By Symi Rom-Rymer
With weather in the 90s and a three-day weekend to look forward to, it’s no time for a heavy post. So instead, here’s some fun Jewish TV mind candy:
I thought I’d kick things off with a sketch from the early years, “Jewess Jeans.” A parody of the then-popular Jordache jeans commercial, Rhonda Weiss (played by Gilda Radner) skillfully plays with our notions of what it means to be both Jewish and sexy.
Vodpod videos no longer available.Posted in Politics
Tagged Gilda Radner, Glee, Jordache jeans, Lea Michelle, Mike Myers, The Wonder Years, TV
By Symi Rom-Rymer
Reuters reported this week that 100 French and American plaintiffs are suing SNCF, the French national railroad company, for their role in transporting French Jews to concentration camps during the Holocaust. The group, made up of Holocaust survivors and their descendents, insist that it’s not about the money, but rather about exposing the crimes in which the rail company participated. “‘It is about money but not in the way they mean,’” said William Wajnryb, whose father died at Auschwitz. “When people make accusations about money, they should look at the SNCF first of all,” he said. “The core of this story is that the SNCF got money for deporting Jews.’” Continue reading
Facebook Fan Giveaway: Win a Free Copy Of “Ground Up” by Michael Idov!
Another in a series of giveaways to celebrate our 35th anniversary, become a fan of Moment by Friday (May 21) and be entered in our Facebook Fan lottery to win this amazing novel. Moment will send 3 lucky winners the book free of charge (note: only to US addresses).
By Sarah Breger
Our commemorative issue is here! Check out
• Moment Magazine Symposium 2010,
Mel Brooks, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Itzhak Perlman, Leon Wieseltier, Geraldine Brooks and 30 other Jewish luminaries and thinkers ponder two big questions: What does it mean to be Jewish today? What do Jews bring to the world? And, celebrate the debut of our newly designed website on May 10th when 35 more fascinating responses from more amazing people go live—available online only! Continue reading
By Symi Rom-Rymer
When a Muslim and a Jew walk into a bar, it’s a joke. When a Muslim discovers he was born Jewish, it’s a movie. The Infidel, shown as part of the 2010 Tribeca Film Festival, is the story of Mahmud Nasir (Omid Djalili), a middle-aged Muslim man from London’s East End, who discovers after his mother’s death that he was adopted as a baby. Not only was he adopted, but his birth parents were Jews. Jews who named him Solomon (Solly) Shimshillewitz, or as his new friend Leonard Goldberg (Richard Schiff) suggests: Jewy-Jew-JewJewawtiz.
While Nasir is trying to cope with his new identity, he also must deal with the impending marriage of his son to the stepdaughter of one of Egypt’s most radical imams, Arshad El Masri (Yigal Naor). The movie takes off when Nasir discovers that his alleged birth father is dying in a nursing home, but can’t see him until Nasir learns what it means to be Jewish. (For the Rabbi is guarding the door, this means Nasir must know how to say the names of the five books of the Torah in Yiddish or recite the Shema). Desperate, he turns to his caustic neighbor Goldberg who instead, teaches him the truly important aspects of Judaism: how to say “oy” with the right inflection and knowing how to dance the Kazatsky (certainly a critical skill in my family!). Continue reading
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