Morgenstern in Vienna

Samuel Morgenstern, an American Jew who left Vienna as a child in 1938, has seemingly made peace with his hometown, where he has been living for some years now, when he is suddenly beset by a number of unexpected visitors: his estranged daughter, Raizele—a psychologist in need of help, fleeing from her family’s past and a bad divorce; Joshua—a naïve, young American searching for some kind of identity; and Bubbe—Morgenstern’s grandmother murdered by the Nazis, who emerges from a glacier with which he shares his apartment, and who proceeds to cook a fresh pot of matzo ball soup every day. Can Bubbe’s soup bring these characters together and help them discover a sense of belonging as Samuel and Raizele reopen old wounds, Raizele and Joshua fall into a passionate affair neither understands, the streets below explode in xenophobic rioting, and the glacier expands further and further into the apartment?

Format: Full-length comedy/drama

Cast Size:2M/2F

Original or Prominent Production:
Ensemble Studio Theatre, Los Angeles, January 2012.

Original Language: English

Production Rights Holder:

Alan Goodson, alangoodson@sbcglobal.net

Experience(s) Chronicled: European Jewry Before the Holocaust | Survivors and Subsequent Generations