A Note from the Dramaturg, Adrien-Alice Hansel

Joshua Harmon’s Bad Jews is a play of opposing viewpoints, of deeply felt convictions. And a play of loud—and long—argument. This savage comedy unfolds the night after their grandfather’s funeral, as three cousins battle it out over an heirloom—a necklace of a chai, the Hebrew word and symbol for life.

Harmon has created a battle of ideas and birthright, equal parts invective and insight on the many things a single object can come to mean to different people. But while the stakes are real—they couldn’t be higher—Harmon’s mode is comic. Battle-to-the-end, say-what-it-takes, no-blow-too-low comic as the unstoppable force of Super Jew Daphna careens into the immovable object of Nonbeliever Liam, insults and indomitable hair flying.

So who deserves the necklace? Does it go to the True Believer as a symbol of maintaining history and honoring perseverance? Or does it go to the self-declared Bad Jew, who sees it as a symbol of the new beginnings, for his grandfather and himself? Or does honoring Poppy need to take a new form?

There’s only one necklace and a single winner as these cousins (and a surprise guest) go for the heart and soul of their grandfather’s legacy in this all-out verbal brawl—heartfelt and over-the-top, ridiculous in its extremity but grounded in the deepest beliefs of these very different twentysomethings, each struggling to reflect and magnify the best of what they learned from one remarkable survivor.