A Companion to British-Jewish Theatre since the 1950s

Description

The first of its kind, this companion to British-Jewish theatre brings a neglected dimension in the work of many prominent British theatre-makers to the fore. Its structure reflects the historical development of British-Jewish theatre from the 1950s onwards, beginning with an analysis of the first generation of writers that now forms the core of post-war British drama (including Tom Stoppard, Harold Pinter and Arnold Wesker) and moving on to significant thematic force-fields and faultlines such as the Holocaust, antisemitism and Israel/Palestine. The book also covers the new generation of British-Jewish playwrights, with a special emphasis on the contribution of women writers and the role of particular theatres in the development of British-Jewish theatre, as well as TV drama. Included in the book are fascinating interviews with a set of significant theatre practitioners working today, including Ryan Craig, Patrick Marber, John Nathan, Julia Pascal and Nicholas Hytner. The companion addresses, not only aesthetic and ideological concerns, but also recent transformations with regard to institutional contexts and frameworks of cultural policies. Cover Contents Notes on Contributors Acknowledgements 1 Invisible Otherness: An Introduction to British-Jewish Theatre since the 1950s Eckart Voigts and Jeanette R. Malkin Part One The Post-War East End Scene: Pinter, Wesker, Berkoff, Kops 2 The Theatre of Arnold Wesker: Didactic, Utopian, Biblical Peter Lawson 3 Restaging the Jewish East End: Bernard Kops and Steven Berkoff Jeremy Solomons 4 The Theatre of Harold Pinter: Staging Indefinable and Divided ‘Jewishness’ Peter Lawson 5 A Jew Who Writes: The Shadow of the Holocaust in Harold Pinter’s Work Mark Taylor-Batty Part Two Force Fields and Fault Lines: The Holocaust,
Antisemitism and the Israel-Palestine Conflict 6 British Holocaust Memory and Polish Holocaust Commemoration: Eva Hoffman’s Play, The Ceremony Phyllis Lassner 7 Dramatic Responses to the Resurgence of Antisemitism: On Trial – the Blood Libel, Arnold Wesker and Steven Berkoff Axel Stähler 8 Representing the Israel-Palestine Conflict in Contemporary British-Jewish Theatre Mike Witcombe Part Three Contemporary British-Jewish Playwrights and
Theatres in Britain: Continuities and Departures 9 ‘Affiliation and Belonging’: Contemporary British-Jewish Women Playwrights Eckart Voigts and Sarah Jane Ablett 10 Three Ways of Being a Contemporary British-Jewish Playwright: Tom Stoppard, Patrick Marber, Ryan Craig Jeanette R. Malkin 11 Staging Jewishness in the Twenty-First Century: Reflections on Key London Venues Cyrielle Garson Part Four Television Drama 12 British-Jewish Television Drama: Jack Rosenthal to the Present Sue Vice 13 ‘It Was F***ing Biblical, Mate’: The Maturing of British Television Drama Nathan Abrams Part Five Interviews with Contemporary British-Jewish Theatre Artists (2017–2018) 14 Nicholas Hytner 15 Julia Pascal 16 Patrick Marber 17 Ryan Craig 18 John Nathan Index