Location
The Spellbound Development Company will present a reading of a new play THE IDEALIST by Jennifer Strome, directed by Lee Sankowich, at TheTimesCenter (242 West 41st Street) Wednesday, February 23rd, 2011 at 7PM. The reading will benefit the Anne Frank Foundation in Basel, Switzerland, whose mission supports the education against intolerance.
Bernard Elias, the only living relative of Anne Frank, and the President of the Anne Frank Foundation, has approved her portrayal of Otto Frank in The Idealist. It is the first dramatic portrayal of Otto Frank outside of the story of The Diary of Anne Frank.
THE IDEALIST divulges the infamous, behind-the-scenes saga of author Meyer Levin (1905-1981), in a fact-based account of his role as the original dramatist of The Diary of Anne Frank.
Strome’s play was written under the mentorship of legendary filmmaker David Brown, who produced the original film adaptation of “The Diary of Anne Frank” for 20th Century Fox in 1958.
Strome spent nearly ten years working directly with Levin’s wife, his 3 sons, Bernard Elias, and with the few remaining witnesses to this 60 year-old controversy.