Family Alchemy: Malamud & Paley Stories on Stage

In order for theater to deliver on its rarely achieved promise of a transcendent live experience that no television show or movie can rival, all the disparate elements of a production must magically fuse together. This doesn't happen often, but Traveling Jewish Theatre is working diligently to discover the formula. In the confident hands of the four-member cast headed by two of TJT's founders, Naomi Newman and Corey Fischer -- both seasoned and talented actors -- three short stories by celebrated Jewish authors Grace Paley and Bernard Malamud are performed exactly as written, with all the "he said"/"she said" third-person narration left intact, the whole thing woven together by the keen eye of director Joel Mullennix. The first, "Mother," features a daughter bringing her dead mom back to life by vividly recalling simple moments around the house. In "The Story Hearer," we eavesdrop on urban tales and meet wonderfully realized characters (several played by the feisty Jeri Lynn Cohen) during a day's walk through 1970s New York City. Finally, "The Magic Barrel" introduces San Francisco newcomer Max Gordon Moore, burning with joyous intensity as Leo, a young rabbi in training who hires a marriage broker (a transformed and hollow-faced Fischer) to find him a wife, and in the hilarious process finds his faith. Short story as theater is a risky endeavor, but TJT never drops the ball, and the result is pure storytelling -- simplified, thrilling, and vigorously reinvented, a slap in the face to anyone who has ever said theater is dead.