The Clyde Fitch Report: With so much geopolitical focus on Israel and Palestine, plus surging and virulent anti-Semitism in Europe, Barry Levey must be awed by his own sense of timing. The writer-actor’s solo play about Holocaust denial, Hoaxocaust!, runs in this summer’s New York international Fringe Festival following a development process involving no fewer than four Off- and Off-Off-Broadway companies. Well, maybe “thrilled” is the wrong word. If the timing of Hoaxocaust! really is that good, things must be bad right now for the Jews.
3 comments:
What got me about this article was definitely the shock value of the word 'Hoaxocost'. However, I find that there is definitely an intelligent argument to be made starting from such an insane concept. Now I haven't seen the play, but to me the issue addressed in the 4th question seemed to get at something important; how easily it is for people to buy a crazy idea. Levey is correct in saying that the most believable arguments of claims against a highly documented event all seem as if they could be true, but aren't. That may sound like a simple and obvious idea, but it's a powerful one. False trivia, like the pen and ink example, can put doubt in any person who doesn't have a working knowledge of an event like the holocaust. Writing a play where people in the audience are forced to examine what they believe can help immunize people against falling victim to false trivia, and this can only be a good thing.
I enjoyed the question/answer format of the article, because it allowed me to gain perspective not only on the play 'Hoaxocaust' but also the writer-actor Barry Levey and how his perspective influences his playwriting. He has a quite blunt and comedic speech, which I can imagine translates quite well into his writing. There seem to be more and more writers entering the theatrical universe with the intent to broaden their audience's perspective. But the people who will go to watch 'Hoaxocaust' already have a wide view of the world; if Barry could invite a better range of viewership, then he could accomplish what seems to be the goal of his piece of theater.
I love this concept, and I think the writer handles it well. Obviously this satiric and it's a good reminder that we can laugh both in the face of tragedy but at the ridiculous deniers.
However, the scariest part is also the truest. These holocaust deniers can plant seeds of doubt by sprouting so-called facts.
If I were to create a theatre piece about deniers, I would explore the part of them that created these lies. Are they lies to them? Are they actually true to them? Is their hatred so blinding that they cannot see what's before their own eyes?
A page of my history was torn out because of the Holocaust--I will never know what my relatives were like, or what their favorite color was. Some say the Holocaust should stop raising its head in art--that it is overused. But I disagree, and this is a funny and poignant way to look at the modern-day situation in relation to that tragedy many years ago.
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