Asher Tzarfati (1944-2022) was a film and stage actor, and one of Israel’s fringe theatre pioneers. Tzarfati was born in Greece and as a child, moved to Israel with his parents. In the late seventies, he founded the Stairs Theatre (‘hamadregot’) that remained active well into the early ‘80s. There, he directed and starred in the production of Georg Büchner’s Woyzeck, where he also met his second wife, actor Rita Shukrun.
Tzarfati appeared on just about every repertoire theatre stage in the country, having starred in countless plays including Steven Berkoff’s Metamorphosis and Ghetto at Haifa Theatre, The Whiners (aka Cry Babies) at the Cameri Theatre, The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui, Death and the Maiden, and Macbeth (where he played the titular role) at Habima National Theatre.
In film, Tzarfati starred in Amos Sefer’s 1972 cult classic, An American Hippie in Israel. Highlights of his other screen credits include The Big Break-in (‘ha-pritza hagdola’) (Menahem Golan, 1970), The Highway Queen (Menahem Golan, 1971), Salomonico (Alfred Steinhardt, 1975), A Movie and Breakfast (Alfred Steinhardt, 1977), Hershele (Joel Silberg, 1977), Operation Thunderbolt (Menahem Golan, 1977), Morning Star (Akiva Barkin, 1980), On the Fringe (Ze’ev Revach, 1987), Shell Shock (Yoel Sharon, 1988), Newland (Orna Ben-Dor Niv, 1994), The Italians are Coming (Eyal Halfon, 1996), Super Boy (Hanoch Rosen, 1998), The Mevorach Brothers (Nadav Levitan, 2000), Nina’s Tragedies (Savi Gabizon, 2003), Foul Gesture (Tzahi Grad, 2006), Eli & Ben (Ori Ravid, 2008), and It All Begins at Sea (Eitan Green, 2008).
