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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Jazz Jews in Excelsis
Those eager to hear the Latin jazz maestro Larry Harlow, whose Yiddishkeit was explored in the Forward last year, at his much-anticipated August 14 Lincoln Center concert, can stave off their impatience for “El Judio Maravilloso” with an exuberant new compendium from Five Leaves Publications, “Jazz Jews.” In the book, British journalist and indefatigable researcher…
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Eli Broad Pledges To Give Away 75% of His Fortune
Late last week, in response to a campaign by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, high profile Jewish philanthropists Eli and Edythe Broad publicly pledged to give away 75% of their $5.7 billion fortune. As part of an initiative that aims to increase philanthropy among the wealthiest Americans, Gates and Buffett have challenged the super-rich to…
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The Soup Nazi Returns
“No Soup for You!” Well, perhaps not for long. Al Yeganeh, who was nicknamed the Soup Nazi in a 1995 Seinfeld episode, will return to his spot behind the counter of his original “Soup Kitchen International” in New York City’s theater district this July. The cook and owner, who famously deprived George Costanza — and…
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Jacques Maritain: How Righteous a Gentile?
For many years, the influential philosopher Jacques Maritain has been seen as a rare philosemite among the French Catholics of his day (Maritain died at age 90 in 1973). Robert Royal’s 1993 study, “Jacques Maritain and the Jews” (University of Notre Dame Press) is an account of Maritain’s friendship with the painter Marc Chagall and…
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‘The Young Israelis’ Capture the Wisdom of the Old
There is nothing puerile about “The Young Israelis” exhibit, which opened on the Lower East Side of Manhattan on June 16. Curated by Lilly Wei at the Lesley Heller Workspace, the event showcases a new wave of cutting edge video artists in their 20s and 30s who have cultivated an innovative language through the imagistic…
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Wait ‘Till the Sun Shines, Nelly Sachs
Anyone traveling through Germany this month has until June 27 to see a landmark exhibit at the Jewish Museum Berlin, “Flight and Metamorphosis: Nelly Sachs, Writer, Berlin/Stockholm.” The exhibit, which opened March 25, pays homage to Nelly Sachs, the only German-language poet ever given the Nobel Prize. In 1966, Sachs shared the Nobel with Israeli…
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German Jewish Athletes Belatedly Recognized
As summer approaches, sports fans may worry about the progress of the Mets’ rookie first baseman Isaac Benjamin “Ike” Davis, of Lithuanian Jewish ancestry, and use Sandy Koufax’s recent White House visit to remind everyone that the “only Jewish left-hander not named Sandy Koufax to toss two no-hitters” was Ken Holtzman. The overpowering passion for…
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The Assaf Kehati Trio Jazzes Up The Beehive and The Blue Note
Music lovers preoccupied with the question of “whither Jewish jazz?” will want to attend the June 19 performance by the Assaf Kehati Trio at Boston’s The Beehive, in anticipation of their scheduled sets at New York’s The Blue Note on August 1. The trio consists of guitarist Assaf Kehati, an Israeli-born resident of Boston, veteran…
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This Week in Forward Arts and Culture
Jon Kalish looks at a production of Romeo and Juliet, in Yiddish. Raphael Mostel discusses ‘Le Grand Macabre,’ an opera by Hungarian Jewish composer György Ligeti, recently performed for the first time in New York. Gordon Haber reviews Kenneth Wishnia’s “The Fifth Servant,” a Golem-era Prague mystery novel. Akin Ajayi talks to Israeli artist Dor…
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Bobby Fischer, Back From the Grave
Bobby Fischer was once the greatest chess player in the world, before he devolved into a ranting, rabid antisemite, despite the fact that he himself was Jewish. By the end of Fischer’s life the only country that would have him was Iceland, where he died in 2008 of kidney failure, leaving behind some $2 million…
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Paul Celan’s Lover Emerges From the Shadows
The Suhrkamp Verlag series of the great Romanian-born Jewish poet Paul Celan’s letters has received worldwide attention. Among the avid readers was an 81-year-old Austrian-born historian of anthropology, Britta Rupp-Eisenreich, long resident in France, where she publishes on ethnology and related subjects. Eisenreich recently decided to speak up about her own secret nine-year love affair,…
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Culture Charlie Kirk kept a ‘Jewish Sabbath.’ What did he mean by that?
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In Case You Missed It
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Fast Forward Banners, tacks and crashes: Protests lead pro cycling team to remove ‘Israel’ from its jerseys
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Opinion Netanyahu’s pitch for Israel as ‘super-Sparta’ is a dystopian death wish
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Yiddish פֿישמאַן־פֿונדאַציע זוכט פּראָיעקטן וואָס שטאַרקן ייִדישFishman Foundation seeking projects that bolster Yiddish
די פּרעפֿערענץ איז פֿאַר איניציאַטיוון וואָס מוטיקן קינדער און יוגנטלעכע צו רעדן ייִדיש
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Fast Forward ‘I will not be silenced’: Josh Shapiro invokes assassination attempt in address on rising hate violence
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