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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Lucian Freud’s Ghosts Laid To Rest in Vienna
Lucian Freud did not live to see the first exhibition of his paintings in Vienna, the city his grandfather Sigmund fled in 1938, but he helped plan the retrospective that opens this week. Freud, considered the greatest British painter of his generation, moved with his family from Berlin to London in 1933 to escape the…
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Brian Welch’s Eye-Grabbing Tattoo
Ouch. Brian “Head” Welch, former guitarist for Korn, posted an interesting picture to Instagram this weekend: a close-up shot of his eye, with the Hebrew word Shekhinah, or “God’s presence on Earth,” tattooed on his eyelid. “Dear mom and dad,” the caption reads. “You’re really not gonna like this tattoo. My apologies.” Welch left Korn…
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View From the Ground of the Arab Spring
We are living through a golden age of documentary film. Surely “The Square,” a riveting account of the Arab Spring as it played out in Cairo’s Tahrir Square between 2011 and 2013, argues in favor of such optimism. In something under two hours, director Jehane Noujaim’s film — which recently screened at the New York…
The Latest
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Google, Moscow Jewish Museum Launch Virtual Exhibition
Google and Moscow’s main Jewish Museum launched a virtual exhibition on Russian Jewish theater. The project was launched last week on a dedicated, English-language website that is part of Google’s Milestones in History series and is accessible online worldwide. The Internet giant set up the exhibition conjointly with Moscow’s Jewish Museum and Tolerance Center, according…
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Polish President Honors Survivor Sigmund Rolat
“Not every Pole is an anti-Semite and not every Jew is anti-Polish, “ has long been the mantra of Czestochowa-born Holocaust survivor Sigmund Rolat, an orphan and survivor of a Nazi slave-labor camp in Czestochowa who in 1948 arrived in New York City as a penniless teenager. On September 23, he was honored at a…
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JTA’s Response to Marina Shifrin’s Viral Video
Last week, Marina Shifrin won the Internet’s love by quitting her job via Youtube video. The 25-year-old previously worked at Next Media Animation, a Taiwanese animation company. The video shows her dancing to Kanye West’s “Gone,” describing why she has decided to wave goodbye to her job. Shifrin announced that she was returning to the…
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Jewish Book Council Names Sami Rohr Prize Finalists
The Jewish Book Council has named the five finalists of this year’s Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature, the Forward has learned. Carolyn Hessel, director of the Jewish Book Council, told the Forward that the five finalists are Sarah Bunin Benor for “Becoming Frum: How Newcomers Learn the Language and Culture of Orthodox Judaism”; Matti…
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Amanda Bynes’ Mom Speaks Out
A lot has been said about Amanda Bynes, but her parents have been conspicuously tight-lipped about the former teen sweetheart’s bizarre actions over the last few months. Until now. In an interview with People magazine, Lynn Bynes responded to the press that her daughter has been getting over her explosive Twitter rants and recent court-ordered…
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Natalie Portman in the Holy Land
Natalie Portman is currently in Israel working on a film adaption of an autobiographical novel by Israeli author Amos Oz. The Jerusalem-born Oscar winner will direct and star in “A Tale of Love and Darkness,” which is to be filmed in Hebrew in Jerusalem. This will be her feature film directorial debut. Portman, who is…
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Polio Couldn’t Stop Hit Songwriter Doc Pomus
“I was never one of those happy cripples,” is the way Jerome Felder described himself. Why would he be? He was just 6 years old when he contracted polio. And in a sad irony fit for a blues song, the young Brooklynite caught the virus at a country summer camp he’d been sent to specifically…
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Is Ronan Farrow Son of Frank Sinatra — Not Woody Allen?
This could only happen in a Woody Allen movie. When asked by Vanity Fair if Ronan Farrow was actually fathered by Frank Sinatra, Mia Farrow’s first husband and so-called “love of her life,” the actress had a surprising answer: “Possibly.” “We never really split up,” Farrow added. The two were married from 1966-1968, and continued…
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