Howard on Headline
CNN Headline News has just given Clark Howard, 53, his own weekend show in which he dispenses advice on all sorts of money matters. (Saturdays and Sundays at 9 a.m. and 1 p.m.)
An Atlanta native, Clark became a millionaire running travel agencies. In 1981, he started giving consumer and travel advice on an Atlanta radio station. In the ’90s, he began a very popular nationally syndicated radio program that he still hosts. He’s also written a series of best-selling financial and travel advice books.
In 2002, Clark and his daughter, then 13, had a joint bar and bat mitzvah. Clark told an Atlanta paper that he grew up in a Reform Jewish home and when he was 13 it wasn’t common for Atlanta Reform temples to put on a “full” bar mitzvah. His daughter, Rebecca, challenged him when she was 11, saying, “Why should I [have a bat mitzvah]. You didn’t [have a bar mitzvah].” Clark says, ”I wanted her to feel connected to the religion. The only way I could demonstrate to her that it was worthwhile was for me to stand up with her.” Clark prepared for his bar mitzvah with seven other adults and, he says, “For the first time in my life I actually studied what Judaism is. Now I could actually assist in leading a service. This is a gift my daughter has given to me.”
‘Defiance’ notes
Liev Schreiber, 41, one of the co-stars of the film “Defiance,” recently spoke to the London Jewish Chronicle about his role as one of a trio of Jewish brothers who fought as anti-Nazi partisans. He said he was reluctant to do another Holocaust film after directing and writing “Everything is Illuminated” (2005), which is also centered on the Holocaust. However, the power of the “Defiance” story drew him in.
Schreiber’s father isn’t Jewish. He was raised by his Jewish mother, but without any Jewish religious background. Nonetheless, the actor strongly identifies as Jewish, telling the Chronicle that his two young sons with non-Jewish actress Naomi Watts, his longtime “life partner,” have been circumcised. Schreiber says: “They both had a proper bris, with a mohel and a Hebrew naming ceremony. I’m not an observant person but I love the idea of a bris in the same way I love the seder. I really appreciate the sense of continuity and relatedness in Jewish culture.”
“Defiance” musical composer James Newton Howard, 57, is regarded as one of the top film composers in the world. He has been nominated six times for the best score Oscar. He recently told the Los Angeles Times: “I didn’t find out I was Jewish until my mid-30s. My father died when I was young. He was Jewish. He had changed his name and he didn’t want me to know that. And my mother, I guess, decided it wasn’t important. I am Jewish and I identify as being Jewish. So to some extent, this [‘Defiance’] was my story. As I became more immersed in the movie, it became more meaningful as it went on.”
Fisher is kosher
Beautiful Australian actress Isla Fisher (“Wedding Crashers”) and British Jewish comic actor Sacha Baron Cohen have been a couple since 2000 and they’ve been engaged for about five years — but they still have not set a wedding date. In October 2007, Fisher gave birth to the couple’s daughter, Olive.
For about five years, Fisher, 32, has been reportedly studying to convert under Orthodox auspices. But the status of her conversion has been the subject of conflicting media reports. Fisher finally clarified matters in the February issue of “Allure” magazine: “I converted as of two years ago. It is always reported that I am still studying, so I am either the slowest studier in the world, or I have, in fact, converted. I never saw it as a losing or gaining situation, just an embracing situation. I think if one wanted to be buried next to one’s beloved and they were Jewish, then one would have to be Jewish, too.”
Fisher added that she took the Hebrew name Ayala (“doe”). It appears that her conversion was completed before Olive’s birth, so Olive is “automatically” Jewish.
Columnist Nate Bloom, an Oaklander, can be reached at <b>[email protected]</b>.