Showtime: Getting to grips with Levin, in Yiddish

The Yiddishpiel Theater is set to start a run of performances of Hanoch Levin’s comedy Solomon Grip.

By BARRY DAVIS
Jerusalem Theatre (photo credit: Rebecca Crown Auditorium)
Jerusalem Theatre
(photo credit: Rebecca Crown Auditorium)
Getting to grips with Levin, in Yiddish The Yiddishpiel Theater will start a run of performances of Hanoch Levin’s comedy Solomon Grip at 8 p.m. tomorrow.
The first show takes place at Tzavta in Tel Aviv and it will also be shown elsewhere around the country, at the Jerusalem Theater, the Givatayim Theater, the Performing Arts Center in Beersheba, the Rapaport Auditorium in Haifa and Heichal Hatarbut in Ra’anana, as well as in Netanya, Ness Ziona, Ashkelon, Ashdod and Petah Tikva.
Levin’s first comedy, Solomon Grip premiered at the Open Theater in 1969 with Hillel Ne’eman directing and playing the main character. The storyline is based on a woman called Pertziflucha who is saddled with caring for her ailing husband. Her husband refuses to take the medicines prescribed for him and, instead, prefers to prolong his malady so that Pertziflucha will continue to tend to his every need.
This is the first Yiddish version of Solomon Grip and stars Ya’akov Bodo, Yisrael Treisteman and Andrei Kaskar.
Yoram Falk is the director.
For tickets and more information: (03) 525-4660 (Tzavta); (03) 732-5340 (Givatayim); (04) 838-4777 (Haifa); (09) 830-8811 (Netanya) or (09) 741-5566 (Ra’anana).Urban art in Haifa
Some of the changes that have taken place in the urban landscape of Haifa in recent years are currently on display at the Haifa Municipal Museum at a show called Urbani.Po (Urban.Here).
The exhibition incorporates several artistic and cultural disciplines and focuses on half a dozen edifices in the city and its environs – May Cinema, the Prophets Tower, Beit Rothschild, the Vocational School in Kiryat Haim, the Kolbo newspaper building and the Haifa Theater.
The show features photographs from the past and the present day, historic film footage and contemporary animation, models and documents and press cuttings.
Urbani.Po, which will run until May, includes a program of cultural events outside the museum, too, which are designed to raise awareness of the importance of preserving Haifa’s architectural heritage. The events will feature members of the artistic and literary community, including veteran writer Haifa resident Sami Michael, actress Salwa Nakara, journalist-musician Ilan Lukach and Haifa-born journalist-musician- comics artist Yoram Mark-Reich.
Urbani.Po is curated by Zohar Efron and Inbar Dror Lachs.
For more information: (04) 911-5888 or www.hms.org.il Pop goes Vivaldi
Next Saturday (9 p.m.), the Mediatheque Center in Holon will host an intriguing collaboration between classical composer, conductor and pianist Gil Shohat and veteran pop singer Yardena Arazi. The show, titled Yardena Arazi Meets Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, also features the string section of the Ra’anana Symphonette.
The concert program includes new workings of some of Arazi’s favorite numbers, arranged for piano and strings, as well as a performance of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons.
The show is part of the When Classical Music and Pop Meet series, which takes in performances of contemporary classical music, jazz, musicals, world music and contemporary Israeli music. Shohat is the artistic director of the series.
For tickets and more information: (03) 502-1555 or www.mediatheque.org.il‘Evita’ does the rounds
Yisrael Lutnik – a.k.a. the Singing Rabbi of Broadway – will star in a local version of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s award-winning musical Evita.
This is the first time the show is being produced in this country in English.
The original production premiered in London in 1976, and an ensuing Hebrew version here starred Riki Gal.
In addition to Lutnik, who is also the artistic and musical director of the show, the cast includes Kfir Levy and Shmuel Dubeck Spitzer.
The first show takes place on Thursday (8:30 p.m.) at Heichal Hatarbut in Or Akiva, and there are further performances in Netanya, Neveh Yarak, Rehovot, Givatayim, Haifa, Jerusalem and Modi’in.
For tickets and information: 077-450- 6012 or www.israel-theatre.com Timeless fashion in Kiryat Bialik
Over the next couple of weeks, shoppers at the Kiryon mall in Kiryat Bialik can get an eyeful of some of the current fashion trends, with a liberal helping of nostalgia.
The “Timeless Fashion” exhibition features eight display windows with contemporary clothes, accessories and even household items that feed off the styles shown on the front covers of La’isha magazine from 1948 until the present day.
The items on show come from all the major stores in the mall and, when the exhibition closes on January 22, a lottery will take place with eight lucky winners going home with the contents