What is Jewish Theater? It may not surprise you to discover that there as many different answers to this question as there are Jews. And while I am not going to attempt to  answer it here, I am going to explore some of the questions one must ask in order to come up with a definition (as always, please feel free to react and respond through the contact page). 

       Is a play that has no Jewish characters or overt Jewish themes a piece of Jewish theater simply because the author was Jewish? Does a play that is written by a non-Jew but has themes that strike a Jewish nerve (bigotry, for example), count as a Jewish play? Does a biography of a person who happened to have been Jewish but whose Judaism has little importance to his/her life story count as a Jewish play? What about a play about Nazism or World War II that never mentions the Holocaust? 

     Ask twenty people who are involved in Jewish theater and you will get twenty answers. For example, many people would consider Lillian Hellman's "Watch On The Rhine" an important piece of Jewish theater.  Others would disagree, citing that although it was written by a Jewish woman and is about the resistance,  against the Nazis, there is neither a single Jewish character nor mention of the Holocaust. 

     On the other hand, something upon which every Jewish theater professional will agree is that there are many more plays out there that reflect the tapestry of Judaism than just "Fiddler On The Roof."  Sadly, except for those people who are avid theatergoers, most people believe that outside of that musical, all Jewish theater is Yiddish theater.  There are hundreds and hundreds of plays that examine the modern Jewish experience, Biblical stories, the State of Israel, historical figures and other aspects of Judaism that many people don't realize have been dramatized. Jewish theater encompasses musicals, dramas, comedies and every other genre of theater. 

     Jewish theater does not have to have one, unifying definition. What it does need is the support of audiences everywhere, so that the great tapestry of Jewish theater can be experienced by everyone.