By Natalie Gamsu and Ash Flanders. Performed by Natalie Gamsu. Kadimah Yiddish Theatre. Fortyfivedownstairs, Flinders Lane. 18 – 23 June 2024
The thread that runs all through Shrapnel, Natalie Gamsu’s one-woman show, is frustrated regret that she is not Spanish. Every now and again, she exhibits a flamboyant flamenco dancer gesture, contrasting that with the far tamer expressions of esprit, emotion and identity that she feels have been forced upon her. Sephardi Jews were expelled from Spain at the end of the fifteenth century and became part of the scattered diaspora. Long, long before Gamu’s birth of course, but she knows. For her ancestors, it mean