A brief thought about Chaim Topol, the legendary Israeli actor who died at 87 on Wednesday, that the obituaries seem to have missed: In his acting career, he pulled off a pretty amazing feat. He simultaneously became the iconic onscreen Ashkenazi Jew and the iconic Mizrachi Jew.
Of course American Jews know Topol from his role in the 1971 film version of Fiddler on the Roof. As Tevye, he took over the role that heretofore had belonged to Zero Mostel on Broadway. Movies have more staying power—and a broader reach—than stage performances, and for two generations it’s been Topol who has been the quintessential Tevye the Dairyman, the onscreen incarnation of Sholom Aleichem’s shtetl everyman.
This has always been my favorite scene from Fiddler:
But years before Fiddler, he was already immortalized to Israelis in the classic film Sallah Shabati—where he played the quintessential Mizrachi Jew.
Sallah Shabati is a satire about the Aliyah of the Middle Eastern Jews in the 1950s. I’ve watched and taught the film many times—as far as I can tell, it’s not explicit which country these Jews have arrived from. (It may be Yemen or Iraq). And their arrival is one comic disaster after another.
Sallah’s family arrive “on eagle’s wings” in the new country full of idealism and excitement. But they’re quickly shunted to a ma’abara, an impoverished settlement town for these new arrivals, which has more than its fair share of squalor. The movie was poignant and fairly controversial in those early days of the state, because it skewered all sorts of sacred cows: the kibbutz (presented as a place of chaos and laziness), the immigration authority (an utterly inept bureaucracy), political parties (cynical manipulators who look for ‘ethnic types’ to garner votes) and so on.
It's a comic take on the vicious and ugly racism the Mizrachi Jews received at the hands of the Ashkenazi elite with their socialism, secularism, and European touchstones. By contrast, the Mizrachim were religious—kabbalistic, even; had less familiarity with modernity and its implications; and culturally had more in common with the Palestinian Arabs than the kibbutzniks.
The very name “Sallah Shabati” is a double entendre: a perfectly legitimate Judeo-Arabic name, but also a pun that could mean “excuse me for coming here.”
Here's my favorite scene from Sallah Shabati, the song “Hamashiach Hazakein” (and watch the two Ashkenazi politicos, who spot Sallah and are eager to recruit him to Labor Zionism):
The movie Sallah Shabati is notable in additional ways. It was written and directed by Ephraim Kishon, a Hungarian-born Jewish Holocaust survivor. (In the death camp, Kishon was lined up with other inmates against a wall; the Nazis shot every 10th person in line. Kishon survived, and ultimately escaped while the Nazis were transporting him to Sobibor.) The movie was the first Israeli film to be nominated for an Academy Award (in 1964; it lost) and it still holds up today. In fact, it’s an important document to remind people of the terrible racism the Mizrachi Jews experienced at the hands of their Israeli brothers and sisters.
Anyhow, what a remarkable feat to portray both Tevye and Sallah!
(Two slightly sour reflections here. First, I wonder if in today’s identity wars, some would object to his playing both of these ethnic roles: be one or the other, but certainly not both of them.
Second, I’m thinking of the protesters in the streets of Israel these days. A sharp satire like Sallah Shabati reminds us all that sometimes the absolutely most patriotic thing you can do is to raise your voice and point out the injustices, or worse, that your country is perpetrating.)
Hats off to Topol, for pulling off this great feat! יהי זכרו ברוך.