Sign-In
Cart
The Story of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg
Paperback
Architecture HistoryPlaywritingSocial Movements
Publisher Price: $8.99
ISBN13: 9780997217032
Publisher: Estuary Press
Published: Nov 15 2018
Pages: 122
Weight: 0.33
Height: 0.26 Width: 5.50 Depth: 8.50
Language: English
The Story of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg is a play written in 1976 by Nina Serrano, Paul Richards and Judith Binder. We originally wrote and produced it in the San Francisco Bay Area, toured it to local colleges and performed it on local media KPFA-fm and KQED-tv.
The story is about betrayal, a brother's betrayal of his sister and his brother-in-law. It is a play set in the eye of the anti-communist hurricane known to history as the McCarthy era. A play about a couple with two young children caught up in the scape-goating hysteria of a new world war, the Cold War. It is a play that follows a young couple to their deaths, clinging to their love for each other and their children, and the only truth that matters, their truth. A truth they are willing to die for, even if it means making their two small boys into orphans. It is a play about a trial that mesmerized people around the world, watching in horror as the heartless American state puts them in the electric chair and throws the switch sending them into eternity and infamy.
A Tragic Play in the Tradition of Euripides
Following the age-old format of theatrical tragedy, we created the plot. The Rosenbergs had to die for the sake of the American empire's war to destroy its socialist rival, the Soviet Union. Ethel and Julius were sacrificed to the anti-communist Gods in the same way the Iphigenia, in Euripides' tragic play, was sacrificed to the ancient gods for the sake of the patriarchal Greek State on its way to the legendary Trojan War. Only the Rosenbergs, unlike the Iphigenia, did not go quietly. They protested the injustice and proclaimed their innocence to the very end, as did their supporters worldwide.
Ethel and Julius Rosenberg were an American Jewish leftist couple caught up in the famous atomic spies case of the conformist 1950's. Ethel Rosenberg's brother, David Greenglass, was a pawn and victim of the anti-communist inquisition in full force in the late 1940s. He was accused of stealing materials from the Los Alamos Labs in the 1940s where he worked in New Mexico. When the Soviets exploded their first atom bomb in 1949, the charges against Greenglass escalated into stealing atomic secrets and giving them to the anti-capitalist enemy, the former Soviet Union. To escape the death sentence and save his wife and children, Greenglass falsely implicated his sister and brother-in-law, the Rosenbergs. Even though, as we all know today, there were no atomic secrets. The US government conjured up fake science hidden behind secret classified documents. This evidence that no one has ever seen, sent the Rosenbergs to the electric chair, leaving behind their two small boys orphaned in 1953. As a reward, David Greenglass received a reduced sentence of 10 years and his wife remained free to raise their children.
Now, decades later, new productions of the play are taking place, first, in 2016, in Bryan, Texas, and upcoming in November 2018, in Toronto, Canada. We invite theater companies everywhere to produce the play. Contact us for more information.
Also in
Playwriting
Our Town and the Cosmic One-Acts: The Long Christmas Dinner, the Happy Journey to Trenton and Camden, and Pullman Car Hiawatha
Wilder, Thornton
Paperback
Art of Dramatic Writing: Its Basis in the Creative Interpretation of Human Motives
Egri, Lajos
Paperback
Andrew Lloyd Webber's Phantom of the Opera: A Behind-The-Mask Look at the Global Phenomenon
Slavin, Nicola
Maher-Smith, Kat
Hardcover
Solo: The Everything Guide to Writing, Performing, and Producing Your One-Person Show
Malinowski, Arlene
Ganey, Julie
Paperback
The Penguin Arthur Miller: Collected Plays (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)
Miller, Arthur
Paperback
The Playwright's Guidebook: An Insightful Primer on the Art of Dramatic Writing
Spencer, Stuart
Paperback
Four Plays: Come Back Little Sheba; Picnic; Bus Stop; The Dark at the Top of the Stairs
Inge, William
Paperback
Putting It Together: How Stephen Sondheim and I Created Sunday in the Park with George
Lapine, James
Paperback
Latin American Plays in Translation: Modern Stories of Gender, Class and Society in Latin America
Villanova, Xavier
Blanco, Mariano Tenconi
Eddowes-Vargas, Sebastián
Paperback
Three Days of Rain and Other Plays: Three Days of Rain; The American Plan; The Author's Voice; Hurrah at Last
Greenberg, Richard
Paperback
We are Proud to Present a Presentation About the Herero of Namibia, Formerly Known as Southwest Africa, From the German Sudwestafrika, Between the Yea
Sibblies Drury, Jackie
Paperback
Shakespeare's Borrowed Feathers: How Early Modern Playwrights Shaped the World's Greatest Writer
Freebury-Jones, Darren
Hardcover
Grab and Grace or It's the Second Step - Companion and Sequel to The House by the Stable
Williams, Charles
Paperback
Shakespeare's Borrowed Feathers: How Early Modern Playwrights Shaped the World's Greatest Writer
Freebury-Jones, Darren
Paperback
Moment Work: Tectonic Theater Project's Process of Devising Theater
Kaufman, Moises
Pitts McAdams, Barbara
Paperback
Actor with a Badge: Attempting Life as a Theatrician on the School-to-Prison Pipeline
Demenkoff, Tommy
Paperback
Our Laundry, Our Town: My Chinese American Life from Flushing to the Downtown Stage and Beyond
Eng, Alvin
Paperback
The Art Of Dramatic Writing: Its Basis In The Creative Interpretation Of Human Motives
Egri, Lajos
Hardcover
A Thousand Splendid Suns (Play Script): Based on the novel by Khaled Hosseini
Sarma, Ursula Rani
Paperback
Wings of Night Sky, Wings of Morning Light: A Play by Joy Harjo and a Circle of Responses
Page, Priscilla
Harjo, Joy
Paperback
Playwright's Toolbox: Exercises from 56 Contemporary Dramatists on Designing, Building, and Refurbishing Your Plays
Maxwell, Justin
Paperback
Simon Stephens International Plays: A Dark, Dark, Dark, Dark Blue; Maria; Fortune; Three Ghosts
Stephens, Simon
Paperback
Dennis Kelly: Plays Two: Our Teacher's a Troll; Orphans; Taking Care of Baby; DNA; The Gods Weep
Kelly, Dennis
Paperback
Do It Yourself Dramaturgy: 1,001 Questions to Ask Myself Before I Submit my New Play (plus 80 bonus questions on how to have a career as a playwright)
Russell-King, Caroline
Paperback