The Arts

‘Seder Stories’ by Nancy Rips may prompt good conversation at your seder

By Joel A. Moskowitz, MD LA JOLLA, California — In anticipation of spending a Seder with our daughter and her family, I chanced upon  a book that describes how one hundred and one famous and not so famous persons recall their experience on Pesach. Nancy Rips, a book commentator, has gathered a small volume, of […]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Jewish Religion

San Diego Jewish Film Festival Preview: ‘The Wave’

By Jack Forman LA JOLLA, California–The Wave, a feature-length film made in Germany in 2008 and scheduled to be screened at 8 p.m. tonight (Wednesday)  the San Diego Jewish Film Festival, dramatizes the events of a real Palo Alto high school teaching experiment conducted in 1969.  The events were first featured in a 1981 American

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Science, Medicine, & Education, Theatre, Film & Broadcast

San Diego Jewish Film Festival preview: ‘Against The Tide’

By Carol Davis SAN DIEGO–The San Diego Jewish Film Festival is celebrating its 20th year this season. The Festival is being sponsored by the Mizel Family Foundation and runs from Feb. 10-21. Titles cover the alphabet from A to Z starting with Adam’s Wall and ending with Zrubavel. Against The Tide is a new release

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Carol Davis, Theatre, Film & Broadcast

Torah lesson: you don’t get something for nothing

By Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal SAN DIEGO — For late night edification and amusement, there is nothing I love better than watching infomercials. (“But wait! There’s more!”) Some of my favorites are those extolling the virtues of $19.99 exercise machines. The ads feature athletic men and women effortlessly going through their paces while the announcer informs

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Jewish Religion, Theatre, Film & Broadcast

‘Expecting Isabel’ delivers

By Carol Davis SAN DIEGO–Lisa Loomer’s Expecting Isabel couldn’t be timelier for director Jennifer Eve Thorn. Thorn, founding mother along with Delicia Turner-Sonnenberg and Jo Anne Glover and mother of one,  is expecting her second child any second now! Loomer’s modern day answer to infertility, Expecting Isabel, is on target bringing to light the plight of

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Carol Davis, Theatre, Film & Broadcast

‘Steel Magnolias’ opens Welk season

By Carol Davis ESCONDIDO, California–The Welk Resorts Theatre, which usually presents musicals throughout the year, opened their season recently with Robert Harling’s ‘comedy drama’, Steel Magnolias. Harling, the story goes, lost his younger sister to diabetes and was having trouble coping. Friends advised that he write about his feelings and use the journaling as a

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Carol Davis, Theatre, Film & Broadcast

A concise and relevant Holocaust compendium for classrooms

Why Should I Care? Lessons from the Holocaust by Jeanette Friedman and David Gold; The Wordsmithy, LLC 2009; 263 pages By Marcia Tatz Wollner SAN DIEGO (Press Release)–Why Should I Care? Lessons from the Holocaust is an easy to read and engaging text to add to one’s personal library and definitely a recommendation for a

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, International, Jewish History, Marcia Tatz Wollner, San Diego County, Science, Medicine, & Education

What we eat helps to forge our Jewish identity

By Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal SAN DIEGO (Press Release)–One of the creepiest television programs on cable is “Bizarre Foods with Andrew Zimmern.” Andrew (who is Jewish, of course) tours the world sampling unusual local cuisine. Some of his favorite dishes have been roasted Wallaby tail, raw crocodile eggs, and juicy cheese worms. While all of these

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Jewish Religion, Theatre, Film & Broadcast, Travel and Food

This Chanukah, your child can receive the gift of Jewish reading

By Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal SAN DIEGO–This week I was honored to be a member of San Diego’s delegation to the “First Ever Jewish Legacy Forum” in Tucson, Arizona. San Diego’s Jewish Community Foundation has been a pioneer in helping local synagogues and agencies promote legacy giving and the establishment of endowment funds. Tifereth Israel Synagogue

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Jewish Religion

The Greene Line: Klezmers and terrorists could have mixed in Paris

By Norman Greene PARIS–Is there a connection between Klezmer music and Islamic terrorism? I was afraid I might find one here in Paris My wife Bobby and I were spending eight days in Paris this fall bemoaning the precipitous decline of the American dollar and generally enjoying the French escape from their recession. Actually, if

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Music, Dance, and Visual Arts, Travel and Food