Jude

Using actual text from his sister's diary, Jude is the story of Jacob Fishkin's life, his survival of the Holocaust, his sister's death, and his attempt to build a relationship with a writer in 2001 to tell his story. The play is a fugue traveling back and forth in time to Poland right before WWII and during, and New York CIty in the early 2000s just before 9/11. It is a story of survivorship and the desire to have one's family legacy preserved.

Format: Full-length drama

Character breakdown:

Jacob, an old man in his seventies, small in stature, but a huge heart
Alan, a teacher of drama at NYU in his thirties or early forties, born Jewish but not a follower
Sarah, a young Polish jew ages from 13 to 18, very much older than her years
Jakov, Jacob as a young boy, a fireball, ages from 11–19
Shoshka, Jacob and Sarah’s mother, in her late thirties early forties, a former political activist
David, Jacob and Sarah’s father, late thirties, early forties, a shoemaker, photographer, farmer, jack of all trades
Mere Lebbe, their youngest daughter, six
Yitzhok, their youngest son, seven
Deb, Alan’s good friend a performance artist and fellow Jew
Kate, Alan’s wife, a non jew from another country
Actress 1 (in her sixties) plays Bobie, Stozipicrow, Rabbi’s wife
Actress 2 (in her fifties) plays Magda, Dantcheka, Rohkol
Student 1, also plays Policeman, Soldier, Motyl, short Partisan
Student 2, also plays Doctor, Yerek, Leyzer
Student 3, also plays Fanya, Kahne
Actor 1 plays Mr. Eisenbaud, Publisher, Moses, Getzel,
Yerek’s Father, Reb Moishe, Mr. Schulz
Actor 2 plays Tall Partisan, Speaker, Reb Chaim, Arieh
Actor 3 (in his late fifties) Partisan Leader, Rabbi, Stozipioz, German Commander, Ronthska

Original or Prominent Production:
Lee Strasberg Theatre School, New York University.

Original Source Material: Sarah Fishkin's personal diary (permission of Jacob Kishkin).

Original Language: English

Production Rights Holder:

Lee Gundersheimer

Experience(s) Chronicled: Theater During Holocaust | Women and the Holocaust | Reactions to the Holocaust | Liberation | Concentration and Extermination Camps | Righteous Gentiles | Perpetrators, Bystanders and Collaborators | Rescue | Survivors and Subsequent Generations | European Jewry Before the Holocaust | Escape | The Ghettos | Resistance