Something
Wicked
This Way Comes...

An Ongoing

Walk & Squawk's Macbeth

at the

Furniture
Factory

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runs Thursdays through Sundays through November 5

The Jewish Ensemble Theatre presents
By Herb Gardner

"Herb Gardner's
best play.
Pungent, deeply
felt and very
powerful."
- Clive Barnes,
New York Post

Performances
Wed. 2 p.m. & 7:30 p.m.,
Thur. 7:30 p.m.Sat. 8 p.m.,
Sun. 7:30 p.m.
In The Aaron DeRoy Theatre

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6600 West Maple Road,
West Bloomfield

Sponsored by:

Oct. 25 - Nov. 26, 2000

.h e Sk ill

MIEZEICICIDE.1013'

For ticket information call

(ii rr

fax: 248-788-5160

JN

248-788-2900

i il °A) I

r

I

• c J apanese Restaurant

11 WE NOW SERVE LIQUOR
TATAMI ROOM

F !Seating for up to 8 tq. 10 persons
,......-,

V;

1

41;; ., Large Sushiltar
CARRY-OUT ONLY w jeaturing friii*ut

fi and Sushirrit*ii -
($15 or more)
Carry-Out Phone No. i• Private Part Room
(248) 538-7080 .1 For m p cca iions

10/20
2000

88

ugar
6239 Orchard

West Bloomfield

A JET production of a Herb Gardner
play reveals the universal relationship
between fathers and sons.

313.832.8890

pay-what-you-can previews October 19 and 20
opening night and fundraiser October 21

King of Sushi - A

'Conversation'

Open

::.

,

"is— Lunch and Dinner

( 48) 538-7081

MASCO

SUZANNE CHESSLER

Forward [newspaper] sign so that it

says "Jew is For war" is something I
saw when I was 9."
Gardner's writing and personality
nti-Semitic issues run
are
showcased in a new book, Herb
through Herb Gardner's
Gardner:
The Collected Plays (Applause;
plays and have stopped
$27.95).
Besides
offering his seriocom-
some performances.
ic
works
in
their
entirety, the book
Conversations With My Father, the
includes essays by
next production
friends and
of the Jewish
actors, including
Ensemble
Dustin Hoffman,
Theatre, takes
who have starred
place in 1930s
in these produc-
and '40s New
tions.
York, where the
At JET, where
characters strug-
Gregory
gle against reli-
Trzaskoma is
gious assaults.
director, Alan Bell
IM Not
plays the father
Rappaport,
and Bradley
recently per-
Gonik and Travis
formed in
Reiff portray the
Europe, is set in
sons, showing
1980s New
changing values
York and was
and beliefs in dif-
canceled by the
ferent generations
playwright in
of a Jewish family.
Germany after
"For me, these
an actor refused
plays are very
to speak lines of
clear, personal feelings or as
Playright Herb
Jewish identity.
clear as I know how to
Gardner: "The
"I don't think of
write them," explains
as
anti-Semitic
Conversations With My Father
Gardner, 65, who notices
incidents
in
the
a Jewish play about anti-
how much he has become
play are very
Semitism," says Gardner, who
like his own father when he
describes all his plays as a mon- much like my
talks with his two children.
experiences."
tage of truth and fiction. "It's a
"I hope to make relation-
play about a family, and I think
and stories identifi-
ship
it would be true of many other
able
enough
so that they
families in many other situa-
interest
people
of
any
generation.
I try
tions.
to write a play I think I'd like to go to
"The details are from my own histo-
see, and I hope that I won't be alone
ry. My father's character is maybe my
when I get there."
father and two uncles put together.
Although Gardner always liked writ-
[My father] did have a bar on Canal
ing,
he did not think of himself as a
Street [in Lower Manhattan], but it
until after he gained suc-
playwright
was called the Silver Gate, not the
cess
as
a
syndicated
cartoonist of The
Golden Door that's in the play.
which
he
started when he
Nebbishes,
"The anti-Semitic incidents in the
was 19.
play are very much like my experi-
"Sometimes I think that in the
ences. The event in the play where
comic
strips, the balloons with the
people change the Jewish Daily

Special to the Jewish News

A