Do you have an inner thespian screaming to take centre stage? If you’re phone isn’t ringing off the hook with invitations to appear on Broadway or the West End anytime soon, boy do I have a Jewish custom for you: the Purim Shpiel. This annual event is a chance for budding Jewish performers of all ages to don costumes, act out an ancient story with modern twists and turns – and thoroughly enjoy themselves.
Shpiel is a Yiddish word meaning “play” or “skit.” “As Rabbi Daniel Kohn explains, “a Purim shpiel is actually a dramatic presentation of the events outlined in the book of Esther … providing an opportunity for crowds to cheer the heroes (Mordecai and Esther) and boo the villains (Haman).” The plays often take on lives of their own in which people write skits to gently mock community leaders.
While the Purim Shpiel may be harmless fun today, it didn’t tickle the rabbis’ funny bones a couple of thousands of years ago. Cantor Janet Leuchter writes that they condemned the theatre as frivolous at best and vulgar/pagan at worst. But she points out the rabbis’ view “was crystallized during the Roman Era, when live theatre was often cruel and violent, and involved slaves, including Jews, as actors who were sometimes killed as part of the drama.”
Since Purim is based on themes including disguise, farce, melodrama, comedy, and victory over existential threat, it lends itself to public displays of rejoicing, irreverence and masquerade. That first took the form with “the hanging and burning of Haman in effigy by Levantine Jewish communities under Christian and then Muslim rule. It was in medieval Europe, however, that the shpiel got its start – in the larger cultural context of both Christian and secular folk entertainment, drama, carnival and parody.”
READ: PURIM TREATS RECALL QUEEN ESTHER, A WOMAN WORTHY OF HER CROWN
Dr. Jeffrey Rubenstein writes that Purim is a holiday characterized by “liminality,” a day “in which traditional social boundaries and rules of etiquette are deliberately blurred. Purim is a day to ‘blow off steam’ for a community by celebrating this ancient escape from destruction.”
By the 1500’s, “it became customary for Purim shpiels to take place during the festive Purim meal in private homes. Yeshiva students were often recruited as actors, and they would wear masks and costumes.” Later on, amateur and professional entertainers were recruited including groups of touring players known as “Shpielers.” Nowadays, these plays are performed in countless synagogues and schools.
The words “poignant” and “Purim shpiel” don’t usually appear in the same sentence but that is the only way to describe one special play that took place over seven decades ago. In March 1945, Solly Ganor was a prisoner in Dachau when an inmate known as “Chaim the Rabbi” stood in the snow, donned a paper crown made out of a cement sack and shouted, “Haman to the gallows! Haman to the gallows! And when I say ‘Haman to the gallows,’ we all know which Haman we are talking about!”
Ganor continues, “We were sure that he has lost his wits, as so many did in these impossible times. By now there was about 50 of us standing gaping at the ‘rabbi,’ when he said: ‘Yidden wos iz mit ajch! Fellow Jews, what is the matter with you?! Today is Purim! Let us make a Purim Shpiel!’”
The best Purim shpiel is, of course, the one you write yourself. But if you do need some assistance, there are numerous playwrights who have shared their oeuvres online. There’s a fascinating example of a historic Purim Shpiel: Esther, Queen of Persia: A Scriptural Play In 5 Acts by Janie Jacobson. Published in 1921, it has been professionally scanned and can be downloaded in its entirety. For more contemporary versions…
- There’s a Rocky Horror Purim Shpiel,
- West Side Tsorys featuring The Shtoonks and the Zets
- and a Doctor Seuss Purim Shpiel, complete with silliness and questionable rhymes:
Esther, Esther, my Queen Esther, there is no one I like bester.
It seems there is no shortage of people who have taped their shpiels and uploaded them to YouTube so that the whole world can benefit from their work. Check out a lively shpiel of Bobover chassidim below. Why they’re waving their lulavs, lemons and spaghetti squash, I’m not quite sure. But if they’re happy, hey, it’s Purim!
And, granted, the following song IS about Chanukah and not Purim. But it was created by a Capella group the Maccabeats to mark the topsy-turvy theme of Purim,“v’nahafoch hu,” or reversal. The 68-second mashup includes micro-clips of famous Jewish performers and a smattering of politicians – including a certain outgoing U.S. Commander in Chief who unknowingly tell a Jewish holiday story. Don’t miss it!
Contact Mark Mietkiewicz via email here.
Photo: Hillel Stony Brook
