Miriam Zohar

Miriam Zohar was born in 1931 in Chernivtsi

Miriam Zohar was born in 1931 in Czernowitz, then in Romania, as Marcela Katz. In 1941 she was deported with her parents and older brother to a labor camp in Transnistria, and the family survived the Holocaust. They returned to Czernowitz in 1944, and her father was later arrested by the Soviet authorities and died in prison.

The family moved to Timișoara, where she worked as a kindergarten teacher. In 1948 they sailed for the Land of Israel on the Pan York, but the British captured the ship and sent its passengers to detention camps in Cyprus. There she joined a Yiddish amateur theater, and in February 1949 the family immigrated to Israel.

After a lead role in a Goldoni play in 1950, she was invited to audition for Habima and was accepted in January 1951. There she adopted the stage name Zohar and played leading roles in about 60 plays. In 1965 she played Martha in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, a role closely linked with her.

In 1996 she moved to Beit Lessin Theater, and she later also acted at the Cameri Theater. She appeared in the film The Schwartz Dynasty in 2004 and was nominated for an Ophir Award in 2015 for Fire Birds. In 2014 she was a torchbearer at the national Independence Day ceremony.