If anything was clear during the Purim celebrations of my childhood—and I’ll be honest, between the costumes and groggers and carnival vibe, not much was clear—it was this: No one wanted to be Vashti.
Whatever grown person played her in the Purimspiel was usually dressed like a caricature of a prostitute. Even worse, at least to me, who loved to act, almost as soon as Vashti entered she was gone. Banished from the stage and from the story, never to be heard from again. Had she been killed? No one seemed to know. Rumor had it she was a prostitute. Or maybe a leper. Or … maybe a leprous prostitute!
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