“On the Horizon” this month we find a fairly straight-faced discussion by Sam Levenson of the evils of dialect humor, and a report by Peter Gradenwitz on cultural activities in present-day Israel.
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Tel Aviv
At the height of the New York season there are about twenty-five plays and musicals on Broadway; in an average week, there will be at least twenty concerts; about fifteen first-run films are being shown; there is opera and ballet. In Tel Aviv, with a population of around a quarter of a million against New York’s eight million, in any week of the winter season you can see fifteen plays, hear eight concerts, go to the ballet, and choose among fifteen movies being shown in Israel for the first time. True, the halls are smaller, and the movie houses have only three reserved-seat showings a day; but the figures are still impressive. And, just as in New York, you can hardly get a seat to anything that is considered good.
At any time, each of the main theatrical companies—Habimah, Ohel, Kameri—is likely to have three plays going, presented in rotation on a modified repertory system, so that while one play is in Tel Aviv, a second is in Jerusalem, and a third in Haifa. The two variety groups—Matate and Li-La-Lo—stick to a single program, changing it every three to four months, and so do the operatic and ballet troupes. The Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, still without a proper hall, plays each subscription program nine times in succession (six times in Tel Aviv, twice in Haifa, and once in Jerusalem), then gives three special series in Haifa and Tel Aviv. Recitalists, local and foreign, play to capacity audiences, with the visiting artists generally giving two different programs. Two different series of five to six concerts each are given for school children during the winter term, and the Tel Aviv Museum offers about forty chamber music concerts during a season—most of which are so heavily booked that they are repeated. Two theatrical groups play especially for children.
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The quantity of cultural fare is plainly amazing. What about the quality? In its concerts, Israel can stand comparison with New York or any European metropolis. Not only is the country regularly visited by the greatest musical performers of the world, but it has its own excellent Philharmonic Orchestra and some individual artists whose solo and chamber-music recitals are always a delight to hear; in addition, the activities of the local chapter of the International Society for Contemporary Music—a weekly one-hour radio broadcast, mostly recorded, and public concerts—help keep the Israeli public acquainted with the latest trends in music. But the theater, by contrast, has remained provincial and rather backward. Music is the dominating force in the cultural life of Israel by virtue of its freedom from the bounds of language, whereas a large proportion of the public that might be interested in the theater has not yet mastered enough Hebrew to be able to enjoy a play. Moreover, most of the theatrical companies—with the notable exception of the Kameri group—stem from a very clearly defined cultural sphere, the Jewish world of the East European countries, and have retained the style of expression they brought with them to Palestine in the 1920’s; that style can appeal only to a fraction of the population. Habimah has played under world-famous directors and has recently given noteworthy performances of Death of a Salesman, Othello, Beaumarchais’ Marriage of Figaro, Strindberg’s The Father; but Habimah is never so good in even the best of these as it is in The Dybbuk or other plays deriving from the East European background. The Ohel troupe, similarly, even where it has made excursions into world literature and presented classical and modern plays, has remained especially the provincial Workers’ Theater; at the moment, its best offerings are those of its charming children’s theater, Bimatenu. The old satirical theater Matate still gives performances of topical plays, but the satire, unfortunately, has to do with issues that have long since died.
But unique among the country’s theatrical troupes is the Kameri, the Chamber Theater, founded in 1945 by young actors who could find no place in the older companies. Kameri has come to be the most successful of all Israel’s theaters, partly through its choice of repertory but largely because its actors speak a “pure” Hebrew, unmarred by the heavy Russian accent which the younger Israeli generation finds unacceptable on the stage. Kameri began its career with commedia dell’arte, its productions of Goldoni’s Servant of Two Masters and Beaumarchais’ Barber of Seville being still fondly remembered; The Shadow, by Schwarz, a dramatization of a Russian fable, was another of its lasting successes. Recently Kameri gave Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie, John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, and The Queen of Sheba, the nearest Israel has yet come to a modern musical comedy. The Queen of sheba offered the most enjoyable theatrical evening in Israel in years; the comedy was written in German verse by Sammy Gronemann, a veteran German Zionist and a well-known playwright and wit, and translated into hilarious Hebrew doggerel by Haim Hefer. A. Abramovitz provided the songs, and Herbert Brun arranged and orchestrated them, and also contributed incidental music. The play deals with Sheba’s visit to King Solomon’s court, and describes the impact on highly civilized Jerusalem of the rather wild but charming people from faraway Ethiopia, “doin’ what comes nacherly”; it is, of course, filled with topical allusions.
The difficulties of theatrical production in Israel are highlighted by the extraordinary fact that Kameri had to withdraw this hit musical play after a few weeks. The troupe plays in Tel Aviv in an old-fashioned, dirty little theater (the Mugrabi) with primitive facilities, and in other cities it performs in movie theaters that are certainly not equipped for theatrical productions. In fact, every performance by any one of the troupes is a major headache. In the case of The Queen of Sheba, performances had to be canceled altogether because Sheba and her royal companions, being very scantily clad, found the drafty theaters too uncomfortable; only the coming of warmer weather permitted the production to reopen. While the plays of the various Israeli companies are generally offered first in Tel Aviv, where theatrical conditions, such as they are, are best, Kameri has adopted the American custom of out-of-town try-outs. Its new productions are given their first showings in villages and in the kibbutzim. Since last March, Kameri has actually been using two Tel Aviv theaters simultaneously.
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Considering the extent of theatrical activity, it is surprising to note how few plays are by Israeli authors. As I write, Kameri is offering no Israeli play, while Habimah is giving only The Road to Elath and Ohel only Huts and the Moon. In recent seasons there have been a few Biblical plays by Aaron Ashman, and some dramas connected with the War of Liberation and the pioneer years of the country by Moshe Shamir, Yigal Mossenson, Yehoshua Bar-Joseph, Shulamit Bat-Dori. It must be said that the Biblical plays have hardly grasped the greatness of their ancient themes, while the plays of pioneer and kibbutz life, as well as those dealing with the war, have not yet attained the dimensions of a living drama of any more than passing interest; incidentally, one of the worst productions of the past season was Shulamit Bat-Dori’s Huts and the Moon, a play about a kibbutz by a group of young Ohel artists—it hardly came up to college dramatic-club standards.
The most original recent contribution to the Hebrew theater came, perhaps not surprisingly, from the dance-stage; this was Deborah Bertonoff’s one-woman dance-drama The Ascent to Jerusalem, based on an idea by the poet Ze’ev. The three acts of the dance comprise a concise, dramatic summary of three periods of Jewish history. The first scenes portray the figures and events of Biblical history: Moses by the river’s brink, the people of Israel in the wilderness, Deborah’s song of victory, David as shepherd, the rule of Baal, the song of the exiles (“By the Waters of Babylon”). The second act deals with the long period of exile: its three scenes evoke for the audience the wandering people, the yearning exiles, the slaughtered martyrs. The final act is the homecoming of Israel: the sowing once again of seeds, the heroic defense of the resettled country, the rebuilding of Zion. A narrator heralds each short scene, reciting passages from the Bible in the first and third acts, while in the second act the narration is based on readings from Haim Nahman Bialik. Joseph Tal’s interesting musical score takes up where the narrator leaves off, and the composer has tried to preserve the poetic style of the spoken lines. The evening had a rare quality of unity and coloring.
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A strange case is that of opera in Israel. Opera was presented in Hebrew to Palestinian pioneers long before there was a proper symphony orchestra, even before the theater was permanently established. Opera began in 1923, when Mordecai Golinkin arrived from Russia with a vision of a “Temple of Art.” Since then, opera has had its ups and downs, numerous companies having risen and disappeared; but Mr. Golinkin is still going strong, and is a regular conductor of the now flourishing “Hebrew National Opera,” though most of the performances are led by Georg Singer. Last year the New York Times was informed that the press would not be admitted to the so-called “National Opera” though they are now allowed in, the story may be worth while telling here—it exemplifies certain phenomena that are not inconspicuous in other fields of Israeli life today.
During World War II a troupe calling itself “The Palestine Folk Opera” flourished in the country. It reached a fairly high level under conductor Georg Singer and even staged an original opera, Dan the Guard, with libretto by S. Shalom and Max Brod and music by Marc Lavry. In 1944, after some years of this opera company’s successful growth, Miss Edis de Philippe—an American singer born in Odessa—arrived in Tel Aviv, having, she said, declined engagements with the world’s largest opera houses in order to offer her talents to the cause of opera in Palestine. To begin with, she would gladly sing La Traviata—without remuneration. Verdi’s opera was prepared, but Miss de Philippe stipulated that only two scenes should be done, as the reception scene of Act I and the ballroom scene of Act II would be too costly to produce and anyway did not contain the best music. Israel then witnessed perhaps the strangest production of La Traviata that has ever been offered in an opera house, with a narrator in front of the curtain telling the story of the play in the omitted scenes, the orchestra accompanying his tale with a potpourri of the most popular music from these scenes, and a solo violin replacing the protagonists in the famous arias. Only when Miss de Philippe later sang Carmen was it discovered why she had insisted on the omission of the “costly” scenes from La Traviata: she simply did not have the high notes required by Violetta in the arias of these scenes. In her later roles, a simpler expedient was used: the higher notes were sung an octave or so lower.
La Traviata was mildly successful; Miss de Philippe undoubtedly had the stage appearance and manners which had up till then been lacking in local operatic production. But though she sang without fee, her expense account was more than the “Folk Opera” could bear; and this, and the forced abandonment of former excellent productions, led to its early ruin. Miss de Philippe and Mr. Simcha Even-Zohar, former secretary-general of the Histadrut, then organized the “Hebrew National Opera,” taking in with them the veteran Mr. Golinkin. A dictatorial policy, not to speak of the absence of any artistic enterprise, has characterized the operation of this private—and not in any sense national—institution ever since. Operas have been selected to fit the limitations of Miss de Philippe’s vocal range, and whenever she herself did not “star,” she produced and directed. Visiting vocalists were employed, it is true, but the country’s best and most experienced opera singers found it impossible to work with the “triumvirate” (as the three directors once called their board). The press was unanimous in demanding certain reforms and in deploring the depths to which opera had sunk in Israel.
Thus there came the day of a certain opera premiere when no journalist had received a ticket; the secretary of the Journalists’ Association called the company’s office, to be told that only a single press critic had been invited and all the others were “unwanted.” The critics then bought tickets for the performance, but ushers barred their way into the theater. The critics appealed to the police, whereupon Miss de Philippe called the Minister of Police at his home and he ordered his officers on the scene to send the critics home rather than allow a scandal. A subsequent move to take the matter to court was stifled.
The Music Advisory Council appointed by the Ministry of Education and Culture, which was subsidizing the company, then appointed a committee to look into its affairs and make a detailed report. After several months’ hearings, which produced some quite extraordinary information concerning both the artistic and financial management of the “triumvirate,” the committee recommended that the company be reorganized; its directors refused, and the Music Department of the Ministry thereupon withdrew its subsidy. The music director of Kol Israel (the national radio station), a member of the Advisory Council, was asked to stop broadcasting the performances, the customs authorities were asked to grant the company no further privileges, and the newspapers were asked to stop carrying the Opera’s announcements and advertisements. But Mr. Even-Zohar, who had in the meantime married Miss de Philippe, is a veteran Histadrut official and on friendly terms with most of the cabinet ministers: the office of the Prime Ministry ordered Kol Israel to continue broadcasting the productions, the Minister of Education asked the press and the customs not to interfere. And the “Hebrew National Opera” is still going strong. Its standards have not improved, but audiences flock to it because no other opera is available at the moment (though the short-lived “Musical Theater” will probably be reorganized).
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There is little to add to what is generally known about the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. It continues to be an excellent group of musicians, the quality of its ensemble playing being dependent to a large degree on the conductor in charge. It is a major calamity for the development of musical standards in Israel that the orchestra—the best equipped and, in spite of many shortcomings, best functioning cultural body in the country—has never found (and never seriously sought) a permanent conductor and an authoritative manager. Like so many bodies in Israel, the orchestra is managed on a collective basis, with the main decisions lying in the hands of a musicians’ committee. The discipline, the programs, and the entire policy of the orchestra leave much to be desired, and magnificent though many of its concerts are, no artistic unity has been achieved in the seventeen years of its existence. The programs are generally those of the big names—conductors and soloists—and the public has been educated to see and hear a great personality rather than an interesting program or a new work. Local conductors and soloists have a very small share in the orchestra’s concert activities, as have Israeli composers: this year, for instance, the season began in early October, and by the end of February just one Israeli composition had been played—and that in a special subscription series of three concerts. Only in the under-rehearsed Youth Concerts did the orchestra play additional works by Israeli composers. As for local soloists, two pianists were included in the programs—both choosing hackneyed virtuoso works—and several orchestral musicians were also called on for solo performances.
But so far the orchestra stands unrivaled as regards the quality of performance; the Haifa Orchestra is too young to compete-though it may one day—and the orchestra of the radio station Kol Israel in Jerusalem has so far lacked the necessary basis of security and the right training facilities, while its members have been employed in too many divergent tasks.
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It is hard to say what direction Israel’s cultural development will take in the next years. With the large influx of Orientals, to whom the world of Western culture is fundamentally foreign—and vice versa—the community is undergoing a basic change. Last year I attended a show arranged by the Institute of Oriental Musical Research, where singers, instrumentalists, and dancers from various Oriental communities—Yemenite, Bukharian, Caucasian, and others—demonstrated their traditional forms of singing and playing to a thrilled audience. The possible significance of this show for Israel’s future culture was pointed up in the remarks of an official of the Ministry of Education and Culture, who said to the pianist Frank Pelleg, at that time head of the Music Department of the Ministry: “You find all this exotic. But in twenty or thirty years, the audience may consist of those Yemenites and Bukharians and Caucasians listening to you as you demonstrate a piano, and one of their scholars will explain what a piano is, or rather what a piano was, and add: ‘Here you have a man who still plays this obsolete instrument.’ ”
Whether the Orientals will ever come to terms with Western theater and music is not easy to foresee. Nor can we predict how much of Oriental traditions the Western Jew will eventually incorporate into his own ways of life and styles of art. But there has already been a considerable cultural interplay in music: the melodic flosculas and rhythmic patterns of the Orient and the ancient yet so novel-sounding instrumental colors of Oriental music have gone a long way already in shaping the Israeli composer’s musical style and expression. Those who fear the cultural influence of the Oriental immigration may take some comfort from the consideration that precisely the Oriental influence has led to Israel’s musical works being sought everywhere in the world as a novel and interesting contribution to contemporary music. Publishers in all major European countries now publish and distribute Israel’s music, and one of America’s leading music firms, Leeds Music Corporation of New York City, is doing much toward making the young country’s best musical creations known in the Western Hemisphere. Israel, so far famed chiefly for her achievements in the musical reproducing and performing field, has now begun to compete internationally in artistic creation as well, and it is to be hoped—with some degree of justified expectation—that her contribution to the world’s music will be more unified and purposeful in character than her somewhat chaotic—even if rich and varied—musical and theatrical life at home.
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