The White Crow (Eichmann in Jerusalem)

Synopsis

In 1960, Adolph Eichmann, the high Nazi war criminal, was kidnapped in Argentina by the Israeli secret service, and brought to Jerusalem to stand trial for Crimes Against Humanity: "The Trial of the Century", as it would forever be known. This play - The White Crow - is based on pre-trial interrogations of the Nazi monster. The psychologist sent in to break the great criminal, Miriam Baum, is an invented character, but all the facts are true. What is most telling is that given the opportunity to confront a notorious Nazi psychopath, we discover that the world of victims and executioners is not the world we expected and that we ourselves are only one decision away from Evil.

Our Review:

7 May 2009

With the possible exception of what might happen in the stands when Millwall visit Elland Road, the most harrowing sight on offer in Yorkshire this month will probably be York Theatre Royal’s The White Crow. Written by American Donald Freed and first performed at Mercury Theatre in Colchester, it imagines a pair of interviews between former Nazi colonel Adolf Eichmann and Israeli psychologist Dr Baum in 1960. The mismatch is rendered particularly restless because Baum left Germany in 1939 as a refugee, and is either unable or unwilling to tell Eichmann whether her children died under his command. Robert Pickavance and Sonia Petrovna, steered by YTR artistic director Damian Cruden, are thus required to visit most of the sharpest contours across the terrain of human emotion, except the happy ones.

The main piece in Lydia Denno’s set is what an all-in-one fold-out Ikea conservatory might look like, but the use of glass panels and blinds gives fitting form...

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