The Marvelous Puppet Show

In this Illuminated Lecture, Professor Barbara Fuchs, Distinguished Professor of Spanish and English at UCLA and director of Diversifying the Classics, addresses La Celestina, a text written in Spain at the turn of the sixteenth century, soon after the expulsion of the Jews. La Celestina asks radically uncomfortable questions of its society and our own: what do we owe each other, especially across lines of class or gender? How do we make room for ourselves in a place where we may not be welcome? In a time of profound dislocation, how do we find meaning in the world?This episode was recorded as a live presentation on April 30, 2026 at The Philosophical Research Society in Los Angeles. Learn more at theatredybbuk.org/podcast.

This episode features a discussion between theatre dybbuk's artistic director, Aaron Henne, and Professor Carol Margaret Davison about Bram Stoker's Dracula, exploring the ways in which the societal concerns present at the time of its publication intersect with the prejudices and beliefs that are embedded in the text.Professor Davison acted as a consulting scholar on theatre dybbuk's new world premiere production, Dracula (Annotated), which Aaron wrote and directed, and which opens in Los Angeles on September 26, 2025 then tours to Tucson and Cincinnati in the weeks that follow. In the piece, the company uses a unique blend of scholarly investigation and heightened theatricality to weave together the gothic characters and plot of Dracula with references to the forces at play in Victorian England that are still timely today.This episode is a rebroadcast of an online Zoom event that was recorded live on August 10, 2025, as presented by the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program and hosted by Shirel Horovitz. The program was edited for the podcast by Julie Lockhart and Mark McClain Wilson. You can learn more about the Jewish Community Scholar Program at www.occsp.net. Learn more at theatredybbuk.org/podcast.

This illuminated lecture features Professor Paul Lerner as he discusses the famous 1938 radio broadcast by Orson Welles of "The War of the Worlds" vis-à-vis analysis from Austrian Jewish media researcher (and later advertising exec) Herta Herzog, who studied audience reactions to the broadcast and argued that the tensions of the time – the rise of fascist movements, the growing likelihood of war – agitated listeners and predisposed them to believe the fabricated threat from the skies, despite Welles’ assurances that the broadcast was a hoax.This episode was recorded as a live presentation on September 1st, 2024 at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles. Learn more at theatredybbuk.org/podcast.

This illuminated lecture features Alan Niku as he seeks to answer these questions: How did Jews in Persia participate in Sufism before and after the appearance of Kabbalah? Is Sufism a fundamentally Islamic form of mysticism? And what Sufi influences are still tangible in the practices of Persian Jews today?This episode was recorded as a live presentation on July 11, 2024 at The Philosophical Research Society in Los Angeles. Learn more at theatredybbuk.org/podcast.

In this episode, presented in collaboration with The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life at UC Berkeley, we explore “Lilith,” a short story by Primo Levi, featured in his 1981 collection Moments of Reprieve. Dr. Francesco Spagnolo, Curator of The Magnes Collection and Professor of Music and Jewish Studies at UC Berkeley, discusses the ways in which “Lilith,” with its combination of memoiristic storytelling, sharply drawn characters, and mythic resonances, speaks not only to the work Levi created throughout his career but to Italian Jewish history and beyond. Learn more at theatredybbuk.org/podcast.

In this episode, presented in collaboration with the Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust Education (OJMCHE), we explore Fiction without Romance; or the Locket-Watch, a novel which was written by Maria Polack in the East End of London and published in 1830.Dr. Heidi Kaufman, Professor of English at the University of Oregon and Regional Museum Educator at OJMCHE, discusses the ways in which the novel, believed to be the first by an Anglo-Jewish writer, upends some of the misconceptions and stereotypes about 19th century life in the East End. Learn more at theatredybbuk.org/podcast.

This illuminated lecture brings together readings from the short play "The Marvelous Puppet Show" by Miguel de Cervantes, published in 1615, with a talk from Dr. Barbara Fuchs, Distinguished Professor of Spanish and English at UCLA and director of Diversifying the Classics. Dr. Fuchs reveals the ways in which Cervantes' uncannily prescient interlude dissects the foibles of belief and belonging and poses uncomfortable questions for the here and now.This episode was recorded live on April 20, 2024 at First Congregational Church of Los Angeles and is presented in collaboration with Diversifying the Classics at UCLA. The podcast presentation is supported in part by a grant from the Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs. Learn more at theatredybbuk.org/podcast.

In this episode, presented in collaboration with Hebrew College, we begin by exploring two poems from the second half of the 19th century by prominent American poets. One, "The Jewish Cemetery at Newport," by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, is generally thought to have been written during a visit to Newport in 1852 and was then published in 1854. The other, a response to that work by Emma Lazarus, called "In the Jewish Synagogue at Newport," was likely written in 1867 and then published in 1871.Rabbi Dan Judson, Provost of Hebrew College, discusses how the poem by Lazarus both builds upon and deviates from Longfellow's poem. He also shares about the artistic and ideological journey that Emma Lazarus, as a Jewish American writer, took over the course of her career, using her poem "The Banner of the Jew," published in 1882, as an entry point to understand this journey, and touches on the ways in which her evolution speaks to Jewish identity in America and the American experience overall.Support for this episode is provided in part by A More Perfect Union: The Jewish Partnership for Democracy. Learn more at theatredybbuk.org/podcast.

This guest episode from Primary Source, a limited series podcast from the Taube Center for Jewish Studies at Stanford University, explores the notorious and fraudulent antisemitic text most commonly known as The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, taking a look at its history and its impact on world politics. This episode from our colleagues is a meaningful companion to our popular Season 1 episode, "The Protocols, Henry Ford, and The International Jew," co-produced with the Association for Jewish Studies, which investigated, in part, the ways in which The Protocols were distributed in the United States and beyond. Learn more at theatredybbuk.org/podcast.

Dr. Jennifer Wells, former Assistant Professor of History and International Affairs at the George Washington University, takes us through the social, economic, and political landscape of Elizabethan England as Aaron Henne, the writer and director of our latest work, The Merchant of Venice (Annotated), or In Sooth I Know Not Why I Am So Sad, and artistic director of theatre dybbuk, illuminates that history's impact on our interpretation of Shakespeare's Merchant.This episode is presented in collaboration with the George Washington University Department of History. This is the third and final episode in our series connected to concepts that intersect with The Merchant of Venice (Annotated), or In Sooth I Know Not Why I Am So Sad. That production combines text from Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice with Elizabethan history and news from 2020 to the present. In doing so, it seeks to illuminate how, during times of upheaval, some people may place blame for their anxieties on an “other.” Learn more at theatredybbuk.org/podcast.