Skip to main content

SHELTERED

 Sheltered now on stage atTheater J, seems so real.  That is because it is. Inspired by the true story of an American Jewish couple who rescued  Austrian Jewish children in 1939 and placed them with American families,  the playwright Alix Sobler explores possible emotions and conflicts that might have gone on  behind the scenes of their daring humanitarian effort
Act 1. Leonard Kirsch (David Schlumpf) and  his wife Evelyn (Erin Weaver) invite  the Blooms, Martin (Alexander Strain) and Roberta (Kimberly Gilbert) to dinner at their lovely home in Providence, RI.  They have not seen each other in a long time, but the Kirsches need a 40th family to agree to sponsor a child.
What is revealed over the evening  are strong emotions  — not only of vastly differing viewpoints on involvement of the events in Europe, but also of the violence within their domestic life.  
The living room has now been reconfigured for Act 2 as a hotel room in Vienna.   The Kirsches  are conflicted over choices of which children out of so many they have interviewed who would or should be selected.  They are interrupted by an Austrian woman, Hani Mueller (McLean Fletcher)  who has  come to ask that her son be taken off the list.
Evelyn is the one who alone with Roberta had opened the flood of violent emotions in the Blooms marriage. Now, she asks to be alone with Hani Mueller to reveal her fears at sending her child away.   
What Evelyn knows, and we too, is that this child is to be placed with the Blooms.    What the Kirsches suspect and what we know, is that, is what the next 6 years will bring to Austria. And what no one can know, is how it will be for any of them.
Erin Weaver’s role of Evelyn is pivotal in this intense and wrenching drama,  as she reaches the deepest pains and fears of both women in this memorable drama. 
The  stage is one that could well have been for a nostalgic play, evoking an underlying sense of regret and woe for all that is unfolding on the world stage.  

At Theatre J, Washington, DC to Feb. 2, 2020.

Popular posts from this blog

  Once is here again!   The Brooklyn Gallery Players reach into the treasure chest of great musicals to bring Once alive and on stage in Brooklyn (until to December 17, 2023). Director Mark Gallagher , and Music Directors David Fletcher and Brendon McCray have crafted a vibrant production, seamlessly integrating the 15 member cast in roles  as both actors and musicians. Set in Dublin, the  formula for the poignant love triangle  is simple. Patrick Newhart  plays Guy, an Irish musician who has given up  on love as he sings the award winning classic  Falling.  Newhart mastered the bombastic busking guitar style and performed each of his songs with intensity and passion Sophie Smith-Brody  is Girl,  a Czech woman  who will inspire him to try again both in  love and with music. Smith-Brody performed each of her disparate songs with aplomb,  from the opening classical piece to her plaintive solos – If You Want Me and The Hill.  The performance starts  with an “ impromptu”  p
Read more
               TINA - THE TINA TURNER MUSICAL  at The National Theatre              In the 1970s, I  had spent weeks climbing around ruins in Peru.  I heard music of the Andes all over.  I  was  finally at  Machu Picchu to spend the night so I could get up early  and climb to see the sunrise from the top of the ruins.   As I got to steps by the gatekeepe,  I could hear his boom box blaring across the Andes “I Wanna Take You Higher”  by Tina Turner.   You don’t have to go climbing the Andes to hear her songs — Tina-The Tina Turner Musical  isright here  at the National Theatre, Washington DC,  until  Oct. 23, 2022.    The show has broken all records with the awards it has received since in premiered in April 2018 in London.  No one questions that Tina is a musical legend but  for this show  accolades to  the stars Naomi Rodgers and Zurin Villanueva who alternate in the  spectacular role.   At every performance there will be people  who remember seeing Tina “back when” and
Read more
  Sarah Ruhl’s Orlando — sparkling wit and ageless wisdom —   at   Constellation Theatre — gone but not forgotten In Virginia Woolf’s Orlando A Biography ,  the eponymous hero undergoes many changes over the centuries— from roles in society and relationships to sex change.  Since the time travel gender bending work was published in 1928, this his/her story has continued to undergone adaptions to its original form, from analytical scholarly critiques to crowd pleasing  movies and stage plays.  Constellation Theatre Company continued  the tradition with its amazing presentation of Sarah Ruhl’s narrative play Orlando .    Five actors  take on dozens of roles as characters or in the  chorus to keep the story at its rapid pace,  condensing events spanning almost five centuries into 100 minutes.   Orlando (Mary Myers) is  ever the aristocrat whether as a page in the court of  Queen Elizabeth I (Alan Naylor)  or involved with a mysterious Russian princess (Edmee - Marie Faal) or pursued
Read more