Habima Theatre

• 1. Introduction

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  Habima Theatre began not in a grand hall in Tel Aviv but in an amateur troupe in Białystok, a city that was then part of the Grodno Governorate of the Russian Empire. Nahum Lazarevich Tsemakh, born in 1887, founded it in 1912 with the ambition of staging plays entirely in Hebrew at a time when that language was rarely spoken on any stage in the world. His co-founder, Menahem Gnessin, was also among its earliest actors. From those modest beginnings, the company would travel across continents, survive the pressures of the Soviet state, and eventually settle in Mandate Palestine before becoming the national theatre of the state of Israel in 1958. What forces shaped a travelling troupe of Jewish Polish actors into an institution of national significance? And how did a rehearsal hall in Moscow become a stepping stone toward a stage in Tel Aviv?

• 2. Moscow's Unlikely Shelter

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  Russian authorities banned Habima's performances because the troupe staged plays in Hebrew, drew on Jewish folk tradition, and addressed themes of Jewish life. That ban forced the company to become itinerant, moving from city to city rather than establishing a fixed home. Relief of a kind came in 1918, when the Moscow Art Theatre agreed to take the troupe under its wing. Many regard this arrangement as Habima's true institutional beginning. Konstantin Stanislavsky, the Moscow Art Theatre's guiding figure, arranged for the mainly Jewish Polish actors to receive training under director Yevgeny Vakhtangov. Even Joseph Stalin, then serving as the People's Commissar for Nationalities Affairs, formally authorized the theatre's creation. Yet Soviet politics ran in contradictory directions. The Yevsektsiya, an organization that wielded influence over Jewish cultural life under the Bolshevik government, moved to cut off state funding to Habima, labelling it counter-revolutionary. The company found itself sheltered by some arms of the Soviet state while under attack from others, a tension that would push the troupe toward the door it eventually walked through in 1926.

• 3. The International Tour

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  In 1926, Habima left the Soviet Union and toured across Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and the United States. The productions met with great success in each country. A split emerged in 1927: Tsemakh and some of the actors chose to remain in the United States rather than continue with the rest of the company. This fracture divided the troupe's leadership and membership, sending the organization in two directions at once. The contingent that did not stay in America turned eastward, carrying the company toward Mandate Palestine and the next chapter of its life. Before departing Europe, the troupe also passed through the Polish city of Lodz, where a pre-war photographer and artist named Mendel Grossman photographed the actors and actresses from the wings of the stage. Grossman later described the visit as having changed his life.

• 4. Taking Root in Palestine

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  The members who continued from the tour brought Habima to Mandate Palestine in 1928. During the 1928-29 season, the Habima Players staged two productions under the direction of Aleksei Dikiy, who came from the Moscow Art Theatre. The first, Ha-otsar, translated as The Treasure, was a rendering of Sholem Aleichem's Yiddish play Der Oytser; it premiered on the 29th of December 1928. The second production, Keter David, meaning David's Crown, premiered on the 23rd of May 1929 in Tel Aviv. It was an adaptation by Hebrew writer Isaac Lamdan of a 17th-century Spanish drama, Los cabellos de Absalón, written by the dramatist Calderón. In 1930, the company traveled to Berlin, where it staged Shakespeare's Twelfth Night under the direction of Michael Chekhov, and Karl Gutzkow's Uriel Acosta under Alexander Granovski. The company finally settled permanently in Palestine in 1931, and by 1945 it had built a theatre in Tel Aviv, moving in before the building was even fully complete.

• 5. National Recognition and Growth

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  Israel's government officially designated Habima the national theatre in 1958, the same year it received the Israel Prize for theatre. That year was notable in its own right: it was the first time the Israel Prize had ever been awarded to an organization rather than an individual. By the 21st century, Habima employed 80 actors, with another 120 staff members working across the complex. The institution had grown from a banned troupe in Białystok into a fully staffed national company occupying the center of Tel Aviv's cultural life.

• 6. The Renovated Stage

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  In January 2012, Habima reopened after four and a half years of renovations. Architect Ram Karmi was commissioned to redesign the historic building, and more than NIS 100 million was invested in the project. The work added 500 square meters of floor space and three new rehearsal rooms, and the building's four auditoriums were completely rebuilt. Each auditorium was given a distinct size and color. Rovina is blue and seats 930 people; Meskin is lavender and seats 320; Bertonov, also known as Bamartef, is green and seats 220; and the smallest space, Habima 4, formerly known as Heineken, is wood-panelled and seats 170. The differences in scale mean the building can now host an intimate studio production and a large-scale main-stage work at the same time, a flexibility the original building could not have offered.