The Greek-Jewish Theater in Judeo-Spanish, ca. 1880-1940

The Greek-Jewish theater in Judeo-Spanish was the product of a combined expression of traditional Sephardic culture and of European education and modernization. It began in Thessaloniki in the 1880s and had become a popular form of entertainment in that city by the beginning of the twentieth century. In later decades the members of Zionist and socialist movements in Thessaloniki produced plays that reflected their political platforms. The history of the Greek-Jewish theater shows the transformation of the Greek Jews from a closed, religious society to an open, secular one.