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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‘Disgraced’ Asks Uncomfortable Questions About Islam
Photo Credit: Joan Marcus “Disgraced,” which opened October 23 at Broadway’s Lyceum Theater, is breathtaking. Literally. There are moments when the entire audience gasps at something so surprising or disturbing on stage, it’s as though all the air is sucked out of the room. Those gasps, however, are the only sound the audience makes throughout…
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POEM: ‘Untitled, Jerusalem, 2002’
You are captives of illusion, experts in eluding truth, you party, drink wine, pick anemone in spring. Occasionally you are reminded that life is transient as grass, that death lies in ambush among green meadows. Though the wrath of the suicide bomber is daily at your door, your children bask in your warmth, and this…
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Medal of Honor Recipient Col. Jack Jacobs Honored at Military Ball
Joking about his height at the podium at the October 13 U.S. Air Force, Soldiers’, Sailors’, Marines’, Coast Guard and Airmen’s Club’s 18th Annual Military Ball, U.S. Army (Ret) Col. Jack Jacobs — the only living Jewish recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor — cautioned the bemedaled and gowned military assemblage at The Pierre not…
The Latest
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This Is Not Your Bubbe’s Yarmulke
Craig Caplan Too lazy to sort through your parents’ kippah drawer? Now, you can print one — in 3D. Per NPR: Craig Kaplan, an associate professor in the Computer Graphics Lab at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada, rarely leaves the house without his Panama hat in warmer weather. He wanted to design a…
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Jay Black’s 7 Favorite Songs
Jay Black has been singing professionally for 51 of his almost 76 years. That “almost” comes out November 2. He’ll be celebrating that birthday with a pair of concerts, one at the Bergen Performing Arts Center in Englewood, N.J., and the other at NYCB Theatre at Westbury on Long Island. We chatted with him about…
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That Time James Joyce Was Mistaken for His Jewish Character
It is widely known that James Joyce’s novel “Ulysses” was not autobiographical. For one thing, the book’s protagonist Leopold Bloom was Jewish, and Joyce was raised as an Irish Catholic. However, in 1940, when Joyce attempted to flee Vichy France to Switzerland during World War II, the Swiss government thought that he was Jewish. More…
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Swiss Coffee With a Dash of Hitler’s Face
A Miss Hitler contest in Russia. A swastika ring for sale at Sears. Nazi chic blouses at Mango. And now, Hitler’s face on a package of coffee creamer. Swissinfo.ch reports that coffee lovers in Switzerland complained after waking up to a certain mustachioed dictator’s face along with their morning cup of Joe. The problematic creamers…
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How Jay Black Got Kicked Out of Yeshiva
Jay Black isn’t feeling well. Descriptions of his aches and pains are pretty much the first thing out of his mouth, even before he asks why I’m about to interview him. “You’re going to be doing two dates around your 76th birthday next month,” I tell him, “And, well, you’re Jewish.” “How do you know…
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Jesuit Tzadik and Audi Honored by FASPE Fellowship
“You cannot murder eleven million people without the cooperation of journalists, doctors, lawyers, society as a whole,” declared Peter John Sacripanti, chair at the FASPE (Fellowship at Auschwitz For The Study of Professional Ethics) inaugural dinner held at the Museum of Jewish Heritage. Anthony Kronman, emcee and former dean of Yale Law School informed that…
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Ariana Grande Talks Kabbalah
Getty Images And so, another pop star jumps on the Kabbalah bandwagon. Move over, Ashton and Madonna — this time, it’s Ariana Grande’s turn to spill the beans on her connection to the Jewish mystical practice. The former Nickelodeon darling told the Telegraph that though raised in a Catholic home in Boca Raton, Florida, she…
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There Was a Miss Hitler Pageant — And it Just Got Cancelled
Alina Voronina from Moscow poses for the contest Last week, Vocativ reported that VKontakte, essentially Russia’s version of Facebook, was hosting a Miss Hitler Pageant. As one would expect, people got a little upset about it. Hosted on the site’s Adolf Hitler page, the Miss Ostland pageant, as it’s officially known, called on women “who…
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