The Jew of Malta. (Classic Theatre, New York) (theater reviews)

Nation, The, April, 1987 by Disch, Thomas M.

The Jew of Malta

By a fine storke of synchronicity, asTrash was premiered at ABC No Rio, The Jew of Malta was being presented by the Classic Theatre at the other end of the Off Off Broadway spectrum, in the choir loft of a church on West 86th Street and Amsterdam Avenue. Marlowe's play has in the recent past aroused the protests of those who don't think that literary cachet excuses anti-Semitism, however hoary. This is the play, after all, in which Barabas, another Rich Jew, confesses:

As for myself, I walk abroado' nights

And kill sick people groaning underwalls: Sometimes I go about and poison wells....

Being young, I studied physic, andbegan

To practise first upon the Italian;

There I enriched the priests...

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