Comedy is what Israeli viewers expect from actress Hila Saada, so her latest role has been an eye-opener.
As Rosa Emoza, the unloved wife at the heart of the latest Netflix Israeli TV hit The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem, Saada is getting a chance to show her range. The veteran of many successful Israeli TV series believes this is her best role ever. “I dreamed of playing a character like this.
A very dramatic and big part. I feel so lucky. It’s such a gift for me as an actress.” In the TV adaptation of the bestselling book by Sarit Yishai- Levi, Saada stands out in a stellar cast that includes one of Israeli’s finest actresses Irit Kaplan and Fauda’s Itzik Cohen.
Saada’s portrayal of the poor, illiterate woman that Gabriel Ermoza (Shitsel’s Michael Aloni) is forced into marrying by his mother Mercada (Kaplan) is mesmerising. The pain she feels at being unloved and an outsider are etched in every nuance.
In the drama, she gives birth to a baby who dies within days, endures a near rape and sees her brother hanged by the Turks. Rosa is supposed to be plain too. The make-up artists on Beauty Queen must have had their work cut out because in real life Saada is stunning.
When we meet on Zoom, she’s dressed casually in a soft bright pink blouse with little make-up, hoop earrings and her almost waist-length black hair loose and glorious. “It was fascinating for me to be just clean as in the scenes from the past,” she says.
“In those scenes I’m almost without make-up except for things to dull my skin. I’ve always played colourful and glamorous characters. In the later scenes I’m made to look older with lines on my face and grey in my hair.
“At first it was difficult to see myself looking what I thought of as ugly. After a couple of weeks though, I loved it, I was someone else and I love Rosa. It was very interesting for me, to explore a lot about myself and how we see ourselves.”
The script moves between Hebrew, English, Turkish and Ladino, the Judaeo Spanish language. Saada is fluent in them all. “I grew up in Migdal Haemek, a small city in the North of Israel. My mother Flora is Moroccan, and my father Yaakov is from Egypt. My grandfather came from Egypt, stopped in France and then came to Israel, he could speak seven languages. I’m learning Spanish at the moment.”
There was no doubt that as a child, Saada was destined to be a performer. “I guess yes, a born actress. I have a big sister, two years older, she was very beautiful. As a little girl, people would see us and say to her ‘Oh you’re so beautiful’ and then look at me and say ‘Oh you’re so cute’. I began to see I needed something where I can be first and shine. I found it in the theatre and in acting. I was a good student at school. But when I was on a stage, I felt beautiful, good, wonderful. Not like how I felt in real life at the time.”
Her family were her first audience. “From when I was five years old, whenever the family got together in my grandparents’ house, on a Saturday afternoon, I’d sit all my family like an audience; we have a big family! Then I did little shows! I loved the applause.”
After army service where she served in administration in Eilat, Saada went to Yoram Levinstein’s acting studio in Tel Aviv. “I had lots of theatre roles after drama school. About five years later I got big TV parts. Then I got Beauty & Baker which was a huge turning point for me.”
Beauty and the Baker was one of Israel’s most successful romantic comedy series with the format sold to the US and remade there. It made Saada a household name in Israel. She also has a burgeoning music career as a songwriter and singer, with her own YouTube channel.
Most recently she duetted on a song with one of Israel’s leading performers, David D’Or. Inspired by Gabriel and Rosa’s story in the drama she wrote Song For Gabriel in Hebrew. Schmuel Raphael, the show’s Ladino tutor, translated it for her. The result, a poignant and haunting song about pure love, is now released on her channel and has been played constantly on Israeli radio.
“It was such an honour to work with David,” she says and then tells me a story. “I met a Sephardi lady a little while ago and she had heard the song. She told me she plays the song when she visits her mother’s grave. I was so touched by this, to be able to move people like this. That is the beauty of music.”
Saada is known as one of the most committed actresses in the Israeli arts world. Dafna Prenner, The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem’s executive producer said of her: “When we were casting, more than anything we wanted someone who could commit to the role and bring the best because it is a difficult role. We did auditions, and almost immediately it was clear, Hila was our Rosa, she was exceptional. She never gives 50 or 70 per cent, always 250 per cent.”
Saada herself said of preparing for the role of Vanessa in Beauty and the Baker: “I got ready for half a day and walked around the house with a bathrobe, got dresses that I thought Vanessa would wear. I did big curls in my hair, put on heels, and did everything so that when I entered the door for the audition, the director would not be confused, that he would not have a doubt, it was me. And that I am Vanessa.”
For another role, she went blonde: “I stayed blonde for two years. Blondes do have more fun! It was a great experience,” she laughs, “but the upkeep is too much because my hair is so dark.” By her own admission, Saada wants to “be famous all over the world” especially in Spain. “I love Spanish films, especially the work of Pedro Almodovar. I have a Spanish agent and am learning Spanish so I am hoping that something may happen there soon.”
Her parents were both involved in education. “My father is a manager in education, and my mother was a teacher for 40 years. All my family are in education and I am the first one to have broken away from that. They have been proud of me since I was a little girl, they knew that acting was my path.” She hasn’t entirely broken the mould as she teaches theatre studies one day a week.
Saada is approaching her 40th birthday in October; “I’m quite happy about being 40. In the past couple of years and now, I’ve felt more in tune with myself, more centred. Shooting and playing Rosa, I gave of myself, but she gave me a lot of deep insights. It was an emotional journey. It all comes together when you grow up, your professional life and as a person. Now I see my job, as something more spiritual. It makes me feel that what I am doing is bigger.”
She is currently single and quite happy about it. “I’m single now. I’m looking of course! I think it takes a little time to meet the right person. I know it will come, at the right time. I want to find my man and have a family and hope it will be soon. But I’m very happy with my life now. In the past few years I seem to have found myself and it is very important to do that before you go to the next step. I love my career, love my life, what can I say?”
The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem is streaming now on Netflix. Listen to Hila Saada’s ‘Song For Gabriel’
