A Much Maligned People: Jews on and off the Stage in the Early American Republic

On August 21, 1776, a gentleman of Philadelphia named John Raser inserted an advertisement in the Pennsylvania Gazette complaining that his indentured servant, Philip Marks, had run away that morning. Raser offered a three-pound reward for Marks's return. He also offered the following clues to help his fellow Philadelphians identify the runaway, describing Marks as, "A Jew, about 5 feet 5 inches high, slim made, lisps and speaks bad English, of a dark complexion and long visage, wears his own long black hair." Raser also cautioned his neighbors to beware his Jewish servant, as the man was "addicted to lying and swearing."¹

Only a year before Raser's announcement, an audience member watching actor Charles Macklin perform the role of Shakespeare's Shylock had commented on the performer's peculiar fitness to play the role of the villainous Jew: "Picture to yourself a rather stout man with a coarse, sallow face, a nose by no means lacking in any of the three dimensions, a long double chin; as for his mouth, Nature's knife seems to have slipped when she carved it, and slit him open on one side all the way up to the ear." The author also noted that Macklin had mastered the "Jewish" mannerisms of the character: "The first words he utters (he) lisps as lickerishly as if he were savoring the ducats and all that they could buy."²

Figure 1.

Advertisement from The Pennsylvania Gazette, August 21, 1776

These two descriptions—written only a year apart—provide a virtual catalogue of Jewish stereotypes, from the physical signifiers of a yellow or swarthy complexion and dark curly hair, to the character traits of "lying and swearing," to the speech patterns of "lisping." One is "fact"—a runaway advertisement written to allow strangers to recognize and capture the fugitive. The other is "fiction"—based on the stereotype of Jewishness that Shylock (and Macklin) personified. Yet when set side by side, the similarities in tone, content, and perhaps even underlying ideology that resonate in these two portraits challenge the contemporary historian to ask if there really is "no smoke without fire" in these descriptions. In other words, to what extent do the cultural stereotypes of Jews that prevailed in eighteenth-century culture (and in this case, on the eighteenth-century stage, or the "synagogue of Satan" as one angry Philadelphia minister described his city's new playhouse), correspond to the social, political, or economic realities that defined Jewishness in the early national period?³

In his essay, "Plays of Jewish Interest on the American Stage, 1752–1821," Edward Colman identifies some twenty-eight productions with Jewish characters that "reached the American stage" in the colonial and early national period.⁴ However, he declares adamantly, "The point to be noted is that none of these characters bears any relation, political, social, or cultural to the condition of Jews in America."⁵ Colman's assertion, while understandable, is problematic, since it ignores the historical context in which these characters were created and the uses to which they were put by American audiences and performers. While he may be correct in identifying the characters on his list of plays as stereotypes, his argument suggests that they came into being fully formed and remained static figures throughout their stage history. I argue, on the other hand, that while the stage Jew may have been at times as grotesque a caricature as the stage Irishman or stage slave, it nevertheless bore witness to specific moments in the development of the social, political, and cultural treatment of the Jewish people during the early national period.

In the wake of the Revolution, Jews struggled to establish their political and social position in the new nation, and they faced an uphill battle against detractors for whom "Jewishness" remained a problematic concept. For example, just as Jewish characters (or sometimes even Gentile characters masquerading as Jews) became scapegoats on the stage, so Jews offstage became targets of political attacks during the pre-Revolutionary and...