Jacob Samuel has a couple references to his Judaism in his stand-up routine. In the past, whenever he brought it up, it usually created a moment of tension before a laugh. But in the year since Oct. 7, especially in his hometown of Vancouver, he's noticed a shift. It's harder to talk about his Jewish identity onstage. He brings it up later, or takes out a couple jokes if the laugh isn't big enough.

Yet Samuel, who won a Juno award for his debut comedy album in 2021, is determined to keep telling audiences he's Jewish. As he tells The CJN's arts podcasters on Culturally Jewish, that visibility is important, even with antisemitism on the rise. And getting people comfortable enough to laugh along with him is critical.

Samuel is will be hitting the road this month, performing in Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal before returning to B.C. for a headline show at the Chutzpah! Festival in Vancouver.

Credits

• Hosts: Ilana Zackon and David Sklar
• Producer: Michael Fraiman
• Music: Sarah Segal-Lazar

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• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to Culturally Jewish (Not sure how? Click here)

Arnie Lipsey has spent decades working in animation. But on the side, years ago, he began painting on canvas, using archival family photos for inspiration. He began colourizing and adapting them, eventually reinterpreting them entirely through a modern lens. That often resulted in jarring, traumatic scenes quietly unfolding behind his smiling family members: spiralling tornados, fiery trains, even the barbed-wire fences of a concentration camp.

The result is an unsettling, engrossing new series of 30 paintings in a new series on display at the Museum of Jewish Montreal until December 2024. The Past Is Before You blends fond memories and childlike innocence with a traumatic family story of escape from Nazi Europe. Lipsey joins The CJN's arts podcast, Culturally Jewish, to explain his process and share some of the real-life history behind the art.

Credits

• Hosts: Ilana Zackon and David Sklar
• Producer: Michael Fraiman
• Music: Sarah Segal-Lazar

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• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to Culturally Jewish (Not sure how? Click here)

When Tuesdays with Morrie was first published in 1997, it elevated Jewish author Mitch Albom to a level of literary stardom that reverberated beyond the book world. The story—which detailed Albom's frequent visits with his former professor, Morrie Schwartz, who was dying of ALS—has since been adapted into a TV movie and an off-Broadway production in 2002 before a New York City revival earlier this year.

And now, a new staging is bringing this two-hander play to the Winnipeg Jewish Theatre—starring The CJN's own arts podcaster, David Sklar. David took a few moments out of rehearsal to sit down with his director, Mariam Bernstein, to talk about the Jewish themes inherent to the story.

But before that, Ilana Zackon catches us up on her busy summer, which included a stop at the KlezKanada retreat in rural Quebec and the Ashkenaz Festival in downtown Toronto, and later offers up some nationwide arts listings, including a couple controversial films about the Middle East debuting at the Toronto International Film Festival this week.

Credits

• Hosts: Ilana Zackon and David Sklar
• Producer: Michael Fraiman
• Music: Sarah Segal-Lazar

Support The CJN

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter
• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to Culturally Jewish (Not sure how? Click here)