Literature / Theater / Music / Art

The Haifa City Center Theater is the first professional independent (fringe) theater in the city. Yigal and Tamara Amitai and Adv. Sarah Doron founded the Theater in 1996. Its name relates to the initiative to revitalize Haifa's city center (Hadar) as a municipal cultural hub, believing that artists in general and theater people in particular can serve as a bridgehead. The initial troupe of actors was composed of local and ex-locals forced to leave the city, who were happy to return to create in it. Later on, graduates of the Haifa University Theater Department joined the Theater. 

"We believe that even today, a collective idealist fringe theater conducting a dialogue with the community, can serve as a bridgehead for revitalizing the city center as a  municipal cultural center, which is essential for turning Haifa into a sizzling city."

The Artistic Idea and the Repertoire

In the early years, the Haifa City Center Theater dealt with quality and alternative theater productions from the world of children:

Anna Louise and Anton - in both versions, for young and older children.

Emil and the detectives

The plays were presented at the Haifa Children's Theater Festival in 1996, 1998 and 2004.

I Want to Be an Opera Singer - an original opera for beginners.

Since 2002, the theater has been involved in adult works, based on plays by Tamara Amitai:

Golda and the Three Bears

I Have a Friend

Little Red Riding Hood and the White Cap Blue

These plays are sort of fairy tales for adults, who, under the seemingly naive understatement of rhyming text, convey sharp messages.

Photos: Ilya Gersberg

www.artamitai.com