Imagining Madoff
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''Imagining Madoff'' is a 2010 play by playwright Deb Margolin that tells the story of an imagined encounter between
Bernard Madoff Bernard Lawrence Madoff ( ; April 29, 1938April 14, 2021) was an American financial criminal and financier who was the admitted mastermind of the largest known Ponzi scheme in history, worth an estimated $65 billion. He was at one time ...
, the admitted operator of what has been described as the largest
Ponzi scheme A Ponzi scheme (, ) is a form of fraud that lures investors and pays Profit (accounting), profits to earlier investors with Funding, funds from more recent investors. Named after Italians, Italian confidence artist Charles Ponzi, this type of s ...
in history, and his victims. Margolin had originally planned to use Nobel Laureate and Holocaust survivor
Elie Wiesel Eliezer "Elie" Wiesel (September 30, 1928 – July 2, 2016) was a Romanian-born American writer, professor, political activist, List of Nobel Peace Prize laureates#1980, Nobel laureate, and Holocaust survivor. He authored Elie Wiesel bibliogra ...
as a character representing a victim, but was obliged by legal threats to substitute a fictional character, whom she named Solomon Galkin.


Elie Wiesel's response to the play

Wiesel had been one of Madoff's most notable victims, having lost his life savings to Madoff's fraud in addition to more than $15 million in losses to a charitable foundation Wiesel operated, the Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity, with Wiesel calling Madoff a "thief, scoundrel, criminal". Wiesel had been chosen as a character by Margolin because she felt that he was "synonymous with decency, morality, the struggle for human dignity and kindness". In Margolin's original version of the play, the Elie Wiesel character was intended to be a
moral authority Moral authority is authority premised on principles, or fundamental truths, which are independent of written, or positive laws. As such, moral authority necessitates the existence of and adherence to truth. Because truth does not change the princip ...
and key character in the play, in which he recounted his
concentration camp A concentration camp is a prison or other facility used for the internment of political prisoners or politically targeted demographics, such as members of national or ethnic minority groups, on the grounds of national security, or for exploitati ...
experiences and provided meditations on repentance. Margolin sent a copy of the play to Wiesel, who responded in April 2010 with a letter calling the play "obscene" and "defamatory" and threatening legal action to prevent the play from being staged.Healy, Patrick
"The Play on Madoff, Without Wiesel"
''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', July 19, 2010. Accessed July 19, 2010.
In an interview with
National Public Radio National Public Radio (NPR) is an American public broadcasting organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It serves as a national Radio syndication, syndicator to a network of more ...
on May 20, 2010, attorney Richard Lehv expressed his opinion that Wiesel would have had little chance in court of preventing Margolin from using him as a character, noting that "it's a free country. You can make a public figure a character in a work of fiction."


Productions

The play was originally to have been staged at
Theater J Theater J is a professional theater company located in Washington, DC, founded to present works that "celebrate the distinctive urban voice and social vision that are part of the Jewish cultural legacy". Organization Hailed by ''The New York ...
, a Jewish theater in
Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...
in May 2010, but was canceled after Wiesel made his objections known.Taylor, Kate
"Play Canceled After Wiesel Objects"
''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', May 19, 2010. Accessed July 19, 2010.
After Ari Roth, artistic director of Theater J, had offered to submit the play to Wiesel's foundation for review, Margolin objected, viewing the offer as giving Wiesel veto power over the play's content. Margolin called the experience "painful" and said that she was "still scared to talk about it" because of fear of lawsuits, but she felt that she "didn't want to abandon this play". Though the character of Wiesel was formally excised from the play, the replacement character Solomon Galkin, described in the play's script as "80 years old,
Holocaust survivor Holocaust survivors are people who survived the Holocaust, defined as the persecution and attempted annihilation of the Jews by Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, its collaborators before and during World War II ...
, poet, translator, treasurer of his synagogue", retained most of the dialogue that had originally been planned for the Wiesel character. The revised play premiered in July–August 2010 at Stageworks/Hudson in
Hudson, New York Hudson is a Administrative divisions of New York#City, city in and the county seat of Columbia County, New York, United States. At the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, it had a population of 5,894. On the east side of the Hudson River, f ...
. It ran at Washington's Theater J from August 31 to September 25, 2011. Artistic director Laura Margolis of Stageworks/Hudson has commented that nothing was lost by removing the Wiesel character, and that the new version of the play gave Margolin greater liberties to develop the Galkin character as a person, rather than as representing a famous figure. In a July 2010 article in ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', Margolin emphasized that she had never planned "to be on the wrong side of anybody, let alone someone I admire". The New Repertory Theatre of Watertown, MA staged the New England premiere in January 2014, which included sixteen sold-out performances. An encore extension was co-presented with the Boston Center for American Performance at the Boston University Theatre-Comley Studio 210 in May–June 2014.


Awards

On February 27, 2012, Deb Margolin's ''Imagining Madoff'' was nominated for the 28th Annual
Helen Hayes Awards The Helen Hayes Awards are theater awards recognizing excellence in professional theater in the Washington, D.C. area since 1983. The awards are named in tribute of Helen Hayes, who is also known as the "First Lady of American Theatre." They ar ...
which celebrates excellence in professional theater in the Washington D.C. area.Playbill.com, accessed on 2/29/12 at: http://www.playbill.com/news/article/160175-DCs-Helen-Hayes-Nominees-Include-Hairspray-Eric-Schaeffer-Jan-Maxwell-Imagining-Madoff


References

{{Madoff investment scandal 2010 plays American plays Plays based on real people Plays based on actual events Plays set in the 21st century Plays set in the United States Cultural depictions of Bernie Madoff Madoff investment scandal