Mother-In-Law Jokes Are Kosher, Judge Rules
By Elissa Strauss May 6, 2010
A U.S. District Judge in New Jersey recently ruled that comedian Sunda Croonquist can continue making fun of her Jewish mother-in-law.
Croonquist, the AP reports, a half-Swedish, half African-American woman who married a Jewish man, was sued two years ago by her in-laws who were offended by her jokes. And just in case things weren’t complicated enough, her husband, attorney Mark Zafrin, acted as her defense.
In a 21-page ruling issued Friday, the judge said that her jabs at her in-laws fall under the category of protected free speech since they are clearly an opinion. For Croonquist, this means she can carry on with her routine.
“Suppose I lost, there would be no more mother-in-law jokes,” Croonquist told a reporter in an interview on KABC in Los Angeles.
On Croonquist’s website you can see footage of her riffing on her mother-in-law, describing the moment when she first met her on the way to a Passover Seder.
“The only thing we have in common is that we don’t want to get our hair wet,” she says.
Though perhaps her in-laws should take this up with uber-Jewish comedian Jackie Mason. Croonquist credits her beginnings in comedy with a “chance encounter” with Mason at a party, who enjoyed her sassy shtick and encouraged her to start doing stand-up.
It’s our birthday and we’re still celebrating!
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news.
This week we celebrate 129 years of the Forward. We’re proud of our origins as a Yiddish print publication serving Jewish immigrants. And we’re just as proud of what we’ve become today: A trusted source of Jewish news and opinion, available digitally to anyone in the world without paywalls or subscriptions.
We’ve helped five generations of American Jews make sense of the news and the world around them — and we aren’t slowing down any time soon.
As a nonprofit newsroom, reader donations make it possible for us to do this work. Support independent, agenda-free Jewish journalism and our board will match your gift in honor of our birthday!
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
