Just because Barbra can do something does not mean that Barbra should do it. The recent news that long-percolating plans for Streisand to star in a film of the Jule Styne musical “Gypsy” will occur has thrilled millions of fans. Not long ago, Barry Levinson shepherded the volcanic Al Pacino through two monstrous TV film…
A controversial Canadian Jewish television host apologized for a rant against the Roma people. Ezra Levant of the Sun TV network sparked widespread outrage in September when he referred to Roma as “gypsies” and “a culture synonymous with swindlers…one of the central characteristics of that culture is that their chief economy is theft and begging.”…
Germany remembered the Holocaust’s forgotten victims on Wednesday by opening a memorial in the heart of Berlin to the half a million ethnic Sinti and Roma murdered by the Nazis. As the mournful strains of a solo violin sounded through the trees, political leaders and frail survivors approached a dark pool close to the German…
From “Papa, can you hear me” to Mama Rose: Musical-theater fans and Barbra Streisand cultists are plotzing over the news that La Streisand has reportedly met with composer Stephen Sondheim and playwright Arthur Laurents to discuss starring in a film version of “Gypsy,” their classic 1959 musical. According to a dispatch in yesterday’s NYTimes.com Artsbeat…
A joint Hindu-Jewish crusade against the abuse of European Roma issued a statement Monday calling on European leaders to stop treating the ethnic group as “pariahs.” Rabbi Jonathan Freirich, a California- and Nevada-based rabbi, and Rajan Zed, president of the Universal Society of Hinduism, argue that European governments repeatedly scapegoat Roma, also known as Gypsies;…
A version of this post appeared in Yiddish here. For musicians traveling through Eastern Europe in search of the authentic Gypsy experience, all roads lead to Bob Cohen in Budapest. A fiddler, scholar and gracious host, Cohen could tell you in which Transylvanian town you can still find an old-time band, or just a lone…
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