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Don't Feel Guilty If Stereotypes In 'Jewtopia' Leave You Laughing

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By DAVE SIMANOFF, The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 1, 2007

TAMPA - Jewish-American humor is all around us.

Artists such as Mel Brooks, Woody Allen and Jerry Seinfeld have injected a decidedly Jewish-American perspective into their works. Consider the self-deprecating humor, the neuroses, the outsider's constant desire to fit in, the fascination with wordplay and arguments, the uncut umbilical cords.

And don't forget the Yiddish. There must be Yiddish.

'Jewtopia,' the new play that opened last week in the Jaeb Theater at the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center, doesn't just continue the experience of Jewish-American comedy. It compounds it. The play isn't just a story told from a Jewish-American perspective - it's a story about the modern Jewish-American experience.

The distinction is significant. Brooks' 'Blazing Saddles' is a western satire and a story about an outsider winning over the establishment with his wits. 'Annie Hall' is a triumph of sharp dialogue. There's a Jewish sensibility to the stories, but the plots aren't about Jewishness.

As the house lights began to dim at the Jaeb on Friday night, I wondered if the double dose of Jewish-American humor and themes in 'Jewtopia' would mean big laughs - or if the effect would be the same as slipping your prescription sunglasses over your regular prescription glasses. (If you've never done this, don't try it. It's a shortcut to a headache.)

The show begins quickly, with two young men attempting to pick up women at a synagogue mixer. One, Adam, is Jewish and unlucky in love. He is sick of being set up.

'My mother set me up on a blind date with her gynecologist,' he whines. 'That's wrong. Just think where that woman's been!'

The other man, Chris, isn't Jewish but is pretending to be in order to land Jewish dates because, he claims, he doesn't like making his own decisions. Chris needs Adam's help to appear more Jewish and to court the woman of his dreams. Adam needs Chris' help to get more dates.

The two form a pact to help each other, which carries the show through the first act and the first part of the second act.

At some point after intermission, 'Jewtopia' starts to ask some weighty questions: First, what does it mean to be a Jew? Then, what does it mean to be happy? The answers are left to the audience.

The lead actors, Christopher Rutherford and Curtis Belz, are excellent - animated but never over the top. The play is smartly written, running on in places but never getting stale. Chris and Adam's first foray into Jewish online dating is riotous, as is a family Seder scene in the second act. Toward the end, there are singing and sequins - but not so much to make anyone think he has ended up at 'Mamma Mia.'

The play trots out every stereotype of Judaism imaginable. Some of these stereotypes have become so commonplace that it's hard to be offended by them anymore - the overbearing, guilt-inducing Jewish mother, for example. Others were simply ridiculous - Jews controlling the media and world banks - and were brought out simply to be dismissed.

I was relieved to see that the audience appeared to laugh with the actors, not at them, when Jewish-American habits and behaviors were mocked.

Sadly, 'Jewtopia' doesn't show a lot of sensitivity for members of other minorities.

The play deserves a black eye for having its one Asian character, a doctor, talk like Hop Sing on 'Bonanza.' There's also an unnecessary and uncomfortable discussion between the two main characters about the use of a certain Yiddish derogatory term for black people.

These faults don't outshadow 'Jewtopia's' highlights, but in 2007, they're cheap and hollow ways to get a laugh from an audience.

THEATER REVIEW

Jewtopia

WHAT: Comedy about a gentile's quest to marry a Jewish woman

WHEN: Through Nov. 11; 7:30 p.m. Wednesday through Friday and 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday and Sunday

WHERE: Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center, Jaeb Theater, 1010 N. MacInnes Place, Tampa

TICKETS: $38.50; (813) 229-7827 or www.tbpac.org

Reporter Dave Simanoff can be reached at (813) 259-7762 or dsimanoff@tampatrib.com.

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