Beit Lessin Theatre announced its repertoire for the 2026 – 2027 season in a press meeting that took place this morning. It’s an ambitious and exciting lineup, which presents, in addition to plays that promise laughs and entertainment, several plays that relate to the critical issues of our times.
Some upcoming highlights:
Artistic Director and CEO Tzipi Pines stated that rehearsals have begun for the play Tous des oiseaux (Birds of a Kind) by the Lebanese-Canadian writer Wajdi Mouawad in a Hebrew translation by Eli Bijaoui, directed by Yair Sherman, house director of Beit Lessin. The play relates to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through the story of star-crossed lovers Eitan, a Jewish geneticist with an Israeli father and German-Jewish mother, and Wahida, an Arabic student at Columbia University. The first performance is scheduled for July 30, 2026.
A new play by Israeli playwright Hillel Mittelpunkt will begin rehearsals on June 28th. Titled in Hebrew “Mesibat Irusin” (Engagement Party), the play depicts a family gathering in the north of Israel during the war, revealing the family’s denial of the security situation, opening cracks which threaten the family unit’s integrity. Mittelpunkt will direct the play which is scheduled to open on August 29, 2026.
Daniel Gal, a Beit Lessin actor, will debut her first play – a musical – in October. Titled in Hebrew “HaShamayim Hem HaGvul” (The Sky is the Limit), the protagonist is Naomi Yosef, a journalist specializing in undercover investigations, who discovers that pop music’s “it girl” is currently a patient in a psychiatric clinic for treatment of victims of sexual trauma, and decides to commit herself to the same institution to follow the story and rescue her career. Describing the play as a “comedy on sexual post-trauma” Gal said she feels that “one of the most moving roles of the theatre is to express humor in spaces of pain and present such sensitive material as a colorful celebration. In a reality in which women’s voices are silenced in the courtroom I feel obliged and fortunate to bring my own private, post-traumatic voice to the stage of Beit Lessin…and perhaps the audience will fall in love with the beautiful journey of a wounded soul, a victim on the path back to herself.”
In November, a Hebrew version of Woody Allen’s 1992 film Husbands and Wives, will be performed, adapted to the stage by Moshe Naor and Amir Kliger. The plot follows two couples who have been friends for years. When one couple announces that they are separating, the shock waves affect the other couple as well.
An adaptation of Tom Schulman’s legendary film Dead Poets Society (1988), translated by Eli Bijaoui and directed by Eldar Gohar Groisman will bring to the stage the story of a teacher who rebelled against a conservative education system and inspired his students. Groisman will also direct the musical Billy Elliot, scheduled for the summer of 2027.
Tzipi Pines will direct a Hebrew version of Australian writer Suzie Miller’s one-woman play Prima Facie, starring Magi Azarzar. The play is about a lawyer who specializes in defending men accused of sexual assault, who is assaulted by a colleague. Coming to court as a victim for the first time, her previous views on the legal system are challenged, and change dramatically as a result of her experience. The play is scheduled for March 2027.
