Film director, film producer, and screenwriter Mark Jay spoke with "The Shmooze" about his 1993 documentary film "East Endings". "East Endings" documents a night at Bloom’s in May 1993—then one of the last remaining kosher restaurants in Whitechapel. Harry Blacker, renowned cartoonist and satirist of British Jewry, arrives to celebrate his 83rd birthday. Greeted by a group of old friends including Anna Tzelniker, Barnet Litvinoff, Bill Fishman, Brian Sewell, Simon Blumenfeld, and Rabbi Lionel Blue, they spend the evening together reminiscing about the Jewish East End of the 1930s: its humor, history, and politics of solidarity.
Episode 402
December 16, 2025
Amherst, MA
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Film director, film producer, and screenwriter Mark Jay spoke with "The Shmooze" about his 1993 documentary film "East Endings". "East Endings" documents a night at Bloom’s in May 1993—then one of the last remaining kosher restaurants in Whitechapel. Harry Blacker, renowned cartoonist and satirist of British Jewry, arrives to celebrate his 83rd birthday. Greeted by a group of old friends including Anna Tzelniker, Barnet Litvinoff, Bill Fishman, Brian Sewell, Simon Blumenfeld, and Rabbi Lionel Blue, they spend the evening together reminiscing about the Jewish East End of the 1930s: its humor, history, and politics of solidarity.
Episode 402
December 16, 2025
Amherst, MA
Episode 398: Shakespeare & Company’s Jewish Play Festival
The Shmooze, The Yiddish Book Center's Podcast
16 minutes 56 seconds
3 months ago
Episode 398: Shakespeare & Company’s Jewish Play Festival
Shakespeare & Company’s Artistic Director Allyn Burrows and the co-chair of the upcoming Celebrating Jewish Plays program Greg Lipper sat down with "The Shmooze" to talk about the weekend-long event. Celebrating Jewish Plays runs October 10–12, 2025, and will feature four staged readings—"The Price," by Arthur Miller; "The Sisters Rosensweig," by Wendy Wasserstein; "Here There Are Blueberries," by Moisés Kaufman and Amanda Gronich; and "Roz and Ray," by Karen Hartman, featuring Tony-nominated actor John Douglas Thompson ("The Gilded Age"). Established in the 1970s, Shakespeare & Company, in Lenox, Massachusetts, develops and performs Shakespeare’s works as well as other classic, contemporary, and socially and politically significant works. The company embraces the core values of Shakespearean ethos: collaboration, commitment to language, visceral experience, and classical ideals expressed with physical prowess and an embodied contemporary voice.
Episode 397
September 21, 2025
Amherst, MA "
The Shmooze, The Yiddish Book Center's Podcast
Film director, film producer, and screenwriter Mark Jay spoke with "The Shmooze" about his 1993 documentary film "East Endings". "East Endings" documents a night at Bloom’s in May 1993—then one of the last remaining kosher restaurants in Whitechapel. Harry Blacker, renowned cartoonist and satirist of British Jewry, arrives to celebrate his 83rd birthday. Greeted by a group of old friends including Anna Tzelniker, Barnet Litvinoff, Bill Fishman, Brian Sewell, Simon Blumenfeld, and Rabbi Lionel Blue, they spend the evening together reminiscing about the Jewish East End of the 1930s: its humor, history, and politics of solidarity.
Episode 402
December 16, 2025
Amherst, MA