Way to Heaven

Some plays hit us over the heads with their ideas and their ideals. This one instead nudges us. It makes us watch and listen—and think and learn. Translated by David Johnston, Juan Mayorga's script is rich but by no means impenetrable. Mayorga turned a relatively unknown episode of history into an examination of universal quandaries—such as to what use people may justifiably put art, to what degree we may ignore our instincts so we can move on to the next task, and finding that delicate fulcrum between saving ourselves and saving others.

After turning the concentration camp Theresienstadt into a sham "ideal" city for the Jewish population, the Nazis decided to prove to the world how wonderful the place was, inviting a Red Cross inspector onto the premises. In Mayorga's view of the event, in anticipation of this visit the camp commandant produced site-specific theater, casting the Jewish families as, literally, happy campers.

Ron Sossi directs with an eye for the counterbalancing facets of the script. The production deliberately mixes audience and theatermakers: A sign as we enter the house welcomes us to examine the onstage artifacts (clothing, furniture, parts of the set), as if in a museum. What do we see; what do we learn? What did the Danish Red Cross representative see and learn when he came to the camp in 1944? As Michael McGee portrays him, he nervously, nearly ashamedly, reveals what he observed and what he should have asked about and reported on but didn't.

The scene shifts to the "citizens" as they play-act. Children are forced to repeat ungainly and, in this case, inappropriately sexualized lines (Nicolas Francis, Dylan La Rocque, and David Valdes maneuvering the difficult tasks of gently performing bad acting on purpose). Young workers deliver propaganda in various forms of "arbeit macht frei" (Joshua Moore, Inessa Guenther, and Nina Sallinen in simultaneously loving and chilling turns). A tiny girl (the hugely focused Talyan Wright) teaches her dolly to swim and thus become a strong independent baby—or drown trying.

But the play doesn't turn fully earthshaking until the last several scenes, when Norbert Weisser and Bruce Katzman step onstage as the Commandant and the town's "mayor," respectively. Weisser terrifies, his mania bespeaking cold insanity that manages to achieve intransigent control. Katzman's turn is the opposite, a man compelled to tightly wrap his emotions while forced to do things no human should even consider. Ice and fire combine in each actor and pour forth in such contrasting ways.

Frederica Nascimento's sterile, stony gray set forebodes, while Kathi O'Donohue's gently warming palette speaks of memory.

And yet, why is art acceptable if it promotes our viewpoints but unacceptable if it proclaims the other guy's viewpoint? Metaphoric yet real, of memory yet urgently relevant, the play leads us inexorably on, as did that horrifying pathway leading from the train station to Theresienstadt—the way to heaven, with a short stop, of course, in the extermination camp Auschwitz.

Presented by and at the Odyssey Theatre, 2055 S. Sepulveda Blvd., L.A. Oct. 1-Dec. 18. Thu.-Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 2 p.m. (Also Wed., Nov. 2 & 9, 8 p.m. Thu. performances Nov. 17 and Dec. 1, 8, and 15 only. No performances Oct. 26-30. Sun., Dec. 4, 7 p.m. only.) (310) 477-2055. www.odysseytheatre.com.