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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Books
Author Blog: Lost Stories
Jennifer Gilmore’s newest novel, “The Mothers,” is now available. Her blog posts are featured on The Arty Semite courtesy of the Jewish Book Council and My Jewish Learning’s Author Blog Series. For more information on the series, please visit: “The Mothers” is my third novel but it’s the first novel I’ve written that tracks so…
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A Holocaust Survivor Seen Through His Art
Portrait artist Kalman Aron has captured the essence of hundreds of people on canvas over the course of his long career. But he has allowed only one of those individuals to truly know the complex and tragic forces behind his creative output. Little did Susan Beilby Magee know that the new immigrant to the U.S….
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Men Sink as Women Swim on ‘Mad Men’
The sixth season of “Mad Men” kicked off last night with an unsubtle theme: death. Welcome to 1968, a time of social and cultural shifts and the continuing defeat of the Vietnam War. Death is something the characters cannot seem to escape. Don knows it all too well, from the suicide of his younger brother…
The Latest
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Holocaust Memorial Day…As Rap
Francky Perez, a Morrocan-born Jewish singer known in France for his hip-hop version of “Hatikvah,” Israel’s national anthem, has struck again. On Friday, Perez released the English version of his French single, “N’oubliez Jamais” (Never Forget), a rap song about — you guessed it — the Holocaust. In an interview with The Jewish Journal, Perez…
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Chelsea Clinton On Hillary, And Running For Office
In an intriguing interview on Monday’s “Today Show,” Chelsea Clinton said that she would be open to running for office someday. “Right now I’m grateful to live in a city, in a state and a country where I strongly support my mayor, my governor, my president, my senators and my representative,” she said, adding that…
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America’s Most Popular Poet
Poet, publisher and bookstore maven Lawrence Ferlinghetti is, at 94, arguably the most popular living versifier, or at least author of the single most popular book of poetry — the million-selling “A Coney Island of the Mind” (1957). It’s a distinction he carries lightly in Christopher Felver’s new documentary “Ferlinghetti: A Rebirth of Wonder.” The…
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Holocaust Notes From Underground
“No Place on Earth” is an amazing story of survival, a testament to the human spirit and, on Yom Hashoah, another reminder that we must never forget. In 1993, spelunker Christopher Nicola discovered some man-made artifacts while exploring caves in western Ukraine. Only these weren’t the remains of some ancient civilization, but remnants from five…
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High Times With Mason Tvert
For the first time ever, more Americans are in favor of the legalization of marijuana than not, according to a new study by the Pew Research Center. You know that trip you’ve been planning to Colorado for, ahem, recreational purposes? Well, you’ve got one main man to thank for it. Activist Mason Tvert is no…
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The Movies According to Roger Ebert
One of the great things about Roger Ebert, who died April 4 at age 70, is that he wrote — or seemed to write — about every movie ever made. The man was encyclopedic. In his last blog post, two days before he died, he reported that he typically wrote 200 reviews a year, and…
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Twitter Mourns Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert, America’s most famous film critic, died yesterday at the age of 70. Every celebrity he had ever lauded with praise or declared inapt — cough Rob Schneider —rushed to give his life a thumbs up. Ebert, an avid tweeter himself, would have been proud. Saddened to hear of the passing of Roger Ebert….
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How Clothes Make Us Modern
Crossposted From Under the Fig Tree One of the most exciting — certainly among the most crowded — of exhibitions in New York at the moment is the Met’s “Impressionism, Fashion, and Modernity.” And for good reason. Training its sights on the triangulated relationship among these three mighty cultural forces of the late 19th century,…
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News What Zohran Mamdani has actually said about Jews, Israel and antisemitism
In Case You Missed It
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Fast Forward Melbourne protesters chant ‘Death to the IDF’ days after attacks on local synagogue, Israeli restaurant
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News He wrote the book on American Jewish history. Stepping back from teaching, Jonathan Sarna says he has plenty of chapters still to go.
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Fast Forward Trump says he didn’t know antisemitic history of ‘Shylock’ when he criticized bankers using the term
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Fast Forward Most New Yorkers deterred by Zohran Mamdani’s support for Israel boycott, but 1 in 3 see it as a boon, poll shows
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