Before the Greenbrier Valley Theatre’s opening of The Dairy of Anne Frank, it was indicted that the play was chosen in part because of the “Unite The Right” rally held in Charlottesville, VA, now over two years ago. The rally, in which members of the Loyal White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, neonazis, and other members of the alt-right took to the streets chanting phrases such as “Jews will not replace us” and the Nazi slogan “blood and soil,” tiki torches held high.
The rally scared many Americans awake to the presence of an anti-semitism on our shores thought to be long gone. That shocked could serve as a lighthouse beacon pointing to the world painted by The Dairy of Anne Frank, based on the diary left behind by a girl whose family hid from the Nazi regime in an annex in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Portrayed with an energy fitting for a 13-year-old girl by Sharon Romano, Frank’s diary serves as the framework of the play, with monologues noting the passage of time, the evolution of her feelings and growth as a person, and the claustrophobic nature of the annex. After Anne’s sister Margot Frank (Lara Treacy) is summoned by the Nazis, the entire family goes into hiding, alongside the van Daans, and later joined by a local dentist, Mr. Dussel.
Read more on Page 5 of the Friday, September 27, 2019, edition of The West Virginia Daily News.
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