JCC THEATERWORKS LAUNCHES TWO NEW PROJECTS

With the plethora of award shows flooding your television set, have you ever given a thought to being asked for your opinion on a new entertainment venture?  Your viewpoint is being solicited in a unique and fun way.  The Second Annual New Haven Playwriting Contest will be held at the Woodbridge Jewish Community Center next Sunday, February 16 at 7 p.m. and your vote is needed.

The first year when the call went out from the New York’s Jewish Play Project, an amazing 167 submissions were received from all over the world.  Next year an astounding 228 plays of a Jewish content were received.  This year 513 plays from 250 playwrights in 25 states and 8 countries were  sent. Wow! The local JCC has only been participating for two of the three years of the project.

A panel of theater experts did a LOT of reading and narrowed the field down to the top 10.  Then a local panel, chosen by the JCC Theaterworks, read the chosen 10 and picked three.  On Sunday, you, the audience, get to vote on which play gets a full New York workshop in June at the 14^th Street Y, with a goal of a professional production to follow.

Will the choice be “G-d’s Honest Truth” by Renee Calarco from Washington, D.C. about a rabbi, posing as a modern day Indiana Jones, who rescues Holocaust Torahs and, in a touching ceremony, finds them new synagogue homes and raises thousands of dollars in the process.  Sounds wonderful, nu?  But what if it is all a sham and fraud?  Based on a true story of a Baltimore rabbi who has since been imprisoned, the play deals with truth and the lack of it thereof.

Another offering is “A Jew’s Uncle’s Camel” by Stan Kaplan from Ukiah, Utah about a New York Theater company and the Jewish woman who finds their work offensive.  Is she powerful enough to stop the production of a play about Palestine and Israel?  Is this propaganda masquerading as art?  Ironically, a real Jewish theater in Washington, D.C. is grappling in a powerful dialogue about its own issues of censorship in whether or not to produce a controversial world premiere Israeli play, “The Admission.”

Your final choice is “Jew Kamp,”  by Stephanie Swirsky of New York, New York, a lighter offering about 5 teenagers on a March of the Living trip to Poland and the death camps and ultimately Israel.  Issues such as sexuality and peer pressure are juxtaposed against Judaism and the Holocaust.  This is a thought-provoking look at today’s youth and their ultimate value systems.

Excerpts of each play will be read and then the voting begins.  Founder and artistic director David Winitsky is in charge of the Jewish Play Project.  Tickets are $25 and $12 for seniors and students and may be purchased online at www.jccnh.org or by calling 203-387-2522, ext. 300.

Also mark your calendars for the JCC Theaterworks moving and poignant production of "The Last Seder" by Jennifer Maisel and directed by Dana Sachs.  What if you knew this holiday celebration would be the last your entire family would hold?  A mother is facing that reality as she readies her husband for an Alzheimer's center and the sale of the family home.  Her four daughters, each with a momentous decision of her own to deal with, come home for their final Passover together and discover what it means for each of them.  Performances are Thursday, March 6 at 8 p.m., Sunday, March 9 at 2 p.m. and  7 p.m. and Monday, March 10 at 8 p.m. in the Vine Audi-

 

torium at the JCC, 360 Amity Road, Woodbridge.  For tickets ($25, seniors and students $12), call the JCC at 203-387-2522, ext. 300.

Support the almost new JCC Theaterworks and its productions in this pair of exciting theatrical ventures.