to shoot Rabinovitch There were no doubts at all about accepting the role in the new film “Aspiration for Life” which is being released these days. “When the filmmakers, Asaf Aviri and Mattan Guggenheim, called me and told me about the film, the participants and my role as Gadi Yigil’s wife – I immediately agreed,” she says Rabinowitz. “The filming was one big pan. We met all the old guard together with young and well-known actors. It was a very enjoyable experience. The smile was always on the lips.”
The film, starring Shlomo Baraba, Davala Glickman, Gadi Yigil, Alon Neuman, Avi Kushnir and more, tells the story of a 79-year-old widower, whose family forced him to move into a nursing home against his will, after he lost his pension and his fortune. In the nursing home he dreams of buying back his old house. The twist in the plot happens when he notices that everyone in the nursing home is consuming medical cannabis and plots to open a cannabis trading business. This is where things start to get complicated.
If there is anything that stands out throughout the conversation with Rabinowitz, 79, it is her optimism. A significant part of this is thanks to her being a pioneer in the teaching of Qigong, the Chinese art of health care. “When you practice this art, you can really feel a sense of well-being with a small smile on your lips,” she says. “People say that when they see me and my students practicing – we seem to ‘float’. To feel this ‘floating’ you need deep roots And an open heart. It’s not levitation and detachment from reality, but levitation from a connection to life.”
As part of being a Chinese medicine therapist, Rabinowitz works at the Davidoff Center for Cancer Treatment and Research at Beilinson Hospital. There she sees the use of medical cannabis up close: “The issue of cannabis is very important and discussed. I see that when a doctor adjusts the cannabis to the patient, it has a very good effect in reducing stress, reducing pain, and it helps to get through the coping period in an easier way. The film can be taken very humorously, it is written in a tragic-comic way and deals with topical issues. That is why it is very easy to identify with the characters in the film. At the premiere of the film I was asked: ‘Do you use cannabis? You always look happy.’ I answered: ‘I really live life in its transparency and clarity and it is full of joy.’ When I say ‘joy’, then these are also the strengths to bear the moments that are less happy and find joy in them as well. For me, this is happiness.”
In the film there is a closing of a circle, as it reunites Rabinowitz and Vigil on the screen, soul mates for decades, who first met when they starred in the North Command band. “When I joined the band, I participated in the program ‘Trip to the North’ (1962),” she recalls.
“When the graduating class left, a new band had to be formed. One day, Belha Khurgal, my bandmate and I, were walking down the street and heard angels singing. We went to see the meaning of the voices and we saw Dani Ben Israel, Gadi Yigil and Kobi Asharat who were walking down the street and singing loudly. They were still high school students before being drafted. We offered them to come for exams for the Northern Command Band. They arrived, Haim Topol gracefully, and they were accepted into the band, so I got to participate with Gadi in the band for a year and a half in the program ‘Hands up’ with the hits ‘Zahirot Bonim’, ‘Kohav HaNortham’, ‘Shir HaHailat’ and ‘Los Picodos Tsfons’.”
Did you like this period?
“for sure. Working with the best creators, working with the director Oded Kotler and the choreographer Danny Litai. At that time, the Haifa Theater also opened, and when we weren’t at a concert, we went to see Haim Topol perform there. This is how we also connected with the repertory theater. In the band you experience the qualities of the ‘tiny stage’, you perform very close to the audience and must be good. We would appear in the field in front of very tired soldiers. Before the release, Oded Kotler invited me to audition for the Chamber Theater, where I acted for years.”
Rabinovitz played in the Chamber Theater in plays such as “Shlomo the King and Shlomo the Shoemaker”, “A Circus Adventure” and “Ooz Li Gotz Li”. “At that time, the actors took an active part in the productions,” she says. “I really like being involved in this magical process – from the reading of the text to the wonder unfolding on stage, which can sweep away an audience of thousands of people.”
things inside us
Thanks to Ligil, in 1967 she also met the man who became one of her prominent professional partners – the actor-singer Shlomo Nitzan. “At that time Gadi said: ‘I have to introduce you to a Haifa friend from the ‘Zoit’ theater, and I’m sure you’ll get along,” she recalls. “We set up a meeting at the Kesit Cafe in Tel Aviv, Shlomo Nitzan and I sat down and talked about the theater and the house, and immediately it turned into singing together. We started singing Shabbat songs and psalms, song after song, and by chance Benny Amdorski came there, passed by us, stopped and said: “What is this beautiful singing?” The first Hasidic records in Israel”.
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Nira Rabinovitch from the film Aspiration for Life (Photo: Shay Peleg)Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Nitzan and Rabinovitz recorded several records composed of holiday and holiday songs, Shabbat hymns and pyots, and became a success. “Until then it was not accepted and it was even considered quite foreign to hear such music,” she says. “But Shlomo and I were bohemian youths with curls and jeans, and from us, the people of the theater, they accepted these songs, and they penetrated so many hearts. We did it out of pure love for the word. Inspired by this idea, the Hasidic wave developed in Israel, and later the play ‘Ish Chassid Hiyyah’, and later also the Hasidic singer festivals. At the first festival, my sister Galia and I were awarded with our performance of Pinchas Kahti’s song ‘Thirst for Soul’. At the same time, Shlomo and I performed in the show ‘Nira Rabinowitz and Shlomo Nitzan Sing and Tell’, produced by Yankel’a Agmon’s Beymat Theater , which was received with love around the world. We loved the material we sang. These are things that were inside us.”
In the 1970s, Rabinovitz was one of the biggest child stars in Israel, participated in various children’s festivals and starred in the children’s program “What Happened” that was broadcast on educational television between 1976-1981 and introduced the doll Kishkeshta to Israeli children. “They were looking for an actress on the educational television to host a segment of acting and acting songs on the program ‘What’s up,’ and they took me from the theater,” she says. “Today it’s the other way around – first you’re a star on TV and then they take you to the theater.”
At the same time and over the years she played in the repertory and commercial theaters in a variety of roles. “I was privileged to work with wonderful professionals, actors, writers and directors,” she says. “My favorite role is Solvague in the play ‘Par Gynet’ with Yossi Banai at the Bhima Theater. A classic.”
the dispersion of the good
She came to the world of therapy in the 80s. “At the end of this decade, when I got cancer, I said: ‘Oh, effortless movement? This is the basis of the Daoist philosophy, which is a philosophy that says to give things only the effort they need and not over-effort,'” she says. “After doing all the conventional treatments in Israel, I went to China to study Chinese philosophy and medicine. I lived for several years in China, and after learning the Chinese language, I specialized in the kinetic-energetic part of this medicine, along with acupuncture and herbs. Chi Kung, like all Chinese medicine, is designed to promote health and prevent disease, but it can also be used to heal and improve. The Chinese say: ‘Waiting for an illness to appear and only then starting treatment is like a thirsty person who is just beginning to explore the well.'”
Nira Rabinovitch from the film Aspiration for Life (photo: screenshot)When she returned from China, she began teaching this medicine in Israel, first at the “Medicine” College, and for many years she has served as the head of the Chi Kung program at the Cypress campus for the training of therapists. others. You are about spreading the good,” she says. “Every teacher, as far as I’m concerned, must remember that he is also a student. This is how your freshness is preserved. You don’t come as a knower but as a learner and as a questioner and allow the process to happen. This is the approach that also helps me stay current. I remember every day being a student.”
Upon her return from China, she also returned to acting in television and cinema, among others in “Florentine”, “Saturdays and Holidays”, “The Nineties”, “Nebso”, “Sabri Marnan” and the youth series “Nalemim” and “Hasamba Dor 3”.
As which characters are you recognized on the street?
“The children and youth recognize me as ‘Tamar the Beautiful’ from Mashamba and because of the role in ‘Nalimim,’ and the children who grew up on Kishkeshta tell their children that I am a YouTuber. It moves me very much. I thank God that I do what I love and love what I do. When I bless myself with goodness, I remember that this goodness comes along with the strength to accept the pain. It is the crack from which the light begins to emerge.”