Friends on Broadway
Julia Roberts made her Broadway debut in the play “Three Days of Rain,” a family drama. The show, which opened this week, co-stars Jewish actor Paul Rudd (who played Lisa Kudrow’s husband on “Friends”).
Meanwhile, former “Friends” star David Schwimmer, who has a lot of Chicago stage experience, makes his Broadway debut playing Lt. Barney Greenwald, a Jewish defense attorney, in a revival of Herman Wouk’s “The Caine Mutiny Court Martial,” opening May 12. Schwimmer says that he is right for the role: “Greenwald is urban, Jewish, a little older” than most of the other officers. “I’m urban and Jewish. And I’m 39, which I think is the right age.”
He added: “My mother and father are both lawyers, and so is my sister, and my grandfather was a lawyer. I think lawyers get a bad rap … I think the play shows how sharp legal minds are.”
I wish Schwimmer luck. He’s taking on a role that was previously “nailed” by Henry Fonda and Jose Ferrer, and those are tough acts to follow.
Lifecycles of the rich and famous
Dan Senor, formerly a Coalition Authority press spokesman in Iraq and now a Fox News commentator, just married NBC weekend “Today” show anchor Campbell Brown in what “People” magazine described as a Jewish ceremony. The two met in Iraq — proving, I guess, that there’s a silver lining to everything.
Gwyneth Paltrow gave birth to her second child, a son she named Moses, on April 9. Paltrow’s father was Jewish, and she was raised Jewish — but her new son’s name may not be a salute to her Jewish background. You see, her husband, “Coldplay” rocker Chris Martin, who isn’t Jewish, wrote a song about Paltrow in 2003 called “Moses.” The first stanza compares her effect on him to the parting of the Red Sea.
Comedian Roseanne Barr says she may now have the bat mitzvah she didn’t have at 13. Barr has been religiously involved for years and her children and grandchildren are being raised Jewish. However, she told an interviewer that her connection to the controversial Kabbalah Centre has been blown up in the media — she says she’s used the centre’s library, but has never joined the group or given it money.
Bad to the shank bone
The Associated Press reports that Josh Bolten, 51, who took over as White House chief of staff on April 15, is a longtime motorcycle enthusiast who likes to take to the road on his black-and-silver Harley-Davidson. As a matter of fact, Bolten keeps an extra motorcycle down at President Bush’s Texas ranch to ride during extended stays. The Associated Press says that Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove even coined a “biker handle” for the Jewish Bolten: “Bad Mitzvah.”
Jewish characters
It sometimes takes me a bit of time to catch up with Jewish characters on TV. One I recently became aware of is Addie Singer, the star character of “Unfabulous,” a Nickelodeon series. Addie is a teen with the usual teen problems. Last season, Addie’s brother mentioned his bar mitzvah and Addie dated a Jewish boy and went to his bar mitzvah.
“Unfabulous” has just been renewed for a third season. It stars Emma Roberts, Julia Roberts’ real-life niece, as Addie. The show’s creator is Sue Rose, a nice Jewish woman who also created “Pepper Ann” — a long-running Disney animated show in which the title character was Jewish.
Over on the Cartoon Network, there’s the new animated series “Minoriteam,” about racism-fighting superheroes from five minority groups. It’s shown as part of the “Adult Swim” block of cartoons. Among the members of “Minoriteam” is “Jewcano”. He is described as “possessing the power of the Jewish faith combined with a raging volcano.”
Come to think of it, “Jewcano” sounds a lot like Moses to me.
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