Presents
The World Premiere of

A Play By James Sherman
Directed by BJ Jones

Additional Production Staff
Associate Costume Designer Mackenzie Mitchell
Dialect Coach Adam Goldstein
PROJECTIONS Aaron Harris Woodstein
WIG COORDINATOR AND ARTISAN Megan E. Pirtle
Production Dramaturg Tanya Lynn Palmer

SPECIAL THANKS
The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust
The Colorado New Plays festival

The show will be performed without an intermission.

Video and/or audio recording of this performance 
by any means whatsoever is strictly prohibited.

Lead
Paul Epner and Janet Gans Epner
Nan Greenough
Judy Newton

Presenting
Donna and Gene Frett
Susan and Henry Gaud
Guy and Joan Gunzberg

In 2009, on a rainy afternoon in New York, my wife Candy and I went to see a documentary about Gertrude Berg, the creator of the sitcom. Her radio and subsequent TV show broke ground, and the documentary Yoohoo, Mrs. Goldberg by Aviva Kempner, which was a NY Times Critics’ Pick, brought back memories of the show that ruled the airwaves. I thought her story would be a terrific stage play and commissioned a draft right away. 

That original treatment didn’t quite work out, but years later, after I saw James Sherman’s play Chagall in School in 2023, and was struck by its themes of anti-Semitism, I told him the story over lunch. He watched the documentary, did the research, and in six months had a first draft of the play you will see today. Cindy Gold, a Northlight regular, is a dead ringer for Gertrude Berg, and I had her in mind for Gertrude/Molly Goldberg from the very beginning.

The themes inherent in the play are chillingly prescient and sadly so. Jim’s play is based on the truth, and though fictionalized, the characters are real and the events are accurate. Last month, The New Yorker featured an article called “The Mother of the Sitcom.”  In it, they stated that without Gertrude Berg, there would not have been an I Love Lucy. In 1950, Berg was the second most popular woman in America after Eleanor Roosevelt. And the underlying themes of her scripts from 1929 on championed Democracy. 

I’m delighted to honor this forgotten heroine and broadcasting pioneer.

-BJ Jones

For a generation of Americans, Gertrude Berg embodied Jewish motherhood in a series of radio, television, stage, and film performances. She is best remembered as the creative force behind the Goldbergs, a fictitious Jewish family who lived in an apartment at 1038 East Tremont Avenue in the Bronx. In addition to her matriarchal public persona, Berg was also one of the first American women to work as a writer and producer of radio and television situation comedy. 

From the late 1920s through the mid-1950s, the Goldbergs made appearances on radio, stage, television, and film. In addition to playing Molly, the family matriarch, Berg produced and scripted the Goldbergs’ various outings. On radio, The Rise of the Goldbergs aired on NBC Blue from 1929 to 1934, and then on CBS from 1938 to 1945, making it one of the longest-running series in the medium. Berg presented the Goldbergs live on tour in 1934 and in a Broadway play, Me and Molly, in 1948. The following year, The Goldbergs became one of the first situation comedies on American television on CBS, and continued to appear on different networks until 1954 (CBS, 1949 to 1951; NBC, 1952 to 1953; DuMont, 1954).

-Jewish Woman’s Archive, by Jeffrey Shandler, updated by Pete Smith

(in order of appearance)

Cindy Gold* Gertrude Berg “Molly”	Mark David Kaplan* Eli Mintz “David”	Sarah Coakley Price* Arlene McQuade “Rosalie"
Ty Fanning* Larry Robinson  Sammy”	William Dick* Phillip Loeb “Jake”	Joe Dempsey* Walter Hart

* indicates a member of AEA

Gertrude Berg/”Molly” Rosalind Hurwitz
Eli Mintz/”David” Victor Holstein
Arlene McQuade/“Rosalie”  Kayla Frischkorn
Larry Robinson/”Sammy”  Gavin Rhys Morgan
Philip Loeb/”Jake”  Patrick John Blashill
Walter Hart Daniel Houle

LORT Theatres are represented by United Scenic Artists, Local USA-829 of the IATSE. This Theatre operates under an agreement between the League of Resident Theatres and Actors' Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Manager's in the United States.

BJ Jones
Artistic Director

Timothy J. Evans
Executive Director

The Saints | Grumman Butkus Associates | Hagerty Consulting Northwestern University | Dr. Scholl Foundation
Full Circle Foundation | City of Evanston | ZS Associates John J. Cahill Inc. | The Sullivan Family Foundation
John R. Halligan Charitable Fund | The Womens Club of Evanston
Henrietta Lange Burk, Fund, Bank of America, N.A., Trustees