For playwright Oscar Speace, Janka is a very personal production. Produced by Roust Theatre Company, it regards his mother, a survivor of the Holocaust, and the trials she endured in order to give him and his brother the opportunities she herself was denied. The story of the play is taken from a 60-page handwritten letter his mother wrote about her time in the concentration camps and the fates of the other members of her family. For 52 years her story went untold and unknown to her husband and sons until Speace discovered it and adapted it to the stage. Actress Janice Noga portrays the titular Janka in this emotional one-woman show about family, true happiness and possibly the most horrifying time in world history.
Despite the show's heavy subject matter, Noga tells Janka's tale in a matter-of-fact fashion, which helps to make the story more accessible for those in the audience who might be more emotionally sensitive to the horrors of that time in history. In a living room-styled set decorated with various items and trinkets, Janka's account of her past segues frequently into anecdotes of her sons growing up or meeting her husband or other random aspects of her daily life, which is charming at the beginning but slightly annoying when it continues to happen in the second act. There were some points in the play where I was not entirely sure where or when we were in Janka's story, and this tended to take away from the weight of the heavier points in the narrative. The more tragic points in the play are still powerful enough to have an effect, though, and Noga switches from mild, storytelling mother to despair and anger flawlessly, creating a character onstage with depth and history and utmost realism.
The play runs for a mere hour and 20 minutes, including an unnecessary 15 minute intermission, which seemed to be more of an interruption than a break from the story; Noga and the story are enough to keep an audience engaged for the full running time. Janka is refreshing and handles its subject matter in a way that is accessible to all, though in the end still heartbreaking and tragic.
