Greetings
Hadar Galron
Nataly Zukerman
Chairs of the Artistic Committee
Welcome to ISRA-DRAMA 2024: Building Cultural Bridges
In a world where the word theatre can mean both art and war, Israeli theatre makers are no strangers to navigating between the two. This year, with the sirens still going, we are once again holding the Exposure online.
While we would have loved to host you in Israel, the virtual stage remains our way of ensuring these essential conversations and connections continue.
Our theme, “Building Cultural Bridges,” feels more urgent than ever. While politics and "The News" are set on creating more conflict in the "divide and rule" style - art creates a space for empathy, dialogue, and shared humanity. ISRA-DRAMA 2024 is our way of saying that even in uncertain times, storytelling must endure.
This year’s program is as dynamic as ever, designed for easy navigation and discovery. Highlights include:
- Panels that delve into War and Theatre, exploring documentary storytelling and the role of humor in crisis, featuring both Israeli and Palestinian voices.
- A special Playmarket that introduces you to some of Israel’s talented playwrights who are not in this year’s exposure lineup.
- At the heart of it all, you’ll find the selected plays in full—ready for you to experience the creativity and depth of Israeli theatre from wherever you are.
And then there are the surprises that will appear in the coming weeks: Spotlights On. As we move into 2025, we’ll reveal exclusive interviews with the artists behind the works selected for ISRA-DRAMA 2024, giving you personal insights into their stories and creative journeys.
For us, building this year’s ISRA-DRAMA: International Exposure has been a way of staying sane in the chaos - it was both a professional challenge and a reminder that creativity doesn't stop even in the toughest times. For you, we hope it's a chance to see the resilience, humor and sometimes sheer "Chutzpah" (nerve) of Israeli theatre in action.
We look forward to welcoming you in person next year, in a peaceful Middle East. Until then, let’s build bridges—one play, one artist, one connection at a time.
Warm regards,
Hadar Galron and Nataly Zukerman
Chairs of the Artistic Committee
*we will be sending you a form to fill in regarding the plays/performances you are looking for, so that we can send you specific recommendations.
Hadar Galron | Nataly Zukerman
Welcome to ISRA-DRAMA 2024: Building Cultural Bridges
In a world where the word theatre can mean both art and war, Israeli theatre makers are no strangers to navigating between the two. This year, with the sirens still going, we are once again holding the Exposure online.
While we would have loved to host you in Israel, the virtual stage remains our way of ensuring these essential conversations and connections continue.
Our theme, “Building Cultural Bridges,” feels more urgent than ever. While politics and "The News" are set on creating more conflict in the "divide and rule" style - art creates a space for empathy, dialogue, and shared humanity. ISRA-DRAMA 2024 is our way of saying that even in uncertain times, storytelling must endure.
This year’s program is as dynamic as ever, designed for easy navigation and discovery. Highlights include:
- Panels that delve into War and Theatre, exploring documentary storytelling and the role of humor in crisis, featuring both Israeli and Palestinian voices.
- A special Playmarket that introduces you to some of Israel’s talented playwrights who are not in this year’s exposure lineup.
- At the heart of it all, you’ll find the selected plays in full—ready for you to experience the creativity and depth of Israeli theatre from wherever you are.
And then there are the surprises that will appear in the coming weeks: Spotlights On. As we move into 2025, we’ll reveal exclusive interviews with the artists behind the works selected for ISRA-DRAMA 2024, giving you personal insights into their stories and creative journeys.
For us, building this year’s ISRA-DRAMA: International Exposure has been a way of staying sane in the chaos - it was both a professional challenge and a reminder that creativity doesn't stop even in the toughest times. For you, we hope it's a chance to see the resilience, humor and sometimes sheer "Chutzpah" (nerve) of Israeli theatre in action.
We look forward to welcoming you in person next year, in a peaceful Middle East. Until then, let’s build bridges—one play, one artist, one connection at a time.
Warm regards,
Hadar Galron and Nataly Zukerman
Chairs of the Artistic Committee
*we will be sending you a form to fill in regarding the plays/performances you are looking for, so that we can send you specific recommendations.
Shimrit Ron
Director, The Hanoch Levin Institute of Israeli Drama
Noam Semel
Chairman
Isra-Drama: Building Cultural Puzzles
In the past, when people wanted to make fun of Tel Avivies, they’d say they’re always sitting in cafés drinking espresso. And here we are, a year and two months since war broke out. After the shock of the first few months of sirens, wailing several times every day, the city adapted itself to its well-known slogan, “the city that never sleeps”, and we came back to the cafés, theatres, and museums. At the same time, we haven’t forgotten for a minute the hostages, the massacred, the fallen soldiers, the immense destruction in the north, the evacuees who are gradually returning to the south, and the profound sadness and suffering.
Life here is like a balancing act: juggling everyday routines while knowing they could be upended at any given moment. Like going to the theatre, where the pre-show announcement isn't just about turning off your phone—it’s also a casual reminder: “If a siren goes off, stay seated or head to the safe room.” Then, ten minutes and a few "boom-counts" later, the show continues.
It's hard to explain to someone from another country how, in April, after a night when Iran launched around 180 rockets and drones our way (most of which were intercepted), everyone just got up the next morning and headed to work as if nothing had happened. It’s also difficult to comprehend how one evening in October, we sat in bomb shelters when the Iranians launched another attack, and the following morning, a woman standing in line at a café, insisted on her usual avocado sandwich and matcha with oat milk.
When Hanoch Levin wrote, “God, grant us one month of good, real, Swiss boredom! I want so badly to be bored! To get depressed from boredom! To hang myself out of boredom! Because I no longer have the strength for this fascinating life of Asia!”, he probably didn’t imagine that the way to meet new people would be in a stairwell when the siren sounds, in the kitchen of a seafood restaurant, or an underground gym that just happens to be within running range.
This year, we really hoped we would be able to hold Isra-Drama with guests and performances, with mingling events, and tours. We put together a detailed program, translated plays, and mapped out the itinerary, following with concern the growing number of flight cancelations.
If you’re reading this, chances are you’re festival directors, curators, or dramaturgs, so you know the drill: the buzz of organizing a festival, piecing together the puzzle of performances, deciding which shows need subtitles, scheduling the reception, and debating which VIPs to invite. It was like working in a parallel universe, in a bubble in which we endeavored to create culture, while all around us the sounds of sirens, interceptions, breaking news, concern for the hostages, violence, and escalation.
When the number of guests (usually more than fifty) went down from twenty-five to ten, we decided to cancel, and reinvent the online format that’s more suited to the present time, which invites you to dive into the program over an extended period of time, and focus on content that piques your interest. Not a broadcast format; more like Netflix.
Last year I was asked when I thought there would be new plays about the war, and I responded that they’re already being written, in the midst of the trauma. Creators are working as they experience and process the situation. It’s no coincidence that the first Covid play, Love and Pandemic, was written at the Cameri Theatre in April 2020, when the worldwide lockdowns began.
This year, Roee Joseph, a reservist who served as an investigator in the Military Police, is staging Shura: The Mission of Identifying Life, a mockumentary play that describes his experiences in the camp where he took part in classifying and documenting bodies following the October 7th massacre. Amitay Yaish Ben-Ousilio, the artistic director of Otef Hanegev Theater, embarked on a journey with a group of actors from Israel’s southern communities that describes their life after being evacuated from their homes in A Place to Live. In December 2023, nine playwrights wrote Bomb Shelter Stories (Habima), a play comprising nine stories, each of which takes place in a different bomb shelter during the ten minutes people are required to stay in a protected space. And let’s not forget Maya Arad Yasur, who on 25 October 2023 sent me the short, shocking play, How to Remain a Humanist After a Massacre in 17 Steps (Jaffa Theatre) for translation. I will also mention Borders by Nimrod Danishman (participated in Isra-Drama 2019), a reading of which was recently held in Italy – an impossible love story between Boaz and George, an Israeli and a Lebanese, who fall in love on Grinder, and dream of meeting in Berlin. And Danielle Cohen Levy, whose play about the trauma of the 1973 Yom Kippur War, On The Way Home | Return Sign, has become an encounter in which the events of the two October wars are revisited, and Just wanted to Dance, a new play written and directed by Hadar Galron, with Nova survivors, about life after October 7th for those who lost their loved ones.
All these are included in the program, the War Plays panel, or the Israeli Dramatists Website, which has been renovated.
We hope and pray for the return of all the hostages and an end to the war, the violence, and the suffering on all sides, and that we can meet in Tel Aviv next year. Our heartfelt gratitude to the six courageous guests who chose to come here on the original Isra-Drama dates to see the plays and attend the events – this is the first time the International Exposure events were spontaneous, and we accompanied our overseas guests to see new plays.
May the festivals you organize never encounter global pandemics and local wars, and may we all experience real Swiss boredom!
Yours,
Shimrit Ron,
Director, The Hanoch Levin Institute of Israeli Drama
Shimrit Ron
Isra-Drama: Building Cultural Puzzles
In the past, when people wanted to make fun of Tel Avivies, they’d say they’re always sitting in cafés drinking espresso. And here we are, a year and two months since war broke out. After the shock of the first few months of sirens, wailing several times every day, the city adapted itself to its well-known slogan, “the city that never sleeps”, and we came back to the cafés, theatres, and museums. At the same time, we haven’t forgotten for a minute the hostages, the massacred, the fallen soldiers, the immense destruction in the north, the evacuees who are gradually returning to the south, and the profound sadness and suffering.
Life here is like a balancing act: juggling everyday routines while knowing they could be upended at any given moment. Like going to the theatre, where the pre-show announcement isn't just about turning off your phone—it’s also a casual reminder: “If a siren goes off, stay seated or head to the safe room.” Then, ten minutes and a few "boom-counts" later, the show continues.
It's hard to explain to someone from another country how, in April, after a night when Iran launched around 180 rockets and drones our way (most of which were intercepted), everyone just got up the next morning and headed to work as if nothing had happened. It’s also difficult to comprehend how one evening in October, we sat in bomb shelters when the Iranians launched another attack, and the following morning, a woman standing in line at a café, insisted on her usual avocado sandwich and matcha with oat milk.
When Hanoch Levin wrote, “God, grant us one month of good, real, Swiss boredom! I want so badly to be bored! To get depressed from boredom! To hang myself out of boredom! Because I no longer have the strength for this fascinating life of Asia!”, he probably didn’t imagine that the way to meet new people would be in a stairwell when the siren sounds, in the kitchen of a seafood restaurant, or an underground gym that just happens to be within running range.
This year, we really hoped we would be able to hold Isra-Drama with guests and performances, with mingling events, and tours. We put together a detailed program, translated plays, and mapped out the itinerary, following with concern the growing number of flight cancelations.
If you’re reading this, chances are you’re festival directors, curators, or dramaturgs, so you know the drill: the buzz of organizing a festival, piecing together the puzzle of performances, deciding which shows need subtitles, scheduling the reception, and debating which VIPs to invite. It was like working in a parallel universe, in a bubble in which we endeavored to create culture, while all around us the sounds of sirens, interceptions, breaking news, concern for the hostages, violence, and escalation.
When the number of guests (usually more than fifty) went down from twenty-five to ten, we decided to cancel, and reinvent the online format that’s more suited to the present time, which invites you to dive into the program over an extended period of time, and focus on content that piques your interest. Not a broadcast format; more like Netflix.
Last year I was asked when I thought there would be new plays about the war, and I responded that they’re already being written, in the midst of the trauma. Creators are working as they experience and process the situation. It’s no coincidence that the first Covid play, Love and Pandemic, was written at the Cameri Theatre in April 2020, when the worldwide lockdowns began.
This year, Roee Joseph, a reservist who served as an investigator in the Military Police, is staging Shura: The Mission of Identifying Life, a mockumentary play that describes his experiences in the camp where he took part in classifying and documenting bodies following the October 7th massacre. Amitay Yaish Ben-Ousilio, the artistic director of Otef Hanegev Theater, embarked on a journey with a group of actors from Israel’s southern communities that describes their life after being evacuated from their homes in A Place to Live. In December 2023, nine playwrights wrote Bomb Shelter Stories (Habima), a play comprising nine stories, each of which takes place in a different bomb shelter during the ten minutes people are required to stay in a protected space. And let’s not forget Maya Arad Yasur, who on 25 October 2023 sent me the short, shocking play, How to Remain a Humanist After a Massacre in 17 Steps (Jaffa Theatre) for translation. I will also mention Borders by Nimrod Danishman (participated in Isra-Drama 2019), a reading of which was recently held in Italy – an impossible love story between Boaz and George, an Israeli and a Lebanese, who fall in love on Grinder, and dream of meeting in Berlin. And Danielle Cohen Levy, whose play about the trauma of the 1973 Yom Kippur War, On The Way Home | Return Sign, has become an encounter in which the events of the two October wars are revisited, and Just wanted to Dance, a new play written and directed by Hadar Galron, with Nova survivors, about life after October 7th for those who lost their loved ones.
All these are included in the program, the War Plays panel, or the Israeli Dramatists Website, which has been renovated.
We hope and pray for the return of all the hostages and an end to the war, the violence, and the suffering on all sides, and that we can meet in Tel Aviv next year. Our heartfelt gratitude to the six courageous guests who chose to come here on the original Isra-Drama dates to see the plays and attend the events – this is the first time the International Exposure events were spontaneous, and we accompanied our overseas guests to see new plays.
May the festivals you organize never encounter global pandemics and local wars, and may we all experience real Swiss boredom!
Yours,
Shimrit Ron,
Director, The Hanoch Levin Institute of Israeli Drama