THE GOOD THIEF'S RETURN

 I just watched LUPIN's second season and enjoyed it a lot. My relationship with the character is old and very affectionate. I read the entire collection and always expected a suitable adaptation in the movies or on TV. The ones I've watched until today, I didn't like. None of them managed to capture the lightness, modernity, and charm of Maurice Leblanc's books.

Having emerged in the wake of the 20th century – in 1905, in a series of short stories published by the magazine “Je Sais Tout”. Arsène Lupine was born modern in its amoral mentality, in its surprising twists exactly like today’s streaming series, and its main character's delicacy and vulnerability.

My first contact with the gentleman thief was through my neighbor Zeca. José Carlos de Almeida Oliveira was the son of a Portuguese family that moved to Brazil in the 1950s and lived in an apartment above ours, in Copacabana beach, Rio de Janeiro. A chic apartment building was built in 1930 when the neighborhood was still populated only by houses.

The Oliveira’s were the most aristocratic family in our building. Family dinners took place over a beautiful setting in the dining room, with silver cutlery, crystal goblets, and white linen napkins. Mr. Oliveira was a serious and disciplinarian man, as a Prussian officer. Everyone in the family had to be showered and dressed properly at the table, at 7 o'clock sharp.

Unlike most Portuguese jokes told among Brazilians in the 1950s, Senhor Oliveira did not own a grocery store or a bakery. He had an advertising agency, which advertised on the city's trams and buses. They had money both in Brazil and in Portugal. Zeca and Mario, the couple's children, had a first-rate education in the best private schools in Rio. They had the most expensive toys and almost all were imported from the USA or Europe. It was while playing at their house that I got to know the wonderful Leggo building blocks, back in the 1960s.

Zeca was the second person in my life to inspire my love for books. The first was my father. The second, Zeca, was a voracious reader. From comics to books, he devoured everything. He was the one who introduced me to Arsène Lupin. Zeca had a real passion for his adventures. I believe that like the character in the French TV series, he designed his life in the footsteps of the charming literary anti-hero. Zeca knew everything about science, history, martial arts, weapons, makeup, safes, and other ideal arts to become a true “cambrioleur”...

When we were 14, 15 years old, one night, Zeca invited me to participate in an “adventure” with him. We walked along with Rua Barata Ribeiro, close to our building, and reaching the corner of Rua Constante Ramos, he entered a residential building back door and signed me to follow him. We took the service elevator and went up to the top floor. When he got there, he opened a door and we found ourselves at the top of the building, next to the water tank. There he opened his backpack and took out a pair of leather gloves, which he put on. He also took out a rope, one of those used for climbing, and tied it to a pipe on the roof, throwing the rest onto a balcony on the floor below. The apartment seemed to be dark and Zeca started to climb down the rope and invited me to follow him. Terrified at the prospect of falling, or being arrested for breaking in, I thanked him for the offer and said I wouldn't, not even for a million dollars. Zeca, obviously, was very frustrated, but he understood my indisposition and we returned home, without getting into any major debates on the subject. He never again invited me to these crazy “adventures”, I don't even know if he single-handedly carried them out. But I never forgot. Years later I found him in Portugal, living in a cellar in Cascais, studying archeology in college, and working at night in the local morgue.

I tell this to show how much Leblanc's character affects his readers and fans. Something that the new French series refers to very intelligently. Hats off to George Kay, creator of LUPIN for the ingenious adaptation of his NETFLIX series. Being faithful to Leblanc's literary spirit, Kay knew how to breathe new life into the character. No one was better than Omar Sy for the new millennium version of the gentle-man thief.

While the original Lupin faced the challenges of upward social climbing as part of his persona. Ossane Diop faces the same challenges in France today, with thousands of African immigrants seeking the same insertion in their society.

The second season finalizes the plot started in the first, leaving us happy with the story's solution, but curious to know what will be the next adventure of the charming thief in the third season. Making it clear, at the end of the final episode, with the entire police force in France chasing Assane through the streets of Paris that Arsene Lupine will still be here to rob our hearts and minds...

 #LUPIN #Arsene Lupin #Maurice Leblanc #Gentleman Thief #Netflix

THE INCREDIBLE SUCCESS OF ISRAEL'S TV SERIES

Thanks to the pandemic, it has never been more important to have audiovisual content available 24 hours a day, accessible to everyone on the planet. Television networks, cable, and streaming channels have been dedicated to supplying this gigantic demand.

Amid this phenomenon, Israel has stood out as the third-largest provider of content to the US, behind only the UK and the Netherlands.

How is it possible that a country with only 72 years of existence, slightly larger than New Jersey, lost among enemies in the Middle East, with a population of just 9 million inhabitants, and with less than 30 years of experience in TV production, is capable of such a feat?

SHORT HISTORY OF THE ISRAELI TV

At the birth of the State of Israel in 1948, the country only had one radio station, administered directly by the government. Meanwhile, in the 1940s the rest of the world was giving its first steps into the brave new world of the television broadcast. Countries such as the US, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union started television broadcasts at that time.

But Israel's population only gained access to television broadcasts much later, when, in 1960, its neighbors Egypt, Lebanon, and Cyprus began to have television. Its programming was entirely in Arabic, very popular among Israeli Arabs. This had the Israeli government quite worried. But it wasn't until 1963, when Levi Eshkol became prime minister, that they decided that it was necessary to establish a television channel in Israel. The new station only started official broadcasts 3 years later, in March 1966, and initially, the programming was only educational.

COLOR TV

The Israelis' next battle was to watch color TV. Despite having already available equipment to broadcast the color images for a long time, the Israeli broadcaster took 10 years to do so. Meanwhile, TVs in Jordan and Egypt began broadcasting in color in 1974.

The reason for the Israeli delay was political. Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir described color television as "artificial and unnecessary”. And the official justification for the delay was that the Israeli government considered importing color televisions to be a frivolous luxury that would increase social differences.

Only in 1977 did the Israeli government allow color broadcasts on state television during the historic visit of Egyptian President Anwar El Sadat to Israel.

Public pressure demanding color TV finally succeded in 1981, but the process only normalized in 1983.

THE NEXT FIGHT – COMMERCIAL TV

In 1978 the government appointed a special committee to explore the possible establishment of a second channel free from government supervision and commercial. In October 1986 the second channel went on air. But it only started to work fully in 1990.

CABLE TV

In the late 1980s, illegal cable television transmissions became popular in Israel's major cities. They were stations broadcasting from private homes to subscribers. The content was mostly home video films. These local stations disappeared with the introduction of regulated cable television in 1989. By mid-1994 some 720,000 Israeli homes were connected to cable TV. And in 2000 satellite television was introduced in Israel.

THE SEARCH FOR EXPRESSION CHANNELS

Behind Israel's audiovisual mass media growth process, there was a struggle between two Israels – the one of the Kibbutzim and socialist spirit that existed before 1967, and one that came to be after the Six-Day War, when Israel felt safe in its new borders and wanted all the benefits of the modern capitalist world.

I see in this a certain parallel between the Jews of the Diaspora, who for centuries were locked in their ghettos and synagogues, immersed in their sacred books and traditions. And, finally, at the beginning of the 20th century, with the secularization of a great portion of the Jewish communities in Europe, Jews who had lived in exile for centuries from the Gentile cultural universe, suddenly had access to these channels of personal expression. Eagerly they excel in the fine arts, literature, cinema, radio, and even on television. The twentieth-century cultural landscape was strongly populated by Jewish artists. In just a century of escaping the Shtetl, Jews have become major producers of culture in every field. Centuries of deep intellectual incubation have regurgitated priceless artistic works to the world.

LESS THAN 30 YEARS OF TV PRODUCTION

Israeli production of television audiovisual content is extremely recent – ​​less than 30 years. And it wasn't necessarily a gradual evolution.

The 1980s produced quite an insipient TV programming in Israel. The main shows of the decade - BLI SODOT, EREV CHADASH, HAMIS'ADA HAGDOLA, KISHKASHTA, and KROVIM-KROVIM, among others, were mostly educational programs aimed at children; there were also some Sitcoms, comedy sketches shows, and documentaries.

The '90s provided little development: the number of comedy shows increased, children's programs continued to happen, and some reality TV came about to add to the programming. In the series area, the first dramatic production appeared. It was called - INYAN SHEL ZMAN (A MATTER OF TIME) and it was about the teenage world, talking about themes such as high school, teenage love, sex, and drafting into the army.

Finally, from the year 2000, the production of series increased a lot, at least 9 of them made it to the small screen - HA-BORER, DEUS, ESTI HAMEKHO'ERET, HA'NEPHILIM, HASHMINIYA, THE RAN QUADRUPLETS, and SRUGIM. In 2003 one of them became the great watershed. Its name – BE TIPUL. A drama revolving around the personal and professional life of a psychologist. The series featured him seeing patients five days a week and, on the sixth, he is the one who seeks supervision and psychological treatment for himself.

Filmmaker Ori Sivan was the main screenwriter for the series. The program has been adapted into local versions in the United States, Argentina, Northern Macedonia, Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Portugal, Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, Moldova, Netherlands, Japan, Canada, Russia, Italy, France, and Brazil. Always with great success.

THE NEXT GREAT NOVELTY

HATUFIM – PRISONERS OF WAR series premiered in Israel in 2010 and was created by Gideon Raff. It tells the story of three Israeli soldiers, captured during a secret mission in Lebanon and held as prisoners, mysteriously released nearly 20 years later. The critically acclaimed program aired in about 20 countries in its original Hebrew format with subtitles. The series gained an adaptation in the US that became a worldwide success.

HOMELAND tells the story of an American soldier, Nicholas Brody, played by actor Damian Lewis. Captured by al-Qaeda for several years, he is eventually returned to the US, and CIA agent Carrie Mathison, played by Claire Danes, suspects he has been tricked into acting covertly against the US. HOMELAND debuted in 2011 and has since won numerous awards. Its eighth and final season was broadcast in 2020.

FOREIGN PRODUCTIONS

Perhaps because of the continuous demand for new material, some of the streaming giants lately have put aside concerns about adaptation and are preferring to directly broadcast the original material in the language in which it was produced – even though it is widely known that the American market is averse to content in a foreign language. This was a big step forward, bold, and reckless.

In this category, two recent productions from Israel stand out. FAUDA and SHTISEL, spoken in Hebrew, Yiddish, and Arabic. They are an absolute success, and their new seasons are awaited with anxiety and anticipation.

STHISEL

Is called a dramedy set in the Orthodox Hasidic community of Jerusalem. The main characters are Akiva (played by Michael Aloni), an artist desperately seeking love; and his father, Rav Shulem, (comedian Dov Glickman), the neighborhood children's school principal, who recently lost his wife. The plot of the series revolves around these two and their families.

I even wrote about the first and second seasons of the series in 2019, as it surprised and pleased me a lot. Although at the time I lived in Jerusalem in the 1970s, I had a real dislike for the Haredim (ultra-Orthodox) in the Mea Shearim and Geula neighborhoods, I enjoyed the show so much that I made a point of meeting one of its authors and directors, Ori Elom, in June 2019 when he and actors Michael Aloni, Dov Glickman, Neta Riskin, and Ayelet Zurer were here in Los Angeles talking to fans and the Jewish community.

After waiting for almost 2 years, it was with happiness that I finally watched the third full season of SHTISEL. In a zoom-chat, I participated, a friend commented on how much he identified in the scripts of this third season, inspiration in Bashevis Singer’s books and also in Chagall's paintings.

I fully agreed with him. I remember that the characters in the series, in one of its episodes, even mention Singer. And the final scene of the season, in which living and dead characters gather in a symbolic supper, everything has to do with Chagal's fantastic paintings.

The other Israeli series that also won hearts and minds around the world, is opposed to Shtisel and passes miles away from Chagal and Singer...

FAUDA…

… Means chaos in Arabic and is an Israeli series that is successful everywhere, even among neighboring Arabs, some of the enemies of Israel. One of its creators and star, Lior Raz, Israeli agent Doron Kavillio, lived in Los Angeles, where he was Arnold Schwarzenegger's bodyguard. He was born in Ma'ale Adumim but raised in Jerusalem. The son of an Iraqi immigrant, Raz grew up speaking Arabic with his father and grandmother. He was a commando in the Israeli navy and served in “Shin Bet”, a mix of Israeli secret service and the FBI. Israelis, after serving 3 years in the country's armed forces every year, do one month of reserve service. It's what they call “miluim”. In Raz's case, for 20 years he was part of the “Duvdevan” unit, specializing in anti-terrorism.

In 1990, when Raz was 19, his girlfriend Iris Azulai was stabbed and killed by a Palestinian terrorist.

With his military experience, his personal life, and his passage through Hollywood, Lior Raz could easily create the series together with Avi Issacharoff, an Israeli journalist specializing in the Palestinian issue. For over 20 years, Lior has been preparing for this role.

Another aspect of the series that is remarkably interesting is the presence in the cast of Arab actors.

UNORTHODOX

Contrary to what most SHTISEL and FAUDA fans might think, Netflix's UNORTHODOX is not an Israeli miniseries. It is a German American production that debuted on Netflix in March 2020.

The series is inspired by Deborah Feldman's 2012 autobiography, "Unorthodox: The Scandalous Rejection of My Hasidic Roots." The four-part miniseries was created and written by Anna Winger and Alexa Karolinski, and directed by Maria Schrader.

Award-winning and applauded by audiences and critics, it tells the story of Esty, a Jewish woman from the ultra-Orthodox community of Williamsburg, New York. After marrying to satisfy her family's expectations, she flees to Berlin, running away from the oppressive reality of her community.

The reason everyone thinks that UNORTHODOX is an Israeli miniseries is due to the presence of Shira Haas, an Israeli actress, who captivated everyone with her portrayal of Ruchami Weiss in SHTISEL.

HOW DO EXPLAIN ALL THIS SUCCESS?

The artist from Israel knows how to tell a good story. No wonder they wrote the greatest bestseller of all time, the Bible. But there are certainly other interesting and unique reasons responsible for this phenomenon.

In 2019 when SHITSEL's main cast actors -- Michael Aloni, Dov Glickman, Neta Riskin, Ayelet Zurer, and their creator Ori Elom were in Los Angeles, they were asked what makes Israeli series so appealing to millions of viewers around the world?

Neta Riskin said that success took the cast by surprise. During the first filming, shooting the scene in which she was assaulted at home, they had little time to do it and she was not satisfied with the result, to which the continuity person soothed her saying: "Relax, no one will watch what we’re doing here!"

Michael Aloni said that was what they thought: who would watch a series about a community of Orthodox Jews, living in this little neighborhood in Jerusalem, without shooting, car racing, violence, and, above all, no sex! For him, the most erotic scene in the series is the one in which Elisheva takes off her wig and shows her gray hair to Kive. Michael also said that in the Haredim neighborhoods in Jerusalem no one has a television or internet. This is forbidden between them. But many watched the series on their cell phones.

Israeli series, in general, have smaller budgets. It was for lack of money that the third season of Shtisel took so long to arrive. To overcome the limitations of the budget, they invest deeply in character development. Whether in the orthodox universe of SHTISEL or the violent conflicts between Israeli forces and terrorists in FAUDA, the construction of the characters and their environment is exquisite.

Any good script teacher tells us that we should write about what we know. And Israeli authors are doing just that. The more honest your script, the more effective.

And I think that when you, as a writer, are faithfully about your microcosm you succeed in touching the hearts of people around the world. We are all human beings essentially with the same dramas and hope.

THE SECRET INGREDIENT

But there is a secret ingredient that gives these Israeli series a special taste. Something that other shows around the world often don't have – this element is called “chutzpah”.

I looked in a dictionary and found some adjectives that help to define it - supreme self-confidence, courage, determination, audacity, daring, outrage, impertinence, insolence, fearlessness, conceit, shamelessness!

All of this is “chutzpah”, and nothing more perfectly defines the Israelite's spirit and soul. Without “chutzpah” Israel would never have survived this long.

Israeli series also have “chutzpah”. They are not afraid to push the envelope and go for it. They are bold. They are not afraid to criticize themselves, their own country. They often generate controversy and radical opinions because of this.

And, most incredible, it gets the most unexpected social results. Dov Glickman, Shule Shtisel, told that he was in Paris with his wife and, while having coffee on a Parisian boulevard, he was approached by 3 Muslim ladies from Lebanon. They watched the series and said that the problems that the Haredim face daily are the same as those of the Muslim community in Lebanon. And, they even said that, who knows, the series would be a way for both peoples to find peace.

If SHTISEL caused this kind of reaction among Lebanese viewers, FAUDA generated unexpected reactions in an even more surprising audience.

When visiting the UAE, Lior Raz was warmly received by several Arab interlocutors. He sat with Palestinians, Iranians, Syrians, Lebanese, Kuwaitis, and people from the Emirates in one place, and felt at home. They were all very receptive. According to him, the magic of the show was to win over people on both sides of the conflict. Extremists among Israelis, after FAUDA, felt empathy for the Palestinians. And on the other side, the Palestinians told him that it was the first time they felt compassion for the Israelis. They connected with the narrative and could see the other side.

This is only possible because the script avoids clichés. Palestinians and Israelis are presented as people of flesh and blood, living real dramas.

THE FUTURE

At the moment the production of content was greatly harmed by the pandemic and broadcast channels and streaming platforms in the US and the world are eagerly seeking content. Israeli series has certainly benefited from this. As a result, recently, streaming platforms are buying international rights and signing co-productions from some of Israel's top providers.

Apple TV+ alone has added five unprecedented Israeli productions and adaptations to its roster in recent months, including a limited series about Hedy Lamarr starring Gal Gadot, which was originally supposed to air on Showtime. So, whoever likes this type of content, be prepared. There’s more to come.

I searched and found some titles, and I'll pass them on here to you.

They are EUPHORIA and OUR BOYS series from HBO, FALSE FLAG from Hulu, STOCKHOLM, and AUTONOMIES from Topic, TEHRAN, and LOSING ALICE from Apple TV +, CONFESSE from the web, as well as VALLEY OF TEARS and ON THE SPECTRUM. I haven't seen any of these yet. The only one I've watched and recommend is Netflix's miniseries WHEN HEROES FLY, with Michael Aloni from SHTISEL; about four Israeli army veterans traveling into the Colombian jungle to rescue a person they thought was dead.

#Israel #Fauda #Shtisel #Betipul #Hatufim #Terapia Session #Homeland #Series #Streaming #Cape #WladimirWeltman