EIGHT NIGHTS

WINNER OF THE 2021 OVATION AWARD FOR BEST PLAYWRITING

The lives that inhabit an apartment from 1949 to 2016. A young refugee woman finally free to start anew in the United States tries to vanquish the past that haunts her, alongside her father, husband, friends, daughter and granddaughter.

--
Set during eight nights of Chanukah over eight decades, Eight Nights is about...
WINNER OF THE 2021 OVATION AWARD FOR BEST PLAYWRITING

The lives that inhabit an apartment from 1949 to 2016. A young refugee woman finally free to start anew in the United States tries to vanquish the past that haunts her, alongside her father, husband, friends, daughter and granddaughter.

--
Set during eight nights of Chanukah over eight decades, Eight Nights is about Holocaust survivor Rebecca Blum, who arrives in America at 19 to forge a new life. The play calls out the trauma experienced not only by concentration camp survivors, but by African American descendants of slavery, interned Japanese Americans, and current refugees from Africa and the Middle East.

The play needs 7 actors, who play 14 roles. One actress plays Rebecca from age 19 into her 40s, then plays Rebecca’s daughter and granddaughter. Another actress plays Rebecca from her 40s into her 80s, as well as her mother, Rebecca’s mother, Anna. Several of the other actors play more than one character.

You may want to listen to this podcast that talks about the play: https://m.soundcloud.com/user-685353444/episode-49-hanukkah-light



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EIGHT NIGHTS

Recommended by

  • Rachel Feeny-Williams:
    15 Sep. 2023
    The past and how it can haunt a person comes alive in this powerful emotion filled piece. Despite the play being set over a long period of time you are never lost and never do you deter from wanting to see how the stories of these survivors unfold. I love the intimacy of using one room for the entirety of the piece and watching the characters come and go over time but they are never forgotten, you always want to know the next bit of their story. This is a piece of power with very real emotions woven throughout.
  • Sam Heyman:
    4 Jan. 2023
    Some plays build tension by wrapping their narrative around a concise period of time, but few of them accomplish the feats of scope and lived-in intimacy as Jennifer Maisel manages with EIGHT NIGHTS. Set over over half a century's worth of Hanukkah evenings, this play engages meaningfully with the impact of generational trauma, the persistent fear of all survivors that the nightmare they survived may return again, and the importance -- and difficulty -- of telling one's story. EIGHT NIGHTS is an impressively structured, heartwrenching triumph.
  • Devon O'Brien:
    20 Jan. 2022
    Eight Nights is lyrical and gut-wrenching at once. Maisel's innovations include ellipses so rich Pinter himself would be envious. Maisel limns her characters instantly, through their unique speak; their lovability ensured by their matter-o-factness about backstories that would level most of us. The use of one apartment over eight nights and many decades is evocative. Characters no longer alive are present on the stage to haunt the living. Rebecca's experiences at Dachau impact her family and are the connective tissue between herself and the Black characters, Japanese and Muslim survivors and refugees. There's joy, humor and the prevailing human spirit.

Development History

  • Reading
    ,
    8 Nights of EIGHT NIGHTS - participating theatres and venues across the country are doing reading of EIGHT NIGHTS to raise money for HIAS
    ,
    2019
  • Reading
    ,
    Antaeus Theatre Company, Lab Results
    ,
    2018
  • Workshop
    ,
    Gulf Shore New Play Festival
    ,
    2018
  • Workshop
    ,
    The Process Series - Playmakers and UNC at Chapel Hill
    ,
    2018
  • Workshop
    ,
    Title Wave series, Bay Street Theatre, Sag Harbor, New York
    ,
    2018
  • Reading
    ,
    Playwrights' Union First Peek
    ,
    2017
  • Workshop
    ,
    Berkshire Playwrights Lab
    ,
    2017

Production History

  • Professional
    ,
    Antaues Theatre Company, world premiere as part of their New Classics Initiative
    ,
    2019

Awards

Winner
,
2021 Ovation Award for Best Playwriting
,
LA Stage Alliance - The Ovation Awards for Drama
,
2021
Semi-Finalist
,
The O'Neill National Playwrights Conference
,
The O'Neill
,
2018