I’m told that every night when the sun goes down, somewhere in the world the curtain is going up on the stage play made from Anne’s diary. - Miep Gies, in her book Anne Frank Remembered Today is opening night. We made it. Through hysterical laughter and heaving sobs. Through run throughs and trying on costumes. Through carrying on chairs and crates. All of it, for these few hours that we get to present this show to the rest of the world.
Tonight's is the only performance I will be attending. I have North Carolina Honors Chorus, which is certainly a gift but at the same time I wish I could be spending it with you. Being your dramaturg has been one of the greatest experiences of my life. As many of you know, I hope to go into dramaturgy in college and hopefully beyond. I never thought I would experience it while still in high school. All of those hours of researching and formatting and writing have brought me so much joy. I can only hope it has helped you create this world. What we're doing is vital. Everyone thinks they know the story of Anne Frank. In my opinion, they don't. I may be here for ensuring historical accuracy, but at the end of the day the message is timeless. There have always been people put under oppression. And while few tragedies will ever come close to the Holocaust, there are horrific events happening every day. Ours is a tale of humanity even in the darkest hours. And I believe it will touch so many souls who come to see it. Certainly there will be those who are not moved, or never think of the show after it's over. But there will also be those who come out thinking, and through thinking they are changing. In the quote up above, Miep says that at every sundown another production of The Diary of Anne Frank begins. This show wouldn't be so universally done if it wasn't universal. And while a lot of those productions are far from great - I watched one online where Anne yelled almost all of her lines - ours is one of the good ones. We are a part of this legacy, and that's something to be proud of. Break a leg tonight, and tomorrow, and Saturday. Your dramaturg, Rebecca Hodge
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While looking for some video resources for Anne Frank, I stumbled upon this gem. Most pictures of Anne and those featured in this story are in black and white - that's simply the technology of the 1940s. But some people, like the creator of this video, take the time to recolor those pictures using their own imagination. While there's no way to know what the real colors would have been, it's a glimpse into the past that makes it just that much more real.
I've always thought that black and white lays a veil over the past and separates it from our reality. It just seems less real when a picture is in black and white, especially when compared to vivid high definition colors of today. But the colors were as real as these people's lives, and recolorings like the one above help to emphasize that. It's funny how everyday pictures can speak so much about Anne Frank and those around her. In a way, these colorful pictures are just like our play - they bring to life what is normally left in black and white text and images. ![]() So, those of you who have read the bios in the "People" section might have noticed I've included MBTI typings for pretty much all of the characters. What is MBTI? Well, it's short for Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, which is used to sort people into sixteen different types that help to explain their thoughts and behavior. I took a special interest in MBTI in summer 2015, after discovering something called the Jungian cognitive functions. Most people know about the binary system of typing - Introverted vs Extroverted, iNtuition vs Sensing, Feeling vs Thinking, Perception vs Judging. Pretty self-explanatory as a whole. But in reality, there's a lot more than that - that's where the cognitive functions come in. There's introverted and extroverted versions of iNtuition, Sensing, Feeling, and Thinking, making 8 cognitive functions. These can be arranged in 16 different ways in a certain order based on strength to make the 16 types. All of these can be seen in the chart to the right. Confusing, I know. But the value of this version of typing is the fact that everything works with one another to make one's strengths and weaknesses clear. Nothing exists independently. By this point, you're probably wondering what all this psychology babble has to do with Anne Frank. Well, I believe that understanding a character's MBTI type will help one to understand the character themselves on a deeper level, as well as understand their interactions with one another. Which, of course, is vital for character building. Take Anne (an ENFP) and her mother Edith (an ISFJ), for example. ENFPs are spontaneous and energetic, with their strongest function being an ISFJ's weakest function (known as extroverted intuition, or Ne). ISFJs prefer order and routine instead, something that ENFPs can't stand (that would be introverted sensing, or Si). So we begin to see where Anne and Edith class on a fundamental level - and indeed, that's only where it begins. This is how their functions stack up: ENFP - Ne Fi Te Si ISFJ - Si Fe Ti Ne I realize that all of that probably looks pretty much like nonsense. But you don't have to understand it in order to use it. You can use a cognitive function test to help figure out your MBTI type, and then read up on it on the website down below. I hope you enjoy! Maybe you'll discover something about yourself along the way.
Right now, costumes are on everyone's mind. We've got the cast bringing items that they might be able to wear in the show and our costume team taking measures and pulling pieces. And, of course, everyone is thinking about their Halloween costume for the 31st!
While Anne Frank might not be the most popular Halloween costume around, there's certainly some 40s style fashion that you can integrate into your wardrobe! (Gentlemen, forgive me - but the 40s fashion for you boils down to suits, dress shirts, and cardigans. It's much easier to find things for women to wear.) Tonight at sundown, Yom Kippur - the Jewish Day of Aronement - begins. Until sundown tomorrow, all Jewish people will be fasting on one of the holiest days of the year. This follows Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, last week,
Together these holidays form the High Holy Days in Judaism. While Hanukkah is certainly the most well known Jewish holiday - and it features prominently in Anne Frank - is one of the least important. Also known as the Days of Awe, these days are a time of deep introspection and reconciliation in order to make the upcoming year as sweet as possible. As a cast and crew bringing to life this story featuring predominately Jewish characters, it is important to understand the Jewish faith more than the average person. While we may not be fasting for the next day, this understanding will help to bring together the world of Anne Frank. Although it's a bit late, l'shanah tovah! A few weeks ago, I got a text from Sam Cole asking me how pregnant Miep would be in the opening scene of the play. I checked the year - 1945 - and began searching.
How pregnant was Miep at the time? Not at all. She didn't have her son Paul until 1950. At first this major historical innaccuracy shocked me. But as I thought about it, I realized it was likely a dramatic choice in order to help visualize the passage of time. But, as is bound to happen in any historical play, there are quite a few innaccuracies found within the lines and the stage directions. For instance, Mr, Dussel is quite changed from his real life counterpart, Fritz Pfeffer. Dussel claims that he has always lived alone and isn't used to having other people around. In actuality, Fritz was married and had a son. Though he ended up getting divorced, Fritz had a serious girlfriend at the time of going into hiding. As she was not Jewish, the two were unable to get married and she didn't have to hide. Fritz sent his son away on a ship to protect him from the Nazis, and so his son survived the war. While in he Annex, Miep carried letters between Fritz and his girlfriend. In other words, Dussel was far from alone. The climactic Hanukkah scene, where the thief frightens the inhabitants of the Annex, didn't actually happen. As Hanukkah celebrates overcoming religious persecution, it seems likely the holiday was chosen for its parallels to the situation in the play. Another inaccuracy comes into play when Anne says she has never seen Peter at her school. In reality, Anne and Peter were already acquaintances before they went into hiding in the Annex. And another - the Franks went in the Annex first, the day after Margot received a deportation order. The van Pels (Van Daans) arrived about a week later. In the show, the two seem to arrive on the same day, with the Franks arriving second. Perhaps the most common "inaccuracy" in the play was what was left out. Miep and Kraler were only two of several helpers who aided the people in the Annex. Anne didn't have just one diary - she had several, in different journals and paper, and eventually went back to revise some of earlier entries. As a whole, the play is accurate because it is adapted directly from a historical diary. But various details have to be changed - as they do in any adaptation - for a theatrical production. Maybe the world of the play will have to be more real than the real world. Today, while aimlessly wandering through Rachel Chavkin's (a particularly marvelous director) Twitter, I stumbled upon this article.
Anne Frank Today Is a Syrian Girl. It's a fascinating read on its own, but as someone currently involved in a production of The Diary of Anne Frank it was all the more intriguing. To summarize the article, it discusses how a 1941 letter pleading for passage to America was recently read, seeming just like thousands of others. The only difference was that this letter came from Otto Frank. With anti-refugee sentiment, the Franks were forced to go into hiding in Amsterdam. We know how the story goes and how it ends. It's possible their fates could've been avoided if they had been able to emigrate to America. The experiences of the Franks echo in the plights of Syrian and Honduran refugees today. With anti-refugee sentiment especially prominent in this politically charged season, it's impossible to deny the parallels of the refugees then and now - the only difference is that this time, we have the ability to change the ending. That's the article. It really makes you think. After all, history is prone to repeating itself. To us, the Franks and the Van Daans and Mr, Dussel and Miep and Mr. Kraler are all fully fleshed out human beings, people we can empathize with and understand. And yet, Americans in general refuse to see the humanity in Syrian and Honduran refugees. They are threats, resource-drainers, a swarm of problems. Like I said, we have the ability to divert history from the path it is currently in. Our understanding of Anne Frank should inform our understanding of the refugee crisis. It's something to think about. |
AuthorI'm Rebecca Hodge, and I am the dramaturg for Green Hope Theatre's production of The Diary of Anne Frank! Here you can find all sorts of information about the world of the play. ArchivesCategories |