Daniel Efrat

{{Infobox person

| name =

| image = Daniel Efrat (cropped).jpg

| alt = A man smiling

| caption = Efrat in 2012

| birth_name =

| native_name = דניאל אפרת

| birth_date = {{Birth date and age|1982|08|04|df=yes}}

| birth_place = Tel Aviv, Israel

| education = Beit Zvi School for the Performing Arts (MA)

| occupation = {{hlist|Theatre director|translator|actor}}

| father = {{ill|Ovad Efrat|he|עובד אפרת}}

| mother = {{ill|Daphna Efrat|he|דפנה_אפרת}}

| relatives =

}}

Daniel Efrat ({{langx|he|דניאל אפרת}}; born 4 August 1982) is an Israeli actor, theatre director, and translator. He trained at Beit Zvi, where he first began translating (English into Hebrew), before joining the Beit Lessin Theater youth company. He has also acted in film and television. He has won various awards in Israel for his translation and direction, as well as acting awards.

Early life and education

Daniel Efrat was born in Tel Aviv, Israel, on 4 August 1982, to musician {{ill|Ovad Efrat|he|עובד אפרת}} and scholar {{ill|Daphna Efrat|he|דפנה_אפרת}} née Tamir.{{cite news|last=בר-און|first=ערן|date=17 July 2011|title=פרס תרגום ע"ש עדה בן נחום לדניאל אפרת|language=he|work=Ynet|url=https://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-4096438,00.html|access-date=5 January 2022}}{{cite web|url=https://www.openu.ac.il/about/gender/researcher/Pages/Prof_Daphna_Ephrat.aspx|title= פרופ' דפנה אפרת|language=he|website=Open University of Israel|access-date=5 January 2022}}{{cite web|url=https://dbs.anumuseum.org.il/skn/en/c6/e8071721/Personalities/Agronsky_Varda|access-date=13 December 2021|title=Varda Agronsky 5343|website=ANU - Museum of the Jewish People|archive-date=31 December 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211231051430/https://dbs.anumuseum.org.il/skn/en/c6/e8071721/Personalities/Agronsky_Varda|url-status=live}} As a child, his father's musician friends would stay at their house, but Efrat said that he was not very excited to see them and that he preferred getting to explore recording studios. He grew up with a relatively liberal family, though he first read Spring Awakening at home when he was fourteen and identified with its themes of stifled adolescence. He has reflected that "there was no real musical theater in Israel when [he] was growing up", so instead he dreamed about it.{{Cite web |title='Flashdance the Musical' comes of age in Tel Aviv |url=https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/culture/flashdance-the-musical-comes-of-age-in-tel-aviv-591394 |access-date=2022-05-06 |website=The Jerusalem Post {{!}} JPost.com |date=3 June 2019 |language=en-US}}

Efrat left home when he was seventeen because he was scared of coming out to his parents, saying he left because he "was angry at them for the reaction [he] expected"; he told them he was gay shortly after he left and they were understanding: "in the first conversation with my mother{{nbsp}}... this issue came up, I told her, and she told dad, and the next morning I got a call from him [during which] he told me how much he loved me."

Around the same time he was sent a conscription order for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), but was not signed up, saying: "I did not ask to be released. I was released. I got there, they saw what was sitting in front of them and decided". He suggested in an interview with Makor Rishon that it was related to his sexuality. He had also not wanted to enlist personally, and his parents reacted badly to this; his father had been in the elite Shayetet 13.{{cite web|url=https://www.makorrishon.co.il/nrg/online/47/ART2/108/976.html|title=כשדניאל מתעורר: ריאיון עם דניאל אפרת|language=he|year=2010|access-date=7 January 2022|website=Makor Rishon}}

He attended the Tel Aviv School of Arts, Thelma Yellin School of Arts and Beit Zvi School for the Performing Arts, where he earned an MA and received awards for outstanding first-year student and outstanding graduating student. He also received the outstanding graduate award from Thelma Yellin. Efrat graduated from Beit Zvi in 2003.{{cite web|title=Program of Studies|url=https://www.beit-zvi.com/?CategoryID=164&ArticleID=98|access-date=13 February 2022|website=Beit Zvi|language=Hebrew}} He began translating while at Beit Zvi, saying that he really wanted to perform The Rocky Horror Show for his senior project in 2002, but no Hebrew translation existed for it, so he did it himself. When instructors heard he had translated a musical, they encouraged him to do some more. His father's band, HaClique, had debuted following a 1980 screening of The Rocky Horror Picture Show at the {{ill|Cinema Paris|he|קולנוע פריז}} in Tel Aviv.{{cite web|last=אביב|first=מאת אורי זר|date=4 March 2015|title=קיצור תולדות הקליק|url=https://timeout.co.il/%D7%A7%D7%99%D7%A6%D7%95%D7%A8-%D7%AA%D7%95%D7%9C%D7%93%D7%95%D7%AA-%D7%94%D7%A7%D7%9C%D7%99%D7%A7/|access-date=17 January 2022|website=טיים אאוט|language=he-IL}}{{cite web|title=תיאטרון - חתרנות מתורגמת|url=https://www.habama.co.il/Pages/Description.aspx?Subj=1&Area=1&ArticleID=12167|access-date=13 February 2022|website=Habama|language=Hebrew}}

Career

Efrat first acted as a child, in the 1991 American television movie Iran: Days of Crisis directed by Kevin Connor, credited as Daniel Ephrat.{{cite news|title=TNT Movie: Iran: Days of Crisis|date=2 October 1991|last=Haring|first=Bruce|newspaper=Variety Daily|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RxHbPxbBM1AC|isbn=9780824037963}}{{cite web|title=אמנים - דניאל אפרת|url=https://www.habama.co.il/Pages/ArtPerson.aspx?PeopleID=1741|access-date=13 February 2022|website=Habama|language=Hebrew}} On television he appeared in Hamachon. His first major film role was in Nadav Levitan's 1998 Aviv (Real Father).{{cite web|title=Daniel Efrat|url=https://mubi.com/cast/daniel-efrat|access-date=6 January 2022|website=MUBI}} He went on to act in several other Levitan films. He then played lead role Menni in the Yair Hochner film Yeladim Tovim (Good Boys), a film about rent boys.{{cite web|title=Good Boys Film (Archived for educational purposes)|url=https://www.goodboysfilm.com/|access-date=6 January 2022|website=Good Boys Film}}{{cite web|title=Yeladim Tovim (2005)|url=https://www2.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b8ba1f96e|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220106055627/https://www2.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b8ba1f96e|url-status=dead|archive-date=6 January 2022|access-date=6 January 2022|website=BFI}} He won the Best Actor award at the 2006 Tampa International Gay and Lesbian Film Festival for the film.{{cite news|last=Slepian|first=Arthur|date=12 February 2011|title=Good Boys|url=https://awiderbridge.org/good-boys/|access-date=6 January 2022|website=A Wider Bridge}}{{cite web|date=12 November 2008|title=indieWIRE INTERVIEW | Going Full Frontal: Yair Hochner's "Antarctica"|url=https://www.indiewire.com/2008/11/indiewire-interview-going-full-frontal-yair-hochners-antarctica-71388/|access-date=6 January 2022|website=IndieWire}}

He stayed in the theatre and began translating, adapting, and directing. In 2008, the youth theatre group at the Beit Lessin Theater was formed, and Efrat joined. This year he performed in and wrote Broadway Corner Freshman, a comedy revue musical featuring songs and condensed plots of popular Israeli musicals. It was praised as a "loving and nostalgic tribute".{{cite web|title=ברודווי פינת פרישמן | וואלה! יורם לימודים|url=http://yoram.walla.co.il/item/1404040|access-date=13 February 2022|website=לימודים | יורם ערוץ הלימודים של ישראל|language=he}} At Beit Lessin, he performed in a variety of musicals, including Hair as Woof, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat as Joseph and Benjamin, Blood Brothers as Eddie and Sammy, and Cabaret as the Emcee.

In 2010, as part of Beit Lessin's youth theatre group, he won the Rabinowitz Charitable Foundation's Ada Ben Nachum Award for his translation of Spring Awakening, starring Ninet Tayeb, which he also performed in and produced. The citation, which also mentioned his 2009 translation of A Midsummer Night's Dream, said that he "successfully faced the special challenges posed by the original text: a dialogue that is a mixture of period language, stylistic poetic language and contemporary dialect". Though the play version of Spring Awakening had been performed before in Israel, Efrat's was the first production of the musical. In 2013, Efrat translated The Rocky Horror Show for its commercial Israeli debut, featuring Lake Rodberg and third-year students of the Yoram Lowenstein acting studio, in Tel Aviv.{{cite web|date=17 September 2013|title=בחזרה לקולנוע פריז... - יובל אראל|url=http://yuvalerel.com/2013/09/18/%D7%91%D7%97%D7%96%D7%A8%D7%94-%D7%9C%D7%A7%D7%95%D7%9C%D7%A0%D7%95%D7%A2-%D7%A4%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%96/|access-date=13 February 2022|website=הבלוג של יובל אראל|language=he-IL}}

He directed the 2012–2013 revival of {{ill|Hillel Mittelpunkt|he|הלל מיטלפונקט}}'s Mami; critical of occupation of Gaza and the West Bank, and of the IDF, the theatre invited soldiers to watch the show for free.{{cite news|last=יודילוביץ'|first=מרב|date=18 June 2012|title=25 "מאמי": הפקה חדשה, פצעים ישנים|language=he|work=Ynet|url=https://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-4243920,00.html|access-date=13 February 2022}} Hava Yarom for Martha Yodaat theatre review magazine wrote that Efrat "is an extraordinary artist, who certainly knows how to swing his baton on plays and especially on musicals{{nbsp}}... and has certainly left his mark on the field of translation" but felt that his attempts to make the musical his own added too much decoration, with "multicoloured vocal richness"; new characters; and more elaborate costumes, choreography, and set designs, distracting from the material. Yarom particularly felt that the staging of the rape scene took away from the Mami performance, though considered that the adaptation as a whole was the negative, saying Efrat's boldness should be praised. Ovad Efrat, his father, was the musical director and arranger.{{cite web|date=6 March 2013|title=העיבוד שהלך לאיבוד|url=https://marthayodaat.com/2013/03/06/%25d7%2594%25d7%25a2%25d7%2599%25d7%2591%25d7%2595%25d7%2593-%25d7%25a9%25d7%2594%25d7%259c%25d7%259a-%25d7%259c%25d7%2590%25d7%2599%25d7%2591%25d7%2595%25d7%2593/|access-date=13 February 2022|website=מרתה יודעת|language=he-IL|archive-date=19 May 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220519044819/https://marthayodaat.com/2013/03/06/%D7%94%D7%A2%D7%99%D7%91%D7%95%D7%93-%D7%A9%D7%94%D7%9C%D7%9A-%D7%9C%D7%90%D7%99%D7%91%D7%95%D7%93/|url-status=dead}}

In 2015, his direction of {{ill|Billy Schwartz|he|בילי שוורץ}} at the Haifa Theatre won the four major awards of the Israeli Theater Academy Awards. It was then staged in North America.{{cite web|last=Musbach|first=Julie|title=BILLY SCHWARTZ Invited to Perform at the Harold Green Jewish Theatre in Toronto|url=https://www.broadwayworld.com/toronto/article/BILLY-SCHWARTZ-Invited-to-Perform-at-the-Harold-Green-Jewish-Theatre-in-Toronto-20171022|access-date=6 January 2022|website=BroadwayWorld}} Efrat had first directed the original musical in 2013; musician {{ill|Ohad Hitman|he|אוהד חיטמן}} approached director Efrat and artistic director {{ill|Uri Paster|he| אורי פסטר}} with his Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance dissertation music, hoping to create a musical. They took the result to the Bat Yam Musical Festival, where it won the grand prize, including a development grant, before working on it more for the commercial debut at Haifa.{{cite web|date=30 December 2015|title=בילי שוורץ נוסעת לתל אביב - יובל אראל|url=https://yuvalerel.com/2015/12/30/%D7%91%D7%99%D7%9C%D7%99-%D7%A9%D7%95%D7%95%D7%A8%D7%A5-%D7%A0%D7%95%D7%A1%D7%A2%D7%AA-%D7%9C%D7%AA%D7%9C-%D7%90%D7%91%D7%99%D7%91/|access-date=13 February 2022|website=הבלוג של יובל אראל|language=he-IL}}{{cite news|last=יודילוביץ'|first=מרב|date=5 December 2013|title=חג המחזמר: אוהד חיטמן זכה עם 'בילי שוורץ'|language=he|work=Ynet|url=https://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-4461803,00.html|access-date=13 February 2022}} Efrat also translated Animal Farm for its premiere as a musical adaptation in 2015.{{cite web|title=Theater Review: Animal Farm|url=https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/culture/theater-review-animal-farm-430216|access-date=2022-05-06|website=The Jerusalem Post|date=27 October 2015 }}

In 2017, he translated Hairspray into Hebrew for its Israeli debut. A review in BroadwayWorld said that "the songs were still extremely fun and flowing and Efrat can clearly write beautiful songs, but one of the major things that made Hairspray such a great musical is Scott Wittman and Marc Shaiman's lyrics and without them it's like a production of Hairspray without tall hair wigs."{{cite web|last=Suzan|first=Ronit|title=BWW Review: HAIRSPRAY Being Big, Groundbreaking and Beautiful in Israel|url=https://www.broadwayworld.com/israel/article/BWW-Review-HAIRSPRAY-Being-Big-Groundbreaking-and-Beautiful-in-Israel-20170806|access-date=6 January 2022|website=BroadwayWorld}} For the Israeli debut of School of Rock in 2019, Efrat translated Andrew Lloyd Webber's songs, saying that though he'd never met Lloyd Webber, he reached out to get approval for each of the song translations and compositions and was never turned down.{{cite web|title='School of Rock' gets a Hebrew twist|url=https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/school-of-rock-gets-a-hebrew-twist-599106|access-date=2022-05-06|website=The Jerusalem Post|date=20 August 2019 }}

Other translations include songs in films and movie musicals, including Tangled, Rio and the Ice Age films.{{cite web|title=דניאל אפרת|url=https://www.ishim.co.il/p.php?s=%25D7%2593%25D7%25A0%25D7%2599%25D7%2590%25D7%259C+%25D7%2590%25D7%25A4%25D7%25A8%25D7%25AA|access-date=7 January 2022|website=Ishim|language=he}} Efrat has said that though he acts, he prefers being known for his work behind the scenes, even though translating is "not a sexy craft", and that he is addicted to both performing and creative work. With Eli Bijawi and Roy Chen, he makes up the young generation of Israeli translation playwriting.{{cite web|language=Hebrew|last=שחל|first=מאיה נחום|date=30 January 2014|title=צעירי הבמה|url=https://www.calcalist.co.il/consumer/articles/0,7340,L-3622990,00.html|access-date=13 February 2022|website=כלכליסט}}

He has also written pop songs, including "Dai La" with Marta Gómez for Roni Dalumi's 2010 debut album.{{cite web|date=21 December 2010|title=רוני דלומי - שירים חדשים מאלבום הבכורה|url=https://www.mako.co.il/music-news/singles/Article-bceb7a5eb150d21006.htm|access-date=13 February 2022|website=mako|language=Hebrew}}

Daniel Efrat

Early life and education

Career

References

External links