James Franco Q & A:  His Film on Tortured Gay Poet Hart Crane

By Naomi Pfefferman
Published on June 15, 2011

Never Too Old to Write a Letter ... of Torah

Published on March 25, 2009

The Jewish Home for the Aging has never had a Torah it could call its own. Since the home first opened in 1912, synagogues or individuals have donated Siferei Torah to the senior-living community, but the scrolls were often old and tarnished, with faded letters or finger smudges on the parchment. These Torahs are considered pasul, or unfit for public reading, but they were the only ones available to the home for religious services.

Michael Tolkin takes on L.A. excess, family dysfunction and private-school politics in sequel to his

By Tom Teicholz
Published on September 14, 2006

Eighteen years ago, in "The Player," Tolkin introduced us to Griffin Mill, a studio executive who gets away with murder -- literally.

Curb Your Verbosity

By Gaby Wenig
Published on December 23, 2004

Wolpe's goal with this book and with his columns is to achieve the most coveted accolade of all newspaper columnists -- to have his column posted on someone's refrigerator.

Yeladim

By Abby Gilad
Published on November 11, 2004

Yeladim

Smarty Pants

By Abby Gilad
Published on October 14, 2004

Albert Einstein was a very smart man -- probably one of smartest people of all time.

Campers Display the Write Stuff

By David Finnigan
Published on July 29, 2004

Letters from Jewish summer camps have not changed much since 1963, when Allan Sherman recorded the classic song, "Hello Muddah! Hello Faddah!" Kids still write about what they had for lunch, what their cabin is like and their bunkmates. Though a national Web site allows one-way e-mails from parents to kids, Jewish summer camps still expect campers to write their folks the old-fashioned way -- with pen, paper, stamps and envelopes.

For the Kids

By Abby Gilad
Published on July 1, 2004

For the Kids

Kids Page

By Abby Gilad
Published on June 24, 2004

Are you traveling to new places this summer?

Book Unpacks Shoah Memories

By Beverly Gray
Published on December 11, 2003

Karen Levine never had plans to write a book.

Then in 2001, the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. radio producer came across an article in the Canadian Jewish News about a young Japanese woman, urged on by Tokyo schoolchildren studying the Holocaust, who traveled halfway round the world to find the owner of a child's battered suitcase. That child, Hana Brady, had died in Auschwitz at age 13, but the determined young woman tracked down Hana's brother George, who had survived Auschwitz and found a new life in Toronto.

Levine made a radio documentary chronicling the meeting between Fumiko Ishioka and George Brady, and that led her to write a children's book, "Hana's Suitcase," a gripping detective story and an inspirational saga.

Hebrew, Anyone?

By Sharon Schatz Rosenthal
Published on November 6, 2003

you thought Hebrew school was just for bar and bat mitzvah students, think again. This fall, tens of thousands of Jews around the United States and Canada are learning to read and write Hebrew through Read Hebrew America/Canada. The campaign, which is made possible by the National Jewish Outreach Program (NJOP), a New York-based organization that provides Jewish educational opportunities, is now offering its annual free Hebrew crash course in Los Angeles and other cities across the country during the month of November.

"Hebrew is the language of the Jewish people, yet in America we don't know if more than 20 or 25 percent of Jews can read it," said Rabbi Yitzchak Rosenbaum, NJOP's program director.

Words From the Old Ball Game

By Rachel Brand
Published on May 29, 2003

In his new book, pop songwriter Seth Swirsky pays tribute to the sport that has played such an important part in his life.

For the Kids

By Abby Gilad
Published on February 13, 2003

One year ago, Kol Tikvah Religious School in Woodland Hills started a letter-writing campaign to Israeli astronaut Ilan Ramon.

What’s the Beef?

By Rabbi Elazar Muskin
Published on November 14, 2002

A number of years ago, during the O.J. Simpson trial, I had a conversation with a non-Jewish merchant who told me that right after Simpson was arrested, he met a good friend of Simpson's at church. At the conclusion of the service, the merchant happened to stand right behind this man as he thanked the minister for his homily and then asked him, "Reverend, would you please pray for O.J."