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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How ‘Holy Rollers’ Gets Hasidim Wrong
“Holy Rollers,” a new film based on the true story of a Hasidic ecstasy-smuggling ring in the late 1990s, is not only a bad movie, but also an offensive one. Not because it shows Hasidim doing illegal things (they did them, after all), but because it uses Hasidim as little more than an attention grabbing…
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Books Simon Monjack, Husband of the Late Brittany Murphy, Found Dead
Just nine days before his death Sunday night in his Hollywood Hills home, Simon Monjack, 40, who wed the late actress Brittany Murphy in a Jewish ceremony, was making hopeful future plans. The “Factory Girl” producer planned to go on a European vacation with Sharon Murphy, Brittany’s mother. The two had become core pillars of…
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World’s Largest Falafel, But Who Cares?
Israel and Lebanon have waged a several year battle over who can produce the largest vat of hummus. The last record was set by Lebanon on May 12, with a 23,046 pound bowl of the chickpea dip. And now Israel is off to set the Guinness World Record for the largest falafel ball. An Israeli…
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Marianne Rubinstein: Grandchild of the Shoah
As Serge Klarsfeld wrote in his preface to a 2002 book by Marianne Rubinstein, “Not Everyone is Lucky Enough to Be an Orphan” (Éditions Verticales), only three percent of deported French Jews returned home alive after the war, leaving their surviving children with unspoken traumas which they passed on to their children in turn. The…
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Hanna Maron: Mother Courage of the Israeli Stage
The widely reported demise of the last Ziegfeld girl, Doris Eaton Travis, sent entertainment historians rushing to the dwindling list of surviving silent film actors, of whom the late Ms. Travis was one. Another name on that list ranks as a survivor on more than one account: the beloved Israeli actress Hanna Maron. Born Hanna…
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Al Pacino’s Visit to Borough Park
Pacino talking in a husky smokers accent, Pacino accepting an Oscar… Pacino shuckling in the back of a Hasidic shul in Brooklyn? Definitely, not something you’d expect. But the actor was spotted in Brooklyn Hasidic Borough Park neighborhood davening and eating cheesecake early last week, according to a post on the Wall Street Journal’s blog….
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The Speedy Success of Richard Zimler’s ‘The Slow Mirror’
It was a miracle three times over, according to Portuguese-American novelist Richard Zimler, that “The Slow Mirror,” the short film based on his story of the same name, won the Best Drama prize at the New York Downtown Short Film Festival on May 2. “First it was a miracle that we got the money to…
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Sleepless in San Francisco: DAWN 2010
As a bit of a New York chauvinist, the intensity of the San Francisco art scene initially surprised me. The city is a delight to perform in. The crowds are fantastic and intelligent and surprisingly attuned to new Jewish culture. This affinity for experimentation with tradition was very much on display last Saturday night at…
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ADL Study: ‘Passion Play’ (Still) Antisemitic
Did the world really need a research paper to determine that the once-a-decade “Passion Play” in the Bavarian town of Oberammergau, Germany, conveys anti-Jewish sentiments, as has been the general consensus since the show’s 1634 debut? The Anti-Defamation League apparently thought so. The group commissioned the Council of Centers on Jewish-Christian Relations (CCJCR), which bills…
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From Feet to Flowers: The Artistic Trajectory of Jonathan Singer
How did a nice Jewish podiatrist from Bayonne, New Jersey become an internationally famous glamor photographer of flowers? That question may be mulled over by visitors to the exhibit of photos by Jonathan Singer, which opened May 14 and runs until June 4 at the Legends Gallery in Chatham, New Jersey. Last year Abbeville Press…
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Tiger’s Jewish Mistress Will Pose for Playboy
Rachel Uchitel, the Las Vegas nightclub hostess-cum-Tiger Woods mistress, will capitalize on her tryst with the world’s most infamous golfer by appearing half-nude in an upcoming Playboy spread, according to celebrity gossip site, TMZ. But, Uchitel, the granddaughter of Ukrainian Jewish immigrants may not be taking it off so fast. She agreed to pose on…
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