We all know about Israeli shows “Shtisel” and “Fauda,” but did you know that the hit teen drama “Euphoria,” starring Zendaya, was originally an Israeli show?
Co-created by Ron Leshem, “Euphoria” aired in Israel for one season in 2012. The show starred Israeli actors Roy Nik (“Kugel“), Maor Schwietzer (“Valley of Tears”), Roni Dalumi (“Chanshi“) and Palestinian actor Tawfeek Barhom (“A Borrowed Identity”) and told the story of a troubled group of 17-year-olds and their adventures with drugs, sex amidst mostly-absent parents. The 2019 HBO series from Sam Levinson is based on that same show has become a whirlwind success and its third season is slated to air in 2025.
But you will soon be able to watch another Ron Leshem show, this time on Netflix. The streaming platform just bought the TV maker’s newest show co-created and directed by Hagar Ben-Asher: “Bad Boy,” a show that only started airing in Israel this week on the cable network HOT. Just like “Euphoria,” the show, which premiered in TIFF last year, follows a troubled teen. Yet this time, it takes us right into a juvenile penitentiary. It’s based on the life story of comedian Daniel Chen, a stand-comedian who spent almost half a decade of his youth in jail. Chen is signed on as co-creator and also plays the older version of himself in the show.
Actor Guy Menaster plays Dean, the younger version of Chen, a gifted but troubled teen who, like Chen, spends four years of his life behind bars. Israeli reviewers are already praising Menaster for his powerful performance in this show as a young boy whose life gets upended when the police knock on his door in the middle of the night and haul him off to prison. Guy’s real-life dad, actor and comedian Oded Menaster plays Dean’s father and actress Neta Plotnik plays Dean’s complicated mother. The show stars a group of talented young actors who play fellow inmates, including Havtamo Farda who plays the mysterious Zion Zoro, serving a life sentence for murder.
The show is also inspired by Leshem’s time as a reporter before his illustrious TV career. Leshem, who serves as “Bad Boy’s” showrunner, said that of all the stories he covered, it was a 2000 piece about the fact that many babies born in prison return there as juveniles that stayed with him.
“I felt like these babies were never given a chance,” he told Deadline. “They are born into a fate and not given a chance for an alternative fate. I spent time as a journalist covering wars and battle zones but it was this story that touched me the most.”
Ben-Asher shared that while working on the show “we quickly realized we had something special here. There is something brilliant in telling a story about someone who has a sh***y life but sees everything through humor.”
“Bad Boy” will premiere on Netflix sometime in 2025, and I truly can’t wait to binge all eight episodes of this dark and intriguing show.
