Tags: diary

A Bouquet of Alpine Violets

A stage adaptation of Mary Berg’s diary to mark the 43rd anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943. Berg’s diary, which preceded the famous Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank, depicts daily life and death in the Warsaw ghetto through the eyes of a teenage girl. Possessing American citizenship saved the Berg family from the fate of millions of Eastern European Jews. Along with other foreign citizens, they were held in Pawiak, the Warsaw prison, before being sent to a camp in France, and then sailing to the U.S. as part of a German prisoner of war exchange. But while in the ghetto and the Warsaw prison, Berg witnessed firsthand the horrors of life there, which she recorded in notebooks and brought with her to the U.S.

A Voice Called and I Went [קול קרא והלכתי]

A play about Hannah Senesh (Zenes), the Israeli paratrooper. The play follows her from childhood to her mission and death. The text is composed of segments from diaries, testimonies, poems, etc.

Anne

Staged in a theater built specially for the play, Anne uses Frank's own words as well as passages excluded from the original published work that deal with Anne's emerging sexuality and her relationship with her mother. The stage itself includes a replica of the Frank's Amsterdam apartment where they hid from the occupying Nazi forces for 18 months until they were betrayed in 1944. Unlike the original 1955 play, Anne ends with her death in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.

Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl

Levin was an American war correspondent working in London in 1943. He was one of the first American journalists to enter a work camp and was scarred by the horrors he witnessed in Ohrdruf, Bergen-Belsen and Dachau. When Levin read Anne Frank’s diary, he saw its potential as a dramatic production. However, Levin’s original full-length dramatic adaptation of The Diary of a Young Girl was never produced. Rather, a new adaptation by Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich was selected for commercial production. His radio play, adapted from his original play, was broadcast twice in 1952 but was shelved in the face of a well-documented battle for the right to have his play produced.

Children of the Holocaust

After World War II, over 200 children’s diaries like Anne Frank’s were found. What happened to these children? This play of remembrance speaks poignantly of the hopes and dreams of Anne, David, Rachael and Michael, victims of the Holocaust. It portrays their courage and their faith, and what they might have been had they lived.

Compulsion or The House Behind

Sid Silver learns about a young girl named Anne Frank and her extraordinary diary, and makes it his mission to ensure her tale is heard. But once publishers and producers get involved, it becomes “a very valuable product”—and his good intentions prove to be his undoing. The character of Sid Silver represents journalist and playwright Meyer Levin whose original adaptation of Anne Frank's diary was rejected in favor of an adaptation by other authors.

Das Tagebuch der Anne Frank

Das Tagebuch der Anne Frank, which translates into English as The Diary of Anne Frank, by Russian composer Grigory Frid, is a monologue-opera in two acts (21 brief scenes) for soprano and chamber orchestra. The 13-year-old Anne Frank is hiding with her family in a house in Amsterdam. In her diary she describes her life in hiding—her emotions, the people around her, the small pleasures in her life, as well as her fears. The opera provides a rich and varied portrait of Anne and the people around her.

Diary of Anne Frank

The original Broadway stage version of the world famous diary Anne Frank kept while she and her family and others were hidden from the Nazis in an attic in Amsterdam, Holland.

Diary of Anne Frank

A contemporary adaptation by Wendy Kesselman of the original stage production by Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich, which includes newly discovered writings from Anne Frank's diary as well as survivor accounts.

Etty

The play begins as Etty is being transported to Auschwitz. In Auschwitz, she works at the Jewish Council registering the Jews that come into the camp and this keeps her and her family safe for a while. Her spirit and hope shines through even as she faces the notion that she, too, will eventually face death in this camp.

Goodbye Memories

Based on the biographies of the Franks and Simons’ personal contact with Anne’s three surviving friends, Goodbye Memories is a universal story of parents, children, friends, sexual awakenings, and the special spirit of a talkative, attention-loving girl named Anne Frank. Unlike the play and movie based on Anne’s diary, Goodbye Memories begins on the morning of Anne’s 13th birthday in June 1942 when she receives her infamous diary. The play ends on the morning of July 6, 1942 when the Franks leave their home to go into hiding.

I Am Anne Frank

A musical adapted from Cohen and Futterman’s 1985 musical Yours, Anne that includes spoken excerpts from Anne Frank’s diary to depict her experiences as if an older Anne is looking back on her life.

Talking with Angels: Budapest, 1943

Talking with Angels: Budapest, 1943 is based on the true story of four close-knit friends and their encounter with transcendent forces. Over a period of 17 months, despite the chaos in Nazi-occupied Hungary, Gitta Mallasz, Lili Strauss, Joseph Kreutzer, and Hanna Dallos held weekly meetings every Friday afternoon. During these meetings, Hanna received channeled messages from four entities—four distinctly different personalities—who spoke through her and gave counsel and comfort to the quartet. In 1976, Gitta Mallasz, the only survivor of the group, turned the transcripts from these meetings into the book Talking with Angels, which Shelley Mitchell then adapted into this critically acclaimed solo performance.

Tempesta

Inspired by Mary Berg’s account of life and death in the Warsaw Ghetto, as well as drawing parallels with Shakespeare’s The Tempest, the production recreates life in the ghetto through the eyes of Prospero and Miranda. Craftsmen work, children learn the Torah at school, a family prepares for a wedding. Gradually Nazi persecution emerges. The people rebel but they cannot escape deportation to the extermination camps. In the final scene, a choir sings as paper blackbirds fly over the heads of spectators, representing those who were lost.

The Dead Bride [הכלה המתה]

Izraeli’s adaptation of Anne Frank’s diary. A tour guide oversees the lives of the hideout residents. Anna expresses her thoughts and feelings—her complex relationship with her mother, her feelings toward Peter. They listen with hope to news of the war on the radio. But the news is not good. Finally, Anna’s mother dresses her in a wedding dress, and she dances with the tour guide.

The Diary

The Diary tells the story of the life of Anne Frank as seen through the eyes of a thirteen-year-old girl, also named Anne, who lives in the present day. The stories of both Anne Frank and Present Day Anne are portrayed in scenes and songs. Present Day Anne learns of how Anne Frank and her family lived in hiding for 25 months; she is astonished at how similar the two girls are, and is saddened to realize that in her present-day world, bigotry and hatred still exists. While Anne Frank’s story comes to a sad end, the retelling of her life offers hope for a peaceful future.

The Violins of Autumn

In the summer and early fall of 1944, Paulette Roche, a young French woman, documented her days in a diary. Filled mostly with ordinary events — attending church, going to work — there are buried within the pages incidents that hint at the horror and danger of living in German-occupied France.

Yours, Anne

Based on Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl and the play Diary of Anne Frank by Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett. A musical of the diary of Anne Frank, a thirteen-year-old who lived in hiding in Amsterdam for 25 months before she and her family were betrayed and transported to Nazi concentration camps, where she died.
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