January 2015 The COASTAL STAR ArtsPaper/Theater AT15 Theater Jewish-themed revue funny for everyone, says Jason Alexander

By Hap Erstein ArtsPaper Theater Writer

It is kind of a cliché: Jason Alexander is a Tony Award- winning and seven-time Emmy- nominated actor, but what he really wants to do is direct. And because of a little sitcom called Seinfeld, he can indulge his affection for directing, because he really doesn’t have to work another day in his life. “No, not financially, but I need to work emotionally. I don’t need to make a lot more money. I do this stuff because I love doing it,” he says by phone during a rehearsal break at the Mizner Park Cultural Arts Center in Boca Raton, where his revue with music, When You’re in Love, the Whole World Is Jewish, is playing through Jan. 11. “Directing is great, When You’re in Love, the Whole World Is Jewis Photo contributed much more satisfying than Jason Alexander directs h. performing.” Alexander says. “Directing is everything acting going, ‘Oy, I know who that is times 100.” IF YOU GO person is that they’re trying to If the show’s title sounds When You're in Love, the evoke here.’ familiar, perhaps you are Whole World Is Jewish, “It will always work very well around Alexander’s age — 55 Mizner Park Cultural Arts in Jewish communities,” says — and sat around the living Center, 201 Plaza Real, Alexander confidently. “I can’t room stereo in the mid-’60s, Boca Raton. Through Jan. imagine a church group is going listening to this comedy album 11. Tickets: $40. Call 910- to get up and do this show, but and its sequels, which featured 7727. certainly community theaters Lou Jacobi, Betty Walker, Frank will be able to get behind it and Gallop and a young Valerie to build the show from the have a good time with it. Harper. vintage albums, he sensed that “It’s a very easy show to tour. Certainly young Jason it needed something more — Six actors and four musicians and his family did. “Yeah, I music. and a very compact set. And it remember them very well. “That’s when we decided we can play a big space or a small In fact when the guys called needed to write some original space. In Los Angeles, we had a me and said, ‘We’re doing a songs. So there are three 99-seat theater, in San Francisco revue of this, would you be completely original songs in the we had a 600-seat theater. And interested?’ they thought I show that I wrote, about things it played equally well in both. would never have heard of that are within our theme, but It’s a nice flexible, family- these recordings, and I went, they did not come from the friendly, everyone-friendly ‘I know them inside out and original album in any way, show. It could be something backwards.’” shape or form.” that really catches on.” So Alexander signed on to In addition, as a transitional So Jason, what is a Jewish co-write and direct the show, device, the onstage band plays sense of humor anyway? even though he recognized the and sings short ditties based “That’s a very good question,” potential pitfalls in the material. around teaching the audience he responds. “There are two “The thing that potentially Yiddish phrases. elements to it. I think. One works against it is that these “So now it feels like there’s a of them is that it is almost jokes were old when they made ton of music in the revue and always self-deprecating. Jews the album,” he says. “So you that’s one of the things that sets tend to have a not-difficult begin to hear the set-ups of it apart from say, ‘Jewtopia’ or time laughing at themselves, these jokes and you instantly ‘Old Jews Telling Jokes,’ which which I think is one of our best know where the punch line is also explore the roots of Jewish qualities. going. comedy,” explains Alexander. “The other part of it is there “So for an older audience, The Jewish angle is certainly is a sense of optimistic fatalism. there’s a nostalgic joy that a big part of the show’s success, ‘Nothing’s going to work out, comes from this. For younger Alexander concedes. “Well, so why should we get worried audiences that have probably it certainly is down here, and about it?’ And there’s also a never heard the joke, there’s in L.A., there was a natural lot of Jewish humor based on the joy of a new joke. But what audience for it.” classic misunderstandings.” we found when we did this in But, of course, he quickly To ensure that you do not Los Angeles and San Francisco, adds, “In all the locations that misunderstand and think that even if you know the punch we’ve played the show, we’ve When You’re in Love, the Whole line, there’s something about had a very large non-Jewish World Is Jewish has any deep seeing these things visually and audience in attendance as well. message, Alexander concludes watching six actors become And they had a great time. by saying, “This show is nothing close to 60 different characters, There’s nothing here that you more than 90 minutes of silly there’s a real theatricality to it wouldn’t get if you weren’t good fun. If you’re going out for that is joyful. Jewish. an evening and you know you “So even if the punch line is “The thing you’d miss, want to have a good time, I can not the big thing, there’s a lot when you start to hear these pretty much guarantee you that. of laughs in every sketch, but Old Vorld excents, if you don’t You’ll do some foot-tapping, not the ones that you would know who these actors are you’ll have a lot of laughs, you’ll necessarily have thought would representing, if you didn’t have go out very hungry — because be the big laughs. Then the a zayda in your family” — a we do a whole number about punch line is sort of a sing- grandfather — “it doesn’t have Jewish food — and it’s a great along, everybody can do it at the same impact as if you did. way to get away from all the the same time,” he said. You still get the jokes, but mishagass that’s going on in the But as Alexander was helping there’s just something about world.”