East Side Story: Ten Years with the Jewish Repertory Theatre (review)

134 SHOFAR Above all, the book includes many commentaries and interpretations of the biblical text. These commentaries partly reflect the classical Jewish tradition (Midrashic, etc.), but they also include a genuine medieval outlook. A later generation of scholars will be able to compare, for example, material which Mme. Sed-Rajna assembled about the giant Goliath with what commentators such as Gersonides said about the man and his armor. In the same way, it should be possible to assemble what the German authors of the Sepher Hasidim has to say, around the year 1200, about King David, and to compare it with the date presented and analyzed in the present book. Interest in Jewish art has become so extensive that publishers nowadays can afford to produce luxurious editions such as Mme. Sed-Rajna's book and still hope to make a profit on the sales. Scholars and scholarship can only benefit from this interest. While it might have been better for footnotes to appear on each page rather than at the end of the book, this is a minor problem which really should not detract from the book's overall value. Joseph Shatzmiller University of Toronto East Side Story: Ten Years with the Jewish Repertory Theatre, by Irene Backalenick. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1988. 197 pp. $30.25. This work grew out of the author's doctoral thesis, and its main thrust is to document the first ten years of the Jewish Repertory Theatre under the direction of Ran Avni. Backalenick begins with a brief though informative chapter on the history of Jewish theatre. We get a sense of the factors that led to the rise of the Yiddish theatre and the need that it fulfilled within the Jewish community. We gain an understanding of a "fervent and uninhibited" audience that wanted anything but realism. And we see that, for the most part, the audience has not changed and, in fact, may pose the greatest obstacle to the Jewish Repertory Theatre's growth. In the next three chapters, Backalenick furnishes a very detailed playby -play account of the lR.T.'s struggle for survival from 1974 through 1985. Based in part on interviews with Mr. Avni, it amounts to a testament to his relentless commitment. Because of its documentary style we experience the endless series of obstacles that confronted him and are often left feeling overwhelmed by the smallness of his day-to-day problems. We hear (in too much detail) of stubborn maintenance men, makeshift sets, interpersonal problems, and box office receipts as we see a leader become caught up in the Volume 9. No.3 Spring 1991 135 trivial concerns that needed to be dealt with in order to keep the Jewish Repertory Theatre afloat. Because his comments are, for the most part, specifically directed to these immediate concerns, we are deprived of any deep insight into the man himself. We lose sight of his guiding artistic vision, the lR.Ts deeper significance to the Jewish community, and what impact it has had on Jewish theatre in America. We are left asking ourselves how Mr. Avni continued. This section is followed by a chapter on the Playwrights-in-Residence Program. Though relatively brief, it is the most engaging. Through a series of insightful interviews with playwrights who were eager to reveal themselves, we are presented with a fascinating account into the creative collaboration that existed between Edward Cohen, lR.T.'s literary manager, and the seven playwrights in residence. Their artistic points of view are as diverse as they are refreshing, and we gain valuable insight into the creative process and a strong feeling for their artistic missions. Their responses as to whether or not they see themselves as "Jewish playwrights" are so strikingly personal we begin to feel we know them. And because their talents are so unique and backgrounds so diverse, we come away with a fascination for Mr. Ed Cohen, who somehow possesses that rare mentoring ability to nurture artists in the face of a reality that demands commercial entertainment. Before concluding, Backalenick goes into a lengthy analysis of the demographics of the J.R.T.'s audience. Though based on what appears to...