STAGE REVIEW : ‘YIDDISH’: A JOY FILLED WITH LAUGHTER, LOVE

It’s eerie to have “The Joys of Yiddish” in town right after the opening of “Ghetto” at the Mark Taper Forum. Joshua Sobol’s drama concerns a troupe of Jewish performers doing shows in the Vilna ghetto during World War II. “Joys” is exactly the kind of show they might have done.

Moreover, these actors--they’ll be at the Beverly Theatre through Monday night--are from Eastern Europe. They regularly work at the Ester Rachel Kaminska State Jewish Theatre in Warsaw. Presumably the fare there is a bit heavier. “The Joys of Yiddish” is a musical revue, mixing comedy and sentiment.

The language is Yiddish, well-described in the program as a “succulent” language. The first performer is a genial old man in a long purple coat, dazzling against the red curtain. His name is Szymon Szurmiej, and he welcomes us to the show with “An Old Actor’s Monologue.” Then comes a sketch about a widowed father (Michal Szwejlich) trying to please his three grown-up daughters. One dreams of having a new dress. One wants a pair of new shoes. One wants a husband--or at least a shop-window dummy. She’s got to dance with somebody! Yes, girls, yes, sings the father, I’ll see what I can do.

Two of the “daughters” (Czeslawa and Zofia Rajfer) are actually twins. They do some duets later. The third daughter, Golda Tencer, turns out to be one of the stars of the show. She plays the starving match girl in “Cigarettes” and sings about her gray-haired mother in “Mamele,” and she neither milks the sentiment nor pretends to be above it.

Tencer is, by the way, a young woman. The routines in this show are traditional, but there’s nothing musty about the performances. It’s particularly pleasing to see Szurmiej’s vigor as he teams with the younger Juliusz Berger in a classic bit from Sholem Aleichem’s “Goldseekers.” Szurmiej is listed as the troupe’s artistic director and manager, and there’s no question that he is still running the store.

Berger has a solo number called “Foolish Little Rabbi” and Henryk Rajfer sings “Song of the Golden Land” with his sisters. (He needs to be louder.) To the side of the stage a little band tootles away. There’s a shawl on the piano and the clarinetist wears a pork-pie hat.

This is charming. So is the slightly wrinkled blue rayon drop with the red roses on it. So are the long crazy-quilt coats on the older men, making them look like assistants in a medieval alchemist’s lab. But no particular point is made of these things. They’re just part of the tradition, like the burlesque comic’s baggy pants. The intent is to do a show, not to be picturesque.

Nor, for all its sentiment, does “The Joys of Yiddish” get lost in some sickly sweet dream of the past. The Holocaust is squarely faced in “The Ghetto Burns” and “Cry Out for My Nation,” and we hear the stirring resistance anthem “Never Say You Are Going on Your Last Journey,” also featured in “Ghetto.”

But there is honey at the bottom of the cup. “Be Happy!” says the last number on the program. We drink to the Israel nation, and clap our hands to (of course and why not?) “Hava Nagela.” Humble as it is, “The Joy of Yiddish” is the real thing.

The show has four more performances: at 8 tonight, at 2 and 6:30 p.m. Sunday and at 8 p.m. Monday. Translation devices can be rented, but get to the theater early: They ran out on Thursday night. The Beverly is at 9404 Wilshire Blvd. Tickets are $18-$22.50. (213) 274-7106.

P.S. It was an error to refer to the Vilna ghetto as being in Poland, as I did in Friday’s review of “Ghetto.” Vilna had been part of Poland, but by the 1940s it was part of Lithuania, as it is today.

‘THE JOYS OF YIDDISH’

A musical revue, presented by members of the Ester Rachel Kaminska State Jewish Theatre of Poland, at the Beverly Theatre. Presented by Fradis-Gerdts Productions. Musical director Leopold Kozlowski. Technician Lech Wojciechowski. Interpreter Marek Pluzanski. Media representative Tomasz Raczek. With Szymon Szurmiej, Golda Tencer, Juliusz Berger, Michal Szwejlich, Henryk Rajfer, Zofia Rajfer, Czeslawa Rajfer. Musicians Leopold Kozlowski, Romauld Golebiaowski, Panajot Bojadzijew. Plays at 8 p.m. today, at 2 and 6:30 p.m. Sunday and at 8 Monday. Tickets $18-$22.50. 9404 Wilshire Blvd. (213) 274-7106.