Ma’aleh hosts Hollywood workshop The Ma’aleh School of Television, Film and the
Arts in Jerusalem, which gears itself toward religiously observant studentswill host a workshop on June 13 taught by Dan Gordon and David N. Weiss, two top
Hollywood screenwriters.
Gordon, who lived in Israel for many years, has
written many screenplays, including The Hurricane starring Denzel Washington,
Passenger 57 with Wesley Snipes and Murder in the First with Kevin Bacon. His
most recent film, A Little War of Our Own, is currently in production and stars
and is being directed by Kevin Costner. Gordon has taught screenwriting in Tel
Aviv and currently runs his own film school, the Zaki Gordon Institute in
Sedona, Arizona. The school is named after his late son. Gordon, who visits
Israel frequently, is a captain in the IDF reserves and served as an escort
officer in the Military Spokesperson’s Unit during the 2006 Lebanon
War.
In response to British director Mike Leigh’s decision to join the
boycott of Israel and not honor a commitment he made to teach at the Sam Spiegel
Film School in Jerusalem in 2010, Gordon established a Mike Leigh Scholarship at
Ma’aleh. Gordon also wrote a critical open letter to Leigh.
Weiss, who
recently wrote the screenplay for the animated comedy, The Smurfs (which
features the voice of singing star Katy Perry), has specialized in films for
children. He cowrote the screenplays for Shrek 2 and Daddy Day
Camp.
Weiss, who is Orthodox, has visited Ma’aleh and taught there in the
past.
Hannah Brown ROI Summit highlights the arts The annual ROI Global Summit
of Young Jewish Innovators taking place from June 12-16 in Jerusalem will
present a varied lineup of artistic talent this year. The ROI Community, founded
by American Jewish philanthropist Lynn Schusterman in 2005 to bring together 150
young social entrepreneurs from Israel and the Jewish world, will be the first
to see “Thru Jerusalem,” an original collage of sound and music created by
YouTube star Kutiman.
Its world premiere in conjunction with Jerusalem
Season of Culture takes place on Monday at 8:15 p.m. at the JVP Media
Quarter.
On Wednesday, the ROI Film Festival and Variety Showcase will
take place at the Dan Jerusalem Hotel featuring Jewish soul singer Neshama
Carlebach, Nili Ohayon (Onili), an Israeli-born French singer/songwriter, Jewish
rocker Sheldon Low, and stand-up comedian Shmuel Beru, who walked across the
Sudanese desert to immigrate to Israel at the age of eight.
David Brinn
Crowe
snips circumcision tweets
Oscar-winning actor Russell Crowe railed against
circumcision in a string of Twitter posts, denouncing it as “barbaric,” before
apologizing the next day.
The stream of tweets began Thursday night, in
response to a query from an Australian follower.
Though the tweets in
question have since been deleted, news outlets reported that the actor wrote,
“Circumcision is barbaric and stupid. Who are you to correct nature? Is it real
that GOD requires a donation of foreskin? Babies are perfect.” Crowe then went
on to address Jews directly.
“Many Jewish friends, I love my Jewish
friends, I love the apples and the honey and the funny little hats but stop
cutting yr babies,” Crowe tweeted.
On Friday morning, after newspapers
and celebrity news sites around the world reported on his posts, Crowe
apologized over Twitter.
“I have a deep and abiding love for all people
of all nationalities, I’m very sorry that I have said things on here that have
caused distress,” tweeted Crowe, who won an Academy Award for his role in the
2000 film Gladiator.
JTA