Jewish History & Culture
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Walk Like A Mom/Rockstar (Susanna Hoffs)
“Hannah Montana,” a Disney Channel program I watch on occasion with my daughter, features a 14-year-old girl with a secret identity: she’s actually a rock star. This is an absurd fantasy. In real life, the rock star at my daughter’s school is a mom. Although she leads a double life, it is no secret. Her […]
Hate the Game, Love The Player (Michael Tolkin and "The Return of The Player")
The fall season is upon us, with new books, movies and TV programs all vying for our attention as palliatives to the news of war, terrorism and melting ice caps. Even as the days get shorter and our own day of judgment looms imminent, we wonder: Is there a hero out there who can set […]
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Kaplan's Collage
Here’s Marty Kaplan blogging on Huffington Post about suggested treatments for Mel Gibson’s “problem”: “‘Jew Like Me’ is another strategy. Walk a mile in my shoes. Gain 10 pounds at my table. Wait two hours after lunch before swimming. Laugh that ironic meta-laugh right along with us when Jon Stewart says, ‘Jewey.’ Sensitize yourself to […]
The Mad Adventures of Gerard Oury
“The King of popular comedy is dead,” proclaimed Le Figaro after Gerard Oury, one of France’s most successful directors (if not its most successful) died on Thursday, July 20, at his home in St. Tropez. I know Oury’s work because as a teenager I went with my mother to New York’s 68th Street Playhouse, an […]
Life vs. Death
In college, I wrote the same literature essay over and over again. Regardless of the novel, its plot or its country of origin, I found that I could always work up four pages on the subject of “Life vs. Death.” My ideas on this subject were not particularly original. In a high school English class, […]
A Little Respect (for Jewish journalism)
For the 20th anniversary issue of The Jewish Journal of Los Angeles, it was suggested that I write a column about Jewish journalism. Herewith the result: Jewish journalism is a much-maligned enterprise — it cries out like the late Rodney Dangerfield for respect. No one really admits to reading a Jewish newspaper. “It comes to […]