This is the Forward’s coverage of Jewish culture where you’ll learn about the latest (and sometimes earliest) in Jewish art, music (including of course Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen), film, theater, books as well as the secret Jewish history of…
Culture
-
Film & TV
On the border of Turkey and Syria, a Jewish family desperate to flee a rapidly-changing world
Swiss-Kurdish director Mano Khalil’s “Neighbours” is a cinematically stunning, deeply unsettling film that is at once brutal and satiric, and at moments even magical. The central figure is six-year-old Sero (Serhed Khalil) and the story is seen through his trusting and innocent eyes. Loosely inspired by the director’s own childhood experiences, the movie, with its…
-
Wordle’s massively popular (Jewish) predecessors
Writer’s note: After an outpouring of love for the word game Jotto, this article has been updated. If you are one of the countless smartphone users currently beguiled by a five by six grid of letters, you may be interested to know about Wordle’s Jewish precursors. Before Twitter was lit up by rows of gray,…
-
Netflix’s newest Israeli hit is simplistic and racist, no matter how many times it name-drops the Oslo Accords
The Liam Neeson movie “Taken,” a high drama of exotic, Muslim traffickers and the great lengths parents will go to in order to protect their children, was an enormous hit. Netflix’s “The Girl From Oslo,” is built more or less identically, and it looks destined for the same success – it appeared on Netflix’s Top…
The Latest
-
Books Think the goblins in Harry Potter are antisemitic? Try the rest of British literature
British literature is so full of antisemitic tropes that the goblins in Harry Potter are now the most obvious ones
-
No, the relentlessly ‘macho’ Norman Mailer hasn’t been canceled — should he be?
This month, Michael Wolff claimed that Norman Mailer has been “canceled” because a project to collect his political writings was discontinued by a publisher. Wolff charged that an essay by Mailer, “The White Negro,” (1957) a dated opus inspired by the Austrian Jewish psychoanalyst Wilhelm Reich, was deemed offensive for today’s readers. Although Wolff’s claims…
-
To you, he was the man behind Woodstock; to me, he was a connoisseur of latkes and matzo balls
My wonderful pal Michael Lang died this past Saturday evening. He was a kind and loving friend, an unstoppable force of nature, and, quite frankly, a legend and icon. At age 24, Michael was the co-creator of the Woodstock ’69 Festival and subsequently, he led festivals under that globally-recognized name. In business and in life,…
-
Why there needs to be an Orthodox episode of ‘Queer Eye’
Picture this: A woman, her hair covered with a scarf, watches as Jonathan Van Ness, the hair and makeup expert for Netflix’s “Queer Eye” styles her sheitel. While he works, they chit chat about wig maintenance and the religious meaning of covering her hair. Finally, she puts it back on. “Yas, queen,” Jonathan says. “Slay!”…
-
Remembering Bob Saget, Millennials’ embarrassing, bawdy, beloved Jewish dad
Children of the ‘90s discovered Bob Saget in phases – he was one of the rare comedy acts that aged with you, while never quite maturing. The comedian, who was found dead in a Florida hotel room Sunday at the age of 65, first entered my life as Danny Tanner, the neat freak single father…
-
She co-wrote the soundtrack of modern Jewish America (and Barbra Streisand revered her)
The song lyricist Marilyn Bergman, who died Jan. 8 at age 93, proved that secure understanding of a Jewish cultural background can lead to empathy for a world of other human experiences. Celebrated for her songwriting duo with her husband, Alan Bergman, which produced hits such as “The Way We Were,” “The Windmills of Your…
-
IFRAME TEST
test
-
The Jewish mentor Sidney Poitier never got to thank
Sidney Poitier, the Oscar-winning actor, director and civil rights icon who died today at 94, often credited a more obscure figure for his success: an old Jewish waiter. When Poitier was a newly-arrived Bahamian in Queens, N.Y., washing dishes at a restaurant, and hoping to make it as an actor, he would bring newspapers to…
Explore
Most Popular
- 1
Opinion In the rush to vilify Israel, genocide scholars ignored the truth
- 2
Fast Forward Coldplay welcomed Israeli fans onstage ‘as equal humans.’ Why are some Jewish people mad?
- 3
Fast Forward Trump lawyer who praised ‘Mein Kampf’ is now accusing Harvard of antisemitism, report says
- 4
Fast Forward The fraudster at the center of an NBA scandal once proclaimed ‘tzedek tzedek tirdof’
In Case You Missed It
-
Opinion Israel’s strike in Qatar: An audacious bid for victory, or just another foolhardy provocation?
-
Fast Forward University of Oregon cuts spare Judaic studies faculty who had raised alarm
-
Fast Forward As more Jews acquire guns, a Jewish security group urges stronger regulations for synagogues
-
Yiddish די ייִדישע גאַסנשילד פֿונעם פּאַריזער „פּלעצל“ איז צוגעגנבֿעט געוואָרןYiddish street sign for the Pletzel, the Yiddish quarter of Paris, is stolen
דער אינצידענט איז פֿאָרגעקומען בעת אַ ממשותדיקן וווּקס פֿון אַנטיסעמיטיזם אין פֿראַנקרײַך
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
