eSefarad Noticias del Mundo Sefaradi
It’s soapy fun, although it takes a while to get going * There is no way to discuss the plot further without revealing spoilers, but you can already tell if this series is for you.
The much-hyped series, The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem, a lavish period drama adapted from the bestselling novel by Sarit Yishai Levi, about a Sephardi family in the capital starting in the Ottoman era through to the War of Independence, is premiering on Yes on June 7 on Yes TV Drama. It’s soapy fun, although it takes a while to get going.
It will run Monday-Thursday at 9 p.m., also on Sting TV and on Yes VOD starting on June 6.
It’s always difficult to adapt an epic novel that spans generations, because no matter how long the movie or series runs, much will have to be omitted, and the motivations of the central characters and details of their biographies get simplified. I have not read the novel and cannot be sure whether or not the series preserves its spirit, but it does create an atmospheric portrait of early 20th-century Jerusalem (based on the five episodes released to the press).
Sometimes an adaptation actually works better if you are not familiar with the source material. For example, while I thought the adaption of Elena Ferrante’s My Brilliant Friend was well done, it did not live up to the book for me, while my friends who had not read the novel loved the HBO series. While the novel The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem spans four generations, the series has scaled it down to focus on two periods: the end of the Ottoman Empire/beginning of the British Mandate era, and from the late ‘30s up through the War of Independence.
Fuente: m.jpost.com
