The Schmooze lies at the intersection of high and low culture. Here, the latest developments and trends in Jewish art, books, dance, film, music, media, television and theater are all assimilated into one handy pop culture blog.
The Schmooze
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Mel Gibson Is Making Passion Of The Christ 2. Here’s Why You Should Be Worried.
It was a cultural phenomenon that raked in $600 million at the box office and is still the highest grossing R-rated film of all time. Years later people are still questioning just how anti-Semitic “The Passion Of the Christ” really was. Mel Gibson, the star vehicle driving the movie to its bloody, sadomasochistic conclusion, famously…
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Ruth Bader Ginsburg Speaks With Jane Eisner, And More To Read, Watch And Do This Weekend
Thursday is part of the weekend, right? This week, definitely: On Thursday night, Supreme Court Justice and pop culture icon Ruth Bader Ginsburg will speak with Forward editor-in-chief Jane Eisner at Washington D.C.’s Adas Israel Congregation. While the event itself is sold out, the Forward will be livestreaming it; learn how to watch it, here….
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Siggy Flicker, Unlikely Voice For Holocaust Education On ‘The Real Housewives,’ Departs Show
There was a time when you might have prayed, “May my daughter never grow up to be a star on the reality TV show ‘Real Housewives.’” Now you can change that prayer to, “Should my daughter grow up to be a star on ‘Real Housewives,’ may she be like Siggy Flicker.” In a dreamlike turn…
The Latest
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The ‘Israeli SNL’ Just Took A Stand For Refugees In An Unbelievably Creative Way
“Do not mistreat or oppress a foreigner, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt,” the Torah tells us. Even if you are now an actor starring on one of Israel’s most popular and influential television shows, you were once a stranger. That’s just what the team behind “Eretz Nehederet,” Israel’s version of “Saturday…
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Abusive Or Empowered? Sara Netanyahu Screams At Aide In New Leaked Tape
Likudnik, Shas voter, Yesh Atid-er, or just a gal who crumples up the newspaper and throws it at the wall when she reads about Israel’s confusing parliamentary system — whoever you are, you have to admit there is nothing in the world like the leaked recording of a furious member of the Netanyahu family. For…
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Sportscaster Suspended For Calling Tom Brady’s Daughter ‘Annoying Little Pissant’
Well, there’s good news and there’s bad news. The good news is that there is a trendy young sports writer named Alex Reimer who apparently rocketed to sports-journalism fame as a tiny child, and he’s Jewish! The bad news is that he has been suspended for calling a five-year-old child an “annoying little pissant.” Five-time…
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Yes, Bruno Mars Is Jewish
The mild-mannered, mega-talented purveyor of some of the toe tapping-est popular music out there, Bruno Mars, is Jewish. The artist, who swept the Grammys on Sunday night, winning in the three major categories Best Album of the Year, Best Record of the Year, and Best Song of the Year, as well as awards for Best…
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The Best Moments Of The Grammys Featured Jews
We have arrived at the safest and most secure part of the year: We are exactly 364 days away from the next Grammy Awards. The musical awards ceremony, which showers celebrities with thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of awards, based on unknowable criterion in an interminable televised ceremony, has come and gone in 2018….
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Why Won’t Publications Give Gal Gadot The Respect She Deserves?
Heads, not to mention eyes, must be rolling at the magazine “Vanity Fair,” where a cover photo of Hollywood royalty taken by Annie Leibowitz has captured unwanted attention. The image includes the actress Reese Witherspoon leaning sensuously against Oprah. The “Big Little Lies” star looks perfect, except that she has three legs. Inside the magazine,…
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Feminists Have ‘Snake-Filled Heads,’ Missouri Senate Candidate Announces
The condition of our nation’s democracy is no joke, but sometimes you have to take your laughs of despair where you can get them. The rogue-ishly attractive, loathsomely misogynist Missouri U.S. Senate candidate Courtland Sykes specializes in this kind of unintentional end-of-days humor. His belief that feminists’s heads are full of snakes, his desire to…
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Yankees Minor League Team Renames Itself ‘Trenton Pork Roll’
For reasons unknown, baseball is not seen as relevant as it once was. Unrelated, no doubt, is the choice by the New York Yankees’ minor league team to rebrand themselves one day a week as “the Trenton Pork Roll” during their 25th anniversary season (they will continue to be “the Trenton Thunder on other nights.)…
Most Popular
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News Who was Horst Wessel, and why are people comparing Charlie Kirk to him?
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Culture Charlie Kirk kept a ‘Jewish Sabbath.’ What did he mean by that?
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Film & TV Robert Redford’s legacy is surprisingly Jewish
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News Was Charlie Kirk a martyr? Here’s why Christians are divided and Jews should care
In Case You Missed It
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Yiddish אַ שמועס אויף ייִדיש וועגן דעם ישׂראלדיקן שרײַבער אתגר קרתA discussion in Yiddish about the Israeli writer Etgar Keret
צוזאַמען וועט מען לייענען אַ ייִדישע איבערזעצונג פֿון קרתס דערציילונג „בײַ נאַכט“
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Culture This Israeli photographer’s work is all about ‘subverting masculinity’
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Opinion The terrifying Nazi precedent for Jimmy Kimmel’s suspension — and the reasons to stay hopeful
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Fast Forward Freed hostage Edan Alexander says he’s returning to the IDF next month
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