By Marshall Weiss, The Dayton Jewish Observer

From 1941 to 1945, nearly 15,000 Jewish children were sent to Terezin, the Nazis “camp-ghetto” near Prague in Czechoslovakia. From there, ninety percent of them were slaughtered in death camps.

Though conditions at this transit and labor camp were harsh, artistic expression flourished among the prisoners.

The Nazis’ aim with Terezin was to spread the lie — via the International Red Cross — that Jews were not being sent to their deaths. Nazi propaganda sought to show that the Jews were being sent east as forced laborers and that those who were too young or old to work lived in “spa-like” conditions.

For the Red Cross inspection of Terezin in 1944, the Nazis cleaned up the camp in which tens of thousands had died from disease and starvation. They planted gardens and treated their Red Cross guests to performances by the inmates. After the visit, the Nazis continued their deportations.

The Zoot Theatre Company will bring to life works of art and writing created by the children of Terezin when it presents Michael Slade’s play, And A Child Shall Lead, April 5 to 14 at the Dayton Art Institute.

Slade wrote the play using poems and stories written by children in the camp; until now, it has been performed by middle- and high school-age children.

The Zoot Theatre Company, Dayton’s mask and puppet theatre, is the first company to present the show with puppets instead of actors; they illustrate the lives of eight children ages 6 to 14 over two years in Terezin.

Mark Metzger, artistic director of Town Hall Theatre in Centerville, directed the Zoot production, with puppets designed by Zoot Artistic Director Tristan Cupp.

Metzger says he was familiar with the script and considered doing it with Town Hall Theatre. “It’s not necessarily a great fit with our audience, which is ages 4 to 10,” he says. Cupp convinced Metzger to direct the production for Zoot with puppets.

“When I say we’re doing a Holocaust play about puppets, the general reaction is, ‘What? It’s not funny.’ Puppets aren’t always funny. Puppets can be extraordinarily moving if done correctly.” He adds that unlike with actors, puppets can illustrate the deprivation rampant in the camp.

“We can show the starvation. We can show the hair loss. We can show a lot that we can’t really do with a child,” he says.

Zoot Executive Director Michael Sticka says the script appealed to him because the children of Terezin created their own puppets and put on puppet shows, a scene toward the end of the play.

“We wanted to take something that’s going to be a little bit more artistically challenging,” Sticka says. “It’s the first time it’s been done this way. And the playwright’s excited about it. He’s anxious to see how this can come about.”

Metzger says the puppets presenting a puppet show in the play should be surreal. “I’m trusting Tristan and his experience and sensibility to pull that off and I’m sure it will be amazing.”

The creative team has consulted with the playwright, who recently workshopped two of his plays with the Human Race Theatre Company: the world premiere of Under A Red Moon in the fall, and Gingerbread Children in March.

Metzger has also made two key additions to the Zoot production. Along with the poetry and writings of the children of Terezin in the script, theatregoers will see works of art by children of Terezin projected onto the set; Metzger contacted the Jewish Museum in Prague and received the rights to use original works of art in the production.

“I really wanted to make it part of the story,” Metzger says. “His play is essentially a combination of real poems, real diary entries, real articles from Vedem (In The Lead), one of the magazines the children produced there.”

Those in the audience will also hear the voices of students at Hillel Academy, Dayton’s Jewish day school. The school’s music specialist, Chris Rowlands, will record students in grades two through five singing Wiegala (Cradle), a Yiddish lullaby written in Terezin by Ilse Weber. She and her child were killed at Auschwitz in 1944.

Hillel’s Hebrew instructor, Rina Thau, translated the words into Hebrew and is teaching the song to the children. The recording will be heard at the end of each show.

Following the 2 p.m. show on Sunday, April 7 — Yom Hashoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day) — Hillel Academy fourth and fifth graders will perform a song they wrote. Hillel Co-Administrator Dan Mecoli describes the song as “a reflection piece gleaned from Holocaust stories they’ve heard from their parents or from adults they’ve interviewed.”

“We’ve really formed a great relationship,” Sticka says of Zoot’s collaborations with Hillel. “They are very progressive educators in terms of wanting the kids to experience art pretty organically. The artist that worked with them in residency this past October is also in this show. So she’s going to work with the kids during the day to rehearse their program. It’s a nice continuation of that relationship.”

Despite the heaviness of the material, Metzger insists the play is a celebration of hope over despair, of the power of art, whether written, illustrated, spoken or performed, and its power to transcend reality.

“One of the characters spends the whole show talking about how it’s important to save this art and somebody will get it out,” Metzger says. “It’s important because we’re doing the show today in Dayton. We have their work, which is mainly what the play is. We are able to bear witness to that story because the kids reported it. If they didn’t have hope, they wouldn’t have created this, hid it and hoped that we’d find it. This is a legacy.”

The Zoot Theatre Company presents And A Child Shall Lead, April 5-14 at the Dayton Art Institute’s NCR Renaissance Auditorium. The play is appropriate for students in middle school and up. Following the 2 p.m. performance on Sunday, April 7, students with Hillel Academy will sing an original song. Following the 2 p.m. performance on Sunday, April 14, Dayton Holocaust Committee Chair Renate Frydman will lead a talk-back session. Tickets are available by calling 223-4ART or at www.zoottheatrecompany.org. Discounts of $2 off single tickets are available until March 31 with the use of promotional code JFGD13.