Jewish Theater

Yom Kippur and The Higher Education

of Khalid Amir

Reviewed by IRENE BACKALENICK

The infamous Yom Kippur War in 1973 was one of Israel’s most critical times, when the nation’s very existence was at stake. During that terrible time American playwright Meri Wallace lived in Israel (from 1968 to 1975), and out of her experience comes a very personal play – Yom Kippur. With that war as its background, Yom Kippur deals with the lives, deaths, anguishes and joys of four young people.

So far, so good. Wallace has chosen an era that offers rich material for exploration. How were families affected by that sudden, disastrous war? How does one balance loyalties? How did its impact change relationships, bring forth long-hidden secrets, develop bravery or cowardice? All questions to which Jews – and indeed any student of human nature – would like to know the answer.

Unfortunately, the best of intentions do not necessarily result in top-notch theater. Wallace too often skims the surface, never pursuing issues nor developing characters in depth. Too often a topic is mentioned and dropped, leaving the viewer at sea. And her two-dimensional characters, paired with a complicated plot, make for a kind of soap opera. Furthermore, the dialogue tends to be flat, limited, uninspired.

Her story deals with two American couples, all four of whom have made aliyah (resettlement in Israel). Yitz and Yael are married, in love, and expecting a child. Friends Ephraim and Sarah are married, but Ephraim prefers Yael. Yitz bravely enlists, rushes off to the battlefront, while Ephraim stays back, battling it out with wife Sarah and longed-for Yael. Numerous other personal issues and characters complicate the tale – Yitz’s mother who had abandoned her son, a new lover for Yael, a marriage for two other friends, birth of Yael’s child.

Problems of the play, whatever its flaws, are not improved by the production. Granted that Yom Kippur is part of the play festival, where new works are necessarily mounted with a minimum of cost. It is a time of beginnings, of experimentation. Nevertheless, director Halina Ujda might have managed a smoother staging. With its many short scenes, Ujda has difficulty effecting smooth transitions, which turn out to be awkward, lengthy and noisy.

Yet the cast of nine acquits itself favorably. Particularly affecting in their roles are Aylam Orian (as Avi) and Gayle Robbins (as Sarah). But, all told, this is a play that has yet to find its best voice. Wallace would do well to take Yom Kippur back to the drawing board, enriching its characters and enhancing its language.

Manhattan’s Midtown Festival mixes it up

Jewish themes and characters are well represented in New York’s current fringe festival – called the Midtown International Theatre Festival. A recent satirical piece, titled The Higher Education of Khalid Amir, deals with Jewish-Muslim-Christian interrelations on a Midwestern college campus. In the process, all institutions and characters are held up to ridicule, but the major targets are the American government and the media.

In fact, playwright Monica Bauer’s hilarious absurdist play, Higher Education, takes us on a dizzying journey through her imaginary (or not so imaginary) world. She throws every type of person into the mix – a whirl of straights, gays, cross-dressers, Jews, Muslims, Christians. They are all skewered.

But the Jews are more sympathetically portrayed than others. Norm, a Jewish professor, is the one who champions human rights, does not hesitate to speak out, even if his job is on the line. And Juanita Juarez, the professor of Latino history, turns out to be a nice Jewish girl from Manhattan’s Upper West Side, nee Juanita Berkowitz. Why has she changed her name, hidden her true identity? It is the only way, it seems, for her to be hired to lecture on Latino culture and politics. But she, too, is a feisty supporter of liberal causes.

What is the plot on which Bauer hangs all this? The Statue of Liberty has been covered with a burka (the traditional covering of Arab women), launching a cross-country rampage of burka-ed statues. The government sees this as high treason and goes after Khalid Amir, an Arabic history professor at Denver State who is in fact no terrorist. But he is a gay man and a cross dresser – worse crimes in some eyes. In short, nothing is sacred. Characters are wildly exaggerated and scenes are replete with physical shtick and hilarious exchanges.

Under Craig J. George’s facile direction, the story moves nonstop from scene to scene, with Joan Barber, Amir Darvish, Amanda Duarte, Alexander Elisa, John Fico, Norm Golden, and Tyler Hollinger as partners in crime. But particularly worthy of note are Fico as the nutty FBI man and Hollinger as a self-important television reporter.

The fringe festival is necessarily a collection of plays-in-process, and this offering is one of the better. Monica Bauer has a wild imagination, a unique style, and a way with language.

Updated 8/6/08