GLYK
GLYK is a queer Yiddish theatre collective dedicated to farting around in the archives. GLYK produces shows that feature 19th-20th c. works (both “classic” and neglected) alongside new Yiddish-language compositions and original English-to-Yiddish translations. Inspired by the tradition of kleynkunst, an early 20th century Yiddish theater mode attempting to overcome the distinctions between amateur/professional, art/life, and audience/performer, GLYK weaves our 21st c. queer sensibility through patchwork performances featuring short scenes, poems, and songs.
I’ve worked with GLYK as a producer, director, translator, performer, and sound guy. I am also a member of the GLYK Playwrights Circle, an internal initiative dedicated to developing English-language plays by collective members that align with our political and aesthetic values.
GLYK’s recent shows include:
Goles-glikn
6.18.26
GLYK @ The NeoFuturarium
Presented by The Chicago YIVO Society
What’s an authentic Jew and how do you become one? What’s the relation between art and life, representation and reproduction? And what the fuck are we doing in Chicago? Featuring: Sholem Asch’s marranage melodrama Maranen and Paula R.’s (Prilutski) high-art send-up Aktyor.
100 yor ARTEF
5.26-28.26
GLYK @ Target Margin
In honor of the 100th anniversary of ARTEF, the Yiddish Worker’s Theater. Featuring: Trikenish, our adaptation of Nathaniel Buchwald’s adaptation of Hallie Flanagan and Margaret Ellen Clifford’s adaptation of a pre-fascist Whittaker Chambers’ “Can You Hear Their Voices?”
SHUND
8.10.25
GLYK @ Target Margin
A tribute to all things trash. Featuring: Doktor pliz by Fishel Bimko, Bashke: Teen Mom, a dramatization of Ruzha Yakubovitsh’s Bashke stories, and a new performance piece by artist Sara Erenthal.
JOSH
12.19.24
GLYK @ Stone Circle
A Christmas pageant according to the Jews. Featuring: Maranen, Sholem Asch’s playlet about Crypto-Jews struggling to give up their privilege, a very free adaptation of the Toldos Yeshu, and some brand new carols that are sure to become holiday classics.
YENTL, or Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria
9.8.24
GLYK @ The Jalopy Theatre
This one’s for the boys. Featuring: HolyOne, Ruby Lee Lowenstein’s trans transadaptation of Yentl, Got fun rakhmim, Dovid Frischmann’s God of Vengance, and tfilin drag with Semen Tov.
The Megillah According to GLYK
3.31.24
GLYK @ The Jalopy Theatre
Co-Presented by The Workers Circle College Network
We got the dates mixed up, and our Purim show is on Easter. Featuring: A scene from Undzer Gloybn and a monologue from Meshiekhs tsaytn, both by Sholem Ash, Shushan Drag Race, a Pascal Lambast, and the fastest Megillah reading of all time.
GLYKTRONICA
2.3.24
GLYK @ trans-pecos
In collaboration with Kleztronica
The crossover event of the year. Featuring: Celia Dropkin and Frank O’Hara over lo-fi beats, Kim Petras and Lana Del Rey in Yiddish, Oy Mame chopped and screwed, Leonard Cohen drag, and a full set from GLYK’s own DJ keyn ShUM.
Balebustes II
8.27.23
GLYK @ CPR – Center for Performance Research
As the foremost scholars of Jewish Heterosexuality Studies, we’ve been called to discuss the issue of our day: Barbie. We return to our exploration of heterosexual camp — this time, without feeling! Who among us has not laid on our back thinking about the Ancestxrs? Dybbuk is yiddish for dissociative sexual episode after all…
Featuring: Bertolt Brecht’s Jewish gf’s finest work (The Jewish Wife, af yidish), even more of Jane Rose’s Engshaft, the first normal take on Jewish Mothers, and a little bris mila khadosha (audience participation encouraged).
Ekhte balebustes
7.2.23
GLYK @ Target Margin
Amra HaRav Andrea Long Chu, “Everyone is female and everyone hates it.” We agree. And so does your Jewish mother. Don’t believe us? Come to Real Housewives of the Yiddish Stage, where the audience always bottoms but the actors don’t want to top. Featuring: Paula Prilutski’s Aktyor, Jane Rose’s Engshaft, scenes from Bravo’s Real Housewives, and a new piece in conversation with the work of Adrienne Rich, all woven together by poems from Kadya Molodowsky’s Froyen-lider.
Yidn in kosmos
5.17.23
GLYK @ The Hole
Jewish alienation on a whole new level. No, not that night at Camp Kinderland where you first experimented with heterosexuality. We’re talking about Jewish aliens. GLYK Kolektiv’s first independent show, Yidn in kosmos (Jews in Space), has it all: cosmonauts violating Deuteronomy 22:5 (don’t we all?), Soviet ET, and the symbolist embodiment of fully automated luxury communism arguing for an end to labor, oh, and a shit ton of tinfoil. Featuring: Leah Hoffman’s Kraft and Mark Rozumni’s Di psure fun kosmos, with accompanying songs and poems.
Eyershpayz
2.12.23
GLYK @ New Yiddish Rep
All we know from eggs is their resale value, and if you don’t have Tay-Sachs, it ain’t bad. Eyershpayz (Scrambled Eggs) is dedicated to the Yiddish love affairs that didn’t leave any eyniklekh for Birthright: from Shabbtai Zevi’s wives spilling the tea about his “performance” to your bubbe’s lesbian phase in the 1902 Kosher meat riots. Featuring: excerpts from Sholem Asch’s Shabse tsvi and Ruby Lee Lowenstein’s MEAT PLAY, with accompanying songs, poems, and monologues.
A levaye far khanike heri
12.18.22
GLYK @ New Yiddish Rep
Hanukkah Harry z”l is niftar. Come let us honor the life of Herschel ben Netzach, known to his fans and loved ones as Hanukkah Harry, through song, dance, and general clownery.
Af yener zayt vant
11.20.22
GLYK @ New Yiddish Rep
Combining classics with the newest Yiddish play around, reimagining the Jewish past with an eye to the future, Af yener zayt vant (On the Other Side of the Wall) asks the crucial question, is shmaltz a lubricant? Featuring: Mikhl Yashinsky’s Vos flist durkhn oder and an excerpt from Sholem Asch’s Got fun nekome, with accompanying poems and monologues.
The Lower East Side Play Festival
The Lower East Side Play Festival was a sold-out, three-night run of six new plays all set on the Lower East Side. You can find the full program credits here.
AmeriGirl (2023) dir. Samina Saifee
I co-produced Samina Saifee’s 2023 short film AmeriGirl along with Brandon Burnett and lead producer Shubhangi Shekhar.