PJ Grisar is a Forward culture reporter. He can be reached at [email protected] and @pjgrisar on Twitter.
PJ Grisar
By PJ Grisar
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Culture Did the Trump campaign really slap a Nazi eagle on a t-shirt?
As wrongheaded as they were in vying to keep the U.S. out of World War II, the America First Committee took great pains to avoid fetishizing fascism. While the group certainly attracted its share of anti-Semites and German American Bundists, its trick was to appear as American as apple pie when courting isolationists. That meant…
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Culture What to read before you stream the ‘Hamilton’ movie
On Independence Day Eve, almost anyone can get a front row seat to “Hamilton.” It’s truly an American dream. The filmed performance of the cultural juggernaut about the inaugural secretary of the Treasury will arrive on the Disney+ streaming service July 3, a year before its intended theatrical release. To celebrate the occasion of this…
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Culture Do we really need Dustin Hoffman starring in ‘Our Town?’
When Broadway finally reopens, it will be in the aftermath of a revolution. A global health pandemic and a national revolt against racism should advance efforts that theatermakers of color have been pushing for for years: inclusion and diversity in casting and production and stories that reflect their lives. The reckoning hasn’t yet reached Grover’s…
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Culture Mel Brooks in ‘deep shock’ after losing Carl Reiner, says son Max Brooks
Mel Brooks was there when his longtime friend Carl Reiner passed away in the middle of the night on June 29. According to Brooks’ son, Max, the director doesn’t yet know how he’s managing the loss. “My dad’s friendship with Carl goes back 70 years,” Max Brooks said during a June 30 webinar for Moment…
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Culture 12 clips to remember Carl Reiner by
Carl Reiner had good reason to disdain bananas. Though he had a 70-year career in film and television, he was regularly referred to in his early appearances as Sid Caesar’s “second banana.” When he sat down with Mel Brooks’ 2,000-year-old man, one critic noted that he had risen to the level of “second-banana supreme.” Yet…
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Culture Carl Reiner, ‘Dick Van Dyke Show’ creator and Mel Brooks’ other half, dies at 98
Carl Reiner, the Mark Twain Prize-winning writer, actor and director whose sharp and open-hearted voice shaped over 50 years of comedy, has died at 98. According to his son the filmmaker Rob Reiner, he passed away on the evening of June 29. Reiner, best known for creating and acting in “The Dick Van Dyke Show,”…
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Music Bob Dylan becomes oldest artist in UK with a #1 album of new songs
Paul Simon once lamented the fact he always seemed to come in second to Bob Dylan. “I don’t like coming in second,” Simon told Rolling Stone in 2011. Yet, there are some titles where getting second place is not quite so bad. Among them: oldest artist to reach #1 on the UK charts with an…
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Culture Why Sacha Baron Cohen is the anti-Zuckerberg
On Saturday June 27 in Olympia, Wash., Sacha Baron Cohen appeared incognito at a right-wing rally, leading the crowd in a chorus of gleeful murderous intent. In a false beard and overstuffed overalls, the “Who Is America” comic welcomed rallygoers at the pro-gun “March For Our Rights” event to inject such “liberal” targets as CNN,…
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