A Performance 100 Years in the Making

At Tel Aviv University’s theatre department, imposing ghostly white figures sing to an old woman on a stage designed like a surreal graveyard. This is the recent production of The Dybbuk, a comedic Yiddish play not performed since the turn of the century. The play is part of a sweeping inter-institutional project to restore popular Yiddish performance pieces and return them to the stage, led by TAU’s Dr. Ruthie Abeliovich. By bringing these plays into the 21st century, the researchers reveal truths about Jewish history and shed light on the critical cultural discussions that our modern Jewish community is still having today. 

Laughter Before the Tragedy 

Two lovers, an arranged marriage, and a demonic possession: many in the global Jewish community have heard of The Dybbuk, a Yiddish ghost story adapted to a famous play and even to a well-known kids’ movie (The Corpse Bride, Tim Burton). The play, by S. An-sky, is a tragedy about a doomed marriage and is considered an important piece of classical theatre. But not many know that decades before its creation, a comedy of the same title and themes, most notably made famous by playwright Joseph Latainer, swept through the Yiddish-speaking theatre world reaching millions of Jews. 

Likely because of their mass appeal to common audiences, it and many other popular Yiddish shows were delegitimized by intellectuals as “shund” —trash—and effectively erased from the cannon. The devaluation of popular cultural art is a phenomenon we still see today, despite its broad influence. 

“Studying these forgotten plays from the flourishing turn-of-the-century Yiddish theatre scene offers insight into the values, challenges and attitudes of the Jewish community at the time--and today."

Now, in a years-long project supported by a prestigious grant from the European Research Council, an international team of Yiddishists led by TAU Dr. Ruthie Abeliovitch of the Katz Faculty of Arts is resurrecting these forgotten dramas. “Studying these forgotten plays from the flourishing turn-of-the-century Yiddish theatre scene offers insight into the values, challenges and attitudes of the Jewish community at the time,” she says. “These shows were often developed in the New York Yiddish community and made their way to Europe. Because they were so popular, they give a window into mainstream mentalities all over the pre-Holocaust Jewish world—as well as revealing how we Jews today are still dealing with many of the same communal issues.”  

Instead of tragedy, Latainer's show ends in a wedding. (Photo: Tami Shaham)

The research, fittingly dubbed “DYBBUK”, encompasses many different facets. The researchers have digitized hundreds of pages of handwritten performance notes through a newly-developed AI interface; begun creating a database of scripts for public use; and mounted an innovative Hebrew-language performance of The Dybbuk through TAU’s Department of Theatre Arts and the Buchmann-Mehta School of Music. 

100 Years Later, The Dybbuk Hits the Stage 

Latainer’s The Dybbuk: in the Clutches of Fanaticism follows Amelia, a young Jewish woman in love with her French teacher, a secular Jew named Leon. Her religious grandmother, however, has promised her to the local rabbi in exchange for his blessings. With assistance from Leon’s servant, Falik, the couple makes a desperate attempt to elope but is soon apprehended by the rabbi and his followers. In the end, the rabbi is exposed as a fraud, and Amelia and Leon get married.  

The show deals with themes that follow us to this day: tradition vs. modernization; duty to community vs. individual fulfillment; the gendered politics of marriage, and more.  

Drawing from a number of different accounts of productions, TAU staged a truly one-of-a-kind musical theatre performance. In translating and adapting to modern Hebrew, the team aimed to incorporate Yiddish as a living language and culture. This meant designing sets and costumes, composing music, adapting scripts and directing actors all in a way that would be recognizable and entertaining to audiences both 100 years ago and today. Many of the artists and all of the performers were TAU theatre and music students; the department also worked with Yonatan Levy, a professional director, Noam Enbar, a musical composer, and Shirly Marom, the project producer. 

In a dream, the ghost of Amelia's mother tells her grandmother that she must let Amelia marry as she wishes. (Photo: Tami Shaham)

Going Digital 

To recreate the show for adaptation, the researchers cross-referenced pages upon pages of notebooks recounting multiple different productions and versions of The Dybbuk. Since many were from over 100 years ago and not always well-preserved, these prompting notebooks—containing scripts, stage directions, musical cues, and annotations—presented a challenge. The team met that challenge with a modern solution: they created a new AI tool. Though handwriting recognition software is well established, no such deciphering model existed for Yiddish handwriting, especially on weathered pages.  

“The plan is to make Yiddish plays, music, and art publicly available, so that these once-beloved works can live again."

Through detailed, painstaking work, the team trained a new machine-learning model that could digitize the prompting notebooks. To date, they have digitized over 700 pages of notes and made their software available to other Yiddishists for other restoration projects. Their data has also become the basis for the development of other Yiddish handwriting recognition programs. The digital project was led by Dr. Sinai Rusinek. 

In addition to The Dybbuk, nearly 15 other plays have been transcribed and uploaded to an open database so that anyone can access and perform them. “The plan is to continue growing the database and making plays, music, historical insights, recordings and other aspects of Yiddish art publicly available,” says Dr. Abeliovitch, “so that these once-beloved works can live again.”