Curt Schleier is a freelance writer and author who covers business and the arts for a variety of publications. Follow him on Twitter at @tvsoundoff.
Curt Schleier
By Curt Schleier
-
The Schmooze Friday Film: Golden Age of Jewish Television
Television’s golden age ran roughly from the late 1940s to the early 1960s — a quaint period in which not a single Jersey housewife or Kardashian made it on the air. Instead, viewers were treated to classical theater and original productions from the likes of Paddy Chayefsky, Gore Vidal and Rod Serling. Great actors and…
-
The Schmooze Q&A: Joel Rooks, the Other George Burns
Joel Rooks was raised in Swampscott, Mass., in a Jewish family that owned a women’s retail clothing store. George Nathan Birnbaum grew up in an Orthodox Jewish family at 259 Rivington St., on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Birnbaum grew up, took the stage name George Burns and became a star of vaudeville, films and television….
-
The Schmooze Putting the ‘Other’ in ‘Other Desert Cities’
In a Broadway season remarkable for its number of quality productions, Jon Robin Baitz’s brilliant “Other Desert Cities” stands a step above the rest. The play is set in 2004 in Palm Springs, where the Wyeth clan is in the midst of a troubled family reunion. Polly (Stockard Channing) and Lyman (Stacy Keach) are wealthy…
-
The Schmooze Friday Film: All-American David
Film still courtesy of Joel Fendelman Is the small-budget gem “David” a parable for peace in the Middle East? It might — or might not — be. But in either case, it is an engaging, intelligent film that wisely resists the temptation of formulaic, diabetes-inducing sweetness or, conversely, knee-jerk bitterness. “David,” screening December 10 at…
-
The Schmooze Friday Film: Allen Bares All
Image courtesy of PBS Woody Allen has always been something of an enigma, slipping effortlessly and Zelig-like from one persona to the next. He started as a gag and television writer (most famously for Sid Caesar), became an extremely successful stand-up comic, wrote humorous essays for The New Yorker (many of which were collected into…
-
The Schmooze Q&A: Calvin Trillin on What’s Funny
Journalist Calvin Trillin is a long-time staff writer at The New Yorker who has written over two dozen books. But he is perhaps best known as a humorist, a career that began in 1978 when then-editor of The Nation, “the parsimonious Victor Navasky,” took him to lunch. As Trillin recalls, Navasky wanted to “discuss his…
-
The Schmooze Q&A: Brett Ratner on Yeshiva and ‘Tower Heist’
Brett Ratner not only provides material for a good story, he even writes the headlines. “Your headline should be: ‘Yeshiva Prepared Ratner To Be Director,’” he said during a phone interview with The Arty Semite. Happily, yeshiva did a good job. Ratner is most famous for the “Rush Hour” trilogy of films. His latest comedy…
-
The Schmooze Q&A: ‘Harold and Kumar’ Directors on High School
Writer-director pals Hayden Schlossberg and Jon Hurwitz have expectations to live up to. Fans of “Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle” and its sequel, “Harold & Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay,” are expecting even bigger laughs from the third installment in the comic duo’s franchise, “A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas,” which opens…
Explore
Most Popular
- 1
News Who was Horst Wessel, and why are people comparing Charlie Kirk to him?
- 2
Culture Charlie Kirk kept a ‘Jewish Sabbath.’ What did he mean by that?
- 3
Film & TV Robert Redford’s legacy is surprisingly Jewish
- 4
Antisemitism Decoded Israel is being blamed for Charlie Kirk’s death. Here’s what that conspiracy theory says about the far right’s divide
In Case You Missed It
-
Culture This Israeli photographer’s work is all about ‘subverting masculinity’
-
Opinion The terrifying Nazi precedent for Jimmy Kimmel’s suspension — and the reasons to stay hopeful
-
Fast Forward Freed hostage Edan Alexander says he’s returning to the IDF next month
-
Yiddish World How a Yiddish acting troupe fooled the Tsarist government
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
