Gidi Dar’s ‘The Wedding Entertainer’ Acquired by Film Sales Company

The Film Sales Company has acquired worldwide rights to “The Wedding Entertainer (The Tale of Moishe Badhan),” the latest feature from director Gidi Dar, ahead of its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival.

The comedic drama, which will debut June 4 at Tribeca, stars Shuli Rand, Elon Gold and Malky Goldman. Dar is expected to attend the premiere alongside members of the cast.

The film follows Moishe, once a celebrated entertainer at Jerusalem’s lavish Hasidic weddings, whose career collapsed due to alcoholism. According to the official synopsis, “Now penniless and in recovery, Moishe must land one final, high-paying engagement to finance his daughter’s wedding. This desperate mission forces a collision between his old-world pride and modern reality, leading to a reckoning with the very ambition that ruined him once before.”

“When ‘Ushpizin’ premiered at Tribeca 21 years ago, it was a leap of faith for the festival to present international audiences with a story from the world of Hasidim,” said Film Sales Company president Andrew Herwitz. “Thanks to the global embrace of that film and the recent successes of so many series such as ‘Shtisel’ and ‘Fauda,’ I feel confident that audiences will be eager to see this new work.”

Dar described the film as rooted in the tradition of classic Hasidic storytelling, drawing inspiration from figures like Sholem Aleichem and Isaac Bashevis Singer. “It is a humor rooted in warmth, tinged with a good dose of cynicism, and grounded in relatable, deeply human situations and dilemmas,” he said, calling the project an homage to filmmakers such as Ernst Lubitsch and Billy Wilder.

Written by Rand and based on a story he developed with Dar, the film is presented in Hebrew, Yiddish and English. Producers include Aviv Ben Slush, Daniel Finkelman, Chaya Amor and Dar, with executive producers Charles-Edouard Gros, Shlomo Boehm, Gold and Jonathan Gordon.