Interview: Richard Topol Talks Arlekin Players Theatre's OUR CLASS

Arlekin Players Theatre’s production of “Our Class” led the winners at this year’s Lucille Lortel Awards, presented at New York University on May 4, where the play, by Tadeusz Słobodzianek and adapted by Norman Allen, was honored as Best Revival.

Igor Golyak – founding artistic director of the Needham-based Arlekin Players Theatre – received the award for Best Director, Jan Pappelbaum for Best Scenic Design, and the New York acting company was honored as Best Ensemble.

Now through June 22, Arlekin Players is presenting “Our Class,” featuring actors Richard Topol and Ilia Volok from the New York company, at the Calderwood Pavilion, Boston Center for the Arts. Also starring in the Boston production is international stage and screen star Chulpan Khamatova.

The play is the story of ten Polish classmates – five Jewish and five Catholic – who grow up as friends and neighbors, then face the awakening of hatred, with life-and-death consequences. Inspired by real-life events surrounding a 1941 pogrom in a small Polish village, the story follows their lives from childhood through eight decades. exploring themes of friendship, betrayal, and what comes from a contempt for others.

In addition to off-Broadway and regional theater appearances, Topol has 11 Broadway shows to his credit, including 2017’s “Indecent,” a drama subsequently mounted at the Huntington in 2019 with Topol reprising his role as Lemmi, plus Larry David’s “Fish in the Dark,” “The Merchant of Venice” with Al Pacino, and the Tony Award-winning revivals of “Awake & Sing!” “The Normal Heart,” “Julius Caesar” with Denzel Washington, “Cymbeline,” “The Country Girl,” and “School for Scandal.” His autobiographical one-man show, “Searching for Mr. Moon,” which he co-wrote with Willy Holtzman, had its world premiere at Maine’s Portland Stage in November 2021.

His film credits include “Lincoln,” directed by Steven Spielberg, “Indignation,” and “Party Girl,” and he has also appeared on television in all the “Law & Order” series, “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” “The Good Doctor,” and “The Good Wife,” and has had recurring roles on “Billions,” “Manifest,” and “The Practice.” The actor can currently be seen as Jonah Fineman on the Epix series “Godfather of Harlem,” starring Forest Whitaker.

Topol – who makes his home in New York City with his wife and fellow actor Eliza Foss and their daughter Sabina, a 2025 graduate of Brown University – was in Boston for rehearsals when he spoke by telephone about “Our Class,” his character, and more.

What drew you to “Our Class” and what do you think makes it work?

The reason I’m doing it is that it is a really great, powerful play that is relevant today. The story speaks to how people’s hate meters keep going higher and higher, which makes it an important story to tell now.

The play is a little bit like eating your vegetables, while this production is like enjoying your favorite smoothie. Igor’s direction is mesmerizing, thrilling, and even, at times, fun. The theatricality he has given this play is wondrous and allows you to be able to breathe and stay in the room.

How did you first come to know Igor Golyak?

Jessica Hecht recommended me to Igor and we met over Zoom in 2020. It was like Jessica had set us up on a blind theater date. I first did “Our Class” for Igor in New York, and right after, in November of last year, I played Shylock in his New York production of Shakespeare’s “Merchant of Venice.” And I would definitely work with him again.

What makes Igor a good director?

Igor has this restless, broken-open imagination, that breaks your imagination open, too, and really makes you think. He sees the big picture and directs you to make it a three-dimensional thing. I don’t always work this way, but I’ve found a way to accept Igor’s direction. His restless imagination and my restless body have become a perfect match.

Tell me about your character, Abram?

There are a few characters that I’ve fallen in love when I played them. That was definitely the case with Lemmi in “Indecent,” and now Abram as well. He’s the one who gets to go to America during a time when there was a lot of upheaval in Russia, Germany, Ukraine, and Poland. My own family were all “Fiddler on the Roof” Jews living just outside what is now Ukraine. I connected to Abram’s story through them.

It’s Abram who is always writing letters to his friends. Indeed, he learns just after the audience does how badly things are going.  Abram believes in America and the power of freedom and opportunity. Through Abram’s story, the audience can follow each character’s journey. Igor has made Abram a little bit like the narrator – he has him announce each of the 14 Lessons. It was incubated in Abram, as well as in me and most Jews, that we must tell these stories and we will never forget.

Changing topics, do people ever ask you if you’re the son of the late Chaim Topol, the Israeli actor and singer best-known for playing Tevye in the feature-film version of “Fiddler on the Roof”?

Yes, that happens all the time. I’m not his son, but I am his fourth cousin once removed from a village in Ukraine. So we’re distantly related and, as such, were never close. I did see him in the final production of “Fiddler on the Roof” he did on Broadway. I went with my uncle and after the show, we went backstage to meet Topol. It was a brief, but very memorable experience.

Would you ever be interested in carrying on your fourth cousin’s tradition and playing Tevye in “Fiddler on the Roof”?

Absolutely.  I feel the same about “Fiddler” as I feel about this play – it’s a mitzvah. I would love to do the show in the traditional style or in Yiddish. I loved the off-Broadway production that Joel Grey directed for National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene a couple of years ago. Steven Skyball was the best Tevye that I have ever seen.

What’s next for you?

I’m continuing work on my one-man show, “Searching for Mr. Moon,” which I’ll be doing at New York Stage and Film on July 27. I lost my father when I was just 12, and this is a personal story about fatherhood and parenting when you don’t have a parent. It’s about my search to find a father to replace the one I lost. The play is underscored by the music of composer and pianist Lukas Foss, my wife’s late father. And when it comes to my daughter Sabina, I attribute becoming a better actor to becoming her father.