By Greggory Moore, Curtain Call Columnist
Seventy-three years after the liberation of the last concentration camp, the Holocaust continues to be a world historical presence, a phenomenon reflected in the continual parade of works based the 20th century’s most infamous crime. A Splintered Soul joined that parade in 2005 with its tale of a small group of Jewish immigrants searching for their place in 1947 San Francisco, where they struggle to reconcile the desperate acts that helped them survive wartime Poland with this new world of ethics and morality.
After losing his wife and children to the Nazis, Rabbi Simon Kroeller (Stephen Rockwell) became a self-described “freedom fighter,” a real one-man wrecking crew à la Rambo. Having spearheaded a train-bombing that resulted in the death of innocent people, he knows a thing or two about trying to live with oneself in the wake of regretful behavior, so he founded a support group for similarly haunted souls and works to live a life of peaceful service. But when Elisa (Quinn Francis) and Harold (Brandon Root) come to him with tales of continuing victimization at the hands of a war profiteer who is beyond the reach of new-world justice, Simon wrestles with whether he is duty-bound to return to his old ways.
It’s not a bad premise, but its execution is fatally flawed, with playwright Alan L. Brooks simply skipping over any plot point or substantive question that gets in the way of where he wants to go. Perhaps the most egregious example involves a mock trial the group holds concerning Elisa and Harold’s alleged victimizer. Simon consults his friend Martin (Louis A. Lotorto), a judge, to learn about American jurisprudence. While Martin holds forth on several legal fine points, he entirely neglects to mention the presumption of innocence and the accused’s right to a defense, which even a layperson like you knows are the cornerstones to our legal process.
Just as dubious as the judge’s omitting this is Simon’s assessment of Holocaust victims. Central to A Splintered Soul is the idea that Holocaust survivors did not actually escape, as their memories “are sharp slivers embedded in the soul,” forever injuring them and spurring them to act in ways that may not be for the best. But in making this case, Simon says—not once, but twice—that those who perished in the death camps were not true victims. “The real victims of the Holocaust,” he says, “were not the victims who died, but those who survived and continue to live.” Think there’s ever been a rabbi who would even imply that the people who died in Auschwitz were not real victims?
The script’s many faults don’t prevent the cast from delivering Brooks’s dialog in earnest. And while they can be a bit too earnest at times (Rockwell’s intensity is sometimes at 7 or 8 when it ought to be closer to 4), they get an “A” for effort. Lotorto is particularly good in an angry exchange with the rabbi. Director Mayra Mazor also does solid work, keeping things from being too static in a play that could easily fall victim to being too talky.
Perhaps the production’s best element is Yuri Okahana’s set design. Despite the play’s action taking place entirely in Simon’s apartment (with small bits in the recesses of his mind), Okahana has given us a multilevel space with a barbed-wire backdrop evoking the camps, along with recesses of space filled by luggage and shoes. Although these spaces are never used or even alluded to, no-one should fail to miss these evocations of the property—artifacts of their former lives—confiscated from the Jews. It’s a powerful touch.
Act Two opens with chronologically disembodied moments in which two refugees come to Simon with confessions of their wartime acts. Simon’s handling of these damaged souls is in keeping with the best of rabbinical tradition, full of wisdom, pathos, and even humor. Had Brooks built his characters and drama from here, perhaps A Splintered Soul could have quietly supported the weight of its subject. As it is, this is only a standout scene in a play that never quite works.
A Splintered Soul at International City Theatre
Times: Thurs-Sat 8:00 p.m. and Sun 2:00 p.m.
The show runs through Nov. 4
Cost: $47-$49
Details: (562) 436-4610, ICTLongBeach.org
Venue: Beverly O’Neill Theatre, 300 E. Ocean Blvd., Long Beach