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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Musical Sparks Fresh Tensions With Blacks Over Infamous Leo Frank Case
The Leo Frank case, a century old now, seems like an unlikely subject for a musical. Nonetheless, in “Parade” Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Alfred Uhry and composer Jason Robert Brown took on the story of the northern Jew who was accused of murdering Mary Phagan, one of the young employees of the Atlanta pencil factory…
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‘Indecent’ Won’t Close On Broadway After All — At Least, Not Yet
“Indecent,” Paula Vogel’s tribute to Sholem Asch’s “God of Vengeance,” will stay open on Broadway somewhat longer than expected. Battling low ticket sales, after winning two Tony Awards on June 11 the play’s production team announced that its last performance at the Cort Theater would be June 25. Yet ticket sales took a significant turn…
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Film & TV ‘Jerry Springer — The Opera’ Headed To Off-Broadway
If you’ve ever watched “Jerry Springer” and thought the talk show, infamous for presenting familial confrontations over lurid secrets, expressed some ineffable (if grim) truths about humanity, you’re in luck: “Jerry Springer — The Opera” will arrive in New York in the 2017-2018 season. The stage production, which premiered in London over a decade ago,…
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Revisiting Tony Kushner’s ‘Angels In America’ In The Trump Era
‘Angels in America” is a play of its time and for ours, too. Tony Kushner’s magnum opus — currently in revival at London’s National Theater, and due in movie theaters here this July — is appropriately apocalyptic, informed by an impression of impending catastrophe. “History is about to crack wide open,” Ethel Rosenberg warns Roy…
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Books Yankel and Leah (Chapter 2): Awkward First Date
This originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. To read the previous chapter. And so after some perfunctory small talk, an appointment was arranged. Yankel would meet with someone called Leah Spielman (he scribbled this into his small appointment book), daughter of Abe and Helen Spielman, refugees from the Old World, now living in Flatbush. “Appointment”…
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In 1906, The Forward’s Geyser Became An Unlikely Water Source
“Thousands Come Drink Cold Fresh Water From The ‘Forverts’ Foundation-Stone,” the Forward’s headline read. And New York’s newspapers were filled with the story of the remarkable source uncovered while digging the foundation for the new 10 floor building that was being raised by the ‘Forverts. The English language press was full of descriptions and images…
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Why We Need To Abolish The Pledge Of Allegiance Now
The “Prayer For Our Country” (or “Prayer For The Country” or “…The Nation”) takes place in synagogues across America (and elsewhere) every Saturday. Those of us who have been to synagogue are familiar with its text. On the face of it, it’s a platitudinous interlude before returning to the religious task at hand. But the…
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What Would Gertrude Stein Say? Visit This Statue And Find Out
What would Gertrude Stein say? In most cases, the answer would likely be “If Napoleon if I told him if I told him if Napoleon,” or perhaps, for special occasions, “The devil what the devil what do I care if the devil is there.” But to be absolutely sure, starting in July, you can visit…
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New Opera Tells Story Of Robert Moses And Jane Jacobs — In The City Where They Battled
“That could be cocaine, Lydia!” an older woman exclaimed as her friend knelt to retrieve a small plastic bag dropped by a passing stranger. “A lot of Jews are lactose intolerant,” a nearby man observed. The strangers stood close together on the ground floor of the glossy Lower Manhattan transit hub of Fulton Center. It…
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National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene To Host Immigration Arts Summit
In July, within sight of the Statue of Liberty, the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene will host a two-day immigration arts summit. The event, scheduled for July 17 and 18, will coincide with the Folksbiene’s presentation of the original musical “Amerike — The Golden Land,” which opens July 4. Like that production, the summit will take…
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Film & TV Why The Transformers Movies Are Really Stories Of Jewish Resilience and Adaptability
With the release of the fifth installment of the “Transformers” franchise upon us, it seems like an appropriate time to reveal that they are Jewish. The Transformers are giant robots who can change themselves into everyday objects, including cars, airplanes, trucks and tanks. They excel at mimicry, morphing between machine and robot with chameleon-like ease,…
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