Distant Survivors
60 Minutes
4 Males, 1 Female, Max/Min cast 5
Poetic Drama, Simple Set| Cast Size: | |
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Time: 1990’s
Place: Bremerhaven, Germany
Set: Stage R – a stool; Stage RC – a ladder; Stage C – a bench; Stage L – a small black platform (or black cubes)
Lighting: white and steely blue
Pre-set: on bench and dock area
House music: Eastern European folk music; begins about 10 minutes prior to starting time.
SCENE ONE: Bremerhaven
House music fades and house lights go out.
LIGHTS: The bench and dock area comes up to full. The Man enters from Stage R, moving toward platform area. He’s holding a map.
MAN:
Canes and armless coats
haunt these German streets
I force myself to walk.
Factories smoke the sky….
A few days ago,
I saw those Bremerhaven graves.
Unadorned stones
honor our simpler dust.
I almost knelt to save
a leaf of ivy. I even heard
the dead were glad
that I’d returned.
Man climbs up onto the platform. He moves to its edge and looks out.
The line of WWI veterans,
My mother’s father among them,
stood at attention on a Bremerhaven dock.
Gusts of brine wind lapped
at the Fuhrer’s black leather coat,
but he took his time,
took each man’s hands in his own,
thanked each for his sacrifice.
.
.For the first time, a woman is allowed to see
her wounded husband, brought back from the East.
She finds him mutilated, missing an ear,
half his face, an arm. “It’s the Jews,”
she screams. “it’s all the Jews’ fault.”
Man comes off the platform and sits down on bench.
He looks toward the audience.
The Zeiders American Dream Theater, Jan 24 - Feb 14, 2019
4509 Commerce Street Virginia Beach, Virginia 23462
In this poetic drama, we see the past through the eyes of a German-American who looks back on his ancestral heritage and tries to come to terms with it. He encounters voices and embodiments of World War II, like echoes from the past and tries to find answers where there are only shadows. Distant Survivors was conceived and adapted for the stage by director June Prager, based on Holocaust poetry by William Heyen.
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Play Details
Time: 1990’s
Place: Bremerhaven, Germany
Set: Stage R – a stool; Stage RC – a ladder; Stage C – a bench; Stage L – a small black platform (or black cubes)
Lighting: white and steely blue
Pre-set: on bench and dock area
House music: Eastern European folk music; begins about 10 minutes prior to starting time.
SCENE ONE: Bremerhaven
House music fades and house lights go out.
LIGHTS: The bench and dock area comes up to full. The Man enters from Stage R, moving toward platform area. He’s holding a map.
MAN:
Canes and armless coats
haunt these German streets
I force myself to walk.
Factories smoke the sky….
A few days ago,
I saw those Bremerhaven graves.
Unadorned stones
honor our simpler dust.
I almost knelt to save
a leaf of ivy. I even heard
the dead were glad
that I’d returned.
Man climbs up onto the platform. He moves to its edge and looks out.
The line of WWI veterans,
My mother’s father among them,
stood at attention on a Bremerhaven dock.
Gusts of brine wind lapped
at the Fuhrer’s black leather coat,
but he took his time,
took each man’s hands in his own,
thanked each for his sacrifice.
.
.For the first time, a woman is allowed to see
her wounded husband, brought back from the East.
She finds him mutilated, missing an ear,
half his face, an arm. “It’s the Jews,”
she screams. “it’s all the Jews’ fault.”
Man comes off the platform and sits down on bench.
He looks toward the audience.
The Zeiders American Dream Theater, Jan 24 - Feb 14, 2019
4509 Commerce Street Virginia Beach, Virginia 23462