What’s Going On In NYC This Week

Your guide to Jewish-y events in New York city for July 14 – July 23

Advertisement

ELEANOR REISSA  AND FRANK LONDON

One of the members of the cast of Paula Vogel’s Tony-winning play “Indecent,” Eleanor Reissa — aka “the Yiddish diva” — will perform a one-night-only concert of traditional and popular Yiddish music along with The Klezmatics’ trumpeter Frank London. Featuring music from the artists’ first collaborative album, “Vilde Mekhaye” (Wild Pleasure), the concert showcases a mix of rock, jazz, zydeco and swing, all sung in Yiddish. Highlights include “Bei Mir Bistu Sheyn,” one of the most powerful songs from “Indecent,” Yiddish classics and contemporary songs translated into Yiddish, such as “This Land Is Your Land” and others. — Monday, July 17, 7 p.m., 54 Below, 254 W. 54th St., (646) 476-3551, 54below.com. $25 – $35.

PETER HIMMELMAN

Singer-songwriter and author Peter Himmelman — Bob Dylan’s Orthodox son-in-law — is celebrating the release of “There Is No Calamity.” Produced with Steve Berlin of Los Lobos, the new album draws heavily on the musical traditions championed by Dylan, as Himmelman addresses today’s dark political mood as a thoughtful, musically compelling critic. “The anger in people’s hearts needs to be cooled,” he notes in his prescient “245th Peace Song,” “but you’ve got to be careful what you cool it with.” Time magazine said that Himmelman “writes songs with the same urgency that compelled the Lost Generation to write” books, which, incidentally, is also something he does; last year Himmelman penned a self-help book about creativity, “Let Me Out.” — Wednesday, July 26, 8 p.m., Rockwood Music Hall, 196 Allen St., rockwoodmusichall.com.

OPERATION FINALE

Termed “a Holocaust Museum smash” by the Chicago Tribune, this multimedia exhibit features recently declassified materials charting the tracking, capture, extradition and trial of Adolf Eichmann. Playing out more like a spy novel than a museum show, the artifacts on display tell a story: it starts with the actual false passports and surveillance photographs used to identify Eichmann when he was in Argentina, and culminates with the famous bulletproof glass booth in which he sat, expressionless, during his trial in Israel, as Holocaust survivors recounted the horrors he masterminded. — Opens Sunday, July 16; Through Dec. 22, Museum of Jewish Heritage, 36 Battery Place, (646) 437-4202, mjhnyc.org.

Theater

OSLO

One of 2016’s best-reviewed works, J. T. Rogers’ “Oslo,” which won the Tony for best play, tells a complex tale of political intrigue and back-door negotiations focusing on the months of talks between Israel and Palestine that led to the historic 1993 Oslo Peace Accords. Directed by Tony-winning Barlett Sher (“Fiddler on the Roof”). Through July 16. — Lincoln Center Theater, 150 W. 65th St., (212) 375-3708, lct.org.

INDECENT

Cited as one of the best plays of 2016 by The Times, “Indecent” follows the original cast of Sholem Asch’s “God of Vengeance,” who risked their careers to perform a risqué work at a time when art, freedom and truth were on trial. The work is playwright Paula Vogel’s Broadway debut. Rebecca Taichman, who won a Tony, directs. — Through Aug. 6; discounts through that date, Cort Theatre, 138 W. 48th St., telecharge.com.

Music

BOOK OF J

Guitarist and vocalist Jeremiah Lockwood of The Sway Machinery and vocalist Jewlia Eisenberg, founder of the Balkan funk-punk band Charming Hostess, team up in a new duo project, Book of J (a nod to Harold Bloom’s book on biblical authorship). Drawing from American psalmody, Yiddish folklore and Jewish liturgy, they explore the intersection of religion and radical politics. On tap: songs that started life in Jewish and Christian religious communities and were later adopted by organizers for various racial, economic and social justice causes. — In residence Saturdays in July, 6 p.m., Barbès, 376 Ninth St., Brooklyn, (347) 422-0248, barbesbrooklyn.com. $10.

SETH KIBEL TRIO

Seth Kibel is a triple threat on saxophone, clarinet and flute. A song from his recent album, “No Words – Instrumental Jazz & Klezmer by Seth Kibel,” was just awarded the Grand Prize in the Mid-Atlantic Song Contest. — Sunday, July 16, 10 a.m. doors, 11 a.m. concert, City Winery, 155 Varick St., (212) 608-0555, citywinery.com. $10.

ARI HOENIG QUARTET

The Israeli-born drummer Ari Hoenig plays a broad-minded brand of jazz, incorporating influences from punk and metal, hip-hop, acid jazz and electronica. With pianist Shai Maestro, guitarist Gilad Hekselman and bassist Orlando le Fleming. — Monday, July 17, 7:30 and 10 p.m., Smalls Jazz Club, 183 W. 10th St., (646) 476-4346, smallslive.com.

IMMIGRATION ARTS CONCERT

Following a day of panels on the topic of immigration, the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene presents an outdoor concert featuring leading artists from the Folksbiene, Irish Rep, Kairos Italy Theater, Pan Asian Repertory Theatre, Repertorio Espanol, Turkish American Repertory Theater and others. — Tuesday, July 18, 7 p.m., Robert F. Wagner Park, 20 Battery Pl., nytf.org. (See story on page 3.)

Film

THE B-SIDE

Portrait photographer Elsa Dorfman found her medium in 1980: the larger-than-life Polaroid Land 20×24 camera. For the next 35 years she captured the “surfaces” of those who visited her Cambridge, Mass., studio: families, Beat poets, rock stars and Harvard notables. As such pictures begin to fade and her retirement looms, Dorfman gives director Errol Morris an inside tour of her backyard archive. — Angelika Film Center, 18 W. Houston St., (212) 995-2570, angelikafilmcenter.com.

13 MINUTES

During Hitler’s anniversary speech on Nov. 8, 1939, Georg Elser (Christian Friedel) is arrested on the Swiss border for possession of suspicious objects. Just minutes later, a bomb explodes in the Munich Bürgerbräukeller, immediately behind the Führer’s lectern, killing eight people. Elser is held and cruelly questioned by the Gestapo, and from them he learns that his attempt has failed — the man he wanted to kill in order to stop the bloodshed of World War II had fled 13 minutes before the explosion. — Lincoln Plaza Cinema, 1886 Broadway, (212) 757-0359, lincolnplazacinema.com.

FALSETTOS

Nominated for five 2017 Tonys, including best musical revival, this Broadway musical-turned-film takes a poignant and satirical look at the complexities of modern-day family life. Originally created under the specter of the AIDS crisis, the story centers on a neurotic-but-charming gay man named Marvin, his wife, his gay lover, his soon-to-be-barmitzvahed son, their psychiatrist and the lesbians next door. Recorded live in 2017, Lincoln Center Theater’s production stars Christian Borle, Stephanie J. Block, Andrew Rannells and Brandon Uranowitz, all of whom received Tony nods. — Sunday, July 17, 2 p.m., Symphony Space, 2537 Broadway, (212) 864-5400, SymphonySpace.org.

MENASHE

Deep in the heart of Brooklyn’s chasidic community, Menashe, a kind, hapless grocery store clerk, struggles to make ends meet and responsibly parent his young son, Rieuven, following his wife Leah’s death. — Lincoln Plaza Cinema, 1886 Broadway, (212) 757-0359, lincolnplazacinema.com.

JOE’S VIOLIN

In this Academy Award-nominated short documentary film, a donated violin forges an improbable friendship between 91-year-old Holocaust survivor Joe Feingold and 12-year-old Bronx school girl Brianna Perez. —  Monday, July 24, 9:30 p.m., on the PBS documentary series POV.

SHALOM ITALIA

On the run from Nazis, three Italian Jewish brothers spent months during their childhood hiding in a cave in the Tuscan countryside. Nearly 70 years later, after emigrating to Israel, the three reunite in the country they were forced to abandon and rediscover their hiding place. —  Monday, July 24, 10 p.m., on the PBS documentary series POV.

Exhibitions

CITY OF GOLD, BRONZE AND LIGHT

In conjunction with the 50th anniversary of the Six-Day War and the reunification of Jerusalem, this new exhibition explores the tensions between imaginary and physical Jerusalem. Combining paintings, drawings, prints, photographs and other media, the exhibit juxtaposes visual and material characterizations of the Holy City from the 17th to 21st centuries with a series of Talmudic, prosaic and poetic passages. — Through July 30, Yeshiva University Museum, 15 W. 16th St., yumuseum.org.

FLORINE STETTHEIMER: PAINTING POETRY

Through her critically acclaimed poems, paintings and drawings, as well as a selection of costume and theater designs, photographs and ephemera, The Jewish Museum offers a timely reconsideration of poet/painter Florine Stettheimer, an icon of Jazz Age New York. – Through Sept. 24, The Jewish Museum, 1109 Fifth Ave., (212) 423-3200, thejewishmuseum.org.

To publish events, submit them to jewishweekcalendar@gmail.com two weeks or more in advance. We cannot guarantee inclusion due to space limitations. Since scheduling changes may occur, we recommend contacting the venue before heading out to an event.

Advertisement