A Link With the Past : * ‘Who Now Remembers?’ at Glendale college is a psychological drama based on the Armenian massacre of 1915. Playwright Rideaux Baldwin says it has universal appeal.

GLENDALE —  In 1921 Berlin, a young Armenian man named Soghomon Tehlirian was on trial for murder. The man he gunned down in cold blood--Talaat Pasha (the pasha in the name indicates a high official in Turkey)--was responsible for the deaths of Tehlirian’s family members. In fact, six years earlier, Talaat had given orders for the extermination of 1.5 million Armenians.

Is murder ever justified, even in such circumstances? Did Tehlirian deserve to become a hero of the Armenian people, or even to be acquitted by the German court?

These are the central questions examined in “Who Now Remembers?”--a new play by Rideaux Baldwin--being presented by the Glendale Community College theater arts department.

While not a conventional courtroom drama, it documents Tehlirian’s involvement in the Armenian resistance movement that developed after the World War I-era massacre.

The play, based largely on fact, explores Tehlirian’s relationship with Yeranouhi Danielian, a young woman often called “the Armenian Joan of Arc,” who worked in the same movement.

“Who Now Remembers?” is a psychological drama, vividly portraying the spirits of the dead, who Tehlirian maintained haunted him and drove him to assassinate Talaat.

The title of the play comes from a speech given by Adolph Hitler to his commanding generals in August, 1939:

“I have placed my death-head formations in readiness . . . with orders to them to send to death mercilessly and without compassion men, women and children of Polish derivation and language. Only thus shall we gain the living space which we need. Who, after all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?”

“Who Now Remembers?” emphasizes this historical link by providing Tehlirian with a fictitious German roommate. Gerek, a sympathetic character, is later passively drawn into becoming part of Hitler’s Final Solution, to his own horror.

The project, which is part of Glendale College’s regular theater season, has already caused a stir in Glendale, a city with a population that is nearly one-fourth Armenian. Many residents in the area are the children and grandchildren of the survivors of the Armenian genocide. Anger and grief over the political killings have been an integral part of the Armenian American consciousness for nearly 80 years.

“We will never know the numbers who died,” said Richard Hovannisian, professor of Armenian and Near Eastern history at UCLA and a leading expert in the field. “The fact is that the whole nation was destroyed. A way of life and the presence of people on the land were totally eliminated.”

The play is also controversial because many people have asserted that the atrocities are a fabrication or, at very least, a sizable exaggeration. Ken Gray, Glendale professor of theater who is directing the play, says he has already received an anonymous phone call from a person insisting that the genocide has never been proved. Survivors--a few still living--have always disagreed, as have Armenian scholars.

“There were American missionaries and American consular officials in the field who witnessed what occurred,” Hovannisian said. “Germany and Austria were Turkey’s allies, and their archives are also filled with documents attesting to the organized nature of the destruction of the Armenian people.”

Far from being a didactic or one-sided history lesson, “Who Now Remembers?” focuses on the theme of prejudice.

It is a subject that playwright Baldwin, who is African American, has explored in his earlier plays (notably the AIDS-themed “HIVers,” which was Glendale College’s 1992 entry at the American College Theater Festival’s regional finals). At least one Armenian character in the current play claims to hate every Turkish person, and one of the more noble-spirited characters is a Turk.

“I don’t think everybody in Turkey was behind it,” said Gray, referring to the 1915 genocide. “I think a lot of people in Turkey didn’t know about it. That doesn’t make any difference in this particular production. This production looks at one man’s need to avenge his mother’s death, whether or not that’s justifiable.”

“I didn’t want it to be an Armenian play,” Gray added. “I really object to some theaters that preach to the converted. I wanted other people to know about their friends and neighbors that they live and work with.”

To a degree, Gray’s student ensemble is already fulfilling that mission.

The Armenian students who form a third of the cast have had the responsibility of coaching their fellow actors in the pronunciation of the Armenian names and terms that dot the script.

They have also found themselves in the position of casual technical advisers, offering suggestions on costume and culture, and monitoring an especially tricky scene in which the Armenian national anthem is sung in a cafe.

Largely by coincidence, “Who Now Remembers?” will end its run April 24. This is the date on which the Armenian genocide began in 1915, and it is observed as a memorial day by Armenians throughout the world.

“I think audiences across the board will enjoy it because it’s so universal,” Baldwin said of his play. “I try to bring in elements that we all can understand. There’s love and there’s hate and there’s loss, and we all experience those, no matter what culture. The names are just different.”

WHERE AND WHEN

What: “Who Now Remembers?”

Location: Glendale Community College Auditorium, Mainstage Theater, 1500 N. Verdugo Road, Glendale.

Hours: 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays. Ends April 24. Matinee performance at 2 p.m. April 23.

Price: $7 general, $5 students and senior citizens, $3 children 12 and younger.

Call: (818) 240-1000, Ext. 5618.