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Tel Aviv is Israel's cultural capital, and it fulfills this role with relish. The Tel Aviv Museum of Art, the city's major artistic venue (for concerts and lectures as well as the fine arts), is complemented by a host of galleries, especially along Gordon Street. Tel Aviv is also home to a dynamic performing arts scene, including the iconic Batsheva Dance Company and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra led by Zubin Mehta.
The Friday editions of the English-language Jerusalem Post and Haaretz contain extensive entertainment listings for the entire country. There are a handful of mostly online ticket agencies for performances in Tel Aviv.
Founded in 1944, this long-standing Hebrew performance theater, located in the Tel Aviv Performing Arts Center, offers a useful "See it in Hebrew, Read it in English" program every Tuesday, in which the performance is simultaneously translated into English. Shows range from classic plays to international dramas, comedies, and local pieces.
This troupe is rooted in the Russian Revolution, when a group of young Jewish artists established a theater company that performed in Hebrew—this at a time when Hebrew was barely a living language. Subsequent tours through Europe and the United States in the 1920s won wide acclaim. Many of the group's members moved to Israel and helped establish a theater company that now inhabits multiple spaces, including a nicely renovated complex at Habima Square. Even though the vast majority of productions are in Hebrew, many are also simultaneously translated into English.
In Old Jaffa, HaSimta Theatre features avant-garde and fringe performances in Hebrew (or sometimes without words at all).
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