Indecent

Most of Europe in the early twentieth century was a-twitter over Sholem Asch's daring play The God of Vengeance, a drama for the Yiddish stage that featured a Jewish brothel runner, his lesbian daughter in a tender and honest rainy love scene, and the hurling of a Torah. It was a lot for audiences to process. When Asch approved an abridged English production for the United States, he didn't suspect what he was in for. While the radical Jewish community welcomed this bold new play, the Orthodox community was aghast at the sacrilege and the sheer indecency of Asch's script. The state of New York charged all involved with indecency, and the play was removed from the stage. Contemporary playwright Paula Vogel revisits and reimagines Asch's play in her drama, Indecency. In it the original actors return from the dead to share their play in a new era. With a klezmer band onstage, Indecency flits from Poland to Germany to America and back as it runs through the controversy and into the war years, as an aging Asch grows more uncomfortable with his young work and watches the rise of the German war machine and anti-Semitism. Max & Louie Productions presents Indecency at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday and 3 p.m. Sunday (June 20 to 30) at the Grandel (3610 Grandel Square; www.maxandlouie.com). Tickets are $40 to $300.