Emmy Winner Ed Asner to Lead National Tour of The Soap Myth
(© David Gordon)
From April 15-May 7, seven-time Emmy winner Ed Asner (The Mary Tyler Moore Show) will star as Holocaust survivor Milton Saltzman in a national tour of concert reading series of Jeff Cohen's play The Soap Myth. Directed by Pam Berlin, the tour includes stops in Tampa, Florida; Sarasota, Florida; Wilmington, Delaware; Hartford, Connecticut; Milwaukee; Carmel, Indiana; St. Louis; Cleveland; Columbus, Ohio; and Pittsburgh.
Performing alongside Asner from April 15-24 will be four-time Tony nominee Tovah Feldshuh (Crazy Ex-Girlfriend), who returns to the dual roles of Holocaust scholar Esther Feinman and Holocaust denier Benda Goodsen, following her performance in the roles in an East Coast tour earlier this year. Dee Pelletier, who originated the roles in the 2012 production at the Roundabout Black Box, takes over for Feldshuh from April 29 through the conclusion of the tour on May 5. The cast of The Soap Myth also includes Ned Eisenberg (Six Degrees of Separation) in various roles and Liba Vaynberg as journalist Annie Blumberg.
The Soap Myth dramatizes the friendship that develops between a young Jewish journalist, Annie Blumberg, and a cantankerous Holocaust survivor, Milton Saltzman, on a crusade about including "soap" in Holocaust museums: Did the Nazis make soap from the corpses of murdered Jews? Along the way, the play grapples with the pernicious evil of anti-Semitism masquerading as Holocaust denial. The play tackles such timely and provocative themes as how a survivor survives surviving, who has the right to write history, and how we determine the truth.
The performances are part of Remembrance Readings — a tribute to Yom HaShoah, observed on May 1.
