CODE: 197 DWB Set for Hollywood Fringe Festival

A World Premiere, Debut Solo Show Endeavor: June 4th (PRESS PREVIEW, 4 p.m.) June 10th 8:30 p.m. (OPENING NIGHT) June 16th 5:30 p.m., June 19th 6 p.m., and June 24th 10:30 p.m. (CLOSING NIGHT) All shows are 60 minutes and will be performed at Asylum @ Studio C, 6488 Santa Monica Blvd, Hollywood, CA 90038.

Benny Lee Harris Lumpkins Jr, a.k.a. Ben-El David, a.k.a Benny Weinberg, or is it Benny Lee Harris Weinberg-Lumpkins Jr., or Benjamin ben Benjamin what ever it is, is blewish, a.k.a. black and jewish. Oy Vey! or Sababa!? Either way, the struggle is real. Benny has heard it all from "How are you Jewish?", to "You're not really Jewish, are you?"

Born in the home of the world's first Jewish Crime Family, The Purple Gang, Benny's early Jewish influences were all around him. As a young kid in the mean streets of Detroit, the Jewish curiosities began with a high school english teacher, Mr. Daniel Sheehy. Why was he never at work? What was that funny thing he wore on his head all the time? What's a shmuck?

As an adolescent, and the final flight of Detroit Jews from the inner city to the suburbs was complete, Benny had lost touch with his Jewish friends, and their sense of community and ideologies. Fast forward to an era of new enlightenment for Benny and a hunger to regain his early Jewish inspirations, Benny began his adulthood journey into Judaism.

Would Benny have to forget his former life in order to find the answers he was looking for in Judaism? "Why Judaism?" Is their really a God? What's this Jesus thing all about?

Its time to answer these questions and more at the only Oneg at the Hollywood Fringe Festival 2016.

Special appearance by Vocal Ensemble "Diversidad."

Now in its thirteenth year, BLJ Productions, formerly known as Lumpy-Cramp© Productions, is dedicated to producing original, bold, and imaginative events that explore an alternative to the normal theatrical scene and stretching the regular definition of political theatre or using art for politics. Its 2003 event "America's Sexual Mastication," opened to a standing room only audience and launched the careers of Benny Lee Harris Lumpkins Jr,. Originally based in Norfolk, VA BLJ Productions, has retooled and relocated to Los Angeles.

Directed, performed, written, designed and produced by Benny Lee Harris Lumpkins Jr., Code: 197 DWB (Driving While Bl-ewish) Black and Jewish, will premiere this June as part of the 2016 Hollywood Fringe Festival. The festival serves as "an annual celebration of emerging artists in Los Angeles" - hollywoodfringe.org and runs June 9 - 26.

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