Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Israel News

Albom Gets the Hebrew Treatment

They’ll laugh. They’ll cry. They might even get a hug from the author.

Theatergoers at two of Israel’s top playhouses will be joined in early May by writer Mitch Albom, who will attend the first Hebrew-language performances of “Tuesdays With Morrie,” his best-selling 1997 memoir.

A co-production of the Haifa Municipal Theatre and Tel Aviv’s Cameri Theatre, the show will premiere in both cities in the presence of the author, who’s sold more than 11 million copies of “Morrie” and has seen the book translated into dozens of languages. The play follows the real-life relationship between the author and Morrie Schwartz, a Brandeis University sociology professor who battled Lou Gehrig’s disease before his death in 1995. The book and the play catch up with Albom 16 years after graduation, when the writer, a sports columnist, learned of his former teacher’s illness on television, reuniting with him and recording his insights and life lessons.

Performed off-Broadway in New York in 2002, “Morrie” has also been adapted for the small screen, winning four Emmys in 2000 for a TV movie starring Jack Lemmon. The Israeli production stars stage actor Yossi Gerber as the title character, and regular TV and film performer Yiftach Klein as Albom. In addition to attending the show’s Israeli premieres — May 5 in Haifa, and the next day in Tel Aviv — Albom is using his trip to promote Tishkofet, an Israeli organization that provides support to patients who have serious illnesses, as well as to their doctors and loved ones.

The author will also celebrate the Hebrew-language release of “Have a Little Faith,” a 2009 memoir partly inspired by Albom’s experience writing a eulogy for a rabbi.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.