The original “Hairspray” (1988) was a weird little movie made by cult director John Waters about rock and roll and race relations in 1960s Baltimore. Then it became a smash musical on Broadway, then a 2007 film adaptation of that Broadway hit. Now, the show is coming to Jerusalem, with a community theater production featuring…
Forward reader Susan Rogol writes: “I receive many invitations to the ceremony of cutting the hair of a boy who has reached the age of 3, and I do not understand why it is referred to as an ‘upsherenish’ rather than an ‘upsheren.’ I always associate the Yiddish suffix “-nish” with something negative, as in…
This post is the third in “Feminist, Orthodox and Engaged,” a series by Simi Lampert on love, sex, and betrothal in the life of a Modern Orthodox woman. It’s not exactly revelatory that people tend to categorize one another. This isn’t necessarily malicious — honestly, it’s probably useful in some ways. Jews are no exception,…
Herb Hoffman writes: “When as a child I needed a haircut — desperately, according to my mother — she would say, ‘Azoy a shmenge oyf den kopp, a mameshe choprene.’ This always seemed to me more Polish or German than Yiddish. She herself came from Lvov and knew all three languages. What is the derivation?”…
A lot of young guys have been walking lately into barbershops all over the world asking for a certain hairstyle. It’s not a new one. In fact, if you are at all familiar with archival film footage and still photographs from Germany in the 1930s, you will recognize it immediately. Older people may cringe at…
Charles Foster, ‘The City of Refuge.’ Each week The Arty Semite connects the Torah reading — however tenuously — with a classic work of rock ‘n’ roll. This week’s parsha, Shoftim, deals with the setting up of a legal system, a monarchy (which is optional) and the role of a prophet. Then the laws dealing…
The “Steven Dann” doesn’t exactly have the same ring as the Ed Sullivan or Brooks Atkinson. But it’s where you can now catch once-hot thespian Nikki Blonsky. An “upscale” Long Island shoe store, Steven Dann is where the former “Hairspray” star has been working the floor since last week, according to the NY Daily News….
Each week in ‘In Song’ The Arty Semite links the weekly Torah reading — however tenuously — to classic works of rock ‘n’ roll. This week’s parsha, Naso, continues from last week with the allocation of Tabernacle relocation duties to the Levites and a census of those eligible for said duties. We then have laws…
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