Propaganda, Patriotism--and Controversy : Play About Jewish Emigration a Hit in Moscow

The first play concerning the sensitive topic of Jewish emigration has opened here, but it gives the so-called refuseniks no cause to raise their hopes about leaving the Soviet Union.

The play suggests that the desire to emigrate is a betrayal of the homeland, almost treason, and it describes the catastrophic impact on a family in Odessa when two brothers decide to leave for another country.

The novelty of a play on the Moscow stage about emigration and Jewish family life has created a strong demand for tickets, even among refuseniks--people who have been refused permission to leave the country. But one Jew who has been trying for more than a decade to leave the country said of the play, “It’s the same old poisonous propaganda.”

Stiffened Resistance

Jewish emigration reached a peak of 51,000 in 1979 but has dwindled to less than 1,000 in 1985 as the government has stiffened its resistance to the exodus to Israel and the United States.

Although newspapers often attack people who want to leave the Soviet Union, emigration is almost never mentioned in contemporary plays or films. The new play, however, has received high praise in Izvestia, the official government newspaper, and it clearly has the backing of Communist Party officials concerned with ideology.

Even so, its production was so controversial that the director of the Stanislavsky Theater was removed to permit it to go forward.

The author, Arkady Stavitsky, said in an interview that Russians and Jews alike who admired the play argued against its being produced on grounds that the emigration issue is too controversial to be aired.

But the play’s supporters apparently won, and the formal premiere took place early this month after some trial runs.

‘Not a Political Treatise’

“It’s not a political treatise,” Stavitsky said. “It’s a personal drama on the level of ordinary people.”

Entitled “Street of Sholem Aleichem, No. 40,” the play is set in the late 1970s, when emigration was at its peak. The people who live at the address in the title are the Margolins, a Jewish family in Odessa.

Boris Aleichem, a professor, and his brother, Leonid, a surgeon, decide to leave their prestigious Moscow jobs and go to Israel. They visit the family home to get their parents’ permission to emigrate.

Rosa, their mother, is shocked. She asks Leonid how he can leave his motherland. Leonid replies that a man’s homeland is where he can be happy. She disagrees, saying that a homeland is where you were born, grew up, even suffered.

When their father learns of their decision, he is outraged. He hurls a chair, rips the sons’ pictures from the wall, and declares, “I have no children anymore.” But Rosa eventually agrees to emigrate so that she can be with her sons. Six months later, the father agrees to come, too, and they pack their belongings.

Social Lepers

The Margolins’ neighbors now castigate them as traitors and treat them as social lepers. For example, Rosa asks a former friend, Sunia, to accept a prized cupboard:

Rosa: Take it. It would be a pity to throw it out. Rosewood, you know.

Sunia: Well, Mother wants me to tell you, we won’t have it.

Rosa: What? You won’t take it? Why?

Sunia: Because it’s an anti-Soviet cupboard.

Another woman tells the family in scornful tones: “Go, but we’ll never let you come back.”

The father, unable to stand the shame, kills himself rather than emigrate. Rosa then decides to remain behind and give him a decent burial. The older son, Boris, asks her forgiveness, and even the cocksure Leonid seems subdued by the tragic developments as the curtain falls.

Despite the strong message, the play has its lighter moments, including a charming dance in the Odessa style and the humorous remarks of Rosa about life in the courtyard.

Stavitsky, who is Jewish, said he based the play on persons he knew in Odessa, which he called a second home after his native Moscow. “I was writing it from the heart, trying to reach the brain,” he said.

The 55-year-old author, who was trained as an electrical engineer and began writing plays on a full-time basis in 1970, said he has never wanted to leave the Soviet Union. “I just cannot think of life without Moscow, without Odessa, the place where I grew up,” he said.

Tickets to the play are, as they say in Russian, “hot pies,” and every night the theater is open, there are big crowds in front of the Stanislavsky Theater on Gorky Street.

Stavitsky said he was paid 3,000 rubles by the Ministry of Culture for his play and will get 4% of the box-office receipts each time it is performed. (At the official exchange rate, the ruble is worth about $1.25.)

“The experts say it will play before 200 full houses,” the author said, with a smile of satisfaction.

Director Fired

The play was discussed by the writers’ union in 1983 and received accolades from Stavitsky’s colleagues. Alexei Tofstonovo, a producer at the Stanislavsky and son of a famous Leningrad theatrical director, decided to do the play despite strong opposition from the theater’s director, Eleanora Trafimova. Later, Trafimova was transferred to another post, with the State Concert Bureau.

The anti-emigration theme clearly appealed to some high officials. As one critic said, “The play is a reflection of the author’s attitudes, which appear to be deeply patriotic and nobly civic.”