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
-
Hasidic Musician Lazer Lloyd Sings Black Hat Blues
Photo: Yocheved Seidman (JTA) — If it hadn’t been for Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach, Lazer Lloyd thinks he would’ve been famous by now. On the other hand, he figures that by now, he’d probably also be dead. Back in 1994, Lloyd was a rising young blues musician with a deal at Atlantic Records when he met…
-
Cuddle Alert! Giant Pandas Coming to Israel
The Chinese government has agreed to send two giant pandas to a zoo in Israel. The gift will be conferred on the Haifa zoo if Chinese panda experts agree that the conditions in the zoo will be appropriate for the animals, according to Haaretz, including providing the appropriate food, which is a certain kind of…
-
Of Latkes and 7 Things About (Jewish) Idaho
1) 1,525 Jews live in Idaho. 2) Idaho’s first congregation, Beth Israel, was founded in 1895. 3) Idaho’s first Jewish residents worked in mining camps. 4) The Falk family started Falk’s Wholesale Company in the early part of the 20th Century. It was later sold to Sears. 5) Moses Alexander was elected mayor of Boise…
The Latest
-
People Magazine Accidentally Declares Kirk Douglas Dead. He’s Not.
Getty Images Kirk Douglas will be celebrating his 98th birthday next week. But not according to People Magazine, who accidentally published the actor’s obituary on their website. “DO NOT PUB Kirk Douglas Dies” “Kirk Douglas, one of the few genuine box-office names to emerge just as TV was overtaking American culture in the years right…
-
The Broadway Composer Critics Love To Hate
Frank Wildhorn will be appearing at 54 Below this week. For those who don’t know, 54 Below is a supper club located essentially underneath what was Studio 54 (where all the action used to take place). For those who don’t know Frank Wildhorn, he wrote “Where Do Broken Hearts Go,” a number one international hit…
-
A ‘Broad City’ Guide To Surviving the Holiday Party
Thanksgiving is over. The turkey leftovers have been sandwiched and your family has come and gone. And so starts the holiday season. Dreading the usual slew of boring parties that you just can’t avoid? “Broad City”‘s Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer have some handy tips that will make the most dreary party seem like… well,…
-
4 Actors Who Had Nothing Better To Do Than Star in ‘The Red Tent’
What do you get when you combine Brody’s wife from “Homeland,” that guy from “Game of Thrones,” Minnie Driver in some kind of linen robe and the writers from the “Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants”? Lifetime’s adaptation of “The Red Tent,”, a two part-miniseries set to air December 7 and 8. Anita Diamant’s best-selling novel…
-
A Lost World in an Old Box of Film
In 2009, writer Glenn Kurtz was sifting through a closet in his parent’s Florida home when he discovered a reel of 16mm Kodachrome color film in a musty cardboard box that had belonged to his grandparents, David and Liza Kurtz. As prosperous Jewish American tourists, the Kurtz’s decided to take a six-week summer vacation through…
-
Henry Kissinger, Barbara Walters at World Jewish Congress Dinner
Hailing Henry Kissinger, honoree at its Theodor Herzl Award Dinner, World Jewish Congress president Ronald Lauder said of America’s first Jewish Secretary of State that “during his shuttle diplomacy, he made it clear to Golda Meir — that he was an American first, Secretary of State second, and a Jew third. Golda replied ‘Fine since…
-
Yiddish Pop Star Claire Barry Dies at 94
Claire Barry, with her sister, Merna, on the cover of their 1961 album ‘Side by Side.’ Claire Barry, who crossed over from the world of Yiddish entertainment to global pop stardom as half of The Barry Sisters, died Monday in Aventura, Florida. She was 94. At the height of their popularity in the 1950s and…
-
‘The Jews Are Coming!’ (After a Yearlong Controversy)
Last year, a single promo clip — a total of 19 seconds in length — provoked a controversy over the content of the show it had been created to promote. What followed was a yearlong saga of politics, professional restructuring and grassroots marketing, as the show — an Israeli sketch comedy show called “HaYehudim Ba’im”…
Explore
Most Popular
- 1
Fast Forward ‘I will never set foot there again’: Jewish Dems boycott Hymie’s deli in Philly after Trump ad
- 2
Opinion Trump’s NYC rally was a morally disgusting glimpse of the MAGA future
- 3
Opinion I’m a U.S. Navy veteran. Here’s why I’m protesting Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally
- 4
Fast Forward Every time Donald Trump has invoked Hitler and the Nazis
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward Devices tagged ‘Free Gaza’ found at ballot drop box fires in Oregon, Washington state
-
Yiddish צוויי אויסצוגן פֿון ייִדישער ליטעראַטור וועגן אַ צעשטערטן שׂימחת־תּורהTwo excerpts of Yiddish literature about devastation on Simchat Torah
די צוויי ווערק דריקן אױס װײטיק, פּנים־אל־פּנים מיט חורבן און בראָך אין פֿריִערדיקע תּקופֿות.
-
Fast Forward ADL takes flak for failing to tie bigotry at Madison Square Garden rally to Trump
-
Theater For ‘Ragtime’ star Brandon Uranowitz, to be Jewish is to be hopeful
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
