Sponsored by
Freed's journey into the mind of 'architect of the Holocaust'
Donald Freed is back in York with his unique brand of political theatre. Arts reporter Nick Ahad spoke to him.
It's good to have him back.
Ten minutes into the phone call and for the past nine minutes one of Donald Freed's inspiring, highly- intellectual, fascinating monologues has held me rapt.
This was the reason why Freed, PEN Winner and one of the most respected living American playwrights, was in York last year.
Damian Cruden, artistic director of York Theatre Royal, invited Freed to join the theatre as writer-in- residence in 2007. The playwright was a visiting lecturer at Leeds University and Cruden, aware of his towering reputation, asked if he would become associated with the venue.
It was a fruitful relationship. Freed admired Cruden and his theatre for its potential as much as they admired him for his achievements.
The end result was Patient No 1, a new play by Freed which was staged at York Theatre Royal last year.
After a year away, Freed has returned with another play, this time a new production of a previously written script.
"The question of why I have come back is very easy to answer," says Freed.
"YTR is one of the great theatres I have worked with in my time. It's been a long trip back and I have had to take a break from teaching in California, but it's a journey that is worth it. Camus said: 'New theatre changes history' and here in York there is new theatre."
Freed is back because of the happy time he had at York when he was last here, but he has also returned because Cruden is staging The White Crow.
The play, written earlier this decade, tackles the issue of the Holocaust – and does so with serious controversy.
Subtitled Eichmann in Jerusalem, the play takes the audience back to 1960 and into the story of Adolf Eichmann.
Eichmann, who is sometimes referred to as "the architect of the Holocaust", was a high-ranking member of Hitler's SS.
He was charged with the task of facilitating and managing the logistics of mass deportation of Jews to ghettos and extermination camps in Nazi-occupied eastern Europe.
After the war, he travelled to Argentina and lived there under a false identity, working for Mercedes-Benz until 1960.
He was captured by Israeli Mossad operatives in Argentina and tried in an Israeli court on 15 criminal charges, including crimes against humanity and war crimes.
He was convicted and hanged in 1962.
Freed's play takes the audience back to 1960 and a hot summer when Eichmann has been captured.
Set entirely in the basement room of an Israeli police building, the action involves a female Israeli psychologist attempting to peel back the layers of Eichmann's psyche to understand how he came to be involved in such an horrific event.
For the play, Freed used transcripts of the trial of Eichmann and the reporting of the trial by the influential German-Jewish political theorist Hannah Arendt.
In her reporting of the Eichmann trial for The New Yorker, she coined the phrase "the banality of evil" to describe Eichmann.
Freed says: "The play was very controversial, because
it takes some of the ideas put forward by Hannah Arendt and examines them in the theatre.
"She argued that the Holocaust was created by bureaucrats.
"In coining the phrase 'the banality of evil' she was putting herself in the firing line – by saying that anyone could become involved in the system of warfare.
"It meant that the Holocaust was not some extraordinary event, but one aspect of the constant state of warfare of the 20th century."
Freed says that when he discovered the transcripts were available of the Eichmann trial, he knew he had the material to create a play.
"I could take the elements of the transcripts to fashion
a composite interrogation and with that examine
some of the issues that surround the fact that the Holocaust happened," says Freed.
"While the play was controversial, the question was never whether or not the Holocaust happened, it examines what the final meaning of the Holocaust was.
"The Holocaust is not over, the final acts are still being played out. The Middle East is a deeper and deeper moral crater, a moral hole out of which is coming the rationale for terror.
"The play examines just some of those issues."
The play features Rob Pickavance and French actress Sonia Petrovna.
Again, Freed's reputation has brought a high class
act to the stage of the York Theatre Royal.
Petrovna has worked extensively on stage, television and film across the world, with roles in films including the Academy Award-nominated Adolescence by Vladimir Forgency and Cannes
Film Festival opening film, Le Feu Sacre by Vladimir Forgency.
Freed's reputation means that actors of this calibre are willing to take a role in a play being staged in the tiny studio of the Yorkshire theatre.
Like I said, it's good to have him back.
The White Crow is at York Theatre Royal studio, until May 23.
Email to a friend
Print this page- Leeds lose Ward to Palace: Is there anyone they can afford now?
- Sheffield Wednesday leaving it late to hijack Leeds United over Ward
- As Snodgrass dithers over Leeds, Warnock throws a lifeline
- Ball is in Leeds United’s court over contract - Snodgrass
- Police turning blind eye to Asian voter fraud, says MP
Looking for...
Featured advertisers
Jobs
Search for a job
Motors
Search for a car
Property
Search for a house
Weather for Yorkshire
Saturday 26 May 2012
Today
Sunny
Temperature: 9 C to 23 C
Wind Speed: 17 mph
Wind direction: East
Tomorrow
Sunny
Temperature: 9 C to 23 C
Wind Speed: 15 mph
Wind direction: East
