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...They were enthusiastic, they rushed down the aisles
at the conclusion of the performance and gave the Habima
Players repeated curtain calls, but one felt that their
endorsement was entirely a tribute to the artistry of the
players rather than to the substance of the play...
The scene is
laid in Prague in the sixteenth century. The Jews are being
persecuted by the Inquisition. the prophet Elijah frees
the bonds of the Messiah, preparatory to delivering the Jews
from their persecutors. At the same time the rabbi Maharal,
skilled in Kabbalist lore, resolves to create a temporal
instrument to defend his people. He molds out of clay a
monster, half man and half beast, in human form and of
enormous strength. This monster, the Golem, thus becomes the
symbol for all temporal powers molded by religion for the
physical advancement of religious purposes...
...No one who
has seen the acting of the Habima troupe can be in two minds
as to the quality of their performance. Action, word and
gesture are welded into a unity which combines the vividness
of accomplished pantomime to the sonority of dramatic speech.
B. Tchemerinsky
as Maharal, A. Meskin as the Golem, and Ben Ari as
Tahchum, the Lunatic, were outstanding in their
interpretations of extraordinarily difficult roles. Meskin's
grotesque and clumsy movements, his enormous physique and his
simple expressions reeked of the clay from which the Golem was
molded. As he groveled at the rabbi's feet, making convulsive
efforts to escape the words of power which were to
return him to the dust, panting and sobbing, he conveyed a
sense of bestial and pathetic helplessness that stirred one
curiously. It was superb acting..."
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