The first line of dialogue in the lengthily titled Marsha Blovotnik and the Marvelous Magical Chicken Soup is actually quite succinct: “I’m angry!” shouts Marsha Blovotnik. It sets the tone for the character, the tight 90-minute production, and Artists Repertory’s 44th season: Comedies for a World on Fire.
The eponymous Marsha (Maria Porter) contains multitudes: She’s a middle-aged chronically annoyed socialist Jewish lesbian living in a cluttered apartment in a defunct community theater. And she’s angry! That anger is the lens through which we view the messy, irritating carnival of human motivations that surround her. Like much of the human carnival, it’s hilarious. Playwright Dan Kitrosser worked in plenty of multi-layered one-liners, mercilessly skewering a feast of hypocrisies.
We meet Marsha as she’s preparing a Shabbos meal for her rich, estranged sister Janice (Robin McAlpine) whom she detests. Unfortunately, Marsha was so angry—she was ”busy canceling her New York Times subscription because of Bret Stephens latest article”—that she completely forgot to make her family’s Shabbos centerpiece, marvelous socialist chicken soup.
The recipe comes from the sisters’ father, Herschel Blovotnik, who also ran the theater where Marsha lives. Just before Janice arrives, a “very old Jewish relative” but “not a specific Jewish relative” magically appears and gives Marsha a fresh pot of the soup. The soup has already been described in glowing terms as “Jewish penicillin,” but this pot is especially potent. Just a spoonful will dissolve away any festering animus between people—between Marsha and her sister, or, writ large, between all the people of the world.
“You Masha Blovotnik have been chosen to begin the Great Change,” the relative, who is not a specific relative, says, “to end the reign of the pharaohs and czars and fascists, you with the shtetl purity of an angry yenta, you have been given this marvelous magical chicken soup and all you must do is give it to your sister.” That’s easier said than done.
Janice arrives and reveals herself as a nouveau riche blowhard, untrammeled either by self-awareness or awareness of the suffering of others. She’s followed by her son Jonathan (Adam John Roper), a 42-year-old rapacious gay vulture capitalist with the unearned smug self-assurance of Jared Kushner. Finally, Lilith (Miriam Schwartz) makes her entrance. The most recent in Marsha’s string of ex-wives, Lilith is ostensibly stopping by to pick up her stuff, but really she’s there to display her own selfish project for an assured future. Despite her anger, Marsha may be the character with the fewest ulterior motives and devious plans.
Hovering over these fractious people is a one-person chorus (Maeve Stier) with a klezmer accordion. This deftly deployed theatrical device weaves together a disjointed, magical chronology that warms, illuminates, and moderates the characters.
Marsha Blovotnik and the Marvelous Magical Chicken Soup is a play that asks what it will take to heal the world, a pursuit within Judaism that seeks to overcome bitter divisions between people. This is evident in the workings of the soup, but also Marsha’s sharp criticisms, like “I am sorry that you think being Jewish means helping yourself instead of helping the world. Because to me, shielding yourself, protecting your own while others suffer, is the least Jewish thing you can do.”
For all her chronic anger, sharp tongue, and sardonic wit, Marsha was chosen by her very old Jewish relative (but not a specific Jewish relative) to be the bearer of the healing chicken soup. She didn’t ask for it. Are they worth her efforts?
Under Luan Schooler’s expansive direction, the ensemble of likeable unlikeables all get their just due. At times, we wonder if the cast’s supporting characters are even worth saving, but if Marsha’s still angry, it also means she hasn’t given up on them.
Marsha Blovotnik and the Marvelous Magical Chicken Soup plays at Artists Repertory Theatre, 1511 SW Morrison, through November 22, $65 w/ other pay tiers and Arts for All tickets available, artistsrep.org, all ages