Jewish destiny? Is it possible that the Jew continue hiring Jewish performers
has been immersed in a million melting pots, only to prove "who are again returning in in-
himself the exception to the rule? My Hindu friend would creasing numbers to the German
no doubt attribute it to metempsychosis. And I ant in- stage."
clined to agree that this time he is not merely trying to
baffle me with another of his strange polysyllables.
Frankly, I was fascinated by the profound feeling which
Congratulations
the story of the pageant enkindled in the seemingly super-
ficially ordinary men and women. One cannot entirely
overlook the humor of the situation where windmill ges-
tures, mad grimaces marked their valiant dramatic efforts.
But even that had its consolation—it was quite obvious
they had very little to unlearn.
A maonificent s pectacle,
"The Romance of a People," covering .1,00(1 years of A wonderful performance,
historic event—and
Jewish history, demands a kaleidoscopic juxtaposition of An
A mi-htz lesson!
themes and moods unparalleled in their depth and impli-
from
cations. So sweeping and cosmic is the pattern of the
pageant that the dramatic medium, inadequate to portray
it and bring it into full blossoming alone, has been merged
with the dance and oratorio forms. The wedding of these
three art forms will, of course, give a ripe and rich texture
.ner and again of
to the pageant. Yet the dramatic element must provide
I), hell's Best
the link between them and establish the tempo and color
for the cavalcade of Jewish events down the ages. This;
is a very important factor since the episodes in the story
are often punctuated by intervals of centuries. The crea-
tion of unity, and continuity of action, falls to the lot of
•
the dramatic idiom. Let us examine a specific case ill
point.
The gigantic pageant opens with a scene depicting
Woodward at Sibley
creation as described in Genesis. The next scene portrays
the worship of Moloch and the Bacchanalian revels of a
people worshipping gods in their own image—earthy•
Woodward at Willis
greedy and lustful. The interval. the gap between the
two, covers hundreds of years. The direction must intro-
duce an illusion of unity and sequence that will augment
Michigan at Griswold
the link provided by the narrative.
a ma tic form of expression all
The pageant has a
its own. The cast must be molded in the image of the
Woodward at Henry
group; the players must be trained in the idiom of the
group rather than in individual interpretation in order to
conform to the nutss theme of the pageant. Moreover, the
Woodward at Charlotte
enormous size of the audience and the unusually long dis-
tances separating it from the players also require that the
BEN WACHNANSY
visual emphasis be transferred from the face to the body.
1.rners1 Manager
(Turn to pa t, I8)

"ROMANCE OF
A PEOPLE"

-

-

ROMANCE OF
A PEOPLE!

JACOB
SCH REID ER

OPEN - ALL- NIGHT

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