Dudu Fisher, Amir Dadon, Roni Dalumi and Ehud Manor belong to a local story that reaches beyond one evening at the theatre. Hebrew readers came before the stage barricade; voices remain long after the curtain falls.
A familiar melody can change when its words arrive in the language you think in. An innkeeper’s joke becomes immediate; a grand declaration reveals its fear; Éponine’s loneliness needs no translation in your head. The Israeli life of Les Misérables runs through books, theatres and recordings. Enter through a production you remember, a singer you love or a volume still waiting on your shelf.
A Hebrew production using Ehud Manor’s translation.
2 November: begins as a replacement Jean Valjean.
The Tzemach–Ofer production.
September: Moshe Kepten’s production opens.
The Cameri’s 1987 production was directed by Stephen Pimlott, with Ehud Manor’s Hebrew translation and musical direction by Eldad Shrem. Its Hed Arzi recording is catalogued by the National Library of Israel. The performers brought singing and theatre into the same company: Dudu Fisher, Riki Gal, Shlomit Aharon, Lior Yeyni, Avi Toledano, Albert Cohen and Tiki Dayan.
Think of that cast as an orchestration of voices: Javert’s authority, Fantine’s memory and hurt, Éponine’s longing, the inn’s rough comedy. Listening through an Israeli cast offers another way to recognize these characters, through voices an audience may already know from songs and other stages.
Selected roles from the production.
Fisher played Valjean in the Israeli premiere and also performed the role in the West End and on Broadway. The Broadway League’s IBDB records his start as a Broadway replacement on 2 November 1993. His career makes a tangible connection between Israeli theatre and the musical’s international history: the same performer and character, meeting another audience in another language.
Think of Valjean as a role of vocal contrasts: strength and tenderness, resolve and hesitation, a phrase that fills a theatre and a moment of near-whisper. That is a rewarding place to begin comparing performers. Which side reaches you first? When does the voice change, and how does that change your attention to the character?
The 1999 Tzemach–Ofer production played the Tel Aviv Performing Arts Center. Dudu Fisher and Yevgeny Shapovalov shared Valjean; Sassi Keshet played Javert. Tim Supple directed with Maly Stille; Moshe Kepten was assistant director.
A future director’s name is tucked into a smaller credit here. Imagine learning a production from inside its rehearsal room, then returning to the material when it is your turn to lead a new company.
Habima’s production opened in September 2016, directed by Moshe Kepten, with Amir Dadon as Valjean. Yossi Ben Nun led the music; Ehud Manor is credited with the translation.
In her ynet review, Orin Weinberg focused on the singers’ dramatic performances and the rock-inflected sound Dadon brought to a role associated with Fisher. It offers a useful listening question: how does a character change when the voice changes? Compare strength and tenderness, but also the room each performer leaves for quiet.
Selected performers and roles. Several parts were shared across the run.
Ehud Manor’s translation credit appears on the Cameri’s 1987 recording. Words for the stage have a particular task: they must communicate action and feeling, remain intelligible through the orchestra and inhabit the melody. Syllable count, stress and breathing become part of the drama.
Try one listen without following the plot. Choose a short musical phrase and notice how the Hebrew sits on it: where a word gains weight, where the sentence moves forward, where space opens. Then return to that moment in another language. You do not have to pick a winner to discover a different possibility within the song.
The novel’s Hebrew translations have a history of their own. Yaakov Steinberg, Ze’ev Hartavi and Avital Inbar are names to look for on a title page; Ehud Manor’s credit belongs to the stage text. A different cover or printing year does not necessarily mean a new translation. Check the translator, edition and any indication of abridgement or adaptation.
For a reading path from the musical, begin with Valjean’s encounter with the Bishop. On stage, the moment propels the story forward; on the page, you can pause, return and examine how trust forms between strangers. Then follow a character who interests you. The book lets you stay with a question after the music would have moved on.
Selected editions of the novel’s translations, with reading and library links.
Project Ben-Yehuda makes both volumes available to read in Hebrew. The volume I page identifies its source edition as 1954. It offers a way into the novel through the Hebrew of another period, including different spellings of familiar names.
Yad Yaari’s catalogue records a two-volume edition of Hartavi’s translation published by Tevel in Tel Aviv in 1953. His translation also appears in the National Library catalogue. Identify the publisher and year of the copy in your hands: an older translation may have several print editions.
Inbar’s translation was published by Keter in 1978. The 2011 edition revisits that translation through renewed editing, rather than introducing a different translator. The publisher’s page identifies the edition and its translation from French.
Production excerpts published by Habima, drawn from this site’s video gallery.
Begin with an intimate moment. Listen to how a quiet prayer carries a much larger danger.
Watch in the galleryEnter Éponine’s imagination. When does the closeness she imagines feel convincing, and when do you hear the distance?
Watch in the galleryFinish with the company. Choose one voice to follow, then listen again through another character.
Watch in the gallery