NORFOLK — Against the backdrop of rising antisemitic violence and rhetoric, the Virginia Stage Company and the Holocaust Commission of the United Jewish Federation of Tidewater will present the play “Wiesenthal” Tuesday.
“Wiesenthal” is a one-man show about Simon Wiesenthal, a Holocaust survivor who became a Nazi hunter after World War II and brought more than 1,000 escaped criminals to justice. “Wiesenthal” was written by and stars Tom Dugan, who said he wants people to know the man often called the “Jewish James Bond.”
Because educating young people is a focus of the Holocaust Commission, student groups will see it free on Wednesday.
Elena Barr Baum, director of the UJFT Holocaust Commission, said that it is as important a time as ever to remember the lessons found in “Wiesenthal.”
“The Holocaust Commission is not political,” Baum said. “But we have to understand why the Holocaust happened and be aware of the conditions that were right in Germany in the 1920s and ‘30s that made these things, these horrible things, happen.”
Last week, the FBI warned of a “broad threat” to New Jersey synagogues and located a man who the agency stated exhibited “an extreme amount of hate against the Jewish community.” Around the same time, NBA star Kyrie Irving made national headlines for not making an immediate apology for posting a link on his social media to a documentary that contained anti-Jewish sentiments.
“This should not be happening in a democracy,” Baum said.
“Wiesenthal” is one of six one-person, historical plays Dugan has written including “Shades of Gray” which spotlighted Robert E. Lee, “Frederick Douglass In The Shadow of Slavery,” and his most recent, “Tell Him It’s Jackie,” focusing on Jackie Kennedy.
Dugan has historians vet his scripts for historical accuracy.
“But each of my plays has been written and produced to be entertainment,” he said, “and my way of saying it is: If you’re not careful, you might learn something.”
Dugan isn’t Jewish, but his wife and two children are. Dugan was raised in an Irish Catholic family and his inspiration for “Wiesenthal” stemmed from his father’s experiences as being in an American military unit that liberated a concentration camp.
But “when I first started even thinking about writing about the Holocaust,” Dugan said, “I said to myself who wants to sit and listen to sad stories for 90 minutes.”
Then, he discovered that Wiesenthal was a pre-war amateur stand-up comedian.
It gave Dugan material to present more than Wiesenthal’s horrors.
“What is most surprising about the play to most audiences is how much they laugh,” Dugan said.
According to the Simon Wiesenthal Center, Wiesenthal was born in what is now Ukraine on Dec. 31, 1908. He graduated in 1932 from the Technical University of Prague after being rejected from a school closer to home because he was Jewish.
During the war, he and his wife were shipped to a series of forced labor and death camps before being liberated. While Wiesenthal and his wife survived, 89 of their relatives did not, including Wiesenthal’s mother.
“When history looks back,” Wiesenthal once said, “I want people to know the Nazis weren’t able to kill millions of people and get away with it.”
Wiesenthal later hosted students in an office he kept in Vienna. Dugan’s play is set in an office. Dugan, as Wiesenthal, speaks to the audience as if they were the last group he ever spoke to in the twilight of his life. Wiesenthal died in 2005.
“I’m not jumping into different characters, but he’s a good storyteller,” Dugan said. “So along the way, you’ll get to know his wife, and you’ll get to know certain war criminals based on the way that Simon tells the story.”
Colin Warren-Hicks, 919-818-8138, colin.warrenhicks@virginiamedia.com
