Yiddish Shakespeare
With Professor Joel Berkowitz and the Yiddish Shakespeare Project
Conversation in English with some subtitled Yiddish video clips
Did you know that “Vilyam Shekspir” dazzled audiences on the Lower East Side and quickly became a staple of the Yiddish theatrical repertory? For over 100 years, Yiddish translators and performers have made the Bard’s words their own, imbuing them with elements of Jewish culture and resilience. Join us on zoom, where acclaimed theater scholar Joel Berkowitz will guide us through this rich and sometimes wildly inventive part of Yiddish history before introducing us to members of the Yiddish Shakespeare Project, fresh off a series of sold-out shows. There will be time at the end for audience members to ask their own questions.
This event is free but donations to support our Yiddish programming are welcome.
Bios
-
Joel Berkowitz is Professor of English and Director of the Sam & Helen Stahl Center for Jewish Studies at UW-Milwaukee. A theatre historian and translator, he has published four books on Yiddish theater and drama, including Shakespeare on the American Yiddish Stage, and is currently writing a book about Yiddish drama after the Holocaust. Joel co-founded and directs the Digital Yiddish Theatre Project (https://uwm.edu/yiddish-stage/), an international research group that publishes articles and other resources on Yiddish theatre for both specialists and the general public. He also consults for the professional stage, including the Broadway and Milwaukee productions of Paula Vogel’s Indecent.
-
Hunter McIlvain (Producer/Technician) Hunter is very excited to be a part of this project! You may have seen him behind the scenes in other projects or at Hunter College, where he recently graduated as a Theatre Major with an Arts Management certificate. Much love to the cast and crew! IG: @hunters.horto
-
Jennie Reich Litzky (Hamlet/Director/Producer) is an actor, director, producer. She is a co-creator of The Yiddish Shakespeare Project, and is thrilled to see this passion project grow, thanks to everyone's hard work! A graduate from Hunter College, Jennie is a Resident Director with NPTC's Women's Work Project, a member of the Jewish Theater Circle, and was an apprentice at Apocalyptic Artists Ensemble. She played Katie in "Love in a Bottle" which premiered at the Big Apple Film Festival, and played "A Naturalist" in the award winning Torch Ensemble's production of The Climate Fables: "The (Green Apple) Play". Follow @jenniereichlitzkytheater for more. https://jenniereichlitzky.com/
-
Jake Levy (Director/Producer) is founder of the Yiddish Shakespeare Project and both the director of and an actor in this piece. A graduate of the Macaulay Honors College at Hunter College, he is a writer, standup comedian, and Yiddishist. He currently works for YIVO as a teaching assistant.