TV turns to the promised land

Israel is following Denmark and Sweden’s lead in offering British viewers dramas such as the inspiration for Homeland
Gritty reality: Hatufim, the Israeli drama which inspired the new Channel 4 series Homeland, starring Damian Lewis and Claire Danes, is set to be screened on Sky Arts in May
5 March 2012

Borgen, schmorgen. The latest must-see chunk of foreign TV for the London chatterati comes not from Denmark, which gave us Borgen and The Killing. Or Italy (Romanzo Criminale, Inspector Montalbano). Or France (Spiral). It’s from Israel.

Sky Arts has just started screening BeTipul, a mesmerising drama series about the sessions between a shrink and his patients. In May, the channel broadcasts Hatufim, aka Prisoners of War, about the reverberations that follow the release of two Israeli Defence Force reservists after 17 years of captivity and torture by Arab terrorists. Both series originally appeared on Israel’s Keshet channel in 2009.

Of course, watching BeTipul may induce a sense of déjà vu if you are a devotee of HBO’s In Treatment, which is a straight lift from the Israeli series and with Gabriel Byrne replacing the baggier Assi Dyan as the psychiatrist. “I was aware that I was choosing universal, almost archetypal situations,” says BeTipul’s creator, Hagai Levi. “That made it easily translatable and adaptable.” The show has been sold to 12 countries.

British viewers who have been enthralled by Homeland, the Showtime thriller currently screening on Channel 4, meanwhile, may catch an echo of Hatufim, on which it is based. The US version ramps up the paranoia, modifying Hatufim’s premise into the tale of one freed, damaged soldier (Damian Lewis) and the CIA agent (Claire Danes) who believes he has been “turned” by his Islamist captors. Despite the stellar cast and high production values of the US series, the Hebrew original is subtler.

British and American TV have woken up to the potential of Israel’s unplundered televisual riches. In America, NBC is remaking Pillars of Smoke, a mystery series set in the Golan Heights and described by one commentator as a combination of “Twin Peaks, Northern Exposure and Lost”. CBS will broadcast a domestic version of the sitcom Tall and Greenbaum later this year. You can bet UK schedulers will be avidly studying these shows’ viewing figures, and their own purchasing budgets.

The cultural traffic isn’t only on the small screen. Lionsgate has optioned the original drama Ha-emet Ha-eroma (The Naked Truth) and the comedy Mitlahevet (Excited). Salma Hayek’s production company is remaking the Israeli film Bonjour Monsieur Shlomi as Diego Ascending. These movies follow in the wake of The Debt, John Madden’s film about a Mossad plot to kidnap a Nazi war criminal, starring Helen Mirren and Jessica Chastain, and adapted from the 2007 original, Ha-Hov.

What is it about drama from the Promised Land that’s catching the imagination on both sides of the Atlantic? “Our culture is closer than most people know, or like to admit, to American culture,” says Hagai Levi. “Also, because we are a new society, with no tradition, unlike Europe, part of our culture is to invent things, to make up stories.” He adds that, given the dearth of production money in Israel, projects are refined to a high level before anything is shot.

Omri Marcus, a development partner of the international TV and Media company ProSieben Red Arrow, offers a further explanation of why drama from his homeland chimes specifically with British audiences. “Israeli TV was established in the late Sixties with the knowledge and experience of BBC people who came over to supervise,” he says. “Since the early days of the Israeli industry and until the early Nineties, there was only one channel that broadcast original content and BBC series.”

This, he adds, is why people of his generation pepper their Hebrew conversation with Anglicisms such as “ciggie”, “telly” and “shenanigans”. Now, perhaps, this trend will be reversed, and we’ll start picking up wider cultural reference points from our exposure to superb Israeli shows. So get watching. Enjoy. Mazel Tov.

BeTipul is on Sky Arts on Mondays at 9.30pm. Hatufim will be shown in May.

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