a makeshift flag and marches off to war. Zionist causes A Flag Is Born was produced by the pro-Zionist American League for a Free Palestine (ALFP) to raise financial and political support for Zionist causes, including the transport of Jews from Europe. The AFLP was entirely open about its political motivations—publicity materials read: "A Flag Is Born is not ordinary theatre. It was not written to amuse or beguile. A Flag Is Born was written to make money—to make money to provide ships to get Hebrews to Palestine ... and [to] arouse American public opinion to support the fight for freedom and independence now being waged by the resistance in Palestine." In promoting the play, the Bergson Group attempted to equate the Zionist organizations in Palestine with the Patriots of the American Revolution. The cover of the program showed three Zionists—one with a rifle, one with a hoe, and one with a Zionist flag—superimposed over three American Revolutionary figures. Advertisements used the slogan "It's 1776 in Palestine!", portrayed members of the Irgun as "modern-day Nathan Hales," alluded to "taxation without representation" in Palestine, and quoted Thomas Jefferson's phrase, "Resistance to tyranny is obedience to God." When Tevye dreams about addressing the United Nations, he compares Palestine in the 1940s with the American colonies in the 1770s. A Flag Is Born played in six North American cities and raised more than $400,000 for the ALFP, the largest block of funds it ever attained. Brando had already been voted "Broadway's Most Promising Actor" for his role as an anguished veteran in Truckline Cafe, but that play was not a commercial success and Brando was still young, relatively unknown and impecunious. Brando contended that the survivors of the Holocaust deserved to have their own land where they could live freely; he accepted only the Actor's Equity minimum payment so more of the proceeds from A Flag Is Born could go towards Zionist causes. Reception and impact Commenting on the play, opened on September 5, 1946, Bernard Lerner wrote in the Atlantic City Jewish Record in the context of post WW2: "It was an oversimplification of the Jewish resistance in Palestine, but what is important is that the audience, constituting the jury, indicated by its applause its vindication of all and any means Jews may use to obtain their ends – freedom in Palestine, freedom from DP camps." After the play proved extremely popular,