First things first: it’s pronounced ‘fay-guh-luh’ (I had settled for ‘fay-gell’ before the show). According to the show’s programme, which contains a ‘glossary of terms’, ‘faygele’ translates literally from Yiddish as ‘little bird’, but is, at least in the context of the show, a derogatory term in place of a homophobic insult that also starts with the letter F. The context is that a teenager is living in a traditional Jewish household. Technically, there is no such thing as a ‘teenager’ in such traditions, as at the age of thirteen a boy is considered to become a man, and a girl enters adulthood on her twelfth birthday.
Dr Freed (Ben Caplan), a therapist who Rabbi Lev (Andrew Paul) astutely observes is often himself in need of therapy, wants to remain in good standing with his local Jewish community. Seeing his son Ari (Ilan Galkoff) display what he considers effeminate behaviour on display at Ari’s Bar Mitzvah, he orders Ari to man up. He is, after all, according to the Jewish faith, about to become a man. It isn’t long before the Book of Leviticus is quoted: “If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.” In a sense, Ari was ‘put to death’, even if it wasn’t by way of capital punishment.
The plotline, alas, is far from watertight. It seems unlikely that Dr Freed, having kicked Ari out of the family home, would have welcomed him back in under any circumstances. Such stubborn people are so set in their ways nothing can ever persuade them they have ever made a mistake. Likewise, his crocodile tears at the close of the play seem improbable, and a man considered by his wife Mrs Freed (Clara Francis) to be uncaring and brutish did not, frankly, deserve to have the final words just before the curtain call. Mrs Freed had eleven dependent children in her care, but she did not look nearly as haggard as someone with no help from her husband, hired childminders or other relatives would.
At ninety minutes without interval, the show is the right length for the story that unfolds. There’s a curious mix of exposition and dramatization, which has an ebb-and-flow effect in terms of the show’s pace, and gives the play an inconsistency and unpredictability. Are we about to be shown something or are they going to simply tell us what happened? A slight pity, then, that how Ari’s story finishes is revealed in the first few minutes of the play, and a much larger pity that the writer felt it necessary to include an overly-laboured story called ‘The Turkey Prince’, which could have been excised in its entirety with no difference to the audience’s understanding of the timeline of events.
Completing the on-stage cast is Sammy Stein (Yiftach Mizrahi) who has some cogent and thoughtful points to make about presumptions and prejudices held even by the local rabbi. Rabbi Lev has, he confided in Ari, been learning about “the LGBT condition”, whatever he meant by that, though he seemed more progressive than most people in his congregation. The show is sufficiently accessible – one need not know anything at all about Judaism before seeing it. There are some intriguing topics explored in this play but it still felt like a work in progress rather than a finished production.
Review by Chris Omaweng
At 13, Ari Freed’s world is upended in an instant – when, at his Bar Mitzvah celebration, his father strikes him down with a single word: Faygele. The sting fractures his already delicate sense of self, forcing him into a battle he never asked for.
Faygele is a story of survival in the space between faith and identity, love and duty, past and future – unravelling the complexities of Ari’s adolescence and the relationships that shape him.
Ari Freed – Ilan Galkoff
Dr Freed – Ben Caplan
Mrs Freed – Clara Francis
Rabbi Lev – Andrew Paul
Sammy Stein – Yiftach Mizrahi
Writer – Shimmy Braun
Director – Hannah Chissick
Set and Costume Designer – David Shields
Lighting Designer – Nic Farman
Sound Designer – Dan Samson
Casting Director – Rob Kelly
FAYGELE
Marylebone Theatre
30 April to 31 May 2025
