Awake and Sing!
(eVideo)

English

Streaming video file encoded with permission for digital streaming by Infobase on October 02, 2012.

Access Video On Demand is distributed by Infobase for Films for the Humanities and Sciences, Cambridge Educational, Meridian Education, and Shopware.

Originally produced by Collegia Capital, Llc., 1972.

Access requires authentication through Access Video On Demand.

Cast: Walter Matthau, Ruth Storey, Leo Fuchs, Robert Lipton, Felicia Farr, Martin Ritt, Milton Selzer, Ron Rifkin, John Myhers.

Walter Matthau heads the cast of this television re-creation of Clifford Odets' 1935 hit Broadway play, the first full-length work performed on the commercial stage by the legendary Group Theatre. This portrait of a Jewish family in a Bronx tenement perfectly captures the spirit of the Depression years and is suffused with details of character and place that combine to be affecting even now. The Bergers, burdened by financial difficulties, have taken in a border - Moe Axelrod (Walter Matthau) - who lost a leg in World War I. Cynical and outspoken, Moe adds a spark to the somewhat accepting lives of the Bergers. The family fights to survive on $16 a week while the intellectual, Marxist-leaning grandfather (brilliantly played by famed Yiddish theatre star, Leo Fuchs) tries futilely to spur his family to action with the injunction, "Awake and sing, ye that dwell in the dust" (Isaiah 26:19).

9 and up.

Mode of access: Internet.

System requirements: Access Video On Demand playback platform.

Closed-captioned.