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
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WATCH: A ‘Star Wars’ Tribute To Hanukkah
“Star Wars” and the holidays don’t have the best history. The trouble began in 1977 — the first Hanukkah after the original “Star Wars” hit theaters. Toy company Kenner found itself unprepared for the demands of the season and, instead of gifting kids action figures of Luke, Leia and Chewbacca, parents were forced to give…
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Polish Politician Dissed Holocaust Commemoration — Then Sued The Curator Who Commissioned It
Continuing a trend, in Poland, of political objections to artwork concerning the country’s role in the Holocaust, a nationalist Polish governor is suing an art curator for defamation. The row began in October, Art Newspaper reported, when a public artwork by Dorota Nieznalski commissioned by Lublin-based art historian and curator Tomasz Kitliński was unveiled during…
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Is The West Suffering From Cultural Dementia?
London’s bookstores all seem to have a “doomsday” table right now — a prominent display of books on the end of democracy, the rise of Russia, the march to Brexit, and the collapse of the idea of Europe. On one of these tables, I encountered “Cultural Dementia: How the West Has Lost Its History and…
The Latest
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Weinstein And Accusers Headed For $25 Million Settlement
Film producer and alleged serial sexual abuser Harvey Weinstein has reached a tentative $25 million settlement agreement with dozens of his accusers. The money comes with a condition — no admission of wrongdoing and no money from Weinstein’s own pocket. The New York Times’s Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, who won a Pulitzer prize for…
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In A Classic English Comedy, A Sly Parable About Anti-Semitism
“England,” wrote George Orwell, “is the most class-ridden country under the sun. It is a land of snobbery and privilege, ruled largely by the old and silly […] A family with the wrong members in control — that, perhaps, is as near as one can come to describing England in a phrase.” That was in…
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Michael Chabon Adapting ‘Amazing Adventures Of Kavalier And Clay’ Into Miniseries
(JTA) — Kavalier and Clay are coming to Showtime. Michael Chabon’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel “The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay” will air as a miniseries next year on the premium cable network Showtime. The critically acclaimed book has been described as “an epic tale of love, war and the birth of America’s comic book…
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The Jewish Geography Of The 2020 Golden Globe Nominees
The Hollywood Foreign Press Association is continuing its love affair with Jewish filmmakers with the 2020 Golden Globe nominees. We don’t expect that members of that outfit are particularly interested in Jewish geography, but here at the Forward, our offices are plastered with headshots connected by yards of red thread and dates of b’nai mitzvah….
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Leonard Cohen’s Last Words Summon The Spirit Of The Poet
Like an urn is full of ash, a posthumous album can often be a light, insubstantial remembrance. The survivors who release it into the wind of public opinion can count themselves lucky if the contents do not rebound onto them embarrassingly. The best case scenario is usually a brief, respectful silence and then insignificance. Things…
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Film & TV Happy 103rd Birthday To Kirk Douglas
In honor of Kirk Douglas’s 103rd birthday, we reprint this tribute to the movie legend who was born Issur Danielovich to immigrant parents. Kirk Douglas, who turns 100 on December 9, is both a movie legend and a Hollywood anomaly: a star divided. Most stars lodge in our collective consciousness. Douglas, while a first-magnitude star,…
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The Secret Jewish History Of The Rockettes
Is there anything more goyish than the Rockettes, the “precision-dance” troupe best known for its starring role in the annual “Christmas Spectacular” at Radio City Music Hall? Well, yes. As it turns out, the entire creative team behind the annual Radio City holiday event, which began in 1932, were Jewish men brought together by Samuel…
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When Tragedy Struck A Rolling Stones Festival, And The Maysles Brothers Caught It On Film
18-year-old Meredith Hunter was pronounced dead at 6:20 PM Pacific Time on December 6, 1969. His killing defined the legacy of the Altamont Free Concert in Tracy, California — which had aspired to be a Woodstock for the west coast — partially because the jarring moments that preceded it were caught on film. Charlotte Zwerin…
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