By Eyal Solomon, Publisher and Editor, Theater Pizzazz
“Slam Frank” is a clever, frequently hilarious satire of identity politics that ultimately falls victim to the very prejudices it sets out to mock.
Anne Frank was a Dutch teenager during WWII who was persecuted and ultimately murdered by the Nazis because she was a Jew. Her diary gave a face and a voice to the Holocaust, the largest genocide in modern history, for generations since. It has reminded us that behind the labels we are all someone’s annoying little sister, and we should put all the hatred and prejudices behind us.
Then Woke happened.
Slam Frank takes Anne Frank’s story and hands it over to a fictional progressive theater company determined to make it relevant to today’s audiences. Apparently, being a Jewish girl murdered by the Nazis no longer delivers; the story must also accommodate every conceivable racial identity, sexual orientation, gender expression, and neurodivergence. What you get is a musical about the modern obsession with identity politics, where even the Holocaust must be filtered through contemporary ideas of privilege and representation.
Anne has accordingly become Anita Frank, played by Olivia Bernábe, a Latina girl whose journey toward cultural authenticity includes discovering the wisdom of her abuela and deciding to write her diary in Spanish. It’s a wicked parody of colorblind and culture-blind casting, as well as Broadway’s eagerness to make every production a showcase for every identity.
The company commits wholeheartedly to the absurdity. Rocky Paterra plays Otto Frank, Austen Horne is Edith, Amelia Louise Barr portrays Margot, and Alex Lewis plays Peter, Anita’s romantic interest (moreso when Peter announces he’s nonbinary, which send Anita into a literal orgasm.)
The trouble comes when the musical abandons its clever examination of contemporary prejudices and seems to indulge in some of its own.
Near the end, four performers appear dressed as Hasidic Jews, complete with grotesquely exaggerated noses that would have made Joseph Goebbels (or Macklemore) blush. They sing about colonizing Palestine and a collection of familiar, ugly Jewish tropes.
Yes, I recognize the satire. That didn’t make the spectacle any less appalling to me.
(I can only imagine the outrage had the same scene been performed in blackface. But hey, Jews, and especially the idea of a Jewish homeland, are apparently fair game, or at least convenient fodder for rage bait.)
For most of the evening, Slam Frank effectively exposes the folly of reducing human experience to competing identities. Then, in its closing stretch, it succumbs to the very tribalism it has spent so much time mocking.
It’s an unfortunate misstep in an otherwise clever, frequently funny, and impressively performed musical that ultimately loses sight of its own argument.
Slam Frank plays at the Orpheum Theatre, 126 Second Ave, New York, NY 10003, through November 30, 2026. For tickets and more information, visit https://www.slamfrankmusical.com/
Photos By Shawn Salley.
