The main plot centers on the love-affair of a young couple, thwarted from marrying by an obscure religious law and an unfortunate joke.
It was first produced by Liebler & Company[fn 2] on Broadway,[1] staged by James Herne, and starred Wilton Lackaye, Blanche Bates, and Frank Worthing.
[2] Though successful in tryouts, the play and its author drew negative reactions from New York reviewers and the local Jewish community during its Broadway run.
[7] While it did not return its backers investment,[8] scholar Edna Nahshon wrote that Children of the Ghetto "should not be judged by the conventional standards of theatrical success or failure".
Michael, Ephraim, and Milly greet Sam, who has returned from a business trip bringing a ring for his fiancé, Leah.
At the Purim ball Malka decries the secularisation of the modern holiday, as Leah and Milly waltz with men other than their husbands.
Soon Michael comes to lead her into the dancing, while Sam Levine greets his old school friend David Borden, just back from Cape Town with a modest fortune from years of prospecting.
David rescues Hannah from a tipsy Pinchas; he has heard something of her from Sam, and she soon teases him with the story of her quick marriage and divorce.
(Curtain) Act IV: Love and Law (At the ghetto marketplace in front of Reb Schmeul's house, three days later.)
The role of Melchitsedek Pinchas was expanded in the drama by assigning him the actions of several minor characters from the novel, principally Old Hyams.
Tyler said they had been warned about Zangwill, that he was a polarising figure in the Jewish world[fn 4] and that he had antagonised American drama critics with an 1898 lecture tour.
[3] But Liebler & Company were sparing no expense, paying director James A. Herne $500 a week,[16] and casting ten popular stars of the day to woo audiences.
[20] William Furst composed a prelude, and incidental music for Act IV, drawing on traditional Hebrew songs.
[21] Zangwill arrived in America by August 20, 1899, to begin working with director James A. Herne on staging Children of the Ghetto.
[22] Rehearsals began that week; a cast list from then shows actor Wilson Deal started in the role of Michael Birnbaum.
[24] The ostensible reason for the switch was the September debut of a play called The Ghetto by Herman Heijermans,[25] but which a critic in New York would ascribe to the author's vanity.
[31] Zangwill, when visiting the city for the tryout, denied a rumor that changes had been made in the play since Washington, D.C.[32] The reviewer for The Philadelphia Inquirer noted "it was less dramatic than it is pictorial" but felt the weak drama was compensated for by depictions of Jewish life and customs.
[31] They also praised the acting of Wilton Lackaye, Frank Worthing, Blanche Bates, Richard Carle, and Mabel Taliaferro, but thought William Norris' Pinchas exaggerated.
[2] New York drama critics remembered Zangwill's 1898 lecture tour disparaging their craft, and let him know it in their opening night columns.
The Brooklyn Daily Times reviewer admired Zangwill's dialogue and "large number of contrasting characters", but felt the latter had preoccupied the author to the detriment of dramatic structure, "this sample of his abilities as a dramatist hardly justifies the position he has assumed as criterion of the play-making art.
"[34] The review complimented the acting and noted the audience's favorable reaction to the play, then concluded by saying "Mr. Zangwill obtruded his picturesque personality" on stage after the final curtain.
[34] The New York Times review said the play "was found to justify the expectations of its worth", but noted the audience applause at the final climax "was clearly of a purely perfunctory sort".
And if it were a pantomime as well as a panorama, the appearance of many people in it would be improved…"[26] The Standard Union by contrast gave good notices to the production without reference to the author's personality, its only caveat being the lengthy fourth act discussions of religion in a play that had already lasted over two hours.
It accused Zangwill of not keeping faith with his fellow practitioners of Judaism in Children of the Ghetto: "Its author presents the most sacred of Jewish rites, not in their highest, but in their lowest phases, not as a plea for respect, but as an excuse for laughter.
[40] Children of the Ghetto was translated into Yiddish by Leon Kobrin and presented at the People's Theatre in the Bowery starting December 23, 1904.