The new play 18 Jews Order Chinese Food is about, well, a Jewish family ordering Chinese food — and the unexpected chaos that comes with it.
The play follows a Jewish family in the wake of a loved one’s funeral, dealing with the turmoil that always follows grief. What should be a simple food order instead spins into the kind of family hijinks that almost anyone can relate to as three generations of a Jewish family all find their own path to dealing with loss.
Written by local playwright Jenna Berenbaum, the show will have its first-ever professional production on the Persephone Theatre main stage this February.
“The story is about everyone coming together,” Berenbaum said. “It’s about moving forward as a family with tradition and faith and relationships after you’ve lost somebody significant.”
Berenbaum said the play was inspired more than a decade ago by real-life events. After their great-uncle’s funeral, they described piling into their great-aunt’s home and trying to order Chinese food with their extended family.
The chaos that ensued immediately had Berenbaum thinking “I need to write a play about this.”
“It’s a comedy — there’s touching moments, but there’s also lots of laughter,” they said. “How family relates together, sometimes that’s chaotic and hilarious.”
Berenbaum said they felt extremely “lucky” to be bringing one of their shows to the Persephone Theatre stage. The play has gone through an extended incubation process: the first version was only 10 minutes long as part of the local Short Cuts Festival before making its way to a reading at First Monday, an event produced in a partnership between Persephone Theatre and Sum Theatre which highlights locally-written new plays and playwrights.
Eventually, with the support of the Jewish community in Saskatoon (the play will also serve as one of the highlight events of the Saskatchewan Jewish Arts Festival) and a final workshop with Persephone Theatre last spring, the show was prepped for its main stage debut this season.
“I’m really excited and really grateful. I’ve had huge support from the community, both people and organizations like Persephone and SaskArts,” Berenbaum said. “I’ve been a part of the arts community in Saskatoon for a long time. I’m grateful and proud of the community advocating for local work, and I’m excited to see it all come together.”
While they weren’t part of the casting process, Berenbaum said it was important for them to have as many Jewish performers as possible involved with the production. What resulted is a show full of both local performers and Jewish performers from across Canada, with local Jewish director Joel Bernbaum at the helm.
Despite the rather silly premise, Berenbaum said the show was “rooted in reality” — helped in no small part by the real-life inspiration for the production.
For the audience who will be seeing the world premiere of this new play, Berenbaum said they hope people can walk away with a deeper sense of connection to their families and their heritage.
“It’s for the whole family. Kids in their 30s, parents in their 60s, grandparents in their 90s — I think people will leave with a sense of familial connection, and joy and hope and laughter,” they said.
18 Jews Order Chinese Food runs until Feb. 16, 2025 at Persephone Theatre. Tickets can be purchased online at persephonetheatre.org.
