Arts & Entertainment
Returning To Its Roots
JET's 2010-2011 season seeks to entertain audiences with plays
that clearly resonate with the Jewish community.
Suzanne Chessler
Special to the Jewish News
T
he Jewish Ensemble Theatre
takes part in two opening
productions for the 2010-2011
season — one on a stage at the Jewish
Community Center in West Bloomfield
and another at the Performance
Network Theatre in Ann Arbor.
The G-d of Isaac, running Oct. 6-31,
opens the West Bloomfield season.
Sonia Flew, a collaboration shared by
JET and Performance Network, is cur-
rently running through Oct. 17 in Ann
Arbor and will be staged Dec. 8-Jan. 2
in West Bloomfield.
Both productions are part of an
expansion of JET initiatives, which this
season will include five locally devel-
oped shows and two touring attractions.
"We're going back to our core constit-
uency this year',' says David Magidson,
artistic director, who is glad that ticket
sales from last season were so strong
that there are no deficits.
"The connection to the Jewish com-
munity will be clear, and I'm very
concerned that people who come to be
entertained are entertained."
The G-d of Isaac, written by James
Sherman and directed by Christopher
Bremer, plays out as comedy while
exploring religious and cultural affili-
ation. A young man married to a non-
Jewish woman reconnects with the
woman he once considered his Jewish
soul mate.
"This is a bittersweet search for what
the man gave up in giving up Judaism,"
Magidson says. "The comedy puts the
character of the man's mother, played
by Henrietta Hermelin Weinberg, in the
audience."
Michael Brian Ogden portrays the
young man, and Kathryn Mayer takes
the role of his former girlfriend, who
has married an observant man.
"Hearing the play spoken out loud
made me appreciate how really funny
it is," says Mayer, 31, making her JET
debut. "Besides being humorous, the
play has deep significance. My character
and Michael's character come to find
out that marriage isn't what they imag-
ined:'
Mayer, who grew up in West
Bloomfield and counts herself as a
third-generation member of Temple
Beth El, now in Bloomfield Township,
holds diverse acting credits, includ-
ing the roles of the title character in
Candida for the Michigan Classical
Repertory Theatre, Peaseblossom in A
Midsummer Night's Dream for the New
American Theater in Illinois and Anne
Allen in Runaways for Impact Theatre
in New York.
"I'm excited to play a young Jewish
woman in my hometown:' says Mayer,
who studied at Oakland University to
teach English to speakers of other lan-
guages and next fall will work toward a
master's degree in that concentration at
the University of Southern California.
JET'S next presentation, 25 Questions
for a Jewish Mother, runs Nov. 13-14
and is linked with the Jewish Book
Fait The writers, Judy Gold and Moira
Ryan, interviewed more than 50 Jewish
women to come up with their produc-
tion defining Jewish motherhood and
starring Gold, an Emmy-winning
actress and comedienne.
Sonia Flew, written by Melinda Lopez
and directed by David Wolber, is anoth-
er tale of a family of two religions.
"We did a table reading of this play
and loved it',' says Wolber, Performance
Network artistic director, who has
worked as JET'S marketing director
and appeared on its stage. "It's a rich
and wonderful mix of humor and real
issues.
"There's a simplicity of dialogue and
characters that makes it stick with audi-
ences as it tells the heart-wrenching
story of a girl transported out of revo-
lutionary Cuba by Operation Pedro Pan
and her later struggles when her own
son enlists to fight in the Afghanistan
war."
Modern Orthodox, written by Daniel
Goldfarb and running Jan. 19-Feb. 13,
would seem to be a Jewish version of
The Man Who Came to Dinner. In the
new comedic context, the man needs a
place to stay over Shabbat.
"This is a very heart-warming play"'
Magidson says. "A non-observant cou-
ple gets to know an observant diamond
dealer."
New Jerusalem: The Interrogation
of Baruch de Spinoza at Talmud Torah
Congregation: Amsterdam, July 27, 1656,
staged March 16-April 10, gives the sea-
son a more serious turn as it explores
ex-communication from Judaism with
a philosopher at the center. Written by
David Ives, the drama is directed by
Magidson.
"Spinoza is one of the greatest Jewish
intellects, but this play is fictional about
a real event',' Magidson says. "I think
audiences will find this action-oriented
and will be interested from the first
second."
Circumcise Me, the second visiting
production, will be presented May 7-8,
featuring writer Yisrael Campbell, who
shares his comic take on converting to
Judaism.
Concluding the season is The Model
Apartment, a Donald Margulies dark
comedy directed by Lavinia Hart and
running May 11-June 5. The play, which
is about a dysfunctional family, has two
Holocaust survivors trying to distance
themselves from a troubled daughter
they have been unable to help.
The Margulies work was first intro-
duced during a JET reading of new
plays, an annual event. Also continuing
will be the children's productions with
a new approach to The Diary of Anne
Frank.
"Adults familiar with this classic
play will feel as if they're seeing it for
the first time Magidson says. "We will
have a public performance in April."
JET Artistic
Director David
Magidson:
"We're
going back
to our core
constituency
this year."
West
Bloomfield
native
Kathryn
Mayer returns
home to
appear in
The G-d of
Isaac.
Judy Gold
brings
25 Questions
for a Jewish
Mother to JET
during Book Fair
in November.
Writer Yisrael
Campbell will
share his
comic take on
converting to
Judaism in
❑
May.
The G d of Isaac runs Oct. 6-31 on the stage of the Aaron DeRoy Theatre
in the Jewish Community Center in West Bloomfield. Performances are at
7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 6, and Thursdays, Oct. 7-28; 5 and 8:30 p.m.
Saturdays, Oct. 9-30; and 2 and 6:30 p.m. Sundays, Oct. 10-31. There is
a matinee at 2 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 27. $32-41. Season subscriptions,
including five shows at a discounted price plus free tickets to the two
visiting productions, are available. (248) 788-2900; www.jettheatre.org .
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