It seems like an unlikely Jewish trio, but Lior Raz, the “Fauda” star and showrunner, Academy Award-winning actor and Jewish icon Dustin Hoffman, and four-time Tony nominee and two-time Emmy-winner Tovah Feldshuh are about to star in a movie together. Judging by the casting, and the filmmaker, it seems like the movie will have some Jewish subject matter to boot.
“Tuner” will be filmmaker Daniel Roher’s first narrative film. The award-winning Jewish Canadian creator fell in love with filmmaking after getting a video camera for his bar mitzvah, and his first film to win huge accolades told the story of Robbie Robertson, a half-Jewish Canadian, half-Mohawk musician who performed with Bob Dylan and went on to gain fame as the leader of The Band.
According to a Deadline, “Tuner” will tell “the story of a talented piano tuner (Leo Woodall, ‘The White Lotus,’ ‘One Day’), whose life is turned upside down when he discovers that his meticulous skills for tuning pianos can equally be applied to cracking safes in this jazz-infused crime drama about love, loss and the lengths we’ll go to for the people who matter most.”
The film was first announced in late August, with Woodall and Hoffman signed on to star. Raz’s and Feldshuh’s roles were announced this week, along with cast members Havana Rose Liu (“Bottoms”) and celebrated French actor Jean Reno. According to IMDB, Feldshuh will be playing a woman named Marla, who the “Nobody Wants This” star said on Instagram is Hoffman’s character’s wife.
Raz is about to star in the “Gladiator” sequel coming out next month, and is also working on a movie about October 7 with his “Fauda” writing partner. While there isn’t much more information about “Tuner,” principal photography on the movie began this week.
Roher’s best-known work is the 2022 film “Navalny,” which won many awards, including an Oscar, and told the story of the poisoning of Russian opposition leader and anti-corruption activist Alexei Navalny, who recently perished in Russian prison. When the film won the Oscar two days after Navalny’s passing, Roher posted on Instagram: “If you were here, you’d tell us to stop crying, take a shot of vodka, and get back to work. I’m pouring one out for you, Alexei. Thank you for everything.”
Roher has an eclectic and diverse body of work, and says that his Jewishness connects with his work in the idea of tikkun olam, or healing the world. He’s shot projects all over the world, including in the Israeli town of Sderot in 2013, where he made a short film named “Kids of the Rocket Siren.” In an interview with Times of Israel from 2019, he said that he is of the Yitzhak Rabin camp of things and that he feels alienated by current Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his principles. He also talked about how he learned to embrace his own Jewish identity as he grew older.
“For a long time, I felt quite alienated by my Jewishness, almost embarrassed by it. I think part of it was a lack of understanding and just being ignorant. When I was younger, my gut reflex was if you told me I had to do something, I wouldn’t want to do it,” he said when he was just 26. “So with my Judaism, it was the type of thing I had to come to on my own. It’s only recently I’ve come to embrace it and understand it’s a fundamental part of who I am.”
