This article is part of our morning briefing. Click here to get it delivered to your inbox each weekday. ‘This is not about Hitler’: Broadway musical tackles American antisemitism
The revival of Parade opened on Broadway this weekend. The musical tells the true story of Leo Frank, a Jewish businessman in Atlanta, who was accused in 1913 of murdering a 13-year-old factory employee. Our Nora Berman spoke with Micaela Diamond, the actress portraying Frank’s wife, Lucille, who fights tirelessly for her husband’s freedom. Context: Frank was convicted after a trial that was filled with false testimonies and surrounded by salacious media coverage. A mob later later kidnapped him from his cell and lynched him. The event was a source of immense trauma for American Jews, and sparked the birth of the Anti-Defamation League. Closer to home: “This is not about Hitler,” Diamond said. “It is a very specific American hatred of Jews. You can’t escape the blame, the atrocity of the American hatred.”
Backstory: Diamond, who is 23, grew up on the Jersey Shore, where she performed in musicals at her JCC and her synagogue. She found out she landed her first Broadway role — playing the youngest version of Cher in The Cher Show in 2019 — while in Israel on a Birthright trip. Of Parade, she said: “I feel more fulfilled at the end of this show than any show I’ve ever done.” |
- Former President Donald Trump said he expects to be indicted today in an alleged hush money scheme. Which certainly doesn’t mean he’d have to halt his campaign for reelection. After all, Eugene V. Debs — the preferred socialist candidate of the Forverts and namesake of our radio signal, WEVD — ran for president in 1920 from the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary.
- Alan Dershowitz, the Harvard law professor who counseled Trump during his first impeachment trial, said that Republicans who criticize George Soros, the billionaire Democratic donor, shouldn’t be concerned about antisemitism. Soros is a Holocaust survivor, but Dershowitz nonetheless said he is “not much of a Jew.”
- Many local police departments do not report hate crime data to the FBI. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, Democrat of New York, is asking the Justice Department to find out why.
- “Israel has mastered the art of tiptoeing around Russia’s involvement in this war,” Ksenia Svetlova, a former member of Knesset, writes in an OpEd.
- An employee at a midsize bank embezzled its clients’ entire savings and triggered the bank’s downfall. No, it’s not the story of Silicon Valley Bank. It’s a new TV series from Israel.
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Clockwise from top left: Ofer Stern, Casandra Larenas, and Daniel and Lior Schleider are all leaving Israel. (Courtesy) |
? Alarmed by their country’s political direction, more Israelis are seeking to move abroad. “I have no doubt I will have tears in my eyes the whole flight,” said Daniel Schleider, who was born in Mexico and made aliyah at 18. He served in the Israeli army, married an Israeli woman, built a career in an Israeli company, and describes himself as “deeply Zionist.” (JTA) ? A Fox News producer, Abby Grossberg, is suing the network, accusing its lawyers of coercing her to give misleading testimony in the case involving coverage of election fraud claims. The lawsuit paints a disturbing behind-the-scenes picture of daily office life, including sexism and antisemitism. “They don’t respect or value women,” she said in an interview. Also: Tucker Carlson’s staff made jokes about Jews. (New York Times) ? Israeli security forces are gearing up for Ramadan, which begins Wednesday night and overlaps with Passover. The confluence of Muslim and Jewish holidays has historically led to tensions at Jerusalem’s holy sites, and this one comes after a particularly violent few months in Israel and the occupied West Bank. Israeli police said they would preemptively arrest instigators. (Times of Israel) ⛰️ Many Jewish refugees escaped World War II by taking a clandestine route through the Swiss Alps. The Alpine Peace Crossing now offers tourists the chance to retrace those footsteps. (Smithsonian Magazine) ? Israel was ranked the world’s fourth-happiest country in a report released Monday by the United Nations, moving up five slots. Finland was No. 1 for the sixth year in a row. (Deseret News, Read the report) Shiva call ➤ Stuart Hodes, a choreographer and dancer who was a partner of Martha Graham in the 1940s and 50s, died at 98.
What else we’re reading ➤ How Judy Blume’s Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret broke taboos around interfaith marriage … In a first, Hebrew University launches undergraduate class in United Arab Emirates studies … For FBI legend J. Edgar Hoover, Christian nationalism was the gospel truth, argues new book. |
Mickey Cohen’s mug shot. (Wikimedia) | On this day in history (1963): Alcatraz, the infamous prison in San Francisco Bay, closed for good. Among the last inmates to occupy the prison was Mickey Cohen, a gangster who served time for tax evasion. He referred to the prison as a “crumbling dungeon,” and was the only inmate ever allowed to leave it for six months by posting bail. In honor of National Countdown Day (yes, it’s a thing), here’s your friendly reminder that you have a little more than two weeks until Passover. Doug Emhoff, the second gentleman of the United States, is scheduled to deliver remarks this afternoon at an event honoring Jewish women leaders. Thursday at 6:30 p.m. CT: Join Adam Langer, the Forward’s executive editor and host of our popular Playing Anne Frank podcast, at the Illinois Holocaust Museum in Skokie, Illinois, for a behind-the-scenes look at the show. Register here ➤
Or sign up here to join Adam on April 2 at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in Lower Manhattan. He’ll be joined by several actors from the original 1955 Broadway production of The Diary of Anne Frank and the touring company that followed it, actors who have not seen each other in decades. |
The trailer for the fifth and final season of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel features standup routines, family drama … and a llama. The show premieres on Amazon Prime Video April 14. In the meantime, you can catch Maisel star Rachel Brosnahan portraying a 1960s New York housewife alongside Oscar Isaac this week in a Lorraine Hansberry revival at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Read our review ➤ —
Thanks to Irene Katz Connelly Mira Fox, Jacob Kornbluh, Tani Levitt and Talya Zax for contributing to today’s newsletter. You can reach the “Forwarding” team at [email protected].
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