Director’s Note

WRITTEN BY Tomer Zvulun

OREL COHEN

As a director, I’m always mindful of my audience. But in Cabaret, the audience is more than a passive observer, it is essential to the storytelling. This is why we chose the immersive environment you are in. The events in this story happened a century away from our current times and the world today is completely different, yet somehow nothing has really changed.

The story of Cabaret was conceived by Christopher Isherwood who immortalized his own experiences in interwar Berlin, a city under severe economic distress—but with a spirited nightlife. Not unlike the lost generation in the nearby French Capital, the story of Cabaret has the feel of a huge canvas with seismic events unfolding yet we’re seeing it through intimate portraits of people who don’t quite fit in. Like most everyone, these characters live in pursuit of dreams, love, and rent. But their world is coming unglued, so they come to the Kit Kat Klub for human connection and escape. 100 years on, we know something they don’t know: their only escape is to drop everything and leave Europe.

During the 1920s, Adolph Hitler created his own narrative and used propaganda to support his egomaniacal ambitions. By repeating his lies, he quashed dissent and turned a population against the free press. At the same time, he acquired a newspaper and fomented hatred toward Jewish people, the LGBTQ community, immigrants, and Eastern Europeans. Fast forward to a hundred years later, in the same continent, have things really changed that much?

I wish Cabaret were a history piece; current events say otherwise. This show reminds us that there are plenty of manipulators who will ramp up prejudice to score political gains and feed their ambitions for power. As always, the people caught in the aftermath of these hunger games are both the real victims and heroes of the time.

Cabaret happens in the twilight of the Jazz Age, when nightlife was a balm for a crumbling society. Pullman Yards takes us there. (What better place to convey urban decay than a historical train depot?) With our discovery series, we’ve gone about as far from the ivorytower opera house as you can get. Tonight’s show is a cautionary tale. I hope you find it fun and entertaining, but also a timeless slice of truth about our human condition.

ERIK TEAGUE