American TV with an Israeli accent
Filed under: A New Reality, Business, General, Israeliness, Pop Culture, tv
The cast of the Israeli version of 'Life Isn't Everything' with Avi Kushnir in the middle.
Then Israel became the ‘startup nation,’ vaunted for its hi-tech prowess. Now the trend seems to be broadening out… into television.
Israeli TV show premises are big in demand in Hollywood. In addition to the series that have already been made over the years based on Israeli shows like ‘In Treatment’ (B’Tipul) and the short-lived ‘Traffic Light’ (Ramzor), there are currently three Israeli series that are in development by US studios.
The latest is the YES Stars series ‘Danny Hollywood’, about a young filmmaker who investigates the mysterious death of her musical idol. She travels back in time, meets and falls in love with him, and then tries to prevent his untimely death.
The CW network bought the rights to the comedy-drama, with A-level executive producers Mark Harmon of ‘NCIS,’ Eric and Kim Tannenbaum of ‘Two and a Half Men,’ on board.
‘Danny Hollywood’ joins ‘Life Isn’t Everything’ on CBS, NBC’s adaptation of the mystery drama ‘Timrot Ashan,’ or (Pillars Of Smoke), and HBO’s The Naked Truth.
‘Life isn’t Everything’ based on Avi Kushner’s popular “Hahaim Ze Lo Hakol’ was brought to Hollywood by Noa Tisbhi, the successful Israeli actress/media mogul who also brokered the deal a few years back that brought ‘In Treatment’ to HBO.
The creator of the Israeli ‘Life Isn’t Everything,’ Daniel Lappin, will be involved in writing the US version of the show. Lappin and Tishbi will also serve as executive producers along with Mike Sikowitz who worked on ‘Friends.’
Life Isn’t Everything is about a middle-aged, recently divorced couple who were bad at marriage and discover they are now really bad at divorce – messy, can’t help but being involved in each others’ lives. It produced 150 episodes and recently wrapped its ninth and final season on Channel 2 to big ratings. 33% of all Israeli viewers tuned in for the series finale.
‘Pillars of Smoke’ is a drama, in its second season in Israel, set in the Golan Heights that follows the police investigation into the disappearance of a cult the area. It’s been called parts Twin Peaks, Northern Exposure and Lost. It was pitched to NBC by the owner of Herzliya Studios and the HOT cable company Alon Aranya, who will serve as the US show’s executive producer.
So, Israeli parents, instead of pushing your kids into hit-tech, medicine and law, it looks like the future lies in TV.
Leo DiCaprio sees gold in Israeli startup
Filed under: A New Reality, Blogging, Business, General, Israeliness, Life, Movies, Technology
Leo DiCaprio may have ended his long-term relationship with Israeli super model Bar Raphaeli, but it seems like his relationship with Israel is still going strong.
The A-list actor recently participated in a $4 million first-round funding for an Israeli visual media platform start-up company – Mobli Ltd. – and is also acting in an advisory capacity for the company, hi-tech insider newsletters reported last week.
Mobli has invented a new photo-sharing application that allows users to share images in real time.
So, for example, at a concert or sporting event, users can receive images of the event from different angles simply by searching for photos taken in other parts of the venue.
According to TechCrunch, users can connect to Mobli with Facebook to bring in a social element to the application and share photos with friends.
For example, concert-goers, celebrity fans, wedding attendees, and families can all share pictures and videos of an occasion, experience or interest with like-minded communities. All pictures/videos are geotagged (and can be optionally tagged to a Foursquare venue) to further narrow collections.
The app offers 22 free filters. Mobli uniquely applies filters on a visual basis but also in relation to location, so users can frame photos taken in a sports stadium in team colors, or taken at a conference with branded filters. Clearly, there’s a huge opportunity for brands to work with Mobli to sponsor filters.
According to the Blonde2.0 blog, “Think of Mobli as a visual engine that enables you to do a 360 around the world and see who’s doing what, where and when. People could be sitting in a café in Paris, watching a show in London, eating at a restaurant in New York, and Mobli brings all these visuals together to enable us all to see what a beautiful world we live in.”
Mobli was founded just over a year ago, and along with its headquarters in Israel, has offices in New York. According to the company, Paris Hilton and David Arquette number among the service’s other famous users, and they says 10,000 people are signing up every day.
DiCaprio’s interest in Mobil isn’t just about which angles make him look better on screen, evidently.
“It’s about him knowing and understanding branding and marketing,” Mobil CEO and co-founder Moshiko Hogeg told VentureBeat. Hogeg is pictured on the company’s website along with a dozen other young, hip-looking Israeli employees. It’s likely their enthusiasm, spark and ingenuity is what attracted DiCaprio to see the Israeli startup light.
An Israeli Halloween
Filed under: A New Reality, Art, Business, Entertainment, Environment, Food, General, History and Culture, Holidays, Immigrant Moments, Israeliness, Life, Movies, Pop Culture
Halloween cookies from the Cupcake Caterers
Not having celebrated myself growing up — rabbi’s kid, although we did hand out candy to all the neighborhood kids — I don’t have any strong connections to the holiday. And because we were the rabbi’s family, our house did not usually get pelted by raw eggs and such — neighborhood protection. So it was the best of all worlds; appreciating someone else’s ‘chag‘, despite the anti-Semitic associations (we lived in a fairly non-Jewish neighborhood) but not having to take it on ourselves.
Living in Israel, I haven’t really given it much thought, except for cruising through various online store catalogs for Halloween costumes that could work well for Purim. But something’s happening this year, at least through my lens. Halloween has always been different for me than Thanksgiving, which I’ve always celebrated here in Israel, and have continued to do so, despite light censure from Israeli-born nieces, nephews and stepdaughters who think that the American-born adults in their lives are crazy to continue with such a blatantly chulnik (Israeli slangish for ‘foreigner’) celebration.\
Maybe it’s Facebook, and the exposure offered to what other people are doing and celebrating. Or perhaps it’s that global village thing, in which we adapt and adopt others’ trends and rituals because they seem worthwhile. All I know is, Halloween is out there, now translated to ליל כל הקדושים, All Hallows Eve.
There are parties advertised online, mostly hosted by Americans, exhorting invitees to “Do it the same in Israel as we would at home!!” There’s also the potential for doubling up on costumes, wearing what you wore for Purim on Halloween, and vice versa. And there are the comments from many, missing that easy availability of candy corn, half off Halloween candy the day after.
Halloween isn’t the American version of Purim, as Senator John McCain once mistakenly noted, despite the similarities. But it does have its appeal, particularly to those of us who hail from the land of the U.S.A. Check out the cookies made by Sidra Collins Muoio, owner of Cupcake Caterers, for her co-workers.
And, finally, there’s Rabies, Israel’s first horror film, which had its premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival last May and played in Toronto in honor of Halloween.
If it’s a celebration of candy, costumes and good times, I’m actually all for it. And I can never argue with an Israeli film that succeeds on North American terms.
Nimby
Filed under: Business, coexistence, General, Immigrant Moments, Israeliness, Life, News, Politics, Sports
A story I wrote last week for JTA brought me to a neighborhood near my own — literally, a 10-minute walk — that I had never visited before. Two neighborhoods, really.
The first was Givat Hamatos, or Hill of the Airplane, named for a plane that crashed there during the 1967 Six-Day War. Givat Hamatos is now known as the latest site for Green Line construction, as the prime minister is planning on extending his contiguous Jerusalem line that will cut off any possible Palestinian string of neighborhoods, as well as Palestinian East Jerusalem. But until a few years ago, Givat Hamatos was the caravan neighborhood for Russian and Ethiopian immigrants, as well as some down-on-their-luck Israelis, like Barak Hasid’s family, interviewed in the story.
What struck me about Barak Hasid and Givat Hamatos, is how close he is to my home, and our very different existences. His family has made do with very little for quite a while, and has found some kind of peace — or at least he has — in their story. A lemonade out of lemons kind of narrative. And then I drove through Beit Safafa, the adjacent neighborhood, trying to get a sense of the place, the people, and the location, which is sandwiched between Givat Hamatos and the Talpiot industrial zone on two sides.
It’s a nice neighborhood with fairly large homes, a very new soccer field (thanks to the Jerusalem Foundation), and is the home to Yad B’Yad, or Hand in Hand, the Jerusalem branch of Israel’s bilingual Arab-Hebrew schools. I can’t tell you much more than that, because I didn’t find anyone to speak to me. But I’m still working on that. I figure there has to be more to the Beit Safafa story, given its history and existence of coexistence.
It’s strange to think of a possible residential neighborhood down the road from me as a) settlement construction and b) possibly part of a future Palestinian Jerusalem. What I do know is real estate locations, and there’s no question that Givat Hamatos works from a geographical standpoint. It’s off a main road, close to a busy business area and has access to major transportation. But nothing is ever that simple in these parts, so we’ll have to see what happens in this particular section of my backyard.
Machne online
Filed under: A New Reality, Business, design, Food, General, History and Culture, Israeliness
Photo montage #1
There are maps of each of the shuk streets, with lists of each stall and then pages for each and every stall, whether it’s the beloved Cafe Mizrachi, a newer addition to the market on Rechov Hashezif, Fishen Chips, a, yes, fish ‘n chips place on Rechov Haegoz, or an old standby such as Atliz Refael, a butcher of 37 years standing on Rechov HaTut.
Photo caption #2
It is a little annoying to be doing your shopping in the shuk, only to have to bypass yet another group of people expounding on the relative merits of one stall’s collection of guavas. But I’m sure there are many shuk old-timers offended by those of us sitting at Cafe Mizrachi with our perfect hafuchs and ricotta brioche.
No doubt they’d raise their eyebrows in disdain at the idea of a website, no less. But hey, it is helpful. Next up: A shuk app.
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