Haifa's old cinemas • Chapter 7 – "The Happy Garden"

Thanks

A large part of the article in front of you is based on Yaakov Davidon's book "Love from Rape", a story of pioneers in the field of building, theater and cinema, in the years 1920-1935, throughout the length and breadth of Israel.
Special thanks also to Itamar Roteloi for his help and support.

The theater-loving builders

In 1920, 22-year-old Yaakov Davidon arrived in Israel. He joined the group of builders - a cooperative of young people who made a living from construction work, and worked, among other things, in the establishment of the Mahane Yehuda neighborhood in Petach Tikva. Davidon, despite his complete lack of experience in the field, was Infected with the theater bug, he left the group and tried to found theater groups in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, without much success.

"world patent"

After these failed attempts, Davidon returned to his group of builders, who had moved to Haifa in the meantime. Even here the theater germ did not leave him and in the end he found himself the leader of a faction of the group of builders who, at the same time, was involved in construction and theater. This is how the "Dramatic Stage - Haifa" was born, a Poalim theater, a professional provider, an amateur provider, which performed occasionally in the "Eden" hall, and also traveled with its performances throughout the country. The group's business model was a global patent: income from construction work, and losses (mainly) from theater operations.

The artistic success, even if it was partial, encouraged Davidon and his friends to try to do something that had not been done before - to put on an original play. The play that was chosen, "On the Kinneret" penned by one, Dr. Meckler, was a terrible and terrible tragedy about a girl who was raped by Cossacks, who goes to the Kinneret colony, but fails to overcome the trauma, and finally finds her death in the Kinneret.

on the verge of bankruptcy

The heavy show failed completely, and the group lost both its money and its prestige. In the meantime, the building market also weakened greatly, and the group was facing complete bankruptcy.
Rescue came from an unexpected place.

the deployment – "The Happy Garden"

In the center of Haifa, in the area between Jaffa Road in the north, Allenby Street in the south, Bankim Street in the east, and Ein Dor Street in the west, a large garden spread out. At the beginning of the 20s of the last century, King George V Street (today's Defenders Boulevard) had not yet been broken up and paved, and there were no streets at all between Allenby Street and Jaffa Road, so it was a vast area.

Two stages

In the heart of this garden, the Arab Ajiel brothers opened the "Happy Garden" (Al-Inshirah - The Departure). It was a cafe with several pool tables, and two stages - one was open (summer), and the other was set up in a large shack that allowed performances even in the winter. The garden was surrounded by a wall about two meters high, and the main entrances were from Jaffa Street and Allenby Street.

• Note: In the 1920's, when the "Happy Garden" was operating, all the streets between Jaffa Road and Allenby Road, including Sderot Maginim (previously called King George V Street), did not exist yet.

The owners of the house were lovers of culture, and Egyptian theater groups and even Egyptian operas were occasionally hosted on these stages.

The "Happy Garden" hosts the "Drama Theater of Haifa"

The indefatigable Davidon turned to the brothers and asked them to use the stages, which most of the time were unused.
Shortly before that, during the performance of "The Lady with the Camellias" by Dumas, staged by a respected Egyptian theater from Cairo, the bored local Arab audience, who were not fond of such classics, uttered rooster crows during the performance. The Egyptian director, offended to the core, vowed never to perform again in front of the uncultured Haifa audience.

It is possible that Tanos Agile, the eldest brother, who was an avid theater lover himself, saw an opportunity in appealing to a new audience that loved classical theater. He welcomed Davidon with open arms, and the brothers made the garden stages available to the group on Saturday nights, for a nominal sum.

The theater-seeking builders recovered a little, and even began, for a time, to see income, but in the end this adventure also failed, some of the group left, and Davidon once again faced a broken trough and oppressive debts.

The show is underway

In their distress, Davidon and three of his friends went to one of their Arab debtors in Acre, and offered him to repay their debt by doing construction work for him. During his stay there, Davidon rolled up to show a movie there, and immediately contracted a new bug.

He returned to Haifa without a team, without a job, without a theater and with quite a few debts, but no one like him would give up. David had a vision. He remembered that he once saw an old moving machine in the "Gan HaSmifu" warehouse, and he had an idea for a new venture.

He went to meet Thanos Agile, who received him with a warm welcome. Davidon had a business proposal: Tanos would allow him to turn the place into a real "Jewish cinema", which would screen films for Jews and Arabs.

Thanos wondered what he needed this trouble for. "Coliseum" was about to close, "Carmel" was rocking, and the competition with "Eden" for the Haifa audience that does not have a penny in its pocket - will be difficult. But Davidon, like Davidon, had a crushing answer: their vehicle, he said, would not be just another vehicle. He will restore his dramatic theater and they will be able to combine, in one ticket, a motion picture with a theater segment as a bonus.

Finally Thanos gave in to this stubborn and dreamy Jew whom he liked very much, and agreed to try.

A Jewish-Arabic-Greek co-production

For the purpose of the project, the two turned to Socrates Totilides, a shrewd Greek merchant, about the source of his wealth there were many rumors (according to one of them, the man put his hand on a treasure hidden by the Germans after the withdrawal of their Turkish allies from the country, after the First World War). Socrates was a prominent dealer in the motion picture business and specialized in distributing films that no one knew from where they came into his hands, and as a general rule, he did not tend to attach excessive importance to copyrights and tax payments of any kind.

And so began "The Happy Garden" (Tanos insisted on keeping the name and this is what came out in the lame translation into Hebrew), a one-off Jewish-Arabic-Greek co-production. It was the eighth show in Israel at the time, and the third in Haifa after "Eden" and "Carmel" ("Coliseum" disappeared from the arena near the opening of "Hagan Hamishim"). The new movie opens with the showing of the film "The Flow of Life" from 1919, which was provided by the Greek partner at a special price.

Return of the "dramatic stage"

Davidon, with his "Haifa Dramatic Stage" (that's how it was in the original) returned to present full plays there from time to time, and also added theater pieces to the plays.

The "Happy Garden" also hosted various shows and events, and even competed with the big brother "Eden" in hosting a masquerade ball for Purim, and balls for other holidays.

The wonders of manual projection

The old manual projection machine "Fata" model 1918, was problematic and required constant maintenance and frequent repairs, but Socrates always knew how to find the spare parts that were needed.

Davidon's number on the machine, in his unique style:
"It had no engine and was operated with the help of a special lever, with the power of a 'horse-man', from the beginning of the show to the end. In the middle of the show, we used to go outside and check what was going on near the cash register. If there was a lack of audience, they would inform the living motor: "Dir Balak, shwiah-shwiah "... ‏ (note, slowly). The handle would slow down, and the actors would float across the surface of the canvas in rhythmic-slow movements, as if they were participating in a ballet performance... However, when a few dozen visitors arrived - they would hurry up and inform the supervisor of the rhythm: "Avam, ya sheikh , evam!" (quickly, quickly) and the actors would immediately rush to finish their performance with quick acrobatic movements in the "Russian Cossack" tempo. The magic word "end" would bring the audience out and... come on, start the affair over again!"

"Faust" in Arabic

The Jewish-Arab partnership also brought with it amusing anecdotes. Thus, for example, Davidon was surprised to discover that the name of the movie "Faust" was translated in the Arabic version in the ad to "Princess Posta". He turned to his friend Thanos and wondered why a movie about a man selling his soul to the devil was given such a strange name.

Davidon describes the conversation:
"I found my friend Tanos in the garden, sipping a coffee offering to his pleasure.
- Ya Thanos! Surely you know who Faust is?
– Mallium, Faust. Who hasn't read Faust?
– Well, what happened to this Faust? Why did he suddenly change his name?
- Ya Davidon! Wow, you will never succeed in this profession. Look, you've been sitting among us for several years, and you still don't know the Arab audience. You should know that the Arabs do not buy cheap tickets in the hall for two grosshes, they buy tickets in the bilog (stand) and pay four grosshes Tabin and Tekilin. You have to consider them.
- What's the deal with Faust's name cards?
- Yes Sidi, great interest. If you call the movie after a man - our audience will not come. For him the male is not a commodity at all, he has to be a female!
- I mean... not Faust, but...
– 'Princesa Posta' that's it!
- Let's say her name is Posta, but why Princess?
- But what should it be? washerwoman?"

And Davidon concludes:
"What is there to argue here? There is no fighting against logic. One and the same."

The young Yigal Alon visits the "Gan Hamishmach"

In his autobiographical book "Beit Avi" (published by the United Kibbutz), Yigal Alon tells about his experiences as a teenager, when he came with other young people to Haifa, to help sell the crops of the fields and almond orchards of Kfar Tabor and stock up on groceries that could only be obtained in the big city.  

This is how he says:
"From our childhood, we were indeed brought up to be thrifty, and yet we allowed ourselves to 'go crazy' on every trip and spend a little money even on small and heart-pounding pleasures, such as a visit to that 'joyful garden,' as it was called, where we saw it without a sound and without a roof, whose roof was opened Between the trees and the water fountains, in lower Haifa, we had to use our imagination a lot to decipher what was happening on the white screen.

And how would it describe a visit to the movie, even if it was silent and blurry at times, without licking sweet and sour ice cream, which was also impossible to get in our village?"

the taste of the crowd

The principle of the show to provide joint performances for both Jews and Arabs required a cultural adjustment. The Jews, mostly young Eastern Europeans, preferred "artistic" films, while the Arabs, mostly preferred action films. In order not to offend any audience, the show made sure to show after every "art" movie, an action and adventure movie.

Thus, for example, after the screening of the artistic film "Casanova", "Buffalo Bill" was also screened to compensate mainly the Arab audience. "Buffalo Bill" was a film in 36 sets (reels). A film of this length required thirty-five breaks (a break after each act) to change the wheels on the single machine. Every break would interrupt the plot and upset the viewers, and this whole story was spread over more than 4 hours.

A trailer for the pogrom

It is not clear why what happened next happened. At two past midnight, the spectators left, probably enraptured by the scenes of violence and shooting, and/or with torn nerves after watching a fragmented and never-ending movie. The tension that had built up beneath the surface erupted into a show of violence in the neighborhood. The result was many wounded on both sides and our vehicle was completely destroyed.

The next day, two defense members came and informed Davidon that they would not allow the business to be restarted, because one of the brothers had participated quite actively in the rampage. The brothers denied and claimed that they actually tried, in vain, to reconcile the rivals.

Davidon number:
"After lengthy and tedious negotiations... it was agreed to allow us to resume the shows in exchange for a respectable donation to the National Fund for Israel." And he goes on to point out that "this was the first donation to KKL-Junk, in which respected Arabs from the people of Haifa participated."

In retrospect, what happened that night in 1928 was a hint of what was to come and a precursor to the events of 1929.

The end

Following the events of 1929, which exacted a heavy toll from the Jewish population of Haifa with 7 dead and 61 wounded, the special partnership of the "Gan Hemshimach" fell apart, the movement ceased to operate and Davidon, once again left without a livelihood, left Haifa to try his luck in the big city. Tel Aviv, also there he found himself involved in film affairs.

Yaakov Davidon returned to Haifa in the 40s, to establish the "May" cinema, but this is a topic for another article.

To the readers

We started by reviewing all the theaters/cinemas that operated in Haifa until the 70s. We have searched archives, books and networks, but we still lack materials.
The cinemas for which the documentation (photos from the Zohar period and written material) is most lacking: "Orly", "Glaur", "Domino", "Haifa", "Chen", "Mayon", "Miron", "Maxim/Vard", " Nof", "Ron", "Shavit", "Blue", "Tamar".

Our requests from you, the readers:

1. In preparation for the reviews of the cinemas of the generation after the movie days, we would be grateful if you would share with us the names of notable films you saw, when, and in which cinema.
2. If any of you have materials (photos from a personal album or just stories) about cinemas from the list above (and others), or you know someone like that (families of the owners or photographers, for example) - please let us know.
3. We are looking for family members of Aviezer Berletsky, who was one of the owners of "Par" and "Chen" - please contact us
4. Regarding the posters and photos we published, if you have any information about the creators of the posters and the photographers of the photos, we would appreciate it if you would share with us what you know, if only so that we can give credit to the creators.

You can contact us in the comments to the article, or by email [email protected]