I spent the summer before college holed up in my room in front of my laptop watching strange cartoon letters take shape and trying to replicate them on my own. I was teaching myself Hebrew. I’d just ...

Along with directing, writing and starring in a Hebrew-language film, now out in U.S. theaters, Portman had to learn how to speak like an Israeli housewife in the 1940s. NEW YORK (JTA) — While making ...