page_title: Golda Meir
section_title: Portrayals in film and theater
hierarchical_section_title: Golda Meir / Legacy / Portrayals in film and theater
caption_attribution_description: English: Performing arts Center in Tel Aviv עברית: המשכן לאמנויות הבמה בתל אביב, Original Image Name:המשכן לאמנויות הבמה בתל אביב, Location:שדרות שאול המלך
context_page_description: Golda Meir was an Israeli teacher, kibbutznik, stateswoman, politician and the fourth Prime Minister of Israel.
  Born in Kiev, Russian Empire, she emigrated to the United States as a child with her family in 1906, and was educated there, becoming a teacher. After marrying, she and her husband emigrated to then Palestine in 1921, settling on a kibbutz. Meir was elected prime minister of Israel on March 17, 1969, after serving as Minister of Labour and Foreign Minister. The world's fourth and Israel's first and only woman to hold the office of Prime Minister, she has been described as the "Iron Lady" of Israeli politics; the term was later applied to British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. Former Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion used to call Meir "the best man in the government"; she was often portrayed as the "strong-willed, straight-talking, grey-bunned grandmother of the Jewish people."
  Meir resigned as prime minister in 1974, the year following the Yom Kippur War. She died in 1978 of lymphoma.
context_section_description: Meir's story has been the subject of many fictionalized portrayals. In 1977, Anne Bancroft played Meir in William Gibson's Broadway play Golda. The Australian actress Judy Davis played a young Meir in the television film A Woman Called Golda (1982), opposite Leonard Nimoy. Ingrid Bergman played the older Meir in the same film. Actress Colleen Dewhurst portrayed Meir in the 1986 TV movie Sword of Gideon.
  In 2003, American Jewish actress Tovah Feldshuh portrayed her on Broadway in Golda's Balcony, Gibson's second play about Meir's life. The play was controversial for implying that Meir considered using nuclear weapons during the Yom Kippur War.Valerie Harper portrayed Meir in the touring company production and in the film version of Golda's Balcony. In 2005 actress Lynn Cohen portrayed Meir in Steven Spielberg's film Munich.
  Tovah Feldshuh assumed the role of Meir again in the 2006 English-language French movie O Jerusalem. She was played by the Polish actress Beata Fudalej in the 2009 dramatic film The Hope directed by Márta Mészáros.
caption: Facade of the Golda Meir Center for the Performing Arts – home to the Israeli Opera and the Cameri Theater, Tel Aviv
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