The Soap Myth (5/2/16)

What is truth? What is memory? What is real?

Those questions go largely unanswered in Jeff Cohen’s The Soap Myth which I saw in a semi-staged reading a week ago. The very talented and excellent cast was Ed Asner, Jayne Atkinson, Donald Corren, Blair Baker, and an uncredited stage manager-cum-cue person.

Staged in commemoration of Holocaust Remembrance Day, this thought-provoking play was really enjoyable and, oddly, sometimes humorous. Bureaucrats, a holocaust survivor, and a magazine writer wrangle about whether or not the Nazis really made soap out of the remains of concentration camp prisoners. Grim stuff.

That said, this was a very touching performance. Some of the actors portrayed more than one character, and did so very well. Mr. Asner was the holocaust survivor who was trying to get information about the soap making added to a Holocaust Museum. The bureaucrats, who had previously included the information, were essentially saying that the hard evidence no longer existed and that history evolves and changes. The magazine writer was pretty much torn both ways and was stuck in the middle, trying to broker a compromise.

I’m not an automatic standing ovation person, but at the end of the performance I was up on my feet with the rest of the audience immediately. I’m very grateful to the Library for the Performing Arts for presenting this and other programming. And it’s always a thrill for me to see a living legend (at least in my mind) perform on stage. The co-producer was the National Jewish Theater Foundation – Holocaust Theater International Initiative. Kudos all the way around!

ConcertMeister