Credit: Youn Park
Firehall Arts Centre until December 4, 2022
Tickets from $25 at www.firehallartscentre.ca or 604-689-0926
Posted November 30, 2022
You could be forgiven for not knowing who Chiune Sugihara was because he apparently wanted it that way. He was happy for a long time that only his wife knew about the heroic service he had performed for thousands of European Jews.
A Japanese vice-consul working in Lithuania during WWII, Sugihara took it upon himself, against orders from Japan, to issue travel visas to thousands of Lithuanian and Polish Jews, frantic to escape advancing Nazi forces across Europe. Travel visas, allowing visa holders to pass through Japan and then on to China, were available but took too long and cost too much; time was running out so Sugihara, fully aware that he would pay dearly for disobeying orders, simply started issuing visas and distributing them. From an article in the Accidental Talmudist, Sugihara explains: “You want to know about my motivation, don’t you? Well. It is the kind of sentiments anyone would have when he actually sees refugees face to face, begging with tears in their eyes. He just cannot help but sympathize with them.”
He understood that Japanese bureaucrats were divided on the issue and he simply took things into his own hands, literally handwriting thousands of visas.
Credit: Youn Park
A world premiere, Courage Now is a compelling story unknown even to most Japanese including Sugihara’s own children and Manami Hara, a Vancouver-based writer/performer. Inspired by her friend and mentor Jane Heyman, former Associate Director of Studio 58, Hara began her research. (Heyman’s connection to the story is that her parents received transit visas from Sugihara and she likely owes her life to him as do an estimated 100,00 descendants of those who benefitted from his courage.)
Credit: Youn Park
Hara blends the real story of Sugihara with the fictional story of Margaret, born Shayna, to Jewish parents in Lithuania. Shayna (Katherine Matlashewski), as a young girl, was put on a train by her father with a visa issued by Sugihara and sent to Japan. Later, as a divorcee now called Margaret Grant and living in Vancouver, she goes to Japan in search of Sugihara only to discover he had recently died.
As Sugihara’s wife Yukiko, Manami Hara exudes quiet calm and compassion despite Sugihara’s stubborn refusal to advocate for himself or his family. There was apparently a period of some years when, feeling disgraced, he became a door-to-door salesman earning barely enough to keep food on the table for his family. Ryota Kaneko’s portrayal of Sugihara illustrates a complex character: somewhat arrogant, somewhat humble – a man who, right to the end, believed he had done only what was the right thing to do yet feeling shame for being forced to resign his diplomatic position. As Shayna, Matlashewski shows the anger she felt when her father refused to leave Lithuania with her but preferred to remain behind in hopes of being reunited with Shayna’s mother, caught up in the conflict in Poland. All grown up as Margaret, Advah Soudack shows her character’s lively, adventuresome spirit as well as her conflicted feelings about her own father Jankl (Amitai Marmorstein).
Directed by Amiel Gladstone, Courage Now is a handsome production with Kimira Reddy’s gorgeous set design – a Moon Gate and open screens set against a glorious rose-coloured skyscape. Lighting design is by Itai Erdal and sound design by Riley Hardwick.
Most interesting to me about the story was the anger still festering in Margaret Grant at what she felt was abandonment rather than her father’s selfless act to get her safely out of Europe, and Yukiko’s frustration at Chiune’s feelings of shame despite his act of heroism. The resolution and peace the women find together is touching.
Courage Now is an earnest play and a reminder that anti-Semitism is still with us, intolerance of all stripes is still rife and it takes courage to take a stand and do what Chiune Sugihara did. As Donna Spencer, Artistic Producer of the Firehall Arts Centre, writes in her program notes, “Perhaps it is our turn to show courage now.”