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October 31, 2003/Cheshvan 5 5764, Vol. 56, No. 6
AJTC opens with 'Value of Names'
JESSICA BARBER
Staff Writer
The Arizona Jewish Theatre Company will kick off its 2003-2004 season with "The Value of Names" -a play focusing on the aftermath of 1950s Hollywood blacklisting.
The play, written by Jeffrey Sweet, stars Benjamin Stewart as Leo Greshen, David Barker as Benny Silverman and Angelica Frost as Norma Silverman.
Benny, a successful actor, feels betrayed when his lifelong friend Leo names him to the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) as a suspected Communist. Years later, Leo becomes the director in a play starring Norma Silverman, Benny's daughter.
"The subject occurred to me because a friend of mine is the daughter of a very well-known man who was blacklisted," says Sweet. "I started speculating about what it would be like for her if she found herself having to work with somebody who named her father to HUAC. It turned out that what I wrote was eerily similar to other circumstances in which people who had been blacklisted had to work with those that cooperated with the HUAC."
However, the play does not focus only on anger, but on a long-term, complex relationship between two men who were at one time closer than family.
"The play takes place in the early 1980s ... and Benny has made something of a comeback," says Sweet. "But he has a daughter who is an actress. She is in rehearsal for a play and in the middle of the rehearsal, the director takes sick and they bring in a new director. That director is the man who named her father to HUAC. It sets into motion a whole series of questions about loyalty, professional versus personal rules, and to what degree you can demand other people adhere to your standards."
Adding more confusion to the mix is the fact that Benny and Leo are a dying breed.
"Most of their friends have died," says Sweet. "They are among a handful of people who can talk in shorthand about things that are precious to both of them. Exiling themselves from each other is, to some degree, killing off a part of themselves."
Sweet wrote the play in the early 1980s, when many affected by the blacklisting craze were still alive.
"This draws on the lives of the people who went through these things," he says. "There was an undercurrent of anti-Semitism (in the blacklisting). They would purposely mispronounce Jewish names. In their minds, there was a correlation between Jews and Communism, completely overlooking the fact that Stalin was doing a fine job of killing Jews himself."
Sweet also believes that politicians attacked Hollywood stars because of the fame they would garner from "bringing down" a notable figure.
"They didn't go after the small fry," he says. "There is the old philosophy, if you want to be big, kill somebody big. If you could make someone well-known humiliate himself in front of you, you must be pretty big stuff."
Although the play was written more than 20 years ago, it has had a comeback in audiences around the country. The play has recently been shown in Nebraska, Chicago and Florida.
"It seems to have come back, for what reasons I wonder?" says Sweet. "What's going on now that makes people think of blacklisting and calling people traitors, and abridging the rights granted under the Bill of Rights?"
Although Sweet's play is based on a serious subject, he stresses that it does not carry a heavy political message.
"There is nothing more deadly than sitting there and being hit over the head with something political," he says. "I saw people caught in an interesting situation ... and I hope people know that the play is funny. Sometimes when you're in a tense situation, you respond with humor."
Sweet graduated from New York University with a bachelor's degree in film, and went on to write a book, "Something Wonderful Right Away," about Second City, a nightclub in Chicago where many famous comedians and actors got their start.
"Second City is the place that has produced more major figures in American theater and television than anywhere else, and it continues to be," he says.
In fact, actors Ed Asner, best known for his role as Lou Grant in "The Mary Tyler Moore Show," and Barbara Harris, a Tony Award-winning actress, will travel to Phoenix to promote Sweet's play.
"I met Ed at a Second City 25-year reunion," says Sweet. "He talked to me about how much he loved my book - this was his life, these were his friends. We made friends and have stayed friends ever since."
Sweet also wrote the script for "Pack of Lies," which aired as a Hallmark Hall of Fame TV movie in 1987, and wrote for the soap operas "Another World" in the early 1980s and "One Life to Live" in 1991. His next project is a play based loosely on a diary he read about a love affair between a German woman and a Soviet soldier in 1945.
"I don't write about themes," he says. "I just write about stories that I find interesting. I'm not a propagandist. I'm just interested in people being put in dramatic situations."
Sweet, a resident of New York City, is a resident playwright of Chicago's Tony Award-winning Victory Gardens Theatre. He will arrive in the Valley Nov. 12 to view performances of the play and attend the fund-raising event with Asner and Harris.
Details
- What: "The Value of Names"
- Who: Arizona Jewish Theatre Company
- When: 8 p.m. Thursday-Friday, 2 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 8-23
- Where: Viad Corporate Center, 1850 N. Central Ave., Phoenix
- Cost: $27-$29
- What: Fund-raising event
- Who: Ed Asner, Barbara Harris, Jeffrey Sweet
- When: 7 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 12
- Where: Private home in Phoenix
- Cost: $125
- Call: 602-264-7131
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