Slash Coleman Has Big Matzo Balls is weird. Weird. But that’s because Slashtipher J. Coleman is weird.
The one-man play is a representation of the playwright-actor-jazz pianist-author-comedian-painter’s Jewish, eccentric, and quick mind. It is a collection of one-liners and songs, audience participation and balls-to-the-wind gimmicks.
Actually, the play is about Slash—he changed his name from Jeffrey after his Bar Mitzvah to include two letters of the Hebrew alphabet and the name his grandfather, who survived the Holocaust, assumed at Ellis Island—and his Jewish identity as a “halfy,” that is, a half Jew. Slash assumes a Jeff Foxworthy demeanor to explain: What’s a halfy? “If your Passover is ruined because you run out of ketchup, you’re a halfy.” Then what’s a Jew? “If you ever had a layover at LaGuardia, you’re in the tribe.”