Cynthia Ramsay – Page 59

The gift of innocence?

The Innocence Treatment by Ari Goelman is a psychological thriller set in 2031 America.

Looking for a smart, tense, psychological thriller for your teenage reader? Ari Goelman’s The Innocence Treatment (Roaring Brook Press, 2017) would fit the bill. Though, if you’re unsure, you can ask the author himself. Goelman will be doing a reading and book-signing on Nov. 21, 7 p.m., at Book Warehouse on Main Street. He will also be at the Cherie Smith JCC Jewish Book Festival on Nov. 27, 6:30 p.m.

Goelman is originally from Philadelphia. “I moved around the U.S. a bunch before ending up in Vancouver, living mostly in New York City and Boston before I came here,” he told the Independent. “I came to Vancouver gradually, a few months here (1995), a few years here (1997-1999), until finally settling here in 2006. I wanted to make sure I waited until I definitely couldn’t afford to buy a house in the city. As for why, I had family in Vancouver, so, when I was looking into grad schools, I knew it was a fun (and back then) affordable place to live.”

The Innocence Treatment is Goelman’s second book. His first, The Path of Names, for middle-grade readers, received many literary awards and nominations. He also writes short stories and is on the faculty of Kwantlen Polytechnic University. His undergraduate degree in economics is from New College of Florida, he has an MSc in planning from University of British Columbia and a PhD in urban studies from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

photo - Ari Goelman — Ari Goelman *(photo by John Goldsmith Photography)*

“One of the first bits of paid writing I ever did was for this very newspaper, when I first came to Vancouver in 1995,” he shared. “True story. A once-off article about Kidsbooks.” True, indeed. The story, “No kidding around,” was published on Sept. 29, 1995, in the Jewish Western Bulletin, the Independent’s predecessor. But back to the present … well, the future.

Goelman sets The Innocence Treatment in his home country in 2031, when “the United States was still enjoying the lull between the first and second uprisings. A drought was drying out the last of the great western forests, but it would be another two years before the massive wildfires that left millions homeless and sparked the second uprising.”

His main character, 16-year-old Lauren was once so innocent that she had to be watched at all times so that no harm would come to her. At first, she is “super-excited” to be undergoing a medical procedure to “fix” her, because then she “won’t be stupid anymore.” But, afterward, she discovers that understanding people and their motivations doesn’t necessarily lead to happier or better outcomes and, more than once, the “new” Lauren must use her ample self-defence skills and literally kick some butts.

“Lauren’s kick-ass qualities naturally emerged from her character,” said Goelman about his strong female lead. “I started with the idea of a character who had spent her whole life very naive and very protected, and I imagined she’d be furious once the veil was lifted and she started to experience the world as it really was. I figured, as well, that after spending her whole life being unavoidably passive, she would be thrilled by her new ability to act and would make the most of those abilities.”

The problem becomes one of self-restraint, which Goelman explicitly explores in a chapter involving an experiment while Lauren is in custody, which I personally found somewhat out of place, or forced.

“What I was trying to do in that chapter was to show Lauren’s inability to control herself, even when she genuinely wants to, both for her own self-interest and to spite Dr. Corbin,” explained Goelman. “That’s what Corbin is really measuring – not Lauren’s fighting ability, but her paranoia and anger. It was a fun chapter to write, because it’s from Lauren’s perspective and she’s aware of the challenge that she’s failing, even as she fails it.”

Overall, The Innocence Treatment is a fun book to read. To use an apt cliché, it is a page-turner. It is also a little scary in its seeming prescience, having been written before the election of Donald Trump and the apparent descent of America.

“Yes, The Innocence Treatment does feel a bit unfortunately prescient at this point,” agreed Goelman. “I’m glad it was published this year, or it would have started seeming less like a near future world and more like the past.”

As for what he thinks the future might hold in reality, Goelman said, “I think the most we can hope for is to slow climate change and deal with its consequences in a fair way that limits human suffering. I’m not real optimistic about our near-term prospects, as I think that nothing good will happen as long as so much of the world’s resources are controlled by so few individuals and families.

“The world of The Innocence Treatment is very much formed by the combination of climate change disaster and the unequal distribution of wealth. And,” said Goelman, “while the election of Donald Trump in the U.S. is the latest and maybe the best example of how these two trends come together, we don’t have to look so far from home. The B.C. Liberals ran this province for 16 years, defunding public education and subsidizing the fossil fuel industry, at the behest of their very wealthy (and largely unregulated) donors.

“On the upside,” he said, “it’s not like the solutions are so complicated – if we get money out of politics, I believe humans can be really brilliant at solving problems collaboratively. So, while I’m pretty pessimistic about any major improvement in the near term, I think it’s very possible to change things for the better – it just requires the political will. There’s a part of The Innocence Treatment where Lauren’s older sister describes the family’s life right after the ‘Emergency’ era permanently reshaped the U.S., and one of the things she remembers is it wasn’t so bad being without power, as people came together to help each other. I think there’s a lot of truth to that. Given the chance, humans are really good at working together. They’re also really good at struggling for dominance and to monopolize scarce resources. It’s anyone’s guess which direction we’re going.”

For the full schedule of the Jewish Book Festival, which runs Nov. 25-30, visit jewishbookfestival.ca.

Step aside fried latkes

My younger brother has one main rule for my nieces, who are 6 and 4 years old – “No head injuries.” Sounds simple enough, until you see one of them launch themselves off the back of the couch. I could see a bit of them in the character of Sadie in Queen of the Hanukkah Dosas, written by Pamela Ehrenberg and illustrated (beautifully and creatively) by Anjan Sarkar.

“It wasn’t that I didn’t want my little sister, Sadie, to help us make dosas for Hanukkah,” explains her big brother. “The problem was, she climbed too much.” Onto tables, out of cribs, up stacks of cans at the supermarket, Sadie does like to climb. And luckily so, it turns out. But you’ll have to read the book to know why.

book cover - Queen of the Hanukkah Dosas — Queen of the Hanukkah Dosas cover

If the title didn’t give it away, Sadie and her family are a Jewish family with Indian heritage. Instead of latkes, they are celebrating the Holiday of Lights with dosas, and there is a recipe for the Indian pancake in the book, as well as a recipe for sambar, a vegetarian lentil stew made with tamarind paste and many other delicious ingredients.

Queen of the Hanukkah Dosas, published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux (2017), is part of PJ Library, which sends free Jewish children’s books to families with kids from 6 months to 8 years old. B.C. community members can sign up through Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver or Jewish Federation of Victoria and Vancouver Island.

PJ Library’s selection committee chose Queen of the Hanukkah Dosas because it “loves how this book celebrates the varied cultural and ethnic backgrounds that make up today’s Jewish community, and encourages each of us to be proud of our individuality.”

The book also offers the opportunity to talk about various holiday customs that cut across Jewish cultures. Sadie wears a dreidel costume for some of the book, the family lights the chanukiyah, there is gelt on the table and, of course, dosas are fried, so there’s that miracle of oil to discuss.

Resettling Eretz Yisrael

Alison Pick discusses her new novel, Strangers with the Same Dream, at the Cherie Smith JCC Jewish Book Festival Nov. 25. (photo by Emma Lee)

“Here they were, she thought, in this remote land of Palestine, far from their homes and families. They had left their lives as they knew them to turn the Balfour Declaration, and the idea of a homeland for the Jews, into truth. They were strangers with the same dream…. But this was the thing: Zionism was not just an idea. It was something that was happening, now and now and now. It was something she could make happen.”

So thinks Ida, one of the three main characters in Alison Pick’s latest novel, Strangers with the Same Dream (Knopf Canada, 2017). Pick will be in Vancouver to open the Cherie Smith JCC Jewish Book Festival on Nov. 25, 7:30 p.m., at the Rothstein Theatre. Appropriately enough, the title of her conversation with Jerry Wasserman is Idealism vs. Reality.

Ida has come to Palestine, to Eretz Yisrael, the Land of Israel, on her own from Russia, having seen her father killed and knowing that the brutal attackers also raped her mother; her sister, “Eva, thank God, had been at school.”

It is 1921. Ida is part of the Third Aliyah, one of many other young idealists, most of whom had no idea at the harsh conditions that awaited them – the heat of the dessert, the abundance of malaria-spreading mosquitoes, the backbreaking work, the relinquishment of individuality and, of course, their new Arab neighbours, who were displaced by their arrival.

The leader of Ida’s particular group is David, who immigrated during the Second Aliyah, in 1910. He “had helped establish the moshava [settlement] at Kinneret, planting eucalyptus trees along the muddy banks, negotiating with the fellaheen [farmers]. Ida heard he had traveled the entire length of Eretz Yisrael on horseback, meeting the Arabs in every tent and marketplace, learning their various customs so as to help in the purchase of land.”

And there is David’s wife, Hannah, who, “like David, had arrived in the Second Aliyah, which meant the halutzim [pioneers] instantly respect her.” While the “historic speeches fell to David; Hannah was left with the logistics.” For example, Hannah was the one to request that the new olim (immigrants) voluntarily surrender all of their valuables “to the enterprise they were building together. She did not want strangers circulating like policemen to take each other’s belongings. Especially not after what so many of them had been through in Czarist Russia.”

Strangers with the Same Dream is divided into three sections, each of which is written from the perspective of one of the three protagonists – Ida, David and Hannah – about the same series of events.

“Following the writing of my memoir Between Gods, I was very interested in the relationship between truth and memory, and the ways in which different people (family members, as one example, or characters) experience the same events very differently,” Pick told the Independent. “I love to challenge myself with each new book and so I decided to try and tell the same story through three different sets of eyes. I wanted the reader to have the pleasure of seeing things the characters did not; that is, miscommunications, misunderstandings, falsely attributed motivations.”

The protagonists could be considered archetypes of a sort. “Although I didn’t set out to write it that way,” said Pick, “Hannah certainly has some of the Mother in her, and Ida has the Maiden. David, I suppose, could be seen as a Trickster, although that might be a generous way to characterize him.”

The novel is introduced by a short prologue, written in the voice of a ghost – a former halutza – who sets up the narrative and then enters it occasionally.

“The ghost is a link between the past and the present,” explained Pick. “Because the three narrative voices were necessarily so limited, I wanted an additional over-arching outside view – outside of time, even – who could reflect both backward and forward. I was also thinking about the idea of haunting – that Israel today (as with Canada, as with many other places) is haunted by history, by the very real lives of those who came before us and influence how we live and how we understand our own stories.”

Pick chose to set the novel in 1921 for a number of reasons.

“I’m not an historian, although I do love writing historical fiction – and, while there is a lot of leeway in fiction as a genre, it is important to me to get the historical facts right. So, I set relatively narrow parameters for myself – all the action takes place roughly over the course of one year. The kibbutz in Strangers with the Same Dream is fictional, but it is loosely based on Kibbutz Ein Harod, established in 1921. While there had been other, smaller attempts at kibbutzim, Ein Harod was the first attempt on a bigger scale, and it is a kibbutz that has, still today, a mythical presence in the collective psyche of Israel.”

The novel took Pick about three years to write, and she did research in Israel.

“At Kibbutz Ein Harod, there is an incredible archive about the early years of kibbutz life,” said Pick. “I was able to access first-person diaries, many written by the female pioneers, which I had translated from Hebrew. Both the translator and the archivist herself were wonderful sources of information about the early years, and they introduced me to an elderly man (who has sadly since passed away), who was there at the establishment of the kibbutz in 1921. So, I read, I researched, I listened, I imagined. And then I tried to breathe life into a world of the past, to bring it to life for readers today.”

While some readers might find the ghost an intrusive presence, I found the novel completely engaging, in part because it shows some of the grim realities the halutzim faced, not only from the land and their Arab neighbours, but from one another. Readers will be able to picture what it was like in those early days. If I wasn’t sure before, I am now that I would have made a poor halutza – the hard work and strange surroundings wouldn’t have been nearly as daunting as the high risk of malaria and the challenges of living in a collective with few resources. I came away from the novel with more admiration for (most of) those who worked to make the idea of Zionism a reality. At least one reviewer, though, has imputed an anti-Zionist message to the novel.

“I confess I have been surprised by the (few) reviews that take the novel as anti-Zionist,” said Pick. “Perhaps I’m naïve – and I am certainly a newcomer to Judaism, which is no secret – but I adore Israel. I traveled there three times during the writing of the book and, each time, I fell more madly in love with the place.

“It did not occur to me that exploring the psyche of those early Zionists – who at the very least did realize that the place they were ‘settling’ was already populated – would be construed as anything other than telling the simple truth. I did not start out with a political message and, indeed, I think to do so is anathema to good fiction. The role of art, as I see it at least, is to open, to unravel, to make space for more questions rather than to judge, decide or condemn. Although one of the characters [David] is decidedly a villain, albeit I hope one in whom the reader sees humanity, the other two main players (Hannah and Ida) are, to my mind, hugely sympathetic. Everyone in the novel – Jews and Arabs alike – are simply trying to make do in a both remarkable and remarkably difficult situation.”

For tickets to hear Pick, and for the full book festival lineup, visit jewishbookfestival.ca.

Volunteering connects

Karen James, board chair of the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver. (photo from JFGV)

Volunteers are integral to almost every nonprofit organization, and Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver is no exception. With this year’s annual campaign well underway, the Jewish Independent spoke with Karen James, who became Federation’s new board chair earlier this year.

Jewish Independent: You’ve been involved with various organizations over the years, such as the Jewish Family Service Agency and the Canadian Jewish Political Affairs Committee. With which organizations are you currently volunteering?

Karen James: When I took on the role of chair of Federation, I let go or passed on most of the other things I was doing. I had been on the board of JFSA and chaired for the past year, but have passed that on. I am still representing Vancouver on the Jewish Agency for Israel board of governors meetings but that is the only other thing I am doing. That still connects to Federation, as we support the agency and Vancouver now has a stronger voice with the agency. I still support CJPAC and JFSA in any way I can.

JI: How do you balance volunteering with working? Is it a challenge?

KJ: I am very fortunate to have a business that does not demand too much time of me right now. Mostly, the balance is between volunteering and time for myself and time for a social life.

The board chair is a significant role. There is no question that I would not be able to do much else. There are many different and moving parts to Federation and this role. I couldn’t imagine having a full-time job and doing this. I want to learn and support everything going on in our community but there are limits to my time and energy sometimes.

JI: How and when did you become involved in Federation, and in what capacities to date?

KJ: I first became involved at Federation in 2007 when I came back from a Federation-led mission to Israel. I took on the role of vice-chair for community and sat at the campaign table. After that, I was women’s philanthropy chair, then chair of financial resource development and then, in 2013, chaired the Israel and overseas affairs committee for four years before stepping into the board chair role…. Because of my involvement over the past 10 years, I can see the full picture of what Federation does and what is happening in the community.

JI: What motivated you to take on the role of Federation board chair?

KJ: I like working with people and the move to chair of the board did seem like a natural progression. I also know that Federation is looking at longer-term succession and was looking at me possibly filling the role, so it wasn’t a surprise…. I want to give back. I have the time and energy to give to my community. Community means everything to me. I was disengaged and, when I moved back to Vancouver, I said I wanted to be part of community, that it was missing from my life. We can be there for each other in times of need and in times of celebration and naches.

JI: In what ways have you witnessed Federation evolving with the community and its needs?

KJ: The 2020 Strategic Priorities. As we developed [it], we sought input from a wide cross-section of community stakeholders, partner agencies, etc. – 2020 is a commitment to more flexible funding models and more grassroots.

I have witnessed that we all [are affected by] the affordability issues in our city. We not only need to address this within our community in the city but also in the suburbs of Vancouver, where our Jewish population is moving to. Over half of our community now lives outside of Vancouver. How can we address their needs, because, if we don’t, we run the risk of losing them entirely? We will need to provide services and programs closer to where this population is living.

It’s also expensive being involved in community life in the city. Housing payments, food, transportation, these are all issues that affect our community members. And then, the cost of Jewish day school, synagogue membership, JCC membership. It all adds up. We have to be able to support these families and individuals, too.

JI: What excites you most about this year’s campaign?

KJ: Incentive and the opportunity it represents to grow the base of support. If we’re going to help everyone, we need everyone. Everyone has a role to play. Tzedakah is a mitzvah you have to do yourself.

Sense of urgency: the community is at a turning point. If we can connect people – either by bringing programs and services to where they live or by keeping the programs and services affordable and offering subsidies – then we can keep them connected to community. Otherwise, we’ll lose them. We only have so much time to make a real difference.

JI: What, if any, of the 2020 priority items speak to you personally, or most?

KJ: Food security and affordability, but especially regional communities and reaching out them. I lived in White Rock/South Surrey for almost 30 years and was there when the WRSS JCC got started. There was nothing out there when I was raising my children and it was a long drive into Vancouver. I know how important it is to provide Jewish [options] outside of Vancouver…. The affordability issues are driving them out there, now we have to take care of them.

JI: When you’re talking to people about the campaign, what do you say to them about the benefits of contributing or volunteering?

KJ: I get more than I give. It is rewarding to me and I feel so lucky to be able to volunteer and give of my time and my resources. The rewards for being involved, for giving and helping are the connections to my Jewish family/community.

JI: If there is anything else you’d like to add, please do.

KJ: I know what it feels like to be disconnected from community, and it has been so valuable for me to connect. I barely knew anybody and, by getting involved, I’ve learned what community is all about.

One of the incentives to which Karen James was referring is that annual campaign chair Alex Cristall and his family will donate an additional $250 to the campaign for each gift from a donor who missed last year’s campaign or who is making a first-time gift. For more information on this initiative, the campaign in general and the types of programs and services Federation supports, visit jewishvancouver.com.

Orwell’s vision timeless

Bernard Cuffling as George Bowling in Leslie Mildiner’s adaptation of George Orwell’s Coming Up for Air, at Kay Meek Studio Theatre Nov. 16-25. (photo by Stephen Courtenay)

Award-winning actor Bernard Cuffling portrays George Bowling in Leslie Mildiner’s award-winning adaptation of George Orwell’s Coming Up for Air. Presented by Kay Meek Studio Theatre and One-O-One Productions, the one-man stage play opens Nov. 16.

First published in 1939, Orwell’s novel centres on 45-year-old insurance salesman George Bowling, “who makes an escape from ‘Hilda and the kids’ in London for a few days following a win at the races,” explains the promotional material. “George visits his boyhood village in an attempt to recapture childhood innocence, but finds it changed beyond recognition by the effects of modern life. His feelings of loss are intensified by the threat of war looming on the horizon.”

“Prose is the most intimate of writing – nothing separates the writer from the reader. Plus, there are no physical limitations to the setting, time, etc.,” Mildiner, a member of the Jewish community, told the Independent about the challenges of taking a novel and turning it into play. “Theatre is both a physical medium and collaboration. Physically, the storytelling is constrained by the limits of the performance space, restrictions of real time and the physical limitations of the actor/s in that space. So, the challenge is to take the unbridled narrative possibilities of prose and contain them on stage. Specifically, a stage play can only cover so much of the story unraveling over the length of a novel, so large sections of the narrative have to be edited or tossed aside. But, thankfully, whatever the medium, all stories have a beginning, middle, end – or three acts. What’s lost [are] certain subtleties and nuances of the story. What’s gained: the director (me!), actor and designers get to bring the story to life whatever way we choose.”

Leslie Mildiner (Courtesy of Kay Meek Studio Theatre)

As a teenager, living in Britain, Mildiner published his first novel; he published his second novel when he was 22. In those years, according to his bio, he “was immersed in the British fringe theatre/alternative comedy scene as a writer and performer. On arriving in Vancouver in the early ’80s, he was drawn to the scene here when he was engaged as a comedy performer at Expo 86.” His scripts have been produced by Vancouver companies like Arts Club, Touchstone and the Firehall Arts Centre, and across Canada. He has also written for TV animation shows, including Kid vs. Kat and Class of the Titans.

So, what interested him in adapting a novel and, in particular, Coming Up for Air?

“The main character George Bowling’s struggle to do ‘the right thing,’” said Mildiner. “He’s a bit of an ass – and you probably wouldn’t want to meet him in real life – but he has a solid moral core and struggles against his need to be ‘the messenger,’ the canary in the coal mine. I found this fascinating. Also, it makes him a modern-type anti-hero. Also, because he is flawed, the audience get to see themselves reflected in him when he is forced to make choices.”

The anxieties and tensions described in Coming Up for Air are still relevant, almost 80 years after its publication.

“Coming Up for Air was published in 1939, a couple of years after Orwell’s experiences in the Spanish Civil War, where he witnessed the hope of people’s revolution turn into totalitarianism, with the threat of Hitler and Germany looming,” explained Mildiner. “In 2017, post-9/11, we live in an increasing paranoid world where even in the West, individual rights (seem) to be eroding. Plus, we have an unstable, narcissistic leader of the Free World, daily making attacks against minorities and those with no power, blaming ‘the Other’ for everything that’s wrong. Also, with the [President Donald] Trump insistence that everything in opposition is ‘fake news,’ including his own lies, Orwell’s ‘Newspeak’ has been brought to life.”

That said, added Mildiner, “Despite Trump, international terrorism, racism, corporate mentality and consumerism, I don’t think Orwell predicted the rise of modern humanism – our real desires and efforts to look after each other. For example, the conservation movement, eco-awareness, fight for indigenous rights, children’s rights, [the] LGBT movement.”

But Orwell did foresee many aspects of the future accurately.

“In seemingly incidental ways,” said Mildiner, “Coming Up for Air is prophetic: the main character encounters urbanization (his small village is now a large suburb), box stores – he complains about new chain stores and the advent of fast food joints. ‘Everything is streamlined and sleek – comfort doesn’t matter,’ he complains at one point. People from that era would be appalled at the idea of an eatery posting signs telling you [that] you can only stay for a set period of time!”

Coming Up for Air runs at Kay Meek Studio Theatre in West Vancouver Nov. 16-25. Tickets ($29-$45) can be purchased at kaymeek.com/coming-up-for-air.

Jersey Boys at Queen E.

The Four Seasons of Jersey Boys sings “Sherry.” (photo from Broadway Across Canada)

The multiple-award-winning Jersey Boys comes to Queen Elizabeth Theatre Nov. 14-19. The musical about Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons was written by Jewish community members Marshall Brickman and Rick Elice.

Elice spoke to the Jewish Independent by phone from New York. He and Brickman were friends well before they became writing partners on the musical and other projects.

“We became friends somewhere in the ’90s, 1997-’98, around there, and Jersey Boys didn’t present itself as an opportunity until 2002, although we didn’t really do anything about it until the very end of 2003,” said Elice, noting that the day prior to our interview, Oct. 17, marked the 13th anniversary of the very first production of Jersey Boys, which opened at the La Jolla Playhouse in 2004.

When Elice was asked to write the musical, he asked Brickman to collaborate with him.

“I had spent a couple of decades in advertising and I was no longer doing that,” he explained. “I was working at a movie studio in California and a former client called – this was right after Mamma Mia! had opened on Broadway – and he said, ‘Hey, I have the rights to the Four Seasons’ music.’”

Initially, Elice thought he meant Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons.” After setting him straight, the former client asked, “‘Well, would you be interested in doing the Mamma Mia! [concept] with the music of the Four Seasons?’ And I said, ‘No, somebody already did that, somebody already did Mamma Mia!’”

But Elice agreed to have lunch with Valli and Bob Gaudio, principal songwriter of the Four Seasons, and he called Brickman.

He and his friend “had been flirting with the idea of maybe writing something together,” said Elice, “which we assumed would be a screenplay because I was working at a studio and Marshall is, of course, an Oscar-winning screenwriter of some renown; I mean, he’s a legend. And I said, ‘Suppose we were to write a Broadway musical?’ And he said, ‘I’ve never written a Broadway musical.’ ‘Well, neither have I! But no one’s going to pay us anything, so we’ll just be wasting our own time and maybe we’ll have some fun. Let’s go to lunch and see what these guys are like.’”

During lunch, they asked Valli and Gaudio what it was like growing up in New Jersey, said Elice. “They started to tell us these jokes and anecdotes that were so, by turn, hilarious, tragic, stunning, but all of them engaging and compelling. We found ourselves leaning forward like anyone would when being told a really good story. And we said, ‘Hey guys, if you wanted to do this, if you wanted to do your warts-and-all life story, life of the group, that would be something that would be interesting because, look at us, we’re on the end of our seats. Other people would probably respond similarly, too.’… And they said, ‘OK, go ahead, knock yourself out. If we like what you do, then we’ll give you the gig.’”

Valli and Gaudio liked the first few scenes that Elice and Brickman wrote, so the writers began shopping the musical around. “The stars were in alignment,” said Elice, “as we wrote in the show.” The perfect producers, a director and venue were all lined up. “The only thing we didn’t have was the show,” he said. But, within a couple of months, he and Brickman had completed a script and, by August 2004, the production was in rehearsal in Southern California.

“And audiences loved the show from the very first performance,” said Elice. “We were always there in the back with our pads, ready to edit and make changes and do all the things in previews you’re supposed to do, but the show was really solid. Fundamentally, the show didn’t change. We improved certain things about it but there was no big surgery to be done on anything.”

He attributed the success to the music, which “underpins all our lives,” and to the fact that the group’s story is “a compelling one.”

“That’s always the secret to good theatre,” he said. “Tell a good story with characters the audience cares about.”

He also credited director Des McAnuff with being “a great visionary and a great field marshal for the project. He created this rocket ship that we all got on. It was a super-happy experience that could have amounted to nothing, and it ended up changing all of our lives.”

photo - Rick Elice, left, and Marshall Brickman, co-book writers of Jersey Boys — Rick Elice, left, and Marshall Brickman, co-book writers of Jersey Boys. *(photo by Joan Marcus)*

Part of the happy experience was writing with his friend.

“Writing for the theatre is like talking something into existence,” said Elice. It’s much harder to talk something into existence when you’re talking mainly to yourself, working as the sole writer, he said. “What I love about working with Marshall is that he taught me that, before you do anything, you take very long walks together and talk and talk and talk and talk, until you know how the characters sound, you know how to voice them, you know what happens, you’ve argued about plot and story and then, at some point, you have nothing left to do but sit down and actually write it. But the writing itself, the act of writing, is a product of extensive thinking and arguing and talking.”

There were no rules or a specific format for how the collaboration worked, said Elice. “If he wanted to write a scene, he would; if I wanted to, I would; then we would swap. And then, eventually, we were together combing through it.”

Elice said that he and Brickman weren’t involved in the making of the film version of Jersey Boys, which was directed by Clint Eastwood. “Generally, what the theatre offers that the film doesn’t offer is the live event,” said Elice.

He explained, “The existence of theatre ought to have ended by now – there are many, many other things to do. The theatre is expensive, it only happens in certain places at certain times of the day, it’s not convenient, it’s not particularly user-friendly as a medium, and yet it still exists. It’s actually doing better now than it did last year and, the year before that, it did better than the year before that, etc. So, why is that the case? Because, I think, we’re hardwired as a species – you and I and everyone around us – back to the days when cave-dwellers sat around fires and told each other stories. We like the idea of sitting in the dark and being told stories and experiencing them with other people sitting in the dark at the same time, experiencing the same story that will never be told in exactly the same way because it’s never the same. While the material may be the same, the performing of it is different, the audience is different, the chemistry in the room is different – everything changes.

“Each performance of a live event is a unique performance … and somewhere in there, somewhere in that unique experience, is something that’s thrilling for us,” he continued. “And what Des does specifically with Jersey Boys is to create a variety of roles for the audience because you’re not just sitting watching a show – you’re also the audience in the saloon, you’re the audience in the recording studio, you’re the audience at the concert, you’re the audience at the stadium. And there’s alchemy that happens with Jersey Boys on stage, where the audience, I think, really forgets that they’re watching actors playing these four guys and begins to believe that they are the Four Seasons and we are the people watching them. And so, the audience responds like they would at a rock concert, and not like they would do politely at a Broadway musical.”

He added, “It also happens to be a feel-good show and, as the world winds its way, a feel-good experience doesn’t feel out of sorts, because the rest of our days, we’re constantly facing greater challenges individually and collectively…. There are problems, there are bad things, so, you go to the theatre and feel good, it feels like a nice gift to give people.”

On Oct. 17, Jersey Boys’ 13th anniversary, a new company started rehearsals for another run of the show, said Elice. He dropped in to say hello to everyone and let them know of the significance of the day. “It’s a little like teaching,” he said. “If you’re a teacher, every year, the students stay the same age and you keep getting older … and I feel a little bit that way about Jersey Boys companies. I show up on the first day of rehearsals and, at the first production [in 2004], I was the same age as everybody in the show, and now I’m this old guy, because so many years have gone by but, of course, we’re still telling the story of a boy band, so you’ve got a cast in their 20s, and that’s a misty distant memory for me now.”

For tickets to Jersey Boys in Vancouver, visit ticketmaster.ca or call 1-855-985-5000.

What if shul had been sold?

Congregation Emanu-El in Victoria is the subject and setting for The Original Deed, which opens Nov. 15. (photo by Sid Tafler)

Established in 1863, Congregation Emanu-El in Victoria is the oldest synagogue in continuous use in Canada. As the saying goes, if those walls could talk. Well, journalist and author Sid Tafler, a longtime member of Emanu-El, has given them a voice, of sorts.

Tafler, who has worked in theatre as a writer, actor and producer, has created The Original Deed, an historical drama about the synagogue.

Despite being such a landmark, Emanu-El “was nearly lost forever a generation ago, when a move was afoot to sell the old building and relocate to the suburbs,” reads the description. “The play tells the story of Sam Abelman, a Holocaust survivor and downtown jeweler, who fights to save the shul from the wrecking ball, while his son Morry tries to sell out and move the congregation to the suburbs. As the father/son struggle reaches a climax, Sam invokes ‘the Original Deed’ and a ghostly figure from his past emerges to salvage his dreams and his memories.”

Performed in the sanctuary, it features Toshik Bukowiecki as Sam, Zuzana Macknight as Rivka Abelman and Bobby Cleveland as Jack Abelman. John Roebuck plays Morry, while the rest of the Abelman clan is performed by Maureen Van Wyck as Leah, Annika Hupp as Esther, Nolan Hupp as Young Sam, and Ava Fournier, 12, who plays Ellen. Bill Taylor takes on the character of Phil Cogan, the lawyer.

“The play is set circa 1980,” Tafler told the Independent. “I say circa because the issue of selling the shul was discussed a number of times over 15 to 20 years, so 1980 is an average.”

photo - Sid Tafler — Sid Tafler *(photo from Sid Tafler)*

Tafler mined the synagogue’s archives and online historical information, as well as the book Sefer Emanu-El, which was published by the synagogue on its 150th anniversary in 2013.

“I found that much of the written history about the shul is about the dynamic era of the founding in 1863 and the colourful figures of the gold rush and late 19th century,” said Tafler. “There is comparatively little about recent history. Some older members of the congregation knew about the proposed sale, which was discussed at board meetings, but not much detail about the how and why – specifically, why the idea was dropped.”

Tafler was inspired “by the intrigue and thinking behind this idea of selling the shul and moving to the suburbs, which many communities have done. When it first came up, the building was not the lovely restored heritage landmark it is now. It was covered in stucco and the ceiling had been lowered to exclude the balcony.”

In the real-life situation, there were proposals to buy an old church or to purchase land near the Jewish Cemetery on Cedar Hill Road, said Tafler.

“I created a family called the Abelmans to embody this story,” he explained. “Sam, an aging Holocaust survivor, is desperate to keep the old building, while his son Morry, head of the building committee, wants to sell out and move to a waterside location in Gordon Head (near the University of Victoria). Everyone gets involved: Sam’s wife Rivka, his granddaughter Ellen, his other son Jack, a wanderer; even his lawyer, Phil Cogan, who holds his finger to the wind and listens to his mother to decide which side he’s on.

“The stakes are very high for Sam,” said Tafler. “As a boy, he looked out the window of his home in Germany and saw his shul being destroyed on Kristallnacht. Soon after, he was shipped off to England in the Kindertransport, and never saw his family again.”

In addition to the history, Tafler said he was “also inspired by Zelda Dean, Emanu-El’s theatre maven, who suggested I write a play about the shul.”

It took two years and nine months for this production to go from idea to the stage, he said. “But, in some ways,” he said, it took 20 years. “My last play, Ghost on the Road, was produced at the Victoria Fringe Festival in 1997.”

The Abelmans are not real people, said Tafler, “but I have grown up with Holocaust survivors and their children and grandchildren from my earliest years. When I was still a toddler, my parents took in two teenage survivors from Hungary, a boy and a girl, who lived with our family in Montreal for a few years. In school, many of my classmates’ parents were survivors and I heard these stories firsthand. Here in Victoria, the survivors were a major presence in our shul.”

So, on whom is Sam based?

photo - Sam (played by Toshik Bukowiecki) and his granddaughter Ellen (Ava Fournier) listen for the sounds of voices in the synagogue walls in The Original Deed, at Congregation Emanu-El this month — Sam (played by Toshik Bukowiecki) and his granddaughter Ellen (Ava Fournier) listen for the sounds of voices in the synagogue walls in The Original Deed, at Congregation Emanu-El this month. *(photo by Gayle Mavor)*

“Sam Abelman is one part Jack Gardiner. One part Peter Gary. One part Willy Jacobs. One part Ray Rose. One part each of my grandfathers, Sam Tafler and Eli Shetzer,” said Tafler. “But mostly, Sam, the lead character in The Original Deed, is himself, played by Victoria actor Toshik Bukowiecki.

“Jack, Peter and Willy were Holocaust survivors and members of our shul at different times,” Tafler explained. “They taught us about terrible loss and despair, redeemed by liberation, healing and building a new life.

“Ray was born in Victoria in 1920 and operated Rose’s Jewelers on Douglas Street, a business started by his father Joseph in 1912. He was a bombardier in the RCAF in the Second World War and flew 33 missions over Europe,” said Tafler.

“Sam and Eli were both born in shtetls in the Ukraine and immigrated to Canada in the early 20th century. They found work and raised families in Montreal and their many descendants now live across North America.”

As to some of the reasons Morry, or community members like him, wanted to abandon the historic building and move to the suburbs, Tafler provided several excerpts from the play, all spoken by Morry (Morris):

“‘… there’s not enough room in this building. We can’t keep holding seders and Hebrew classes in this little space.’ (gestures at back, behind pews)”;
“It’s a new age, Dad. We need a real school if we expect the kids to keep coming.”
“Dad, this building is old, it’s small, there’s no room for a school, for offices.”
“(At the site in Gordon Head): ‘Use your imagination. Two lovely, modern buildings. A social hall, parking lot over there. Open space for the kids. And for expansion.’”

The Original Deed runs at Congregation Emanu-El Nov. 15-16 and 18-19, at 7 p.m. Tickets ($20/$15) are available at Ticket Rocket, ticketrocket.co/event/details/101436/the-original-deed.

Granirer paints with words

I am the proud owner of a Pnina Granirer work. More importantly, I am privileged to know the wonderful human being who is Pnina Granirer. After reading Light Within the Shadows: A Painter’s Memoir, I now know more about her art, its influences and styles, and her life, its joys and challenges. I also discovered that she writes as beautifully as she paints, and has a warm sense of humour.

Each chapter features a relevant quote from people throughout history, something they said or, most often, wrote; people as diverse as Roald Dahl, Anne Frank and Shakespeare. In these and her own words, Granirer imparts not only her life story but her philosophies on creativity, education, identity, family, business.

“There are people who plan their lives meticulously, step by step – I have never been one of them,” she writes. “Of course, I had goals, but these were like signposts to be reached one by one, short-term endeavours without a specific plan for the faraway future. I rather liked the idea of floating along, steering my boat from time to time and hoping that I would reach my destination, whatever it was meant to be.”

And the 82-year-old has experienced many destinations on her continuing journey. In a May interview with the Vancouver Sun, she talked about having written a book twice the size of what was published.

“There were a lot more historical references, many stories about family members and some more memories – it was too long and had to be cut,” Granirer told the Independent.

About the possibility of another book, she said, “I’m thinking about this and how I could use some of the chapters that have been cut, but, at the moment, I’m far too busy with getting through with the exhibition. I need a quiet space in order to begin thinking about writing and hope that I’ll begin doing just that early in 2018.”

Granirer will do an artist’s talk at the Sidney and Gertrude Zack Gallery on Nov. 16 to open an exhibit of her work mounted in conjunction with the Cherie Smith JCC Jewish Book Festival because the occasion also represents the launch of her memoir. The event is sponsored by National Council of Jewish Women. This is especially appropriate because one of the topics that Granirer explores in her memoir is the difficulty of being a mother, a wife and an artist. About the 1970s, when her two sons, David and Dan, were young, she remarks, “I had little contact with the visual arts community in general and its avant-garde segment in particular. I didn’t have much time for forging professional ties, as my world consisted of my husband and my sons, who were a great source of joy and a well of inspiration for my art.” In this period, she not only produced much work, but also took on teaching.

Her memoir – which includes pages of colour photographs of her work – is divided into three acts. It takes readers from Romania, her birthplace and where she grew up, surviving the Holocaust; to the safety of Israel in 1950, to where first her father, then the family, fled from the dangers of communist Romania; to the United States in 1962, where her husband Eddy, a math professor, could find work, as the recently initiated American-Russian space race saw Americans “pouring money and resources into research, hoping to be the first to put a man on the moon…. Mathematics, the cornerstone and essential building block of scientific research, was suddenly in high demand all over North America.” Three years later, the Granirers would make their way to Vancouver.

Granirer talks about luck throughout the memoir and, specifically, about a couple of “old hackneyed sayings” being true, that of being “in the right place at the right time” and of being “born under a lucky star.” “Events beyond our control do change the course of our lives,” she writes. And, while they don’t always do so for the better, Granirer chooses, at least in looking back, to appreciate her good fortune.

“Of course, I never even thought of being lucky at the time,” she admitted to the Independent. “One just lives one’s life as it comes along and only later, in retrospect, one sees the whole picture. Getting older allowed me to have a better perspective of the past and writing the memoir brought it all together. We kept saying for years how lucky our family was to live in Vancouver, but day by day there were ups and downs and the occasional complaints when unfortunate events happened – and they did. The memoir was a watershed for me and helped me see the serendipitous moments in my life when fate could have gone easily the other way.”

The light and shadows of the book’s title not only apply to the vividness of remembered moments and the darkness in which forgotten moments lie, but also the grey areas through which we must travel in life – the uncertainties, the aforementioned circumstances beyond our control.

When asked if she was a naturally optimistic person or developed into one, she said, “I probably am more of the former, although that does not mean that there are not times when I feel as if the world is collapsing on me. There have been hard times for me in the past, but somehow I seem to manage to get through. I just try to deal with the black thoughts, when they come. Nothing is really black-and-white, it’s through the shadows that we have to find our way.”

In addition to geopolitics, health and other uncontrollable issues, Granirer also had to negotiate the politics of the art world, in which she had to deal with many curators who “did not seem to be interested in art and artists, except as tools for enhancing their own careers.”

“… meeting someone who loves a painting and wishes to live with it, who wants to learn the details of its creation and is convinced that owning it will enrich his or her life, is the most rewarding experience for an artist.”

Nonetheless, she persevered – “Early in my career,” she writes, “I decided to follow my own course, regardless of the cost.” She did so, even as she realized that, in her profession, “being different was not considered an asset, but a liability.” Though admitting that all artists, including herself, crave recognition, she writes that “meeting someone who loves a painting and wishes to live with it, who wants to learn the details of its creation and is convinced that owning it will enrich his or her life, is the most rewarding experience for an artist.”

To mark her 80th birthday, in 2015, and her 50th year in Canada, Granirer gave many others a gift. “Established galleries usually charge the artist 50% commission for each work sold, in exchange for space and promotion,” she explains. “Why not invite the public … for 10 days and offer the commission to my collectors instead.” It was because of this generosity that I was able to buy my first Granirer.

After this exhibition and sale, Granirer and her husband headed back to Romania, 65 years after they had left the country. It was a meaningful visit with at least three serendipitous occurrences. But, back in Vancouver, she ended up in hospital. Sixteen days later, after two surgeries for diverticulitis, she made it home. “I counted my blessings and told myself how much worse it could have been,” she writes. “What if it had happened while I was in Romania?”

She returns to the memoir’s opening paragraph about getting older, in which she remarks, “Simple words like ‘later,’ ‘next year,’ ‘tomorrow,’ ‘not now,’ become risky, unsure and speculative.” But there is also much to look forward to, she says. At the time of writing, it was an international exhibit in Costa Rica and one in Spain. Currently, she’s preparing for the Zack Gallery exhibit and the launch of the memoir. The event takes place Nov. 16, 6 p.m., and admission is free. It will be a great opportunity to meet the artist – and pick up a copy of Light Within the Shadows.

Conversation continues

Author Nathan Englander with the Globe and Mail’s Marsha Lederman at an Oct. 22 event held by the Cherie Smith Jewish Book Festival, which runs Nov. 25-30. Englander was in Vancouver as part of a North American tour of his latest novel, Dinner at the Center of the Earth. For an interview with Englander, visit jewishindependent.ca/a-novel-born-of-heartbreak. (photo by Cynthia Ramsay)

Stories from the Sylvia Hotel

Left to right: Advah Soudack, Tom Pickett and Adam Abrams co-star in Two Views from the Sylvia, playing at the Waterfront Theatre Nov. 8-12. (photo from Kol Halev)

“For me, the ‘coolest’ thing is Sylvia herself,” Advah Soudack told the Independent. “From everything I have read and heard, she was a dynamite of a woman – fiery, passionate and full of life. The woman lived until 102, for goodness sake, and did so with a heart murmur that caused much concern for doctors and her parents when she was young. I like the story of how she met her husband, Harry. The two were on a Jewish singles cruise and, when Harry witnessed Sylvia dive enthusiastically off the side of the boat, he knew in that moment that she was the gal for him. I only wish Sylvia was alive to see the show.”

Soudack takes on the role of Sylvia Ablowitz, née Goldstein, whose father, Abraham, built the Sylvia Hotel and named it after his daughter. The family’s story and stories about the renowned establishment in English Bay are depicted in Two Views from the Sylvia, which is being presented by Kol Halev Performance Society Nov. 8-12 at the Waterfront Theatre.

“This is the most ambitious show Kol Halev has produced, and their first as a registered society. But it fits perfectly into their mandate to tell stories of Jewish history and local Vancouver history, with music, song and performance, in an engaging and entertaining way,” said Adam Abrams, who plays Abraham in the production, and is also vice-president of Kol Halev. “I’m so excited to be a part of it,” he said.

Two Views from the Sylvia is comprised of two original one-act plays. Its genesis can be traced back some four years, to a Jewish psychology network meeting attended by Kol Halev president Sue Cohene and Ablowitz’s great-niece, Marsha Ablowitz, who pitched the story of her famous great-aunt to Cohene. In mid-2013, members of Kol Halev met with Marsha Ablowitz and her mother, Sally Seidler, who is now 99 years old.

By August 2013, Joan Stuchner had drafted the first two pages of a play. A few months later, Deborah Vogt joined the writing team, with she and Abrams assisting Stuchner. Sadly, Stuchner died in June 2014 of pancreatic cancer and Vogt had to complete the script without her.

Vogt’s one-act play, Sylvia’s Hotel, with music by Britt MacLeod and Kerry O’Donovan, lyrics by MacLeod, is set in 1912, and focuses on the origins of the hotel and on the Ablowitz-Goldstein family. “Both young Sylvia Goldstein and Joe Fortes, the beloved lifeguard who taught Vancouver children to swim, experience the challenges of those who didn’t quite ‘belong’ in the Vancouver of the time,” notes the promotional material. It forms Act 1 of Two Views from the Sylvia.

Act 2, called The Hotel Sylvia, is by Cathy Moss and Kelsey Blair. It focuses on the period after the building of the hotel, and “we meet the characters whose lives and loves became interwoven with the story of the Sylvia over her 100-year history.”

In Act 1, most of the characters are based on real people, members of the Goldstein family and Fortes. In Act 2, most of the characters are composites of more than one person or story, notably the character of Franny, who is a nod to a longtime Sylvia employee.

“Several of the stories told in this one act play are the stories as told to Cathy Moss and me by Huguette Gingras, who was the front-desk clerk at the Sylvia Hotel for 35 years,” said Cohene.

Tom Pickett, who plays Fortes in Act 1, plays the character of John in Act 2. “Though John is an independent character, he cares about the Sylvia the way Joe cares about the kids and English Bay so, in my mind, I imbue a hint of John with a bit of Joe and maybe vice versa,” said the actor.

Pickett – who said he has played Fortes a few times before – was immediately on board when he heard that Christopher King was the director and Shelly Stewart Hunt was the choreographer of the production. “Then I had the pleasure of talking with Sue Cohene on the phone and the connection was instantaneous,” he told the Independent. “And then, as we began rehearsals, the artistic opportunities to honour a Vancouver landmark like the Sylvia and represent a historical figure like Joe Fortes deepened. I think many people know of the Sylvia but don’t know a lot about the Sylvia. I’ve done a gospel concert at the Sylvia, my wife’s cousin from Montreal always stays at the Sylvia, my mechanic, the teller at my bank, the list goes on.”

“It seems that everyone has a story or a connection to the Sylvia,” agreed Abrams, “so it’s exciting to be telling a story about something so iconic, that means so much to people in Vancouver. And though I’m thrilled to have a great role, I’ve been mostly just impressed with what everyone else is bringing to it. There are some really beautiful moments both visually and dramatically, and some wonderful music, too. I think people are going to leave the theatre humming the title theme, ‘At the Sylvia’!”

About his character in Act 1, Abrams said, “Abe is someone who wants more than just personal success, he really wants to make his city a better place and feels the hotel will help achieve that. He’s also proud of his Jewish heritage and wants to show what his people can accomplish – despite facing a lot of the prejudice that was so common at that time.”

In Act 2, Abrams plays Mr. Lowry, “the manager of the present-day Sylvia, [who] is trying out Franny for the front-desk job to see how she does. He just shows up a couple of times, but I’m finding a lot of little moments of humour in his appearances.”

In preparing for the show, Soudack met with Marsha Ablowitz. “I not only flipped through piles of photos and heard stories,” said Soudack, “but also held Sylvia’s hairbrush, mirror and curling iron with her initials gracefully engraved on them in my hands. If the audience is paying close attention, they may even catch a glimpse of these artifacts in the show.”

While Sylvia appears in Act 1, she is only talked about in Act 2. In the second half of the production, Soudack plays Nora, who appears, said Soudack, “as a flashback to the Sylvia during the Second World War.”

“She is an interesting character, not only because of her independent nature, but also because of the times in which she would exercise this independence,” said the actor. “Nora, as explained by her daughter Gloria in Act 2, would visit the Sylvia twice a year. Gloria mentions that her mother, Nora, would come to write in her journal. She made a routine of it and even wore the same blue dress…. It turns out that she didn’t always come to write in her journal, she would also come to the Sylvia to dance.

“For me,” said Soudack, “Nora is an intriguing character to play because there has to be a reason why she came to the Sylvia and did so year after year. In the script, she talks about ‘taking a night off from everything.’ She mentions things about the war, headlines, air-raid precautions, however, as the actress, I choose to dig deeper and find what else she is ‘escaping’ from and taking the night off from…. There is a pure innocence to Nora going to the Sylvia twice a year to write in her journal and dance, but is there also an alter ego or an alternate life she desperately wants to explore?”

Other Jewish community members in the cast are Anna-Mae Wiesenthal and Joyce Gordon, while Heather Martin is associate producer and Gwen Epstein is on the production team. The Jewish Museum and Archives of British Columbia has created a photo exhibit, which will be on display at the theatre.

“Lots of things are very exciting,” said Cohene, “like watching amazingly creative choreography being developed on the spot. Hearing beautiful singing by the cast makes me want to sing along. I don’t – I am the producer and need to remember my role.

“I hope that people who come to the show are aware that we are a community theatre group. We are so fortunate to have the wonderful participation of two professional actors,” she said, referring to Pickett and Soudack, “who work alongside our very talented group of emerging actors. Kol Halev strives to be inclusive, accommodating performers of all ages, backgrounds and levels of experience. We aim to offer the opportunity to learn and create, in all aspects of our production. I’m hoping that this value is appreciated when the public sees the show.”

For tickets ($28) – and a chance to win free ones with your story of the Sylvia – visit kolhalev.ca.