Harold Grinspoon, the founder of PJ Library, reads one of the program's books with a gaggle of children. (PJ Library) NEW YORK (JTA) — PJ Library wants to come between parents and children — literally. Every month, PJ Library mails free Jewish-themed children’s books to nearly 100,000 households in North America with a grand ambition: that somewhere between Dr. Seuss and the Berenstain Bears, a child may turn to… Read more »
(JTA) — As moviegoers over the weekend flocked to see Marvel’s new superhero ensemble, they would understandably associate the idea of Nazi-fighting avengers with Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Hulk and Black Widow. But, in fact, there was also a real-life band of Jewish freedom fighters with the same… Read more »
The cover of artist Stan Lebovic’s book reads “Black is a Color, by a survivor’s son.” But in his search for meaning in the aftermath of the Holocaust, “I don’t focus on the negativity,” Lebovic promises. Instead, he finds hope and inspiration in the resilience of the Jewish people.… Read more »
Detail from medieval Spanish Haggadah (Courtesy University of Manchester) A fourteenth-century Jewish religious book, preserved by experts at The University of Manchester’s John Rylands Library, hand delivered to The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, where it will be on exhibit through Sept. 30. The masterpiece from Catalonian Spain will feature in a special installation called… Read more »
(Cleveland Jewish News) — Michael Belkin knows plenty about the music industry; he was born and raised in it. More than 40 years ago, his father Mike and his uncle Jules founded Belkin Productions, which helped launch the careers of such artists as Johnny Carson, Tiny Tim, Janis Joplin,… Read more »
Sharon Azrieli-Perez, a Candian-born opera singer, performs "Turandot" with the New Israel Opera in 2008. (sharonazrieli.com) NEW YORK (JTA) — When Sharon Azrieli-Perez told her father — David Azrieli, one of Israel’s biggest real estate moguls — that she wanted to be an opera singer, he told her he’d pay for voice lessons only if she got into Juilliard. That was all the motivation she… Read more »
In his video for the song "HYFR," Drake re-creates his Bar Mitzvah -- sort of. (cash Money Records/Youtube) WASHINGTON (JTA) — Thanks to hip-hop superstar Drake’s latest music video, there are now far more eyes focusing on Temple Israel’s bimah than there are even during the High Holidays. And even though the song’s lyrics are decidedly more profane than sacred, the Reform synagogue’s president said he hoped… Read more »
Shlomo Bar Aba as Eliezer Shkolnik in ‘Footnote’ Footnote,” the marvelous fourth feature by Israeli director Joseph Cedar and his wittiest and most accomplished, begins with music reminiscent of melodramatic Hollywood thrillers of the 1940s. The absurdly ominous score is so over the top that it’s funny. Indeed, the director is winking at us, acknowledging from… Read more »
Shuler Hensley and Eugene Brancoveanu in “The Thomashefskys” “Ladies and gentlemen, welcome! Tonight we’re here to tell you a story. It’s the story of Boris and Bessie Thomashefsky, two kids from little shtetls in the middle of the Ukrainian nowhere who came to America and became the founders and pioneers of the American Yiddish Theater … they… Read more »
Michael Ginsberg, played by Ben Feldman, is the new Jewish copyeditor on the AMC award-winning show "Mad Men." (Michael Yarish/AMC) NEW YORK (JTA) — “Mad Men” is like the Jews — it gets a lot of attention for a show watched by less than 2 percent of the population. To kick off its fifth season, the 1960s period program, winner of four straight Emmys for best drama, has a new Jewish… Read more »
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Emotional. Raw. Frustrating. That’s how Oz Fishman describes his reaction to “Bully,” a documentary that follows five students who face bullying daily. The movie also focuses on two victims of bullying who killed themselves. “I think every single person who wants to be a member of… Read more »
Artist Lori Loebelsohn paints what she calls 'life-cycle portraits.' (Courtesy Lori Loebelsohn) NEW YORK (JTA) — Lori Loebelsohn enters other people’s lives at pivotal moments: a marriage, a milestone birthday, a Bar Mitzvah. Armed with a pen and a notebook, she discusses intimate details about the inner lives of those she has just met: their passions, their most significant memories, their… Read more »
A wax likeness of Anne Frank has been installed at Madame Tussauds in Berlin — in the room next to the Hitler figure. (Photo: Christian Kielmann) Is the image of Anne Frank heading in the same commercial direction as Edvard Munch’s “The Scream”? Munch’s Expressionist painting, once an iconic representation of horror, for years has been available as a party inflatable, an action figure mask, even a bobblehead. With the installation of a lifelike wax… Read more »
Dutch composer Leo Smit Sixteen members of the Tucson Symphony Orchestra will perform the work of Leo Smit, a Dutch Jewish composer killed in the Holocaust, at the community’s annual Holocaust commemoration, “A Grave in the Air: A Musical Remembrance,” on Sunday, April 22. Smit, who was of Portuguese descent, was born in… Read more »
Sonia Reich is a Holocaust survivor who, as a child, hid from the Nazis in the forests of Poland and witnessed the murder of family members. Sixty years later, she’s transferred the horrors of her past to the present, experiencing late-onset post- traumatic stress disorder, which manifests in paranoid… Read more »
(L-R): Milla Bańkowicz as Krystyna Chiger and Robert Więckiewicz as Leopold Socha (Jasmin Marla Dichant/Courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics) In the last few decades, German and French filmmakers — reflecting and, in some cases, bravely advancing national attitudes — have examined the Holocaust with both blunt candidness and shades-of-gray maturity. Polish director Agnieszka Holland’s profoundly responsible and beautifully made “In Darkness” represents a rare cinematic attempt to address… Read more »
Photo: Ed Flores Born Marcus Rothkovich in Dvinsk, Russia (now Latvia) in 1903, Mark Rothko was an artist who created larger-than-life canvases until his death by suicide in 1970. “Red,” John Logan’s play about Rothko, which garnered six Tony Awards in 2010, is currently onstage at the Seattle Repertory Company in a… Read more »
LOS ANGELES (Jewish Journal) — Jason Segel folded his 6-foot-4-inch frame compactly onto a couch at the Four Seasons Hotel and placed his hand upon his chin. Quirky and thoughtful in conversation, the star and co-writer of such comic hits as “The Muppets” and “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” spoke eloquently… Read more »
Geneva – Dr. Raz Somech is one of the main figures in the deeply moving documentary “Precious Life,” which was nominated for an Academy Award in 2011 and serves as a powerful image of hope in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In 2008, a four month-old baby from Gaza, Mohammed Abu… Read more »
NEW YORK (N.Y. Jewish Week) — The novelist Jonathan Safran Foer grew up with a fairly typical American Passover. His father would use the Maxwell House Haggadah, supplemented with his own pamphlet of writings, and lead the annual Foer Seder. But nine years ago, sitting at his family Seder… Read more »
