You Are So Not Invited to My Rosh Hashanah
(Unless you are Yanky Goldhaber or Tsahi Halevi)
Welcome back to us after a brief hiatus. So much has happened over the summer we almost certainly cannot recount it all here, but we hope to get you up to speed on some of the latest developments on the Israeli cultural scene.
Hashem is Really the Ultimate Big Brother
Viewers of Israeli television outside of Israel often suffer from selection bias. With access to only a select group of TV shows, they are overexposed to what critics sometimes call prestige TV–fancy series with high budgets and Very Serious Plots. But, of course, there is so much more. Like the rest of the world, Israelis love reality television. Most of the popular international formats have local versions, although not all have been successful. (For example, the Israeli version of the Bachelor only lasted a season or two. There’s a dissertation waiting to be written there.) The competition shows tend to feature a variety of different kinds of Israelis, ostensibly trying to win, but often reinforcing national norms and identities in the name of a friendly competition. (Think Bake Off vibes, but much less calm.) Anyway, Israeli reality television is criminally understudied, which is truly a shame.
One of the most popular shows in Israel is Big Brother, where strangers go live in a house together and…watches them. It also is one of the oldest reality shows, which started in 1997 in the Netherlands. Participants enter the house and live there for a hundred days, or until they get voted out. There are 24/7 cameras as well as weekly episodes. Also there are challenges? One season they made an atheist pretend to be an Orthodox Jewish settler. It’s a lot.
In an early season, the Ashkenazim and the Mizrahim split into warring factions–the Friedmans and the Bolbols–named after the leaders of each group. Even today, you can call someone a Freidmanit to insinuate that they are very, very Ashkenazi. (Ask Shayna how she knows.)
While there has always been a diversity of participants on the Israeli version of Big Brother, there had never been a Haredi contestant until now. Enter Yanky Goldhaber, a twenty year old from Bnei Brak. With a look many compared to Harry Potter, he quickly became a fan favorite. A lot of his fans were from the Haredi community, but he also appealed to a wide variety of Israelis who just thought he was nice and sweet. And he is! He taught his housemates to sing in Yiddish, and personally made sure the house stayed kosher. Most impressively, he refrained from speaking during every Shabbat he spent in the house due to an interesting Halachic distinction. He was still recorded passively, as was everyone else, by various static cameras placed in the house. But since other cameras were specifically voice activated, he was able to avoid triggering those cameras, which would have clearly violated the Sabbath. In a recent Instagram story where Yanky answered questions from followers, he said this decision was incredibly difficult, but entirely worth it. He also respected his family’s privacy requests by not speaking about them much on the show, other than to say he missed them a lot, especially his nieces and nephews.
There were a few missteps, like when he said that female participants shouldn’t walk around “immodestly,” but he quickly apologized. And of course, so many rabbis felt the need to weigh in if this was Good For The Jews or not. We are not clergy, but we are DOCTORS, and we say Yanky is Good For The Jews.
Anyway, Yanky finished third, despite claims of voting issues. One of the big problems was that apparently one could only vote via a smartphone, and the Yanky Loving Kosher Phone Public was rudely denied their rights. Upon leaving the house, Yanky blew a shofar and led the entire audience in prayer. Just another day in Israel.
Since he left, he’s been mobbed by adoring fans, including comedian Orel Tsabari (a GREAT instagram follow by the way) and the incredible Palestinian Israeli musician and actress Valerie Hamati. He just made a list of most eligible singles in Israel. (Hey ladies!) Yanky is a perfect example of the modern Haredi subculture rapidly growing in Israel today, proof of a group of Haredi Israelis who are deeply invested in both their Haredi identity and being part of wider Israeli society. Yanky obviously doesn’t represent every Haredi person, or even a majority, but he is a sign of changes in Haredi identity and culture in Israel. And for Yanky–what’s next? Joining the IDF, a fascinating move. Yanky, we hope we haven’t seen the last of you.
New Boy Band, Who Dis?
About a year ago, we suddenly noticed the appearance of a new Israeli boy band named As One, made up of six young men, some Arab and some Jewish (presumably all citizens of Israel, although it is never specified in any of their social media posts). So far their main musical productions seem to be covers of popular songs and their main vehicle of distribution is Instagram. On their official account, there have been intimations that they are recording original material, but so far the band seems to be more a superficial gesture at a kind of intercultural pseudo-peace-building initiative via thirst trap than anything else.
This kumbaya can’t-we-all-get-along message seems to be the main impetus behind the creation of the band, which apparently is backed by the executives who signed Maroon 5 and Kings of Leon, marking it as a major international initiative. So far, As One’s audience doesn’t seem to be Israelis at all - all of their social media content is in English, which has the effect of flattening any cultural differences between the band members, and they’ve spent most of their time in LA and London (to record, we think? It’s not really clear).This strategy makes sense, since the band is clearly mostly a money-making opportunity for some big studio, and no Israeli, Arab or Jewish, is naive enough to buy the message of peaceful coexistence they’re selling.
Final verdict on As One: No content, all vibes.
The Israel to India Pipeline
In our very first issue, we wrote about an Indian cover of a song by our favorite band (z”l), Static and Ben El, evidence of the increasingly friendly relationship between India and Israel. There has also been an Indian version of Fauda, just renewed for a second season, whose Israeli original starred our fave heartthrob Tsahi Halevi. And now Tsahi is appearing in a recently released Bollywood production titled Akelli, about a young Indian woman captured by Isis in Iraq and turned into a sex slave. Halevi plays the villain, an Isis commander named Assad, and truthfully we aren’t sure what else happens because there is no way to watch the film in the U.S. But beyond the subject of the film, which received lukewarm reviews in India, casting an Arab-Jewish Israeli actor as an Isis commander in an Indian film is a sign of the complexity of identity as well as his talent. In fact, he also sings a song in Arabic in the film!
And if you had any doubt about his abilities, his new song, “Al chol hacham” (On the Hot Sand), should put those to rest. Tsahi recently traveled to India to promote the film with his co-star, Nushrratt Bharuccha, and sported some Indian fashion at the premiere (he is also a model for the Israeli clothing company Golf - the man truly does everything).
Spinning Beats with DJ Schmuley
All the American Jewish media buzz for the last couple of weeks has been about Adam Sandler’s new movie, You Are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah (well, except for a brief moment when those photos of Timothee Chalamet smooching Kylie Jenner surfaced). The film is a sweet testament to friendship, girlhood, and family, but also features a scene-stealing performance by one of our favorite Israeli comedians, Ido Mosseri. Mosseri, one of the stars of the hit sketch comedy show Hayehudim Baim (The Jews Are Coming) as well as the Israeli voice of Sponge Bob, plays DJ Schmuley, who is the go-to entertainment in the affluent suburban community where the movie is set. Mosseri brings his characteristic chaotic energy to his performance as a shlimazel whose DJ set pieces are absolutely over the top, tailored to each outrageous b-mitzvah theme. Also, we definitely caught that split second DBG tribute. While the whole film is worth watching, Mosseri, who has worked with Sandler before on movies like Don’t Mess With The Zohan, provides some excellent comic relief.
What We’re Writing (other than this newsletter)
Melissa’s book, Beyond the Land: Diaspora Israeli Culture in the 21st Century, is out now from Wayne State University Press. If you order the book and let her know she will mail you a signed personalized bookplate to stick in your book. You can order from the press or your favorite bookseller. If you are in LA, there will be a book launch event at Hillel 818 in Northridge on September 27.
And together we wrote an article for AJS Perspectives, the magazine of the Association for Jewish Studies, about our favorite terrible movie, Jarhead: Law of Return. It’s not online yet, but when it is you’ll be able to find it on the AJS Perspectives website.
Shana Tova from all of us, and especially Aliza.