By Joel Magalnick, Editor, JTNews
Note: The name of the theater company’s fall production has been corrected to Tales of Chelm.
When the Seattle Jewish Theater Company did its first of four performances of Tales the Chelm a month ago, it marked the official answer to a question Art Feinglass asked when he first arrived in town a little over a year ago: “Would [there] be enough interest to make the company worth trying?”
With one spring production under its belt, another spring production, the Tony-winning Last Night in Ballyhoo in the wings, and Tales the Chelm, stories based on The World of Sholem Aleichem, slated next for the launch of the Washington State Jewish Historical Society’s gala on Nov. 6, Feinglass is busy. And that’s not to mention the New York-based murder mystery and corporate training businesses he owns and runs from Seattle.
It is those two businesses that Feinglass has run over the past 20 years that gives him the eye for talent and how that talent should be utilized.
“I’m finding the actors very good. I’ve got a combination of professional actors — you can see the expertise — and amateur actors, community theater actors,” he says. “One woman in my company has 40 shows to her credit, one guy has 70.”
For the time being, the money
problems that have long beset Seattle’s theater community — and resulted in the
shuttering of the Intiman Theatre earlier this year — are not on this company’s radar screen. The budget is very small — most of it comes out of Feinglass’s pocket: “We’re talking hundreds of dollars,” he says. “Everybody’s working for nothing.”
He said, however, that he does try to pay the musicians. The troupe uses existing spaces at places like the auditorium
at the University Prep high school next to Temple Beth Am or, next month, Temple B’nai Torah. Partnerships like these also help to bring in new audiences, whether they’re Jewish or not.
“We’re on the same side here,” Feinglass says. “I think that partnering works well, it’s also a good way to get the different components of the community working together.”
He has found one surprise with the creation of the company: “How receptive and welcoming audiences have been,” he said. “People are really ready for a Seattle Jewish theater company. I was hoping they would be.”