(Posted 2/17/23) By Fern Siegel

The title of Anna Ziegler’s latest play, The Wanderers, is aptly named.

Jews have wandered throughout their history — both in physical and emotional terms. The two couples posited in her new work, now off-Broadway at the Laura Pels Theater, are also wanderers in search of meaning.

But where can it be achieved? Religion? Work? Family?

Those are the questions — and quandaries — faced by two distinct Brooklyn couples: Esther (Lucy Freyer) and Schmuli, (Dave Klasko), ultra-Orthodox Jews of the Satmar Hasidic sect, and Abe (Eddie Kaye Thomas) and Sophie (Sarah Cooper), two secular Jewish writers. Into the latter world arrives Julia (Katie Holmes), a star actress.

The Satmars live in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, north of the Williamsburg Bridge, preferring to remain separate from the outside world. Just to the south of the bridge, the neighborhood does a 180 — a hipper, more artisanal sensibility. The physical distance that separates them is small; the metaphysical differences are huge.

What’s interesting about Ziegler’s play, which takes place from 1973-2017, is how happiness and despair, control and controlled, often fall along gender lines.

The Hasidim are a sex-segregated group with clearly defined roles. For Esther, those restrictions are challenged — to the shock and sadness of her husband, who finds comfort in following strict observances. Conversely, Abe is restless, unsure of his worth, despite public praise and affirmation, and discovers solace in meeting and corresponding with his idol, Julia. Somehow, in email, both are free to express their inner selves.

But that’s a tricky proposition for Sophie, who feels thwarted, in part, by supporting her husband’s career over her own, as she is the primary caretaker of their children. So, too, does Esther, who loves her kids, feels hamstrung by a world suspicious of secular books and ideas, as well as her fascination with possibilities outside Hasidism. Both women yearn to explore their more creative instincts. That quest for individual identity, The Wanderers suggests, is universal. And be it sexual or religious, patriarchy, in whatever guise, can suppress it.

More compelling is the back story of Abe, Sophie, Esther and Schmuli, who are intertwined in fascinating and unexpected ways. The play, which is also a study in family pathology, examines issues of domesticity, familial relationships, drive, desire and indulgence in all its complexities and contradictions.

Sadly, Abe blames his mother for circumstances his father and grandfather created. His father, for reasons unknown, is released from any paternal responsibility. Then again, that’s the essence and irony of male entitlement, even among men who believe themselves “woke” enough to recognize its repercussions.

The Wanderers, which runs 105 minutes without intermission, boasts a solid ensemble deftly directed by Barry Edelstein. It’s a smart, thoughtful and unnerving look at gender roles, marriage and the quest for ultimate meaning. And to its credit, it resists easy answers.