Interview: Noga Flaishon of MEMORIAM at Main Street Theater

Main Street Theater is launching a very special production at its Rice Village location. It’s a world premiere, MEMORIAM, from March 29th through April 19th, and written by Noga Flaishon, a self-described "neurodivergent Israeli writer/producer based in London." The story concerns a company called Memoriam Incorporated that digitizes people's memories so customers can experience them fully, even feeling the sensations of past events.

There's a lead character named Rachel, and she's a memory buyer for this Memoriam company; she is going after the most important and personal acquisition she has ever dreamed of finding. It's the memories of the last holocaust survivor on earth, who also happens to be Rachel's own grandmother. It is about what memories mean, who owns them, and what we owe to future generations. The play was a recent finalist in the Jewish Playwrighting Project and looks to be an exciting blend of science fiction and searing drama. Broadway World writer Brett Cullum was excited to talk to Noga Flaishon about how MEMORIAM has come to premiere in Houston.  

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Brett Cullum: Let’s just start right at the beginning. What inspired you to write MEMORIAM?  

Noga Flaishon: It was during the pandemic, and I don't remember exactly what it was specifically. There wasn't a eureka moment, but I think it was an amalgamation of the fact that we all started living online a lot more because we were so detached from each other. The way that I saw everybody around using the memory of the Holocaust. You had anti-vaxxers wearing yellow stars, and I was like, “Really???!?? This is this the hill you want to die on?” Also, I spent a lot of the pandemic in Israel, a country that is, in a way, built on trauma. So all these things came together. And I think the ideas about memory, and how we edit and preserve our own memory, and how it intersects with technology. It must have been very alive in my mind at the time because two plays came out of it. One was MMEMORIAM, which is now seeing its world premiere, and the other was called LETHE. It's more heavily cyberpunk, and that one saw its premiere back in 2021 in the King's Head Theater in London.

Brett Cullum: I ran across LETHE in looking at your work, and it looked amazingly cool and sci-fi. So this is actually Memoriam’s first-ever staging? Is that correct? How did you connect with Main Street Theater in Houston? Did they approach you? Did you approach them? What was the story behind all of that?

Noga Flaishon: It was all thanks to the Jewish Playwriting Contest. Once more or less finished, I submitted it to the JPC for the 13th year they have run the competition. It ended up becoming one of the finalists, which meant that it got some amazing advocacy and support, dramaturgy, and opportunities to workshop with the JPC. The artistic director of Main Street Theater, the lovely Rebecca Greene Udden, is one of the readers of the Jewish Playwriting Contest. So she liked the play, and she got first dibs. 

Brett Cullum: You work and live in London. How did you end up there, of all places?

Noga Flaishon: This is gonna make me sound like the weirdest stalker in the entire world. But it happened because of David Tennant. Not just because of him, but that's a very roundabout way of explaining it. I was a big DOCTOR WHO fan, and I ended up watching him in a play on YouTube; I watched it in ten-minute increments [David Tenant’s] version of HAMLET. If you've never seen it, it is there online. It's a version of Hamlet with him as the titular Hamlet and Patrick Stewart as the father and the uncle. It was an incredible performance, and I remember back then I was still an actor, and I remember seeing that and thinking I want to do that. I wanna learn how to do that. I decided to take my chance and apply to schools over here, and I was lucky enough to be accepted into the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, where I did 3 years of training. After that, I stayed for a while. I tried to work for a while in the industry, and then, obviously, the pandemic hit. And that's where I pivoted into writing and producing. But the real story is that I came over here on a whim, and then I just fell in love with the city, and very slowly, my social circle transitioned here, and I like it here better than I do at home.

Brett Cullum: Where's home?

Noga Flaishon: Israel. Obviously, London is home, too, at this point. That's the expat thing. Israel is also home. Neither is completely home. Israel just feels very complicated right now, and I don't wanna…  tell you what… [trails off] Let's not get into that.

Brett Cullum: Okay, let's get into something more accessible and easier like DOCTOR WHO. You were a big fan, and now you work with the BBC on DOCTOR WHO projects. David Tennant should be very proud!   

Noga Flaishon: I grew up watching this thing. I feel like the ascended fangirl on this one. The story was that during the pandemic, so many things changed for me, and I was very bored. I was home, and my friends and I were all actors. We used to do a weekly Zoom Meeting where we would play party games on Zoom. It was so sad, but it was just like we missed each other. And then one day, I was like, “Listen, guys, we can play another game of Wordle, or whatever it was we were paying at the time, or I have an audio drama. Do you guys want to have a go and record it?”

The people I ran with at the time were so talented and wonderful, and we recorded my first audio drama, which was called MY FATHER PUNISHED ME WHEN I TALKED TO GHOSTS, which was based on a Creepypasta story. I created another one, and then I sent the next one to Big Finish. Because I was aware of them and their work, I knew that they were one of the biggest purveyors of audio content. And I really liked writing for audio. I found a really nice niche in there. So I approached them, and they said, “Sure, yeah, come on board. They gave me my first gig, producing the MISSY set. We released it last year, and It's called “Bad Influence.” Then, more production joined in with more opportunities to write, and I've been with Big Finish for almost three years now and am very happy. They do the DOCTOR WHO audio dramas. 

Brett Cullum: Okay. I also noticed on your website that you talked about a show called Zombies Run. What is that?

Noga Flaishon: It's an app that you play while running. It was created by SIX TO START and Naomi Alderman. She's the author of amazing works, such as THE POWER and THE FUTURE. She's an incredible science fiction writer, and working with her in any capacity has been such a learning experience. ZOMBIES RUN is a game where you download an episode, put on your earphones, and go on a run. You collect resources to build your base, and you run away from Zombies, and that's it. That's the show.

Brett Cullum: Back to MEMORIAM at Main Street Theatre because I could talk DOCTOR WHO and zombies all day, and we’d never get back on-topic. Are you actively advising them and making revisions as they rehearse this play?  

Noga Flaishon: “Ish” (makes a hand motion signaling “sort of”)! I sent them the script, and then the director and I had a few conversations about the script, where I outlined places where I thought I would like the emphasis to be put on. Also, I put notes to the director in the play. I gave it to somebody to read, and they were like, “Oh, it's looking like it's going to be 2 hours!” I was like, “No, it's supposed to be an hour and a half because you're supposed to be reading all the family scenes in Jewish fast speak.” This is just the thing that we do in my family, where we don't let anybody slip in a word! What you want to say. You get it out quickly because you don't know when somebody's going to interject you. I love my family so much. But we have a horrible discussion culture! Sometimes, debates in my family get aggressive.

Brett Cullum: But you are coming down here for the premiere? You're gonna be here opening night and everything?

Noga Flaishon: Yes, I'm very excited. I'm gonna be here. I'm gonna be there for a week. I'm flying in on the 22nd of March. I'm gonna see a few rehearsals. Obviously, it's a tricky thing, right? Because they've been creating this world of the play, which will definitely not be a hundred percent of what I imagine because they're different people. And it's going to be very interesting for me. Do I interject? I would like to. I really trust Main Street, and I really trust the artists that they chose. They all look incredible, so I reckon unless something screams at me like, “OH, MY GOD! THEY DIDN'T GET IT!” No, I really trust them. And I really looking forward to just sitting back and enjoying. 

Brett Cullum: They are one of the premier companies here in Houston. They do such great work, and it's a very intimate theater. I'm curious to see a sci-fi work there. Is MEMORIAM a very intimate play? Do you feel like it will work in a very small house?

Noga Flaishon: I looked at their house. It seems not small.

Brett Cullum: It's… well… it's smaller compared to the other theaters in Houston. (Brett imagines the Alley that seats 776 people on their mainstage, and the Hobby Center has a capacity of 2,650. Main Street, in comparison, has 92 seats!)

Noga Flaishon: You need to remember that I come from a pub theater background. I come from the King's head at the back of the pub, the Hope Theater at some attic, or the Edinburgh fringe in the back room of some hotel that they forgot they even had. These are the stages I'm used to. Main Street’s stage looks great!

Brett Cullum: It is a 3-quarter thrust, and it's a wonderful space as far as that goes. It's definitely not a nightclub. And their design team is amazing. So, I can't wait to see how they bring all of this to life. On a different note, are you going to meet with Jewish organizations and other theaters while you are here? The JCC participates in the Jewish Play Contest, and we have an incredible Holocaust museum. 

Noga Flaishon: I gotta be real with you. I looked up places to eat. I hear good things about Texas ribs, so they're good. I hear good things about Tex-Mex, and I hear good things about the meat. So I'm excited to try them. God, I'm so Jewish. Whenever I go anywhere, the first thing I'm excited about is trying the local food. We are a people excited about food.

Brett Cullum: I don't think that's necessarily Jewish. I'm excited about food three times a day! A lot of people are excited about food. (Brett starts imagining Tex-Mex and ribs!) Let's go back to MEMORIAM. What do you want? Audiences to walk away with? 

Noga Flaishon: So, at its core, MEMORIAM asks what space we give trauma in our day-to-day life and relationships with other people. Growing up in Israel, I can't remember exactly when I was told about the Holocaust. It just seemed like a thing that I had always known happened. It had a very central place in my upbringing. I think one thing I would like the audience to take away is I would like them to question how centralized the Holocaust is in their own identity as Jewish people. Non-Jews who watch the play? I would like them to question the media that they consume. Who benefits from it? Is the media that they consume exploitative? So much of the media that we consume right nowadays is built on that. Nowadays, we should strive for authenticity and demand a level of authenticity and vulnerability from creators and from the media we consume. I don't know how healthy it is [the current media]. I'm just asking questions, man.

Brett Cullum: Well, a good play is always gonna ask questions. I've been thinking a lot about generational trauma. It comes up a lot when discussing things because my spouse is part of a historically celebrated family. It's the Ingalls family from Little House on the Prairie. We talk about the stuff that they went through. How does that influence their family? Even the stuff that my non-famous family went through, you know? How does that impact me? Do you feel like you have this generational trauma that you kind of share?

Noga Flaishon: We all do. We we all we all have that, I think. The thing that is unique about people who come from a marginalized background is that the generational trauma is normally very, very deep-rooted. I think for people who come from marginalized communities; there is an element of generational trauma that is in everything we do. It's in the way that we think about our relationship with our parents. And it's in the way we think of our relationship to food, our bodies, and our relationships. It's in everything, and you often don't see it. You often don't feel it until something really traumatic happens and sort of forces you to look at that part of yourself. That is the lesson you learn from people trying to keep you safe. But those lessons may not be useful. Now.

Brett Cullum: Well, I was going to ask you about this concept of MEMORIAM and a company that will digitize memories, let you access them, feel them, and become part of you. Is there anybody you would want to have memories from your family, or would it be just celebrities like David Tennant who would live there?

Noga Flaishon: My mom was an Olympic gymnast. I would love to know what that felt like, although the level of anxiety that it must be being in the Olympics training room. It was probably it's probably a memory that was just full of anxiety. I would love to experience memories of, I don't know, like Serena Williams or somebody who's done something incredible and singular, and I would like to feel that moment. I am the best in the world at something.

Watching a memory of somebody who saves elephants for a living would be cool. Like watching them live, the memory of releasing an elephant into the wild is quite magical. Or even simple things like remembering, like experiencing the memory of somebody who gets to marry the love of their life. Can you imagine just putting on a visor and getting to experience that surge of dopamine for a second?

Brett Cullum: Yeah, it's interesting. Everybody has some sort of magic in them, and this whole concept makes it neat to think that we could experience other people's memories. Not only the Holocaust survivors and things like that, because obviously that is a generational trauma type thing, but also the happy times, too. Seeing the joy and things that pass down like that would be interesting. So I think it's very unique. Your voice is cool because it's taking this into a sci-fi kind of aspect. And that's something I've never seen with this material. So I am thrilled that Main Street is, gonna produce this one.

Noga Flaishon: So think about it if you have a leak in your house, right? You don't see the leak because you've been living in that house for so long, and the leak has been developing so slowly that you don't see it, and then somebody else comes into the house, and they see the house for the 1st time. So they go, “Oh, my God! This is a massive leak!” That's one of the things that placing things in a realm of sci-fi, horror, urban fantasy, or magical realism allows you to do. It allows you to look at something that is a part of your life, like that new person who walks into your house and sees the leak for the first time.

Brett Cullum: Oh, absolutely; thank you so much. Noga Flaishon.

MEMORIAM runs at Main Street Theater, the Rice Village location, from March 29th through April 19th, and I guess if we come on opening, we'll actually get to see you. I think I already have tickets for the opening!

Noga Flaishon: I promise that I am just as awkward in real life.

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