Individual Roles
Easily digestible segments:
Holocaust survivors and saviors recount their harrowing true experiences in order to encourage people today to speak up in a world increasingly tilting to the far right.
Note: While the following individual pdfs are presented as if the testimonies are given in the play in their entirety — in actuality, sections of the testimonies are woven into an overall narrative of the timeline of historic events leading up to and including WWII and the Holocaust.
As the play’s overview real-life character says: “Some people say that I am obsessed with the Holocaust. Am I? Or am I obsessed with the thought that these horrific crimes against humanity can happen again – anywhere – anytime – to any group of people? All it takes is allowing the thin edge of the wedge to grow so wide until … there is no turning back.”
NARRATOR/POINT OF VIEW:
PHYLLIS Female 70 (American Jew):
The only Jewish child in her elementary, junior high and high school classes in a small Midwestern town (Elgin, Illinois) of 50,000, she is protected by her parents – both born in the U.S. – from anti-Semitism. It is a major turning point in her life when she and her Jewish husband of one year are stationed with the U.S. Army in Munich, Germany, only 25 years after the end of WWII.
NEWS UPDATES:
RADIO ANNOUNCER Male 30 to 40 (American, British, etc.):
Inspired by Edward R. Murrow, an American broadcast journalist and war correspondent who gained prominence during WWII with a series of live radio broadcasts from Europe for the news division of CBS.
LITHUANIA; AUSCHWITZ AND STUTTHOF DEATH CAMPS; DENMARK:
JUDITH Female 8-15 (Lithuanian Jew) — survivor:
The youngest of three children, she tells of surviving the harrowing barbarisms of the Nazis’ Final Solution with the one hope that she will not lose her own compassion for humanity. (See historical footnote about number tattoos and Judith.)
Short monologue of Judith performed in both English and German by bilingual actress/director Deena Unverzagt (based in Hamburg, Germany).
Three-minute Judith monologue from play as performed by professional teen actor Starla Bolle as part of a presentation for the National Holocaust Awareness Initiative — www.nhaionline.org
POLAND:
POLISH COUNTESS Female 50 (Catholic) — savior:
With her husband, she tries to save Jews from being murdered by the Nazis. As she says, she believes that “we are all each other’s keepers.” Information at Yad Vashem in Israel about the rescue efforts of this Polish countess and her husband.
GERMANY:
ELFRIEDE MORGENSTERN Female 9 (German Jew) — survivor:
Recounts her experiences in Frankfurt in 1938 on the night of Kristallnacht (Nov. 9-10) – the Nazis’ orchestrated pogrom against the Jews in Germany and Austria. German passport that enabled her to escape Nazi Germany.
FELICE Female 35 (American Jew) — daughter of a survivor:
On a trip to Europe in 1975 Felice experiences a pivotal moment in which she finally has a glimpse into the unspoken horrors of her mother’s past.
ROMANIA AND FRANCE –savior:
RUTH KLUGER Female 30 to 35 (Central European Jew):
After earlier immigrating to the land of Israel under British control, she returns to in the summer of 1939 as the 10th member and only woman of Mossad le Aliyah Bet, the underground Jewish immigration organization. Extremely brave and quick thinking, she is faced with agonizing choices of which Jewish refugees she can try to save. (See historical footnote on Ruth Kluger.)
Ruth Kluger’s speeches in Romanian.
WARSAW GHETTO:
IRENA SENDLER Female 35 (Polish Catholic) –savior:
Polish Catholic social worker in 1942 smuggles Jewish babies out of the Warsaw Ghetto before the Nazis liquidate it. She withstands torture by the Nazis and does not reveal where she has safely placed the babies. On the day of her execution she is rescued by the Polish underground. Life in a Jar: The Irena Sendler Project
JACK PRICE Male 13 (Polish Jew) — survivor:
When on an illegal scavenging expedition outside the Warsaw Ghetto, he finds himself sealed off from the ghetto and his family, and he must undertake dangerous missions to survive.
CZECHOSLOVAKIA:
SOL Male 14 to 21 (Czech Jew) — survivor:
Through luck and language ability he survives a series of near-death experiences at the hands of the Nazis.
ITALY:
JEWISH CHILD in ROME Female 10 (Italian) — survivor:
In 1943 when the Nazis round up the Jews in Rome with no warning, her father’s quick thinking saves her life.