May 11, 2010 | 8:14 am

Howard and Hef

Posted by Rob Eshman

In yesterday’s Los Angeles Times, columnist Steve Lopez profiled Hugh Hefner.  And it made me think of Howard.

On the surface, the two couldn’t be more different.  Hefner is 30 years older than Stern.  He’s the child of deeply Christian Nebraska farmers.  He made his reputation cultivating an aura of suave sophistication, worldliness and sex appeal—just about 180 degrees off the image Howard presents as an uncool, uncomfortable, anti-social dork. And yet…

Lopez gets under the surface of Hef, and under the surface, the parallels between the two men become much more obvious.

Both men created a media empire by breaking cultural taboos.

Both men have an intense work ethic.  They are hard-working, obsessed perfectionists.  And they are both highly intelligent (Hef’s IQ is said to be 150.  Howard plays the dope but his is clearly way up there).

Both men have a sense of their historic role.  They are meticulous archivers of their lives and careers.  While they sell fun, they take their careers quite seriously.

“Hefner held a stack of notes detailing his millions in donations to film preservation and the study of cinema at UCLA and USC,” wrote Lopez, ” as well as a list of 22 documentaries he has helped finance, including movies on Mary Pickford, Lon Chaney and Rita Hayworth.”

Or consider this passage about Hef’s archives:

He smiled and led me up to the third floor, where a man named Steve Martinez has spent 20 years helping Hefner compile more than 2,000 bound scrapbooks filled with press clippings and personal mementos.

“I’m archiving his legacy,” said Martinez, as Hefner, a pack rat, grabbed a volume off a shelf and showed me his first cartoon strips as a sketch artist, photos of his family and letters he wrote to his mother.

“It was a way of inventing a world of my own, in which I was center stage,” he said of his collection, which will now include a second round of stories about the Hollywood sign.

Hefner reached for Volume 372 and was showing me photos of the 1978 fundraiser to restore the sign when his staff reminded him that he was more than half an hour late for his next interview. Hefner, lost in the story of his life, didn’t want to leave.

Reading this, I thought of Howard’s many references to his archives, and of those “History of Howard Stern” radio documentaries that air on his channel.  Hef would be impressed.

Of course. the easy parallel is that both men created careers for themselves that were, despite the trials and tribulations, really fun. That’s very very smart.

 

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May 5, 2010 | 2:37 pm

Howard Stern Goes to Shul

Posted by Rob Eshman

  Howard waited until late in the show today to announce that for the first time in his adult life, he was going to a synagogue to pray.  I missed the segment (I heard him talking about a staffer named Shuli, not shul), but I read about it at the excellent howardstern.com site.

Late in the show, Howard shocked Robin by announcing his return to prayer: “There’s something I’m upset about and I can’t get any—I can’t figure out any logical, scientific way to solve it so I’m going to prayer. Yeah. I asked [Beth] to go with me because I don’t want to sit there like an asshole by myself. So I’m now resorting to prayer. I’m going to pray to God. Yeah. It happened the other night. It always happens when I’m sick. That’s when I’m at my weakest.”

Howard declined to be specific but continued: “There’s something I’m so upset about—that is wrecking my life—that I’m going to pray to God for him to fix it.” While punctuated with one-liners (“I’m going to go to a Jewish temple and if that doesn’t work, I’m going to church.”), Howard said his appeals to God would be sincere: “I’m not praying for myself, by the way. [I’m] praying for someone else…I need help…it is something horrible.”

Howard said he’d fully committed to the idea: “I even decided—in this moment that I’m praying to God, I’m going to be wearing a Yarmulke. Yeah. Because I—I don’t want to be taken as a joke or as being disrespectful. A Yarmulke is a sign of respect—of humility in front of God.” Howard concluded his announcement: “So I’m not going to say that I don’t believe in God anymore because that would be hypocritical.”

As I’ve written elsewhere on this blog, Howard has the same tortured relationship with organized Jewish religion that many of his peers have.  Think Woody Allen, Phillip Roth, Larry David, Neil Simon—Howard is their radio equivalent—and all of them have skewered the faith they had shoved down their throats as children. 

Howard has taken that to hysterical extremes—playing his squeaky-viced bar mitzvah tapes for comic effect, inviting the comedian Gilbert Gottfried in to do shtick as a rabbi, deriding—often with good reason— the emptiness of the bar mitzvahs he’s forced to attend. But…

But it is not surprising that as he’s matured, he has come to a deeper, spiritual understanding of what Judaism has to offer.  If you look at Roth’s writings, even Woody Allen’s later movies, you see the same evolution.  These men accumulate success, fame, money, but inevitably they look for more.  In their art, they are often asking big questions in funny ways.  In their lives, they are prone to asking the same big questions.  Their obsession with mocking Judaism belies an obsession with Judaism, a sense that there’s more there there, that the religion that disappointed them so as adolescents could perhaps sustain them as adults.

I don’t know what crisis Howard is undergoing— His children?  Beth’s need for a child?  His parent’s aging? Artie? His career choice? How dumb am I to even speculate?—but I do know that religion done right—Judaism done right— can be a powerful tool for guiding one through turmoil, indecision, darkness.

There are superb rabbis in New York and elsewhere who can offer the best of his faith back to him,  but ultimately, he was born into a faith that offers no easy answers, certainly no instant ones.

“Imperfection holds the sparks of holiness,” wrote Rabbi Irwin Kula in his book Yearnings, “we must understand the wisdom of our yearnings.”

Hang in there Howard….

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April 5, 2010 | 2:51 pm

Howard Stern v. Jamie Foxx

Posted by Rob Eshman

One thing Howard Stern understands about radio is that it is a macho medium. It’s a man’s world.  My friend Teresa Strasser, who used to co-host the Adam Carolla Show on 97.1, pointed out to me that a woman DJ doesn’t stand a chance in drive time.  It’s cultural, but it’s also aural—the timbre of a woman’s voice is difficult for people to listen to for four or five hours at a time. A quick glance of who’s who in radio bears that out—Rush, Howard, Sean Hannity.  With one exception—Laura Ingraham, the Top Fifteen radio talk show hosts are men.

Stern understands that in a man’s world, macho rules.  That’s why he has perfected the art of the radio battle—he knows how high the stakes are in the schoolyard brawl of radio. His current comer is the actor and singer Jamie Foxx.

Some crew on Foxx’s Sirius show attacked Howard for comments he made about ‘Precious’ actress, Gabourey Sidibe. Stern said Hollywood didn’t have many opportunities for grossly obese women, and that the press and others would do her a favor by pointing out to her and those who look up to her that Sidibe’s weight problem will cripple and kill her.
VJs at Jamie Foxx’s ‘Foxxhole’ station on Sirius/XM radio bashed Stern for his comments, then Foxx himself defended his VJs. Foxx attacked Stern as irrelevant.

That set Stern off—he had to fight back—and it was on.

What’s fascinating is how quickly it gets ugly on radio.  Foxx called Robin Quivers a “house nigger”—about as low a name as one could use to describe a woman who has pioneered a path in prime time radio.  (Seriously, Robin Quivers is the Hattie McDaniels of radio, period.  It’s an achievement she gets no credit for, because in a race-obsessed society people—like Foxx—can only see her in relation to Stern).

“The crew started in with me and I’m not some pussy who’s gonna sit here and take it and listen to some bullshit.” He said. “And quite frankly, I’m mad now because, you know, I got a shitload of stuff on Jamie Foxx, which isn’t a lot of fun and if he wants to start in with me….I don’t really care about Jamie Foxx. He says we’re friends but we’re not friends. He’s been on my show a couple of times. I don’t consider him a friend anymore.”

That opened up the floodgates—Stern kept pushing further and further.  He knows fights are a way to establish radio pecking order, and he has 30 years more experience with it than Foxx.  Stern knows how to go for the jugular and hang on until the floor is bloody. He started by hinting that Foxx himself is in the closet. ( In Stern’s universe the greatest crime is inauthenticity. He’s a champion of gay rights, but quick to attack those who pretend to be something they’re not, like straight.).  And that’s likely just the beginning….

Meanwhile, reading the comments on the sites covering the fight, it’s pretty shocking how many people go to the Jew thing.  Take a peek at some of the comments:

  y: MrsJones on 3/31/2010 7:24AM
  Highest Ranked
  Foxx is getting what he deserve. How could he go along with that hook nose jew putting down a black woman and compared Sidibe to late rapper The Notorious B.I.G. Worst Stern outed him for what he is an under cover fag and no friend of his. I will never understand why every time some black men get a chance to put down a black woman they jump on it. I will never support anything he does again.

  liberal elite
  3/30/10, 15:34:PM
  lots of black folk on this board defending Howard Stern, wtf? why nimrods? When will black folk ever learn that united we stand and divided we fall. Get out of that slave mentality of defending the white man. Stop blowing Howard Stern, what has he done for black folks or for you lately? You all need to back the brother (Jamie Foxx that is), because he does not have to stick his neck out for black folks, he’s already paid. We are a pathetic race of people. Howard Stern is Jewish and you best believe, Jews will have no problem coming to his defense whether he’s right or wrong, that’s why he gets away with so much bulshet. But that’s how the Jews get down. We need to take a page out of that book and stop believing the white man has the coldest ice.

  Howard is an extremely powerful Jewish man…He hasn’t done what he has done all these years without some serious protection from the hierarchy…You will all know how powerful Howard is by how Jamie response to him…Howard basically blew Jamie’s cover about being gay…

  jandrus
  3-30-2010 8:54 am
  But you are a Jew!!!! Wwhy you f**king Jews always playing the victim card.F**K YOU Howard Jew Stern.

  AND THIS IS ANOTHER EXAMPLE RIGHT HERE!
  How is it that a smelly looking dried up Jew man can degrade, disrespect and try to belittle a positive educated black woman and be allowed to get away with it with no consequences? Let a black man say “jew b*tch” and the curtains will close on his black azz! Career finished!!!!
  yes jamie said Gabby looks like Notorious BIG. She sort of does.lol I love BIG! Im brooklyn born and raised…BK all day! A joke? Yes, no disrespect. But noooooo some of us black people wanna come down on Jamie, some even saying he’s no better than this Jew trash. WAKE THE FCK UP!
  …and for the record, Howard said much more then this “Gaby Sidibe is the most enormous black chick he’s ever seen, how she’s not really going to get anymore roles, and how everyone’s just being nice to her because she’s the fat chick” I would tell you to google it but do you really want to?

  because just about all the producers and casting agents are…And Hollywood no longer hires hetro humans that aren’t Jewish.

  jandrus
  3-30-2010 8:54 am
  But you are a Jew!!!! Wwhy you f**king Jews always playing the victim card.F**K YOU Howard Jew Stern.

  howard stern is in the illuminate and hes a jew that is why he is a cry baby

  DIZ CRACKAZ HOWARDZ DA JEWZ STERNZ IZ SMELLZ LIKEZ WETZ DOGGZ

  Guest
  JAMIE CANT WIN HIS PAY CHECK IS SIGN BY JEWS ITS A LOSE LOSE SITUATION FOR HIM AND ROBBIN YOUR NOT A HOUSE N!GGER YOUR A SELL OUT BECAUSE YOU SIT THERE AND LET HIM TALK SH!T ABOUT BLACK WOMEN FOR A PAY CHECK ALL THAT MONEY AND THEY WAS WATCHING HER IN THE SUPERMARKET IN THE KOTEX SECTION LIKE SHE WAS GONNA STEAL SOMTHING LOL

  Guest
  f*** miley cyrus! you shouldnt have dissed the precious chick b**** ass snitching ass jew howard.

  Guest
  EVERYBODY KNOW JAMIE IS A BOULE f*g. HOWARD A JEW SO HE KNOW FIRST HAND. PROB f***ED JAMIEWITH THE REST OF THEM RICH WHITE BOYS WILL SMITH *COUGHS*

Three thoughts:  Howard seems to represent “Jew” in the popular conscience more than any other celebrity, maybe save Steven Spielberg.

Some people out there have some pretty conflicted feelings about Jews.

Advice to Jaime:  Go into the Stern studio and make nice.  You don’t need this.  Ask Les Moonves.

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February 2, 2010 | 5:55 pm

Superbowl Howard

Posted by Rob Eshman

It’s Wednesday, and all America is looking forward to Superbowl Sunday.

Except for me. And Howard.

I always liked Howard, but when did like turn to love?  When did I go from fan t acolyte, from someone who realizes how good he is to how important he is?  When I first heard him talk about the Superbowl.

“I don’t give a Shit about the Superbowl,” he said. “It’s a pigf——.”

That’s right—football, baseball, hockey, basketball—Howard has made it clear it’s not his thing.  Each day he speaks to a valuable demographic of men between the ages of 18-55, prime football-lovin’, Sports Center watching, game betting fans, and he’s just completely honest with them: he couldn’t care less.

I related.  I followed baseball and football as a kid—my favorite book was Jerry Kramer’s autobiography—but I eventually lost interest.  When my friends talk about scores and quarterbacks and Sunday game lineups, I zone out.  I used to ask a friend who follows college basketball to brief me during March Madness so I’d be able to exchange a few knowing comments with my other male friends.  Yeah, North Carolina put up a great D. Then I stopped: Really, who the fuck cares?  It’s a pigf——.

Listening to Howard, I realized I wasn’t alone.  Here he was, talking to guys, admitting he couldn’t care less about pro sports.

Which demonstrates the number one, be all, end all, bottom line Stern-Rule-for-Life: Be Yourself.  In a word: Authenticity.  Macho is not having to act macho.  Maybe only pussies hate sports, but it takes a real man to admit it. 

Talk radio is a man’s world. It’s guys listening on their way to work.  It’s guys calling in to vent and rant and rail because no one else cares about their opinions and frustrations and the guy at the other end of the phone gets money to listen— not to care, mind you, just to listen and figure out how to turn the Id and angst of the American male into good radio.

My friend Teresa Strasser, who used to co-host the Adam Carolla Show on KLSX, said the chances of landing a lead drive time radio gig for a woman are close to zero. Lots of reasons: men won’t bare their souls in public to a woman; men can’t ultimately relate to a woman—if she’s too macho, she’s a freak, if she’s not macho enough, she’s a wife. And it’s even more basic, Teresa told me: people get tired of the higher pitch of a woman’s voice.

I for one could listen to Teresa day in day out— but I get what she’s saying: most men can’t.  What I love about Howard is despite the fact that he rules FM talk, he’s not like most men.

It may be the most subversive aspect of Howard Stern: not the way he’s brought lesbians and hookers and reality programming into the mainstream, but how he has modeled a different kind of American Macho.

Take the whole gay thing. Long before it was popular to support gay marriage or gays in the military, Howard did it.  With humor, yes, but also with passion. If someone wants to die for his country, he’d say over and over, go ahead and let him, who cares what he does in bed. The way Howard put it was much more clever.  Hey, I don’t have the balls to go fight. I don’t want to die for my country.  If some gay guy wants to take my place, why would I want to stop him.  When the history of gay liberation in this country is written, it will have to include a few paragraphs on Howard Stern.

By playing the coward, Howard made gay equal macho. And he did it over and over, years ago, before the head of the Joint Chiefs finally had the balls himself to reverse Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. WIth Howard it was always, Don’t Ask, Don’t Care.

Same with gay marriage.  If a couple of gays want to give a kid a good home, what do I care?  Was the way Howard put it.  I don’t want to raise these kids without homes.  I don’t want to commit.  If they want to, I say let them.  Howard made gay look tough and professional sports look silly.  He reversed the stereotypes, and subverted the American Macho ideal.

But he didn’t just destroy the ideal, he replaced it with one a lot of men, like me, can relate to.  It’s not the Budweiser commercial, Army recruitment trailer man- that’s the one we’ve been sold our whole lives.  In Howard’s world, real men love straight sex but don’t fear gay men. They like to work out and play chess.  They listen to Rob Zombie and Katy Perry.  They love Terminator and American Idol.  They talk about doing shots and about turkey chili.  They want to see Osama Bin Laden and his cronies bombed until their DNA evaporates, but they don’t want to, as Howard said today, “send young men to die in winless wars.”  They can love Dancing With the Stars and hate the Superbowl.  They can be their authentic selves, no apologies.

I suppose they can, like Howard, even admit to crying while reading Marley and Me.

( I didn’t.  Let’s face it: That’s just gay.)

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January 28, 2010 | 7:54 pm

Howard’s Healthy Ego

Posted by Rob Eshman

One of the criticisms you hear about Stern is that he has an out of control ego.  I think a better term is healthy.  Howard’s healthy ego is a lesson in itself.  And the lesson is this: ego is good.

People say we live in a narcissistic society, that we are the twisted children of a Me generation of unbridled entitlement and desire, but often I find just the opposite: people shrink from their true power and their true potential.  Every rabbi at some point drags out the story of a sage named Zusia who had a vision of what the angels would ask him in heaven. They wouldn’t ask him why he wasn’t as great as Moses, or Joshua.  They would ask him why he wasn’t as great as Zusia.

“They will say to me, ‘Zusia, there was only one thing that no power of heaven or earth could have prevented you from becoming.’ They will say, ‘Zusia, why weren’t you Zusia?’”

Howard doesn’t shirk from being fully himself.  He has used his talents to their fullest, and asserted his personality into a sedate media landscape.  He’s been fully Howard.

The apotheosis of this is of course the Howard 100 News—an entire professional news team devoted to gathering and presenting news about Howard Stern and his universe.  Is there a better spoof of our celebrity-crazed society?  Is there a more brilliant parody of celebs who feed on creating TMZ- worthy moments?  The Howard 100 News is celebrity culture taken to its goofy extreme, where every star hires his or her own team of journalists to report on their every thought. (The difference between TMZ and Howard 100 News is that Howard uses truly seasoned journalists.  I’ve been interviewed by Steve Langford a few times and there is zero difference in professionalism and approach between him and someone reporting on health care or nuclear terrorism).  I’m trying to think of any comedian who’s done something similar to the Howard 100 News, and I can’t. It’s not like having a straight man, it’s like having a division of straight men.

That comic idea—that a star deserves his own news channel—can only come from someone who isn’t afraid of asserting his ego, of taking total control of his world and his image. Howard’s got an out of control ego?  Like that’s a bad thing…...

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January 26, 2010 | 3:25 pm

Ozzie and Oz

Posted by Rob Eshman

Today Howard Stern did the impossible: he made me care about Ozzie Osborne.  Don’t really know who the guy is, haven’t listened to his music, and I couldn’t care less about his reality show or what he has to say—when I can understand what he’s saying.  Today I turned in to hear Howard interviewing Ozzie about his new autobiography.  I was just about to switch to All Things Considered when Howard pushed the interview in a direction that had me riveted: he asked Ozzie about the 19 times he failed his driving exam. It’s not the kind of thing most interviewers would latch onto, but Howard must have sensed there was comic gold there. 

“How do you fail a driving test 19 times?” Howard asked.

Ozzie then told the story of showing up high, or drunk, of having instructors refuse to get into a car with him—it wasn’t an anecdote, it was a whole movie.  Howard has that ability to push into places in interviews where a great, untold story lies hidden, and draw it out.  Part of it I think is his talent as an entertainer, his sense that what interests him will interest his audience.  But deeper than that is his sense of curiosity, driving him to go beyond almost all other print or on air interviewers would go. 

When I interviewed the great Israeli novelist Amos Oz earlier this year, he said the key to his talent is just that, curiosity.  It drives one to a deeper understanding of oneself and the world and makes for great art… and great radio.

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January 11, 2010 | 5:23 pm

TMZ

Posted by Rob Eshman

For the past few days Howard’s been playing and replaying an argument that took place on the after-hours “Wrap Up Show” between Stern Show writer Benjy Bronk and Tracy Millman.  It’s verbal cage fighting.  Benjy is a funny guy, a show writer, but he cannot go word for word with this tough chick who bats him around with her mouth until he literally starts making animal noises.  And here’s the kicker: Tracy is not an on-air talent, she’s the office manager. 

A few years ago, Tracy had a now-famous run in with Steve Grillo, a former show intern who was working as a bartender. She accused him of stiffing her with a big bar tab for drinks he said he’d comp her. That was the first time Stern—and his fans—heard Tracy Unleashed, and it was radio gold.  Stern’s talent, his genius, is to recognize the power of a truly individual voice.  In some ways that’s the heart of his show’s success: his ability to bring out and highlight the unique voice of everyone in his orbit.  He recognizes, and is truly excited by, the power of the true, honest individual voice.

Now he’s talking about giving Tracy Millman her own radio show.  (I can just see it, TMZ, the Tracy Millman Zone. Let Harvey Levin come after her and she could snap his head off with a hard stare).

“If she could bring up that level of honesty and anger,” Stern said , “she’d be a huge personality.”

There’s a big lesson there: find your true voice, and you could be huge.

Especially if your true voice is really articulate when its angry…...

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January 10, 2010 | 12:44 am

Howard’s Hidden Demo

Posted by Rob Eshman

I’m at a gelato place in North Hollywood, sitting at a communal table that’s papered over with sections of today’s LA Times and New York Times.  An Asian-looking woman sits down and spots the LA TImes Calendar section with its cover story about NBC canceling Jay Leno’s 10 pm show.  She picks it up and says to her byfriend, “Howard Stern was right.”

That’s it—point proved.  Howard still attracts a demographic completely at odds with his image among his critics.  The Asian woman has a pink blackberry and a Bottega Veneta wallet.  She’s sitting with two Asian men in button down shirts, talking about real estate REOs.  All look around early thirty, professional.  His critics say Howard only appeals to post-pubescent white boys addicted to half-naked lesbians and fart jokes.  What about thirty-something Asian-American professionals?

I ask the woman about Howard.  She says she’s been listening for three years—a lot of her friends do.  The two guys with her say they listen too.  We get into a discussion about Howard;‘s future on Sirius—and we all agree that the technology itself doesn’t have much of a future.  Younger people can just program their listening through Pandora or whatever’s next.  Without Howard the company is toast.

“What will happen to Richard and Sal?” the woman asks.

“I’m not worried about them,” one of her friends says. “What about J.D.?”

“He’ll end up working for Ronnie,” the third guy says.

“You think Artie’s coming back?” the woman asks me.

I shake my head.  It seems he’s got a long road to wellness, and being on the show full time any time soon seems unlikely.  We’re quiet for a second.  Mournful.  Until one of the guys says, “Man, I drank too much.”

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January 7, 2010 | 11:31 am

Artie Lange Hospitalized

Posted by Rob Eshman

The New York Post reported today that Artie Lange is hospitalized after attempting suicide:

Troubled comic Artie Lange landed in the hospital after stabbing himself nine times in an apparent suicide attempt, sources told The Post. Lange’s frantic mom called 911 Saturday morning after she entered his Hoboken apartment and found the bloodied funnyman, a law-enforcement source said. Lange sustained six “hesitation wounds” and three deep plunges. A source close to Lange’s management team confirmed that the Howard Stern sidekick stabbed himself, adding that his mother had come to visit him that day to drop off food. Surgeons managed to save Lange despite heavy bleeding. “We all have our demons,” Stern said on-air this week, referring to Lange’s past battles with addiction. “Artie has given this show tremendous moments of great comedy. He’s a tremendous contributor. He is a good man. Don’t forget how great he is.”

Artie is supremely talented—a guaranteed laugh on the way to work.  My heart and prayers g out to him and his family.

I Googled a bit and found that self-stabbing is a rare form of suicide, and particularly troubling.  One study reported that most stabbers are male (70 percent) and the vast majority to not succeed in killing themselves.  All of them are intoxicated at the time of the attempted self-stabbing.  The 1994 study found that self-stabbers fell into two groups:

The patients fell into two distinct clinical groups: the first consisted mostly of young men with antisocial personalities who were intoxicated at the time of the self-stabbing and who reported ambivalent suicidal intent; the second consisted of psychotic patients, most of whom were actively ill at the time of the self-stabbing, and who reported clear suicidal intent. Patients in the first group were noncompliant with treatment and difficult to engage; those in the second group needed psychiatric hospitalization and often responded to antipsychotic medication.

Artie,  from what I’ve heard over the years, sounds like he could belong to either group. 

Howard spoke about Artie today for the first time since break.  He refused to go into detail.  He was walking that line he often comes up against when he finds himself treating a personal or show matter completely differently than he would if it happened to another celebrity, or someone he actually didn’t like. Double standard?  Absolutely—and he makes no apology.  One of Howard’s quality is that he’s an experienced and mature broadcaster, well-aware of what the real limits of propriety are.  They have nothing to do with dick jokes or naughty words or fart sounds, as the FCC would have it.  They have to do with how you treat those around you—and Howard seems to know how to do that like a real mench.

Artie: good luck.  Find Jesus or a good shrink or Britt Hume or a great prescription or whatever—you will get better, you will keep being funny, you will love and laugh and eat canoli again.

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December 28, 2009 | 11:38 am

NYC Stern

Posted by Rob Eshman

In New York for vacation.  It feels like home, partly because the Levy-Wallach clan gathers here, partly because the food is endless and amazing, but also because Howard broadcasts from here.  Lstening to him every week day, I feel a part of the city.

And I’m among his fans. A couple of days ago Cousins Larry and Nina invited us for brunch to their apartment on the East Side, and Larry looked at me seriously and said, “So what about Artie?  Does he leave the show or stay?  I think he’s tanking it.”

There’s a conversation starter you don’t get much in LA.

More Howard moments: Walking on Broadway near 80th, there was a truck from the North Shore Animal Shelter, Howard’s wife’s Beth’s charity. I walked up to the ladies in charge and said, “I’m a member.”

In Times Square, passing the Marriot, where Robin was caught up in the shooting of the CD scammer—surrounded by a billion people, and THAT’S what I remember.

You could write a book at how Howard shaped the image of this city—- another reason to take Stern seriously….

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December 9, 2009 | 6:03 pm

Stern… Seigelman… Seagal

Posted by Rob Eshman

Howard tipped off listeners to a trainwreckishly delightful new reality show: “Steven Seagal: Lawman.”  I watched it the same way I used to watch the alley cats mating outside my window in Jerusalem: it’s noisy and gross but, hey, it’s also part of God’s world.

In “Lawman,” former action star Seagal goes on patrol with the Jefferson Parish Louisiana Sheriff’s department as a reserve deputy sheriff.  Two things surprised me right off: 1. Seagal is a cop who physically cannot run, and 2. He is not even the heaviest member of the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Department. What is the motto down there— “To Protect and To Serve Ourselves Huge Portions of Jambalaya”?

I’m fairly sure Seagal knows how to shoot.  I watched a scene where he instructs another cop how to hit a target from what looks like seven feet away.  Seagal tells the cop, “I’m going to shoot a hole in the target.  Then I want you to put your bullet through that hole.”  Seagal then proceeds to do that, because, as he explains a half dozen times in the first episode, he is a trained martial arts master, and his years of Eastern discipline have taught him how to shoot, how to fight, how to stay calm, how to see things no one else sees—it seems, in fact, his years of martial arts discipline have taught him everything except how to say no to dessert.

But poking fun at Seagal is as easy for me as shooting a bullet through a bullet hole is for him.  For all I know he may be in the joke—making him one of the most brilliant self-parodists since Mae West. But I doubt it.

What I loved about “Lawman” was watching how Seagal has so completely transformed his persona from the circumstances of his birth, to whatever he is now.

Because, really, Steven Seagal is a Jew.

I mean, he’s a Jew from Lansing, Michigan, the son of Samuel Steven Seagal (1928-1991), a high school math teacher.  His father’s parents were Russian Jews,  Nathan Siegelman - later changed to Seagal - (1892-1973) and Dora Goldstein (1894-1989). Seagal’s mother is of Irish ancestry (Jewish? Catholic?) but according to Reform Jewish law, the man is a Jew.

But Seagal, like many Jews of his generation, sought enlightenment and cultural attachment elsewhere.  His family moved from Lansing to Fullerton, CA when Seagal was 5 years old, and Seagal grew up in the Southern California suburbs. (Which makes his attempt at a bayou accent in “Lawmen” all the more puzzling.  I’ve been to Fullerton and they just don’t speak like that there.).  He found meaning and spiritual succor in the Eastern martial arts—again, a very Jewish thing.  The leading karate teacher in LA is an Israeli. Jews, especially of Seagal’s generation, were turned off by what Judaism had become—a pale copycat of Protestant propriety, with rote Hebrew school learning, mumbled, meaningless prayers, and bar mitzvahs that amounted to little more than a punch line.  This is the Jewish world Howard Stern—who is just two years younger than Seagal—mocks often on his show, and it’s funny ‘cause it’s true. Jews growing up in the 50’s, 60s and early 70s got the assimilated version of Judaism, castrated of its spiritual power. 

So it’s hardly surprising Stern has a running gag about being “half Jewish,” even though he’s as full-on Jew as Golda Meir.  In fact, it’s telling: in Stern’s generation, American Judaism was practiced in a half-assed way, at half-strength, half-heartedly.

And it’s also hardly surprising that Stern turned away from Judaism and toward the Eastern practice of Transcendental meditation, of which he is a big proponent and practitioner. And that Seagal turned to Zen and aikido and karate and Tibetan Buddhism and etc.  Just because it’s hard to take Seagal’s seriousness seriously, it’s easy to mock a 400 pound Zen master with the world’s worst hair weave, the face of a Pinsk peddlar, and a Bayou accent that sounds like he learned it by listening to Dennis Quaid in “The Big Easy.” But he did do what at least a generation of Jews did: leave what he saw as a stale religion and culture behind and seek meaning, connection and enlightenment elsewhere.

 

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