{"id":269,"date":"2009-03-26T00:51:01","date_gmt":"2009-03-26T07:51:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.midnighteast.com\/mag\/?p=269"},"modified":"2009-03-28T05:18:22","modified_gmt":"2009-03-28T12:18:22","slug":"with-a-little-help-from-my-friends-celebrating-pinter%e2%80%99s-work-in-tel-aviv","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.midnighteast.com\/mag\/?p=269","title":{"rendered":"With a Little Help from My Friends: Celebrating Pinter\u2019s Work in Tel Aviv"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"pinterfull1\"Does the Israeli theater audience have the capacity to relate to the ambiguity and deceptive simplicity of Harold Pinter, renowned British playwright, poet and activist, recipient of the 2005 Nobel Prize in Literature? This was one of the issues that arose when Israeli actor, director and playwright Oded Kotler teamed up with Professor Avraham Oz, literary scholar and translator (Shakespeare and Pinter among others), to celebrate Pinter\u2019s work with full length productions of his plays in Tel Aviv. Although they were not able to realize their vision fully, their year long project comes to fruition this weekend in a three-way cooperative effort between Habima National Theatre, Tmuna Theatre and The British Council<\/a>. Pinter\u2019s \u201cBetrayal\u201d (1978) premieres tonight at Habima and a full schedule of staged readings (11 plays), poetry, song and discussion, begins tomorrow at\u00a0Tmuna.<\/p>\n

Sadly, Pinter, who died on December 24, 2008, did not live to enjoy this recognition of his work in Israel. Professor Oz relates that despite Pinter\u2019s known criticism of Israeli politics, the playwright was very eager for the Israeli audience to become better acquainted with his work and was pleased to learn that one of his plays, \u201cMountain Language\u201d (1988) will be read in Arabic. The spirit of cooperation and enthusiasm generated by the festival is exemplified by the fact that all the participants in the events at Tmuna, including over 50 actors, singers, directors and musicians \u2013 have volunteered their time and talents.<\/p>\n

Oz feels that Pinter\u2019s work has suffered as a result of being tagged \u201cabsurdist theatre\u201d in Martin Esslin\u2019s influential book: The Theatre of the Absurd, first published in 1961. Subsequent staging of Pinter\u2019s work according to this interpretation, in an \u201cabsurd space with no location\u201d was not appropriate to the work, according to Oz, and audiences responded with boredom and disinterest. In later years, Pinter\u2019s work came to be viewed as realist drama, and was well received, Oz relates, citing a 1984 production of \u201cHomecoming\u201d directed by Ilan Ronen. Oz\u2019s perception of Pinter as a realist is supported by Pinter\u2019s own words, in an address given in 1962 at the National Student Drama festival in Bristol: \u201cI have usually begun a play in quite a simple manner; found a couple of characters in a particular context, thrown them together and listened to what they said, keeping my nose to the ground. The context has always been, for me, concrete and particular, and the characters concrete also.\u201d<\/p>\n

The festival at Tmuna introduces a Pinter \u201cfirst\u201d: the translation of his poetry into Hebrew. Famous for his plays, it is not as widely known that Pinter began writing poetry well before he became a playwright, and continued to write until his final days. Oz translated a selection of 18 poems from different phases in Pinter\u2019s career, reflecting the development of his writing style. According to Oz, the early poems reveal the influence of T. S. Eliot in their more elaborate language and complex images. Oz comments, \u201cIn the early poems there are plays on words, he even invents words, creating compound words\u2026the modernism is very apparent. It was the 1950s and he was a young man in his twenties\u2026you can see that he had a great passion for words and was very talented.\u201d Oz looked to the poetry of Nathan Alterman as a Hebrew parallel to this phase of Pinter\u2019s poetry.<\/p>\n

As Pinter began to write plays (The Birthday Party, his first dramatic work, premiered in 1958), the language of his poetry changed, says Oz:\u00a0 \u201cthere is more freedom in his use of language, it becomes more of an everyday language \u2013 the words are simpler, more straightforward, influenced, among other things, by the realist character of his dramatic work. The poetry is in the syntax.\u201d Pinter\u2019s last poems deal primarily with politics and death. As part of the festival, several Israeli musicians \u2013 Yaheli Sobol, Karni Postel, Shaul Besser and Tal Belchrovitch set the poems to music and they will be both read and sung in an evening devoted to Pinter\u2019s poetry late Friday night at Tmuna.<\/p>\n

Oz has translated many of Pinter\u2019s works throughout the years and says, \u201cHe is a mathematician of words, he is not an easy writer. Each word is carefully thought out; there is a rhythm to the writing. It\u2019s fun, it\u2019s a challenge. You really have to listen with his ear.\u201d Oz first translated \u201cBetrayal\u201d in 1980 and says that when rehearsals began for the current Habima production, he went over the text line by line with the actors, making several changes so that the feel of \u201ceveryday language\u201d would reflect the changes in the Hebrew of today as compared to 1980.<\/p>\n

Oz first met Pinter at a party in London in the 1970s, but in the last ten years the two developed a close friendship and correspondence. Michael Billington, Pinter\u2019s official biographer, issued a revised edition of his original 1996 text, with a new chapter covering the decade from 1996 to 2006. The title of this new chapter is taken from a letter Pinter wrote to Oz, a testimony to the significance of that relationship. In planning the current festival Kotler and Oz wanted to \u201cbreak the myth\u201d that Israeli audiences are not \u201cready\u201d for Pinter \u2013 the audience has demonstrated that it is ready and eager, as several of the plays at Tmuna are already sold out. Oz further expressed his hope that \u201cthis weekend will be a trigger and inspire more of these events that highlight the work of playwrights who may not be first on the list of repertory theatres, but are important writers.\u201d As Pinter wrote to Oz, in the letter quoted by Billington, \u201cLet\u2019s keep fighting.\u201d.<\/p>\n

Pinter Weekend Events:<\/p>\n

Betrayal
\nDirector: Moni Moshonov
\nHabima National Theater
\nThursday, March 26th at 20:30
\nYad Lebanim, 63 Pinkas Street, Tel Aviv
\nTickets: 03-6295555
\nwww.habima.co.il<\/a><\/p>\n

Tmuna Theatre Pinter Weekend
\nArtistic Director: Moni Moshonov
\nLiterary Consultant: Professor Avraham Oz<\/p>\n

Friday, March 27th\u00a0
\n12:00 The Birthday Party staged reading
\n14:00 Hothouse staged reading
\n20:30 Three plays in staged reading:
\nLandscape, Dumbwaiter, The New World Order
\n23:00 An Evening of Pinter\u2019s Poetry<\/p>\n

Saturday, March 28th
\n11:00 Two plays in staged reading:
\nCelebration, Ashes to Ashes
\n12:30 Pinter\u2019s World: A Discussion of His Work
\nModerator: Professor Avraham Oz
\nParticipants: Moni Moshonov, Michal Peles, Gideon Levy, Professor Shimon Levy, Hillel Mittelpunkt
\n18:00 The Homecoming staged reading
\n20:30 Three plays in staged reading:
\nMountain Language, One for the Road, Night<\/p>\n

Tmuna Theatre
\n8 Soncino Street, Tel Aviv
\nTickets: 03-5611211
\nwww.tmu-na.org.il<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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