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Baruch Spinoza (Marco Naggar) and Clara van den Enden (Kate Huffman) in New Jerusalem. Photo by Hope Burleigh. |
By Ed Rampell
The censorial impulse has always been with us, from the Spanish Inquisition to the Salem Witch Trials to Peter Zenger’s trial to the post-World War I Palmer Raids to the Scopes Monkey Trial to the Stalinist Moscow Show Trials to the House Un-American Activities/McCarthy Era purges, and so on. Throughout history the “heretic,” the “apostate,” the free thinker, the non-conformist, has often faced persecution by orthodox defenders of the established order who fear the status quo is being threatened by new, different ideas. David Ives’ New Jerusalem takes a searing look at an archetypal seer facing excommunication by no less than two powers that be.
Philosopher Baruch Spinoza (Marco Naggar) was born in 1632 in the Dutch Republic of Amsterdam, where his family had fled from Portugal, with its inquisition and forced conversions of Jews. What is now Holland has long enjoyed a reputation for the kind of tolerance which Spinoza preached, and Amsterdam, of course, is where Anne Frank’s family sought refuge from fascism’s gathering deluge 400 years later. While the Netherlands granted these Sephardic wandering Jews more liberty than the auto-de-fes of Portugal and Spain, Amsterdam’s Jewish population experienced what’s been called a sort of second class citizenship, not unlike what blacks encountered in the segregated South.
Spinoza sprang out of this social milieu, and by the time he was 23 evolved a “heretical” philosophy that challenged the precepts of the Old and New Testaments. In a nutshell, Spinoza argued in favor of logic and rational thought against superstition and was a major Enlightenment theorist. Not surprisingly, the dominant majority Christian culture seemed to feel jeopardized by Spinoza’s radical precepts. Spinoza posed a double-edged dilemma for Amsterdam’s Jewry (or at least its establishment) which felt not only ideologically endangered, but, as a minority, perceived its tenuous position in a foreign land was being imperiled by what the majority viewed as apostasy coming from the strangers in their midst. Dutch Jews, or at least their leaders, felt like they were between the proverbial rock and hard place.
This is the stuff that makes for heady drama: The clash of ideas plus a trial, which is inherently confrontational, generating the conflict tragedies thrive on. Some, however, may find the play to be talky, especially act one, with its exposition; act two moves at a brisker pace. Jerome Lawrence and Robert Edwin Lee’s similarly themed 1955 play about a teacher of evolution being put on trial, Inherit the Wind, was filmed four times, most memorably in 1960 by Stanley Kramer. But alas, poor 23-year-old Spinoza had no Spencer Tracy/Clarence Darrow type character defending him.
Perceived as a sort of witch doctor, Spinoza needs a spin doctor to defend him as he debates Amsterdam’s chief rabbi, Saul Levi Mortera (Richard Fancy), and Gaspar Rodrigues Ben Israel (Shelly Kurtz), a parnas (president or trustee) of the congregation of Talmud Torah. Spinoza’s expulsion hearing of took place there, in Amsterdam’s foremost synagogue, in July 1656. Amsterdam regent Abraham van Valkenburgh (Tony Pasqualini) observes -- if not presides over -- the proceedings to determine whether or not Spinoza should be forever banished by the Jews with a kherem (somewhat similar to an Islamic fatwa).
Unlike the Scopes Monkey Trial, which was actually broadcast on live radio during the 1920s, little remains of the record of the actual inquiry (although the chilling verdict remains). Having no trial transcripts, the playwright conjures up dialogue and the action of various characters, who spy on and testify against Spinoza, including his Dutch friend, the painter Simon de Vries (Todd Cattell), his half-sister, Rebekah (Brenda Davidson) and a female friend who Spinoza seems sweet on but can’t properly woo because she’s Christian. Conflicted Clara van den Enden (Kate Huffman) valiantly tries to defend the thinker.
The ensemble acting is adroitly, tautly directed by Elina de Santos. The sparring between the philosopher and his interrogators, especially the rabbi, is electric. Sparks fly as an anguished Mortera faces off against his former pupil, while Kurtz’s parnas likewise delivers a bravura performance. The rabbi’s philosophical conclusions in the face of his ex-student’s reasoning is surprising -- and quite troubling: Spinoza must be expelled not because he lies, and is wrong, but because he tells the truth and is right. So the victims of expulsion go on to practice expulsion themselves.
Naggar’s prophet outcast alternately comes across as priggish, smug, self-absorbed, self-righteous, brilliant and brashly hubristic in that youthful, exuberant way. Naggar hails from Geneva, the Swiss city with a long human rights history that’s currently celebrating the birth there of another of the Age of Reason’s top philosophes, Jean-Jacques Rousseau. As the Jewish leaders, a bearded Fancy and Kurtz (a Yeshiva University grad!) are also standouts, delivering Ives’ zingers with gusto and angst, as their characters whine on about Spinoza’s temerity in thinking for himself.
Stephanie Kerley Schwartz’s set is spot on, creating a sense of being in a Jewish temple with Sephardic roots, where most if not all of the action takes place. However, Schwartz’s modern dress costuming presented a conundrum for this reviewer. On the one hand, this breaks the illusion of the fourth wall. Theatre, film, TV, etc., can take spectators to another time and place, long ago and far away, but when Mr. Pasqualini’s Valkenburgh appears in a snazzy three piece suit and tie, the aud’s “willing suspension of disbelief” (as poet Samuel Coleridge put it) is shattered.
On the other hand, this contemporary aspect could be an attempt to create a Bertolt Brecht-like “alienation effect,” intended to snap viewers out of the reverie that they are seeing real life unfold before their eyes, when in fact, they are merely watching a staged rendition of reality. Therefore, spectators should assess the play as a work of art using their logic (a true Spinozan perspective!), instead of via emotions caused by empathizing with characters, the plot’s plight points, etc.
Having said that, I feel that the modern dress costuming is a blunder, and note that according to photos in a N.Y. Times review, the cast wore period costumes in a 2008 off-Broadway production of Ives’ drama. Furthermore, the current version’s own graphic likewise depicts a figure in 17th century garb. As for authenticity, only a few experts and sticklers for absolute accuracy would demand costly costuming completely faithful to that era’s fashions. In fact, mere black robes would have served as appropriate garb for some characters.
But this is a mere quibble, and the West Coast Jewish Theatre’s production is a thought provoking evocation of the thought police -- then and now. Last year WCJT also presented the anti-Nazi plays The God of Isaac and Arthur Miller’s Broken Glass. In addition to being an ethicist, Spinoza was a lens grinder, a symbolic calling for a man who set out to make humanity see the truth, and for one finally ground down before his time. To find out why Albert Einstein said he “believe[d] in the god of Spinoza,” don’t miss New Jerusalem -- a shining city on a theatrical hill.
New Jerusalem runs through April 1 at the Pico Playhouse, 10508 W. Pico Blvd., L.A., CA 90064. For more information: Call 323/821-2449;http://www.wcjt.org/.
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