The sources of the shoddy failure of "Unquiet Night" (Laila Lo Shaked ), a musical based on Shlomo Artzi’s songs at the Cameri Theater in Tel Aviv, can be found in a number of places. Not all of them are directly connected to what happens on stage and backstage in this production. I am pronouncing it a failure even before its commercial fate is known (I saw it in its fourth performance, in a completely full hall ), because to my mind it is a cultural and theatrical flop.

Aki Avni, left, and Yael Bar Zohar performing in “Unquiet NIght.” A purely commercial offering out of place in a repertory theater.

Photo by: Elitzur Reuveni

Usually in a musical the music comes first. The ultimate proof of a new musical is in its catchy tunes. Which is why the most cutting criticism of a Broadway show was: "We left and whistled the scenery." The whole American songbook of the 20th century is made of show tunes whose cover versions became hits. A number of musicals became classics, especially shows in which the music, plot and characters held together well – for example "West Side Story" or anything Stephen Sondheim has written or is writing.

About 30 years ago, things took a turn in commercial theater. If what ensures success is catchy tunes, why not start with it? Thus began a wave of musicals built around hits by a single songwriter or grou,p around which a plot is tailored to justify performing them in a specific order. The clearest example of this is "Mama Mia," based on ABBA’s hits, but there are many other examples.

Macho and sensitive?

What’s good for the West End and Broadway is also good for Tel Aviv. In 2002 Habimah put on "Mary Lou," based on songs by Zvika Pik. The story was written by Mirit Shem-Or and the play was written by Dan Almagor and Steven Dexter (who also directed it ). The plot really was of no importance, the audience loved the tunes it knew, the show ran for more than 400 performances and it was also performed by Habimah in the United States.

Back then I wrote that a repertory theater, national or not, should not be doing productions like that, whatever their quality, because even at their best they will be nothing but theatrical entertainment. The audiences and cultural policy makers in Israel ignored me.

For more than a decade now Artzi, together with Danny Robas, has been writing a musical about King Saul. He isn’t the only one to have seen himself as the maker of a musical inspired by the Bible: Dudu Topaz (who was never a singer and was, of course, an entirely different story in every respect ) put on the musical "Moses" at the Sifria Theater in Ramat Gan, and quite an embarrasing flop it was. There have been rumors for several years now that Artzi has offered "Saul" to the Cameri. Is it possible that someone at the Cameri said "Why take a risk with new songs from Artzi and an original biblical musical if we can use the Artzi songs that has already succeeded?"

Shlomo Artzi’s place as a singer-songwriter is ensured. Yoav Kuttner and Prof. Oz Almog write in the program notes for "Unquiet Night" about his uniqueness as an artist who, according to Almog, expresses "the mythological sabra [literally prickly pear, used to refer to a native-born Israeli], who beneath the outer shell of thorns and roughness is in fact a gentle, sensitive and caring man." And as if that were not enough, Almog also writes that he "concentrates on the agonies of the mature man, who is both macho and sensitive."

Both macho and sensitive or not, Artzi’s performances do indeed fill the amphitheater at Caesarea time after time, for the.last thirty years. According to Kuttner, he represents the Israeli man who "is caring, sensitive, romantic, pays attention to the suffering of others, remembers the Holocaust, feels the pain of the wars, loves his old friends and knows how to comfort and encourage those close to him."

To my mind, what was wrong for Zvika Pik and Habimah continues to be wrong for Shlomo Artzi and the Cameri: This is a purely commercial offering and it is not the Cameri’s business to put on a production like this. However, it seems Cameri CEO Noam Semel and artistic director Omri Nitzan thought otherwise. If Artzi is indeed an Israeli icon, and if they hire for the job the genius du jour of the Israeli theater, Yael Ronen – then presumably the coefficient of success is a sure thing because of Artzi’s hits and Ronen’s reputation as a serious theater person who appeals to the younger generation ("The Guide to the Good Life," "Plonter" ).

Ronen is one of those directors who first goes into a rehearsrl room with the actors, and only afterward does it become clear what emerges from the work process. This is popular way of workwng worldwide, though I am not yet convinced as to why this is preferable to dealing with a written play, the work of an artist who knows what it is he wants to say.

He goes to look for a sofa at the homes of friends of his who ostensibly live in happy relationships. First he shows up at the home of Avi Greinik, a comical, goodhearted nerd, who has proposed to his girlfriend (Kineret Limoni ) but she hasn’t given him an answer and has ordered tickets for a joint trip with her ex, Yuval. The ex turns out to be a same-sex ex (Ayelet Robinson ), which comes as shock to him, which provides a new interpretation of the song "You will never know."

Then our hero goes to his own ex, Yael Bar Zohar, who pays him no mind (or body ) because she is having an affair with Tal Museri, who is married ("Most of the time you are my wife," he sings, flexing his spectacular pecs ).

Because this a musical, there is an athletic dance number on the bed performed by Avni and Roni Hadar (who is his wife, some of the time ) with sexual innuendos for those who dont understand why they dance lying down. Then there is another one with Avni and Bar Zohar, in which he hauls her around like a doll and even drops her (because he ruined her life in the past; choreography by Saar Magal ).

And there is another comic interlude with Nir Zelichowski, a barman who is having an affair with Efrat Gosh, a waitress at the bar. Since Gosh is a singer and not an actress, she hops around like a childish energizer bunny. Both of them are in detox from alcohol, but he falls of the wagon and there is a bit of violence between them (she wants them to move to a moshav; he "Won’t leave the city," as the song goes ).

So that we aren’t shortchanged of the qualities brought to the stage by Bar Zohar (who also starred in "Mary Lou" ), there is a dramatic scene in which she settles accounts with Museri for using her and discarding her and having the gall to sleep with his own wife, "In a zimmer!" she roars like a wounded lioness, and we get to see her being furious in a very short slip a la Anna Magnani.

After that, in a cabaret number accompanied by a girl band, with a chair, she is supposed to be a combination of Liza Minelli and Britney Spears, to the sounds of "Let’s take us a day."

Bar Zohar can sing and dance, but she can’t really act, and to my mind she lacks what in stage language is called "it." This needn’t prevent her from continuing to flex her talents, but the main stage at the Cameri Theater is hardly the right place for her to be doing this.

A musical band in the background, a few cubes that occasionally light up from inside, a bar on the left, a bed on the right and mainly rock concert lighting: Two poles of spotlights cast beams of light from behind onto the stage. Sometimes one stays low and another rises, creating the effect of a crocodile’s maw that could swallow the actors. Lots of moving lights and spotlights on the soloists.

There is a very successful musical about a man – though a bachelor – who checks out his friends’ relationships and finds that being married isn’t fun for any of them, with excellent music written especially for the show: Steven Sondheim’s "Company."

Compared to that, in "Unquiet Night" the Israeli male comes across as a miserable and uninteresting adolescent, who doesn’t yet know who he is, and for whom a relationship is mainly sex, preferably a lot, and with the other sex. Nevertheless, he does have one unique quality. I have kept it until the end, because it appears only at the end of the show, which lasts one hour and 55 minutes without an intermission: The hero had a friend who was killed at Wadi Saluki in the Second Lebanon War.

This friend is not only there on the stage, with a guitar (Amir Dadon, the curly-haired Israeli fatality, who sings "An unquiet night" ), but also visits the dreams and nightmares of his wife (May Finegold ) and his good buddy (Zohar Liba ), who witnessed his death.

This is indeed an Israeli moment no foreigner would understand. The friend and widow nearly console each other in the bed, but the fatality is there with them, which enables Finegold to serve up a wonderful and intriguing rendition of "He doesn’t know what I am going through." This is a moment of powerful theater, which would certainly win her first place in "A Star Is Born," Israel’s version of "American Idol." Here at long last is a kernel, perhaps not for a musical, but rather for a play.

The finale is by the whole ensemble, with "Moon," "This is what remains" and "Suddenly when you didn’t show up" (incidentally, Avni crawls back to his wife on all fours, and she even takes him in ). The audience in the hall rose to its feet and applauded rhythmically. There are familiar songs and there are names known to the young audience – which doesn’t go to the theater and doesn’t care about what theater is.

"Did you enjoy yourself, sweetie?" a veteran Artzi fan asked her girlfriend in the elevator. "Yeah, nice," replied the friend. The question is what the connection is between this and the Cameri Theater, winner of the Israel Prize (as announced in its logo ).

It is customary to give new productions, and especially new musicals, a few days of grace to "break them in" before offering a professional opinion. I saw the fourth performance and my impression was that it is sufficiently broken in, never mind worn out. I paid NIS 260 at the box office for a ticket to the performance (season ticket holders pay less than NIS 100 ). At that price it doesn’t deserve any days of grace.

Artzi gets lost on stage

Tags: Amir Dadon, american idol, artistic director, Cameri Theater, united states, Noam Semel, A Star Is Born

33 Responses to “Artzi gets lost on stage”