From the beginning of his career straight through to the end, Robin Williams was a superstar, an unavoidable cultural presence, yet when I attempt to conjure memories of his performances, I don’t compulsively recite famous punchlines or stream emblematic bits in my head, not at first. It takes a second before that ribbity “nanu nanu”…
Robin Williams wasn’t Jewish. But he was close. Though raised Episcopalian in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan (his mother was a Christian Scientist), the comedian had an affinity for Jews which shaped and even defined many of the roles he took on. He used Yiddish, danced a mean hora and did a killer Barbra Streisand impression. With…
Robin Williams was my childhood. From “Mrs. Doubtfire” to “Hook,” to “Aladdin,” to “Jumanji,” I can’t even keep track of all the moments of glee and laughter that he bestowed on countless of fans. Since hearing about his apparent suicide at the age of 63 last night, I still catch myself remembering snippets of dialogue,…
Robin Williams was not John Keating, the teacher he portrayed in the 1989 film Dead Poets Society. Keating was a character, made richer by Williams’ own improvisatory genius, but a character nonetheless. Williams, as we now all know, was all too human. Yet their fates, for me, are intertwined. Keating is a preacher of sensitivity….
It has become a depressingly familiar and ritualized cycle of mourning. I heard the news on Facebook. If I’d been on Twitter, I would have heard it there — Robin Williams dead at 63 of an apparent suicide. Those who knew him shared memories of his talent and his generosity. Those who met him once…
Oscar-winning actor and comedian Robin Williams was found dead on Monday from an apparent suicide at his home in Northern California, Marin County Sheriff’s Office said. He was 63. The sheriff’s coroner’s division said it suspects the death was a suicide due to asphyxia, but the cause of death is still under investigation. “This morning,…
Judging any author by the film adaptations of his books is perilous, but few examples are as unfair as Jurek Becker (1937-1997), a German-language Polish Jewish writer who survived the Łódź Ghetto, Ravensbrück, and Sachsenhausen. Becker’s most famous novel, 1969’s “Jakob the Liar” (Jakob der Lügner) still merits rereading, despite the uneven 1999 movie adaptation…
Who’s Jewish? According to Google (and Gawker ) nearly everyone in Hollywood, from Meryl Streep to Morgan Freeman, and even Mel Gibson. Well, sort of. A post late Tuesday on media news and gossip Web site Gawker revealed that the top search suggestions on Google for various celebrity names (when preceded by the word is)…
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