''Perdition'' is a 1987 stage play by Jim Allen. Its premiere at London's

Royal Court Theatre The Royal Court Theatre, at different times known as the Court Theatre, the New Chelsea Theatre, and the Belgravia Theatre, is a non-commercial West End theatre in Sloane Square, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, London, Englan ...

Upstairs, in a production directed by

Ken Loach Kenneth Charles Loach (born 17 June 1936) is a British film director and screenwriter. His socially critical directing style and socialist ideals are evident in his film treatment of social issues such as poverty (''Poor Cow'', 1967), homelessne ...

, was abandoned because of protests, and criticism by two historians, over its controversial and tendentious claims.

Outline

The play makes use of a libel trial in

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

in 1954–55 concerning allegations of collaboration during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

in 1944 between the leadership of the

Zionist Zionism ( he, צִיּוֹנוּת ''Tsiyyonut'' after ''Zion'') is a nationalist movement that espouses the establishment of, and support for a homeland for the Jewish people centered in the area roughly corresponding to what is known in Je ...

movement in

Hungary Hungary ( hu, Magyarország ) is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning of the Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia a ...

and the

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

s. Its starting point was the trial of Rudolf Kastner, a leading member of the Budapest Aid and Rescue Committee, whose job was to help Jews escape from Nazi-ruled Hungary. His libel trial in Israel concerned an accusation that he had collaborated with

Adolf Eichmann Otto Adolf Eichmann ( ,"Eichmann"
''

SS officers in charge of carrying out the

Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...

. Although the initial trial found that he had indeed "sold his soul to the devil" by saving certain Jews whilst failing to warn others that their "resettlement" was in fact deportation to the gas chambers, there was a subsequent trial at the

Supreme Court of Israel The Supreme Court (, ''Beit HaMishpat HaElyon''; ar, المحكمة العليا) is the Supreme court, highest court in Israel. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all other courts, and in some cases original jurisdiction. The Supreme C ...

in 1958 at which the findings were overturned. The claim he had collaborated with Eichmann was false. By the time of the appeal, Kastner had been assassinated. A 2017 account by Paul Bogdanor concerning Kastner's activities in Hungary concluded that he did collaborate with Eichmann and his associates. "During the Holocaust in Hungary the acting head of the country's Jewish rescue operations betrayed his duty to rescue the victims and placed himself at the service of the murderers". The play itself, paralleling the 1954 case, uses the device of another (this time, fictional) libel trial in London in 1967 involving a man called Dr. Yaron who is suing Ruth Kaplan, an Israeli Jew who has claimed Yaron collaborated with Eichmann. Allen queries whether the saving of certain Jews in a purported act of collaboration in line with Zionist philosophies about populating Israel at the expense of those Jews who remained. The play’s text includes such analogies as “the Zionist knife in the Nazi fist” (which was cut in the pre-production period) and accuses Jewish leaders: “To save your hides, you practically led them to the gas chambers of Auschwitz”. (This text is also online under the title
"A Discourse of Delegitimisation: The British Left and the Jews"
) Characters assert that “Israel was founded on the pillars of Western guilt and American dollars” and “Israel was coined in the blood of Hungarian Jewry”. Allen was influenced by activist

Lenni Brenner Lenni Brenner (born 1937), formerly known as Leonard Glaser or Lenny Glaser, is an American Trotskyist writer. In the 1960s, Brenner was a prominent civil rights movement activist and vocal opponent of the Vietnam War. Since the 1980s, his activ ...

’s book '' Zionism in the Age of the Dictators'' (1983), which he described as "a goldmine source". In an interview with '' Time Out'' at the time of the intended original production, Allen described his play as "the most lethal attack on Zionism ever written, because it touches the heart of the most abiding myth of modern history, the Holocaust. Because it says quite plainly that privileged Jewish leaders collaborated in the extermination of their own kind in order to help bring about a Zionist state, Israel, a state which is itself racist". According to Allen, during the Holocaust, "the lower you went down on the social scale, the more you found resistance; but the higher you went up the social scale, the more you found cooperation and collaboration ith the Nazis��. In an interview in ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'', Allen claimed Zionists interests overlapped with Hitler's "on the basis of opportunism." Allen said: "Hitler was fond of the Zionists, they were good Jews, prepared to fight for land." Chaim Bermant wrote in ''

The Jewish Chronicle ''The'' () is a grammatical Article (grammar), article in English language, English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite ...

'' that Allen "suggests that the entire leadership of the Zionist movement ... people who strained every ounce of their being to do all that could be done to save European Jews – were involved in a dark conspiracy to betray them."

David Cesarani David Cesarani (13 November 1956 – 25 October 2015) was a British historian who specialised in Jewish history, especially the Holocaust. He also wrote several biographies, including ''Arthur Koestler: The Homeless Mind'' (1998). Early life ...

wrote that, like Brenner in his book, Allen drew on anti-Zionist stereotypes originating in the Soviet Union which have a "Jewish conspiracy theory" at their centre.

Cancellation and controversy

In January 1987, the

-directed production of ''Perdition'' for London's

, intended for its Upstairs studio theatre, was cancelled on the day before the first preview performance. At the time, the historian

Martin Gilbert Sir Martin John Gilbert (25 October 1936 – 3 February 2015) was a British historian and honorary Fellow of Merton College, Oxford. He was the author of eighty-eight books, including works on Winston Churchill, the 20th century, and Jewish h ...

said the play was "a complete travesty of the facts" and "deeply anti-Semitic". Gilbert identified 60 errors in the script. He told ''

The Sunday Times ''The Sunday Times'' is a British newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of News UK, whi ...

'':

"In reality there are inaccuracies on almost every page of the script; not only errors of fact, but innuendoes and allegations against thousands of Jews unable to defend themselves because they were murdered ... by the very people with whom, the script insists they were in deliberate and sinister collusion."

Another specialist in the field, David Cesarani, agreed.

Max Stafford-Clark Maxwell Robert Guthrie Stewart "Max" Stafford-Clark (born 17 March 1941) is a British theatre director. Life and career Stafford-Clark was born in Cambridge, England. the son of David Stafford-Clark, a physician, and Dorothy Crossley (née Old ...

, then the artistic director of the Royal Court, rejected assertions the play was antisemitic or contained errors, but said that continuing with the production would cause "great distress to sections of the community". Stafford-Clark recalled in 2021 that Stephen Roth, chairman of the

Institute of Jewish Affairs An institute is an organisational body created for a certain purpose. They are often research organisations (research institutes) created to do research on specific topics, or can also be a professional body. In some countries, institutes can ...

, told him that in Allen's text "the Zionist resistance wasn’t mentioned, the confused situation in Budapest wasn’t mentioned and the number saved wasn’t touched on." Loach claimed that the Royal Court had given into pressure from members of the British Jewish community, including Roth, the publisher

Lord Weidenfeld George Weidenfeld, Baron Weidenfeld, (13 September 1919 – 20 January 2016) was a British publisher, philanthropist, and newspaper columnist. He was also a lifelong Zionist and renowned as a master networker. He was on good terms with popes, ...

, and the political adviser

Lord Goodman Arnold Abraham Goodman, Baron Goodman, Order of the Companions of Honour, CH, (21 August 191312 May 1995) was a British lawyer and political advisor. Life Arnold Goodman was born at Hackney, London, Hackney, London, son of Jewish parents Jose ...

. Loach told a newspaper of the Workers Revolutionary Party that he "hadn't tangled with the Zionist lobby before" and "what is amazing is the strength and organisation and power of their lobby." The "Zionists", he said "want to leave intact ... the generalised sense of guilt everyone has about the Jews so that it remains an area that you can't discuss". He was also angry with the dramatist

Caryl Churchill Caryl Lesley Churchill (born 3 September 1938) is a British playwright known for dramatising the abuses of power, for her use of non- naturalistic techniques, and for her exploration of sexual politics and feminist themes.

, who defended Stafford-Clark's decision. Jim Allen himself blamed "the Zionist machine". Cesarani in ''Jewish Socialist'' wrote in response to such comments that "the protagonists of the play are willing to manipulate anti-Jewish stereotypes outside of the theatre as well as within it." The

Directors Guild of Great Britain The Directors Guild of Great Britain (DGGB) was a professional organization that represented directors across all media, including film, television, theatre, radio, opera, commercials, music videos, corporate film/video and training, documentaries, ...

protested at the cancellation. In a letter to ''The Guardian'' in 2004, in connection with the premature end of another controversial play's production, Loach wrote that "the charge of antisemitism" against Allen's play "is the time-honoured way to deflect anti-Zionist arguments". Glenda Abramson wrote in ''Drama and Ideology in Modern Israel'' (1998) that, in his play, Allen "uses Zionism rather than Nazism as his exemplar of fascism and the analogy of Israel rather than Nazi Germany in his warning about the future revival of global fascism". In an article for ''

'' in 2017,

Dave Rich Dave Rich is Head of Policy at the Community Security Trust and is a leading expert on left-wing antisemitism, according to ''The Jewish Chronicle''.Stalinist Stalinism is the means of governing and Marxist-Leninist policies implemented in the Soviet Union from 1927 to 1953 by Joseph Stalin. It included the creation of a one-party totalitarian police state, rapid industrialization, the theory o ...

lie". He wrote that Loach is one individual who uses the ''Perdition'' episode "to try to claim that the entire Zionist movement collaborated in the murder of their fellow Jews; either from cold, cynical calculation – they only cared about getting Jews to Mandate Palestine – or through ideological affinity".

Later developments

In 1999, the play was performed at the

Gate Theatre The Gate Theatre is a Theater (structure), theatre on Cavendish Row in Dublin, Ireland. It was founded in 1928. History Beginnings The Gate Theatre was founded in 1928 by Hilton Edwards and Micheál MacLiammóir with Daisy Bannard Cogley and Ge ...

in London in a production by

Elliot Levey Elliot Levey (born 6 December 1973) is an Olivier award winning actor. Career Olivier award winner for the role of Herr Shultz in Cabaret.known for his work in British Theatre, he has performed at the Donmar Warehouse, Almeida and National Th ...

, Loach's son-in-law, in what David Jay, writing for the ''

New Statesman The ''New Statesman'' is a British political and cultural magazine published in London. Founded as a weekly review of politics and literature on 12 April 1913, it was at first connected with Sidney and Beatrice Webb and other leading members ...

'', described as "a significantly rewritten version". Levey defended the play in 1999: "It is not historically inaccurate. It's very much a pro-Jewish play. My hope is that it won't be sat on, as it was in the 1980s." ''

Perfidy In the context of war, perfidy is a form of deception in which one side promises to act in good faith (such as by raising a flag of truce) with the intention of breaking that promise once the unsuspecting enemy is exposed (such as by coming out ...

'', by

Ben Hecht Ben Hecht (; February 28, 1894 – April 18, 1964) was an American screenwriter, director, producer, playwright, journalist, and novelist. A successful journalist in his youth, he went on to write 35 books and some of the most enjoyed screenplay ...

, is a non-fiction work about the Kastner trial. The title of the play appears to echo Hecht's book.

Outline

Cancellation and controversy

Later developments

References

Further reading