The People in the Picture

Iris Rainer Dart’s sincere, well-meaning weepie, set to music by Mike Stoller and Artie Butler, renders its story the way fat is rendered in an old Jewish home: over low heat, with traditional tools, in the service of making schmaltz. Donna Murphy stars as a Holocaust survivor intent on preserving her memories. The musical means to stress the importance of laughter in the face of tragedy, but despite a generally strong cast, maudlin tear-jerking predominates.—Adam Feldman