New play gives unflinching look at horrific Hamas attack

Phelim McAleer was thumbing his nose at Hollywood long before the phrase “parallel economy” hit the zeitgeist.

The muckraker, alongside creative partner and spouse Ann McElhinney, fought tooth and nail to get the 2018 film “Gosnell” to the public against all odds.

He didn’t stop there.

McAleer next came at the progressive narrative with the one-two punch of his plays “Ferguson,” about the death of Michael Brown, and “FBI Lovebirds: UnderCovers," which mocked the anti-Trump agents at the heart of the Russia collusion hoax.

No Hollywood or Broadway money was ever going to fund these. So Team McAleer improvised. Again and again. Crowdfunding. Guerrilla marketing. Scrambling to find new venues when owners of the old ones had a change of heart.

His latest endeavor could be the most emotional story he’s ever told.

“October 7,” opening May 2 at the Actors Temple Theatre in New York, lets the survivors of Hamas’ terrorist assault on Israel share their stories. The production is set to run through June 16.

McAleer traveled to Israel shortly after the Oct. 7 atrocities to interview the survivors. Some citizens weren’t initially eager to share what they witnessed. Others were wary of the couple’s Irish roots.

“People [are] very, very angry at Irish people [in Israel],” McAleer tells Align. “It’s become the most pro-Hamas European country. ... It’s disgraceful.”

It wasn’t easy hearing the horrifying tales shared by survivors, and the process took its toll.

“There’s a limit to how many interviews you can do, but we’re not the victims. If they can talk about it, I can listen,” he says, noting he began every interview with a simple question: What were you doing on October 6?

“It shows the world how people had normal, domestic lives and how their lives were changed by Oct. 7,” he says.

He wanted to act fast, in part because he feared the media might try to “memory-hole” the atrocities before too long. He also heard the pleas for a “ceasefire” days after the savagery unfolded.

Once again, McAleer is tapping “verbatim theater” to tell his tale. The storytelling method uses real documents, like court transcripts, to flesh out the dialogue. For “October 7,” the dialogue will flow directly from the couple's in-person interviews.

Creative license is restricted to what makes the final cut. That makes it harder to debate the facts in question.

The play is one of very few creative efforts tied to the massacre. “Screams Before Silence” is in production, a documentary about how Hamas terrorists sexually assaulted countless women during and after the attack.

McAleer isn’t surprised at the dearth of projects tied to Oct. 7. He’s also hard-pressed to explain it.

“Israel is [seen as] the enemy, it seems. ... I don’t know the reason for that,” he says. “If Hamas surrendered tomorrow and gave back the hostages, there would be a ceasefire.”

“The creative community wants to talk about Gaza, not Oct. 7,” he added.

Previous McAleer productions have faced unusual challenges. His crowdfunding campaign for “Gosnell” got booted from Kickstarter.com under mysterious circumstances. Some actors who originally agreed to appear in “Ferguson” got cold feet.

The Actors Temple Theatre doubles as a synagogue, meaning there’s less chance the venue will do an about-face and block “October 7.”

His use of “verbatim” storytelling tactics, in theory, shields him from critics. It doesn’t always work that way for McAleer’s critics. “October 7” may not be much different.

“Are they against the truth now, against the actual, spoken truth? Shame on them if they are,” he says of potential naysayers.

McAleer may be a parallel economy pioneer, but working outside the Hollywood system is still a challenge.

“You learn things and then they change the rules,” he says. “Distribution is very hard. Getting venues is getting harder and harder. It used to be they quietly blacklisted you. Now, they proudly blacklist you.”

“October 7” won’t go away after the show wraps in New York. McAleer is planning to take the show on the road — specifically to American colleges where anti-Semitism has exploded in recent months.

“This is the new center of anti-Semitism, anti-Israelism,” he says.

Some universities have vowed to fight back against on-campus bigotry in the wake of Oct. 7. That hasn’t gone well so far. Raffaella Sadun, the new co-chair of Harvard University’s task force to battle anti-Semitism, resigned shortly after accepting the role.

Two Jewish MIT students sued the university last month, alleging it let anti-Semitism flower on campus. Other colleges, including New York University and the University of Pennsylvania, face similar lawsuits.

“Let’s see if they’ve learned their lesson … if we’re allowed to put on a play telling the truth [about Oct.7]. Will they put barriers in our way, or let people put barriers in our way?” McAleer asks.