My Name Is Asher Lev
My Name Is Asher Lev
By Aaron Posner
Directed by Mark Edward Smith
Mad Cow Theater, Orlando FL</strong>
Asher Lev (Michael Frishman) is a nice Jewish boy. Raised in the Hassidic Kosher streets of Brooklyn he loves his parents but they don’t “get” him. His dad travels the world building Yeshivas, his mother wants to take up Russian Studies, and while they all pursue their personal grails he’s dismissed for his artistic skills. They kvetch, they argue, and they heap shame on each other higher than the Brooklyn Bridge. Eventually the local rabbi does the kind thing; he hooks Asher up with abstract expressionist Jake Kahn. Ethnically pure yet unobservant, Kahn takes on Asher as an apprentice and teaches him the fine points of Madonna, Crucifixions and painting naked ladies. It’s a classic immigrant story: suppress your talent and stay with your roots or suppress you heritage and become something greater than just another mensch arguing the Talmud.
Fishman is brilliant yet accessible as Asher. He’s on stage constantly in this 90 minute near monolog. He’s charming, guilt-ridden and eager to please. Opposite him we find a blindingly brutal Brian Brightman as the heartless father who sees nothing beyond piety as worthy of a Jew. Brightman’s also the fallen Kahn; and in one role beats Judaism into Asher and in the other he attempts to beat it out of him. Sara Oliva hosts equally bipolar roles: her best moments come as the Jewish mother who can see outside of her small world; but she also shines as the foul mouthed gallery owner and the seduction-free model. Each point of this triangle is equally unyielding, and when it’s over, there only one separate but equal truth for each of these three. Fortunately the points on this Jewish throwing star all aim in wildly different directions granting us a Holy Roller coaster ride of angst and tough decisions and never once are we stranded in the midst of Tolstoy’s dreadfully happy families.
For more information on Mad Cow, please visit http://www.madcowtheatre.com
