‘Holywood’, the hottest new place in show business
With cult homegrown TV shows and major stars moving in, Israel has never been more ready for its close-up
Of all the burning cultural questions on social media during lockdowns, “When does Shtisel season 3 start?” cropped up a lot. The Israeli drama about an ultra-orthodox Jewish family, which first aired in 2013 and was picked up by Netflix in 2015, finally returned at the end of March to a devoted global audience of millions.
That the Hebrew and Yiddishspoken series, set in the sparse Jerusalem apartment of patriarch Rabbi Shulem Shtisel (veteran star Dova’le “Dov” Glickman) and his teacher/ artist son Akiva (Michael Aloni, now a cult heartthrob), should attract such viewing figures almost beggars belief.
Prayers, modest dress and no touching in any episode is a tricky sell, but it is the devout beliefs, daily rituals and familiar struggles of the Shtisel family — delivering what the New Yorker describes as “pleasures similar to those of an expansive 19thcentury novel” — that have engaged the hearts and minds of viewers from Melbourne to Manchester.
There’s no doubt a proposed spinoff Shtisel cookbook of Jewish recipes (every episode is glued together by food) will go down well, given a booming global interest in Israel in the vein of the Scandi obsession of recent years. The country’s rapid vaccination programme means it looks set to open its borders to groups of fully jabbed tourists next month, and airlines are scrambling to add flights to their schedule for those desperate for a dose of its world-class sunshine, culture and cuisine. Welcome to Holywood, then: a fitting rebrand for a country with a biblical legacy that has risen to become a leading producer of inspired onscreen entertainment.
A small place (population 9 million) with big ideas, it remains home to Wonder Woman Gal Gadot, and now director Quentin Tarantino, who moved to Tel Aviv after marrying Israeli-born singer and model Daniella Pick, in 2018. Simon Cowell is set to return to TV screens later this year, for the first time since breaking his back, as a judge on Israeli X Factor. All this is quite the triumph for a country that only had one TV channel until 1993 and was best known for supplying formats remade by other countries — think Homeland (inspired by Hatufim, both written by Gideon Raff), which exploded internationally in 2011, after In Treatment (based on Israeli drama BeTipul) picked up a clutch of Emmys.
“Then Fauda aired in Israel in 2015 and things changed,” says Dana Stern, managing director of Yes TV studios. The testosterone-charged action series about an Israeli army undercover unit was picked up by Netflix and broadcast in its original Hebrew and Arabic.
If Hollywood has always been keen to adopt Israel’s TV creatives, the streaming giants are now bankrolling their homegrown ideas. Tarantino’s plans to refurbish a historic Tel Aviv cinema are timely, given there are two biopics about Israel’s prime minister Golda Meir in the works: a film starring Helen Mirren, and the TV series Lioness, produced by Barbra Streisand with Shtisel’s Shira Haas.
And last year, while the acting community was on hiatus in the rest of the world, Covid-safe production was able to continue on Israel’s most ambitious period drama yet, The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem. Billed as a Bridgerton-esque saga, it’s based on the bestselling novel by Sarit YishaiLevi and stars a who’s-who of Israel’s actors, including Aloni, who was filming Shtisel simultaneously, switching costumes and altering facial hair between shoots.
Israel’s flourishing reputation as a creative force means agents, lawyers and publicists are on red alert for new signings. “Everyone is repped to the teeth by American agents,” says Stern, who is currently producing the Hindi version of Fauda in Kashmir.
Shtisel producer Dikla Barkai says there are no plans for a fourth series. “Our TV creation exploded and it’s hard for us to believe, understand and imagine all the love we received,” she says. Those in love with Shtisel will hope plans change.