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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Meet the Rabbi Who Officiated at Chelsea’s Wedding
The New York Times is reporting that Rabbi James Ponet officiated, alongside Reverend William Shillady, at the Saturday evening wedding of Chelsea Clinton and Marc Mezvinsky. Ponet is Yale’s Jewish chaplain and heads the university’s Joseph Slifka Center for Jewish Life at Yale. Read his bio here. At Yale, he’s taught a seminar on “The…
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This Week in Forward Arts and Culture
Nathan Jeffay visits the new and improved Israel Museum. Jordana Horn goes to see “Life During Wartime,” Todd Solondz’s profoundly Jewish mix of angst, pedophilia, awkward puberty and big-time familial dysfunction. In the latest installment of The Nigun Project, Jeremiah Lockwood partners with hip-hop collective Felonious on an old Lubavitch tune. Philologos wonders who put…
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When French Was the Mameloshen
The Middle Ages were no holiday in the Catskills for the Jews of France. Yet a new study by Kirsten Fudeman, a professor of French at the University of Pittsburgh, conveys an unexpectedly upbeat message. “Vernacular Voices: Language and Identity in Medieval French Jewish Communities” (University of Pennsylvania Press), details medieval Jews’ persistent love of…
The Latest
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Clinton Wedding: Here Comes the Bride (Finally)
This week the Forward has rounded up all the facts (read: rumors) on the nuptials of our favorite first daughter Chelsea Clinton to New York i-banker Marc Mezvinksy. We’ve told you all about the guy, dished about how the MOTB really feels about the wedding, revealed the Yiddish past of Rhinebeck, NY, the supposed site…
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Mel, Oliver and "Mad Men": A Month of Real and Fictional Antisemitism
It’s been quite the month for antisemitic comments and conspiracies. Just as the new ADL report reveals the continual presence of antisemitic incidents in American lives and online, a number of comments from celebs have brought the strain of bias back into the spotlight. First there was Mel Gibson’s alleged antisemitic threats against TMZ founder…
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Reality TV Comes to Orthodox Suburbia
Malkah Winter feels the need to express herself creatively, and she comes by it genetically. The daughter of the late Yiddish theater owner and producer, Oscar Ostroff, Winter has been single-handedly directing, producing and editing Jewish Life TV’s new reality show, “In Over Our Heads.” The show aims to smash stereotypes surrounding suburban Orthodox Jews…
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Clinton Wedding: WikiLeaks at the Wedding
The Forward has learned that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is not in Melbourne, Australia, as has been widely reported. According to documents that Assange accidentally leaked to his own website, Assange has set up shop in Rhinecliff, NY, where he and anonymous volunteers are amassing top-secret information about Chelsea Clinton’s wedding to Marc Mezvinsky. The…
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Obama Without, Great Music Within
As their name suggests, Pitom comes on suddenly. On Wednesday night, while pedestrians clustered outside a grungy Lower East Side dive bar ogling President Obama’s motorcade on its way to and from Anna Wintour’s hush-hush fundraiser, the raucous four-piece band took the stage inside and delivered a far more exciting show. Following the always-delightful Xylopholks,…
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Israel is 8th Happiest Country on the Globe
Want to be happier? Move to Israel. And no, this isn’t Jewish Agency propaganda. It’s the results of a recently announced Forbes mega-study on happiness around the glob. Gallup surveyed thousands of people in 155 countries, between 2005 and 2009, to find out how happy they were. It asked participants about overall satisfaction with their…
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Books An Advertising Pioneer Who Predicted Israel’s Publicity Woes
Today, the name of pioneering advertising executive Albert Lasker is mostly associated with the Lasker Foundation, a non-profit organization that supports medical research. But as a forthcoming biography by Jeffrey Cruikshank and Arthur Schultz points out, Lasker himself was more likely to self-identify as a “propagandist” than as a philanthropist. “The Man Who Sold America:…
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A Conflicted Conductor Under Stalinism
Some Soviet Jews, whether or not they were true believers in Communism, were forced to express gratitude to Stalin simply for not being Hitler. That is one conclusion to be drawn from “Kirill Kondrashin: His Life in Music” a recent biography of the great Russian Jewish conductor by journalist Gregor Tassie (The Scarecrow Press). According…
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Fast Forward Rep. Max Miller says driver called him a ‘dirty Jew’ and threatened to kill his family. A local doctor turned himself in.
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News An Alabama millionaire offered Jews $50,000 to move to his town. 16 years later, what’s left?
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Culture Why is Israel’s attack on Iran called ‘Rising Lion’ — and what does the Bible have to do with it?
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News As Israel attacks, what is life like for Jews in Iran?
In Case You Missed It
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Culture How a Jewish reporter like me got addicted to Christian media
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Opinion Israeli leaders are using Holocaust comparisons to justify attacks on Iran. Is that kosher?
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Fast Forward Over half of Jewish students at Columbia experienced discrimination and exclusion after Oct. 7, survey shows
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Fast Forward Journalist board of Shtetl, news site covering haredi Orthodoxy, resigns after founder renounces mission
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