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Jewish World Review March 15, 2013 / 4 Nissan, 5773 Jewz in the Newz By Nate Bloom
Bonnie Franklin, Valerie Harper; LA mayor's race; Albert Brooks on going to shul
JewishWorldReview.com |
VANITY FAIR GOES JEWISH The January and March issues of Vanity Fair magazine have an astonishing amount of first-class Jewish related celebrity news and the good news is that most of that material can be read on-line. (http://www.vanityfair.com/magazine; click on issue cover). The January "comedy" issue, edited by JUDD APATOW, 45, has interviews with the mostly-Jewish cast of "Freaks and Geeks"; a joint interview with ELAINE MAY and MIKE NICHOLS, both 80; and a very revealing interview with ALBERT BROOKS, 65, in which he gives his really moving reason why he insisted that his two children, now ages 14 and 10, go to temple with him. **
SHORT TERM TROIKA?
On March 5, Los Angeles city councilman ERIC GARCETTI, 42, came in first in the open primary to become the city's next mayor. His father, Gil Garcetti, 71, the former L.A. District Attorney, was born in Mexico to Italian and Mexican Catholic parents. His mother, SUKEY ROTH, is an American Jew. Eric was raised Jewish and is a synagogue member.
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SAD NEWS
BONNIE FRANKLIN, best known as the star of the hit sit-com, "One Day at a Time," died on Mar. 1, age 69, of pancreatic cancer. She met her husband, MARVIN MINKOFF, when he produced an excellent 1980 TV movie about the life of birth control pioneer Margaret Sanger that Franklin starred-in. The couple wed in 1980 and remained married until Minkoff's death in 2009. She was a loving stepmother to Minkoff's two children. From 1999-2001, she hosted a cable TV show in which she interviewed other Jewish celebrities.
Valerie Harper, 73, who isn't Jewish, but played the famous Jewish character "Rhoda Morgenstern" on the "Mary Tyler Moore Show" and on the spin-off, "Rhoda," has been diagnosed with a terminal brain tumor. In 2007, she starred as GOLDA MEIR in the film adaptation of the hit Broadway play, "Golda's Balcony." DAVID GROH, the Jewish actor who played Joe, Rhoda's non-Jewish husband, died in 2008, age 68, from cancer.
**
HERE'S THE PART OF THE VANITY FAIR INTERVIEW WHERE BROOKS DISCUSSES RELIGION WITH FILM DIRECTOR AND PRODUCER JUDD APATOW, WHO IS A SECULAR JEW. It is the most cogent and compelling explanation I've ever seen as to why--even when one's faith is "imperfect," you and your family should go to synagogue-and it comes from a "hip" entertainment figure.
Judd Apatow. Are you religious at all?
Albert Brooks. It's funny, I don't believe in the images of what G0D is, a thing or a person. I do wonder often the reason the sea horse is here, or a tree, or why I'm here, and so I don't know if I'm religious. But it's interesting when you're part of a group-the Jews, to be exact-that the world has had such problems with. It has really nothing to do with religion. That's why, if my kids didn't want to go to temple, I used to say, "Let me explain something to you: If Hitler came back, he's not going to ask if you went to temple. You're already on the train. So you might as well know who you are and why they're going to take you."
J.A. What do you get out of temple?
A.B. I went to a memorial service and brought my kids and we thought about my dad and my mom, and the rabbi gave kind of a cool sermon, and you're sitting in a room with everyone who would have to go on the same train. So there's a bit of community there.
J.A. That's dark.
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J.A. I'd love to buy it, though. I wish I could.
A.B. I don't buy it, but I love it.
J.A. It would make the day so much easier.
A.B. Look, only a few people get to die peacefully in their sleep after a wonderful life. So that's like not making the football team. There's lots of things you don't get to have. That's probably one of them. Thank G0D, I consider myself lucky that I live after anesthetic. Can you imagine those days? "Sit down. Tuesday we're taking off your arm."
Info Note: Persons in capital letters, above, are deemed Jewish for the purpose of this column. For the purpose of the column, the person has to have at least one Jewish parent, be raised Jewish or secular, and not identify with a religion other than Judaism as an adult. Converts to Judaism are also, of course, considered Jewish, even if they don't have a Jewish parent.
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