Our Class Archives | Arlekin Players Theatre https://www.arlekinplayers.com/category/news/news-room-reviews/our-class/ An international theatre collaborative. Tue, 03 Dec 2024 04:19:08 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.7.1 https://www.arlekinplayers.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/cropped-site-icon-32x32.jpg Our Class Archives | Arlekin Players Theatre https://www.arlekinplayers.com/category/news/news-room-reviews/our-class/ 32 32 The New York Times. ‘Our Class’ Review: A Town’s Horrific Past Chillingly Brought Into the Light. https://www.arlekinplayers.com/the-new-york-times-our-class/ Sat, 06 Apr 2024 03:16:33 +0000 https://www.arlekinplayers.com/?p=14151 The story of a 1941 massacre is told through the lives of 10 Polish classmates, five Jewish and five Catholic, in this suspenseful but humane play.

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The story of a 1941 massacre is told through the lives of 10 Polish classmates, five Jewish and five Catholic, in this suspenseful but humane play.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/19/theater/our-class-review.html

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The Wall Street Journal. ‘Our Class’ Review: A Disturbing Drama of Divergent Lives. https://www.arlekinplayers.com/the-wall-street-journal-our-class/ Sat, 06 Apr 2024 03:14:39 +0000 https://www.arlekinplayers.com/?p=14148 Set in Poland before, during and after World War II and the Holocaust, Tadeusz Słobodzianek’s play at BAM follows a group of classmates—half Jewish, half Catholic—who grow into adulthood through that violent period.

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Set in Poland before, during and after World War II and the Holocaust, Tadeusz Słobodzianek’s play at BAM follows a group of classmates—half Jewish, half Catholic—who grow into adulthood through that violent period.

By Charles Isherwood

Jan. 18, 2024 9:00 pm ET

https://www.wsj.com/articles/our-class-review-bam-nazis-world-war-ii-poland-jewish-catholic-play-f7dac63a

Our Class
Stephen Ochsner (center) PHOTO: PAVEL ANTONOV

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NY Jewish Weekly. ‘Our Class,’ a timely play asking big questions about antisemitism, makes its New York premiere. https://www.arlekinplayers.com/jta-org-our-class/ Sat, 06 Apr 2024 03:02:06 +0000 https://www.arlekinplayers.com/?p=14143 ‘Our Class,’ a timely play asking big questions about antisemitism, makes its New York premiere.

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January 17, 2024.

By Chava Pearl Lansky 

https://www.jta.org/2024/01/17/ny/our-class-a-timely-play-asking-big-questions-about-antisemitism-makes-its-new-york-premiere

Our Class
“Our Class,” written Polish playwright Tadeusz Słobodzianek about the Jedwabne pogrom, makes its New York premiere at BAM. (Pavel Antonov)

(New York Jewish Week) —“But what could I do?” 

Variations of this question are asked again and again throughout Polish playwright Tadeusz Słobodzianek’s “Our Class.” The play is inspired by the real-life 1941 pogrom in the small Polish village of Jedwabne, in which local residents murdered hundreds of their Jewish neighbors.  

And now, at a time of increasing antisemitism stemming from Israel’s war with Hamas, “Our Class” makes its New York premiere at Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Fisher Fishman Space. 

“Our Class,” first produced in 2009, tracks 10 Jedwabne residents — half of them Jewish and half Catholic, with the majority of the characters based on real people — from 1925 through the pogrom and beyond. The characters begin as young classmates, children of 5 and 6 playing and learning together and dreaming of their futures. In this context, “But what could I do?” refers to harmless events, such as one student silently standing by while another is teased for his unrequited crush. As they reach young adulthood, the classmates are haplessly thrust into the roles of victim and perpetrator, and “But what could I do?” takes on a terrifying gravity. 

That the murderers in “Our Class” were conducted by Jews’ neighbors, rather than occupying German Nazis, is what made director Igor Golyak so eager to tackle Słobodzianek’s text. 

“It was just regular people, just like you and I, that could reach these heights of hate and find a reason to burn their neighbors,” Golyak, a Ukrainian Jew who immigrated to the United States at the age of 11, told the New York Jewish Week. 

Based in the Boston area, Golyak is the founder and artistic director of Arlekin Players Theater, a company made up of Jewish immigrants and refugees from Eastern Europe dedicated to presenting Russian theater. He’s gained acclaim in recent years for his virtual theater work, including “State vs. Natasha Banina,” which was a New York Times Critics Pick, and “chekhovOS/an experimental game/,” starring Mikhail Baryshnikov and Jessica Hecht. 

When Golyak and his creative team first read “Our Class” together in May 2023, they drew comparisons to the ongoing war in Ukraine. What they couldn’t have expected was how Hamas’ Oct. 7 terrorist attack on Israel, and its aftermath that has included both a war in Gaza and global displays of antisemitism, have recast Słobodzianek’s play in a new light. 

“It feels very urgent, like it’s another recognition of the importance of not forgetting the antisemitism and hate that unfortunately exists in the world,” Golyak said. “We think this lies asleep in the world culture. But it is a very light sleeper.”  

The Jedwabne pogrom was thrust into the spotlight in 2001 with the publication of Jan T. Gross’ book “Neighbors.” Gross, a professor of history at Princeton University, discovered that despite public perception — and even a memorial in Jedwabne — the massacre of the village’s 1,600 Jews did not happen by the hands of the Nazis. Rather, it was the local Catholic Polish population who took the initiative in torturing, murdering and burning alive their neighbors. Gross’ revelation led Poland’s president, Aleksander Kwasniewski to apologize to the international Jewish community in 2001, though some Poles remained in denial. A decade later, on the 70th anniversary of the massacre, Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski asked for forgiveness again.

More recently, however, the Polish government has adopted an official stance of denial, vigorously rejecting any claims of local complicity in the Nazi campaign against the Jews, which left 90% of Polish Jews dead.

Alexandra Silber, a Jewish actress with a ream of Broadway and West End credits who’s playing the part of Jewish classmate Rachelka, has also felt the tenor of the play shift since the events of Oct 7. “It’s made it horrifying and relevant in a new way,” she said. “I felt really called upon by Rachelka to serve her. I have a lot to say on her behalf.”

Rachelka is one of a handful of Jewish characters in “Our Class” who aren’t killed in the pogrom. One of her Polish classmates hides her away and eventually marries her. She converts to Catholicism and changes her name. Like with each of the 10 classmates, Rachelka’s journey raises its own questions. 

“Is it better to survive?” reflects Silber. “Rachelka’s Jewishness, her Jewish name, her Jewish soul departs, and she has to live as a new person. Every single thing about her survivor’s life does not resemble who she began as, and is that better?” 

Alongside Silber, the cast is made up of actors hailing from New York, Los Angeles, Ukraine and Russia, and includes both Jewish artists and some with Polish roots. “We’ve really created an unbelievable diversity of humanity in our group of 10,” Silber said. 

Golyak adds that after the Oct. 7 attack, the cast came together in a series of discussions. “We have cast members and team members, designers, that were personally affected by Oct. 7 because of relatives and friends that have actually been murdered,” he said. “So it’s been a very, very personal journey.”

While “Our Class” dives deeply into its challenging subject matter, it is not without its moments of levity. 

“I’m trying to find a lot of humor in this play because people are funny, and that’s what makes them humans and humane,” Golyak said. “We can relate to people that make mistakes and are sometimes funny and sometimes awkward, and these people are just like us.”

New York audiences will have the chance to see themselves most clearly in the character of Abram, the only one of the 10 classmates who left for the United States before the 1941 pogrom. Throughout the play, Abram (played by “Indecent” star Richard Topol) communicates with his old friends through letters, trying to piece together the conflicting information he receives from the safety of his home in New York. 

Abram serves as a foil, a reminder of the fallibility and subjectivity of memory. “We need to understand this as people living in America, separated by the ocean from evil,” Golyak said. “The more relatable Abram is, the more we understand that this evil is actually closer than we think.”

Technology has become a hallmark of Golyak’s work, and this production uses devices such as a fake documentary movie set — complete with an onstage camera person — along with chalk drawings and projections, to expose elements of the characters’ journeys. He’s joined by a creative team including scenic designer Jan Pappelbaum, music director Lisa Gutkin, choreographer Or Schraiber, and many more.

“Our Class” raises a lot of questions, but neither Słobodzianek nor Golyak are interested in offering simple answers. But for the director, that’s precisely the point. 

“It’s very difficult to overcome these big events in one’s life, and I’m definitely not here to judge who did the right thing or the wrong thing, because I don’t know how I would act in these situations,” Golyak said. “But the beauty of this play is that it asks these questions.”

“Our Class” will be performed through Feb. 4 at BAM’s Fisher Fishman space (321 Ashland Pl., Brooklyn). Tickets start at $59.

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Theater Pizzazz. Review by Carol Rocamora https://www.arlekinplayers.com/theaterpizzazz-com-our-class/ Sat, 06 Apr 2024 02:54:51 +0000 https://www.arlekinplayers.com/?p=14129 Theater Pizzazz. Review by Carol Rocamora.

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January 18, 2024.

Theater Review by Carol Rocamora . . .

https://www.theaterpizzazz.com/our-class/

Our Class

Ten actors take their seats in a semi-circle onstage at BAM Fisher’s Fishman Space, script in hand, as if ready for a reading of a play. But as they begin, they slowly evolve into their characters and reenact dramatically what is undoubtedly the most devastating story you will see on the stage this season (and beyond)—one that will impact you profoundly, one that you will never forget, one must be heard and heeded long after the lights go down three traumatic hours later.

Such is the overwhelming power of Our Class, a 2006 play written by Polish playwright Tadeusz Slobodzianek, telling the story of ten classmates growing up together in the small town of Jedwabne, Poland in the 1930s and 40s. They consist of five Catholics and five Jews. Spanning eight decades, this story reveals how their bonds are torn asunder and their lives shattered and scattered by the cataclysmic historic events of that period, featuring the invasion of the Stalinist Russians, and then the Nazis. Thanks to the brilliant director Igor Golyak, leader of Arlekin Players Theatre, who discovered this play and decided it must be done, the play is the centerpiece of this year’s Under the Radar Festival and it is an absolute must-see for its power and relevance in this time of war and world upheaval.

Our Class
Gene Ravvin as He in “Just Tell No One.” (Courtesy Arlekin Players Theatre zero-G Lab)

The play (adapted into English by Norman Allen) is based on a book called Neighbors by Polish author Jan Gross, about a horrific event in Jedwabne, Poland on July 10, 1941, when 1,600 Jews in that tiny town of 3,200 were rounded up in a barn and burned to death. Gross’s research uncovered the truth that it was not the Nazis who executed this terrible massacre—as the Polish government had always proclaimed—but rather the Polish neighbors themselves who grew up alongside the Jews whom they murdered on that terrible day.

The play is cleverly divided into fourteen so-called “Lessons”—or scenes—that span those eight turbulent decades, accompanied by Polish poems and songs. Act One (covering the mid-1930s until 1941) begins with the classmates introducing themselves. We witness their warm solidarity and mutual affection, laughing and learning together, playing soccer. In Lesson II there is even a mock wedding among the young students between a Catholic boy and a Jewish girl, with everyone cheering “Mazel tov!” 

But, starting in 1935, cracks began to form in this solidarity. In Lesson IV one of the Catholic students announces that, by decree of the Polish Minister of Education, Jewish students must sit in the back of the classroom. There are reports of Polish Christians looting Jewish shops and smashing windows. Then comes the invasion of foreign forces, beginning with the Stalinists and their NKVD (police) wreaking havoc on the Polish town and destroying the students’ solidarity. Four of the Catholic classmates (boys) went underground and formed a resistance, accusing their Jewish classmates of Stalinist sympathizing. They accuse one of the Jews, Jakub Katz (played by Stephen Ochsner) of informing on them to the Russians, and beat Katz to death. Next, they rape another of their Jewish classmates named Dora (Gus Birney), who by then had married a Jewish classmate, Menachem, and bore a child. 

Our Class
Stephen Ochsner

The chaos crescendos to the horrifying climax in Lesson IX, set on a hot summer day on July 10, 1941. By then, the Nazis had taken over the town and ordered the Poles to round up the Jews in the town square. There, surrounded by an audience of their Polish neighbors who watch and laugh, the Jews are forced by the Poles to weed between the cobblestones, then form a grotesque parade playing Russian songs. The Poles then beat the Jews savagely. Wladek (Ilia Volok), one of the Catholic boys, hides Rachelka (Alexandra Silber), his Jewish classmate, in his mother’s hayloft, but the rest of his Catholic classmates join other Poles in beating, raping, and torturing the towns’ Jews, using axes, knives, and hammers. Dora, clutching her baby, calls out to Rysiek (Jose Espinosa), her classmate, for help, but he hits her over the head with his club. “Everyone was watching,” Rysiek explains to the audience, “What was I supposed to do?” The Jews are then marched to the barn, which is sealed and set on fire. The Polish neighbors watch while 1,600 of their Jewish neighbors burn to death after the classmates help barricade the doors with wooden bolts.

Stunned by the horrific climax, I stumbled out into the BAM Fisher lobby at intermission, incredulous that there could be more of this story that would have as much impact as that first act. But the remaining six scenes (or “Lessons”) in Act Two were also devastating . . . in other ways. They follow the lives of the seven remaining classmates through six more decades, each bearing the indelible mark of July 10. To reveal all these storylines would deprive you of the play’s enormous cumulative impact—but allow me to offer a few in Act Two to give you a sense of the magnitude of betrayal, denial, loss, and personal tragedy. Rachelka has become one of the only two Jews in the entire town to survive the massacre. “You saved my life,” she says to Wladek who has hidden her and agrees to marry him, convert, and change her name to a Polish one (Marianna). The couple is forced to hide during the Nazi occupation, living in the forest (they have one child who died). Still, they live out their days in Jedwabwe; and, after Wladek dies Marianna moves into an old age home, where she spends what she calls the happiest days of her life, enjoying watching TV programs. Another Catholic classmate, Zocha (Tess Goldwyn), hides Menachem (her Jewish classmate, played by Andrey Burkovskiy) in the pigsty behind her house. They, too, eventually marry, but separate as the decades go by (she goes to America; he goes to Israel, where he dies tragically). Meanwhile, Zygmunt writes to his classmate Abram (Richard Topol)—who had gone to America to become a rabbi early on in the play—with the false news that all the Jews in Jedwabne had been murdered by the Nazi Germans. 

Our Class
The Cast of Our Class

What a huge artistic responsibility it is to put a story of this magnitude on stage—and what a challenge to do it effectively! For this towering achievement, his stunning stagecraft, and brilliant artistry, director Golyak deserves the highest praise and admiration. Together with his gifted designer Jan Pappelbaum, they offer an empty stage flanked upstage by a huge wall that serves as a floor-to-ceiling blackboard on which the classmates write their names and other messages, standing on huge ladders (there are also projection designs on it by Eric Dunlap to illustrate the story as it unfolds.) The blackboard also serves as a backdrop for the violent, vicious beating of one Jew by his Catholic classmates. Director Golyak makes use of the entire theater—at one point, he has actors crawl on platforms hanging from the ceiling. I’ll never forget the culmination of Act One and the image of the Jewish classmates disappearing behind the blackboard which has now become a side of the burning barn, with a terrifying glow of red flames coming from the crack in the floor. 

As for Golyak’s stellar international ensemble, they bring each of these characters to pulsating life. (The characters, by the way, are composites based on true residents of Jedwabne.) I’ll never forget the scene dramatizing the horrific rape of Dora (played by Gus Birney) by her Catholic classmates. Dora eventually perishes in the fire; nothing remains of her baby but a crumpled sheet on the stage floor (another one of Golyak’s stunning images). The four Catholic classmates: Heniek (Will Manning), Wladek (Ilia Volok), Zygmunt (Elan Zafir), and Rysiek (Jose Espinosa), though driven to savagery in Act One, manage to elicit our compassion in Act II as history and fate catches up with each of them. Rachelka/Marianna (Alexandra Silber) portrays a young woman dazed to distraction by her fate as the only Jewish survivor of this tragedy (along with Menachem). 

Our Class
The Cast of Our Class

According to Rachel Moss, the production’s scholarly dramaturg, Jan Gross’s book Neighbors, on which the play is based, has provoked controversy, causing a debate among scholars and politicians as to the truth of who was really responsible for the massacre on July 10, 1941, as well as the actual number of fatalities. Evidence of that controversy can be found in the village of Jedwabne itself today. According to Sara Stackhouse, the production’s executive producer, she and director Igor Golyak visited Jedwabne and the site of the massacre as part of their pre-production preparation. She reports that the village green featured no sign commemorating the atrocities. As for the site of the barn where the burning took place, there is a plaque saying: “In this spot, Jews were murdered,” with no reference as to who was responsible.

Our Class addresses this terrible and tragic irony regarding truth and history. In the final scene, Heniek cries out to Wladek: “Truth? Which one? There are so many. Pick one. Pick the truth that makes you famous in our old age. Is that what you want? You to rest for all eternity beside the same people whose reputations you destroyed? Your grave next to theirs?” The painful “lesson” we learn from this play is that the obfuscation of the truth happens throughout history. Indeed, we are witnessing it today. 

On the production’s website, there is a statement made by actor Richard Topol, who played Abram, one of the classmates who left Jedwabne in the early 1930s. In the play, his character was sent to America and became a rabbi. One of the most heartrending passages in the play is his letter to the Polish government, reciting the names of the dozens of family members he lost in the Jedwabne massacre. In contrast, at the play’s end, he joyously recites the names of his new family members in America—children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. Topol’s personal statement on the website resonates like a prayer of hope: “There is always hate in the world, and we have to find a way to overcome that hate.” 

Our Class
Andrey Burkovskiy, Tess Goldwyn

Slobodzianeek’s play Our Class had its English-language premiere at the National Theatre in London in 2008. Since then, it’s been performed in Berlin, Tel Aviv, Chicago, and Washington. Now receiving its New York premiere, it plays alongside other productions in response to the rise of antisemitism which have been receiving attention in New York and London. Among these worthy productions, Our Class distinguishes itself with its epic scope and its profound insights into the complexities of history and man’s tragic capacity for cruelty, hate, and destruction. It is also unforgettable for the stunning theatricality and artistry that director Igor Golyak has brought to this powerful work, ending in a startling, moving image of unexpected hope—that of those young classmates at the beginning of their school years together, playing a game of soccer, Christians and Jews, side by side. Despite all this tragedy, the play and its director are bravely saying that hope . . .  is still possible.

I couldn’t imagine this story in the hands of a more inspired and creative theater artist than Mr. Golyak. This is a play and production that must be seen—indeed, cries out to be seen in these terrible, troubled times of global strife. It has arrived just at the right moment for us to learn its lesson if only we can.

Our Class. Extended Through February 11 at BAM Fisher’s Fishman Space (321 Ashland Place, between Lafayette Avenue and Hanson Place, Downtown Brooklyn). www.ourclassplay.com 

Photos: Pavel Antov

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WBUR Op-Ed – Stopping the inferno: Why this artist supports Israel by Igor Golyak https://www.arlekinplayers.com/stopping-the-inferno-why-this-artist-supports-israel/ Mon, 16 Oct 2023 16:10:57 +0000 https://www.arlekinplayers.com/?p=14013 My theater company in Needham was created by Jewish immigrants and refugees from Eastern Europe. As a company, we stand with Israel. As an artist and a human being, I stand with Israel. (Are we alone?)

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October 13, 2023.

By Igor Golyak

https://www.wbur.org/news/2023/10/13/arlekin-players-igor-golyak-israel

Stopping the Inferno: Why this artist supports Israel?

My theater company in Needham was created by Jewish immigrants and refugees from Eastern Europe. As a company, we stand with Israel. As an artist and a human being, I stand with Israel. (Are we alone?)

Last Friday, Oct. 6, was our opening night for Arlekin’s production of “Just Tell No One.” Written by Natal’ya Vorozhbit and Oksana Savchenko of the Worldwide Ukrainian Play Readings, it premiered at Lincoln Center last year with Bill Irwin and Jessica Hecht, as well as David Krumholtz and Tedra Millan of Broadway’s “Leopoldstadt.” “Just Tell No One” is a play about the human consequences of war in Ukraine, my homeland (is it?), which I fled as a Jewish refugee with my family when I was 11, seeking refuge in the U.S. where we thought we’d be safe. Jewish relatives and friends from that part of the world also fled, and many of them are now your neighbors in the U.S.; a few even became a theater company. Others escaped to Israel, a new homeland (is it?) for them, where they thought they would be safe.

We are not safe. Again.

“You know, just don’t tell anyone. And I won’t tell them. They killed us.
Just don’t tell anyone, and I won’t tell you we’re alive.”
— “Just Tell No One” from the full-length play “Night Devours Morning” by Oksana Savchenko, translated by John Freedman

Gene Ravvin as He in "Just Tell No One." (Courtesy Arlekin Players Theatre zero-G Lab)
Gene Ravvin as He in “Just Tell No One.” (Courtesy Arlekin Players Theatre zero-G Lab)

Our production of “Just Tell No One” features many Arlekin company members, immigrants and Jewish refugees. On opening night, following the performance, we toasted to celebrate the importance of this work and our hopes for other projects this season. This includes the New York City premiere of “Our Class” by Tadeusz Słobodzianek, which we will present at Brooklyn Academy of Music in January — the controversial story of a pogrom in Poland during the Holocaust, where 1,600 Jews died at the hands of Polish classmates and neighbors. At our premiere, I shared some stories from our creative team’s summer visit to Poland for research, and my own journey trying to understand how this kind of evil can happen, and continues to happen; how people can slide into hatred again and again, and how to live a full life and enjoy the time and family we have. We raised a glass to the power of theater, the work of our company and its relevance in our world right now.

The next morning I awoke to the news of the unprecedented, unexpected savage attacks by Hamas on civilians in Israel. My inbox blew up as our community reeled in shock and fear. Again. Arlekin swiftly posted our solidarity with Israel, as our company members tried to reach loved ones in Israel to see if they were alive and checked on the wellness of our Jewish friends here. We prayed as relatives and their children were called up to service in the Israeli military. The theme of my inbox and social media threads from Jews around the world was, “Here it comes again. Another wave. Protect your family. We aren’t safe anywhere.” After Saturday night’s performance, rather than a celebratory toast, we held a moment of silence. We stood together. Because we can’t believe it. And we can.

We are grieving and bewildered at the silence of our non-Jewish friends, members of the theater community and neighbors. Where are the #WeStandWithIsrael posts? Where are the #IStandWithIsrael graphics? My neighbors here in the West, I don’t think you understand. For centuries, the Jewish people have been exterminated, hated, killed, displaced, driven out of their homes, separated from their families and attacked. Everywhere. In every century. Here in the U.S., this year and every year. And this weekend, brutally and without warning, in Israel.

Friends, here is why I stand with Israel. The decline of the Roman Empire can be attributed, in part, to a sense of complacency that crept in as the empire prospered. The Romans became comfortable and, in many ways, unconcerned in the face of looming threats, including barbarian invasions. Israel, in its modern context, does not stand down because it cannot. History has proven what happens when Jewish people stand down. Israel cannot be complacent or become a civilization that vanishes, so it confronts aggression and evil with unwavering determination.

Today, the Western world champions principles like individual liberty, human rights and the rule of law. Israel tries to act as a resilient defender of the values and way of life cherished by the Western world. In stark contrast, Hamas stops at nothing, resorting to such tactics as torture, kidnapping and the deliberate killing of innocent victims — including children — not for strategic victory, but in a macabre display of power. This form of malevolence, exemplified by figures like Osama bin Laden, who sought to gain notoriety through his attacks rather than to win a war, underscores the urgency of countering such twisted ambitions.

This kind of brutal and senseless killing is a continuation of the Holocaust. Never again is now. The massacre by Hamas in Israel today is happening not because of land or jurisdiction, but because the killers want to eradicate the Jewish people. It is a solemn imperative to halt these atrocities and protect the innocent from the grasp of those who use violence to seek status. Israel’s steadfastness in the face of these actions exemplifies the importance of resolute action in safeguarding the principles that underpin our civilization.

We can make plays about antisemitism and open all the Holocaust museums we want. We can make speeches about freedom and inclusivity. We can tell our young people to be upstanders and take action, but all of this is meaningless if we don’t actually stand up, take action and stop the inferno. So, I stand with Israel.

We can tell our young people to be upstanders and take action, but all of this is meaningless if we don’t actually stand up, take action and stop the inferno.

 am a compassionate, empathetic, discerning person. I recognize that the history of the Middle East and the actions of the Israeli government are fraught and complicated. I try to understand the complexity and pain of the long-term conflict. I weep over the violence, the civilian Palestinians killed and children lost. I grieve for the Palestinian victims who are voting, democratic, Israeli citizens. It is all horrifying.

But my friends in America, my theater friends, hear me. Jewish people are and have been hated, tortured, killed, persecuted and oppressed, just because we are Jews. And nothing stops it. I don’t know if I am an American, or a Ukrainian, or if I am somehow an Israeli, but I know that I am a Jew. My father told me this in the USSR when I was 10. He was shaving. The more we are hated, the more I feel I am a Jew. I feel it every day, no matter where I am, as my people have felt it everywhere throughout history. So, I stand with Israel.

I ask for your compassion, your understanding, and if not your complete solidarity, your empathy, a willingness to see another point of view and an openness to dialogue with those who support Israel. At Arlekin, we make plays about these pain points, these complexities and these human experiences. We try to untangle our history and our incomprehensible behavior as humans. I invite you to talk with us, to reach out to your Jewish and immigrant neighbors during this terrible time of war, and to think about what life is like for us as we ask where we might go next, whether our children are safe, whether we dare go to synagogue this weekend, why we don’t really have the freedom America promises, and whether we can openly say who we are. I invite you to come see Arlekin’s plays this year and be in dialogue with others around them.

I am a Jew. I am an artist. And I stand with Israel.

Igor Golyak is the founding artistic director of Arlekin Players Theatre & (zero-G) Virtual Theater Lab.

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From Artistic Director Igor Golyak https://www.arlekinplayers.com/from-artistic-director-igor-golyak/ Fri, 08 Sep 2023 15:25:56 +0000 https://www.arlekinplayers.com/?p=13955 This season at Arlekin we are trying to untangle traumas and pain points, to make sense of the complicated history of Jews, of Europe, and of our lives here and now in the US. Our projects this year are an exploration of humanity, an effort to comprehend what we might do and who we might be in the face of future aggression and oppression, and how we might live together with meaning. I invite you to join me as we delve into this beautiful, challenging set of artistic projects, and hope to see you at the theater.

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Artistic Director Igor Golyak

Dear Friends,

In 2000, a controversial article was published in a Polish newspaper, followed by the book “Neighbors” (both written by historian Jan Gross), which unearthed shocking and difficult information. The response was a great outcry from the Polish and as they struggled with new ideas of culpability and responsibility, and tried to face a painful past. It also illuminated a truth that it hard to accept — that evil can live within us and next to us unexpectedly, and is part of our human nature. In 1941 in the small Polish village of Jedwabne, 1600 Jews were murdered, not by Nazis as earlier reported, but by citizens of the town their classmates, people they grew up with, studied with, fell in love with, played sports with… their neighbors.

Today, as I write this, Ukraine is on both the counter-offensive and the defensive, responding to strikes and atrocities propagated by those who are their neighbors and relatives in Russia.

And history has confirmed that Ukrainians collaborated as police in the massacre in Babi-Yar, Kyiv, where my grandmother’s family and over 33,000 other Jews were exterminated, also in 1941.

These irreconcilable stories collide within me, have continued repercussions in the communities I answer to. They confront us with a part of humanity that is hard to understand. How do we find a way to live responsibly, believe in something good, and enjoy the time we have with each other, our families and loved ones in the face of this reality?

This season at Arlekin we are trying to untangle these traumas and pain points, to make sense of the complicated history of Jews, of Europe, and of our lives here and now in the US. Our projects this year are an exploration of humanity, an effort to comprehend what we might do and who we might be in the face of future aggression and oppression, and how we might live together with meaning. I invite you to join me as we delve into this beautiful, challenging set of artistic projects, and hope to see you at the theater.

With gratitude for your continued support,

Igor Golyak

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The New Yorker https://www.arlekinplayers.com/the-new-yorker/ Tue, 03 Dec 2024 04:15:27 +0000 https://www.arlekinplayers.com/?p=14466 The frenetically inventive director, Igor Golyak, and his ensemble cast don’t shrink from the historical atrocities they dramatize. The audience delivered an impassioned ovation.

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“The frenetically inventive director, Igor Golyak, and his ensemble cast don’t shrink from the historical atrocities they dramatize. The audience delivered an impassioned ovation.”

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Our Class Transfers to Manhattan with The Merchant of Venice off-Broadway Fall 2024 https://www.arlekinplayers.com/our-class-the-merchant-of-venice-press-release/ Thu, 09 May 2024 19:42:30 +0000 https://www.arlekinplayers.com/?p=14298 Press Release.

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Click below to read Our Class and The Merchant of Venice Press Release!

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Our Class Press Release https://www.arlekinplayers.com/our-class-press-release/ Tue, 08 Aug 2023 14:01:00 +0000 https://www.arlekinplayers.com/?p=13972 Press Release. Arlekin Players Theatre, the award-winning, artist-driven theater company helmed by Ukrainian-born artistic director Igor Golyak, today announced its 2023-2024 Season featuring the New York premiere of Tadeusz Slobodzianek’s Polish masterpiece OUR CLASS as
adapted by Norman Allen, directed by Golyak

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Our Class

Click below to read Arlekin’s 2023/24 Press Release!

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