Zadok Zarfati

Tzedi Tzarfati ( , also transliterated as Tsadi Tsarfati, Tsedi Sarfati, or , , and ; born 16 January 1941) is an Israeli television presenter, director, and actor.

Early and personal life Tzedi Tzarfati was born Zadok Zarfati in Tel Aviv, present-day Israel, on 16 January 1941. He is of Bulgarian and Greek descent and grew up in the Old North area of Tel Aviv with his father after his parents divorced shortly after his birth. His father remarried when Tzarfati was five, and he considers his stepmother to be his real mother, as he connected with her more than his biological mother. He has two younger siblings from his father and stepmother.

He is gay and had to live closeted in Tel Aviv growing up, before it developed LGBTQ+ culture. In his Israel Defense Forces service he was assigned to an entertainment role in Central Command and was threatened by superiors when they suspected he was gay; they used slurs to interrogate him, leading him to retreat further from a gay identity. He came out when he started directing, saying he wanted to be himself; shortly after he did so, he was beaten by a gang with a dog and left for dead. Though he came out to be comfortable in himself, he has expressed uncertainty about the cultural concept of coming out and whether it is necessary, also telling Haaretz that he did not make any public declaration when he did come out as he wanted to be seen as a director before a gay man or a "gay director". When he became a judge on Kokhav Nolad, he became much more prominent, and Tzarfati's sexuality became a public debate; he was displeased with the media response, feeling insulted at the characterisation that he was only coming out as an old man. The last show he performed in was Hair with Svika Pick in the early 1970s; after it, singer Chava Alberstein asked him to direct a show, and "all of a sudden [his] life changed".

The Idol franchise started in Israel in 2002 as Kokhav Nolad, and Tzarfati joined as one of the judges in 2004. Compared to Simon Cowell, The Jerusalem Post said the Israeli judging panel were nice to the contestants.

Though he does not know Yiddish, he directed a 2014 Yiddishpiel production of The Government Inspector starring Mike Burstyn and a cast of predominantly young Russian actors. He also directed a 101 Dalmatians musical starring Dana International and Duo Datz

In 2016 he directed a production of West Side Story in Tel Aviv, with the Jets as Ashkenazim and the Sharks as Mizrahim, and in 2018 he directed a revival of Annie in Israel, saying he had seen it on Broadway about 35 years earlier and was so moved by the song "Tomorrow" that he performed the song as much as possible, but also wanted to bring the whole show and its message of optimism to audiences.

Tzarfati is one of the judges on The Singer in the Mask, the Israeli iteration of the Masked Singer franchise. It began airing in 2020 and receives a large share of timeslot viewership. In April 2020, he directed a rock opera version of Swan Lake at the off-Broadway St. Luke's Theatre.