Makeup of her life: From a street girl to a superstar | Israel today

"I feel fantastic," the eyes of Ada Lazorgan, the Israeli makeup priestess, sparkle as she takes me into her home in Tel Aviv.

"I always say, life starts at age 60."

Lazorgan (64), the oldest name in the local beauty industry, lives with her husband Rami (64) in a lush green penthouse in the peaceful Tel Yitzhak neighborhood.

Close to the bar, but also far enough away from it, and especially a few meters from the makeup school and its studio, located on Yigal Alon Street.

Even before we dive into memories of Studio 54, working with Mariah Carey, Cindy Laufer, Claudia Schiffer, Carla Bruni, Smadar Kilczynski, Tami Ben-Ami, Gal Gadot and many others, I have an urgent question to find out who saw the big stars in the world the epidermis , Without filters.

Who is the most beautiful woman you have ever met?

"I love natural women. Women who are closest to the land. I think Sandy Bar and Shirley are beautiful beauties, and so is Gal Gadot. I worked with her before she went to Hollywood, in an advertisement she did. Gal told me she was going abroad, to try to break in there, and I told her That she would be a big star.

In general, as soon as I look at someone and tell them their future - it usually happens. "

But no one could tell Lazarus, who was born in 1957 in Germany, what her future would look like.

It's hard to believe that even Netflix would have bought the rights to such a ridiculous script.

The Jewish girl who grew up in a Catholic monastery, came with her mother and brother to a kibbutz in Israel, rolled in the streets, traveled on the Tel Aviv-Manhattan line and in the 80s became one of the leading ashtrays in the world, dominating makeup in all kinds Carrie, the Scorpions, Cindy Laufer and others.

Along the way, she fell in love with Rami Lipstadt and married him, gave birth to two sons, Guy (31) and Tal (28), returned to Israel with the establishment of Channel 2 and became one of the pioneers of the Israeli fashion and beauty industry.

About 21 years ago she founded a makeup school, and seven years ago a product line bearing her name was added. 

"Ash Ash was my dream. I dreamed of being a makeup artist," she admits with a smile from the one who fulfilled it.

You were at the peak of your career abroad, why did you return to Israel? 

"I saw broken people. People who have everything, but they are so sick on the inside that they need pills, because they have lost the felt and sanity. I realized that from all the sugar and whipped cream, they just drown. So broken that they feel like vomiting, and they vomit on themselves."

When did you understand that?

"When I was with Mariah Carey alone in the sauna in London, and she was singing. I looked at her and said to myself, 'I too am beginning to feel that I am not me. I knew the children are my sanity and my light, and I asked myself what I was doing here.' Fly, 'I said to myself,' even if "The price is to drink only water and eat only bread. There were diamonds, limousines and planes around me, but people wanted to die and they projected it on me. I became a part of them, I was emotionally disconnected."

"I brought foreign standards to Israel." To Zorgen at work, from the private album

With uncompromising honesty, while not trying to beautify or blur flaws, she reveals to Zorgan what's going on under make-up and concealers.

She talks fast and a lot, shoots her truth clearly and sharply, and does not apologize.

Perhaps this speed stems from her childhood traumas, which were the most unconventional imaginable and caused the abandoned girl to mature too quickly, to learn to rely only on herself.

"I was born in a convent in Germany, which became an orphanage during World War II," she says. He abandoned her in favor of his business in Germany, and then she had an affair with my father.

"My parents, together with Sesk, ran a dubious business in East Germany. They were smugglers of cigarettes, food and furs, and then my father was caught and imprisoned, and Sask, who returned to the picture, was caught and imprisoned. My mother was left alone, so she put the older children with "A nanny and me she only came to breastfeed once a day. The nuns raised me. In the meantime, her older children ran away and walked around alone. She searched for them for two years until she found them, thanks to their pictures."

After her father was released from prison, and just before the fate of her life changed and she was to be given up for adoption, her mother decided to kidnap little Ada from the convent and come with her and her family to Israel, here she had a brother who lived in Kibbutz Dafna.

"They've already found a great family for me," she says, "but Mom got anxious about leaving and I was a stunning baby. She didn't give up on me."

• • •

The family came to Israel, but things did not go smoothly.

The parents found it difficult to adapt to the reality in the young country and also had difficulty raising the children.

"I was never more than half a year in school because my parents always moved with me from place to place. They were kind of gypsies. They had a great love for me and each other, and they sang, danced and kissed me, but I was also their psychologist, I took care of them. I always had to be the sane person there, it was not normal. "

In 1970, the parents decided to try their luck in the United States and traveled with Hannah Vichy to the Big Apple. 13-year-old Ada, who did not receive a visa, was left behind and had to live with her uncles on the kibbutz.

"They put me with the uncles, but it didn't work out. People didn't want me, everywhere I was a nuisance, a 13-year-old girl whose parents were gone. I was a cat with nine souls, I just wanted them to love me.

"Already as a child I had defenses. I was very smart, and excellent athletic in running and long jump. I was already told I was 'material for the Olympics.' In the world, but not so much I wanted to be beautiful.As a girl, I started walking the streets and was exposed, so I did not want to be beautiful.

"I remember myself hitchhiking and knocking on people's doors at night because I did not want to sleep outside. I would suggest to strangers that I clean their house or take care of the children because I do not want to sleep on the street. During the day I walked around with sticks and stones, I learned to protect myself. I experienced things when I was sitting alone in a dark corner at Central Station or when I was hitchhiking, but I knew how to defend myself.

"I looked up and I said to myself, 'You and he are friends.' I said, 'God, I love you, we'll see them,' and he was watching over me. My hand and run so fast that I did not even know what happened to them.Sometimes I even looked for it, that someone would come and try to do something to me, I did not see with my own eyes.

"I would look in the mirror and say, 'Ada, I'll take care of you. I love you. Everything's fine, you'll get far, we'll see everyone. You're smart and know things. You'll have a lot of money and take care of the children, the elderly and the dogs."

The one who paid a price for the years of disconnection, wandering and storms that the adolescent witness went through, was her hair, which turned from a lush blonde mane to thinning and stiff, mainly because of the poor diet on the street.

Today she is with an almost completely exposed skull, with only a little golden hair left on her.

Just before the age of 17, when she finally won the coveted visa and arrived in the United States, her hair became a dispute between her and her parents.

She left a girl at the most significant age for education, and when I arrived they tried to put me in frames, but it did not work.

As I arrived I was angry with them.

The look with my hair today comes from my childhood.

"My parents wanted me to put on a wig because they were afraid of what the neighbors would say. They were ashamed of me and my hair and wanted me to be a neat girl. I'm dying for my skull, maybe I was a monk in one of the incarnations."

Did you finally manage to come to terms with your mother?

"Sure. Fifteen years ago, when she was over 80, I brought her to the country. She lived in Las Vegas and was a gambler, and when she started being demented, I brought her to a unit we bought for her in a nursing home. "And for a pedicure. She would ask me, 'Ada, am I rich?'

"As a girl I started walking the streets and was exposed, so I did not want to be beautiful."

In her youth, from the private album

• • •

The need to make a living soon led Ada to Manhattan, where she was a waitress and fell in love with an Italian actor who specialized in dubbing. He was a decade older than her, which did not stop them from moving in together. To work in a profession that does not require too much English, a language that was not common in her mouth, she decided to study cosmetics and rolled into the Christine Wolma School on Fifth Avenue. At the end of the training, she was assigned to work at a leading makeup store, "Face Factory", located opposite "Bloomingdale's".

"All the industry and mingling was there, and I grew up in this store," she says. "I became a store manager and went out to the New York industry. HIP, I met Andy Warhol and Calvin Klein. Before each outing we would put on make-up, invest in costumes, hair, it was a whole scene. We were excited kids and I was happy. Thanks to my partner, I did not continue with them to the basements, ".

What exactly is this "sahla"?

"I saw people rise and fall. Dealing with illness and anxiety. I saw, for example, Jia (Jia Carnegie, who is considered the first supermodel and died at the age of 26 from AIDS - SZ), who as she entered modeling deteriorated into heroin use and contracted AIDS.

She was among the first to die from it.

I was there when AIDS struck Manhattan and I saw my friends die, fall like flies.

"All of Manhattan was one big party, I was lucky to be with my husband."

At the same time, Ada grew up with the scene.

She makes a lot of money, puts out a makeup line in her name and also mixes with the leading Israeli models.

"Michaela Barko came to me, and so did Hani Perry. We became a clique."

Changing her life is model Sapir Friedman, who arrives in New York and immediately becomes a close friend of Ada.

When Friedman asks her to come to Israel to ash her for her wedding, Ada shows up, and on the way decides to cut off her Italian boyfriend and stay in Israel.

• • •

In Israel, too, she works with local supermodels.

"They were real divas," she describes, and begins to recreate an unforgettable meeting with the horror of the ashtrays, Karen Donsky.

"Karen was a supermodel who opened an agency and led the clique of the '80s. She's the models' madam, the diva. I came to the test, she sat with the mirror on and I could not reach her and I had to find indirect ways to get closer. I wanted to be the most collected and tick it off, "She did not try to please her, and I succeeded, I do not know how. The next day they called and said, 'She is flying at you.'"

"I was told, 'She's flying at you.'"

Karin Donsky, Coco

As she begins to work, Ada also does not forget to hang out, especially at Rafi Shauli's club, the Colosseum and the theater club.

"I brought Studio 54 to Israel," she boasts, "they said of me 'Ada came from New York, Ada is a freak, Ada loves to dress', because we dressed up before every departure."

She connects with Doreen Frankfurt ("I was a New York hipster, Tom Boy, Doreen loved me") and photographer Yaki Halperin, and also gets to work with the late Tami Ben-Ami. Yaki, "she recalls," Tammy was the Israeli Iman to me, and that was before they met Iman, the first black supermodel, who was the wife of David Bowie.

For me, Tammy represented the Israeli black woman.

Her height, elegance.

We became good friends.

We spent and were in productions together.

She went out with Olsie Perry then. "  

"The Israeli Iman".

Zemi Ben-Ami, Moshe Shai

In the early 1980s, following a job offer, Ada decides to return to Manhattan.

At the last second, someone almost changes her mind.

"The day before I left, Rami arrives by chance," she describes with bright eyes the first meeting with her future husband Rami Lipstadt, a businessman, importer and director of the Ada Lazurgan institution.

"Remy is a man with his feet on the ground, and I am a scattered artist whose head is in the sky," she admits with a wide, unapologetic smile.

"We met when there was a pilgrimage to say goodbye to me, before I returned to Manhattan. I saw him at the door and immediately realized I saw my husband. Something in his vibe told me 'this is your husband.' He was a promoter, a partner of producer Shuki Weiss, a record store owner and a man in the nightlife music industry. "

• • •

Ada lands in Manhattan, but the bond between her and Remy grows stronger.

"We stayed in touch by phone. He helped me finish things in the country. Then I invited him to Manhattan. I wrote him 'I need my agent by my side.'"

Remy, who thought he was coming for a short vacation, stayed in Manhattan for 11 years.

The first year of them is 1983, the two are 26 years old and love is flourishing.

One day, Ada returns to their apartment with a tempting job offer from the Regers Hair Salon chain, which has hundreds of beauty salons all over the United States.

"They just put make-up booths in salons and needed a supervisor," she says. In everyday life in a makeup stand that exists in every salon.

"They would announce when I would arrive at the chain's branch in each city, 'Ada to Zorgen is Cumming to Town,' and would make a list of customers who came, for example, to match shades. We made adjustments and makeup, alongside points of sale. It was a time of many flights, hotels and limousines. "Everything in VIP, as if the star had arrived. People were waiting for me, I made a lot of money and everything was good. We were even paid for the apartment in Manhattan, but it was very abrasive."

A year later, Ada proposes to Remy.

"I wasn't sure he would agree, so I told him 'let's get married to be legal in the U.S.'" The two are starting to grow roots in Manhattan. "It was my first home," she admits.

In 1984, Ada resigned and set out independently, as a makeup artist for the whipped cream men in Manhattan.

"I made catalogs for Victoria's Secret and clips for Cindy Laufer and Scorpions," she says.

At the same time, it is based in the prestigious "Pierre Michel" salon at the Plaza Hotel, determined to work with the biggest stars.

"I met Gili Gamliel, a hair stylist who got the biggest stars, like Mariah Carey, and we started working together. There was no specific person I dreamed of, but I worked at all the shows of New York Fashion Week, with Victoria's Secret, Norma Camley and Betsy C. "Wonson, and I did touchups for Cindy Crawford and Naomi Campbell. I was next to all the supermodels, and I said to myself: one day I'll make them up."

"I made up the stars according to my feeling, but they are usually very opinionated."

Cindy Crawford, AP

When you were next to them, were you afraid of them?

"I had fears, I was still young. In Israel I made up Karen Donsky, Tami Ben-Ami and all the divas, but I was not closed on myself and I did not have confidence. I had to be accurate and know how to ash, it took me years to gain confidence. When I worked with Stars in photos and shows, it did not occur to me.I made up the richest women in Manhattan, women from the Emirates came to the living room, but I focused on being great and not thinking about who was sitting next to me, so as not to get too excited and confused.

"I made up the stars according to how I felt, but they are usually very opinionated and know what they want. Through them I learned how to stand up for ash and where. "Campbell, Steffi Seymour and Claudia Schiffer would go to him, he determined the structure and the look, and I was on the team that actually puts them on."

Another Israeli friend of Ada, who also gets to work with her, is Smadar Kilczynski.

"We met when she was 17 and moved in with me in a small apartment in Tel Aviv. After a few years, when Rami and I were based in Manhattan, she came to us and we were her agents. Smadar started working and lived with us. She was like our girl, at least ten years younger than us. Everywhere. "Just see her face, the face of a village girl. On gates, billboards, buses. A second before her huge break-in, she asked Rami for a hundred dollars and went to Las Vegas, to marry Asi Dayan. She cut a second before the world break-in."

Were you angry with her?

"No, but we had to give an answer to everyone. All day I got phone calls asking '? Where the fuck is she' '.

Were there any other famous models you met?

"With Carla Bruni I did her first photos. She was very young, and even though she came from a high class of nobility, she was a scared girl. She did photos for insider articles in New York fashion magazines and just started dating Mick Jagger, he caught her." .

You raise the obvious question about sexual harassment in the industry.

"On the sets everything was very professional, the dirt was off the set. The Americans are like the Japanese, everything is so precise at work that you can not deviate. Once you go a bit out of frame or try to push the boundaries, you fly. Everything is very discreet and conservative, and that taught "Me to be professional. When I work with the stars and with the clique, everything is very precise and professional. There is no nonsense. Everything else happens later."

Still, what have you seen around you in those years?

"I saw the squirrel. The biggest, richest parties, drugs and stars when they are not happy. They have everything, but they have nothing. How can you be happy when you have everything? There is nothing to achieve, you are already up, so or you will take sedatives. "And other drugs, or God forbid you commit suicide. A lot of models were like that, but the singers weren't. The producers kept them short, but they had no life. They were puppets, robots."

• • •

As she forges ties with all the heads of the industry, Ada goes to fashion shows, flies all over the world and works non-stop, even with famous singers.

"I was close to Mariah Carey for three years and also worked with Cindy Laufer, in the years that Madonna just exploded. They were burning and wanted to be as successful as her, to be as provocative as she was."

How did the affair with Carrie begin?

"Maria had a lot of time with her make-up artist and needed a make-up artist for a clip that was filmed two days later. I was already with Cindy Laufer and did shows, but I was afraid. How would I touch her? Hugh, I love natural, fresh makeup. ”She was free, fun and relaxed.

"After a few minutes she asked me to apply her lashes. I had no idea how to apply lashes, so I asked her to demonstrate to me. She took out her own lashes and learned from her how to apply. I held the mirror and buttered her, encouraged her to continue, and so it was from that day on. "She glued her lashes to herself. I started with her from a place I control, but make her up with products she is used to and loves."

Despite the close work, the relationship between Ada and Carrie did not become friends.

"We are not friends. I am politically correct, but we have no connection beyond work. I was still a little afraid of her, as I was afraid of them all. I was very afraid of the big models, who the producers always asked 'Do you like makeup? Are you satisfied?' "The super decide what they want and many times do not look you in the eye at all. They have their pressures, and you have yours."

We are not companies. "Mariah Carey, EP

Adona did not meet Madonna, the star of those years.

"I was afraid of her," she admits, "I had a chance to meet her and I didn't want to. She was too forceful for me."

In 1990, Ada gives birth to Guy (31), her eldest son and Rami and is now a senior manager in the family business.

Even after the birth, she continues at the same pace of work, with Guy and the personal caregiver traveling with her.

"He traveled with me all over the world," she says, "he would come to Seth and sleep with me at night, but I felt guilty. Then, when our second child, Tal, was born, I said to myself, 'Ada, your children are not supposed to grow up here,' and I ran away.

"I was then among the five most powerful ashtrays in New York, but I gave up campaigns and very handsome sums. I decided that was enough for me."

Why, actually?

"There's evil in this industry. Everyone wants to be better than the other, so there's harassment. And everyone's constantly on bullets, 'Take Zenx, take Zenx.' It's a war. "The sane part, for example of Maria. Despite the success, it is important to understand that New York is a labor camp. I always had Remy, and I had a nanny from the first day after Guy was born, but I wanted to return to Israel and run after my children at the beach, to be in the sun."

• • •

Ada's dream comes true, but only partially.

She and Rami return to Israel and settle in an apartment on Smolensky Street in Tel Aviv, near the sea, but Ada is drawn to the developing industry. In those years, Channel 2 goes on the air and the thing that is most needed is the hands of a skilled makeup artist.

When the two boys are 5 and 2 years old, Ada repositions herself in Israel, but "hardly sees my children. I wanted to raise them, but I kept getting them in a half clutch. This token fell to me when I returned from a trip to London, and when I got home they drew and did not tell me Hello, I told them 'I brought them presents', and then the little one, Tal, told me 'I do not want your presents, I want mom, and you keep going'.

"That night, after a career of twenty-something years, I said to myself in front of the mirror 'What do you want, glory? Do you want to be detached from your children so that they can tell you that you are beautiful and sexy and come to parties?'"

And what did you answer to yourself?

"No. I realized I was a victim of the industry. I understood enough, as much as possible. I was exhausted."

In terms of work, were you easily accepted when you arrived?

"בהתחלה לא קיבלו אותי בכלל. התאורה בהפקות בארץ היתה מזעזעת ואני אמרתי לבמאים מה לעשות ואיזו תאורה אני צריכה. אמרתי להם 'תטשטשו לי את כל הצהבת הזאת'. אמרו לי 'מי את בכלל?' אז הלכתי לבעלים ואמרתי 'אני הולכת הביתה' ובסוף קיבלו את זה. הייתי יושבת על התאורה כי הבאתי סטנדרטים של חו"ל".

עם התאורה הנכונה, הגיעה גם ההצלחה. "חטפו אותי לפרסומות", היא נזכרת, "הפרסומת הראשונה היתה עם טיירה בנקס לשוקולד רוזמרי. פרסומת גדולה שצולמה בפילם. במקור היו צריכים לצלם עם נעמי קמפבל בלונדון, אבל היא הבריזה, אז לקחו את טיירה במקומה והעבירו את הצילומים לארץ.

"הביאו אותנו למלון הילטון ועשינו מפגש יום לפני הצילום. היא היתה בלי תוספות שיער ולא זיהיתי אותה. כשהיא עמדה לידי לא ידעתי שזו היא. עמדה לידי מישהי עם שיער קצר ושרוף שנראתה כמו אחת מהארלם.

"זו היתה פרסומת לשוקולד, היו קלוז־אפים, ורציתי שהצופה ירצה לקפוץ לתוך המסך ולתת לטיירה ביס, כי היא השוקולד האמיתי מבחינתי. כל העולם ואשתו הגיעו לסט, באו לראות את טיירה. שמתי עליה המון שימר, הבאתי את החומרים הכי טובים, של בובי בראון, מאק ושאנל, ואז פותחים אורות ומוניטור - והבמאי שונא את זה. הוא שואג 'מה זה כל השימר הזה על הפרצוף שלה?!'

"האוזניים שלי נהיו אש, כל הסט היה עלי. רצתי לטפל בזה, עשיתי כאילו אני מאפרת אותה וביקשתי שתסתכל על עצמה במוניטור. טיירה אהבה את זה, והיא הדיווה, אז הוחלט שככה בדיוק זה יישאר. היא אמרה, 'אני כל כך יפה, צלמו! שוט!'"

"היא אהבה את האיפור, והיא הדיווה". טיירה בנקס, אי.פי

• • •

הצורך בעצמאות מביא את עדה להקים לפני יותר מ־20 שנה את בית הספר לאיפור שלה. "אנחנו מכשירים מאפרים שעובדים בתעשייה", היא אומרת, "הבוגרים שלנו עבדו איתי מ'כוכב נולד 2', דרך 'נולד לרקוד' ו'מאסטר שף' ועד 'דה וויס' ו'רוקדים עם כוכבים', בכל מקום. התלמידים שלי הם אלו שיצאו איתי לתוכניות ריאליטי, כי כולם רצו את עדה לזורגן".

ראית דברים מעניינים בהקשר של איפור ריאליטי לאחרונה?

"בגמר 'הכוכב הבא' שירי מימון נראתה מיליון דולר, אבל אז היה ראיון איתה ונכנסו לקלוז־אפ בלי תאורה וראו חטטים. זה משהו שלא צריך לקרות. אגב, רותם סלע היתה מפוצצת באיפור, והיא יפהפייה".

"היא יפהפייה". עם סנדי בר, מהאלבום הפרטי

נוסף על בית הספר, לפני שבע שנים הושק ליין מוצרים של המותג "עדה לזורגן", כשהבן גיא שנכנס לעסק החליט להרחיב אותו. מוצרי הליין כוללים ריסים, מכחולים, ליפסטיקים, מייק־אפ, וכל מה שנשים שאוהבות להתאפר חולמות עליו. חלק מהמוצרים מיובאים, והרוב מיוצרים בארץ, בפארק אפק. הייחוד של לזורגן טמון בפיתוח המייקאפים והקונסילרים, כמי שהמומחיות שלה היא בהתאמת גוונים. "אני יושבת עם הכימאי ואנחנו מתאימים את המרכיבים, שצריכים להתאים גם למזג האוויר בארץ וגם לגווני עור שונים.

"אני בעסק משפחתי קטן. לא מתעשרים מזה, אבל זה עסק בריא ומבוסס ואנחנו חיים ממנו, כל המשפחה. בהמשך יש לנו כוונה לצאת לחו"ל, וכבר יש גם הצעות, אבל בינתיים עוד אין לנו עיניים גדולות".

פחדת בקורונה? הרי כמעט הכל נסגר.

"בית הספר ומרכז ההדרכות הושבתו לשמונה חודשים, אבל האתר היה פעיל ושירות הלקוחות שלנו נתן מאה אחוז מעצמו. פינקנו את הלקוחות ויצאנו בשלום מהקורונה. אני בכלל לא התעסקתי בכספים. אני ציירתי ורקדתי. אנחנו עובדים עם כולם, מפרגנים לכולם ומייצרים לאחרים. רמי משווק למכללות האיפור הגדולות בארץ, למיקי בוגנים ולירין שחף. זה שוק של זאבים, אבל ידוע שרמי הביא רוח אחרת.

"אנחנו ישרים ולא מרגלים אחרי אחרים, לא מעניין אותי מה הם עושים וכמה. יש לנו את מובילות דעת הקהל שלנו, שהן כוכבות ובלוגריות ביוטי, ואני מאחלת לכולם בהצלחה". 

ואיך את שומרת על עצמך? מהצד, לא נראה שהתעייפת.

"אני מאוד משתדלת לשמור על הבריאות שלי. אני אוהבת להתייחס לגוף שלי ולתת לו מקום, אז אני שוחה כמעט כל יום בבריכת גורדון ויורדת לים בסופי שבוע. יש לי גם 'מיני חדר כושר' בבית, לעשיית פילאטיס ו־TRX. אני רוקדת בבית או עולה על הסטפר".

הטיפ הסודי שלה, אגב, הוא בכלל ספונג'ה. "אני חולת ניקיון", היא מבהירה, "זה הטיפול הנפשי שלי, וגם לסדר. לא באתי מבית מסודר, אני ילדת רחוב, ולכן חשוב לי הקונטרול. זה מפקס אותי.

"אני אוהבת גם לרדת לפעמים מפסי הרכבת, כי אני בן אדם שמח ומשוגע. אני אוהבת להיות ליצן, לא לקחת אחריות ולהשתגע. גם זה קורה לי לפעמים - וזה בסדר". 

shirz@israelhayom.co.il