This episode was recorded at Washington Hebrew Congregation in Washington, D.C., in partnership with the Association of Reform Jewish Educators. Thanks to our friends at ARJE for making this show happen. Our Jewish guest is food historian Michael Twitty, author of the James Beard Award-winning book The Cooking Gene, who returns to the show to tell us about his years as a Hebrew School teacher, when he was often the first black person his students interacted with, and his next book project, Koshe...
Jan 24, 2019•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 166
This week on Unorthodox, we're setting it up. Our Jewish guest this week is longtime matchmaker Tova Weinberg, who founded the Jewish dating website Saw You at Sinai. In an interview recorded at our Hanukkah live show in Pittsburgh, she tells the hosts about ditching dentistry to become a matchmaker (she estimates she's made 350 matches over the past 40 years), and her opinion on what it is that men and women really want. She also helps out a listener with some first date tips. Our Gentile of th...
Jan 17, 2019•1 hr 10 min•Ep. 165
This week on Unorthodox: early elections in Israeli, bat mitzvah recaps, and a taste of Liel's listener meetup in Tel Aviv. We have three Jewish guests: Jesse Eisenberg, who in addition to playing everyone from Lex Luthor to Mark Zuckerberg on screen, executive produced the new documentary 'The World Before Your Feet,' which follows Matt Green as he walks every block of of New York City, and was directed by Jeremy Workman. The three of them sat down with Stephanie Butnick to discuss Matt's unusu...
Jan 10, 2019•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 164
Back in 2013, Tablet contributor Daniel Estrin spoke to Amos Oz for Tablet's Vox Tablet podcast. Oz died today, December 28, 2018, and we wanted to bring you this episode from the back catalog.
Dec 28, 2018•28 min
We're closing out 2018 with two interviews with people who stand up—quite literally—for what they believe in. First, we sit down with formerly Hasidic comedian Leah Forster, who has traveled the world performing for religious Jewish audiences, but whose recent gigs were cancelled after religious authorities found out she was gay and threatened to pull the kosher certifications of venues who hosted her. You can follow along with Leah on Instagram. Then, Mark talks to Presbyterian minister Jeff Hu...
Dec 27, 2018•51 min•Ep. 163
Tis the season—for Chinese food and a movie! Our first Jewish guest is Bill Adler, the Def Jam alum who helped Run DMC create their iconic 1987 song "Christmas in Hollis". He tells us how he went from being a music journalist to the second full-time employee at Def Jam in the 1980s; how "Christmas in Hollis," ended up on the soundtrack of films like Die Hard, and how his distaste for cliche holiday music led him to make an annual Christmas playlist for friends and family, and now, you! Listen to...
Dec 20, 2018•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 162
This week on Unorthodox, we're getting over our latke hangovers. Our first Jewish guest is New York Times writer Taffy Brodesser-Akner, who has written profiles of celebrities like Gwyneth Paltrow, Bradley Cooper, and Melissa McCarthy. She joined us at our recent live show at the Manhattan JCC to talk about how she tries to be a journalist and a mensch, which biblical figure she'd love to profile, and why she enjoys being on Twitter. We also sit down with Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, the former Ch...
Dec 13, 2018•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 161
From warding off the evil eye to rules about whistling, Jews are serious about their superstitions. This week on Unorthodox, we hear from listeners about their family customs, talk to Tablet's editor-in-chief Alana Newhouse about the enduring nature of shtetl superstitions, and take a visit to a very lucky spot in Northern Israel. Ptui ptui! We love to hear from you: Send comments and questions for Unorthodox to [email protected] or leave a message at our listener line: 914-570-4869. This...
Dec 06, 2018•1 hr 4 min•Ep. 160
Today's episode comes out a day early, so you can gobble it up before Thanksgiving. First, comedian Travon Free, a producer on Lena Dunham's HBO show Camping, speaks with producer Josh Kross about anti-Semitic old tweets of his that resurfaced last week. Liel sits down with Jewish guest Frederick Wiseman, the legendary filmmaker, to discuss his latest documentary, Monrovia, Indiana. Our gentile of the week, live from Cleveland, is former Rock and Roll Hall of Fame president and CEO Terry Stewart...
Nov 21, 2018•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 159
This week on Unorthodox, boy are we grateful. We're grateful for our gentile of the week, Shay Khatiri, the Iranian-born political refugee who raised more than $1 million for the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh following the Oct. 27 massacre. He set up a GoFundMe page, which quickly went viral, and the campaign has so far raised $1.2 million, which will go directly into the synagogue's bank account. He also tells us about being blacklisted by the Iranian government after signing a 2016 lett...
Nov 15, 2018•1 hr 8 min•Ep. 158
This week on Unorthodox, we’ve got a bit of a mish-mash (mish-mosh?) for you. First, a taste of our visit to Cleveland, where we recorded a live episode at the Mandel JCC (and ate a lot of deli). Then, Stephanie sits down with Jewish author Gary Shteyngart, whose new novel Lake Success is about a Manhattan hedge fund manager named Barry Cohen who abandons his wife and son for a Greyhound road trip across America with the backdrop of the 2016 election. In the wake of the Pittsburgh synagogue shoo...
Nov 08, 2018•1 hr 13 min•Ep. 157
On Saturday morning, 11 Jews were murdered in a synagogue in Pittsburgh. Like Jews and their friends everywhere, we were heartbroken by this heinous anti-Semitic massacre, the first-ever large-scale attack against Jews on American soil. To grieve with our brothers and sisters in Pittsburgh and hear their stories, We traveled to Squirrel Hill, the city's Jewish enclave, along with a team from Tablet. What we found was a unique and committed Jewish community, where congregations are intertwined an...
Oct 30, 2018•47 min•Ep. 156
This week on Unorthodox, we're going fer-mental. Liel and Stephanie sit down with chef David Zilber, the director of the fermentation lab at Noma, the Copenhagen restaurant credited with redefining Nordic cuisine. He and Noma chef and co-owner Rene Redzepi just came out with The Noma Guide to Fermentation, which has everything you could ever want to know about fermenting. He tells us about growing up eating Ashkenazi and Caribbean cuisine in Toronto, seeing Drake and the cast of Degrassi on the ...
Oct 25, 2018•53 min•Ep. 155
This week on Unorthodox, we're on patrol. We talk to Ruchie Freier, the founder of Ezras Nashim, the first all-female volunteer ambulance in New York City, founded and staffed by Hasidic women in Borough Park, Brooklyn. Ruchie and Ezras Nashim are the subject of the documentary '93Queen', made by filmmaker Paula Eiselt, who also joins us. Ruchie Freier is a New York City Criminal Court judge, and the first Hasidic woman to hold elected office in the US. Paula Eiselt is an independent filmmaker. ...
Oct 18, 2018•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 154
This week on Unorthodox, we're still recovering from all the Jewish holidays. Our Jewish guest is Benyamin Cohen, host of the weekly podcast "Our Friend from Israel." He's also the guy who manages the official social media feeds for Albert Einstein, which might just be the best job ever. He tells us about tweeting for the late genius, plus his journey into megachurches while writing his 2009 book, “My Jesus Year: A Rabbi’s Son Wanders the Bible Belt in Search of His Own Faith." Our gentile of th...
Oct 11, 2018•1 hr 8 min•Ep. 153
This week on Unorthodox, we're going down to the station. Our guests are Hal Linden and Ryan Ochoa, who co-star in the new film The Samuel Project. Linden is best known for his portrayal of police precinct captain Barney Miller in the eponymous TV series, which aired from 1975-1982 (millennials, you can binge it on Amazon Prime), but his prolific six-decade career has included perfomances on stage and in film. Ochoa is an actor and musician who has appeared in the Disney series "Pair of Kings" a...
Oct 04, 2018•1 hr 7 min•Ep. 152
This week on Unorthodox, we're celebrating the Jewish harvest festival of Sukkot! Farmers and Etrogs and more! Who says Jews don't farm? Stephanie Butnick reports from Petaluma, CA, where activist Jews fleeing Eastern Europe in the early 1900s settled and became chicken ranchers. The politically-minded chicken-farming Jews of Petaluma even got a visit from Golda Meir! What's Sukkot all about anyway? And what's with the lulav and etrog? Liel Leibovitz and producer Josh Kross head to West Side Jud...
Sep 27, 2018•1 hr 20 min•Ep. 151
This week on Unorthodox, we're really, really sorry. We're marking the Days of Awe between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur with our annual apology show. We're joined again this year by Tablet contributor Marjorie Ingall, who runs the website SorryWatch, which analyzes apologies in the news. She goes over the best and worst public apologies of 5778, and offers tips for how to make a meaningful apology. Storyteller Hal Karp tells of how, during a particularly dark period of his life, he goaded his br...
Sep 13, 2018•1 hr 20 min•Ep. 150
Happy birthday to us! We're celebrating three years of Unorthodox with a very special episode featuring our hosts, producers, and Tablet staffers reflecting on some of our most memorable segments. Tablet editor-in-chief Alana Newhouse revisits our very first episode, and shares her initial doubts about our audio adventure; host Liel Leibovitz reflects on his contentious Ep. 25 interview with Jewish Voice for Peace's Rebecca Vilkomerson, and what he learned from the interaction; and Tablet execut...
Sep 06, 2018•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 149
This week on Unorthodox, we're all about Eichmann. We sit down with Operation Finale director Chris Weitz and actor Nick Kroll to discuss the new film, which depicts the 1960 covert mission to capture Adolf Eichmann, the Nazi architect of the Final Solution, who was living under an assumed identity in Argentina. Kroll, who is best known as a comic actor, plays Rafi Eitan, the Shin Bet leader who coordinated the mission, alongside Oscar Isaac as legendary Mossad agent Peter Malkin, Ben Kingsley a...
Aug 30, 2018•49 min•Ep. 148
This week on Unorthodox, the producers take over while Mark, Liel, and Stephanie are off having summer fun. Shira, Noah, and Josh bring you three stories of people sharing, studying and challenging their faith. First up, Unorthodox couples counseling. Listeners Ken Rosen and Elettra Pauletto came to us to discuss their pre-marriage anxieties about conversion, kids, and Jewish practice. Second, Shira sits down with her favorite gentile, Harvard Divinity School professor Charles Stang, to talk abo...
Aug 16, 2018•1 hr 19 min•Ep. 147
This week on Unorthodox, we're wining and dining. Our Jewish guest is author Andre Aciman, whose 2007 novel Call Me By Your Name was adapted into the Oscar-nominated film starring Armie Hammer and Timothee Chalamet. He tells us about being forced to leave Egypt with his family as a teenager, getting recognized on the Upper West Side after the film premiered, and his absolute favorite coffeemaker. Our gentile of the week is journalist Kevin Begos, whose new book is Tasting the Past: The Science o...
Aug 09, 2018•57 min•Ep. 146
Tradition, tradition! In honor of a new Yiddish production of Fiddler on the Roof, we're heading back to Anatevka. Our Jewish guest is Rachel Zatcoff, who plays Tzeitel in The National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene Off-Broadway production, Fidler afn Dakh. Our Gentile of the week is James Monroe Števko, who plays Mendl, the rabbi's son. They tell us about learning Yiddish for the show and what it's like working with director Joel Grey and Jackie Hoffman, who plays Yenta. We also sit down with Alisa...
Aug 02, 2018•1 hr 8 min•Ep. 145
This week on Unorthodox: Is it OK to say 'JAP'? We were joined by Odd Mom Out's Jill Kargman, Broadway legend Tovah Feldshuh, and Jewish Women's Archive director Judith Rosenbaum at the Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan last week for a lively discussion and debate about the Jewish American Princess stereotype–its origins, implications, and cultural staying power. We also screened a short film we made about the JAP stereotype, which you can watch here, and heard from audience members about what the ...
Jul 26, 2018•1 hr 14 min•Ep. 144
"Hi, are you Jewish?" It's a question you may have been asked in any number of towns or cities by a smiling bearded man wearing a yarmulke. It's one of the trademarks of Chabad, the Hasidic movement that dispatches its young men around town to help Jewish strangers perform a mitzvah—Jewish women are offered Shabbat candles, and Jewish men are encouraged to put on tefillin. We've always been fascinated with this practice, with some of us finding it charming and others, frankly, terrifying. So we ...
Jul 12, 2018•39 min•Ep. 143
In honor of July 4th, we're celebrating the diversity of American Jewish life—which, as we've learned, goes well beyond eating bagels on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. Up first, we get a crash course in the history of Jews in the South from Stuart Rockoff, who created the Encyclopedia of Southern Jewish Communities, a rich online resource from the Institute of Southern Jewish Life. Next, Sammy Potter tells us about driving an hour to synagogue from his home in Yarmouth, ME, and why he wants t...
Jul 04, 2018•1 hr 13 min•Ep. 142
This week on Unorthodox, we have three special guests. Jonathan Ornstein is the executive director of the JCC Krakow, which celebrates its 10th anniversary this year. With more than 10,000 visitors a month, the JCC is at the center of a Jewish revival in Poland, that Ornstein, a New York native, is witnessing—and cultivativating—firsthand. We also talk with Gabi Birkner and Rebecca Soffer of Modern Loss, a website that aims to make conversations about grief less fraught and awkward. Their book, ...
Jun 28, 2018•49 min•Ep. 141
This week on Unorthodox, we’re all about food and futbol. Our Jewish guest is writer and food historian Michael Twitty, whose book The Cooking Gene: A Journey Through African American Culinary History in the Old South, won two James Beard Awards this year. He describes being told that a book by a black, Jewish, gay man would never succeed (and how it felt to prove them wrong!), explains how most of the foods we eat today originated in Africa, and tells us why Jewish food is more than just gefilt...
Jun 21, 2018•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 140
This week on Unorthodox, we talk to Rabbi Mike Moskowitz, the new scholar in residence for trans and queer Jewish studies at CBST, the world's largest LGBTQ synagogue. He's the first Orthodox rabbi at the New York City synagogue, and he explains how Judaism, even at its most observant, can make room for transgender adherents—and how Jews could learn a lot from the trans community. We're also joined by Gentile of the week Matthew Polly, whose latest book is Bruce Lee: A Life. He tells us about Le...
Jun 14, 2018•1 hr 4 min•Ep. 139
For our first book club episode, we talk to Israeli-born writer Ruby Namdar about his ambitious second book, The Ruined House, which won Israel's most prestigious literary award and was recently translated into English. The book is set in New York City, where he's lived for the past 18 years, and follows a charming and successful professor named Andrew P. Cohen as he descends into a very peculiar kind of madness. Ruby tells us why he made his protagonist such a specific male archetype, and expla...
Jun 07, 2018•1 hr 4 min•Ep. 138
