Yentl at Theater J

Yentl

Theater J
1529 Sixteenth Street, NW Washington

In 19th century Eastern Europe, a young girl is determined to pursue religious studies -- even if it means breaking Jewish law -- in the stirring and ever relevant Yentl. Forbidden from studying the Talmud because of her gender, Yentl disguises herself as a man and sets out for a yeshiva. But when she falls in love, she must decide how far she's willing to go to protect her identity. Based on Isaac Bashevis Singer's classic Yiddish short story, Yentl the Yeshiva Boy, this powerful tale has inspired legions of artists, including Barbra Streisand who transformed it into a powerful musical film. Now Theater J presents a new adaptation invigorated with a bracing klezmer/pop/rock score from music veteran Jill Sobule ("I Kissed a Girl," "Supermodel").

Thru - Oct 5, 2014

Price: $30-$65

Show Type: Drama

Running Time: 2hrs, 30mins;one intermission

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Yentl Reviews

Average Rating based on 5 reviews

Highly Recommended
Recommended
Somewhat Recommended
Not Recommended

Washington Post - Somewhat Recommended

"...What hasn’t been resolved sufficiently in Theater J’s production is the matter of balance, a knitting of genres on the more skillful level of “Spring Awakening.” The “Awakening” kids sing in a modern idiom as a manifestation of rebelliousness; why the villagers in a hidebound Polish shtetl do is far less satisfactorily justified. As a result, this overlong, awkwardly encumbered “Yentl” — with a script based on Singer’s tale “Yentl the Yeshiva Boy,” credited to both Leah Napolin and Singer — comes across more like a body with two brains: a play and a musical of clashing styles forced to inhabit the same space."

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- Peter Marks

DC Theater Arts - Highly Recommended

"...In Theater J’s beautiful, eloquent, and thrilling new production of Yentl, such profound new life has been breathed into Isaac Bashevis Singer’s beloved novella that at its heart this retelling is more transformative than any before. By that I mean: Inside this thoroughly charming show is an interpretation so disarming that it’s not only (in Artistic Director Ari Roth’s words) “a Yentl for our time“; it’s ultimately a Yentl for the future of who we are."

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- John Stoltenberg

MetroWeekly - Somewhat Recommended

"...Most of the 14-member cast in this tricky Theater J production, directed by Shirley Serotsky, plays at least two characters, and several also double as musicians. All do a fine job when breaking into song and dance, but are on less sturdy ground when speaking. At a recent performance most of the leads stumbled over their lines at least once. And as effective and convincing as Bass is in conveying as both male and female, you just don’t get the sense there’s real sexual attraction to Hadass, nor do you sense a real conflict over gender. Instead, the conflict is one of culture. If Bass’s Yentl could live life as a female rabbi, there wouldn’t be any such character named Anshel, period."

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- Doug Rule

Washingtonian - Recommended

"...Humor, including in the form of tongue-in-cheek sexual innuendoes and irreverent musical numbers—such as “Oh, Sh*t,” which Yentl sings as she realizes just how deep a hole she’s dug herself—add necessary levity to what could be a too-heavy exploration of restrictive religious tradition and the historical marginalization of women. Robbie Hayes’s two-story set is gorgeously detailed, and the cast does a lot with a couple of wooden benches and tables. Serotsky also does a lot with her cast—with the exception of Blass, each actor embodies several different role, and there are some very fine performances. Darnall nails the charm and intelligence that make Avigdor so magnetic to the young Anshel. Tisdale’s Hadass has the right mix of naiveté and stubbornness, though her motives are harder to parse: She must suspect something about Anshel doesn’t quite add up, though she seems nothing if not a devoted wife throughout. (In that regard, she serves as an illustration of what Yentl’s fate could have been, had she not taken extreme measures to remain in control of it herself.)"

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- Tanya Pai

DCTheatreScene - Recommended

New music, as well as smartly-visioned staging by Shirley Serotsky, takes the themes of the original and develops them for the 21st century, making Theater J’s Yentl an intelligent and important new work, rather than an easy repeat of previous work.

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- Alan Katz

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Yentl at Theater J

Yentl

Yentl Reviews

Washington Post - Somewhat Recommended

DC Theater Arts - Highly Recommended

MetroWeekly - Somewhat Recommended

Washingtonian - Recommended

DCTheatreScene - Recommended

Yentl Photo Gallery

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