The New Jewish Comedians: Meet Talia Reese, Standup Comic

We've been posting clips of Jewish comedians going back to the days of vaudeville and burlesque, from Jack Benny to Alan King, and including dozens more. We've posted many of them since we started Jewish Humor Central nine years ago. In March we gave a lecture at Florida Atlantic University on these old timers.

But a new generation of Jewish comedians is on the rise. And they're very funny. It's a rare one who can get through a routine without off-color words or phrases, but some are trying very hard to let the jokes and situations carry the day without resorting to outright foul language.

Some of the new comedians are only new to us, since we haven't been watching all the late night TV shows and comedy specials where they make their first appearances. But as we discover them, we'll share some of their video clips with you.

Today we're sharing a video clip by Talia Reese. The New York Post recently featured a nearly full-page article about her life and comedy entitled, "Orthodox Jewish Comic Finds Balance Between Raunch and Religion," and called her a "Hot Ticket". 

Talia attended law school and worked as a lawyer, is married to a fellow lawyer, and lives in Great Neck, New York. Her standup routines are sometimes risque, but she cleans up her act when she performs at synagogues like this routine at a Young Israel dinner.

Enjoy! 

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Jewish Traces in Unexpected Places: Shulem Sings "God Bless America" at Mets Game

Shulem Lemmer, a young Chassidic singing star and recently signed Universal Music/Decca Gold recording artist, has been making the rounds of sports stadiums and singing our National Anthem and at the start of games around the USA.

Lemmer, who goes by his first name, Shulem, appeared earlier this month at the Folksbiene Summerstage concert in Central Park. He has sung the National Anthem at a Brooklyn Nets basketball game, at a San Francisco Giants baseball game, and God Bless America at a Boston Red Sox baseball game in Fenway Park.

Here he is singing God Bless America during the 7th inning stretch at the New York Mets / Washington Nationals game at Citi Field in New York City on April 7th, 2019. 

Enjoy and Shabbat shalom!

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Throwback Thursday Comedy Special: Sid Caesar Pantomimes Grieg's Piano Concerto

On May 25, 1957, Caesar's Hour featured Sid Caesar playing a pianist struggling through Grieg's Piano Concerto. Pantomime was always one of Caesar's strengths, and this skit doesn't disappoint.

Caesar's Hour wals a live, hour-long American sketch-comedy television program that aired on NBC from 1954 until 1957. The program starred, among others, Sid Caesar, Nanette Fabray, Carl Reiner, Howard Morris, Janet Blair, and Milt Kamen, and featured a number of cameo roles by famous entertainers such as Joan Crawford and Peggy Lee.

Widely considered a continuation of Caesar's earlier programs, the Admiral Broadway Revue and Your Show of Shows, Caesar's Hour included most of the same writers and actors, with the notable addition of Larry Gelbart (who went on to co-create the M*A*S*H TV series with Gene Reynolds) in the latter show.

Nanette Fabray replaced Imogene Coca, who opted to star in her own TV series in 1954, The Imogene Coca Show. The writing staff of the show was reunited in 1996 for an event at the Writers Guild Theater in Los Angeles called Caesar's Hour Revisited, excerpts of which were broadcast on PBS under the title Caesar's Writers. 

Enjoy!

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#Throwback Thursday    #TBT

Stand-up Comedian Elon Gold Has Fun With Hebrew and English Words

The 2019 AEC 15th Annual In Pursuit of Excellence Gala in Las Vegas featured a comedy bit with stand-up comedian Elon Gold and Adelson Educational Campus senior Rosie Polonsky.

The duo put on a skit highlighting the fun that can result from saying words that have totally different meanings in Hebrew and English.

A classic example: Mi means who, who means he, he means she. And so it goes, on and on, bringing back memories of Abbott and Costello's famous "Who's on first?" routine.

The Adelson Educational Campus is an academically invigorating Preschool-through-Grade-12 independent private school based on Jewish values and identity. Thriving on two closely connected schools located on one state-of-the-art campus, it carefully nurtures the youngest preschoolers and guides them, step-by-step, to become intelligent, compassionate, proactive young adults.

Enjoy! 

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Jewish Traces in Unexpected Places - "Sunrise, Sunset" from Yiddish "Fiddler" - in Tokyo!

Sunrise, Sunset in Yiddish? Sure, it's a featured song (Tog ayn, tog oys) in the Yiddish version of Fiddler on the Roof, now playing in an extended run Off-Broadway at Stage 42 in New York.

But it's also being played in Tokyo and on YouTube by a Japanese klezmer band called Jinta-la-Mvta. It's is a musical group founded in 2004 by Ohkuma Wataru, clarinetist and bandleader of the groundbreaking Japanese experimental folk band Cicala Mvta, and his partner and drummer Kogure Miwazo.

Ohkuma’s interest in Klezmer music began in the late 80s. He was one of the first Japanese artists who listened to and played the genre. He has a repertoire of dozens of Klezmer tunes through his distinct perspective, setting him apart among non-Jewish klezmer musicians. 

Considered as one of the few Klezmer experts in Japan, he has also penned various pieces on Klezmer and Japanese liner notes of Klezmatics and Frank London. Since the Great Northeast Japan Earthquake and the subsequent nuclear crises in 2011, the band started to perform not only on club stages and festivals but also at anti-nuclear protests and demonstrations on the streets of Tokyo, attracting a new and wide range of audiences and fans.

The  YouTube post includes a greeting to the Yiddish-speaking audience:

Tayere Yidn, mir zaynen tsuzamen mit aykh. Libe fun Tokio
(Dear Jews, we are together with you. Love from Tokyo)

Enjoy!

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A Joke to Start the Week - "A Month of Inheritances"

Another Monday, another Joke to Start the Week. This week we're bringing you a joke from California, where Chabad of Downtown San Diego had a comedy night earlier this year. It attracted joke tellers including Gary Wolfson, whose joke we're featuring this week.

Here's the setup: Hymie says "What's wrong? You look terrible." Abe says "Oy, it's been such a crazy few months." Hymie says "Why? What happened?" And Abe says "Well, last month my cousin died. She was from Sydney, Australia, a very rich lady. She left me $50,000." And then...

Enjoy!

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New York Cantors Perform Wide Range of Jewish Music at Summerstage in Central Park

On June 12, The National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene and Capital One City Parks Foundation's SummerStage presented The New York Cantors, a concert by three young Cantorial superstars to a standing-room-only audience in New York's Central Park. 

As reported by Broadway World News, 

The Cantors lead three vibrant congregations in the New York area-Azi Schwartz at Park Avenue Synagogue, Yaakov (Yanky) Lemmer at Lincoln Square Synagogue and Netanel Hershtik at the Hamptons Synagogue.

The Cantors were accompanied by a 16-piece orchestra, conducted by Artistic Director of The National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene Zalmen Mlotek. Special guests joining the show include Shulem, a young Chassidic singing star and recently signed Universal Music/Decca Gold recording artist; Grammy-winning klezmer icon Frank London, a founding member of the Klezmatics, who performed the world premiere of his new klezmer concerto, "Freylekhs - A Klezmer Fantasy for Orchestra and Trumpet."

Also appearing was Andrew Kurtz, Music Director and conductor of the Gulf Coast Symphony. The emcee was Rabbi Joseph Potasnik, Chairman of the New York Board of Rabbis and co-host of "The Rabbi and the Rev," a weekly radio program on WABC.

The eclectic program included Yerushalayim Shel Zahav, Prayer for the IDF, God Bless America, A Million Dreams (from The Greatest Showman), Funiculi Funicula, Oseh Shalom, Close Every Door (from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat), Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah, and Hatikvah.

We're sorry that we missed the concert (we were attending the "Shtisel-Behind the Scenes" program at Temple Emanu-el that night), but we can all enjoy the musical clips in the video below.

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Welcoming Shabbat with Rebbetzin Tap in "Shabbos is Almost Here"

Kerry Bar-Cohn is the only female chiropractor in Ramat Beit Shemesh near Jerusalem, where she lives with her husband David and four sons.
 
But that's only her day job. As "Rebbetzin Tap," she produces music and dance DVDs for children, as well as online courses and a plethora of YouTube videos, whose goal is to emphasize the “joy” component in Judaism and in life, and to teach self-esteem and empowerment.

Why Rebbetzin Tap? Because tap dancing is part of all her music videos.

She has a background in stage performance, first as a child, then attending the High School of Performing Arts in New York, and subsequently returning to performance ten years ago after making aliyah.

Kerry has performed for children, teens and adults around the world, giving concerts and inspirational talks. She also recently started the Kol Isha Facebook group, where women and girls can post their singing and dancing with one another. The group has drawn thousands of members.

In this pre-Shabbat video, Bar-Cohn and her friends tap dance while they prepare for Shabbat. Check out the lyrics. The song starts out: 

You don't have the time to doze when you're folding all the clothes.
Shabbos is almost here.
This is not the time to plotz when you're scrubbing all the pots.
Shabbos is almost here. 

Right...You get the idea.

Enjoy, and Shabbat shalom! 

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Throwback Thursday Comedy Special: Milton Berle and Harpo Marx on the Kraft Music Hall

The original Kraft Music Hall was a radio series that aired from 1933 to 1949. It was one of the most popular programs of its type, particularly during the period (1936–1946) when it was hosted by Bing Crosby, then by Al Jolson (1947-1949).

By 1958, Kraft was prepared to revive the Music Hall for television. The first host was "Mr. Television", Milton Berle, who had become television's first superstar by hosting an earlier NBC program, the Texaco Star Theater. 

Let's go back 60 years to the night in 1959 when Harpo Marx was Berle's guest on the show.

Enjoy!

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#Throwback Thursday    #TBT