"When one lives in the jungle one must
look out for the wild life."
Bessie Berger knows she lives in the jungles of the Bronx.
It’s 1935. You bet her goal is to protect her family and everything and
everyone she holds dear from the wild life out there.
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| Sandy Campbell, Max Macke, Joe Paulson (background) |
She knows that just down the street from their Longwood Ave.
apartment they threw a family out on the street and all their furniture on the
sidewalk. “A fine old woman with grey hair.” Forbid, she might be next.
She also knows that a butcher on Beck Street won eighty
thousand dollars with the purchase of a fifty-cent piece. She questions why
anyone would spend a fifty-cent piece for Irish Raffles? She reasons that if
they could win on Beck Street ‘we could win on Longwood Ave.’
She knows as well that in order to protect her children from
living in either shame or misfortune that she will do anything, lie, cajole or
coerce to stop that from happening. Bessie has all the answers because she is
in charge of the Berger lair.
Bessie Berger is a first generation American Jewish woman. She
lives in Odets’ world and embraces the essence of his beliefs. Clifford Odets was born to Jewish immigrant parents. He
later became one of the original members of the New York City based
Avant-guard, left wing ensemble Group Theatre.
He has been ‘lionized as the country’s most promising
playwright,” “the proletarian Jesus”, and the “poet of the Jewish middle
class.” “Awake and Sing!” premiered in 1935 one month after “Lefty”. That March
his anti-Nazi pay “Till The Day I Die” opened in New York.
To the best of my recollection his plays produced here have
been few and far between and that, my friends, is our misfortune. His 1937
“Golden Boy” was among the first in this area, and that was in 2008 by New
Village Arts Theatre in Carlsbad. They are at it again currently mounting
Odets’ “Awake and Sing!” (Originally titled “I Got The Blues”) considered to be
his masterpiece. It is making a San Diego premiere. It plays through
April 16th.
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| Tom Deak, J. Tyler Jones, Eric poppick, Sandy Campbell, Joe Paulson, Tom Steward, Max Macke. |
Under Kristianne Kurner’s (she also designed the detailed and
cramped set of the Berger home) deft direction, and an all-star cast Odets’
play and this production is a stunner. It is also timely, provocative and eye
opening! If one fails to see the similarities then and now of the condition in
the country, one has been blindsided.
Bessie Berger (Sandy Campbell) struggles between realism and
idealism. She is the personification of the
life’s blood of her family yet on some level she is one that almost sucks the
air out of them in the playwright’s homage to the woes and misery, tensions and
conflicts of life in America during the great depression.
If you are looking for a Jewish mother, Campbell’s Bessie
fits the bill. “I don’t understand what I did to God He blessed me with such
children. From the whole world…”
But Bessie doesn’t live in a vacuum. Even though she runs her
tight ship with righteousness and conviction there are those in her flat that
are trying to grow wings and fly. Her job is to see that they fly in the right direction.
Her apartment on Longwood Ave is bursting at the seams with immediate
family and a lodger. Ideological conflicts and hope also permeate the spaces
left between conversations. Oft times it
appears that the jungle lies within.
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| Tom Deak, Eric Poppick, Max Macke, J. Tyler Jones |
Bessie’s father Jacob (an outstanding Eric Poppick) is a
sentimental idealist who strives for justice when justice is the last thing on
his daughter’s mind; think respectability.
Poppick’s Jacob is as steady as is his character especially
when those around him have lost their center. He begs his family to leave the
world a better place than when they found it.
He finds his neutrality not in his belief in Marxism, but in
the recordings of the Great Caruso. His main contribution is the attention,
support and inheritance he gives his grandson Ralph (J. Tyler Jones). To both
his grandchildren, his final act of dignity is to convince them to ‘free themselves’.
Ralph is the romantic in the family. He is, if allowed, the
future of the Berger family. “I got a girl…Don’t laugh….But she got me! Boy,
I’m telling you I could sing!” Jones is near perfect as he pushes ahead,
listen, draws conclusions, stays true to his own beliefs, good bad or oft times
stifled. “Life with my girl. Boy, I could sing when I think about it.”
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| J. Tyler Jones, Max Macke, Anna Rebek |
Hennie (Anna Rebek) is the almost spinster daughter at 26.
Stoic to a point she finds herself, much to her chagrin, in an arranged
marriage when her mother realizes that her stay at home independent daughter is
in a ‘family way’. Rebek’s body language and facial expressions say more with a
look or gesture than all Bessie’s kvetching, reasoning and oft times humor.
The man Bessie picked for Hennie to give her daughter an air of respectability is Sam Feinschreiber (a well measured performance by Tom Steward). It is
Hennie’s job to convince Sam that the child they are rearing belongs to him.
Still fresh off the boat, and shy to a fault he runs to Bessie whenever there is a family crisis
between himself and Hennie.
The almost invisible person in the room is Myron (Joe
Paulson), Bessie’s passive husband who, even if he tried, couldn’t compete with
his wife. He quotes the good old days, offers an opinion or the answer to a
rhetorical question in which no one is particularly interested. “People aint
the same. No manners. The whole world’s changing right under our eyes.”
Paulson, who is making his NVA debut, is a person to be followed. His is
another flawless performance.
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| Anna Rebek, Max Macke, Sandy Campbell, Joe Paulson |
Speaking about flawless Max Macke is Moe Axelrod, the boarder
in the Berger homestead. His performance as the tough guy (he lost a leg in the
war) and larger than life presence that also carries a torch for Hennie goes
beyond excellent. There is a brute force between the two that reverberates in
look and closeness. In fact, the Berger world almost revolves around him as he
struts, pushes, mocks and dominates every scene he’s in.
Dropping by for some chopped liver on his way to a union
meeting is Uncle Morty (Tom Deák), Bessie’s brother. He’s made the American
Dream come true and everyone looks to him for advice. Deák fits the bill as the
domineering force in the brother /sister relationship, but like his sister he likes
to change the odds if and when it suites the need.
And, as Tevye says, ‘those outside our circle include’….
Outside the Berger circle is Schlosser (Alex Guzman who also doubles as the
guitar player seen behind a scrim above the Berger’s), the German janitor. He
gets no respect and is overworked and oft times verbally abused by Bessie. Last
but not least is Tootsie the unseen dog.
Adding to the overall look Elisa Benzoni’s period costumes
are right on target, Melanie Chen’s sound design, Chris Renda’s lighting and
JoAnn Glover’s dialect coaching give cause to celebrate Odets in the house.
As a supporter of recycling, reclaiming and reviving, Odets’
“Awake & Sing” in this revival by NVA is as top notch and relevant as the
year it was written.
“Your dead shall live; their bodies shall rise.
You who dwell in the dust awake and sing for joy! For your dew is as the dew of
the dawn, And the earth will give birth to the departed spirits. Isaiah 26:19.
See you at the theatre.
Dates: Through April 16th
Organization: New Village Arts Theatre
Phone: 760.433.3245
Production Type: Drama
Where: 2787 State Street, Carlsbad Village
Ticket Prices: $36.00
Web: newvillagearts.org
Photo: Daren Scott
