Arts and Culture

Chaim Potok’s widow, Adena Potok, center, advised the Arizona Jewish Theatre Company production of ‘My Name is Asher Lev.’ From left: Andrea Dovner, Layne Racowsky (director), Michael Kary, Ben Tyler (Mark Gluckman)

The Arizona Jewish Theatre Company in Phoenix will present the Arizona premiere of “My Name is Asher Lev,” written by Aaron Posner, and based on the novel by Chaim Potok, March 24-April 3. “My Name is Asher Lev” had its world premiere in Philadelphia in January 2009. Set in… Read more »

Klezmer Company Orchestra

The Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona and the Tucson Jewish Community Center will present a benefit concert, “Beyond the Tribes: A Latin Jazz and Klezmer Extravaganza,” featuring the Miami-based Klezmer Company Orchestra on Tuesday, March 29 at the JCC. The evening will start at 6:45 p.m. with Latin dance… Read more »

Joan Rivers wouldn’t mind meeting a nice Jewish man who is affluent, healthy and can drive — that is, if she can find the time. “It would be nice, but at my age? My god, the curtain is down, the hotel is closed,” jokes Rivers from her home in… Read more »

Biblical scholar James Kugel speaking about his new book, "In the Valley of the Shadow," in Pasedena, Calif., Feb. 3, 2011. (Sue Fishkoff)

PASADENA, Calif. (JTA) — When Jewish biblical scholar James Kugel was diagnosed with a particularly aggressive form of cancer in 2000, he didn’t find religion. The world-renowned academic and author of numerous books, including the acclaimed “How to Read the Bible,” already was a practicing Orthodox Jew. Instead, Kugel… Read more »

Susanne Bier, director of "In a Better World" [Sony Picture Classics]

LOS ANGELES (JTA) — Film director Susanne Bier, whose Danish movie, “In a Better World,” won the Oscar on Feb. 27 for best documentary, is an anomaly. She is a woman director in an overwhelmingly male profession, and she is emphatically Jewish in a country and industry in which… Read more »

In just two years the Tucson Festival of Books has been astonishingly successful: It ranks fourth among book festivals around the United States, with 80,000 book lovers attending last year. The 2011 festival will take place March 12 and 13 on the University of Arizona campus. “What’s unique is… Read more »

Maxx Carlisle-King, Judy Kaye and Ryan DeLuca in Arizona Theatre Company's Lost in Yonkers. (Photo:Tim Fuller/Arizona Theatre Company)

Arizona Theatre Company will bring the Kurnitz family to life in Neil Simon’s Pulitzer and Tony-winning “Lost in Yonkers” Feb. 26 through March 19. Called “the best play Simon ever wrote” by the New York Post, “Lost in Yonkers” chronicles the Kurnitz family’s efforts to stay together during World… Read more »

LOS ANGELES (JTA) — Is the Holocaust passe for Hollywood and the world’s filmmakers? This is the first year in at least half a century that not a single Oscar or Golden Globe entry has focused on the horrors of the Shoah. Equally ignored, with one peripheral exception, are… Read more »

In a scene from the film "Inside Hana's Suitcase," Hana arrives at Auschwitz in October 1944.

Hallonot, Hebrew for windows, is an annual Coalition for Jewish Education program providing windows into different aspects of the Jewish world. CJE has partnered with the Tucson International Jewish Film Festival and the Tucson Symphony Orchestra to present this year’s Hallonot, “Voices and Views on the Holocaust,” which will… Read more »

Producer "Scooter" Braun, left, and Justin Bieber in "Never Say Never," a film the recounts the meteroric rise of the young singer. (Courtesy of Paramount Pictures)

LOS ANGELES (JTA) — Is “Never Say Never,” the biographical documentary and concert film that recounts the rise of Justin Bieber, also a message film of “Hear O Israel?” The film, which opens Feb. 11 in wide release, has a genuine Jewish backstory due to the onscreen presence and… Read more »

William Link

The Tucson chapter of the Brandeis National Committee will hold two Book and Author events next month, an evening soiree on Feb. 9 and a lunch program on Feb. 10. Featured authors ­— all with a mystery or history bent — are William Link, Douglas Starr, Rhys Bowen and… Read more »

Amy Chua has drawn a firestorm of criticism over her book "Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother" and its synopsis in The Wall Street Journal. (Penguin Press HC)

NEW YORK (JTA) — With her take-no-prisoners approach in “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother,” author Amy Chua has drawn the ire of mothers across America who take exception to the draconian measures she recommends to ensure successful, prodigious offspring. So it’s little surprise that prominent among her critics… Read more »

The rapper Shyne, shown leaning against a pillar in the Old City of Jerusalem, says the tenets of Judaism help him become closer to the kind of person he strives to be. (Dena Wimptheimer)

JERUSALEM (JTA) – It was early on during his difficult, isolated years in prison that the former gangsta rapper known as Shyne decided to formally take on the laws of Judaism as his own. Shyne, who legally changed his name in prison from Jamaal Barrows to Moses Levi —… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — A debate among bloggers following Debbie Friedman’s death is raising questions about the obligation of gay and lesbian celebrities to be out front in discussing their sexual orientation. The discussion began with a Jan. 10 post to Jewschool by David Levy lamenting what he described… Read more »

SAN FRANCISCO (JTA) — Journalist and author Lisa Alcalay Klug flew across the country this month to present at Limmud NY, the annual New York version of the worldwide Jewish learning extravaganza. The Jan. 14-17 conference in upstate New York was Klug’s seventh Limmud gathering in 12 months. Like… Read more »

(JTA) — Debbie Friedman, the popular singer and songwriter who died Jan. 9, wrote the following for “I Am Jewish: Personal Reflections Inspired by the Last Words of Daniel Pearl,” a collection of writings following the 2002 murder of Wall Street reporter Daniel Pearl. Dear Daniel, This is the… Read more »

Debbie Friedman, Jewish songwriter and performer, dies.

SAN FRANCISCO (JTA) — Over the weekend, as singer-songwriter Debbie Friedman lay dying in a hospital bed in Southern California, the call went out to Jewish congregations around the world to pray for the popular musician. But early Sunday morning Friedman, who composed “Mi Shebeirach,” a popular version of… Read more »

The album cover of Shlock Rock's "Shabbat in Liverpool," which features Beatles' songs set to Sabbath prayers and replicates the Fab Four's famed "Abbey Road" album, was released in December 2010. (Shlock Road)

STAMFORD, Conn. (JTA) — When is it kosher to listen to the Beatles on the Sabbath? When your chazan adapts the Kabbalat Shabbat Friday night service to the melodies of John Lennon and Paul McCartney. Lenny Solomon, the founder of the song-parody group Shlock Rock, employed “nusach Liverpool” for… Read more »

The desire to reconcile with dead loved ones — to say what was never said and understand what was never explained — is powerful and universal. Yet 60-something José initially appears immune from that impulse when he finds his ex-wife dead in her apartment at the beginning of the… Read more »

The 20th Annual Tucson International Jewish Film Festival, which will run Jan. 20-30, will open with “Who Do You Love,” a behind-the-scenes look at the brothers who started the legendary Chess Records, launching the careers of Muddy Waters, Bo Diddley, Etta James, Churck Berry and others. It will be… Read more »