history Archives – Jewish Journal

Spectator – Movie for ‘Rent’

Keren Engelberg November 17, 2005

The sound and feel of Broadway\’s \”Rent\” are intact, even while the music assumes a slightly edgier rock core, and some dialogue is spoken rather than sung.

Catskills Memories

Naomi Pfefferman March 24, 2005

Rita Lakin\’s new musical, \”Saturday Night at Grossinger\’s,\” fetes the businesswoman behind the food and the entertainment, Jennie Grossinger (1882-1972).

“I Am Jewish.”

Jewish Journal September 16, 2004

\”I am Jewish,\” were the words Wall Street Journal correspondent Daniel Pearl spoke to his terrorist captors shortly before they murdered him.

Playwright’s Alter Ego Returns Home

Naomi Pfefferman September 2, 2004

\”Boy\” revolves around 40ish novelist Eric Weiss, who returns home — actually to the hospital where he was born — to visit his dying father, Manny, a shoe salesman. It\’s his first trip back in a while, and he\’s ambivalent: \”I saw what Brooklyn did to my parents, and I knew I had to get the hell out of here,\” he tells a friend. \”I saw … the fear, the xenophobia, the suffocating double grip the Holocaust and the Depression had around their throats.\”

A Dramatist’s Own Private Afghanistan

Barry Joseph September 25, 2003

\”Homebody/Kabul\” is very much about people trying to erase their pasts through encounters with those who are different from them. Whether British or Afghan, Christian or Muslim, all the characters have a history created by colonialism that informs their present struggles.