TV & Film

Don’t miss Jewish film fest

Full Support shines a positive, life-affirming light on Noa’s Bras, in Jaffa. (photo by Tulik Galon / Go2Films)

The Vancouver Jewish Film Festival is now underway, with screenings at Fifth Avenue Cinemas through May 1, then at the Rothstein Theatre May 2 and 4. There are numerous films being presented, from documentaries to mysteries, dramas and more.

Being supportive

It may seem like a strange thing to say, but women should put Noa’s Bras, in Jaffa, on the itinerary of their next trip to Israel. If you don’t need a bra, you can go try some on, just for the experience of being well taken care of. At least, that’s how it seems a visit would go, from watching Michal Cohen’s documentary, Full Support.

Full Support shines a positive, life-affirming light on this store to which women come in need of varying sizes, looks and fits. Some brave clients share their stories with the filmmakers, and the result is a moving portrayal of women of all ages, socioeconomic backgrounds and life circumstances. Among them are cancer survivors, victims of abuse, divorcées; one woman wants something sexy, another just wants something comfortable, a preteen looking for her first bra comes in with her mom. The staff – maybe one or two of whom are proprietors? (it’s not clear) – are knowledgeable, respectful and helpful. It is amazing to see the staff literally size up a client from across the counter and then know which of many, many boxes they must go to for the bras they’re looking for. The store apparently offers 189 sizes!

Outside the store, the camera catches men walking by the shop, some even peeking in, then almost running away with embarrassment. There are other moments of humour, as well as many touching moments, including when one of the store clerks pops into the tailor next door for him to sew up this or that and we find out that he and his wife are waiting for a permit to visit their daughter in Nablus.

Full Support is an interesting, thoughtful and funny film.

– CR

A murder mystery

photo - In Highway 65, a demoted Tel Aviv detective, Daphna (Tali Sharon), finds herself assigned to investigations in the hick town of Afula — In *Highway 65*, a demoted Tel Aviv detective, Daphna (Tali Sharon), finds herself assigned to investigations in the hick town of Afula. *(still from film)*

Family secrets are the theme in Highway 65, in which a demoted Tel Aviv detective finds herself doing slashed tire and lost phone investigations in the hick town of Afula.

Daphna (Tali Sharon), the downgraded cop, is a shlubby Columbo with appalling table manners but proficiency at her job. The lost phone – a seemingly innocuous investigation – leads to something much larger. The phone’s owner, Orly, has been missing for a week and no one has reported her absence.

It’s a small town where everyone knows everybody’s business and outsider Daphna finds herself in the midst of a perversely convoluted family drama, crossing personal and professional boundaries with nonchalance.

The family is marking the 10th yahrzeit of the missing woman’s husband and Daphna’s investigation puts a serious crimp in the commemoration. The family has an ominous mafia feel to it and the film jolts the viewer with an instant of truly shocking violence that illuminates the narrative and ultimately fingers the culprit.

Fans of quality Israeli TV will recognize Sharon from her role as Hodaya in Srugim, about Orthodox singles in Jerusalem. The male lead, Matan, is played by Idan Amedi, a singer-songwriter and actor known for playing Sagi Tzur in Fauda. Amedi was seriously injured during reserve duty in January 2024, when six fellow soldiers were killed in Gaza.

– PJ

Relentlessly talented

photo - Diane Warren: Relentless introduces audiences to the seemingly chaotic genius of songwriter Diane Warren — *Diane Warren: Relentless* introduces audiences to the seemingly chaotic genius of songwriter Diane Warren. *(still from film)*

Everyone knows a song that was written by American songwriter Diane Warren – everyone. For more than 40 years, she has been writing hits in multiple genres. From “Rhythm of the Night,” performed by the band DeBarge; to “When I See You Smile,” for Bad English; to “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing,” sung by Aerosmith; to multiple songs performed by Beyoncé, Michael Bolton, Cher, Celine Dionne, Meat Loaf, Whitney Houston and so many others. Her writing has earned her a long list of awards and 16 Academy Award nominations – while she has yet to win an Oscar for a particular song, she was recognized with an honorary Oscar in 2022 for her achievements.

The documentary Diane Warren: Relentless, directed by Bess Kargman, introduces audiences to the seemingly chaotic genius of Warren, who was born in Van Nuys, Calif., into a middle-class Jewish family. The third daughter of David and Flora Warren, she is much younger than her sisters and knew, from a young age, that music – rather than something more conventional – was the path she wanted to follow.

Her parents struggled with how to parent Warren. Her dad was supportive of her music dream, at least, but her relationship with her mother was troubled till the end. Warren grew up feeling an outsider both at home and at school. It is not clear when she was diagnosed, but having Asperger’s syndrome contributes to both Warren’s genius and her struggles. She also shares that she was molested as a child, in the context of having written “Till It Happens to You,” which Warren wanted Lady Gaga, also a survivor of sexual assault, to sing.

A lot of Warren’s collaborators lend their views to this documentary, and their respect for Warren is clear, even when there are hurt feelings. For example, she gave both LeAnn Rimes and Trisha Yearwood the song “How Do I Live,” but both versions ended up being a hit.

A master of romantic songs, Warren has no romantic partner, only a love for creating music – something she is driven to do and will continue to do as long as she is able.

Relentless is a fascinating look at a fascinating person.

– CR

Quest for the past

photo - The Property closes the Vancouver Jewish Film Festival May 4 — *The Property* closes the Vancouver Jewish Film Festival May 4. *(still from film)*

One probably wouldn’t expect lots of yuks in a film about a grandmother and granddaughter traveling from Israel to Poland to reclaim property lost during the Holocaust. But the first great guffaw in the closing night film of the Vancouver Jewish Film Festival, The Property, comes early, with the frustrated chaperone of ill-behaved high school students shouting, “You don’t deserve to be taken to the concentration camps!”

Dark humour and subtle situational absurdity shine a light on serious paradoxes, twists of fate, loss and possible redemption. The film by Dana Modan, based on a graphic novel by her brother, Rutu Modan, centres around distinctive characters and intersecting personal and world history.

The trip’s mission seems straightforward, but Savta has a secret – and a secret agenda. Secrets abound, actually, but the conundrum, as the granddaughter observes drily, is that no one really cares.

Ostensibly, the family is returning to Poland to regain physical property stolen during the war – an apartment building – but it becomes clear almost immediately that the grandmother is after something else. The viewer’s assumptions about her motivations will be subtly upended.

The grandmother, Regina (Rivka Michaeli), and granddaughter, Mika (Sharon Strimban), spend much of their time in Poland doing their own things, but their experiences – past and present – imitate the other’s. History and the present day seem to merge, then diverge, when Mika stumbles into a too-authentic immersive experience at a museum that is the essence of dark humour, as is the interaction with a museum curator who takes her work just a tad too seriously.

Family secrets, though, are the heart of the film, as are the complex interactions between Jewish and non-Jewish Poles across generations.

Beginnings and endings and the sense that the past keeps repeating are a thread throughout The Property.

“How many times can you start a life all over again?” asks the grandmother at one point. But Mika’s experience suggests it’s all a big repetitive cycle anyway.

– PJ

For tickets to the Vancouver Jewish Film Festival, visit vjff.org.

Guns & Moses to thrill at VJFF

Filmmakers Salvador and Nina Litvak with Guns & Moses cast members Neal McDonough, left, Dermot Mulroney, centre, and Mark Feuerstein, right. (photo from Pictures from the Fringe)

Los Angeles filmmaker and author Salvador Litvak (no relation) will be in the city for this year’s Vancouver Jewish Film Festival to promote and talk about his and wife Nina Davidovich Litvak’s latest movie, Guns & Moses, which screens April 27, 4 p.m., at Fifth Avenue Cinemas.

The action thriller features a Chabad rabbi who becomes a detective and gunfighter to investigate a murder at his synagogue. This will be the third movie by the Litvaks and their production company, Pictures from the Fringe. Their previous films are When Do We Eat?, about “the world’s fastest seder gone horribly awry,” and Saving Lincoln, which is based on the true story of Abraham Lincoln and his friend and bodyguard Ward Hill Lamon.

Between movies, Salvador Litvak became the Accidental Talmudist – in fact, his last event in Vancouver was an Accidental Talmudist Shabbaton at the Kollel. He and his wife co-manage accidentaltalmudist.org, which has more than one million followers. Last year, he published a bestselling book, Let My People Laugh: Greatest Jewish Jokes of all Time.

Salvador Litvak grew up in New York but was born in Santiago, Chile.

“My mother’s family, both my mother and grandmother, were Holocaust survivors who came to Chile from Hungary and my father’s family ended up in Chile fleeing the pogroms in the Ukraine about 1905,” he told the Independent. As immigrants, he said, “we got to this country and my parents wanted me to go to Harvard to be a doctor and, since I was 5, I said OK, but, eventually, I figured out that I didn’t want to be a doctor and I didn’t want to be a lawyer because I enjoyed writing and creating very much.”

He said, “Eventually, I talked my way into UCLA film school, where I arrived in the 1990s, attended the MFA director’s program, and said thank G-d I didn’t miss this because this is what I was meant to do.”

Pictures from the Fringe’s first feature film, When Do We Eat?, about a dysfunctional family’s Passover seder, was inspired by the fact that there were no Jewish holiday movies and the Litvaks wanted to “create a Jewish version of It’s a Wonderful Life.” Both filmmakers are baalei teshuva, or returnees to Judaism, and were “in the early stages of their journey,” said Salvador Litvak. They infused the movie with a “tremendous amount of spirituality, Torah and Chassidut,” but, he noted, “now that we’re Orthodox, we admit that it’s a little edgier than we would like.” However, he said, “All of the deep stuff in it, the Torah, the love, in addition to the raucous humour, stands the test of time.”

Litvak said his journey as the Accidental Talmudist and the establishment of accidentaltalmudist.org have helped When Do We Eat? gain new popularity and provide a built-in audience for Guns & Moses, which was partially inspired by a tragic shooting in California on April 27, 2019.

The couple had “built a large audience interested in authentic Jewish content, and we are filmmakers, so we knew that our next movie would be somehow Jewish. I wanted it to be an action thriller because I love action thrillers,” he said.

The Litvaks watched a thriller a day for three years to “learn the genre inside out,” he said. “While we were immersed in that, there was a tragic murder, a shooting at a Chabad synagogue in Poway, Calif., where a young white nationalist came in and murdered a woman named Lori Gilbert-Kaye, injured the rabbi, and would have killed a lot more people if his gun had not miraculously jammed and members of the congregation rushed at him and then he fled.

“I went down the next day and attended Lori’s funeral and interviewed the rabbi and congregants and got to know what happened there personally, and I said there is something in this that can become an action thriller with a murder/mystery structure,” he said.

And so, Guns & Moses – about a Chabad rabbi who becomes an investigator and gunfighter after witnessing a tragic shooting at his synagogue – came into being. It was filmed in 2022.

Litvak said he knew that a movie about Jews under attack who fight back “would always be relevant, but we had no idea how relevant it would be” after Oct. 7, 2023.

One of the important themes of the movie, said Litvak, is that Jews are in danger and need to protect themselves and be responsible for their own safety. For him personally, that has meant joining a Jewish self-defence organization called Magen Am (which means Shield of the Nation) and going through extensive training (including learning how to use a gun) so that he can protect his own synagogue in case of an attack like the one in Poway. In the movie Guns & Moses, the character of Rabbi Mo Saltzman goes through the same training that Litvak went through.

In Guns & Moses, Saltzman is played by actor Mark Feuerstein, who starred in the hit series Royal Pains and appeared in the movie Defiance, among other things. The cast includes American-Israeli actor Alona Tal as the rebbetzin, Christopher Lloyd as a Holocaust survivor, as well as veteran actors Neal McDonough and Dermot Mulroney, Jake Busey, Craig Sheaffer, Mercedes Mason, Mark Ivanir (who also appeared in When Do We Eat?) and young actor Jackson Dunn, who Litvak believes will become a star. Litvak praised his cast, who only had 20 days to film Guns & Moses.

Litvak is looking forward to coming back to Vancouver, where he has visited many times because he has family here. The city is “very dear to my heart,” he said, and he loves the people and feels at home as soon as he lands here.

For tickets to Guns & Moses and other Vancouver Jewish Film Festival screenings, visit vjff.org.

David J. Litvak is a prairie refugee from the North End of Winnipeg who is a freelance writer and publicist, and a mashgiach at Louis Brier Home and Hospital. His articles have been published in the Forward, Globe and Mail and Seattle Post-Intelligencer. His website is cascadiapublicity.com.

* * *

Editor’s Note: Guns & Moses’ North American release date is July 18. For more information, visit collider.com/guns-and-moses-trailer-release-date.

An almost great movie

Coexistence, My Ass! follows Israeli activist and comedian Noam Shuster Eliassi as she develops her show of the same name. (photo from DOXA)

Coexistence, My Ass!, directed and produced by Amber Fares, is almost a great documentary. But it fails to ask at least two key questions that would have made for a more in-depth portrayal of an interesting and complex human being.

Coexistence, My Ass!, whose May 4 screening at the DOXA Documentary Film Festival already has sold out, is about comedian Noam Shuster Eliassi, who was born in Wahat Al-Salam / Neve Shalom / Oasis of Peace, a village in which Jewish and Palestinian Israelis have chosen to live together. It has been considered a model of coexistence and Shuster Eliassi grew up amid the idealism it represented, and speaks Arabic fluently. She and her best friend (to this day), Ranin, a Palestinian Israeli living in Oasis of Peace, were among the kids trotted out as the generation who would bring peace.

Shuster Eliassi’s mother is Jewish Iranian and her father is Jewish Romanian. The couple met in high school (in what country is not revealed), so basically grew up together. They decided to live in Oasis of Peace and became, says Shuster Eliassi in her act, what most Israelis love to hate most: woke, progressive leftists. “They believe in the radical idea that Israelis and Palestinians deserve the same equal human rights! Crazy. So radical.”

It seems important to know why Shuster Eliassi’s parents left their respective countries to live in Israel, but especially her mother. With Iran as the main funder of Hamas’s – and other terrorists’ – murderous activities, and the fact that tens of thousands of Jews had to flee after the 1979 revolution, it seems that Shuster Eliassi’s mother’s experience is crucial to understanding Shuster Eliassi. But this question, if ever asked, doesn’t make it into the film.

Shuster Eliassi is an intelligent and accomplished person. By age 15, she had graduated, so to speak, from being one of the kids giving flowers to visiting celebrities (who would often mistake her, because of her dark skin, for being Palestinian – and with such good Hebrew!) to speaking around the world about coexistence and the possibilities for peace. At 21, she got a full scholarship at Brandeis University for being a peace activist. She even met the Dalai Lama, who, she quips, didn’t think she was Palestinian – “He just thought I was Indian.”

At 25, Shuster Eliassi landed a “peace worker’s dream job” – a position at the United Nations. We don’t learn much about what her job entailed, but there are clips of her speaking about the West Bank and Gaza as being the biggest prisons in the world, and how “the occupation” affects Palestinians and Israelis. Career-wise, she was on a wave of success, she says in her show, when she saw Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s TV program, made before he was elected, about a comedian who becomes president. Zelenskyy, of course, then did become president, so Shuster Eliassi observes that, if she wanted to take her political career seriously, she needed to start writing jokes.

photo - Comedian Noam Shuster Eliassi in performance — Comedian Noam Shuster Eliassi in performance. *(photo from DOXA)*

This takes us to where the film begins, with her at Harvard in 2019, where she’s been asked to deliver a peace-building project. She tells them that Coexistence, My Ass! will be that project, and she’s accepted.

In the documentary, we see the development of Coexistence, My Ass! and how Shuster Eliassi’s views change as the political situation in Israel deteriorates and the violence increases. Her parents are often her sounding board, as are friends and fellow comedians. We witness the results of a hate crime – the school in Oasis of Peace was set on fire in September 2020. We see moments of happiness, most unexpectedly, perhaps, when Shuster Eliassi returns to Israel from the United States with COVID and must be quarantined in a hotel, where sick Jews and Palestinians are being isolated from the general population.

“And everyone is radically getting along. This is a 5-star oasis of peace. If they continue getting along, my comedy career is over. Just kidding, you’ve read the news, I have material for years. Netanyahu has my back,” says Shuster Eliassi in her act. “Somebody give him a beeper,” she adds sheepishly, referring to Israel’s taking out of Hezbollah with exploding pagers in September 2024.

Months before Oct. 7, 2023, Shuster Eliassi was disillusioned and would get into yelling matches with Jewish Israelis protesting the Netanyahu government and dangers to democracy because their protests didn’t also explicitly call for equal rights for Palestinians. Whereas pre-COVID, she says, “My biggest responsibility is to speak to my people…. The Jewish audience is where we have to work,” the purpose of Shuster Eliassi’s comedy ceases at some point to be a way to encourage peace and becomes a form of resistance.

After Oct. 7, when some of Shuster Eliassi’s family and friends abandon their belief in coexistence because they feel peace with Palestinians isn’t possible, Shuster Eliassi goes the other way, giving up on coexistence because she feels – though doesn’t state explicitly – that peace with Jewish Israelis is not possible.

Moria, a comedy writer, advises Shuster Eliassi that people need to hear what Shuster Eliassi has to say, but it can’t just be “genocide, genocide!” The role of a comedian, says Moria, is “to bring people together. To unify. We can’t stop the killing, but we can unify people. To get people to see the world through your eyes.”

“No, that’s not what I’m doing,” responds Shuster Eliassi, who explains that her goal isn’t to unify, it’s “to voice resistance to this insane show of force that has swept everyone up blindly.”

Shuster Eliassi’s friend Ranin reluctantly retains hope for coexistence because, otherwise, she tells Shuster Eliassi, there is no place for Palestinians and Arabs within Israel. For Shuster Eliassi, though, by the end of the film, there seems to be no place for Jews in Israel. She only sees fault with Israel, and somehow thinks that Hamas wouldn’t want to kill all Jews if Israel had dealt with “the occupation.”

If memory serves, Hamas is only mentioned once in the documentary, in a clip from Shuster Eliassi’s show, where it is part of a joke, perhaps one told before 2023, it’s not clear. Why Hamas plays little or no role in Shuster Eliassi’s view of the evolving situation is the second of those two key questions that would have made Coexistence, My Ass! a better film.

While Shuster Eliassi laments that Israelis – even the coexistence crowd – are not able to meet Palestinians where they’re at, she is unable to meet her fellow Jewish Israelis where they are at. While she is comfortable performing at a Palestinian festival where she’s greeted by a man wearing a “Palestine vs the world” T-shirt that, on the back, has a Palestinian flag over all Israel, she isn’t comfortable with Israelis who would fill out that same map with no Palestinian territories. While she is correct that peace is only possible between equals, she only sees one oppressor – Israel. Not Hamas. Not any other international party, like Iran. Just Israel.

Many of the people at the sold-out screening of Coexistence, My Ass! will think it’s the most amazing film ever because, despite attempting to be fair – and it seems like Fares honestly did try to present multiple sides – it ultimately heralds their anti-Zionist beliefs and justifies them. Others will be disappointed that Coexistence, My Ass! ends up being just another anti-Israel film, which will, no doubt, win more awards than it has already, despite its critical flaws.

Beckman gets his third FU

The big reveal: Vitaly Beckman fools Penn & Teller a third time with his illusion “Still Life.” (image courtesy Vitaly Beckman)

“It’s a real privilege to be able to share something that was created from just an idea, and see how well it’s received,” Vitaly Beckman told the Independent after winning his third FU (Fool Us) trophy on Penn & Teller: Fool Us last month.

With his characteristic charm and sense of humour, Beckman had the host of the show, Brooke Burke, arrange a pineapple, a pomegranate, a couple of melons and a clock (whose hands she set however she liked) either on a fruit stand or beside it. Beckman even invited her to move any item after her initial placement, which she did not. Then, he turned his attention to a covered painting that had been on stage the whole time. When unveiled, the revealed artwork depicted Burke’s arrangement exactly.

“The concept might have been in my head for years,” said Beckman, a member of the Jewish community who lives in New Westminster. “I think I even had a sketch of the idea in my diary years ago. After I finished my off-Broadway run, I had some time to work on a few ideas, and this is the one I decided to pursue in 2019. I started performing it in Singapore and, right after that, the pandemic started, so only a few years later could I test it out some more on the road. So, while the illusion took a few months to create, it took a few years to polish and work out the kinks.”

Beckman fooled Penn & Teller in 2016 and again in 2021.

“Nothing beats the first time,” Beckman said. “However, this was also very exciting because it is harder and harder to come up and stump them, especially after they know me already, but also the illusion I picked is more difficult to perform this time, and a lot more things can go wrong. So, because of that, the stakes were higher! Definitely exciting to be able to do it with all that in mind.”

For his third attempt, Beckman considered several pieces from his current touring show, An Evening of Wonders, and “Still Life” ticked a lot of boxes, he said.

“The illusion was telling a very simple story, in about five minutes, which is the optimal time for a show like Fool Us. Yet, it was also very visually startling,” he said. “It has inspirational elements, as my goal is not really to trick people but to inspire and uplift them. But then, of course, the mystery elements in it were also very strong. I knew that Penn & Teller would have a real hard time with it!”

Winners of the FU trophy get to perform in Penn & Teller’s live show, and Beckman will join them in Las Vegas on April 26. To watch Beckman fool the duo, go to youtube.com/watch?v=Z3hJA2I-Fig.

Film Fest starts soon

Sabbath Queen is a film about the life of Amichai Lau-Lavie, part of a rabbinic dynasty going back 38 generations. (still from film)

The 36th annual Vancouver Jewish Film Festival runs April 24 to May 4, beginning with opening night film Midas Man, which “offers Beatles fans a fresh look at the pivotal role Brian Epstein played in the band’s meteoric rise.” An enormous range of dramatic and documentary films, features and shorts, fill out the festival’s run, and the Independent reviews some of them here.

Tradition!

Hester Street, based on Abraham Cahan’s 1896 Lower Eastside immigrant novel Yekl, was released in 1975, about the same time as Fiddler on the Roof. The movie approaches some of the same topics of assimilation and tradition, without the song and dance.

Yankl (now Americanized Jake, played by Steven Keats) transforms from a yeshivah bocher to a shmatte sweatshop worker. Along comes Gitl, the wife who had waited behind in Russia, and young son Yossele who, payos cut off, becomes Joey.

The 50th anniversary of the film’s release reminds us that the 1970s were a time of nostalgia and of Jewish narratives that both idealized and lamented the American dream. In Hester Street, which is in black-and-white for mood, the boarder Bernstein (Mel Howard) represents tradition and continuity, contrasting with Jake in the fight of money versus learning, of getting ahead versus getting an education. Bernstein’s presence in the home of the primary couple puts Gitl in a predictable three-cornered bind both romantic and cultural.

Hester Street, which is filmed in black-and-white for mood, confronts the themes of tradition and assimilation — *Hester Street*, which is filmed in black-and-white for mood, confronts the themes of tradition and assimilation. *(still from film)*

Younger viewers might take some time to recognize Gitl (Carol Kane) as the kooky landlady from Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. Meanwhile, the tough-talking landlady in Hester Street is recognizable as Doris Roberts, who contemporary viewers will recognize as the buttinsky mother-in-law from Everybody Loves Raymond.

There are subversive components of the film, including the role of divorce in perpetuating traditional values. Subversion twists again and indeed Gitl assimilates in her particular ways. As the last line in the film declares ambivalently, “We mustn’t be too quick to say this or that.”

Director Joan Micklin Silver was a pioneering woman in male-dominated 1970s Hollywood.

Kosher queen

Tradition, continuity and modern times are absolutely the themes of Sabbath Queen, a film by Sandi DuBowski about the life of Amichai Lau-Lavie.

The scion of a rabbinic dynasty going back 38 generations, Amichai is the son of politician, ambassador (“and we suspect a spy”) Naphtali Lau-Lavie and nephew of Israel Meir Lau, former chief rabbi of Israel. Filmed over 21 years, the documentary follows Amichai as he is ordained as a rabbi, via the Conservative movement’s Jewish Theological Seminary. But choosing the Conservative movement over orthodoxy is the least of Amichai’s rifts with his traditional family.

In 1993, Amichai was outed as a gay man in a news report and, it seems, he never looked back. After fleeing to New York a couple of years later and getting involved with the Radical Faeries, a queer, shamanistic spirituality group, “one vodka too many” leads to his alter ego emerging “out of my head like Athena.”

The drag queen Hadassah Gross – a Hungarian sex advisor, kabbalist, matchmaker and widow of six rabbis – was born. Amichai describes his drag persona as “something between channeling and performing” and it is all about exploring the intersections of feminine and masculine. (“What the goyim call the yingele and the yangele,” says Hadassah.)

“Artists are the new rabbis,” he declares, but eventually seems to decide that being an artist is not enough and he seeks his rabbinical smicha, in large part, it seems, to combat his brother and the larger establishment on Orthodox dogma.

He becomes the spiritual leader of a decidedly unorthodox congregation called Lab/Shul. And, when his officiating of interfaith partnerships clashes with the Conservative movement, the rabbi faces the consequences.

Amichai’s brother, father and mother have their reservations, to put it mildly, about Amichai’s activities.

“We’re pushing a lot of boundaries here,” he acknowledges. Or, as his Orthodox rabbi brother puts it, not entirely sympathetically, “He’s playing with Judaism.”

One feels invasive as the camera goes close up on Amichai at his father’s funeral and that sense of voyeurism repeats throughout the film, as does the feeling that the documentary’s subject is something of an emotional exhibitionist.

The relationship between Amichai and his immediate family represents the larger cultural dissonance between queer and other nonconforming Jews and the orthodoxy of the tradition, though there is an astonishing, uplifting conclusion to some of these challenges by the film’s ending.

A family affair

I first saw A Real Pain on a flight home from Israel last month. Selecting a Hollywood treatment of two cousins doing a Holocaust road trip to their grandmother’s hometown in Poland, I girded myself for cringe-inducing, inappropriate or otherwise disappointing fare. My expectations were pleasantly upended. This is a profound, beautifully presented film that hits the right notes in so many ways.

I am not the only one impressed. Unbeknownst to me when I chose it, the script and the acting were already grabbing accolades worldwide. Costars Jesse Eisenberg (who won the BAFTA Award for best original screenplay) and Kieran Culkin (who won both an Oscar and a Golden Globe for best supporting actor) deliver moving and multidimensional characters.

David (Eisenberg) and Benji (Culkin) are the proverbial odd couple but what I had somehow anticipated to be slapstick comedy turned out to be deeply touching. As we find out more about Benji’s story, his erratic behaviour makes more sense.

Moments that could come off as didactic – almost documentary-like scenes at the Polin Museum and the Monument to the Ghetto Heroes, among others – somehow work even when you think they shouldn’t. The British tour guide James (Will Sharpe) is repeatedly challenged by Benji and acknowledges his own shortcomings as a non-Jewish facilitator, inviting viewers to ponder insider/outsider roles in the immediate and larger story.

If you ever wondered what corner Baby from Dirty Dancing ended up in, here she is – Jennifer Grey – playing a supporting role as one of the members of the cousins’ small tour group.

Spousal secrets

It is hard to write about Pink Lady without giving too much away. A seemingly ordinary religious Jerusalem couple with three happy kids and an involved extended family are upended when the husband is subjected to violence and blackmail.

Director Nir Bergman’s Hebrew-language feature film sees Lazer (Uri Blufarb) and Bati (Nur Fibak) pondering the most existential questions of how God challenges even his most dedicated adherents. A deeply serious film with both laugh-out-loud incongruities and eye-covering discomfiture, Pink Lady is a slice-of-life with deep theological questions.

Oct. 7 revisited

image - Of Dogs and Men, which deals directly with the attacks of Oct. 7, 2023, is a blend of fiction and documentary — *Of Dogs and Men*, which deals directly with the attacks of Oct. 7, 2023, is a blend of fiction and documentary. *(still from film)*

At least two films in the festival deal directly with the attacks of Oct. 7, 2023.

Of Dogs and Men is a blend of fiction and documentary. Director Dani Rosenberg’s film follows 16-year-old Dar (Ori Avinoam, also cowriter) as she sneaks back into Nir Oz, her vacated kibbutz, in search of her missing dog Shula.

While the quest for the dog may be a stand-in for the larger search

Israelis have undertaken as individuals and collectively to discover the fate of missing people – Dar’s mother’s fate remains unknown – it is hard not to wonder if the choice to centre a (missing) dog in the story is not meant to invite dissonance among overseas viewers. Given the indifference and even celebration with which some people worldwide have responded to the Oct. 7 attacks, is the tragedy of a lost dog a statement on the qualitative value the world places on Jewish life?

Dar tags along with a woman who rescues animals in the abandoned and war-torn areas.

“Aren’t you afraid of dealing with those dogs?” she asks the woman.

“Look what human beings did. So, I should be afraid of dogs?” the woman responds. “There’s no creature more awful, crueler than human beings and I still live among you.”

Through the imagery of destruction and the litany of names of victims, the film breaks down distinctions between Israeli and Palestinian victims.

The documentary 6:30 provides a harrowing, minute-by-minute narrative of Oct. 7 events from different locations and perspectives. The interviews with survivors just a week after the attacks show raw emotion.

Some of the Nova festival-goers thought they were hallucinating as the hellish day unfolded. Several people, including first responders, speak of detachment, of a disconnect between what they were seeing and what they could believe. In retrospect, one survivor wonders if his liberation is real or if he died and that is what he is now experiencing. Others talk of the emotional burdens they will carry forever.

Linor Attias, a United Hatzalah volunteer who arrived at Kibbutz Be’eri in a mass casualty event vehicle, notes with pride that Arabs and Jews were united among the rescue workers trying to save the lives of victims. She loaded people into ambulances, where they released piercing shrieks of agony, having held them in for hours of silence in order to save their lives.

“That howl of pain cuts through the soul,” she says.

The most chilling thing about the film is realizing, amid all these horror stories, that these are the testimonies of the lucky ones.

Full details and tickets are available at vjff.org.

Video shares Spiers’ legacy

Artist Naomi Spiers explains the first panel of her wood-framed paper-cut mechitzah (partition) at the Chabad of Vancouver Island location in Victoria. A new video by David Cooperstone highlights some of Spiers’ creative path. (still from film)

Salt Spring Island sculptor Naomi Spiers, who celebrated her 90th birthday in March, is the subject of a new film, Naomi Spiers: A Legacy, released in January by Vancouver videographer David Cooperstone.

Available on YouTube, the film follows Spiers’ path from her artistic beginnings and initial work in Ontario, through to her experiences abroad and her designs found on the mechitzah (partition) at the Chabad of Vancouver Island location in Victoria.

Born in Toronto in 1935, Spiers was allowed to have a penknife, and she carved her pencils into totem poles as a child. “I carved anything I could find and, when I was 14, I got a summer job with a potter,” she recalled. “Later, I got my hands in clay and started making all kinds of things.”

image - Naomi Spiers — Naomi Spiers *(still from film)*

Spiers went to the Ontario College of Art (OCA), where she studied sculpture. At the end of the four-year degree, she won a scholarship to study at the University of Edinburgh College of Art. Afterward, she returned to the OCA to assist a former instructor teaching first-year sculpture.

There, she met Reuven, a fellow artist who, along with his two brothers, had immigrated to Canada from the United Kingdom in 1952.

“I was very impressed by his talent and very astonished when he asked me to marry him,” Spiers said.

The couple opened a studio in Collingwood, Ont., on the shores of Lake Huron, and had various shows during their time there, with Reuven, whom Spiers said “was born knowing how to draw,” receiving several large commissions.

She, meanwhile, created sculptures for the Catholic Church. Though not born into a Jewish home, Spiers came from a background steeped in biblical stories. She had to memorize many of them and, because of that, she was able to make works of a religious nature.

After several trips to British Columbia, she and Reuven moved to Salt Spring Island. Reuven did house renovations, while Naomi taught at Cariboo College (now Thompson Rivers University) in Kamloops. The two would see each other on weekends in Vancouver, where, on one occasion, they met an Israeli doctor who invited them to stay at a kibbutz.

The couple fell in love with Israel and moved there in 1987, eventually settling in Safed. They refurbished a centuries-old home – with no electricity, plumbing or windows – and set up a gallery: he painting, she sculpting.

It was in Safed that Naomi began to develop an interest in paper cuts, after seeing an exhibition in Jerusalem. At this point, a light went on in her head, and Spiers thought to herself, “I could do that.”

“It was quicker and cheaper than sculpture and people used to ask me to do family trees and things like that. I sold quite a lot of them,” she said.

Their time in Israel turned out to be very successful professionally. Naomi would have liked to have remained there, but Reuven’s physical constraints necessitated coming back to Canada.

Upon their return, the couple bought and renovated another property on Salt Spring Island. In 2009, Reuven, however, became ill and passed away. Within a short period, it was decided that a monument be established in his honour, and thus the Chabad mechitzah saw its beginnings.

With the help of Reuven’s brother, Martin, who assisted with the woodwork, the five paper-cut panels that form the partition got underway, each with its own theme.

The first panel in the Victoria shul shows the seven fruits of Israel – the ones that could be offered at the Temple. The second features the 12 tribes of Israel, with the symbolism being taken from inscriptions in the Hebrew Bible.

In the middle of the partition is a Star of David panel, with hexagons that depict various Torah tales. This is followed by a panel based on the Jewish calendar – here, for example, the month of Adar takes the viewer to a scene from the Book of Esther.

The last of the panels represents the Jewish holidays: a shofar, apples and bees making honey for Rosh Hashanah; a tent for Sukkot; a menorah and oil for Hanukkah; noisemakers and masks for Purim; four cups of wine and matzah for Pesach; and the 10 Commandments for Shavuot.

“My dear brother-in-law Martin built all this lovely woodwork,” Spiers said. “It wasn’t something he had ever done before, so we went around the house and looked at things that Reuven had made and tried to get the same style he would have done if he were doing it.

“Martin went ahead and built them,” she said. “I think they’re very nice and they matched the other furniture in the shul, and they were his monument to his brother – they were very close. Between the two of us, I think we did a good job of it.”

Chabad of Vancouver Island’s Rabbi Meir Kaplan, who first met the Spierses in 2008, shortly before Reuven’s death, lauded Naomi’s work, calling it “a stunning piece of art” and “the nicest mechitzah ever created.”

image - Naomi Spiers’ five-panel paper-cut mechitzah she created for Chabad of Vancouver Island in Victoria — Naomi Spiers’ five-panel paper-cut mechitzah she created for Chabad of Vancouver Island in Victoria. *(still from film)*

Spiers had approached Kaplan with her ideas after her husband’s death and, with his encouragement, she proceeded. After seeing the first panel, Kaplan said, “I was blown away. How can you do this with paper?

“As the project progressed, the works became more complex, with more wisdom and more meaning. This has become one of the masterpieces of our organization,” he said. “Local community members are proud of it and always are looking at it, trying to find some additional details and meanings in this beautiful design.”

Kaplan, who advised Spiers on religious aspects during the years-long project – he traveled to Salt Spring Island on several occasions – noted that visitors to the Victoria Chabad have been deeply impressed by the artwork, as well. He hopes that the panels will be part of the synagogue’s decor for centuries to come.

Spiers estimates that it took roughly a year to create each panel. At the time she started, Chabad of Vancouver Island had not yet moved into its present location at 2955 Glasgow St.

Acknowledging that she always likes to have a project in the works, Spiers said she would like to contribute more to the community, possibly to the new school that opened across the street from the Chabad Centre last fall.

“It was an honour creating a video about Naomi Spiers, with the focus on the incredible mechitzah she created for Chabad of Vancouver Island,” Cooperstone told the Independent. “In doing this video, I discovered her amazing talent as an artist. The intricate, detailed paper cutting which Naomi spent five years creating is a marvel to look at and appreciate. I hope this video will be an everlasting legacy to this remarkable woman.”

Cooperstone has made several videos about community members, including The Naiman Family Concert with Vancouver Jewish Folk Choir (2017), Yosef Wosk Book Launch (2023) and L. Cohen, a JCC Interview with Michael Posner (2024).

The music for the Spiers film comes from Tzimmes, the Vancouver-based ensemble. Andrea Zeitz helped to put the film together and Cooperstone gave special thanks to Michael and Dvori Balshine for bringing the film to fruition.

Sam Margolis has written for the Globe and Mail, the National Post, UPI and MSNBC.

Balancing education and art

Alix West Lefler plays Frida in The Fast Runner, a 15-minute short from director David Bercovici-Artieda that was shot over the course of four days in the Greater Victoria area. (photo from thefastrunnerfilm.com)

The Fast Runner, a film about a young girl and a rabbi confronting the reality of the Holocaust, will be shown at the Comox Valley International Film Festival on April 5. The 15-minute short was shot over the course of four days in the Greater Victoria area and involved 260 people.

Director David Bercovici-Artieda, the son of a Holocaust survivor, described the project as both a profound responsibility and an intensely personal journey. His father’s experience, though not depicted in the story, inspired him to bring the film to fruition.

“It’s not just about telling a story. It’s about honouring the memory of those who lived through unimaginable horrors, including my own father. Every frame, every scene and every creative choice carries the weight of history – my family’s history,” he told the Independent.

“I came to understand the profound impact of survival – not just the physical endurance, but the emotional and psychological resilience that followed. His story, and those of so many others, shaped my perspective on the responsibility of storytelling and the importance of preserving these narratives for future generations.”

Bercovici-Artieda said creating a film like The Fast Runner is a balancing act between art and education. It must be compelling, engaging and cinematic, but also serve the greater purpose of preserving memory and fostering empathy. At its core, he explained, the film carries a message of compassion, hope and perseverance in the darkest moments of history.

“It is a reminder that, even in the face of cruelty, there were acts of kindness, moments of defiance and an unbreakable human spirit. These themes are as relevant today as they were then,” he said.

Bercovici-Artieda admitted that, during the process of putting the film together, he questioned whether he was doing justice to the story and honouring his father’s legacy in the right manner.

“Ultimately, telling these stories is a privilege,” he said. “It is a way to ensure that the Holocaust is never forgotten, to remind audiences that history is not just in textbooks – it lives in the voices and memories of those who came before us.”

Bercovici-Artieda stressed that the film is about choices as well: those forced upon people who suffered and those made by people who stood by, helped or betrayed. Viewers, he hopes, will recognize the weight of these decisions and that history is not just a collection of events: it is built on the actions and moral dilemmas of individuals.

“I also hope audiences see the film not just as a story about the past, but as a reflection of today’s world,” he said. “The forces of hate, intolerance and dehumanization did not disappear with the Holocaust. They persist in different forms. If we are not vigilant, history can repeat itself. And, right now, we are witnessing a dangerous rise in antisemitism, Holocaust denial and historical revisionism.”

photo - Director David Bercovici-Artieda behind the camera of The Fast Runner, which next screens at the Comox Valley International Film Festival — Director David Bercovici-Artieda behind the camera of *The Fast Runner*, which next screens at the Comox Valley International Film Festival. *(photo from thefastrunnerfilm.com)*

Most importantly, Bercovici-Artieda would like people to leave the theatre with a sense of empathy. Survivors like his father, he said, endured unspeakable horrors, but they carried on, rebuilt their lives and, in many cases, found a way to forgive.

“If they could move forward with hope, so can we,” he said.

Currently, Bercovici-Artieda is raising funds to support a partnership with Journeys in Film, an educational nonprofit, to help teachers bring The Fast Runner into classrooms worldwide. In addition, he would like to expand screenings, panel discussions and outreach programs to engage audiences in meaningful conversations about the Holocaust, resilience and the dangers of historical revisionism.

“My hope for educating people about the Holocaust through The Fast Runner is to provide a deeply human perspective on one of history’s darkest chapters – one that goes beyond statistics and textbooks,” he said. “I want audiences, especially younger generations, to connect emotionally with the story, to feel the weight of what was lost and to understand the consequences of hatred and intolerance.”

The Fast Runner screened at the Victoria Film Festival in February; the Shabbat Lounge, a Jewish cultural event running alongside the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, in January; and the Victoria International Jewish Film Festival last November. After Comox, it will make its Latin American debut, with three screenings in Ecuador, Bercovici-Artieda’s home country. One of the screenings will take place on Holocaust Remembrance Day (Yom Hashoah), on April 23, in Quito.

The film stars Alix West Lefler as the young girl Frida and Alex Poch-Goldin as the rabbi. Only 13 years old, West Lefler has a considerable list of acting credits, including roles in films (Speak No Evil, The King Tide) and on television (The Good Doctor, Riverdale). Poch-Goldin is a veteran stage and television actor with appearances on Nero Wolfe, Murdoch Mysteries and Queer as Folk; he is also a playwright, director and librettist.

Michael Bruce Adams wrote the screenplay for The Fast Runner. Adams has been involved in more than 150 film productions. Besides short films, he has written features and documentaries.

Bercovici-Artieda has been the cinematographer on dozens of film projects and a director of several recent television series’ episodes and movies, including the holiday film Making Spirits Bright.

For more about The Fast Runner, visit thefastrunnerfilm.com.

Sam Margolis has written for the Globe and Mail, the National Post, UPI and MSNBC.

On the lookout for wildfires

Tova Krentzman’s Fire Tower is a documentary about the people stationed high above the ground in the Yukon and Alberta, who are looking for smoke or signs of a wildfire. (photo from Tova Krentzman)

Tova Krentzman’s Fire Tower, a documentary about the people stationed high above the ground checking for wildfires in the Yukon and Alberta, has been covering the film festival circuit. Most recently, it was shown in February at the Available Light Film Festival in Whitehorse, where the director resides.

The idea for the film arose when Krentzman was working as a cook at a firefighting camp one spring. Several lookouts, the people who comprise the first line of defence in battling wildfires, stayed at the camp as they were getting ready to head to their respective towers.

“I had a chance to talk to them and hear their stories. I even got to visit one of them. I was completely fascinated. The seed was planted there,” she told the Independent.

Krentzman’s diverse background includes experience as a geologist, cook, medic and merchant seafarer. She is also a photographer. Initially, she thought chronicling the stories of the lookouts would make an interesting photography book. However, when the pandemic struck, she became increasingly involved with video and turned the subject into a film.

For the documentary, she featured several different types of people who are lookouts, with ages ranging from young adults to seniors. Nonetheless, Krentzman said, they share a certain trait in common: the ability to be with themselves and thrive alone.

She was struck by the ability of the lookouts to climb a 100-foot tower every day, often many times a day, and to stay focused throughout the months they were on duty. In Alberta, where the season can last for six months, from spring to fall, lookouts work long hours without any breaks. In the Yukon, though the season is shorter, the job also requires a particular fortitude.

“It is definitely a certain kind of inner physical and mental strength to be able to do this job. When you are alone, everything you have ever done in your life comes into your mind, all your mistakes, everything,” she said. “You have to be the kind of person who can manage themselves. But these are also people who are able to feel very connected to their surroundings and derive a lot of pleasure of being connected to nature and what they are looking at.”

After spending large amounts of time with the lookouts, Krentzman observed how content they were with what they were doing. There was no drama, no breakdowns. Instead, the film raises the issue of how, in a hyper-connected world, solitude can inspire a different kind of connection with not only nature but community and one’s creativity.

“I think the film does get into what the struggles and challenges are. And so, people reflect on things and have some quiet reflective moments that they discuss and they are personal. I would say, overall, they are pretty satisfied with what they are doing,” she said.

photo - A scene from Fire Tower. To do their fire spotting, lookouts must climb a 100-foot tower every day, often many times a day — A scene from Fire Tower. To do their fire spotting, lookouts must climb a 100-foot tower every day, often many times a day. *(photo from Tova Krentzman)*

Krentzman hopes that, through watching the 47-minute film, more people will realize that the towers exist. She also hopes that the film will draw attention to the dozens of people perched in the air on the lookout for potential danger. While wildfire events can blanket the news cycle during summer months, the towers are not widely known and most provinces no longer have them, she said.

“It is important to realize all the steps that go into fire protection and prevention. The lookouts spot many of the smokes and call it in when it is a little wisp of smoke – that is when you can actually prevent it from becoming bigger. The idea is to catch it before it is a big fire,” Krentzman said. “If you can see a fire from a satellite, then it is too big – that is not prevention.

“They are really there to protect, as a first line of defence, and then they call in the fire agencies and there is a back-and-forth going on. It is quite incredible what goes on behind the scenes when it comes to fires.”

In the time since the documentary was made, Krentzman said, the fire seasons have started so early that she likely would not have been able to gain as much filming access to the towers because of liability concerns.

Originally from Montreal, Krentzman has lived in different places, including Israel, where many in her family still live. Yet, she was drawn to the Yukon and has spent several years there.

“The Yukon is one of those places that, as a Canadian, you have to see what it is,” she said.

Fire Tower debuted at the Hot Docs Festival in Toronto last April and has appeared on screens in the United States, Asia and Europe. The documentary was to have been shown in British Columbia last summer at the ArtsWells Festival in Wells, but the event was postponed due to a wildfire.

For more information and to ask about a group screening of the film, visit underwirefilms.com.

Sam Margolis has written for the Globe and Mail, the National Post, UPI and MSNBC.

Blue Rodeo is thriving at 40

A 1989 PR photo for Blue Rodeo’s Diamond Mine album. Left to right are Bazil Donovan, Bob Wiseman, Jim Cuddy, Greg Keelor and Mark French. The documentary Blue Rodeo: Lost Together (left) has its world premiere at the Whistler Film Festival. (photo by Andrew MacNaughtan / bluerodeo.com)

The world premiere of Blue Rodeo: Lost Together, which gives viewers a glimpse into the rise of this iconic Canadian band, was so anticipated that the first screening of the documentary at the Whistler Film Festival sold out – a second screening has been added.

The Whistler Film Festival runs Dec. 4-8, offering several programs, including feature-length films, shorts and its “Mountain Culture” series of films, après events and Q&As. The WFF24 Content Summit, which runs Dec. 4-7 in person and Dec. 10-12 online, presents speakers, panel discussions, workshops and other opportunities to learn and connect.

Looking through the festival lineup, I came across Blue Rodeo: Lost Together and requested the screener for a few reasons. First, I grew up with Blue Rodeo’s music and knew many of their songs. Second, given the challenges of being recording and touring musicians – and Canadian to boot – I find it remarkable that the band is as popular as ever 40 years after high school friends Jim Cuddy and Greg Keelor started it. Lastly, founding members included Bazil Donovan (bass), Cleave Anderson (drums) and, most interestingly from my perspective, Bob Wiseman (keyboards). Wiseman is my second cousin and, though I’ve never met him, I have always been proud to let people know that I had a relative in Blue Rodeo. Wiseman was part of the group from 1984 to 1992.

Blue Rodeo: Lost Together delicately covers the comings and goings of musicians, and the sometimes-difficult friendship and professional collaboration of Cuddy and Keelor. It is frank about the band’s challenges in becoming a commercial success, starting as it did in the era of hard rock, but also dealing with some producers who had a different vision than Cuddy and/or Keelor of what would lead to that success. It is always fascinating to see how creative people balance their very personal drive with taking other people’s feelings and opinions into consideration (or not) and the need to feed and clothe themselves.

Overall, Blue Rodeo seems to have avoided any huge drama, though marriages and partnerships were tested by the rigorous tour schedule once the group broke into the international music scene. Some member partings were clearly amicable, such as when Anderson returned to his postman job after taking a five-year hiatus to play with the band – he had a family to support and wanted to be present for them. Other separations were more fraught: Wiseman wanted to leave a good year at least before he did, his unhappiness seeming to have started – from what I understand from the documentary – with the making of the album Casino, which was released in 1990. To make Blue Rodeo fit a more market-friendly mould, so it could become popular in the United States, Wiseman’s innate energy and expressive performance style was tamped down. “That was really traumatic for me,” he says in the film.

Despite creative differences and some tough times, all the interviewees in the documentary speak of one another and their experiences with great respect and gratitude. It is uplifting to see people treating one another kindly, even as they disagree. Hopefully, it isn’t just for show. Their affection seems genuine. The bonds these musicians have created between themselves and with their listeners seem strong. With all the bad that happens in the world, this is reason enough to watch this documentary – and, if you haven’t already, check out the music of Blue Rodeo.

At press time, there were tickets left for the Dec. 8 screening of Blue Rodeo: Lost Together. Of course, the festival features many other movies during its Dec. 4-8 run, including September 5 on Dec. 5 and 8. The thriller is based on the hostage-taking of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics. The description reads: “At the heart of the story is Geoff, a young producer eager to prove himself to his legendary boss, Roone Arledge. Teaming with Marianne, a German interpreter, Geoff unexpectedly takes the reins of the broadcast. As tensions rise, conflicting reports swirl and the lives of the hostages hang in the balance, Geoff faces difficult decisions that test his skills and moral compass.”

For tickets to the Whistler Film Festival and the full lineup of movies, visit whistlerfilmfestival.com.

Jweekly a model of success

Ieden Wall and Susan Minuk’s contrasting styles balance JWeekly Canada perfectly. (photo from JWeekly Canada)

JWeekly Canada made its Season 5 debut in September, becoming the longest-running Jewish TV talk show in Canada.

Friends and colleagues warned Ieden Wall – the show’s creator, co-host, writer, director and executive producer – that he might be making a mistake by signing on with Omni TV, the multicultural TV channel owned and operated by Rogers Sports and Media. Wall, however, insisted that traditional cable TV, based in a North American major market, is a lemon with a surprising amount of juice to be squeezed out of it – if one plays their cards right.

The data seem to support caution. Approximately 42% of adults now opt for streaming services, with 35% accessing streaming content through their TV sets and 7% using personal devices. Roku predicts that this trend will persist and that an estimated 75% of all Canadian households will cut the cord by 2026.

But JWeekly Canada, which Wall co-hosts with Canadian journalist Susan Minuk, has made lemonade.

Rogers Sports and Media runs Hudson & Rex on its CityTV platform in the same Saturday primetime slot as JWeekly Canada. It is hard to image that JWeekly Canada could compete digitally with the heavily marketed hit, which airs on Omni’s sister station. And, by all accounts, its budget of $9,000 per episode should not allow it to compete. Yet it does – JWeekly Canada reaches some 100,000 viewers a week and more than half a million viewers a month. The half-hour program airs three times per week on television, is posted on a handful of social media channels and streams on JWeekly’s website.

JWeekly Canada has found its audience.

Cable TV reaches 97.3% of the over-55 population but only 29% of the 18-34 demographic in Canada each week. Wall highlighted what he considers an overlooked statistic in a 2024 Statista survey: 79.6% of Canadians between the ages of 45-54 watch cable TV within their primetime leisure window.

“There is a surprisingly large subsection of men and women in their mid-to-late 40s who search out desirable content on cable TV during their nightly leisure window,” Wall said. “This group was crucial in us building our core audience.”

While Wall shares the JWeekly Canada screen with Minuk, the two seldom appear together. Their contrasting styles balance the production perfectly. Minuk is the soft-spoken interviewer and Wall is the playful provocateur. Together they offer up a little something for everyone it seems.

JWeekly Canada is a Jewish-themed talk show, but with broader appeal. It has avoided being ethnocentric, offering content that smiles with Jewish pride, while still welcoming a multitude of cultures. To emphasize this point, JWeekly Canada’s current audience is only 31% Jewish.

When asked about the show’s diverse viewers, Wall said, “Listen, our guests are some of the most intriguing and accomplished people in our country. The fact that they are Jewish is ancillary to the merit of their talent and success.

“If you are talking to a genius scientist who just invented a revolutionary heart procedure, which augments human arteries with lizard skin, it doesn’t matter if he/she happens to be Chinese, Indian or Jewish. Right? Great TV is great TV.”

The show’s format is a hybrid of in-studio interviews, conducted by Wall and Minuk, and Wall’s field segments. His daring and quirky remote pieces have allowed JWeekly Canada to reach outside Omni TV’s boomer demographic and attract a younger audience.

His recent incarnation is the creation of a Jewish AI system called Chat JPT. In this segment, Wall tries out a pre-market Jewish AI system designed by Dr. Shecky Kravitz. Wall develops an unlikely friendship with Hershel, one of the platform’s avatars, and quickly finds out that letting his all-knowing avatar tag along for daily activities is both a blessing and curse. Well, probably more of a curse.

In JWeekly Canada’s second season, Wall did 12 segments from a residential elevator at a luxury highrise. He called the segment “The Elevator Show.” For it, he put an elevator on “service,” took it to a floor of his choice and did on-the-spot interviews. Residents from the building gathered outside the open cabin, on bridge chairs, to watch. It was pretty darn cool.

“I have always considered Ieden to be ingenious,” said talk show legend Dini Petty. “I really hope Ieden finds the financial resources and marketing support he deserves because his ideas are truly pioneering.”

Wall has plans to come to Vancouver in the spring for a three-part documentary series called Solid Gold, about the life and times of 19th-century businessman Louis Gold, who settled here from the US with his family and helped build the city. Wall’s vision is to document the rich Jewish history in all major cities across Canada.

And he is hoping to soon reach more BC Jews with JWeekly Canada. With increased viewership from West Coast Jewry online, Rogers Sports and Media is considering running the program on its Omni Pacific Channel next September. In the meantime, the program is streamed and podcast every week on jweekly.ca.

Louis Mann is a retired psychotherapist living in Boston. He grew up in the Bathurst Manor district of Toronto and continues to take an avid interest in Jewish causes in Toronto and throughout Canada.