Jewish ‘Stranger Things’ star Noah Schnapp visits Israel
The actor had his bar mitzvah there years earlier
(Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for Turner)
By Lior Zaltzman July 19, 2023
A version of this article originally appeared on Kveller.
Jewish actor Noah Schnapp, who plays Will Byers on the Netflix hit “Stranger Things,” is currently in Israel, where he appears to have been hounded by some fans and paparazzi.
The actor, 18, shared a picture from the Western Wall on his Instagram stories, captioning it: “learning so much about my culture. So inspiring.”
Schnapp, whose parents are both Jewish, was seen wearing a kippah on his head and teffilfin wrapped on his arms. Schnapp was on a tour of the city organized by Aish Global, along with fashion influencer Moti Ankari and actress and producer Rachel Katsner.
Will from stranger things at the kotel pic.twitter.com/bJ9X5AiU5m
— jewboy media (@simmy_cohen) July 18, 2023
Schnapp, now 18, who has both Russian and Moroccan Jewish roots, was also seen enjoying Tel Aviv and bopping to a song by Israeli singer Mergui. “In love with this place,” he wrote in one Tel Aviv photo he posted in his stories, in which he’s overlooking the Mediterranean at dusk on a city balcony.
This wasn’t Schnapp’s first visit in Israel — the actor had his bar mitzvah there half a decade ago.
And while Schnapp’s character in “Stranger Things” is not Jewish (even if his mom is played by Winona Ryder, née Horowitz), he did play a young Jewish boy in the 2019 movie “Abe” and a young shepherd helping smuggle Jewish refugees out of Nazi-occupied France in the 2020 movie “Waiting For Anya.”
In “Abe,” Schnapp’s character blends the cuisines of his mother’s Jewish family and his father’s Palestinian parents to forge a truce between the feuding branches of his family tree.
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
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