Caricatures, Vicious Anti-Semitism Seen in Play Staged Here
Last Fall
artistic quality, and its assault
BY ROBERT FRANKEL
the country — and has drawn a
number of complaints charging
anti-semitism. (The play was pre-
sented in Detroit last October, and
the objections to its performance
were reported in the Jewish News
Nov. 3).
I attended two performances in
New York City during the troupe's
December engagement at the Film-
makers Cinematheque, a local
avant-garde showcase. "L'Amant
Militaire" is a modern, hip, adap-
Slomovitz
tion of a classic 8th Century Italian
vent Szalasi from yielding to a farce by Carlo Goldoni.
new Nazi demand."
The basic plot and characters
Then the Nazi roundups for slave
of the original work are pre-
labor and extermination camps be-
served: Spain is fighting on
gan anew in the Nazi campaign of Italian soil; the Italian mayor, a
horror that led to the mass murder
greedy, war profiteer, is con-
of Hungarian Jewry!
niving with the Spanish general;
There is a Jewish tribute to the mayor's daughter is secretly
Wallenberg, and here we turn
being wooed by a Spanish lieu-
again to the Morse account:
tenant. Parallels are drawn
Purely Commentary
By Philip
(Continued from Page 2)
orate design, complete with offi-
cial seals and the triple-crown in-
signia of Sweden. It stated that
the bearer awaited emigration to
Sweden and, until his departure,
enjoyed the protection of that gov-
ernment. Wallenberg persuaded
the Hungarian authorities to re-
spect five thousand of these home-
made passports.
"Although the appeal of the
Pope, the President of the United
States, the president of the Inter-
national Red Cross and the King
of Sweden had halted the deporta-
tions temporarily, the Jews of
Budapest remained at the mercy
of Hungarian gendarmes and the
armed street fighters of the Fas-
cist Arrow Cross organization.
Their property and possessions had
been confiscated, their apartments
seized, and access to food and
medicine had been cut off. They
were daily subjected to humilia-
tion and violence. Death in the
streets of Budapest was a com-
monplace event.
"In this grim setting Raoul Wal-
lenberg wrought a man-made mir-
acle. Working around the clock, he
built a city-wide relief organiza-
tion, establishing hospitals, nurs-
eries and soup kitchens. He em-
ployed four hundred Jews to staff
these institutions. With funds re-
plenished by the JDC, Wallenberg
purchased food, clothing and medi-
cine. Ile dropped the requirement
that the Jews have some direct
connection with Sweden and dis-
tributed an additional five thou-
sand protective passports. Neither
the Germans nor their Hungarian
ally wished to antagonize the neu-
tral Swedes, and though Wallen-
berg was continually threatened,
no direct action was taken against
him.
"Wallenberg's example was con-
tagious. Soon the Swiss began pro-
viding similar protection to the
Jews. Red Cross delegate Robert
Schirmer, sent to Budapest after
repeated entreaties by the War
Refugee Board, began an ener-
getic distribution of supplies, and
the international insignia of mercy
appeared everywhere."
Morse also reports on Wallen-
berg's response to challenges to
his activities in behalf of Jews in
Hungary, how "to meet new
threats he begged, borrowed - and
rented 32 apartment houses to
which he removed the 5,000 hold-
ers of his unique document ('safe
passport' passes). "The Swedish
flag flew over these buildings, and
Wallenberg and his colleagues
guarded the entrances. With funds
continually replenished by the
JDC. Wallenberg bought food and
medicine for his wards, who were
forbidden to enter most retail
stores. Growing more daring as
the crisis mounted, Wallenberg is-
sued an additional 5,000 protective
passports. Eventually he shielded
20,000 Jews, 13,000 in the so-called
Swedish houses. Forty (lectors re-
cruited by Wallenberg inoculated
the residents of the crowded
ghetto against typhoid, paratyphoid
and cholera. The Swiss kept pace
with the Swedes, providing hous-
ing for an estimated 20,000 Jews,
to whom they had issued their own
protective documents. Prime Min-
ister Szalasi attempted by law to
nullify the Jews' international pro-
tection, but Wallenberg, playing
upon the Arrow Cross leader's am-
bition for diplomatic recognition,
persuaded him to retract the or-
der. But Wallenberg could not pre-
48—Friday, February 23, 1968
The original plot makes the
money-hungry Italian mayor, on the war in Vietnam. I asked
Pantalone, a villain. It does not them about the blatant anti-Semi-
make him a Jew. That he be por- tic stereotyping and received
trayed as a Jew was clearly a answers like these:
decision of the Mime Troupe. In
"You're too sensitive."
its production, Pantalone wears an
"Some of the actors are Jewish.
exaggerated hook nose, speaks How can you accuse them of anti-
with a Yiddish accent, and uses Semitism?"
Yiddish expressions. He is por-
"It's humor—you know, like the
trayed as an ugly, sexually de- Jewish jokes we tell at parties."
praved scoundrel, obsessed with
"There are a lot of Jews just like
making money. At one point be that. I hate them, too. That's not
muses at length about, selling his anti-Semitism. It's not against all
own daughter.
Jews — just a type."
Not one of the four reviews I
I went to see "L'Amant Mili- read on the play — all favorable,
taire" prepared to like it. I left the incidentally — mentioned Jews or
theater outraged and sick at heart anti-Semitism.
at the ugly caricatures and the dis-
The San Francisco Mime Troupe
play of vicious anti-semitism.
is a prime example of anti-
What shocked and angered me Semitism from a broad grouping
even more than the play itself was of individuals which includes New
that other people, whom I ex- Leftists, hippies, some young Jew-
pected to react as I did, did not. ish intellectuals.
Among the audiences who saw the
In order to stem the newer type
throughout the Mime Troupe's play on the two nights I did —
production with the war in Viet- liberals, radicals, intellectuals, and of anti-Semitism I have been de-
nam, the draft, the military-in- even some of my own friends (one scribing, it is important to under-
dustrial complex, the hippie a strong Zionist) — almost none stand its protagonists. Understand-
movement and other contempor- noticed the anti - semitism or ing of their mentally—of their
valid concerns for what is wrong
ary American preoccupations. seemed disturbed.
with the Establishment and with
The play is an allegory on Amer-
All of them loved the play, rav- today's affluent and apathetic
ican society from the point of
ing about its excitement, humor, society — can they be reached.
view of the New Left.
directed primarily toward liberals, presented in various cities around
black militants, anti-war protestors
and many segments of the New
The San Francisco Mime Troupe and Old Left.
The group's c u r r ent work,
Is a revolutionary, left-oriented
theater group well known on the "L'Amant Militaire" ("The War
West Coast. Founded in 1959, it has Lover"), is an allegorical attack on
presented more than 20 productions the war in Vietnam that has been
(Assistant to the Anti-Defamation
League's National Director of
Fact-Finding)
"When the Jews emerged into
the sunlight of a peaceful Buda-
pest, they named a street in
honor of Raoul Wallenberg.
There was little more they could
do to express their gratitude, for
he had already disappeared in
the vastness of the Soviet Union.
But the Israelite Congregation of
Pest, where the Swedish houses
had been located, paid him a
quiet tribute which included
these words:
"The time of horror is still
fresh in our memory, when the
Jews of this country were like
hunted animals, when thousands
of Jewish prisoners were in the
temples preparing for death. We
recall all the atrocities of the
concentration camps, the depar-
ture of trains crammed with peo-
ple who were to die, the suffer-
ings in the ghettos and the at-
tacks against the houses which
had been placed under interna-
tional protection. But we also
remember one of the greatest
heroes of those terrible times:
the Secretary of the Royal
Swedish Legation, who defied the
intruding government and its
armed executioners. We wit-
nessed the redemption of pris-
oners and the relief of sufferers
when Mr. Wallenberg came
among the persecuted to help.
In a superhuman effort, not
yielding to fatigue and exposing
himself to all sorts of dangers,
he brought home children who
had been dragged away and he
liberated aged parents. We saw
him give food to the starving and
medicine to the ailing.
"We shall never forget him
and shall be forever grateful to
him and to the Swedish nation,
because it was the Swedish flag
which warranted the undisturbed
slumber of thousands of Jews in
the protected houses.
"He was a righteous man. God
bless him."
But in the Detroit News story
from Stockholm of July 18, 1956,
we read:
In 1949, the grateful Jews of
Budapest hired a sculptor to do
a figure of Wallenberg as St.
George. A few hours before the
statue was to be unveiled in a
Budapest park, it was myste-
riously blown up. The Hungarian
police never pursued the sabo-
teurs and subsequent informa-
tion pointed to Moscow as the
destroying agency."
As architect Sol King suggests,
now is the time to honor Wallen-
berg's name—at the University of
Michigan. There are many of us
here who can point with pride to
an alma mater whence there
emerged the courageous Raoul
Wallenberg. Perhaps the sesqui-
centennial year of the university
is the proper time for the proposed
action. And this also happens to
be the 25th anniversary year of
Sweden's welcome to the 8,000
Danish Jews who escaped the Nazi
terror. Let this be the glorious year
of honor to the Danes who helped
the Jews escape, the Swedes who
welcomed them and Raoul Wallen-
berg, the most courageous of the
Swedes!
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
Adolph Sutro—The Man Who Dared
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0111
This cartoon and story are reproduced from "A Picture Parade of Jewish History" by Morris Epstein,
published by Shengold Publishers, New York, by special arrangement with the author and publishers.
Adolph Sutro was an American mine often reached 110% The about 200,000 volumes and 135
Jew Who left his influence on the poisonous gases and the waters rare Hebrew manuscripts. He spent
West early in the history of its which flooded the mine caused $1,000,000 for public baths and
parks and furnished a band to play
growth. Born in Aix-la-Chapelle, many disasters.
Sutro developed an ambitious for the people each Sunday. He
Germany, in 1830, he was educated
at several -of the best technologi- plan for a ventilating and drain- also gave the city an aquarium, and
cal schools in Germany. At an ing operation. In 1864 he obtained several statues and fountains. One
early age he was placed in charge the right-of-way for a tunnel of the richest man on the Pacific
of his father's large woolen mills, through Mount Davidson. For four- coast, he owned about one-tenth
but the German Revolution of 1848 teen years he worked on his proj- of the area of San Francisco, in-
made his family poor and the ect. He appealed to Congress for cluding Sutro Heights, which be-
Sutros emigrated to America, set- funds and traveled to Europe to came a city property after his
raise more money when the grant death.
tling in Baltimore in 1850.
was exhausted.
In 1894, he ran for the office of
In the same year, the discovery
While Sutro was consulting ex-
of gold attracted Adolph Sutro to perts in Europe, powerful opposi- Mayor of San Francisco. He said:
San Francisco, where for the next tion to his plan arose. His credit "If placed in the Mayor's chair,
ten years he sold tobacco and cigar- was stopped and his tunnel was I shall bring about an honest ad-
ettes. A few years later he was ridiculed in the press. Sutro went ministration and yet save enough
lured across the Sierra Nevadas to the miners themselves. He called for a fund to beautify our city."
by the discovery of silver in the a meeting of miners in Virginia He was elected.
Comstock Lode in Mount Davidson. City and won their support. The
Adolph Sutro died in 1898. His
Sutro had studied mining, but tunnel was begun in 1869 and com- contributions to the science of min-
ing and to the welfare of the
he had never faced anything like pleted in 1879.
With the mine operating success- average citizen have earned him
the problems of the Comstock Lode.
Miners were dying from the intense fully, Sutro moved to San Fran- a place of honor among America's
heat, for the temperature of the cisco. He collected a library of pioneers.