Israeli Cinema Gets a Warm Welcome in New York, Then an Ugly Joke Threatens It
Shuli Rand at the premiere of "The Jester" at the 2026 Tribeca Festival / Avner Shavit
When we were children, we were taught the following sentence, "Behave nicely, or we will not invite you again." Elon Gold, the American comedian who stars in the Israeli film "The Jester," apparently did not hear it, or did not absorb it. This week he caused a disgraceful and unnecessary incident when he was interviewed on the red carpet for the delightful film, which was shot in Israel. When asked how the experience was, he joked at the expense of a New York Times investigation according to which Israel trained dogs to rape Palestinians. He said, "Only two dogs raped me." The interviewer, the American Zionist influencer Lizzy Savetsky, replied, "I thought they only rape Palestinians," and he answered, "No, I got a dog too." The exchange may have been intended only for people with a sense of humor like Gold and Savetsky, but it quickly spread online and set off a storm against the film, including calls to boycott everyone involved and to stop inviting Israeli films to festivals.
As part of the campaign, internet users who have not seen the film are going to sites such as IMDb and Letterboxd, writing negative reviews and lowering its rating. "The Jester" had major potential, at least in the Jewish American market, but this affair is already appearing in every Google search connected to it and on its Wikipedia page, and could perhaps endanger its release in America. Worse still, it will make it even harder for blue and white works to be accepted to the festival in the future. For now, Tribeca has limited itself to a condemnation, but who knows what the future consequences will be.
In recent years, the Tribeca Festival has remained one of the last true friends of Israeli cinema, screening, among others, "Closer" and "Foreign Language." This year it screened two Israeli films, "The Jester" and "What Will Come" (which we will discuss later). As I understand it, there was strong opposition within the festival to accepting them, and they are there largely thanks to its director, Jane Rosenthal, who deserves the title Righteous Among the Nations. But will she be able to withstand the pressure in the future? Gold's joke provided significant ammunition to voices calling to expel Israeli cinema from the event. Despite everything, it will be a hit in Israel.
The cast of "The Jester" at the Tribeca Festival / Walla, Avner Shavit
It must be said, on the other hand, that in recent years we have heard countless horrific jokes about Israeli victims on October 7, not to mention denial of Hamas crimes and especially the sexual crimes in that massacre. Anyone now outraged by Gold's joke previously justified anti-Israeli jokes with arguments about freedom of expression and the like, which have suddenly been forgotten in the discussion. However, it is clear that this is a disgraceful and shocking joke, which presumably the entire film crew, and hopefully most of the Israeli film industry, finds as repulsive as any hypocrite at Columbia University. It is also so unnecessary. Instead of understanding the situation, respecting the event and using the platform to spread messages of love and peace, why pour fuel on the fire?
All of this is sad as well because "The Jester" is a film with a big heart and a big soul, and in other circumstances it should not have caused any controversy. It is another collaboration between director Gidi Dar and star Shuli Rand, whose story is in many ways the story of Israel. They first worked together in the early 1990s as two secular men on "Eddie King," one of the most unique films in the history of Israeli cinema. When Rand returned to religion, they created "Ushpizin" together, considered the first Hasidic film, and it was a major success in Israel and America. A few years ago they collaborated on another hit, "Legend of Destruction," an acclaimed animated film about the destruction of the Second Temple. In "The Jester," they continue their journey through the depths of Jewish history and culture, this time with what is one of the first cinematic tributes to the figure of the badkhn, that jovial Eastern European Jew who used to entertain audiences at various festive ceremonies, such as weddings, and who is seen by some as a kind of spiritual father of the stand-up comedian.
Shuli Rand and Tzofit Grant / Walla, Avner Shavit
Rand plays a Jerusalem badkhn who has fallen from greatness and now has to restore the crown to its former glory. To fund his daughter's wedding, he begs to perform at another wedding, where the happy father is an old friend, played by Tal Friedman, who moved to America and became rich. But the latter has already booked another badkhn, a more modern American one, played by our acquaintance Elon Gold. The competition between the two for center stage, which also symbolizes the conflict between tradition and progress in Judaism, is only one of the film's many plotlines, and there is never a dull moment.
Rand and Dar are among the most reliable duos in Israeli cinema, and this is their best film alongside "Ushpizin." The dialogue, moving between Hebrew, English and especially Yiddish, is witty and full of life; the story is rich and full of turns; the drama is emotional; and the result does justice to a sense of time and place. It is interesting to note that while Rand returned to religion, Malka Goldmann, who plays his daughter, דווקא returned to secular life, after growing up in Meah Shearim as the daughter of a rebbe, and today lives in America as a completely secular woman. In any case, both are excellent, as are Tal Friedman and the other actors, led by Eli Gorenstein, a favorite of this column. And what about Elon Gold? To be perfectly honest, he is annoying in the film too, but that is what the role requires. There is no knowing what will happen to the film in America, and it is hard to be optimistic, but it is likely that in the Holy Land it will be a major box office hit, and rightly so. It will probably also be a major contender at the Ophir Awards. Shuli Rand has already won two of them, and it is בהחלט possible that he will win a third.
The second Israeli film screened at Tribeca was less amusing, it begins with a suicide scene. This is "What Will Come," the second film by Ruti Pribar, who starred at the festival a few years ago with "Asia," which won prestigious prizes there, in years when Israeli cinema was much less unwelcome. Ronit Yudkevitz, with her extraordinary class and sensitivity, plays a woman trying to start her life anew after her partner took his own life. She leaves the moshav where they lived, travels south, starts working at a hotel and forms a romantic connection with its manager, played by Yaakov Zada-Daniel, who is, incidentally, 14 years younger than the star. This is one of the first times we see such an age gap in Israeli cinema, although the writer-director said after the screening that the gap did not exist in the script but was created organically during casting.
In any case, the acting here is excellent, and as in "Asia," the one who steals the show is cinematographer Daniella Nowitz, which is also a rare case in Israeli cinema in which both the director and the cinematographer are women. Relative to a film that begins as it does, and perhaps as its title suggests, "What Will Come" is actually a fairly uplifting and optimistic work, showing that there is always a chance to make amends, start over and, as Rihanna put it, find love in a hopeless place. Clearly, a drama of this kind will have a harder time at the box office than "The Jester," but we will certainly see it at the Ophir Awards as well.
A third film with a clear Israeli connection also had its world premiere at the festival, "Noga." It was directed by the Austrian brothers Juno and Benji Bergmann, but produced by Dana Stern, and it is about Noga Erez, currently, and perhaps ever, the most successful Israeli singer in the world. As Erez herself says in the film, her music belongs equally to her partner in life and work, Uri Russo, who also appears here. The documentary follows the two as they achieve unimaginable successes like the warm embrace from Billie Eilish and Robbie Williams, but also through crises. The central one comes, of course, after October 7, which leads to a campaign of hatred and boycott against the musician, simply because she was born in Israel.
And speaking of birth, at a certain point Erez realizes that the only way to fight hatred and death is with love and life, and decides that the time has come for her to have a child. And if we are talking about children, the documentary takes a brave and unapologetic approach and calls things by their name throughout, both when it describes what Israel went through on the day of the massacre and afterward, and when it presents the hypocrisy and violence of the boycott movement. Apparently only Austria can produce a film so pro-Israel these days. The film is fascinating to watch and engrossing for several reasons, the intimate and comprehensive access, or at least so it appears, that the directors were granted to their two subjects, the cinematography by Roi Mord and editing by Yonatan Weinstein, both at the highest level, the array of historical and hysterical events Erez has been part of, and of course, above all, her music. Nothing will stop her.
Noga Erez at Tribeca / GettyImages, Slaven Vlasic
