Monday Media: Telegraph Avenue

Attention Michael Chabon Fans!!

Check out NPR’s exlusive First Read of Michael Chabon’s Telegraph Avenue.  You can read or listen to an excerpt of Michael’s magnificent new novel (yes, I’ve read it, and no, I’m not exaggerating) here. Below is a sneak peek:

“Hello?” Gwen called, letting herself in the front door. A small black Buddha greeted her from a low table by the front door, where it kept company with a photograph of Lydia Frankenthaler, the producer of an Oscar­-winning documentary film about the neglected plight of lesbians in Nazi Germany; Lydia’s partner, Garth; and Lydia’s daughter from her first marriage, a child whose father was black and whose name Gwen had forgotten. It was a Chinese Buddha, the kind that was supposed to pull in money and luck, jolly, baby­faced, and potbellied, reminding Gwen of her darling husband apart from the signal difference that you could rub the continental expanse of Archy Stallings’s abdomen for a very long time without attracting any flow of money in your direction. “Somebody having a baby around here?” continued on npr.org…

Michael opens the DCJCC’s Hyman S. & Freda Bernstein Jewish Literary Festival on October 14. Tickets go on sale September 1–don’t get closed out!

Shabbat Surfing: Academy Award-Winning Links

Joseph Cedar director of the Academy-Award nominated Israeli film Beaufort (featured in the 2007 WJFF) resolves his shabbat dilemma. Meanwhile, there is another Jewish-themed film competing for Best Foreign Film – The Counterfeiters. The Austrian/German co-production is in limited release this weekend from Sony Pictures Classics, which had hoped to have three films nominated in this category, but The Band’s Visit was disqualified for having too much English, and Persepolis was a surprise exclusion from the final nominees. Naturally, we’re all rooting for Beaufort and the good folks at Kino Films. Meanwhile, we ask, is host Jon Stewart Jewish?

• The other big Jewish movie news this week came from the news of a dream-team shidduch between the Coen Brothers and Michael Chabon to adapt The Yiddish Policeman’s Union.
• The JTA asks the hard questions of Jewish identity to the Democratic mascot for the Denver convention. While Orthodox Anarchist asks some disturbing questions about the recent tactics of Dennis Kucinich’s congressional campaign and its meaning in the broader political culture.
• Refugees from Darfur find refuge in Israel (at last) and Steven Spielberg takes heat from the Chinese for resigning as an artistic advisor to the Beijing Olympics to protest China’s Sudan policy.
• Carla Sosenko, frustrated with the men on JDate, contemplates switching teams in this post on Jewcy, but learns to act like a guy instead.
• On a sadder note, Theater J regular and veteran actor Bill Hamlin passed-away yesterday. Ari Roth and Delia Taylor have a post about Bill on the Theater J blog. For my part, Bill was one of the best people–not just in theater, but anywhere. He was a gentle soul with a keen eye and range as an actor that went from Shawian intellectuals to Chassidic Rebbes to Alzheimer’s Patients, to the devil himself. He was a midnight radio DJ for years and years and although he’s left us with plenty of great memories, he left us too soon. Take a bow Bill, you deserve all of our applause one last time.