Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By admin on July 31, 2022

One of the many casualties of last months shutdown of the 46-year-old San Diego Repertory Theatre was the Reps Lipinsky Family San Diego Jewish Arts Festival, which was was forced to close midway through its 29th season.

Rep veteran Hershey Felder, a playwright, actor, pianist and filmmaker, was able to find a new San Diego venue for a scheduled festival sing-along performance. But a film about Jewish history and culture that hed written and produced to debut at the festival never got its premiere. Instead, Felders Musical Tales of the Venetian Jewish Ghetto is now available for streaming on his website hersheyfelder.net.

Its a shame the film didnt reach a wider audience because the beautifully produced and star-studded movie tells a story about Jewish history in Venice thats not widely known. Its also the first of the dozen or so films that Felder has made since the pandemic began that features him in a new onscreen role: himself.

Theater audiences know Felder best for his solo plays about famous composers. When theaters closed in 2020, he re-created many of these plays and several new stories on film with supporting casts, orchestras and costumes at locations around his home in Florence, Italy.

In Musical Tales of the Venetian Jewish Ghetto, Felder has no costume and not much script. The 85-minute film is about Felder and an international group of close friends gathering in Venice before the Jewish festival of Shavuot to talk about their Jewish identities, tell the story of Venices Jewish ghettos, sing and play Jewish music and celebrate Shabbat dinner together.

Venetian historian and TV personality Francesco da Mosto, left, and Hershey Felder in Musical Tales of the Venetian Jewish Ghetto.

(Hershey Felder Presents)

Famous Venetian historian and TV personality Francesco da Mosto and two other local historians share screen time with Broadway stars Tovah Feldshuh and Eleanor Reissa. Music is provided by Israeli cellist Amit Peled and the Klezmerata Fiorentina quartet. Felder walks solo around Venice with a cameraman, narrating the history of Venices two Jewish ghettos and he plays piano for a new numbers. But he gives the spotlight to his guests, and he cooks for them a passion for which hes known.

The first Jewish ghetto in Venice was created in 1516. Da Mosto says Jews fleeing pogroms in Eastern and Western Europe were welcomed by the Venetian leaders because the city-state had fallen on hard times. New trade routes to India had hurt Venices dominance as a Mediterranean trade center, so business owners and farmers welcomed the business of Jewish moneylenders. Jews were safe from persecution there, but still locked behind ghetto gates at night and forced to wear identifying yellow hats and scarves in public. It wasnt until Napoleon conquered Venice in 1797 that Jews were allowed to travel freely.

The most famous story of Jews in Venice is Shakespeares The Merchant of Venice, which the films historians dissect to determine its source material and whether or not its an antisemitic play or a play that tries to humanize the embattled Jewish moneylender Shylock.

The films most moving moments take place inside the 14th-century Palazzo Balbi, where Peleds mournful cello performance of the theme from Schindlers List had everyone in the room in tears. Another powerful scene is when Reissa tells the story of her estranged father, a Holocaust survivor whose true heroics and intelligence she only discovered after his death.

One historian describes todays Venice as an open-air museum, since many longtime families have left the city for the good. As a result, residents are grateful for new Venetians like Felder who have arrived to help the city and tell its many stories.

Read more from the original source:

Review: Hershey Felder explores the ancient Jewish ghettos of Venice in latest theatrical film - The San Diego Union-Tribune

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