After a great five-week run of the Live! At the Tenement program, things culminated on July 29 with a bash. Live performances, some by costumed interpreters who had finished up with their tours mere minutes earlier, and Whole Foods-provided food and drink helped guests make merry for the two-hour evening show.
Clare Burson started the night with a solo acoustic set supporting her newest record, Silver and Ash, a concept album about her grandmother’s emigration from Germany. The sparse, haunting songs felt perfectly suited to the particular venue that night, covering everything from the stifling summer heat to historical tragedies like the bombing of Rotterdam by the Germans during World War II.
During quiet folk songs, waltzes, and ballads, Burson twisted vintage sounds into something uniquely modern and beautiful. While tuning up, she entertained the crowd with a story of a coveted family heirloom—one hundred year old Lithuanian cheese.
Clearly, Ms. Burson cares about the past, and it radiated from her with her every word. A few local Lower East Side residents explained that they only hoped “she’d play even more.” They thought it was “so beautiful; she’s a wonderful singer.”
The Venn Diagrams, an eclectic two-piece formed in 2001 featuring guitarist Rick Sorkin and the Museum’s own Jeffrey Marsh, took the stage next. With guitar and ukulele, the Diagrams reinterpreted classics like Lou Reed’s “Take a Walk on the Wild Side,” Dolly Parton’s “Nine to Five,” and even strummed a carefully bent handsaw with bow for an eerie take on “Dream a Little Dream of Me.”
Marsh also drew inspiration from opener Burson for one bittersweet, immigration-related original about “a big trip” away from a loved one.
“I adore her music,” he said, “and I wanted to do an homage.”
Much like their inventive webisodes that involve irreverent chatter, musical performances, art pieces, and comedy in rapid succession, the duo eschewed a straightforward set, instead speaking offhand and sometimes directly to the audience during their cabaret act. They kept the intimate crowd guessing about what would come next.
The shop was packed once costumed interpreter Katie Barnard stepped away from her Bridget Moore persona for the night and revealed her own talents, beautifully singing a slew of show tunes accompanied by sister Lisa Barnard on piano. The crowd wildly cheered her renditions of songs like “I’m Not Afraid of Anything” from Songs for a New World. And for the first time, actress, singer, and fellow costumed interpreter Jen Faith Brown joined Barnard for a few enthralling duets including Ragtime’s “Our Children” after practicing for more than six weeks. Brown also took her turn performing alone, with classics “Singin’ In The Rain” and “Bill” from Showboat receiving equal fanfare.
It was inspiring to see the small experiment of the Live! At the Tenement program grow to bring the community together by finding new ways to educate and entertain. Many who attended the party had already experienced Live! once or even several times before.
Returning to the tenement for a third time, one audience member thought the interaction offered even the most unlikely visitors a reason to stop by.
“It’s really fun,” she said. “It’s all history, which I usually don’t like, but the [costumed interpreters] were so good! It was cool.”
Jeffrey Marsh explained that the program had exceeded the performers’ expectations as well. “Towards the end everything was sold out, which is a good step, but beyond ticket sales, the reaction from visitors has been much grander, much more wonderful than anything we could have ever imagined.”
Thanks to everyone who supported Live! At the Tenement and celebrated with museum staff on July 29.
-posted by Joe Klarl, with video by Devin
Showing posts with label Live at the Tenement. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Live at the Tenement. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Meet Katie Barnard, for Live! At the Tenement
Katie Barnard is a costumed interpreter in the Live! At the Tenement program, portraying Bridget Moore. I recently spoke with her both in and out of character.
Can you tell me a little bit about who you’re portraying in this program?
I’m portraying Bridget Moore, an Irish immigrant who lived in the building in 1869 with her family.
What responsibilities do you have to keep your character accurate?
Mostly things about correctly portraying what’s good about living here for her but also the truth of her story, which I think is a tumultuous one. The trip across the ocean, leaving the homeland and the famine. What does that turn a person into, if they’ve survived but watched people die because of nothing they can control?
And you want her to seem grateful at the same time.
Exactly. It’s a careful balance. It’s interesting because Bridget is different than a lot of the other characters; this house for her is probably the nicest house she’s ever lived in, aside from when she was a maid.
How do you maintain the interest of your audience?
Well, we only have ten minutes so there’s not really a lot of maintenance that has to be done, but usually connection to the space allows visitors to reference things around them, and then stories and anecdotes to back up the how and why of a particular item. It’s hard because you don’t want to be inaccurate historically but at the same time, you should also seem like a human being. And we have the least information about Bridget Moore [out of all the] characters, so it requires a little artistic license.
I think someone in Bridget Moore’s situation would want to entertain, would want to be witty and entertaining with visitors. And I think it’s only in those moments where people ask direct questions about her journey or her homeland that it surprises her a little bit, you know, so that there’s a reaction.
Have you done anything like this costumed interpretation before?
No. I’ve done a lot of acting in general… which is interesting, actually, because in general [when] acting, you’re very specific and accurate. You’re trained to have a lot of research behind you, so costumed interpreting isn’t too far from what you might do if you’re in some sort of play [that’s] set in a different era. I also portray Victoria Confino, [an immigrant who lived in 97 Orchard Street in the 1910s,] in a different program so sometimes my wires get crossed, maintaining the different accents, characters, and time periods. [Laughs.] It gets confusing.
What is the most fun about portraying Bridget Moore?
I think what’s most fun about her are the things that she gets excited about. I imagine from the research that [program coordinator] Sarah Litvin has done, which is brilliant research, we can figure out from the time period what would have been exclusively, like, oh-my-gosh-can-you-believe-I-have-this-thing. So I find the most fun to be figuring out that excitement about something that would seem really trivial to us now. A rug on the floor seems like nothing but to Bridget Moore, that’s a big deal.
Then, program coordinator Sarah Litvin and I met with Bridget Moore…
Could you tell me about yourself, your family, and what you do for a living?
Sure, of course. My name is Bridget Moore. I’ve got a husband Joseph, and I’ve got three wee ones. A girl, Mary Kate. She’s almost four. And a girl, Jane. She’s almost three. And a wee one, Agnes. She was just born, just recently. Joseph works in a saloon, in a pub, you know? Nearby. He does that at night and sometimes during the day. I work here in the house.
How long has your husband been working at the pub?
He’s worked in a pub since I knew him. But he switches from pub to pub depending on the season. Sometimes he works in a hotel, sometimes he works at a pub in the Five Points. It’s depending on whether it’s the busy season or the slow season. He’s got it all figured out.
So he didn’t come to this country with you?
No, no, no. I came here alone when I was wee. I was seventeen or so.
How would you describe your experience since you arrived in the city? How is life in the tenement?
I think it’s pretty nice. The only thing I don’t like so much is slaggin’ all the stairs, you know? You’ve got to climb all the stairs. We don’t have that. When I was in Ireland, it was very different. We were all on the one floor and there was one room and that was it. It’s very complicated with all the stairs and the rooms and all that. And you’ve got to climb the stairs many times in a day because you’ve got to go down there to get water. The well is down out behind the building. But when I first got here, I was a little bit intimidated cause I came from a farm. When you come from a farm, and ya’ arrive in a place like New York, it’s very strange. There’s a lot people from all over. No one in this neighborhood speaks the same language I do, and I had to get really used to that. We’ve only been here a little while in the neighborhood. When you live in the Five Points, it’s a little bit like being in Dublin, I hear. But I don’t know. [Laughs.]
Do you feel you have a strong sense of community here now? Or does it still feel foreign to you?
No, it’s alright. It’s different because my community at home is my family. And here, you learn to make family where you can. I’ve got friends at the church.
So if you could change one thing about the tenement, what would it be? Would it be having to go down all those stairs for water?
It would be the stairs! [Laughs.] But there are other things too, y’know. It’s so dark. I’d like a few more lamps, but right now we don’t have enough money to get them.
SL: Is there anything you do to try to make use of the light you have?
There is. You know, I learned about something. Can I tell you it? When I was uptown, they would say, to make the room make a little bit brighter and larger… they’re always worried uptown about making everything bigger than it is. So they tell you you’ve got to put glass on the wall. Now this is very strange, and Joseph doesn’t like it at all because in Ireland, if you look in the glass, they think you go to the next world. So there’s a lot of worry, but I said, “If you’re in America, you’ve got to put the glass on the wall because here it’s so dark and you’ve got so little space that if you put the glass on the wall like this [points to the mirror hanging on the mantle], it makes it feel bigger and brighter.
What are your hopes for the future in the next couple of years here?
It’s hard to say. This is a pretty nice place so if we could maintain it, that’d be great. If we could get a little more light and stay, that’d be wonderful. [Laughs.] But the only problem is Joseph gets a little restless because there’s no one here from Ireland except one pair upstairs. So he wants to go back to the Five Points, but if I have my way, I don’t think so.
Meet Katie Barnard tomorrow at Live! at the Tenement's evening bash, 6:30 PM at the Museum Shop, 108 Orchard Street.
- Posted by Joe Klarl
Can you tell me a little bit about who you’re portraying in this program?
I’m portraying Bridget Moore, an Irish immigrant who lived in the building in 1869 with her family.
What responsibilities do you have to keep your character accurate?
Mostly things about correctly portraying what’s good about living here for her but also the truth of her story, which I think is a tumultuous one. The trip across the ocean, leaving the homeland and the famine. What does that turn a person into, if they’ve survived but watched people die because of nothing they can control?
And you want her to seem grateful at the same time.
Exactly. It’s a careful balance. It’s interesting because Bridget is different than a lot of the other characters; this house for her is probably the nicest house she’s ever lived in, aside from when she was a maid.
How do you maintain the interest of your audience?
Well, we only have ten minutes so there’s not really a lot of maintenance that has to be done, but usually connection to the space allows visitors to reference things around them, and then stories and anecdotes to back up the how and why of a particular item. It’s hard because you don’t want to be inaccurate historically but at the same time, you should also seem like a human being. And we have the least information about Bridget Moore [out of all the] characters, so it requires a little artistic license.
I think someone in Bridget Moore’s situation would want to entertain, would want to be witty and entertaining with visitors. And I think it’s only in those moments where people ask direct questions about her journey or her homeland that it surprises her a little bit, you know, so that there’s a reaction.
Have you done anything like this costumed interpretation before?
No. I’ve done a lot of acting in general… which is interesting, actually, because in general [when] acting, you’re very specific and accurate. You’re trained to have a lot of research behind you, so costumed interpreting isn’t too far from what you might do if you’re in some sort of play [that’s] set in a different era. I also portray Victoria Confino, [an immigrant who lived in 97 Orchard Street in the 1910s,] in a different program so sometimes my wires get crossed, maintaining the different accents, characters, and time periods. [Laughs.] It gets confusing.
What is the most fun about portraying Bridget Moore?
I think what’s most fun about her are the things that she gets excited about. I imagine from the research that [program coordinator] Sarah Litvin has done, which is brilliant research, we can figure out from the time period what would have been exclusively, like, oh-my-gosh-can-you-believe-I-have-this-thing. So I find the most fun to be figuring out that excitement about something that would seem really trivial to us now. A rug on the floor seems like nothing but to Bridget Moore, that’s a big deal.
Then, program coordinator Sarah Litvin and I met with Bridget Moore…
Could you tell me about yourself, your family, and what you do for a living?
Sure, of course. My name is Bridget Moore. I’ve got a husband Joseph, and I’ve got three wee ones. A girl, Mary Kate. She’s almost four. And a girl, Jane. She’s almost three. And a wee one, Agnes. She was just born, just recently. Joseph works in a saloon, in a pub, you know? Nearby. He does that at night and sometimes during the day. I work here in the house.
How long has your husband been working at the pub?
He’s worked in a pub since I knew him. But he switches from pub to pub depending on the season. Sometimes he works in a hotel, sometimes he works at a pub in the Five Points. It’s depending on whether it’s the busy season or the slow season. He’s got it all figured out.
So he didn’t come to this country with you?
No, no, no. I came here alone when I was wee. I was seventeen or so.
How would you describe your experience since you arrived in the city? How is life in the tenement?
I think it’s pretty nice. The only thing I don’t like so much is slaggin’ all the stairs, you know? You’ve got to climb all the stairs. We don’t have that. When I was in Ireland, it was very different. We were all on the one floor and there was one room and that was it. It’s very complicated with all the stairs and the rooms and all that. And you’ve got to climb the stairs many times in a day because you’ve got to go down there to get water. The well is down out behind the building. But when I first got here, I was a little bit intimidated cause I came from a farm. When you come from a farm, and ya’ arrive in a place like New York, it’s very strange. There’s a lot people from all over. No one in this neighborhood speaks the same language I do, and I had to get really used to that. We’ve only been here a little while in the neighborhood. When you live in the Five Points, it’s a little bit like being in Dublin, I hear. But I don’t know. [Laughs.]
Do you feel you have a strong sense of community here now? Or does it still feel foreign to you?
No, it’s alright. It’s different because my community at home is my family. And here, you learn to make family where you can. I’ve got friends at the church.
So if you could change one thing about the tenement, what would it be? Would it be having to go down all those stairs for water?
It would be the stairs! [Laughs.] But there are other things too, y’know. It’s so dark. I’d like a few more lamps, but right now we don’t have enough money to get them.
SL: Is there anything you do to try to make use of the light you have?
There is. You know, I learned about something. Can I tell you it? When I was uptown, they would say, to make the room make a little bit brighter and larger… they’re always worried uptown about making everything bigger than it is. So they tell you you’ve got to put glass on the wall. Now this is very strange, and Joseph doesn’t like it at all because in Ireland, if you look in the glass, they think you go to the next world. So there’s a lot of worry, but I said, “If you’re in America, you’ve got to put the glass on the wall because here it’s so dark and you’ve got so little space that if you put the glass on the wall like this [points to the mirror hanging on the mantle], it makes it feel bigger and brighter.
What are your hopes for the future in the next couple of years here?
It’s hard to say. This is a pretty nice place so if we could maintain it, that’d be great. If we could get a little more light and stay, that’d be wonderful. [Laughs.] But the only problem is Joseph gets a little restless because there’s no one here from Ireland except one pair upstairs. So he wants to go back to the Five Points, but if I have my way, I don’t think so.
Meet Katie Barnard tomorrow at Live! at the Tenement's evening bash, 6:30 PM at the Museum Shop, 108 Orchard Street.
- Posted by Joe Klarl
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Meet Jeffrey Marsh, for Live! At the Tenement
Jeffrey Marsh is currently a costumed interpreter in the Live! At the Tenement program. I was lucky enough to speak to him in and out of character. See Jeffrey perform as Harris Levine tomorrow night at Live!.
Jeffrey, who are you portraying here at the museum?
I will go back in time more than a hundred years and be Harris Levine who lived in the building in 1898.
What responsibilities do you shoulder to keep your character accurate?
One of our speakers, Karen Lomen, called it a delicate illusion. It’s my job to keep that world of 1898 intact from the tour’s start to its finish. There’s a whole comprehensive, cohesive world that these [visitors playing the role of newspaper] reporters can tap into.
How do you maintain the interest of your audience?
Well there are so many layers to costumed interpreting. Part of it is being charming; part of it is using tools like soliciting help from the people you’re talking to, respecting them so that that turns into a respect for the interpreter. And having the tools that [program coordinator] Sarah Litvin gave to us really helps in that space.
How is it different to play this role than to simply be an educator?
Oh goodness. Well, it’s a heck of a lot more fun, not that educating’s not fun. It’s all fun but this is some of the most fun that I’ve had here. It uses my actor self as well. I moved to New York to do this – performing and acting. And when I first started at the Museum, this was going to be my day job, I was going to have to slog through and do plays and performing another way. But I’m utterly delighted to have it all fold together with this program. I can use those muscles for acting well beyond what is my motivation. I get to use my third person experience as an educator to take on a whole new role. And as I experience the Museum in a new way, hopefully visitors will too.
A lot of us have felt that this is so special. It feels like we shouldn’t be allowed to do it. It’s so much fun. It’s supposed to be about educating and the history and all of that stuff but this program has taught us that that process of interpreting the past, of looking at these lives, can be so interesting and so fun to us. That will translate, I think, in two directions.
You’ve told me what’s the most fun about this program. What’s most nerve-wracking about it?
Really keeping a respect for the lives we’re talking about. Nerve-wracking may not be the best way to put it. But that is the main focus because he’s an actual person and I want to have as much reverence as I can have for his whole story, the complexity of his life. It’s easy to be charming and entertaining, but we also want to convey how it may not have been in that living situation. That complexity can inform the interpretation as well.
Now, as a reporter for the New York Times all the way back in 1898, some questions with Harris Levine…
I just want to know a little bit about your family…
You know I can’t read the Times? You know that? But when it comes out, you tell…
I’ll tell you how it goes. Could you tell me about your family and how you make a living?
Living? You mean work?
Yes.
Well, that Mrs. Goldberg next door, she got a joke for everything. She come running in last week and she said, “Well you know in America, in English, they got the word “home.” Got four letters in there: W – O – R – K.
So you work in your home?
I do work in my home. We got the contract now from the goniff on Hester Street. He tell me this color’s gonna be in for the fall. I think it’s schlecht. It’s bad. But he says ladies gonna be wearing that color head to toe in the fall. Rose is what it’s called. Rose here, rose there, rose in the kitchen and every part of the apartment.
Do you make all of this clothing yourself?
We sew. It comes to us cut. It’s delivered up here.
I see. And do you have a wife? Children?
I do. Jennie. She comes with me. We get married right before we come. And now we got three. Max just been born. He’s new. Jennie’s not here though. She’s down with the fish peddler trying to get two herrings for a penny. The kids went with here because they want to get out. It’s so hot in here. So Jennie’s gonna be sad; she missed American reporter.
What do the kids usually do each day?
Pauline plays a game… well, she’s at that age where she wants me to be nice, right? So she goes and she waits for the coal truck to come by and she chase after. Anything that falls off that truck, she get it and she bring it to me. She brought me three pieces last week. And the other one’s a baby. You know what he does? Lie around. You know what happens if I lie around all day? We don’t eat. [Laughs.]
Williamsburg Bridge, looking east from Manhattan to the
East River. Lower East Side Tenement Museum (c) 2010I was wondering if you could tell me how New York differs from your old home?
You seem like you have a nice home here but if you could change one thing about the tenement, what would it be?
Listen, you heard of this place, Brooklyn? In a minute, we’re all gonna be the same city. Over there, they tell me, if you’re Jewish, you work in one place, you open the door, walk out, down the street even, open another door and that’s where you live.
So you’d like to move to Brooklyn?
Yes, a neighborhood called Williamsburg. Work here, live over there. That’s enough.
Jeffrey, who are you portraying here at the museum?
I will go back in time more than a hundred years and be Harris Levine who lived in the building in 1898.
What responsibilities do you shoulder to keep your character accurate?
One of our speakers, Karen Lomen, called it a delicate illusion. It’s my job to keep that world of 1898 intact from the tour’s start to its finish. There’s a whole comprehensive, cohesive world that these [visitors playing the role of newspaper] reporters can tap into.
How do you maintain the interest of your audience?
Well there are so many layers to costumed interpreting. Part of it is being charming; part of it is using tools like soliciting help from the people you’re talking to, respecting them so that that turns into a respect for the interpreter. And having the tools that [program coordinator] Sarah Litvin gave to us really helps in that space.
How is it different to play this role than to simply be an educator?
Oh goodness. Well, it’s a heck of a lot more fun, not that educating’s not fun. It’s all fun but this is some of the most fun that I’ve had here. It uses my actor self as well. I moved to New York to do this – performing and acting. And when I first started at the Museum, this was going to be my day job, I was going to have to slog through and do plays and performing another way. But I’m utterly delighted to have it all fold together with this program. I can use those muscles for acting well beyond what is my motivation. I get to use my third person experience as an educator to take on a whole new role. And as I experience the Museum in a new way, hopefully visitors will too.
A lot of us have felt that this is so special. It feels like we shouldn’t be allowed to do it. It’s so much fun. It’s supposed to be about educating and the history and all of that stuff but this program has taught us that that process of interpreting the past, of looking at these lives, can be so interesting and so fun to us. That will translate, I think, in two directions.
You’ve told me what’s the most fun about this program. What’s most nerve-wracking about it?
Really keeping a respect for the lives we’re talking about. Nerve-wracking may not be the best way to put it. But that is the main focus because he’s an actual person and I want to have as much reverence as I can have for his whole story, the complexity of his life. It’s easy to be charming and entertaining, but we also want to convey how it may not have been in that living situation. That complexity can inform the interpretation as well.
Now, as a reporter for the New York Times all the way back in 1898, some questions with Harris Levine…
I just want to know a little bit about your family…
You know I can’t read the Times? You know that? But when it comes out, you tell…
I’ll tell you how it goes. Could you tell me about your family and how you make a living?
Living? You mean work?
Yes.
Well, that Mrs. Goldberg next door, she got a joke for everything. She come running in last week and she said, “Well you know in America, in English, they got the word “home.” Got four letters in there: W – O – R – K.
So you work in your home?
I do work in my home. We got the contract now from the goniff on Hester Street. He tell me this color’s gonna be in for the fall. I think it’s schlecht. It’s bad. But he says ladies gonna be wearing that color head to toe in the fall. Rose is what it’s called. Rose here, rose there, rose in the kitchen and every part of the apartment.
Do you make all of this clothing yourself?
We sew. It comes to us cut. It’s delivered up here.
I see. And do you have a wife? Children?
I do. Jennie. She comes with me. We get married right before we come. And now we got three. Max just been born. He’s new. Jennie’s not here though. She’s down with the fish peddler trying to get two herrings for a penny. The kids went with here because they want to get out. It’s so hot in here. So Jennie’s gonna be sad; she missed American reporter.
What do the kids usually do each day?
Pauline plays a game… well, she’s at that age where she wants me to be nice, right? So she goes and she waits for the coal truck to come by and she chase after. Anything that falls off that truck, she get it and she bring it to me. She brought me three pieces last week. And the other one’s a baby. You know what he does? Lie around. You know what happens if I lie around all day? We don’t eat. [Laughs.]
Williamsburg Bridge, looking east from Manhattan to the
East River. Lower East Side Tenement Museum (c) 2010I was wondering if you could tell me how New York differs from your old home?
Rev. Goldstein – the rabbi in Plonsk where I’m from – said, “You know what about New York City? They got no God there. They got this new god they call money. And take a look - it’s true.
Listen, you heard of this place, Brooklyn? In a minute, we’re all gonna be the same city. Over there, they tell me, if you’re Jewish, you work in one place, you open the door, walk out, down the street even, open another door and that’s where you live.
So you’d like to move to Brooklyn?
Yes, a neighborhood called Williamsburg. Work here, live over there. That’s enough.
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Meet Judith Levin, for Live! At the Tenement
I recently got the chance to speak with Judith Levin, a costumed interpreter in the Live! At the Tenement program. She told me a little bit about her character and the program, which runs until July 29th. You can see Judy in action tomorrow evening at Live!.
Can you tell me about who you’re portraying here at the museum?
I’m portraying Fannie Rogarshevsky. Mrs. Rogarshevsky came to the United States from Lithuania in 1901 with her husband, Abraham, her children, and a niece who gets palmed off on her parents who already live here. Her brothers already live here and by the time she and Abraham move to 97 Orchard Street, they’ve come from just down the street. They’ve come from another pre-old-law tenement that probably might have just been about to undergo renovation. So they come here and they’ve got six children, two of whom were born down the street, ranging in age from a little child to teenage girls. About half the family is working in the garment industry. So by 1910, she’s got kids working and has just married off a kid, her daughter Bessie, to a border of her parents, and they’ve moved across the street and produced two kids fast.
When you’re portraying her, how do you make the character as accurate as possible?
I have a sense of who she is from the way she looks in pictures, from the history of her children – if they go away, they move back soon. The grandchildren remember her yelling out the back window, telling the bums to go sleep somewhere else. She’s a woman who loses her husband when her husband is quite young, in his early 40s, from tuberculosis. And she becomes the janitor of this building in order to keep a roof over her family’s heads. She is a big, tough lady.
What I try to balance is the sense that she’s a baleboosteh, a boss, a big tough mama. On one hand, she has a very complicated life. These people are not as successful as the Levines [another family interpreted at the Tenement Museum and on Live! at the Tenement] are going to be. They’re not going to wind up living in a nice neighborhood. But she’s kept most of her kids alive, and they come back, and she wants them near her. There’s a story that when one of the daughters moves to the apartment behind this apartment that Fannie sends the Sabbath meal on the clothesline across to a daughter who had been married and living in the Bronx but moved back here during the Depression.
So these stories are going through your head when you’re in character?
Yes, from photos and from the memories of children and grandchildren. We know more about this family and what they’re like than, say, the Levine family because we have the memories of one of the sons, Henry, from when he was quite an old man, who could tell us where everybody slept, which is what everyone always wants to know and what we almost never know for sure about these early families.
From there, how do you try to engage your audience?
I want people to respect her. I don’t think she was having a great time. People have commented on how cheery these characters are but I don’t think she was a very cheery person. But she was very proud of the home she had made, so it is very interesting to have people come into this space that she inhabits with this family. They come in and they often say, “Oh, this family has money. Look at all this stuff they have. They don’t have a factory in the living room.” And I say, “Yeah, but they had six children.”
She was very proud of the things she had here. A working family in the old country did not have a room that looked like a living room, even if it turns out you’ve got four boys sleeping in it every night using the couch as a pillow. And what we know from family memories is that she was proud of the furniture, and we were able to replicate that. Our sense is that she’s buying furniture secondhand and, to her, it’s fancy. It’s what the nice people uptown would have had because it’s carved and it’s upholstered, and the headboard of the bed is solid wood. It’s also all about forty years out of date.
She comes to 97 Orchard Street, and they have running water, which she’s never had before. She’s a house-proud woman. She has lights for the first time. You can see the dirt and that helps. If you can’t see it, it’s harder to clean.
So I’m always trying to balance the ways in which she was very proud of what she had achieved and on the other hand, the fact that this is a woman who’s getting down on her hands and knees to scrub the toilets of her neighbors every week.
Do you find it gratifying to be a costumed interpreter? Is it fun?
I find it exciting and difficult and interesting enough that I want to keep doing it. What it’s done is that, being Fannie, spending time in that apartment, and thinking as a member of that family with those responsibilities, I do a different tour. So when I move to the role of educator, there’s a part in my head that’s Fannie’s voice understanding what that couch meant to her. Now, after a lot of years at the Museum, that’s one beat up couch. But for her, it’s the symbol of this life that she has made here. However poor that life seems and was, they’re making themselves American. It’s an Orthodox family. They don’t want to give up who they are. They don’t want to become American in that way, yet she’s also very proud of what they have here.
She’s the last person to ever live in this building. When everyone moves out, Fannie is living here in 1941 with her youngest son Philip and his wife. Only at age 68 does she move into government-supported housing where there’s hot water. So for some reason, she’s hanging onto this place where so much of her life had been. She’s the center of a world that includes her parents in the building, and her brothers who sound like fruit sellers to me, on a small scale, in the neighborhood. She knows everybody and I think she’s trying to run all their lives. So it changed my sense of how to give that tour.
Meet Judith Levine - as Fanny Rogarshevsky - tomorrow evening. For tickets, visit www.tenement.org.
- Posted by Joe Klarl
Can you tell me about who you’re portraying here at the museum?
I’m portraying Fannie Rogarshevsky. Mrs. Rogarshevsky came to the United States from Lithuania in 1901 with her husband, Abraham, her children, and a niece who gets palmed off on her parents who already live here. Her brothers already live here and by the time she and Abraham move to 97 Orchard Street, they’ve come from just down the street. They’ve come from another pre-old-law tenement that probably might have just been about to undergo renovation. So they come here and they’ve got six children, two of whom were born down the street, ranging in age from a little child to teenage girls. About half the family is working in the garment industry. So by 1910, she’s got kids working and has just married off a kid, her daughter Bessie, to a border of her parents, and they’ve moved across the street and produced two kids fast.
When you’re portraying her, how do you make the character as accurate as possible?
I have a sense of who she is from the way she looks in pictures, from the history of her children – if they go away, they move back soon. The grandchildren remember her yelling out the back window, telling the bums to go sleep somewhere else. She’s a woman who loses her husband when her husband is quite young, in his early 40s, from tuberculosis. And she becomes the janitor of this building in order to keep a roof over her family’s heads. She is a big, tough lady.
What I try to balance is the sense that she’s a baleboosteh, a boss, a big tough mama. On one hand, she has a very complicated life. These people are not as successful as the Levines [another family interpreted at the Tenement Museum and on Live! at the Tenement] are going to be. They’re not going to wind up living in a nice neighborhood. But she’s kept most of her kids alive, and they come back, and she wants them near her. There’s a story that when one of the daughters moves to the apartment behind this apartment that Fannie sends the Sabbath meal on the clothesline across to a daughter who had been married and living in the Bronx but moved back here during the Depression.
So these stories are going through your head when you’re in character?
Yes, from photos and from the memories of children and grandchildren. We know more about this family and what they’re like than, say, the Levine family because we have the memories of one of the sons, Henry, from when he was quite an old man, who could tell us where everybody slept, which is what everyone always wants to know and what we almost never know for sure about these early families.
From there, how do you try to engage your audience?
I want people to respect her. I don’t think she was having a great time. People have commented on how cheery these characters are but I don’t think she was a very cheery person. But she was very proud of the home she had made, so it is very interesting to have people come into this space that she inhabits with this family. They come in and they often say, “Oh, this family has money. Look at all this stuff they have. They don’t have a factory in the living room.” And I say, “Yeah, but they had six children.”
She was very proud of the things she had here. A working family in the old country did not have a room that looked like a living room, even if it turns out you’ve got four boys sleeping in it every night using the couch as a pillow. And what we know from family memories is that she was proud of the furniture, and we were able to replicate that. Our sense is that she’s buying furniture secondhand and, to her, it’s fancy. It’s what the nice people uptown would have had because it’s carved and it’s upholstered, and the headboard of the bed is solid wood. It’s also all about forty years out of date.
She comes to 97 Orchard Street, and they have running water, which she’s never had before. She’s a house-proud woman. She has lights for the first time. You can see the dirt and that helps. If you can’t see it, it’s harder to clean.
So I’m always trying to balance the ways in which she was very proud of what she had achieved and on the other hand, the fact that this is a woman who’s getting down on her hands and knees to scrub the toilets of her neighbors every week.
Do you find it gratifying to be a costumed interpreter? Is it fun?
I find it exciting and difficult and interesting enough that I want to keep doing it. What it’s done is that, being Fannie, spending time in that apartment, and thinking as a member of that family with those responsibilities, I do a different tour. So when I move to the role of educator, there’s a part in my head that’s Fannie’s voice understanding what that couch meant to her. Now, after a lot of years at the Museum, that’s one beat up couch. But for her, it’s the symbol of this life that she has made here. However poor that life seems and was, they’re making themselves American. It’s an Orthodox family. They don’t want to give up who they are. They don’t want to become American in that way, yet she’s also very proud of what they have here.
She’s the last person to ever live in this building. When everyone moves out, Fannie is living here in 1941 with her youngest son Philip and his wife. Only at age 68 does she move into government-supported housing where there’s hot water. So for some reason, she’s hanging onto this place where so much of her life had been. She’s the center of a world that includes her parents in the building, and her brothers who sound like fruit sellers to me, on a small scale, in the neighborhood. She knows everybody and I think she’s trying to run all their lives. So it changed my sense of how to give that tour.
Meet Judith Levine - as Fanny Rogarshevsky - tomorrow evening. For tickets, visit www.tenement.org.
- Posted by Joe Klarl
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Sitting down with Live! at the Tenement staff
I recently got the opportunity to sit down with Sarah Litvin, coordinator of Live! At the Tenement, and Jeffrey Marsh, one of the Museum’s educators, who had a lot to say about the program that runs from June 24th to July 29th.
Can you tell me a little bit about the Live! At the Tenement program and your role in it?
SL: Sure. Live! at the Tenement is basically a new way of looking at the spaces that we as a staff have talked about in third person. What happens when we look at it in first person? What are all the tiny little details that come up?
JM: A million details.
SL: A million details about what life was like for these people. Generally, this program is an opportunity to visit three different apartments in the building, to see more of the recreated homes that we offer, and to interact with the actors playing the part of these characters who really lived in the building. It’s a chance to get inside of their heads, interact with them, find out what their lives were really like and how they created a home, oftentimes their first in America.
JM: It’s a human way, a very touching way to encounter them.
SL: It’s about learning emotionally. With a lot of our tours, it’s so much about the history, and people are very interested in specific details of architecture and so on. But it’s also really important to look at these spaces with an emotional eye and say, “What was this like? How can I relate to this? What does my life have to do with the people who lived here?”
JM: And that’s the real bridge to the present, the contemporary mission of the program.
Sarah, did you take the brunt of the work putting this program together?
JM: She did. I can answer that.
SL: [Laughs] It’s been a lot of fun. It’s been a really big challenge to think through all the millions of details but also to create a big cohesive thing. It’s six different characters, eight different actors playing the parts, and educators who have to make the framework to bring everyone through it. And then all the details on the administrative side of how to make all the ticketing work, how to promote it, how to get marketing and education on the same page…
JM: Timing for the tours…
SL: Timing for the tours, timing for scheduling, and there are all the different educators with lives outside of this place. It’s been a lot of logistics, but also a lot of content and a lot of research which is really fun.
How long has all of that taken? When did you start?
SL: The first thing we did was throw together a program in a couple of weeks [in October 2009]. It started out as a Halloween family day and we realized this wasn’t just for kids. Lots of people who showed up weren’t kids and they loved it. So we said, “Let’s just make this into an interpretive program suited for any audience.” Then, really since December, we’ve been working on creating [Live! at the Tenement].
How did you choose which real-life people should be portrayed by the actors?
SL: The short answer is that there are thousands of people who lived in this building, but we only have the set pieces for four different families. Our staff determined who, of those families, we decided to interpret. We wanted to get different types of people involved in costumed interpreting – right now the only program we have is for women who can pass as fourteen years old [on the Confino Family Living History tour]. There are a whole lot of other people who are excellent costumed interpreters so we started out with Bridget Moore, Fannie Rogarshevsky, Harris Levine, and Al Baldizzi. Then we just went from there and said, “Well, let’s bring in Al’s wife Sadie and Harris’ wife Jennie and go with that.”
How are these historical men and women similar and different from one another?
SL: That’s what I think is so fun. We didn’t really know at the beginning. We were just focusing on each character individually. As we thought more and more about who these people were, we thought, well, for Harris Levine who had a sweatshop in his home, home was very much work. For Al Baldizzi, as a carpenter who wandered the streets trying to find work, coming home was most decidedly not work. He was doing his work in other homes, seeing a lot more of the city. So we had to think about how to bring out that contrast.
For the women, for instance Bridget Moore, when she worked as a domestic in somebody’s home uptown, it was not her own kitchen, she was cooking their food, she was being told what to do, there were serving bells there that were driving her crazy, and now here she is at 97 Orchard Street and she has her own kitchen, the biggest space she’s ever had for herself. Compare that to Jennie Levine who’s sharing this tiny space with a presser [from her husband’s garment shop]. They have no space and they can’t get their work done because they’re in each other’s way all of the time.
JM: So it’s not just a contrast of time periods or countries of origin. It is a contrast of attitudes toward home and what that concept means.
What resources did the actors use to try to nail their parts?
JM: Paperwork, paperwork, paperwork.
SL: The first thing we did was use the information in tour content, and then we started going to the oral histories, to the archival records, all the prior resources, thinking, “Who was on Harris Levine’s naturalization papers? Jacob Vogelman. Great! That’s a name we can use in the program. We know they knew each other.” So that’s helped us. If we don’t know exactly what soap opera Sadie Baldizzi listened to, we know what soap operas were playing generally, at the time.
JM: You need to be trained on a specific level with information and day-to-day stuff but also on this meta-level on how to craft that into something that fulfills the mission of the program.
Is it fair to say that it’s about half the real-life person and about half a composite character of that community?
SL: For Fannie Rogarshevsky, we have two different oral histories and all different kinds of documents. She lived in the building for a long time. She had a big family. So it makes it really hard because that constricts our options in some ways: we know so much that we have to be true to those facts. It’s easier when we have specific guidelines but we can interpret the rest of it.
Another interesting resource we have is a furnishings plan. Pamela Keech, the furnishings curator, researches what [these immigrant families’] homes would have looked like, so we have a perfect basis to interpret why they bought these things. She used a lot of historic context.
JM: In addition to all that homework stuff, we’ve also received dialect training, stuff to fuel us as actors in this space, crafting a dramatic story that connects with the visitor.
And you have an acting background?
JM: Correct, as do most of us in the program.
This program seems unique because it’s so immersive. What role do visitors to the museum play in the reenactment and what do you encourage them to do when they experience Live! at the Tenement?
JM: When you interact with an interpreter, you will be a reporter from The New York Times, which is just a certain way of looking at the world, a certain attitude to take into that space. An attitude of inquisitiveness, of being engaged.
SL: Inquiry, observation.
JM: And it all comes back to that curation that Pam did, the spaces, the physical aspects of what they’re looking at, which we thought would be a great and easy tool for folks to use in order to jump to larger issues.
So you fully encourage all your visitors to ask as many questions as possible?
SL: Oh yeah! That’s what makes it fun as an interpreter. Sometimes visitors ask you things that you just don’t know so you have to be on your toes.
- Interview by Joe Klarl
Can you tell me a little bit about the Live! At the Tenement program and your role in it?
SL: Sure. Live! at the Tenement is basically a new way of looking at the spaces that we as a staff have talked about in third person. What happens when we look at it in first person? What are all the tiny little details that come up?
JM: A million details.
SL: A million details about what life was like for these people. Generally, this program is an opportunity to visit three different apartments in the building, to see more of the recreated homes that we offer, and to interact with the actors playing the part of these characters who really lived in the building. It’s a chance to get inside of their heads, interact with them, find out what their lives were really like and how they created a home, oftentimes their first in America.
JM: It’s a human way, a very touching way to encounter them.
SL: It’s about learning emotionally. With a lot of our tours, it’s so much about the history, and people are very interested in specific details of architecture and so on. But it’s also really important to look at these spaces with an emotional eye and say, “What was this like? How can I relate to this? What does my life have to do with the people who lived here?”
JM: And that’s the real bridge to the present, the contemporary mission of the program.
Sarah, did you take the brunt of the work putting this program together?
JM: She did. I can answer that.
SL: [Laughs] It’s been a lot of fun. It’s been a really big challenge to think through all the millions of details but also to create a big cohesive thing. It’s six different characters, eight different actors playing the parts, and educators who have to make the framework to bring everyone through it. And then all the details on the administrative side of how to make all the ticketing work, how to promote it, how to get marketing and education on the same page…
JM: Timing for the tours…
SL: Timing for the tours, timing for scheduling, and there are all the different educators with lives outside of this place. It’s been a lot of logistics, but also a lot of content and a lot of research which is really fun.
How long has all of that taken? When did you start?
SL: The first thing we did was throw together a program in a couple of weeks [in October 2009]. It started out as a Halloween family day and we realized this wasn’t just for kids. Lots of people who showed up weren’t kids and they loved it. So we said, “Let’s just make this into an interpretive program suited for any audience.” Then, really since December, we’ve been working on creating [Live! at the Tenement].
How did you choose which real-life people should be portrayed by the actors?
SL: The short answer is that there are thousands of people who lived in this building, but we only have the set pieces for four different families. Our staff determined who, of those families, we decided to interpret. We wanted to get different types of people involved in costumed interpreting – right now the only program we have is for women who can pass as fourteen years old [on the Confino Family Living History tour]. There are a whole lot of other people who are excellent costumed interpreters so we started out with Bridget Moore, Fannie Rogarshevsky, Harris Levine, and Al Baldizzi. Then we just went from there and said, “Well, let’s bring in Al’s wife Sadie and Harris’ wife Jennie and go with that.”
How are these historical men and women similar and different from one another?
SL: That’s what I think is so fun. We didn’t really know at the beginning. We were just focusing on each character individually. As we thought more and more about who these people were, we thought, well, for Harris Levine who had a sweatshop in his home, home was very much work. For Al Baldizzi, as a carpenter who wandered the streets trying to find work, coming home was most decidedly not work. He was doing his work in other homes, seeing a lot more of the city. So we had to think about how to bring out that contrast.
For the women, for instance Bridget Moore, when she worked as a domestic in somebody’s home uptown, it was not her own kitchen, she was cooking their food, she was being told what to do, there were serving bells there that were driving her crazy, and now here she is at 97 Orchard Street and she has her own kitchen, the biggest space she’s ever had for herself. Compare that to Jennie Levine who’s sharing this tiny space with a presser [from her husband’s garment shop]. They have no space and they can’t get their work done because they’re in each other’s way all of the time.
JM: So it’s not just a contrast of time periods or countries of origin. It is a contrast of attitudes toward home and what that concept means.
What resources did the actors use to try to nail their parts?
JM: Paperwork, paperwork, paperwork.
SL: The first thing we did was use the information in tour content, and then we started going to the oral histories, to the archival records, all the prior resources, thinking, “Who was on Harris Levine’s naturalization papers? Jacob Vogelman. Great! That’s a name we can use in the program. We know they knew each other.” So that’s helped us. If we don’t know exactly what soap opera Sadie Baldizzi listened to, we know what soap operas were playing generally, at the time.
JM: You need to be trained on a specific level with information and day-to-day stuff but also on this meta-level on how to craft that into something that fulfills the mission of the program.
Is it fair to say that it’s about half the real-life person and about half a composite character of that community?
SL: For Fannie Rogarshevsky, we have two different oral histories and all different kinds of documents. She lived in the building for a long time. She had a big family. So it makes it really hard because that constricts our options in some ways: we know so much that we have to be true to those facts. It’s easier when we have specific guidelines but we can interpret the rest of it.
Another interesting resource we have is a furnishings plan. Pamela Keech, the furnishings curator, researches what [these immigrant families’] homes would have looked like, so we have a perfect basis to interpret why they bought these things. She used a lot of historic context.
JM: In addition to all that homework stuff, we’ve also received dialect training, stuff to fuel us as actors in this space, crafting a dramatic story that connects with the visitor.
And you have an acting background?
JM: Correct, as do most of us in the program.
This program seems unique because it’s so immersive. What role do visitors to the museum play in the reenactment and what do you encourage them to do when they experience Live! at the Tenement?
JM: When you interact with an interpreter, you will be a reporter from The New York Times, which is just a certain way of looking at the world, a certain attitude to take into that space. An attitude of inquisitiveness, of being engaged.
SL: Inquiry, observation.
JM: And it all comes back to that curation that Pam did, the spaces, the physical aspects of what they’re looking at, which we thought would be a great and easy tool for folks to use in order to jump to larger issues.
So you fully encourage all your visitors to ask as many questions as possible?
SL: Oh yeah! That’s what makes it fun as an interpreter. Sometimes visitors ask you things that you just don’t know so you have to be on your toes.
- Interview by Joe Klarl
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