When Jessica Hecht, the two-time Tony nominated actress, played Golde in Fiddler on the Roof  back in 2016, she never imagined that portraying the plight of the iconic matriarch would spark a vision to bring social and emotional healing to young people from Anatevkas across the globe. 

But eight years later, after journeys to Greece, Moldova and Uganda, Hecht was back in Manhattan in early July with The Campfire Project, her initiative that tends to the creative instincts of minors and young adults who have left their home countries due to conflict or persecution. 

The program, in partnership with Project Rousseau, the New York-based nonprofit that helps empower youth in need, and hosted by The Workers Circle, the Jewish organization formerly known as the Workmen’s Circle, brought together 100 asylum seekers. Aged 5 to 28, the participants had arrived in the United States from Senegal, Venezuela, Iraq, China, Ecuador, Afghanistan, Mauritania and Guinea. It marked the latest iteration of a program that until now had operated only in Europe and Africa. 

Participants had the opportunity to meet with immigration attorneys and psychologists and experience a week of art exploration, including drumming, singing, dancing, theater and writing, led by award-winning educators and performers from the New York theater community. 

In one writing workshop, using a prompt from the poem “I Come From,” written by Dean Atta, a Brit who has Greek Cypriot and Caribbean heritage, those gathered revealed their innermost thoughts: “I come from the peace and clarity of the night.” “I come from a place that can be found far away.” “I come from the courage of an athlete.”  

The week will culminate on July 14 with a presentation written and performed by the participants— and directed by Broadway veteran Kate Whoriskey—and open to the public at the 52nd Street Project Theater.  

That seems a fitting venue as the idea for Campfire was born just a few blocks east during the 2016 staging of Fiddler on the Roof at the Broadway Theater. 

That Fiddler revival was meant to evoke the unfolding humanitarian crisis as tens of thousands of Syrians seeking asylum turned up on Greek shores. As the scope of suffering became clear, Hecht began raising funds through backstage bake sales to send to humanitarian organizations. At the same time, she learned that a production of Hamlet performed for refugees in the French northern port city of Calais had been so popular that audiences were returning for repeat viewings and were reciting the text along with the cast.  

Channeling the strength of all the Goldes that ever were, an idea was born: Why not spearhead a production uniting the New York theater community with the refugee community in Greece?  

With underwriting in part from the Fiddler actors—the first check was written by Hecht’s Tevye, Tony Award-winner Danny Burstein—she and a group of arts educators, including Campfire co-founder and theater producer Jenny Gersten, set off on an exploratory visit to Ritsona, Greece. There they met asylum seekers from Syria awaiting visas and relocation in the European Union. Having lost their routines, they enthusiastically responded to the focus and intellectual stimulation a production could provide.  

“Adolescent boys break danced for us,” said Hecht. “They wanted to show us that they could contribute.”  

Upon her return to the United States, she sought out mentorship from Nisha Sajnani, co-director of the Jameel Arts & Health Lab at NYU Steinhardt, established in collaboration with the World Health Organization. “Dancing, art and singing not only de-stress,” according to Sajnani, “these activities promote sensory activation, aesthetic engagement and help children who’ve experienced trauma imagine possible futures.” 

In 2018, Hecht, Sajnani and 22 “campers,” as Hecht affectionately refers to the members of the teams she assembles, returned to Ritsona, where they spent a month staging, in Arabic, The Tempest, Shakespeare’s drama that is set in motion by a shipwreck on a Mediterranean island. Included in the cast were refugees who had sailed and even swam the Aegean to safety.  

In Ritsona, Hecht realized Campfire’s potential to answer some of a community’s unmet needs. “You really need to be on the ground to understand what’s needed,” Hecht said. “Clothing purchased as costumes could stay with the community, as could musical instruments. Set building requires art supplies and even furniture. We were able to provide respite care for participants with children.”  

The Tempest was so joyful and meaningful an experience that Campfire was invited back three additional times. Word spread quickly through the international community of nongovernmental humanitarian workers, which led to Campfire’s two visits to Moldova, where “campers” worked with Ukrainian mothers and their children who had fled the Russian-Ukrainian war. 

It was in Moldova where Hecht encountered IsraAID, the Tel Aviv-based nongovernmental organization whose mission, according to its website, includes “supporting people affected by humanitarian crises.” Through IsraAID, Hecht soon received an invitation to the Palorinya Refugee Settlement in northeastern Uganda. Home to approximately 125,000 residents, Palorinya is a permanent home for refugees, most of whom are displaced from the ongoing war in South Sudan.  

IsraAID’s involvement in the settlement began in 2016 with the stated aim of “ensuring that children and caregivers had access to education” and “strengthening social cohesion” between new arrivals and established residents in the area. 

Many of the children at Palorinya, who make up over half of the settlement’s population, come unaccompanied, having seen parents or other family members killed. Placed in households with relatives or with residents from their hometowns, they face unique challenges. Along with regular power outages, the prevalence of malaria and isolation endemic to life in the district, the youth are tasked with adult responsibilities, including farming, animal care and caring for siblings, as well as manual labor to supplement income.  

Food insecurity has led to a rise in early marriage for female children as heads of households—some as young as 13 years old— may feel obligated to marry a child off to ease the burden on the family.  

A plan was hatched for Campfire to spend 10 days at Palorinya in September 2023. There, they engaged with youth from 11 to 24, who already were participating in enrichment activities at IsraAID’s Child Friendly Space at the settlement, culminating in a carnival-like performance. 

Hecht included in her group past campers Katie Flahive, a New York-based actress and educator; David Hugo, director of the musical theater department at Long Island University; and actress Maura Tierney, best known for starring roles in ER and The Affair. She also added five first-timers. They included visual documentarian Jason Somma; actress Kathleen McNenny, who teaches mask work at The Julliard School; Alex Zaslav, who works for Hand in Hand, the network of bilingual, integrated schools for Jewish and Arab students in Israel; and Lilia Gaufberg, a dancer who is also trained in developmental psychology and has taught children from traumatic backgrounds. Zaslav and Gaufberg, who are Hecht’s nieces, are Tel Aviv-based and American-born. 

And then there was me. The mentoring I’d done with unhoused youth, for whom I led writing workshops and improvisational theater, were my recommending skills, and I jumped at the chance to participate. As Hugo noted, “Jessica is the most positive person I’ve ever met. Whatever she’s doing, you know it will be worthwhile and you want to join in.” 

It was the middle of the night when we landed in Entebbe. After a day spent acclimating, we boarded a bus and headed north with ambitious plans and a Mary Poppins’ duffle of art supplies, courtesy of McNenny, which we were all convinced was overkill. 

As the towns lining the highway thinned, pavement gave way to dirt roads. Eight hours later, we were snaking rugged scrubby hills and the rushing waterfalls of the Nile, past gorillas sitting legs out-in-front on the side of the road, looking every bit like stranded motorists awaiting roadside assistance.  

Soon, we arrived at the Laropi ferry, one of only two passageways into the West Nile Valley, making the region one of the most remote in the country. “It’s like we’re inscribing ourselves in the Book of Life,” Zaslav said as we inked our names into a leather-bound ledger at the dock. We crossed the Nile on the flat-bottomed ferry with maybe 50 souls; the only other vessel on the river was a single dug-out canoe carrying fisherman casting nets into the tall reeds. 

Once in the West Nile Valley, we passed small clusters of shopping outposts and scattered dome-shaped, traditional grass-thatched roofed huts made of mud walls. Some residents cooked over open fires while others carried bundles of firewood on their heads to sell as kindling. 

Buses attract a lot of attention in that part of the world. Even children barely toddling know that buses bring outsiders and resources, so as we arrived, we were swarmed by at least twice as many children than we’d anticipated. The majority looked to be between the ages of 3 and 5, not at all the group we’d planned for.  

Some were outfitted in brightly striped or swirling patterned African fabrics and some wore their robin’s egg-blue cotton school uniforms. There were girls dressed in Disney princess gowns with just a bit of buoyancy left in the crinoline. Others wore faded T-shirts with Gucci and Anna Sui labels, with one boy in a Lady Boss cropped top.  

Adolescents, mirroring teenage disaffection worldwide, looked at us with wary apprehension. Hecht had warned that adaptability was the watchword during engagements, but the exercises I’d carefully structured into a curriculum would be too sophisticated for these little ones. Ever unflappable, Hecht and the more experienced campers sprang into action.  

With the help of IsraAID’s educators, many of whom are refugees themselves, we formed a circle spanning the length of the field. “We heard about you. We heard all about how amazing each of you are and we had to come and meet you,” Hecht said, stepping into the circle, a playful respect and sense of wonder in her voice.  

Hugo launched into vocal warm-ups designed to help students feel confident about taking up space with their bodies and voices. Zaslav introduced dance moves as Gaufberg broke out her guitar. 

Some kind of muscle memory from my son’s childhood kicked in. Suddenly, I was shepherding 50 or more ducklings into a classroom and discovered the durability of time-tested classics: The hokey pokey is a crowd pleaser on any continent. After several groups rotated in and out, I had a moment of sheer terror that anyone who has ever been in charge of children can relate to: I blanked. It was 90 something degrees and what felt like 1000 percent humidity. Sweat was pouring down my neck when Hecht jumped in, “How can I support you?” she whispered. 

The next thing I knew, we were turning construction paper into “feelings journals.” “Draw a happy face and a sad face, and then draw or write about something that makes you happy or sad,” she suggested. The prompt provided instant access for expression while allowing agency to share only what the children felt comfortable doing. 

Regrouping that night, we adults swapped information, stories and vegetable curries. We marveled over how, despite working with 200 to 300 children, and the swirl of English, Loganda (the official language of Uganda), Arabic, Kuku and Acholi, the translators managed our communications. 

Zaslav described how she’d copied the groove of a young man who’d made fun of her dance moves, and how that had broken the ice with the teenagers. I relayed how a grade-school-aged girl had written, “My mother ran away because she couldn’t afford to pay for my school,” while others had expressed love for a sibling, soccer, dancing, music, YouTube or school, like youngsters in any town the world over. 

Over the ensuing days, Hugo, Flahive and Tierney led stilt-walking workshops, a Campfire tradition. “For someone who has lost control over many aspects of their lives, stilt walking is an instant confidence rebuilder, besides being fun,” Flahive said.   

I apprenticed myself to Gaufberg. Together we taught Israeli and American folk songs, and the children and caregivers, in turn, taught us their songs. McNenny’s bottomless bag of arts supplies proved invaluable. The sight of teenage girls floating from McNenny’s classroom, carrying themselves like visiting royalty, ribboned crowns streaming, became a regular sight, followed by the girls breaking into spontaneous dance parties.   

We continued in this way from sunrise to sunset. Local muralist Boniface Adrawa designed and led the painting of an expansive mural upon which even the tiniest tots added their handprints.   

At the closing celebration, a local marching band led the community to a staging area. There, the children performed for the elders, community members stilt walked for each other and we danced with women from the surrounding village. 

One of the writing workshop participants, teenager Richard Alema, held us in rapt attention with his passion for poetry and theater, and then, he issued both a warning and advice: “If we observe the rights of our children, then they will be the next leaders. When we fail to do so, they will be the rule breakers.”  

After 10 days, the early morning sun shone golden as we crossed the Nile, heading toward our homes in the Western world. In keeping with Campfire’s commitment to ongoing support, Hecht engaged Adrawa and local musician Patrick Anguyo to work with the children twice a month for a year. Hecht also arranged for board games, art and classroom supplies and new sitting mats. 

Hamas attacked Israel seven days after our return from Uganda. “Campfire will be ready to answer the call if and when we’re asked. Given the current climate, it seemed like an important moment to attend to our refugee crisis at home,” Hecht explained when she announced the plan to bring Campfire home to New York.   

Of course, I felt compelled to sign on immediately, joining a group of returning campers along with some new ones. I spent the week in New York leading writing workshops, creating poems and personal histories with participants of all ages. 

We campers all related to what NYU’s Sajnani once said about The Campfire Project being appropriately named. “Campfire invites us to build a warm hearth around which to call others to play, sing, dance, challenge themselves and share a story or two,” she had said. “Jessica’s kindling the flames of inspiration casts light on a path toward a more compassionate world.”  

 It’s hard to imagine a more urgent need. 

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Annabelle Gurwitch is a New York Times best-selling author of five books, including You’re Leaving When?