A theatrical documentary commemorating the Night of the Murdered Poets

Tuesday 12August 2025at 7:30 PM
at The Wild Project
195 East 3rd Street
New York, New York 10009
suggested donation: $15
reserve a place here
In 1956, the Yiddish world was heartbroken to discover that the Soviet regime had liquidated many of their finest Yiddish writers, as well as other artists, journalists, and scientists in a 1952 mass execution that came to be known as The Night of the Murdered Poets.
Each year since,theKultur-kongreshas honored the memories of these figures with atroyer-akademye(solemn gathering). But over time, knowledge of the events hasactually faded among the general public. Actress and writerYelena Shmulenson has created an in-depthexamination of the hope and the devastation behind those writers’ and artists’ lives, works, and fates in a culture where the government controlled discourse. Over the last 4 years, we have presented Yelena’s text twice. Now we are preparing to present it on the stage one more time before we take it to the next phase.
See it on stage before we commit it to video!
We are planning to create a video of Shmulenson’s script and submit it to Jewish film festivals for 2027 for the 75th anniversary of the tragedy. We hope that it will increase awareness and become a part of Jewish and Yiddish educational curricula.
Appearing in the upcoming program are Shmulenson and her husband Allen LewisRickman, both stars of stage and screen in English & Yiddish (the Coen brothers’A Serious Man,Off-Broadway’sTevye Served Raw),along with Suzanne Toren, and Shane Baker. Musical accompaniment is by Zisl Slepovitch. This performance will be in English, and Yiddish- and Russian-with-English-supertitles.
The evening is presented in conjunction with COJECO and the Jewish Labor Committee.
Again, that’s Tuesday, August 12th, 2025 at 7:30 PM.
The Wild Project is located at 195 East 3rdStreet, between Avenues A & B.
The recommended donation is$15and can be made throughwww.brownpapertickets.com. We strongly suggest you reserve in advance as seating is limited.
If you wish to donate a different amount, you can do so throughour website hereand then write us to let us know the names of those who are coming;orif you aren’t in a position to donate right now, simply respond to this email and let us know who’s coming — we simply want to allow as many people as possible to remember these writers and honor their memories.

More about The Night of the Murdered Poets
On the night of August 12, 1952, 13 members of the Jewish Antifascist Committee were executed by firing squad in Moscow’s infamous Lubyanka prison after years of confinement and torture to extract false confessions of treason and espionage. This was to be one of Joseph Stalin’s last crimes before his death six months later.
Following years of repression of Yiddish and Jewish culture, a renewed campaign began in 1948 after the state-sponsored assassination of Solomon Mikhoels (who had led the GOSET – Moscow State Jewish Theatre). Mikhoels also led the Soviet Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee (JAC), formed during World War II to drum up Jewish support in the free world for the Soviet war effort. The remaining members of the JAC were arrested beginning later that same year.
Among the casualties of the “Night of the Murdered Poets” were five Yiddish writers active in the JAC: David Bergelson, David Hofshteyn, Perets Markish, Itsik Fefer, and Leyb Kvitko, as well as legendary actor and Mikhoels’ successor as director of the GOSET, Benjamin Zuskin. Every year since the murders were revealed, Yiddishist organizations wordwide have honored the victims of that awful night, along with other victims of Soviet repression, with yearly memorials.
The five writers were all born in the region that now makes up independent Ukraine. Even as that country is today aflame with war, COJECO BluePrint fellow Yelena Shmulenson (herself a native of Crimea) offers this staged documentary, examining how the Soviet state repressed Yiddish culture.