Nathan Burstein
By Nathan Burstein
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Culture Balancing Act
Lisa Appel spends more time standing on her head than most Jewish educators spend on their feet. The classroom veteran with an affinity for Hebrew songs also spins more plates and juggles more scarves than her colleagues, and she’s more likely to teach in sparkly attire and a bright-pink wig. In other words, Appel is…
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Culture Hollywood Drama About Jewish Resistance Hits the Classroom
High-school history instructors don’t normally find themselves on Hollywood guest lists, so filmgoers with better inside connections might have been surprised recently by the teachers’ presence at advance screenings of “Defiance,” the Holocaust drama that opened nationwide January 16 and stars James Bond actor Daniel Craig. But the film’s preview audiences, like the genre-altering movie…
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Life Bernard Madoff, the Condiment
He’s been bad for the Jews and catastrophic for American capitalism, but perhaps Bernard Madoff might make a good condiment. The world’s most loathed alleged Ponzi schemer — reportedly responsible for losing $50 billion of investors’ money — has inspired a hot sauce in his very own name and image. Bernie in Hell, a five-ounce…
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Israel News Two-State Solution?
For the first time ever, Israel has chosen an Arab representative for one of the year’s most high-profile international gatherings: the televised music competition that launched the career of the Swedish pop group ABBA. Musician Mira Awad, described on her MySpace page as a “Palestinian actress, singer and songwriter living in Israel,” will perform for…
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Israel News Songs of Hope From the Underground
Israel’s battle with Hamas has driven much of the country’s music scene underground — in many cases, literally. Since the outbreak of fighting, December 27, dozens of Israel’s best-known singers have performed free concerts for compatriots living within range of Palestinian rockets, sometimes playing in bomb shelters in Beersheba, Ashkelon and Ashdod. Musicians ranging from…
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Israel News Basketball Star Shines on the Big Screen
Talk about a role reversal: It’s a Jew barking orders at the Germans in an upcoming Israeli movie, though much of the shouting is restricted to a basketball court. “Playoff,” a Hebrew-language biopic now in the early stages of development, will tell the unlikely story of an Israeli basketball coach recruited to head the West…
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Israel News Hundreds of Little Dreidels
It was the opposite of the “No Spin Zone.” On December 22, hundreds of southern California Hanukkah enthusiasts converged on Santa Monica’s Third Street Promenade in a mass attempt to break one of the few world records Michael Phelps left standing in 2008: the distinction of spinning the most dreidels simultaneously. Enlisted by Sha’arei Am…
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Israel News Meyer Lansky’s Off-Broadway Debut
He spent a long, blood-soaked career in the shadows, but Jewish mobster Meyer Lansky is finally taking center stage. “Lansky,” a one-man play about the infamous gangster, will begin previews January 23, in an off-Broadway production starring Mike Burstyn. Dubbed the “financial wizard of organized crime” in his New York Times obituary, Lansky, who began…
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