On this week’s episode, Tracie and April discuss the recent discussion on the concept of “Jewface” that followed a recent podcast by Sarah Silverman on the topic. They discuss a few different perspectives on the topic and reflect on the patterns within the portrayal of Jewish characters in media.
On this week’s episode, Tracie and April discuss the recent discussion on the concept of “Jewface” that followed a recent podcast by Sarah Silverman on the topic. They discuss a few different perspectives on the topic and reflect on the patterns within the portrayal of Jewish characters in media.
- [Tracie] Sarah Silverman ignited quite a conversation when she decried what she called Jewface, the practice of casting non-Jewish actors to play Jewish characters.- [April] This is "Jews Talk Racial Justice," with April and Tracie.- [Tracie] A weekly show hosted by April Baskin and Tracie Guy-Decker.- [April] In a complex world, change takes courage.- [Tracie] Whole-hearted relationships can keep us accountable.- So word on the street is that you read an interesting article this week, Tracie.- Yeah, yeah, so it was this article in The Forward, published on, let's see, October 11th, by Benjamin Ivry. And the headline is, "Does Sarah Silverman"Actually Have a Point about 'Jewface'?" And Jewface is in quotes. So Ivry sort of is lifting up a recent podcast episode of Silverman's.- Yay, podcasts, by brilliant, smart Jewish women. Sorry, please continue.(both laughing)- Yeah, so I didn't listen to the podcast, full disclosure. I just read this article, where Silverman complains about the fact that as she sees it, if a Jewish female character is accomplished, successful or desirable, she will be played by a non-Jewish actress. And the only Jewish characters that actually have Jewish actresses are sort of the stereotypical overbearing, whining, nagging Jewish mother-- Comic relief type.- Right, right, sort of a la Philip Roth. And so, Ivry goes into, he sort of looks at different cases of non-Jewish actors being cast in Jewish roles, and what effect that has. The grossest ones that I shared with you right before we started recording was, he points out the fact that, here, Ivry says, "At its worst, the current"entertainment industry approach favors casting non-Jews"associated with antisemitic comments in Jewish roles." So almost like a penance. So he names, for instance, Vanessa Redgrave, in 1978, had antisemitic comments and then, a few years later, she played a musician imprisoned in Auschwitz for a TV movie, written by Miller.- (gags) Boo.- Yeah. And a similar thing much more recently with Gary Oldman, who had some antisemitic comments in 2014, and then, later played "Mank," the quintessential Jewish, in "Mank," the show was called "Mank," he played Herman Mankowitz. So that's gross, like that's-- And I don't fully know, I wanna be clear, maybe if I knew more of the details of the circumstances, I'd be like, wow, what an amazing restorative justice effort but on its surface, from what I'm hearing, that immediately makes my skin crawl a bit and feels icky.- Yeah, it feels pretty icky.- No additional information, just as a caveat there.- And to be fair, that is, that was the point that Ivry was making, so he wanted us to feel icky about it. But good job, Benjamin, I feel icky about that. So-(April laughs) So that, it was sort of an interesting question, and you and I started talking about it, and then you noticed that MaNishtana, Rabbi Shais Rishon, actually also responded.- Mm-hmm.- To Silverman's podcast, in the JTA.- Yeah, and I always like reading his thought leadership, because he has such a brilliant mind, and often, incorporates humor. I think, in this one, there's not quite as much of his quintessential humor, but he's also really great at weaving in pop culture and remembering. He also seems to have a mind, a memory like a trap, so he-- Agreed.- You know, throughout this piece, he cites multiple things where, yeah, so please continue.- Oh, no, that's, the thing that then, MaNishtana brought in to the conversation is naming what, I guess, is sort of the invisibility of privilege, but that's the Ashkenormativity of Silverman's complaint. Like they're only talking white Jewish roles and white Jewish actors or not actors.- And I wanna complexify that a bit,'cause I don't actually agree with that statement, that assertion.- Okay.- I would say she only name white examples, but as someone, who I live in the consciousness, like I read for that, and I was, I heard some potential Ashkenormativity but then as I understood that Jewface was being used as Blackface, I understood that it can mean. So I wanna, almost like a spiritual, metaphysical thing, so I wanna note that they haven't yet, but to me, it isn't inherently exclusive of Jews of color, that the term that I, as a Jew of color can own and use that term in a liberatory, inclusive manner, but that we're noticing, or that MaNishtana pointed out that the examples that Sarah gave on her podcast, or that other white Jews are lifting up are not as multiracial and inclusive as they should be, as they can be, and as they should be.- As they can be, yeah.- Yeah. So I like that, it still has critique in it, but it also says that there's clear room here where there can be behavior change and shift. It's not that the word itself is inherently racially exclusive.- One of the things that I, one of the examples that MaNishtana lifted up that I was really interested in, is that he points out that though her character on Blackish is not, that Tracee Ellis Ross is Jewish. So Rainbow isn't-- Yes, she is!- But Tracee Ellis Ross is, and he points out that her siblings, that the character's siblings are also played by-- The actors.- The other actors who play the character's siblings are also Black Jews.- Right, Daveed Diggs and Rashida Jones.- Exactly, exactly. Thank you for lifting up their names, which I was not-- Oh, yummy.- I remember that-- So yummy. (laughs)- Yeah, well, I think that's a really interesting case to think about, because-- Whatcha thinking, Tracie?- Well, I have heard white Jews sort of complain when fairly strongly Jewishly coded actors played characters, lived into characters who were not Jewish. So for instance, the guy from "Scrubs," Zach Bramf, I think is the actor's name. And I think the character was also Zach? I don't know, I never watched the show closely. But when I worked for a Jewish museum, and we did a story about entertainment and doctors and Jewish doctors, we did a show about that, and so we looked into that character in particular, and the actor gave an interview to a Jewish newspaper, it was like a Hillel of his alma mater or something, where he talked about the fact that in his mind, like he just shows up as a Jewish person, even within the character, but the character is not, and sort of the dissonance there. And that felt like, at least within the confines of this newspaper article and the museum exhibit that I was working on, that felt like a big deal about assimilation and about fitting in and standing out.- Antisemitism and the way it manifests.- Yeah, sort of that quiet antisemitism that we just kind of accept and model who we are, kind of tamp down who we are to fit into the greater, wider America.- Erasure, pushing down. Yeah, mm-hmm.- In this case of Tracee Ellis Ross, Daveed Diggs and Rashida Jones playing siblings on this television show, all of whom being Black Jews and their characters not being Jewish, that, it's raising the same alarm bells for me as when-- This character on "Scrubs."- As when that particular character in Scrubs was being discussed, exactly. And because I, and maybe there is, besides MaNishtana.- And may I toss in something else really quickly, another quick-- Yeah.- Cultural reference is recently, and now, I'm going back to taking a break from Netflix, because I think it's a shadow comfort for me, and I'd rather be reading, writing or doing other things, but before my last binge was belatedly watching a few seasons' worth, a couple seasons' worth of "Suits," and there's a character where I think what you're talking about, and I was trying to explore this, and I was very intrigued by this, because there is an explicitly Jewish, kind of, character, and then a Jew-ish character. So like the lead guy looks sort of Aryan, his name is Harvey Specter, and there are different facets of his living, his excellence, his behaviors that fits into patterns of Jewish professionalism, but his character is explicitly not Jewish. But it's sort of weird, and I think the actor isn't Jewish, but it's still weird. As someone who is very Jewish and looks for that, and then there is another Jewish character on the show to your point, it's a male. So I wanna name that I think it's worth naming explicitly that, and I do look forward to listening to Sarah Silverman's episode, which I think likely, we will both do, but with production schedules and getting this out in a reasonable amount of timeframe, we just wanna come out with this. But I think, in general, prioritizing and lifting up sexism and still being really thoughtful about Jewish women, I just wanna name that that's the central, essential dynamic here. But in this show of"Suits," and the character who is Jewish is an annoying, is a-- Nebbish? Would you say?- Is very nebbishy, is extremely nebbishy, has an obsession with his cat, is very awkward, is very unlikable, continually botches key moments that Harvey, the apparently not Jewish Jew with a Jewish name, and other characteristics that would lead one to think that maybe he is an assimilated Jew, but it seems, which I would be open to, because many Jews are assimilated. But they're still parts of Jewish identity and peoplehood, whether or not assimilated Jews recognize it or not, that I believe are a part of collective peoplehood patterns that show up within our Jewish people. Not universally, but very commonly. So anyway, so that's just my point of reference if anyone else has seen that show or is a Megan Markle fan and that was a few years ago, and I read a couple articles that spoke about this, and no one explicitly names it as antisemitism, but it felt, to me, like, that was a variable at play and like I, there wasn't something where I could be. Well, actually, although the one character, like it was,(sighs) they don't totally vilify him, but it's not great.- It's not flattering.- It's not great. No, it's not flattering.- Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I'm thinking about "The Big Bang Theory," which my husband and I watched for awhile, and there was the one character, Howard Wolowitz, who is Jewish and his mom, who's like the stereotypical nagging, who we never even actually see on screen, we only hear her complaining. And they make a lot of fat jokes, which is really, looking back on it, that show's actually not so great.- Uh-huh.- It's kinda problematic.- Mayim Bialik is on.- Yes, she is.- And is her character Jewish on the show?- Not explicitly so, no.- Mm-hmm.- Mm-mm.- Which is, again-- Right, it's-- Given that she's-- A pattern.- An Orthodox Jew, and I'm not, like, to me, this whole conversation surfaces that I think are very aligned with our "Jews Talk Racial Justice" vibe. From my role as a practitioner and leader in the Jewish community around working for almost 20 years to increase the collective power analysis of the community, and I can almost say it in a nutshell here. I think that the very nature of this conversation is a sign of progress of the collective consciousness strengthening of our people, and to our earlier point and to what MaNishtana lifts up, it's important to me that as we do that, that we continue to also reach for expansion and not limited or like racial bias or limitations and actually say, this is something that affects us as a multiracial Jewish people. This is something that we are seeing, and that doesn't mean that people have own all of the complexity of that, but also not exclude a significant segment of the community. But you know, to me, that's also just interesting to notice, is you know, as MaNishtana noted, that some potential hypocrisy, or some of the challenging dynamics for some folks, perhaps, in what Sarah Silverman shared, given her history around different jokes she's made at times and at times, when she's performed Blackface, according to MaNishtana, and he's solid on his facts. As people of color, at times, when we say things like that, like I trust that he's correct in that, and it's interesting, to me, because as I read that, it, some of these things just like in me a little bit differently, I think, as someone who has a pretty rigorous healing, ongoing healing practice, where I spend a lot of time healing from the impacts of racism on my family and on me and my own life and on my own professional trajectory, which I've still managed to thrive in spite of it. But there have been some pretty hefty setbacks but that's not, I find, for me, where I like to live. But also, as I read what MaNishtana wrote, as over the years, I've gotten to see more of Sarah Silverman's work, and also, see her evolution, and learn more about her, and also, is it seems she's, in times, stepped away from some of what I felt was racist comedy and not helpful and not funny. I've really come to, I include her when I think about Jewish sisterhood. And so, initially, when you shared, and I had seen little blips of this. I don't spend as much time on social media now, again, for focus and peace and all kinds of things, but my initial thought about it was, oh wow, I'm really excited, I'm interested. Well, I think, maybe internally, there was a little bit of hesitation, but I was mostly just interested in hearing a Jewish woman speaking about what she perceives as antisemitism and some sexism. I don't know if she uses those words. Those are the words that I'm using. I don't wanna put those words on her, but I was interested in that, and that still is of interest to me. And how I reconcile the discrepancy that MaNishtana is understandably raising is that I think a number of our movements, particularly Black Lives Matter and different racial justice movements and the movements of Jews of color working to bring change our in community, Jews are starting to, white Jews are starting to pick up on some of this and understand it, and the thing that we, I think, we need to be careful about that I've already named, but I'll name more, perhaps, pointedly here, is that this is not the first time that this has happened. So to me, what we want to avoid, or what, I already said what we want,'cause I really believe in centering that. What we want to avoid is mainstream, white Ashkenazi Jews cherry picking parts of power analysis that serve their analysis and exclude the people who champion those ideas and who are more heavily harmed and affected by that. And I haven't reviewed all of this, but from what you've shared and what MaNishtana has shared of what Sarah Silverman shared, one piece here that I find interesting, the point that is being raised, and I think we both are clear that it seems like that this is a legitimate critique that people are lifting up, and that the critique of the critique that this critique should be more inclusive of our multiracial Jewish people is also valid. I think what I'm interested is also like below the hood is, which to me, doesn't justify it, that this is predominantly a manifestation, whatever the group is, whether it's often Black people, whether it's people with disabilities or trans and nonbinary folks, or various other groups that have been targeted severely by systemic oppression at all its levels, that this is an issue that seems to affect, right, like we, or at least I hear this conversation being had about people who are on the spectrum, on the autism spectrum are consistently played by people who are not autistic. Or like this shows up in different places, and so I think it's worth explicitly naming here that this is something that is of concern, that this is a marker or one way that systemic oppression manifests, and that people may have different perspective on this. I don't always necessarily think that an identity, to me, it's on a case by case basis, that ideally, a role should be played by a person who embodies that role, and also, to me, it's more of a fact that it's very, very rare, it's consistently, the exclusion is consistent. That is, to me, the sign that this is definitively one manifestation of oppression. And we're not saying here, oh, go ahead.- I think that it's, there's additional nuance to it in the natures of the roles. So.- Right, agreed.- Right, if Black folks, Black actors can only get jobs as like the maid or the person living with AIDS.- Or funny, relatively insignificant to the plot line, sidekick.- Right, right.- The various stereotypical roles that Black people are traditionally, and still, to this day, often given.- And then also, like non-Black actors are getting the Black characters, like I'm just, I'm making it bigger. So that then the problem is, it's about representation but it's also about who can play what. I think that's part of the original critique from Silverman, that Jewish actresses only get the Jewish roles that are stereotypes.- That are heavily stereotypical, usually not flattering.- And if there are flattering roles, they're played by non-Jews.- Even when this is not ambiguous for other identities, it still happens, so this is not, in any way, to justify the oppressive patterns that we're seeing, the oppression that's playing out. And again, in my perspective of it personally, maybe this will evolve as I continue, which I do, to do ongoing liberation and anti-oppression education. I am not of the mind that every role of a specific identity need, must be played by a person of that identity. I think, though, that ideally, much of the time, or most of the time, that should be the case, and the fact that it's almost never or it's only for very stereotypical caricature type roles, that that happens is, to me, that clearly, there's a problem. And so I just wanna nuance that, because I think, at times, people get stuck in the either/or, and I just wanna name that to me, there's a little bit of a both/and here, that the fact, like I think likely, Sarah Silverman wouldn't be saying it, wouldn't be raising this up and critiquing it, if it weren't so stark. If she had, if there were examples in the world, if she had and we had multiple examples of Jewish, of complex, brilliant, wonderful, joyous, talented, desirable and appealing, right, I think Jewish women being played by Jewish women and then there were also other roles that weren't played by Jewish women, I don't think there'd be much of a conversation here. It's the fact that almost none of them are. This conversation, to me, is not fully identical to the conversation about Blackface.- Right.- Because of the fluidity, because of the ways in which, because of antisemitism, in part, and also, as a given survival strategy that different Jews took on around upward mobility, and because of a shared, often, not always, because of the beautiful and gorgeous and significant presence of Mizrahi and Sephardic Jews, but in terms of some of the early waves of Jewish immigrants coming, mostly from Europe, Germany, and then, as well as Eastern Europe, that Jews, racially, don't necessarily have identical, but basically is the whole issue around the fact that a number of Jews have, over generations, and even to this day, done a lot of work to assimilate heavily.- Into whiteness.- Into whiteness, into whiteness, and you know, so when like Joan Rivers came up, I was like, that's interesting, right, because she dyed her hair blonde, I'm pretty sure. And I think she may have had surgery, and if she didn't, then a number of other Jews did, and changed their names from, like I always find it interesting, when I think someone's Jewish or I know someone's Jewish, and I go to see, they have their stage name, like King or Rivers or any number of other things. And then you look them up and it's like Stanawitz or.- Right, right.- Whatever, but you know.- MaNishtana offers whitewashing as an alternative description to what Silverman calls Jewface. And I think that that speaks to, actually, the fact that there has been whitewashing of Ashkenazi Judaism within America, both from without and from within.- I don't know that I like whitewashing. I think I like Jewface better, because I don't think Jewface is inherently, if it was like Ashkenaz Jewface or something. Like I don't think that Jewface is inherently Ashkenormative. but whitewashing, I don't, I'll reread what he wrote, but it doesn't, to me, it doesn't apply if you begin having more quote-unquote more desirable women of color playing Jewish women of color. Whitewashing doesn't work in that context. So I think at this time, I'm sticking to this term. But I guess, I think for me, I think what I'm trying to both understand and situate within my overall analysis and also, preemptively address, because what I would want, I don't want, that to me, it doesn't have the same parallel or history as Blackface.- Yeah, it doesn't.- I think this issue is important, I think it's worth talking about. I think that there are other grotesque histories and dynamics that this might tie to, but I would prefer that people really take some time to analyze this and speak to the truth of their experience without trying to leverage for support or arguably, out of intellectual laziness, the analysis of other communities. Like notice what's helpful, like of each, a both/and, of like, looking at the work of other folks and the scholarship and thought leadership and making the corollaries where there are corollaries, but also, doing our own work, and to be part of our own work, to think about mindfully assimilation and the ways that that can play out here. I don't have too much more to say about it,'cause it's not a huge, and either way, this shouldn't be happening. It doesn't justify it, but that was kind of a question, or something that came up in my mind, and so, I'm curious if folks want to email us or share thoughts via jewstalkracialjustice.com, if there's more analysis you have. I also suspect that there may be some additional pieces, Tracie, that might be coming out on social media or different thoughts about this.- Yeah, it looks like the conversation is not over.- But I think that the last piece I wanna say, and I already named this, but just from a principle perspective, I am here for Sarah Silverman as a Jewish woman, being visible as a Jewish woman, and leveraging her platform to say, this is something I'm noticing, and I stand by her in that. And there are some things that have happened in the past that I don't always, I have thoughts about, but I also see that she's on a process of growth, and I respect her in her artistry, and I hope, and I don't wanna make it just only about Sarah, but to me, what Sarah represents, that as we have this conversation, and I always love lifting up the perspective of Jews of color, I'm excited to see if there are also Jewish women of color besides me and our podcast conversation around this who want to lift our voices up. And that, as with many issues, we look at and consider. To me, this gets to be a collective conversation, that collectively, as a community, and as a world, I hope that we see examples of us modeling, paying extra close attention to the thoughts and leadership and insight of Jewish women, as we work to change these patterns over time. Thanks for tuning in. Our show's theme music was composed by Elliot Hammer. You can find this track and other beats on Instagram @ElliotHammer. If this episode resonated with you, please share it and subscribe. To join the conversation, visit jewstalkracialjustice.com where you can send us a question or a suggestion, access our show notes and learn more about our team. Take care until next time, and stay humble and keep going.