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 Why Theodor Herzl still matters
Theodor Herzl did not live to see Israel realized, but he is arguably the country’s most enduring visionary. In less than a decade, before his early death in 1904, at the age of 44, Herzl lifted the Zionist movement from obscurity to a palpable political force through his magnetism and dedication. Many Israelis and Zionists…
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Culture It’s Nazis vs. Nazi hunters in Amazon’s comic book revenge fantasy
The opening credits of Amazon’s “Hunters,” a new series about a crew of Nazi-killing avengers in late 1970s New York, unfold over the backdrop of a chess board. The game’s hand-painted pieces take on the shape of the central players — a bloodied young man with a knife, a black woman with an afro and…
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Culture Poland’s Jewish Museum director is stepping aside — why now?
“It’s been almost a year since I left the museum, actually,” said Professor Dariusz Stola. “I waited quite patiently, I must say.” Stola was formerly the director of POLIN, Poland’s Jewish museum in Warsaw, until February 2019, when his five-year contract ended. For a year, he took no other job, hoping that he would be…
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Culture A museum devoted to Southern Jewish culture to open in fall of 2020
For 26 years, the only museum devoted to Jewish life throughout the American South operated on the grounds of a Reform summer camp in Utica, Miss. Since opening its doors in 1986, the Museum of the Southern Jewish Experience was a hub for Southern Jews looking to get in touch with their region’s vibrant past…
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Culture Behold: The trailer for Wes Anderson’s most Jewish film yet
We sometimes like to imagine the private rooms of Wes Anderson: The pastel wallpaper, staid geometry, old knick-knacks and, most of all, the reading material. Works on oceanography accrued for “The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou” (2004); the collected works of Stefan Zweig, who inspired “The Grand Budapest Hotel” (2014) and J.D. Salinger, whose work…
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Culture Did Trump really miss the point of this ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’ clip?
President Trump has a busy cable news-viewing schedule, so perhaps he can be forgiven for not being up to date on “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” On Monday night, the president tweeted a (NSFW) clip from the show’s season 10 premiere that aired on January 19. He appeared to miss some crucial context, but that doesn’t mean…
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Culture Did Kirk Douglas really use his last words to endorse Bloomberg?
Mike Bloomberg is paying online influencers to make his presidential campaign look hip, evidently anxious about cornering the youth vote. But the state of his base is perhaps best summed up by an altogether different alleged endorsement: That of film legend Kirk Douglas, who died last week at the age of 103. This weekend at…
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Culture The Jewish, Polish, Mexican theater director who mentored Alejandro Iñárritu
Did you hear the one about Alejandro Iñárritu’s Jewish Polish-Mexican directing mentor? If you weren’t busy checking your Oscars ballot during the commercials on Sunday, you may have heard Iñárritu, the Academy Award-winning director of “Birdman” (2014) and “The Revenant” (2016) give a shout-out to a director named Ludwik Margules during a Rolex commercial. “Ludwik…
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