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dravenonred t1_ix801j0 wrote

This article is paternalistic garbage.

It arbitrarily picks Seinfeld as a "high point" of Jewish comedy, and then uses this unearned distinction to pick apart the lack of Jewish focus?

It dismisses Marvelous Ms. Maisel, which is arguably a love letter to New York Jewish society of the 50s, because it's lead isn't Jewish despite a deep bench of accomplished Jewish talent both on camera and behind the scenes?

Lastly, it attacks the very idea of non-jewish playing Jews as "an exception" to casting authenticity pressures while being amazingly ignorant that the whole point is that black/gay/trans actors are being actively crowded out of media by being relegated to "their" type of characters, who are then split with more conventional actors on top of it. Jewish actors are welcomed into play many types of roles, which does in fact take off the pressure to always cast authentic Jews as Jewish characters.

Ok, done kvetching for a while. But garbage.

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Thymus_Tickler t1_ix89pcs wrote

Not to mention Badiels past of appearing in black face.

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tinasnow-poty t1_ix8cits wrote

Seeing him of all people saying that some types of racism are dismissed is actually mind boggling to me

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edwardmetalwing t1_ix8aar1 wrote

I went to his show just a few months ago and it really just amounted to jealousy of black people being treated with sympathy.

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Dayofsloths t1_ix7vvxp wrote

I have to say the basic premise that we don't see Jewish people on television is pretty laughable.

Curb your enthusiasm, the marvelous Mrs Maisel, The Goldberg's, and Seinfeld are just off the top of my head, there are tons more.

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Bob_12_Pack t1_ix7xwkk wrote

According to the article, not Jewish enough apparently, or in the case of Mrs Maisel, the actress isn't Jewish.

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dravenonred t1_ix80nrl wrote

Right? Like, that's not a problem for us. I don't have to be mad about Michael Fassbender playing a Jewish magneto when half the Avengers are Jewish actors playing non-jewish roles. Working Jewish actors are doing okay as is.

But when Idris Elba is "too urban" to play James Bond and Laverne Cox doesn't get cis character roles, they have a much better argument for authentic casting than we do.

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centrafrugal t1_ixc0q49 wrote

>But when Idris Elba is "too urban" to play James Bond

Is this an actual quote from someone? Any time this idea comes up it's always fans clamouring for Elba, the producers saying they'd love to cast him and Idris saying he's never had any desire to play James Bond.

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dravenonred t1_ixc44ls wrote

https://time.com/4018556/anthony-horowitz-idris-elba-james-bond/

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centrafrugal t1_ixcaaq5 wrote

Thanks, hadn't heard that before. Thankfully the writer seems to be pretty much alone on that and not in any position to influence casting.

>“For me, Idris Elba is a bit too rough to play the part. It’s not a color issue. I think he is probably a bit too ‘street’ for Bond. Is it a question of being suave? Yeah.”

I'm not sure exactly what 'street' means it sounds like he doesn't understand the difference between Stringer Bell and Idris Elba!

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SuspendedInKarmaMama t1_ix838ft wrote

Jews are the most overrepresented demographic on tv and in film by far, it's not even close.

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ZombieRichardNixonx t1_ix94rd4 wrote

Jewish people are so well represented on TV that when I was growing up as a Jewish kid, I never even realized how much of a minority we were in the general population, because so much of what I watched seemed to have Jewish representation in one form or another.

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HumanOrAlien t1_ix874e2 wrote

The Patient and Fleishman Is In Trouble are two very recent examples.

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BlackSpinedPlinketto t1_ix89z09 wrote

I really enjoyed what the Jewish element brought to The Patient. The ending sucked, but the story was really interesting and the conflict between orthodox and just the mother who sang Jewish songs was one of the more interesting aspects. There was a parallel to him and those in a prison camp too. Shame it didn’t knock it out the park, but was decent.

I don’t feel like Jewish life is under represented at all, but it’s still nice to explore it. There are lots of types of families and cultures to explore in the world, you mainly see (American) Catholics, Italian, Jewish and black.

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barkbarkkrabkrab t1_ix8c27m wrote

The Patient felt like an actual Jewish story because there is actual cultural tension between Orthodox and Reform/Conservative jews and it added meaning to the main story. Transparent is probably the most Reform Jewish show ever. Admittedly Mrs.Maisel doesn't hit right for me- sure she talks a lot about making briskets, but her complete obliviousness to civil rights or like hiring/housing discrimination in the 1960s drives me nuts!

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Bears_On_Stilts t1_ix8olih wrote

Midge Maisel, besides her involvement in the very Jewish comedy circuit, is embodying the mostly-forgotten archetype of "the Jewish Princess." Upper middle class to upper class, materialistic and pop-culture savvy, not especially interested in ethnic or religious tradition or history beyond a superficial level, somewhat apolitical, thoroughly Americanized and "white" despite her parents being much more entrenched in a lived traditional Jewish experience.

Remember that it's been over a century since the Jewish diaspora hit America in its biggest wave, and nearly a hundred years since the Holocaust. Jewish culture in America has become extremely secularized and mainstreamed, so the notion of "Jewish girl behaving like a white girl" doesn't really hold water anymore as a character archetype. But you get a lot of Jewish Princess jokes in the earlier works of Mel Brooks, Allan Sherman, Neil Simon (whose distinctive style is aped STRONGLY by Mrs. Maisel), etc.

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BlackSpinedPlinketto t1_ix97vkf wrote

Oh lol like literally the princess in Spaceballs? I guess that was what he was doing. I loved that movie, even though I had never met or heard of many Jews. And I hadn’t seen Star Wars.

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lilbiggs t1_ix853yi wrote

David baddiel cries anti-semitism at everything these days. Might take him more seriously if he tries properly to make amends for his black face in the 90s

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ehsteve23 t1_ix8rxsm wrote

He's apologised to Lee in person after 25 years. As part of his tv show about how antisemitism is a special kind of racist...

(Sponsored by Ford)

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JayAPanda t1_ix80k24 wrote

I saw the advert for this and felt the premise was extremely presumptuous. There are no completely unacceptable forms of racism, and Baddiel himself has an anti-Black past.

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minehost t1_ix8gtfo wrote

Cashed in on being English as fuck, now cashing in on being Jewish.

Bet he don't talk about cashing in on doing blackface though...

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centrafrugal t1_ixc1cvi wrote

It's apparently in this documentary where he says he's very sorry and tells Jason Lee he thought he was a brilliant footballer. Conveniently enough.

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thecountvon t1_ix8k59y wrote

From the article:

> The high point is probably Seinfeld, but it’s hard to say exactly what’s so Jewish about Seinfeld, beyond Jerry himself being Jewish. Arguably, it’s less that and more to do with New York, and with endless discussions about the tiny details of life, described once by producer Larry Charles as “a dark Talmud”.

EVERYTHING about Seinfeld is Jewish. Arguing is a part of Jewishness. They meet at a Deli. NYC is Jewish. George, who’s not a Jew, is Jewish. Elaine, who’s not a Jew, is Jewish. Kramer is the Shabbos goy of the bunch.

That’s the point of “dark Talmud” - we have a mandate as Jews to debate. So even if this article agreed with everything I say, I’d still find a way to pick something apart. My mother taught me this.

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Aduro95 t1_ixaaz8t wrote

I've just watched the documentary and it does highlight a lot of problems with anti-Semitism in modern society that are legitimate, if not exactly original. However I had a major problem with how it downplayed a lot of other equality issues.

Like, the whole thing where Baddiel brings up that they are expected to take responsibility for Israel as something that Muslims have no point of comparison for. While Muslims are expected to take responsibility for everything from grooming gangs to the 7/7 bombings.

Or like he seems to think that whitewashing casting is a thing of the past for other ethnicities or that disabled actors aren't struggling when able-bodied actors are cast as disabled people.

Its irritating watching him condemn every other progressive cause as excluding Jewish people while sidelining the very contemporary discrimination that other people suffer. He didn't even touch on transphobia in liberal organisations.

Then they roll out David Schwimmer and do lip-service to the fact that Friends was terrible at ethnic diversity, and that the Jewish Representation was sort of there but is left out of the conversation. But they don't talk about how all the casual homophobia on Friends?

I'm not saying every social justice documentary needs to talk about everything. But Baddiel should have been a lot more careful about representing other oppressed people, given the general message of this documentary is that progressives don't care enough about anti-Semitism.

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Wight3012 t1_ix83dxi wrote

Go watch Shtisel, great show. Shababnikim is also nice

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yieldbetter t1_ix9f2kx wrote

Funny how two out of three people I saw on the trailer for this including the creator have done black face

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lordofbitterdrinks t1_ix8pruc wrote

Can’t be worse than how TV always portrays cleft lip people. They are always the villains… rapist and child molesters with the exception of Joaquin Phoenix.

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