On the eve of Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day), Concentration, Arne Weingart’s theatrical adaptation of his poetry written in the voice of a World War II death camp prisoner, runs April 11 and 12 in a new, reimagined production at the Ruth Page Center for the Arts, 1016 N. Dearborn, Chicago. This new production is co-produced by Temple Sholom of Chicago.
Concentration imagines a young poet in a World War II death camp, sharing his experience through 50 short poems voiced by four actors and serving as a kind of journal—an imagined response to all-too-real yet unthinkable events. The production features striking visual effects and original music by Cherise Leiter, performed live by four musicians: violin, cello, clarinet, and voice.
Weingart said, “Concentration is a dramatic meditation on keeping oneself alive, body and soul, as though our uncertain past were able to speak with clarity and compassion to our uncertain present.”
“With the distance in years since the Shoah, it is essential that we not relegate the experience to history,” said Temple Sholom of Chicago Rabbi Shoshanah Conover. “Instead, it must continue to beat in our hearts and live in our minds with the power of memory. Arne Weingart’s narrative poetry captures individual voices and experiences with potency, poignancy, and even humor. In so doing, he makes Concentration an unforgettable memorial to our resilient legacy.”
Award-winning poet and author Arne Weingart originally wrote and published Concentration in 2023 and adapted it in 2024 for an initial staged reading in Denver. Concentration was subsequently staged in a full production at the 2024 Rhinoceros Theater Festival (Rhino Fest) in Chicago. Weingart has several published poetry collections, and his work appears in numerous literary journals. Full bio below.
Directing Concentration is Anna H. Gelman, an artistic associate of The Neo-Futurists and lead creative producer and director of livestream at Mishkan Chicago. She has also worked with Organic Theater Company, Red Tape Theatre, Shattered Globe, Goodman Theatre, Steppenwolf Theatre’s LookOut series, and more. Full bio below.
Composer Cherise Leiter has composed works for choir, piano, voice, band, orchestra, and assorted chamber ensembles. Her works have been performed throughout the U.S., Canada, Scotland, France, Italy, Romania, and Japan. Full bio below.
The cast of Concentration includes Jack Aschenbach, Lynne Baker, Rich Lazatin, and Jourdan Lewanda. Musicians are Barbara Drapcho (clarinet), Sonia Goldberg (voice), Kelly Quesada (cello), and Nathan Urdangen (piano). Jordan Olive is music director, Ryn Hardiman is lighting designer, Madeline Felauer is costume designer, Zach Weinberg is production manager, and Eliot Colin is stage manager.
A talkback featuring Weingart, Gelman, and Leiter follows the April 12 performance.
Concentration takes place Saturday, April 11 at 7 p.m.
and Sunday, April 12 at 2:30 p.m. at
Ruth Page Center for the Arts, 1016 N. Dearborn, Chicago.
Tickets are $18 and $36 and are available at
Concentration26.eventbrite.com.
All programming is subject to change.
Arne Weingart is a graduate of Dartmouth College and received an MFA in writing from Columbia University. Published poetry collections are Levitation for Agnostics, winner of the New American Press Poetry Prize; Unpractical Thinking, winner of the Red Mountain Press Poetry Prize; and Concentration (FutureCycle Press). He has been awarded writing residencies at the Atlantic Center for the Arts, Vermont Studio Center, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts and has been a featured panelist/reader at the Southern Festival of Books and the Frost Farm Poetry Conference. Journal publications include Arts & Letters, Georgetown Review, Mayday Magazine, Mudfish, Narrative, New Millennium Writings, Nimrod, Oberon, Passager, Paterson Literary Review, Plume, Poetry Daily, RHINO, Sow’s Ear Poetry Review, Solstice, Southeast Review, Southern Poetry Review, Southword, Spoon River Poetry Review, The Georgia Review, The Irish Times, The Massachusetts Review, and The Moth. Prizes for individual poems include those offered by Sow's Ear Poetry Review, the Frost Foundation, and The Moth's Nature Writing Competition (judged by Helen Macdonald). His work has been anthologized in Border Lines, Poems of Migration (Knopf) and Poets Meet Politics (Hungry Hill Writing).
Anna H. Gelman is a director/producer/editor working in experimental theater and film, ritual design, and live streaming. Gelman has worked with Blue in the Right Way, Digital Alliance, Red Tape Theatre, Morten Group, Bob., Organic Theater Company, GreatWorks, 2nd Story, Prop Theatre, Rhinofest, BorderLight International Theatre Festival, Kansas City Fringe, About Face Theatre, Wender Collective, Shattered Globe Theatre, Goodman Theatre, Steppenwolf LookOut, and others. She is the lead creative producer and director of livestream at Mishkan Chicago and is an artistic associate of The Neo-Futurists. Gelman’s work has been described as “expertly crafted” (Chicago Reader), “hauntingly contemporary” (NewCity Stage), and “funny, unexpected, melancholy and thoughtful” (Chicago Theater Review). She was one of The Fifty People Who Really Perform for Chicago in NewCity Stage in 2022 and was recently dubbed a “rising director-producer” in the Chicago Reader. She holds certificates from The Moscow Art Theater School and The Prague Film School and is a graduate of Oberlin College.
Born in Florida, Cherise Leiter received a B. M. in music theory and an M. M. in composition from the University of Florida. She is currently Professor of Music at Metropolitan State University of Denver, teaching music theory and composition. A composer whose output includes works for choir, piano, voice, band, orchestra, and assorted chamber ensembles, her compositions have been performed throughout the United States, Canada, Scotland, France, Italy, Romania, and Japan. She was a featured composer at the New Music Symposium, the University of Central Missouri's New Music Festival, the Aspen Composer's Conference, the Women Composers Festival, the Atlantic Center for the Arts, June in Buffalo, Music By Women Festival, and Brush Creek Foundation for the Arts. In her spare time, sheis an avid knitter, horse rider, hiker, swimmer, cook, and bibliophile. She also has a vested interest in anything made of chocolate.