Frank Blocker to Star in New York City Premiere of GOOD JEW at United Solo Festival

Direct from hurricane-ravaged Florida, Peculiar Works Project will present Frank Blocker as Holocaust survivor Henryk Altman in Good Jew, Official Selection of the 2022 United Solo Festival. Written by Murray Scott Changar and Frank Blocker, this verbatim solo play is based on multiple interviews with the late Mr. Changar's late father, Henryk, and directed by Jamibeth Margolis, granddaughter of Holocaust survivors.

Good Jew will be performed ONE NIGHT ONLY on Wednesday, November 16, 2022, 7:00pm EDT, at the Theater Row Theater, 410 West 42nd Street, New York, NY. The show runs 70 minutes, and extremely limited $42.50 tickets are available at https://bfany.org/theatre-row/shows/united-solo-theatre-festival-2022/.

There will never be enough stories of Holocaust survival, but there are none like the ones of Henryk Altman. He navigated World War II using false papers, ingenuity, guile, and was blessed with a lot of luck, traveling through Poland, Russia, Ukraine, and Denmark, even passing through Germany at the height of the war. Continually avoiding and denying his own heritage, Henryk's journey offers hope and humor, as he gets away with... well, a lot of things.

He escaped the Treblinka death-camps, twice, joined the Resistance, navigated from the ghettos of Warsaw, through Germany and onto Norway, but Henryk Altman doesn't see himself as a Good Jew. No one survives war by being good.

Frank Blocker has performed solo works throughout the US for more than 20 years, and he brings Henryk to penetrating life, revealing the chards of courage and perseverance that push him on. An award-winning playwright and Drama Desk Award-nominated performer, he is best known for character roles and multiple personalities in solo performances. He recently rode out Hurricane Ian at home in Naples, Florida with his rescued greyhound Razmus, where he is the Film and Theatre Director at Centers for the Arts Bonita Springs.

Co-author Murray Scott Changar is Henryk's son. Blocker and Changar were partners in theatre and in life until Changar's passing a decade ago. The two worked together as editors of the Stage THIS! series of short play collections and Blocker edited Changar's only novel, sci-fi thriller The Slaves of Votarus. Changar has the distinction that all the plays he wrote have made their way to production, including The Gates of Helen which premiered at Whole World Theatre in Atlanta, a year prior to his death.

The senior Changar (Henryk Altman) was a man with a quick wit, many skills, and the ability to speak four languages. When the son passed only a few years after his father, Blocker feared the project they had begun together would fade along with the rich and powerful stories that Henry held in his memories. Blocker developed the play over the pandemic years, until the opportunity arose to work with director Jamibeth Margolis, herself a granddaughter of Holocaust survivors. Her commitment to these stories and her style of directing are a match not to be missed.

With nearly twenty years of professional experience in theater and opera, Margolis is both a theatre director and casting director based in New York City. She casts for several prestigious theaters and opera companies around the US including the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene, Plaza Theatricals, and New City Music Theatre. Theatrical directing credits include: National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene's Broadway: A Jewish American Legacy gala event, The Whole Megillah at 54 Below, and Jekyll and Hyde at the Arvada Center Theatre. Margolis and Blocker met when she directed the musical Alice by William Wade, for which Blocker wrote the book. The Stage Manager is Jared Six.

The play is being produced by Peculiar Works Project of New York. Blocker worked with PWP on their OBIE Award-winning production of West Village Fragments/East Village Fragments that took over the streets of lower Manhattan for two summers and on The Don Quixote Project which took over the Merchants Building's 13th floor and involved 100 artists and performers. Since 1993, PWP has originated both intimate theatrical works and large-scale performance events, favoring the use of multi-media. www.peculiarworks.org

Now in its 13th year, the annual United Solo Theatre Festival is the world's largest solo theatre festival, and features shows from across the country and around the world. Produced in conjunction with Peculiar Works Project, the development of Good Jew is thanks in part to readings and workshops at Live Arts! Collaboration at University Settlement on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, The Art House in Midtown Manhattan, and AG Contemporary Art Studio in downtown New York.

Performance Details:

Wednesday, November 16, 2022 @ 7:00pm

United Solo Theatre Festival
Theatre Row
410 West 42nd Street
New York, NY 10036

212-714-2442 ext. 45

boxoffice@theatrerow.org

Tickets: $42.50

https://bfany.org/theatre-row/shows/united-solo-theatre-festival-2022/

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