The Lawrence Family Jewish Community Center’s award-winning J*Company Youth Theatre is set to open a musical titled “Yours, Anne,” based upon the diary of Anne Frank and a play by Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett. Enid Futterman wrote the libretto and Michael Cohen, the music. The show plays Dec. 2-10 at the JCC’s David and Dorothea Garfield Theatre, 4126 Executive Drive.
Along with other family members and friends, the pubescent Anne Frank was hidden in an Amsterdam warehouse prior to their discovery by the Nazis. Though Frank perished, her diary, written over two years’ time, was discovered by a family friend, survived and was published, becoming emblematic of the Nazi eradication of Jews in Europe. Full of hope and longing for life and love, the diaries have been subject of many films and television specials.
Director Joey Landwehr, who stages “Yours, Anne,” asked each J*Company cast member to read “Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl” prior to commencement of rehearsals. To lend further authenticity to the production and deepen the actors’ understanding, the J*Company is being advised by La Jolla resident and Holocaust survivor Dr. Edith Eva Eger, whose story remarkably parallels that of Frank. In addition, she will share her Holocaust experience with the opening night audience following the Dec. 2 performance.
Eger, a clinical psychologist who moved to La Jolla from Texas in 1992, says she is often referred to as the Anne Frank who survived. Her parents died at Auschwitz, but she was saved at the time the camp was liberated by a young soldier who noticed her hand moving as she lay with others in a mass grave. She has dedicated her life to instilling a sense of resiliency and purpose in young people, and is a frequent commencement speaker. She believes that one may choose whether to be a lifelong victim or a survivor.
As they huddled in the cattle car on the way to Auschwitz, her mother said, “No matter what happens, remember this: No one can take away from you what is in your mind.”
“Whenever I don the gown to speak at commencements, I think of Anne Frank,” Eger said. “I think she would be proud of what I’ve done.”
As for the J*Company, Eger, who’s been working with them regularly, was set to have dinner with them on Nov. 16.
“They call me grandma,” she said, “and you know, children may not listen to their parents, but they listen to their grandma.”
“Yours, Anne” plays Thursday, Saturday and Sunday, Dec. 2-10. Schedule is as follows: 8 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 2; 2 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 3; 7 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 7; 8 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 9; 1 and 4 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 10. Tickets are $12.50 for children and $16.50 for adults, available at www.lfjcc or by calling (858) 362-1348. Audience members can also tour a life-size replica of Anne Frank’s attic home as part of the presentation.
