Jewish History & Culture
171 posts found
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See Jane Shlep (Yiddish with Dick and Jane)
"See Jane shlep, Shlep, Jane shlep, Shlep, shlep, shlep." This is not your parent’s primer. This is "Yiddish With Dick and Jane," a new parody by Ellis Weiner and Barbara Davilman, who will be reading their work this Sunday, Sept. 19 at the Skirball Cultural Center. The story of how Dick and Jane came to be flavoring their speech with Yiddish began innocently enough two summers ago, when Weiner and Davilman found themselves in Laguna with three hours to kill… -
Einstein in California
One hundred years ago, Einstein was a Zurich Polytechnic teaching graduate who couldn’t land a job in academe. Instead, he got a position as a patent clerk in Bern, Switzerland. Not the most challenging job, but it gave him time to think. Einstein liked to conduct what he called "thought experiments," one of which asked: "What would a beam of light look like if you could race besides it?" During the course of 1905, what has come to be called… -
Tough Guys (Isaac Babel)
Reading "The Collected Stories of Isaac Babel" (W. Norton & Co., 2002) in paperback, edited by Babel’s daughter, Nathalie, got me thinking about Jewish gangsters and tough guys. Babel was born in Odessa in 1894. He wrote of Odessa’s Jewish underworld and its gangsters in sparkling prose. Fifty years before Mario Puzo gave us "The Godfather," Babel offered up Benya Krik. Benya, Babel tells us, had "gangster chic" — a century before Tupac took the stage. Babel’s Odessa was home… -
Rambamalama (The Rambam, Rabbi Leder and Julie Salamon)
Put down your "Da Vinci Code." Set aside your "South Beach Diet." Let your kaballah red string drop off your wrist. I’m here to alert you to the next pop cultural phenom: a 12th-century philosopher popularly known as the Rambam. Just a few weeks ago, I attended the "Aloud" reading series at the Los Angeles Central Library to hear a conversation between Julie Salamon and Steven Leder. Salamon, a culture reporter for The New York Times, is the author of… -
A Sunny Hungarian Rhapsody
As winter chill gives way to spring sun, it’s not too early to start planning a summer trip to Budapest. Budapest, Hungary’s capital, straddles the Danube, with historic old Buda on the hill, and Pest with its atmospheric 19th century and Art Nouveau architecture. In recent years, many of the Budapest’s historic sites have been restored, such as the Parliament building and St. Stephen’s Church, and their interiors are breathtaking. Part of Budapest’s appeal is that it is very much… -
Schindler's Impact (The 10th Anniversary of "Schindler's List")
In May 1995, I found myself in Lviv, Ukraine. My father died two years before, and I was there on a roots trip. I wanted to see the city where he grew up and perhaps unearth some of the information that he could never bring himself to share, such as the names and birthdates of his brothers and sisters, all murdered. I discovered his own real birthday to be a completely different day, month and year than we had always… -
Dreaming of a Blue and White Christmas (Christmas Movies from Michael Curtiz to Jon Favreau)
Christmas came early this year — Nov. 7, when New Line Cinema released “Elf,†the family-friendly comedy that, as of this writing, has earned more than $156 million (see story, p. 19). Another surprise is the success of the far-more-cynical adult offering “Bad Santa,†which had a production cost of $18 million and, since its Nov. 26 release, has earned more than $43 million. These are Christmas films that, you could say, are good for the Jews. Both are written… -
'Fabulous Invalid' (Ruth Seymour's Chanukah Program on KCRW)
I used to have this Thanksgiving Day ritual in New York: no matter what I was doing, or where I was going, I would find a way to be near a radio around 11:30 a.m., to tune in to WNEW-FM 102.7’s broadcast of Arlo Guthrie’s “Alice’s Restaurant,†in its entirety, in all its musical and comedic glory. Over the last few years in Los Angeles, I’ve acquired a similar accidentally/on purpose habit: every year around this time, I manage to… -
Budapest in L.A.
In the coming weeks I will spend many dreamy hours inside Wilshire Boulevard Temple. Two blocks east of Western on Wilshire, the landmark building is an imposing and awe-inspiring architectural gem that belongs to that school of temple architecture that says: We Jews are citizens, and our house of worship is as glorious as any non-Jewish one — maybe more so. Wilshire Boulevard Temple was completed in 1929, the same year as New York’s Temple Emanu-El, the world’s largest synagogue.… -
Maahj Cracks Fashionistas (The Maah-jong craze)
What, you may be asking yourself, is the next hot trend? The style universe looks to Los Angeles in general, and this column in particular, for those cutting-edge trends that define the culture. No wonder this column has become such a favorite of trendsetters and fashionistas everywhere. (Nonetheless, I continue to deny "sexing up" reports for W, Ingrid Sischy, Kal Ruttenstein, Bonnie Fuller or Hello! Magazine — no matter what the BBC claims.) But back to the future: A movement… -
The Heroes of Jewish Comedy
On Monday, July 7, Comedy Central will premiere the first of a six-part series called, "Heroes of Jewish Comedy." Unfortunately, the series suffers for being a clip job not up to its subject. Less documentary and more comedy would help. Produced in Britain, the show already seems dated (the series has high hopes for NBC’s "The In-Laws," a show that has already been canceled). The narration, read by iconic TV Semite Judd Hirsch, is equally underwhelming. As my mind wandered… -
Kitaj the 'Diasporist'
Six years have passed since painter R.B. Kitaj moved from London to Los Angeles, following a hail of criticism and counterattacks (more on that later). Recently, I visited the artist at his home and studio on the occasion of "Los Angeles Pictures," a breathtaking exhibit at Venice’s LA Louver Gallery. Kitaj’s show in Venice includes more than 20 works, paintings, drawings, even a few abstracts. Clearly, Kitaj’s time in Los Angeles has been productive. But can a self-proclaimed "Diasporist" ever…