"If the viewer thinks about what a bereavement is, I did mine": Ari Pullman revived Hanoch Levin's shitty play

Twenty years after the death of Hanoch Levin, "The Grief Without End", the shuttered fruit first emerges, on the chamber stage, and the director is no other than Marie Pullman, in his first work in the theater. In an interview for Walla! Culture, the creator explains why he avoids turning the play into a story about a father who mourns the death of his soldier son

"I've always wanted to do theater." Ari Pullman reveals the show to the media (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Grieving endlessly (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Hanoch Levin passed away in the summer of 1999, leaving behind a huge amount of 22 plays that he failed to stage. On the twentieth of his death, his widow Lillian Berto contacted Larry Pullman and invited him to direct one of them. He began to read them all and stopped at seventh, "Endlessly Grieving," which, as its name implies, turns out to be an irresistible moving play about a king who is devastatingly dealing with the grief of the death of his son, who died as a result of illness. The creator says that as soon as he read it, he realized that there was no need to move on, and that was the show he would do. The result can be seen in the Chamber Theater in mid-January, and at least according to the sections exposed to the media, it is an incredible masterpiece.

Pullman is one of the most successful filmmakers in the history of the local industry, including "Waltz with Bashir", who recently starred in quite a few international decades, and "Holy Clara" and "Futures Conference" and the "Parsha of the Week" series, and is now completing a new project. - An intriguing and promising cinematic adaptation to Anna Frank's diary. Compared to his rich experience in film and television, theater has not worked so far. "I always wanted to, but I never thought he would come out," he says in an interview with Walla! culture.

You won the Golden Globe and the French Oscar for "Waltz with Bashir" and you were nominated for the American Oscar, and you have generally faced many challenges in your professional life - and yet to direct Hanoch Levin's performance has not yet staged. That made you stress?

"No, I am generally not afraid. There is also a release in doing something for the first time. Like with Waltz with Bashir, we did the first animation film in Israel. When you do something a second time, after you succeed, there is the pressure that you might fail, but this time The first is innocence. "

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not afraid. Ari Pullman (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Grieving endlessly (Photo: Reuven Castro)

As far as they seem distant, maybe there is a common denominator between this show and Wells with Bashir? The film dealt with your post-trauma as a combat soldier in the Lebanon war, and "Grief Without End" also deals with trauma and memory.

"This is the first time I think about it. What I can say is that there was something terribly tickling about turning the king's dead son into a soldier. But where would it take? It's just a provocation, it would kill the play, it's terribly unintelligent, and I read the notebooks The originality of Hanoch Levin. It was not his intention. "

And what do you mean?

"If ten percent of the audience came out of the show with a thought of what a bereavement is, I did mine."

This is one of the most important Israeli films ever. Today there is no way they would have produced it

"If ten percent of the audience came out of the show with a thought of what a bereavement is, I did mine." From "Grief Without End" (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Grieving endlessly (Photo: Reuven Castro)

"Hanoch Levin is larger than new and preserves the Hebrew language," Pullman stated in the introduction to the media before the first exposure of excerpts from the play, and in conversation with Walla! Culture continued to emphasize the great creator's greatness - "There is some misconception about him. They are referred to as 'The National Playwright', 'The Great Playwright', but he was also a great director, an amazing director. For example, see the original production of 'The Child Dreams' , Or the "lay down".

Do you remember your first encounter with him as a viewer ?

"Yes, I think it was in Crome, which I saw as a kid. It's the most Polish play of his plays, and I grew up in a Polish house where they were all Holocaust survivors who wanted my sisters and I to act like sabras, but they never left the community. And eating Polish food, and what motivated them was a sense of guilt that they were alive while none of the family survived. It's something that is always up in the air in Levin's plays. The characters avoid guilt and inferiority, and there are always games of humiliation and power. "

Also in this play, when the king, played by Maurice Cohen, drops a wheelchair in her wheelchair, a character named "The Mentalist", played by Yoav Levy

"In the original play there is no wheelchair. I added it because I was looking for a way to present a game of strength between them, one has to bend to reach the other."

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full of power. Maurice Cohen and Mia Landsman in "Endless Grief" (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Grieving endlessly (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Why was it important for the lead role of Maurice Cohen, the only non-regular star of the Chamber?

"I built the show around it. It's strong and powerful, but also weak, it has helplessness - and you believe it. We won't expand to not do spoilers, but the King does terrible things during the show, and I needed a player that evoked emotion and empathy, but I wouldn't Go cry with this character, what did I do? "

How much has your experience in cinema helped you as a theater director, and how much work in theater will you help as a film director?

"In the end, directing is a practice. Things don't change. You have to know how to spot a fake. The first thing I did was to download the cast to the actors. The viewer sees everything, even from a line of thirty, so I staged them like they were in a close-up. Because every movie of mine is interrupted and it takes me years to raise money. "

The decor here was designed by your regular partner David Polonsky, who also worked with you on "Waltz with Bashir". Why did you design it in the spirit of German expressionism?

"I'm dying for this period. Have you seen these movies lately? They are amazing. There are 100 times better horror movies out there than anything they do today."

Collaborating with Ari Pullman since "The Weekly Affair". Yoav Levy (on the wheelchair) on Morris Cohen's side in "Grief Without End" (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Grieving endlessly (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Alongside Morris Cohen, "Grief Without End" presents an impressive cast of actresses and actresses, including Mia Landsman, David Saul and two who worked with Pullman in "Parsha of the Week" - the dancer / actress Lear Katz, who embodies the dead child in a gentle and poetic and powerful way. , And Yoav Levy, in his role as "Mentalist" completes a spectacular year for him, beginning with the "Unofficial" and "High Days" films, in which he played the image of Hagai Amir. "As soon as I heard that Ari was going to stage a show, I clearly had to and must be a part of it, and I was glad he thought so," he says in a conversation with Walla! culture.

You have a much richer theatrical experience of his own. How was he acclimated?

"Ari in the theater is like Yeka in the Middle East. There are things he has had a hard time with, but there are also parties he really enjoys - for example, the fact that there is time to work and should not waste time arguing budgets like a movie production. Hardly exists. Overall, enjoy the work on this show, as much as you can enjoy it, in light of its content. "

How was the atmosphere backstage really?

"We tried hard to find the lighter sides, and the humor in the play. We really struggle not to destroy it with over-dramatization, because really it doesn't have to have enough power in the first place."

Your and Ari's most common denominator is that you are burnt fans of Liverpool. This year will probably win the championship for the first time in three decades. What will you do when the championship game exceeds one of the shows?

"Wow, we will be in trouble, we will contact management to clarify the gravity of the matter and cancel the show that evening."

Maurice Cohen and Lear Katz in "Endless Grief" (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Grieving endlessly (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Ari Pullman introduces "endless grief" (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Grieving endlessly (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Maurice Cohen and Lear Katz in "Endless Grief" (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Grieving endlessly (Photo: Reuven Castro)

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Maurice Cohen in "Endless Grief" (Photo: Reuben Castro)

Grieving endlessly (Photo: Reuven Castro)