Category: Culture

(New York Jewish Week) — When William Shakespeare wrote “The Merchant of Venice” 400 years ago, he had almost certainly never met a Jewish person. In fact, in 1596 or so, when he created the infamous character of Shylock — a greedy moneylender who thirsts for a literal “pound of flesh” from his Christian antagonist, […]

(New York Jewish Week) — Following the successful stagings of “Leopoldstadt” and “Parade,” another play dealing with antisemitism is headed to Broadway. “A Prayer for the French Republic,” about a Jewish family confronting rising antisemitism in France, will open at the Samuel J. Friedman Theater in early 2024, with previews beginning Dec. 19. Written by Joshua Harmon […]

(New York Jewish Week) – Broadway actress Julie Benko won’t be out of a job when “Funny Girl,” in which she plays the Jewish performer Fanny Brice, closes in September. Instead, Benko, 34, will join the cast of Barry Manilow and Bruce Sussman’s forthcoming Broadway musical “Harmony,” which is set to begin previews Oct. 18 […]

(New York Jewish Week) — As a child, Holocaust survivor Leo Ullman attended baseball games at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn with his aunt, who believed it would help him become more American. Yesterday, Ullman, a longtime New York Mets fan and prolific memorabilia collector, made an appearance at Citi Field. But this time, he was on […]

((JR)) — The Israeli satirical drama film “Concerned Citizen” opens with the sacrosanct rituals of a bourgeois Tel Aviv life: a robot vacuum slides gracefully across the floor; lush house plants are watered; vegetables are blended into green juice. The score from the Bellini opera “Norma” plays in the background. Then a car alarm rudely interrupts […]

((JR)) — The Sassoon family is having a moment. The Baghdadi Jewish dynasty that made its fortune in trade across the Indian subcontinent and East Asia is the subject of the current exhibit at the Jewish Museum in New York, titled “The Sassoons.” Joseph’s Sassoon’s book, “The Global Merchants: The Enterprise and Extravagance of the […]

(New York Jewish Week) — It’s not every day that a new ice cream parlor opens on the Upper East Side — much less a new, “French-inspired” scoop shop opened by the offspring of one the most famous Jewish families in New York’s culinary scene.  On a sunny Wednesday afternoon, Sasha Zabar launched his latest […]

((JR)) — After five seasons, 20 Emmy awards and plenty of Jewish jokes, “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel” airs its final episode on Friday. The lauded Amazon Prime show from Amy Sherman-Palladino has enveloped viewers in a shimmering, candy-colored version of New York during the late 1950s and early 1960s — a world in which “humor” […]

((JR)) — These have been a wild few years for Matty Healy, the outspoken lead singer of the English pop rock band The 1975.  His group has released a string of acclaimed albums that went to the top of the British charts. But at the same time, Healy has cultivated a reputation as an offensive […]

(New York Jewish Week) — Woody Allen stepped into a different kind of starring role this week: the good samaritan who saves someone with the Heimlich maneuver. The embattled Jewish Oscar winner helped his friend, Andrew Stein, a former Manhattan borough president, when Stein choked on a piece of pork at the Caravaggio restaurant on […]