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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It’s hard To Be a Rock-Drummer: Max Weinberg’s Fate in the Balance
Rumors are swirling furiously on entertainment blogs about whether Max Weinberg, Conan O’Brien’s longtime drummer and comedic foil, will be rehired for Conan’s upcoming TBS cable show. The kerfuffle started when Weinberg’s fellow Jewish rock musician Al Kooper (born Alan Kuperschmidt) told an interviewer that Weinberg had been “fired” because of conflicts with Weinberg’s performing…
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Antisemitic Riots in Oslo: Part of a Trend?
According to “The Anti-Jewish Riots in Oslo,” a cogent new book by Norwegian historian Eirik Eiglad, the riots of January 2009 in Oslo, ostensibly against the war in Gaza, actually followed “age-old patterns of antisemitic hatred.” Himself beaten, kicked, and spit on by demonstrators, Eiglad, who had not joined any side, recounts how a deranged…
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The Jew’s Ear Juice
China is capable of anything. So goes the mantra in the west. So when they say they have cans of The Jew’s Ear Juice, maybe they mean it. After all it can’t be a language problem after two years of hard work by the professionals and volunteers of the “Shanghai Commission for the Management of…
The Latest
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Sanford Friedman’s ‘Heroic or Meritorious Achievement’
A brave alternative to 1950s “Stoolpigeon Culture,” as described in Joseph Litvak’s influential “The Un-Americans: Jews, the Blacklist, and Stoolpigeon Culture,” the novelist Sanford Friedman, who died April 20 at age 81, proudly assumed his membership in several minority groups. Leftist, gay and Jewish, Friedman was a Horace Mann School student, where he became friends…
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Happy Birthday Amos Oz!
Some writers slow down with age. Their books take longer to appear, their delivery live is more halting, their stories are repetitive, confusing or meandering. Not so Amos Oz. Over the past three decades that I’ve seen him, his calm but forceful delivery has become more fluent, more persuasive and, indeed, wiser. On Tuesday morning,…
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Shalom in the Catholic Home: Shmuley Urges Pope To Have Shabbat Dinners
If doling out advice — from parenting to relationships to spirituality — to American Jews and Gentiles wasn’t enough, celebrity rabbi Shmuley Boteach has gone for the big score: the Bishop of Rome, the head of the Catholic Church, the Pope. By consulting with Rabbi Shmuley, the Pope joins the ranks of Michael Jackson and…
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Renaissance and Brand New Works Ready for Display at Old/New Israel Museum
When the Israel Museum reveals its newly renovated campus in July 2010, it will display a curious (and extreme) blend of Renaissance and modernism. The museum will feature two large-scale, site-specific works by Indian sculptor Anish Kapoor and Danish installation artist Olafur Eliasson, as part of the site’s $100 million architectural reconfiguration. And, for the…
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Claude Sarraute: A Disobedient Daughter
The French Jewish journalist Claude Sarraute, 82, is the daughter of the noted Russian Jewish novelist Nathalie Sarraute (born Natalia Tcherniak). A new memoir from Éditions Plon, “Before You Forget Everything!” explains how Sarraute consciously avoided following in her mother’s footsteps. The elder Sarraute was the author of abstract, sober philosophical narratives such as “Do…
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Shimon Peres, Limor Livnat and Nir Baram Start Festival With a Bang
The Second International Writers’ Conference started off tonight in Jerusalem with a bang as literature crashed into politics. After the ceremony renaming one of the squares below Mishkenot Sha’ananim for the Kings of Spain, President Shimon Peres gave the keynote address, shortly followed by Minister of Culture and Sport Limor Livnat and the Spanish Minister…
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Food & Wine Magazine Honors Israeli Chef
Defining Israeli cuisine is tough work, as Forward Ingredients columnist Leah Koenig recently pointed out. But difficult or not, Israeli food culture is thriving, and the global gastro community is taking notice. Food & Wine, the influential American culinary monthly, named Israeli Yonatan Roshfeld a top “Rising-Star Chef” in its 2010 list of the 100…
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An Exceptional Jew: Jesus as Seen by Jewish Historians
Before 1970, writings about Jesus by Jewish scriptural authorities were relatively rare, apart from the widely known works of Lithuanian-born Joseph Klausner. But as the Swiss New Testament scholar Daniel Marguerat writes in a preface to Dan Jaffé’s informative “20th century Jewish Historians on Jesus,” Christianity is the “only world religion whose founder is not…
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