Avishai Milshtein grew up in
Ramat Gan. He is the only child of two
Polish-born parents who were
Holocaust survivors. He began acting in plays at the age of ten at the Eretz Oz Theater. He appeared in children's plays such as
Heidi, Hannah's Sabbath Dress,
Tom Sawyer, and
Hasamba (playing the role of Yaron Zahavi). He also had small roles in the film
Noa at 17 (directed by Isaac "Zepel" Yeshurun, 1982). He graduated from the Thelma Yellin High School of the Arts, majoring in theater (1978–1982). While a student at Thelma Yellin, he performed in the school's production of
The Threepenny Opera by
Brecht and
Weill. Impressed by the work, Milstein decided to study the German language. He studied at the
Goethe-Institut in Tel Aviv and Düsseldorf (1981–1985).
Career At the age of sixteen, in 1980, Milstein directed for the first time a work he had written - The Sparrow, an opera composed by Dori Parnes (then seventeen); a co-production between Thelma Yellin and
Beit Lessin Theater, May 1980. In the
Israel Defense Forces, he served as a radio operator in the
Signal Corps,
Central Command. His play Then As Death (Az Kamavet), directed by
Shoshana Riseman, was presented at the
Acco Festival of Alternative Israeli Theatre in 1987 and received an honorable mention for both the play and the production. He studied theater, literature, and German philology at
LMU Munich, Germany (1986–1990). and taught at the
Berlin University of the Arts. Founder and head of the Theater Department at
Alliance High School, Tel Aviv (1997–2001). Milstein founded the Notzar Theater, together with Dalit Milstein (no family relation), and served as its artistic director and as the director of the Association for the Advancement of Theater in Jaffa (1991–2004). The Notzar Theater's first production was
The War Plays by
Edward Bond. The production was staged at the Acco Festival in October 1992 and won awards for design and guest performance. In 1997, Milstein directed the Israeli premiere of the classic play
Penthesilea by
Heinrich von Kleist, produced by the Notzar Theater. The production was later presented at the Trailblazers Festival in Aachen, Germany. He served as a dramaturg for the Habima Theatre from 1990 to 1995. Guest dramaturg for the production of
The Merchant of Venice, directed by Hanan Snir, at the
Deutsches Nationaltheater und Staatskapelle Weimar in Weimar (1995) and at the
Israel Festival in Jerusalem (1996). In 1996, he received the
America-Israel Cultural Foundation directing Scholarship. In 2012, he performed in the play “Maxi and I”, which was staged at the Beit Lessin Theatre. In 2023, he played in the TV series "Berlin Blues", produced by
yes. Founder and artistic director of the “Curtain Opens” Festival for Young Israeli Playwriting at Beit Lessin Theatre since 2000, in which 300 plays were staged over its first 20 years. He initiated “IsraDrama – A Spotlight on Israeli Drama”, 2010, and 2012. In 2005, he founded the “Opening Stage” Festival for Young Israeli Playwriting at Beit Lessin Theatre. In 2012, he founded and managed the Playwriting School of Beit Lessin Theatre in collaboration with Stage Center. He served as co-artistic director (together with Jan Linders) of the project “Familienbande” (“Family Ties”), a joint initiative between Beit Lessin Theatre, Tel Aviv, and the Heidelberg Municipal Theatre, Germany. The project presented six bi-national productions beginning in May 2009. Milstein directed “The Banality of Love” by
Savyon Liebrecht at Beit Lessin Theatre in January 2009. The production won the 2010
Israeli Theatre Award for Best Original Play of the Year. It opened the "Stuckemarkt" festival, Heidelberg, in 2010 and was later hosted by the
Theater Freiburg in May of that year. In 2015, Beit Lessin Theatre premiered his play “Don’t Forget to Love – Love Hurts.” The production is based on 35 interviews with Israeli and German mixed couples, telling their stories 70 years after
Auschwitz and exactly 50 years after the signing of diplomatic relations between Germany and Israel. The play was staged as a co-production with the
Badisches Staatstheater Karlsruhe. ==Personal life==