The element of witnessing
By DANA DUGAN
Express Staff Writer
To put it in perspective, the famous diarist and Holocaust
victim, Anne Frank, had she survived would be my mother’s age, and
several years my father’s junior, both of whom are very much with us and
going strong.
The tragic Anne Frank was only 15 when she died at Bergen-Belsen,
a Nazi concentration camp. But she, fortunately for the generations who
followed, lives on in her diary, which her father Otto Frank published
after the war. And she survives for new audiences through the play And
Then They Came For Me: Remembering the World of Anne Frank by James
Still.
Directed by Company of Fool’s artistic director, Rusty
Wilson, this moving play will be presented at the Liberty Theatre in
Hailey featuring Wood River High School students. It runs May 18, 19 and
25, 26, at 8 p.m., as well as several scheduled matinees for valley
students.
The production marks the end of the first year of the
Blaine County School District’s Theater Academy.
The play is an unusual presentation in that it offers a
multi-media viewpoint of the small, limited, and persecuted world
inflicted upon the Franks and two other families associated with them in
Amsterdam, before and during World War II.
Two surviving members of these families were the
inspiration for the play. Ed Silverberg was Anne’s first boyfriend,
known from her diary as "Hello."
Eva Geiringer-Schloss, who wrote Eva's Story: A
Survivor's Tale by the Step-Sister of Anne Frank, was even more
closely aligned with Anne. They were the same age, were refugees from
Germany and, in 1942, both eventually were forced to go into hiding with
their families. The Geirgingers also were captured and sent to
concentration camps, where the father and brother Heinz died.
Eva and her mother survived Auschwitz. Her mother then
married Otto Frank in 1953, and Eva became Anne’s posthumous
step-sister.
As part of the multi-media aspect of the play, there is
newsreel footage of concentration camps and videotaped interviews with
Schloss and Silverberg, who recount their Holocaust experiences as actors
depict the stories onstage. It’s as if the audience is seeing Eva and
Ed's memories made flesh.
"Eva and Ed are treated like characters we interact
with [the video images]," said Kathleen Craig, who plays Anne Frank.
Not only is Eva Schloss, now 72, present in the video but
she will be on hand in person, for talks with the audience following each
performance. She has lived in London since the late 1950s, and in the past
few years has appeared in this country many times to recount her
experiences and answer questions.
For many children this is their first and unforgettable
introduction to the horror that was the Holocaust.
The play opens in 1938 and follows the family as they
intermingle, go into hiding and then are arrested.
"It’s not just the Holocaust where millions of
people died," said Sharon Barto, who plays Eva. "It shows that,
in all the hell, there was love and hope."
At times, the actors simply watch the videos from the
"magic carpet," a metal stage that juts into the proscenium.
"There is a challenge to act with the video," said Aurora
Hull-Mullins, who appears as Mutti, Eva’s mother.
Eric Hamlin plays Ed Silverberg, Dan Moore plays Pappy
Geirginger, Chris Stice appears as Heinz, and Mackenzie Harbaugh plays a
Hitler youth.
Jon Dykstra helped design and build the set, and is the
stage manager for the production.
"It was a good fit," said Rusty Wilson, who
discovered the play incidentally while he was traveling, and immediately
set in motion obtaining the rights and developing the production.
"This is a story that should always be told," he
said.
The Theatre Academy is pleased to present this play, which
showcases their efforts this year, but mostly it’s an opportunity to
depict a piece of history.
"Witnessing is very important," said Barto.
