User:Jonarkin

Jacob Meir (Juki) Arkin (March 26, 1933 - January 27, 1996) was an Israeli-American mime, actor, dancer, director, choreographer and labor leader.

Born to a Jewish policeman in Tel Aviv, Israel, Arkin spent much of his early years in an orphan's moshav called Shfeya in northern Israel after his father was assassinated by an Arab mob in one of the Jaffa riots in 1936. It was in Shfeya that he honed his theatrical skills and shortly afterward began a successful career as a performer in Israel, often pairing with friend and fellow actor/mime Shaike Ophir.

After meeting modern dance choreographer Anna Sokolow and developing a deep friendship that was to last decades, Arkin moved to Paris to study mime under Etienne Decroux and Marcel Marceau - whose performing company he soon joined.

In 1959, Arkin came to the United States and developed a one-man pantomime show, appearing on programs such as Look Up and Live, Wonderama with Sonny Fox and The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson when that show taped in New York. While teaching movement for actors at HB Studio in Greenwich Village, he attracted the attention of the producers of Milk and Honey, the new Jerry Herman musical, and he was cast in the charter company as Avi, the cynical Israeli farmer. It was during the Milk and Honey run that he met his future wife, commercial and television actress Helene Parker, a featured actor on the hit show Car 54, Where Are You?who gave birth to their only son, Jonathan, in 1964. Arkin followed that show with a role in the Broadway, then touring company, cast of the Richard Rodgers musical No Strings. He left that company to start a pantomime tour of South Africa with Shaike Ophir.

Shortly after the birth of his son, Arkin returned to Israel, where he starred in the Hebrew version of the hit show How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. He remained in Israel to start his own jazz dance company and continued to teach and perform until his death in 1996 from non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma.