Category: Culture

(JTA) — A matchmaker who says she has successfully paired 200 Jewish couples is the star of “Jewish Matchmaking,” a Netflix series that is set to start streaming May 3. Netflix announced the series, a spinoff of its wildly successful “Indian Matchmaking” show, nearly a year ago. Now, new details that the streaming giant released […]

(New York Jewish Week) — When Anat Gov’s play “HaChaverot Hachi Tovot” (“Best Friends”) premiered in 1999, it was an anomaly among Israeli works of theater. In fact, Gov wrote it with anomalous intentions: In an interview before it opened, she called the piece a form of “compensation for the fact that there are no […]

(JTA) — “It’s like a Jewish ‘Lord of the Rings,’ but he’s just going to his mom’s house.” That’s how director Ari Aster, known for his acclaimed horror movies “Hereditary” and “Midsommar,” described his new film, “Beau Is Afraid,” in a behind-the-scenes video released on Wednesday. Aster, who works with A24, the same studio behind […]

(JTA) — HarperCollins has revised multiple novels by the famed British mystery writer Agatha Christie to remove references to Jews and other minorities deemed offensive by sensitivity readers. The edits, which the British Telegraph first reported on Sunday, add Christie to a growing list of authors whose work is getting tweaked for contemporary audiences. Roald […]

(JTA) — Ben Stiller offered his own High Holiday alternative to Adam Sandler’s “Chanukah Song” as his fellow Jewish comedian accepted the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. During an awards ceremony that took place on March 19 and aired last night on CNN, Stiller asked from the stage at Washington, D.C.’s Kennedy Center for the Performing […]

(JTA) — The last 20 years haven’t been kind to Jewish journalism, with local weeklies shrinking or folding and even big city papers suspending their print publications and going completely digital. Publishing online has allowed these papers to cut costs and given them the potential for a wide reach — albeit a potential undermined by […]

(JTA) — Kanye West announced on Saturday that he now is a fan of Jewish people, reversing the stance he revealed back in October when he vowed to “go death con 3 ON JEWISH PEOPLE.” The latest twist in a saga that has fueled antisemitic rhetoric across the United States was prompted, West said on […]

(JTA) — When Deborah Koenigsberger Gutierrez attended a small cocktail reception with the celebrated Mexican filmmaker Guillermo del Toro last December, she didn’t expect to leave with an idea for a synagogue fundraiser.  But in a conversation with del Toro and a few other guests at the event, which was in honor of the premiere […]

(JTA) — The most notable message Melissa Klapper got during her four-night run this week on “Jeopardy!” didn’t come because the Jewish studies scholar was unable to answer a question about Yom Kippur. It also wasn’t an unkind note from a game-show stickler who believed she’d gotten credit for a wrong response. Instead, it was an […]

(JTA) — The 2023 MLB season is almost upon us, and it has the potential to be a historic year for Jews in professional baseball. Last year, 17 Jewish players appeared in a game — a likely record. This season, the number could be even higher. The slate of Jewish players in the game this […]