The idea for Jews. In Their Own Words. came from an instance of ant-Semitism that played out in the theater where this show now premieres. In 2021, the Royal Court staged Rare Earth Mettle, a show in which an evil and money-grubbing billionaire was distinctly and stereotypically Jewish. That prompted the British journalist Jonathan Freedland and the actor Tracy-Ann Oberman to create a play about how anti-Semitism persists in an institution that loudly decries discrimination. The only dialogue Freedland used was from a dozen Jewish people—average British citizens and eminent Jewish intellectuals such as Howard Jacobson and Margaret Hodge. Stitched together, these first-person accounts tell the history of an ancient prejudice. The first run is co-directed by Vicky Featherstone and Audrey Sheffield. —Jensen Davis