Israeli theater honors its own

Hillel Mittelpunkt's Anda from Beit Lessin was named Play of the Year, and Mittelpunkt won Best Playwright.

Theater Review 88 (photo credit: )
Theater Review 88
(photo credit: )
Hillel Mittelpunkt's Anda from Beit Lessin was named Play of the Year, Mittelpunkt won Best Playwright and Best Actress went to Keren Tzur in the title role at the 14th annual Israel Theater Prize ceremonies at the Beersheba Theater last Friday. Painful and uncompromising, Anda is built around the shameless politicization of the 1961 Eichmann trial. In other important awards, the Cameri's Fiddler on the Roof was named Best Musical and Natan Datner, who plays the immortal Tevye, got Best Actor. Best Director, however, went to Udi Ben-Moshe for the Cameri production of The Good Person of Szechuan, the music for which also won Best Composer for Keren Peles. Both she and Ben-Moshe got the awards last year for Make My Heart Quiver. Best Comedy of the year was the Haifa Theater production of Ephraim Kishon's His Name Precedes Him. The Cameri's Amadeus won Best Revival, as well as Best Supporting Actor for Itai Tiran as Mozart. Best Supporting Actress went to Miki Peleg Rothstein for Vivian in Habimah's Nutcase, and Most Promising Actress went to Rinat Matatov as Yana in the same play. Dan Shapira won Promising Actor for Alan Strang in Beit Lessin's Equus. Dori Parnes and Shimon Zandbank shared the Translation Prize for, respectively, Twelfth Night and The Good Person of Szechuan. Best Entertainment went to Tzavta's Hymn to Nerves. The Meir Margalit Lifetime Achievement award was given to veteran Yiddish Theater actor Ya'akov Bodo. The ITP ceremony was held at the new performing arts center in Beersheba to demonstrate solidarity for the South, and also to honor the Beersheba Theater, which turns 35 this year.