Jacob Ben-Ami

Being in the Yiddish theatre in my early twenties gave me the opportunity to meet and befriend legends. In 1970 I was cast as Yisroel-Yeshiye (Israel-Joshua) Singer, the older brother of Isaac Bashevis Singer in Singer’s “In My Father’s Court” ("In mayn tatns bes-din shtub") at the Folksbiene Playhouse, which was on the second floor of the Forward Building at 175 East Broadway near Essex on the Lower East Side. What a wonderful, memorable cast.

My younger brother Yitzchok -- the author as a little boy -- was played by Marilyn Gold. Our mother was played by the long time Folksbiene actress Mina Kern (not Bern, but Kern).

Other cast members were Sarah Stabin, and an actor named [Ben] Feivelowitz, who played a character named Bababa, so named because as an old man, he’d finish every sentence with a memory lapse with “Ba ba ba ...” Stabin and Feivelowitz had been members of the Folksbiene since 1915. Incredible, right? Other luminaries were Elias Patron who played a gangster from Smocza Gasse (Smotshe Street) in Warsaw, whose most memorable line was when he held a gun in someone’s face and said “Kuk areyn un lakhl! Kuk areyn. Zeyst dort dem malakh amoves? Zeyst im? Kuk areyn!” (Look into the hole. Look in! Do you see the Angel of death in it? Do you see him? Look in!).

Joshua Zeldis, another Folksbiene veteran, played Chaim Gorshkover, a Chassid of the Rebbe of Gorshkov. Zypora Spaisman who would ultimately take over the Folksbiene in the following decades as its “grande dame,” played a chicken hocker. But the stars of the play, the stars of the season, the stars of my experience were the aging former superstars of the Yiddish theatre Jacob Ben-Ami and his decades-long lover and super-star actress Berta Gersten who had starred in the Yiddish film, "Mirele Efros" thirty-five years earlier. Ben Ami and Berta had been married to other spouses as they carried on their affair, and when they reached their late seventies, they each became widowed and moved in together. At the Folksbiene, they shared a dressing room, and she was so caring and loving, serving him beverages and sandwiches and just sitting with him , just being together. I was so drawn to them and befriended them. And after a few weekends, Berta started to bring extra sandwiches for me. We often spoke about life and the old days. She shared that she had shingles. That as a young actress she met the writer Sholem Ash, who touched her cheek in a creepy way and said “a shayne maydele.” (a pretty girl) ... Just hearing a personal memory of a legendary Yiddish writer from an elderly friend was so special to me, a young Yiddishist. And Ben-Ami, who played the father and Rabbi of a “bes-din” (religious court) on Krochmalna Street in Warsaw, was magnificent. He had an intense look. You could see that he had been incredibly handsome as a younger man. When arbitrating between various Warsaw characters, he would rarely raise his voice -- only in a most dramatic moment now and then. When saying the Kiddush over a Shabbes dinner he became a most pious Chassid filled with emotion and reverence. It was that “Yom hashshi” (sixth day) chant that has stayed with me all these years. What a thrill and what an honor. Opening night was a great thrill. The reception was at the Garden Cafeteria on the corner of Essex and East Broadway -- one of my favorite restaurants of all time. Seated at one of the first tables was none other than the author himself, Isaac Bashevis Singer. I went over to introduce myself. “A groyser koved, fraynd Bashevis. Ikh hob geshpilt ayer bruder, Yisroel-Yeshiye” (It’s a great honor, Mr. Bashevis. I played your brother I.J.) He looked at me, and in an angry voice declared “Man tate hot nisht azoy geshrign.” (My father never yelled like that.) Of course I never repeated that review to Ben Ami, but now knew the quirky side of a Nobel Prize-winning author.

The last time I saw the great Jacob Ben-Ami was at the 92nd Street Y. It might have been in 1974 or 1975. It was after a performance of “The Wise Men of Chelm,” a performance by the Yiddish Drama Group of Montreal led by my dear friend Dora Wasserman. I had invited Ben-Ami, who lived a few blocks from the Y. It was a lovely, exuberant performance, full of humor, music, dancing. Following the show, we gathered in the library right next to the Kaufman Auditorium, where I introduced Ben-Ami to Dora embraced him and in a heartbeat had forty young Yiddish actors from Montreal singing and dancing around this legendary Yiddish star, accompanied by the accordionist Sharon Chazin. The room was filled with joy and the broadest smiles one can imagine ... Soon, as I walked Ben-Ami out of the building he said to me, “Moishe, I never thought that I would ever believe that the Yiddish theatre had a future. Today, I truly believe it does.” A week later, he closed his eyes for the last time.