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A shooting in Israel overnight, swastikas found near Indiana University, police chase camel through golf course, and remembering the Holocaust survivor who invented Transformers.
OUR LEAD STORY Steven Spielberg’s big-screen reimagining of the classic Broadway musical, now in theaters, is being called a triumph and already generating Oscar buzz. We’re kicking off the weekend with a special package about ‘West Side Story’ – in particular, exploring the Jewish influences that helped usher it into existence.
The original ‘West Side Story’ was Jewish – would that have been a better musical? Before Leonard Bernstein composed any music, before Jerome Robbins choreographed a step, before Arthur Laurents completed a single draft of a full book, before Stephen Sondheim would even join the team – before “West Side Story” was the production it became – a group of Jewish men conceived of a musical that meditated on religious intolerance and antisemitism. Read the story ➤
How Leonard Bernstein, composer of ‘West Side Story,’ embraced his Jewishness – and changed the world: Early on, one of Bernstein’s mentors warned that such an obviously Jewish name would never make the marquee at Carnegie Hall. Perhaps he could become Leonard S. Burns instead? A new documentary reveals how Bernstein embraced his heritage, traveling to Israel and incorporating Hebrew into his talks. He also proved his mentor wrong when he became music director of the New York Philharmonic – at Carnegie Hall. Read the story ➤
Six ways to celebrate the choreography in the new ‘West Side Story’: Whether you’re coming home from the movie theater hungry for more, looking to whet your appetite before you go, or aren’t quite ready to sit in a crowded room full of strangers, here are six other things to watch to celebrate the dancing in the film — and understand the artistry (and a bit of the legacy) behind it. Read the story ➤
Tony Kushner on ‘West Side Story,’ and his new Jewish musical: The Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright’s “Caroline, or Change” tells the story of a Black maid working for a Jewish family in 1963 Louisiana. There were certainly socioeconomic disparities during the civil rights movement, but current events have led to a change in consciousness about the virulence, malevolence and scope of racism in this country. “The difference between the richest and the poorest is cosmic at this point, almost metaphysical,” Kushner said in an interview. Read the interview ➤
ALSO FROM THE FORWARD Rabbi Israel Dresner with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. decades ago and at Katz's Deli with his son last week. ‘I’ll have what he’s having’: A dying rabbi makes a final trip to Katz’s Deli: Rabbi Israel S. Dresner, 92 and with stage 4 metastatic colon cancer, is a pioneering civil rights crusader. He organized the largest mass arrests of rabbis and interfaith clergy in American history. The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. asked him to deliver the prayer at the foot of the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, in 1965.
But that was then. And this is now. Doctors told him before Thanksgiving he has months, maybe weeks to live. So he’s been planning his own funeral with his children, and checking off items on a final bucket list.
He went to a Broadway show (“The Book of Mormon”). He davened at Central Synagogue in Manhattan. And he went for a final pastrami on rye at Katz’s Deli. Read the story ➤ WHAT ELSE YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY Israeli soldiers carried out a manhunt Friday morning in a Palestinian village after an attack killed a Jewish student. 🇮🇱 At least one Palestinian shot at a car filled with Jewish seminary students Thursday night near a settlement outpost in the occupied West Bank, killing an Israeli Jewish man and lightly wounding two other people, officials said. (Jerusalem Post)
😲 A swastika was painted on a building near the campus of Indiana University in Bloomington. It is at least the sixth swastika found in the area in the past three weeks, one on the campus itself. At least a dozen mezuzahs have also been desecrated or stolen from the residences of Jewish students at the university since the High Holidays in September. (Indiana Daily Student)
💰 After 70 years on the sidelines, AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobbying group, will now officially fundraise for politicians. The focus is on congressional incumbents who are facing primary challenges over their pro-Israel stances, as the group aims to strengthen its influence in Washington. (Forward)
🐫 A Kansas camel escaped a nativity scene, leading the police on a chase through several neighborhoods over the course of two days. At one point, it ran across a golf course with officers in hot pursuit in golf carts. (Religion News Service)
Shiva call ➤ A plus-sized Jewish lady redneck died in El Paso on Saturday. So begins the raucous obituary for Renay Mandel Corren written by her son, Andy, that went viral on the internet on Thursday, being shared tens of thousands of times. “I would like to hire this obit writer in advance for when my time comes,” one woman wrote on Twitter. When reached for comment, Andy said, “This time of the year, with the pandemic, the government, and the environment, things are feeling really bad. It’s nice to laugh, too. That was my mother’s specialty, laughing in the face of quite a bit of tragedy.”
Another shiva call ➤ Henry Orenstein, a Polish survivor of Nazi concentration camps who went on to invent the Transformers toys, died at 98. What’s more, Orenstein had more than 100 patents to his name and was inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame. He was a longtime donor to Jewish causes, including the Orenstein Project, an Israeli nonprofit he founded that focused on food insecurity, especially among Holocaust survivors. Read more about his life ➤
ON THE CALENDAR On this day in history: Gen. Ulysses S. Grant expelled Jews from areas of Tennessee, Mississippi, and Kentucky on Dec. 17, 1862. It was part of an effort to stop an illicit trade of Southern cotton, which Grant thought was being run “mostly by Jews and other unprincipled traders.” Known as General Order No. 11, it lasted only a few weeks before being revoked by President Abraham Lincoln on Jan. 4, 1863.
YOUR WEEKEND READS Don’t be tethered to your computer this weekend. We’ve curated our favorite stories from the past seven days into a free, printable magazine. In this issue: the surprise culprit of the great cream cheese shortage, what American Jewry – on the left and right – gets wrong about Trump, how a Jewish preschool student was shunned for Santa and much more. Get your copy here ➤ VIDEO OF THE DAY What was Jewish life like in Europe before the Holocaust? Watch these rare, intimate home movies – depicting family life, birthday parties, vacations and more – courtesy of the Steven Spielberg archive at the U.S. Holocaust Museum.
––– Thanks to Chana Pollack and Eliya Smith for contributing to today’s newsletter. You can reach the “Forwarding” team at editorial@forward.com.
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