Gesher Theater Launches Extended Jaffa Fest 2026
The Gesher Theater is set to launch the Jaffa Fest 2026 international theater festival on September 15th. This annual event, supported by the Tel Aviv-Jaffa Municipality and the Ministry of Culture and Sport, aims to foster new encounters, events, and theatrical discoveries. This year's festival will feature a special "Krymov-Fest" program dedicated to the influential director Dmitry Krymov. Krymov will engage with the audience as a director, playwright, educator, and filmmaker. The "Krymov-Fest" includes the premiere of the play "Bloody Mary," a live recording of "Children's Unchildlike Question," an acting masterclass, a screening of Krymov's debut film "Everything is Fine," and a presentation of the "Zima" magazine with Sergey Nikolaevich, Evgenia Dodina, and Dmitry Krymov.
The festival will also honor three recently deceased prominent directors, Evgeny Arye, Rimas Tuminas, and Yuri Butusov, with a "Memory of the Greats" series featuring screenings of their plays "Oresteia," "War and Peace," and "R" ("The Government Inspector"). Playwright, director, and theater critic Marina Davydova will be a special guest, presenting her new play "Berlin, Charlottenburg" in a premiere reading. Emerging talents from "Gesher Studio," including Neta Rot with her debut novel "Tamara Lies" and Noa Carmi with her "Date on Shenkin" project, will also be showcased. The festival program includes a pop-up performance by Good Sign Theatre, "Letters to Exes," based on anonymous letters from audience members to former lovers, and a concert by the band FromScratch featuring Gesher Theater actors.
Gesher Theater General Director Lena Krayndlina stated that due to the current "crazy universe," the festival will extend beyond a few days and run until the end of the year, creating a continuous space for events. She described the current program as a "tasting" to build anticipation for future offerings. Krayndlina emphasized theater's role in connecting people, countries, and cultures, noting that Israeli theater is adapting to new realities and formats. The festival will feature artists who have been displaced, those continuing to create amidst global upheaval, and will focus on memory, connection, and the shared experience of theater. The festival's continuation, she asserted, proves that theater is alive as long as people are willing to meet, listen, laugh, argue, remember, and embrace the new.
