Zohar was one of the most distinguished directors and entertainers in Israeli history, who became religiously
Uri Zohar, a famous film director and entertainer in the 1970s from a secular background who became religiously observant, died on Thursday at age 86 after suffering a heart attack.
Born in Tel Aviv, Zohar was a bawdy icon of the Israeli bohemian scene of the 1960s and 1970s. He wrote, directed and starred in cult films such as “Metzizim” (“Peeping Toms”) and “Big Eyes” and was a regular on the TV sketch show “Lool” (“Coop”).
Big Eyes, which was starred by Arik Einstein, was digitally restored by the Israel Film Archive (IFA), and the restored version had a festive and emotional premiere at the Jerusalem Film Festival last September.
“Uri was an inseparable part of Israeliness in all of its variations, a prickly, deep-rooted Israeli with an enormous spiritual world and a beating Jewish heart.”
Prime Minister Naftali Bennett
He was awarded the Israel Prize in 1976 but refused to accept it.
Zohar grew religious in middle age, appearing on screen in a skullcap until finally withdrawing from popular culture for an ascetic life of biblical scholarship in Jerusalem.
Asked how he regarded his former career, Zohar told an interviewer: “I respect it, the way a mature adult remembers his childhood. But there’s no escaping the fact that I was a child.”
“Uri was an inseparable part of Israeliness in all of its variations, a prickly, deep-rooted Israeli with an enormous spiritual world and a beating Jewish heart,” Prime Minister Naftali Bennett mourned.
In a statement, the culture ministry mourned Zohar as “among Israel’s greatest artists and a cornerstone of Israeli culture.”