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After the sad, sentimental melodramas, the
Germans are turning to happy productions and now are staging
Israel Rosenberg's and Isidore Friedman's operetta, "Sadie Becomes a
Rabbi's Wife."
I have to admit that my heart felt lighter: I
prefer to listen to song numbers with jokes and jests and to see
dance numbers being performed, rather than a heart-rending melodrama
on stage through which the audience is drawn to a sea of tears.
The two authors of the operetta obviously have ruled strongly
over their collective work, because they have entered into a world
of jokes, dramatic and humorous scenes and also, you understand,
couplets. The musician Harry Lubin has inserted into the scenes
melodic singing numbers with
great pleasure; Lillian Shapiro has inserted
good dance numbers. -- and together a play has been created where
everything is good: A rabbi, a rabbi's wife, a cabaret, Jews, young
girls, porters and even a couple of semi-idiotic grooms, one of them
a Litvak with "sin," and a second who is a Galitsianer with "yak."
But all the people are, in truth, only operetta figures without
flesh and blood: the rabbi is not a rabbi; the rabbi's wife is not
the rabbi's wife; the sexton is not the sexton, -- and it is
totally a paper world, a world of "marionettes," of air shadows, no
more.
And this is actually the story with every operetta.
Do you want this content? Here is what has remained with me in
my memory of the entire content:
A Young Hasidic rabbi, a
widower, comes from Galicia to America, meets his friend from
childhood, a married woman Sadie, who is admired by her debauched
husband -- a love had blossomed between them, which later becomes a
marriage: she then divorces her husband and marries a rabbi. So Sadie
becomes a rabbi's wife. However, earlier she had caught her husband with
his lover in a cabaret, and then he brought his lover to their home
where she remained side by side with the lawful wife (in an
operetta, as in life, anything can happen!). The beloved falls in
love with a boy and the divorced man remains poor as a stone.
There is another entanglement with a stupid girl who has two idiotic
husbands, but forgive me and release me from the obligation to hand
over this entanglement as well. Enough for us!
The main thing
is, obviously, the song and dance numbers and the comical scenes
with the jokes.
The main role of the rabbi's wife here is
played by Lucy German; she has a lot to do in her role: she sings,
she leads through dramatic scenes, and she also even dances; and she
displays temperament. Her comic love scene with the rabbi stood out
to the audience in a strong way.
Misha German here is the
young rabbi. It is a small role, but he performs it with charm, in a
pleasing way, with soft features and movements.
The comical
content is of the girl with the two husbands posing with a set of
triplets from Irving Jacobson and Mae Schoenfeld and Isidore
Lipinsky. They evoke a lot of laughter from the audience; true, the
laughter is from a vaudeville character, but in the Yiddish operetta
people are not picky when it comes to humor.
Miss Schoenfeld and Irving Jacobson are an able pair for such roles. She manifests a
lot of temperament and humor.
Unfortunately, the talented
Frances Weintraub was not attracted to set of trip, which would
also contribute to the humor of the operetta. Poor thing, she was
occupied with a mere mother-role in which she cannot prove anything.
It is also the same with the gifted Yudl Dubinsky, who can't do
anything with his empty role of an up-and-coming ex-con.
Also Zvi Scooler, the treacherous married man, after all, has little
to prove. In the few scenes with his lover and his wife is perfectly
smooth.
Anna
Toback, who has a beautiful voice and beautiful appearance, is an
impressive lover; also she should have been used for more singing.
Max Rosenblatt sings quite well his few numbers.
Isidore Friedman, the sexton, is a characteristic
operetta sexton; the sextons, who I have known in my life, have
naturally been different.
A couple of running side roles are
here too: Simeon Ruskin and Moshe Himmelstein.
A pleasant
impression was made by the company of young dancers who are
lively, alert and eloquent.
The audience in the theatre takes
to the operetta because people laugh often and loudly, and no one
wipes their eyes.
And this was probably the goal that Misha
German was aiming for with his new performance.
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