Summer in Ivye

For a group of Holocaust survivors, finding themselves actors in a world-class theater production was an incredible turn of events. This compelling documentary chronicles events that took place during one remarkable summer, when American choreographer Tamar Rogoff staged a large-scale theater production in a forest outside a remote village in Belarus. Assembling a troupe of international actors, Holocaust survivors and local townspeople, Tamar embarked on what she expected to be a journey of self-discovery. Instead, what evolved is an extraordinary and inspiring story of an entire group of people who overcame cultural differences and generations-old hostilities to tell a story that had been kept secret for 50 years. Together they conceived a performance that filled the empty forest with scenes from everyday life, echoing the richness and humor of a time before World War II. Rehearsals and performances took place in the same forest where 2,500 Jews, including 29 of Rogoff's own relatives, were killed in one day in 1942.