Dima and Yuliia Lytvnenko spent their entire lives in Odessa. There, the married couple owned a restaurant, Mama Cassala (Ukrainian for “Mama Said”) and a sausage factory. Both were destroyed in 2022 rocket attacks during the ongoing war with Russia.
Fearing for their safety, the Jewish family — they have three children, ages 15, 11 and 10 — fled to Spain in 2023, and then to New York City in early 2024. Today, they are the proprietors of Papa Did It, a beef jerky and cured meat company based in Staten Island.
Yuliia Lytvynenko has been surprised by how little New Yorkers seem to know about the Jewish community in her hometown. Lytvynenko describes Odessa as a “very Jewish city” with many Jewish schools and synagogues. “But a lot of people don’t know that the Jewish in Ukraine are still there,” she said.
The Lytvynenko family’s journey of displacement, preserving their heritage and building a home on a new continent will be told this month and next in New York as part of “Diaspora,” a four-course dinner and theater experience inspired by real-life stories of the Jewish Diaspora.
Produced by a group of Broadway alumni and entrepreneurs, “Diaspora” is the latest project from StoryCourse, an immersive dining and theater collective that’s focused on telling the stories of marginalized people. Running for 13 performances throughout November and December at a studio space at 245 West 18th Street, “Diaspora” treats audiences to performances based on real-life immigration stories of Iranian, Ethiopian, Mexican and Ukrainian Jewish families, accompanied by vegetarian and nut-free food that represents the four countries.
StoryCourse Diaspora creative director Charly Jaffe (left) and head of operations Andy Hartman in the Chelsea studio where the dinner-and-a-show experience comes to life. (Jackie Hajdenberg)
“I think this is an experience that will really widen people’s perspective on what Jewishness can look like, can taste like, can feel like, and it’s an experience that allows for everyone to have a seat at the table,” said Adam Kantor, the director of “Diaspora,” whose previous credits include “The Band’s Visit” and “Rent.”
“We’re in really divisive times now in terms of anti-Jewishness and anti-immigration policies,” Kantor added. “So it feels like this is sort of a latent sociopolitical act, but it’s one that does not aim to be overtly political, necessarily. It aims to bring people together over community and food and heart.”
Inspired by the Passover seder — that is, combining storytelling with a festive meal — StoryCourse was founded in 2017 by Kantor, composer Benj Pasek and Brian Bordainick, the creator of the membership-based supper club Dinner Lab, all of whom are Jewish. StoryCourse went viral with its virtual “Saturday Night Seder” in 2020 — held as a fundraiser for COVID-19 emergency relief — and has also put on shows centering the stories of LGBTQ+ chefs.
“Diaspora” embraces the Jewish roots of StoryCourse, according to Charly Jaffe, the organization’s creative director. “In a time where so many people are feeling like they’ve lost their sense of home, whether it’s a literal home, political home, or the-earth-we-live-on home … it’s looking at what we do at StoryCourse, and what our Jewish lineage — what we have in our history — actually has so much value for us,” Jaffe said.
The three other Jewish families at the heart of “Diaspora” are Stephanie and Yvonne Ohebshalom, daughter and wife of real estate developer Fred Ohebshalom, who have Iranian roots; Beejhy Barhany, the owner of Harlem’s Tsion Café, who came to New York from Ethiopia via Sudan and Israel, and Fany Gerson, owner of Fan-Fan Doughnuts in Bedford-Stuyvesant, who hails from Mexico.
“People think: ‘Jewish New York,’ and they just think, like, Katz’s Deli, or Borough Park, or neurotic Woody Allen,” Jaffe said. “There’s so much richness in [the] global Jewish tapestry.”
Andy Hartman, StoryCourse’s head of operations, said he hopes audiences will leave with an “expanded understanding” of Jews and Jewish food. “I think so much of what we have been trying to do is sort of push back on the Ashkenormativity that exists in the United States, more broadly, but even in New York, in terms of what Jews look like and what Jewish food is,” he said.
“Diaspora” will explore these themes over four courses adapted from the four families’ own recipes, including Persian naan-o-paneer and Shirazi salad, Ethiopian messer wot lentil stew, Ukrainian borscht and Mexican dessert flavors like guava with cheese. They’ll be prepared by two Jewish chefs, Dave Dreifus, the founder of Best Damn Cookies, and Lottie Gurvis, owner of Oh My Noshhh private dining.
About 50 guests each night will travel the world from their dinner plate while learning about the lives of these real, New York-based Jewish families.
Ethiopian chef Barhany, who is also the author of “Gursha: Timeless Recipes for Modern Kitchens, from Ethiopia, Israel, Harlem, and Beyond” is participating in “Diaspora” because, she said, “I wanted to bring the perspective of other Jews that we have to immerse ourselves and celebrate our differences and be more inclusive.”
Beejhy Barhany opened Tsion Café in 2014. (Josefin Dolsten)
Barhany, 49, was born in Ethiopia; as a child, she spent three years in Sudan before her family arrived in Israel, where she eventually served in the Israel Defense Forces. After traveling the world, Barhany settled in New York, where she’s lived for more than two decades.
“I don’t think there is much knowledge on the flavors, traditions and what Ethiopian Jews have to offer to the landscape of the deliciousness of Jewish food,” Barhany said. “Tsion Café, or myself — we’re adding to that landscape of the diverse, unique flavors that the Jewish diaspora has to offer.”
Yuliia Lytvynenko said she hopes “Diaspora” informs its New York audience about contemporary Ukrainian Jewish life. (Case in point: Her husband’s surname was not originally Lytvynenko — his father, for whom Papa Did It is named, changed the family’s surname from Rabinovich due to rising antisemitism in Ukraine in the 1970s.)
During the Lytvynenkos’ course — the third — Ukrainian borscht, a favorite dish of the Lytvynenko children, will be served, along with a few creative interpretations of traditional Ukrainian spreads.
Asked what he hopes audiences will walk away with from the show, director Kantor said: “I hope that they will be crying into their borscht.”
“StoryCourse: Diaspora” will run for 13 performances throughout November and December at 245 West 18th St. Tickets, $180, include a four-course meal and wine.
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