Former NSYNC star Lance Bass and husband Michael Turchin dropped by the HuffPost Live studios earlier this week to talk about their interfaith marriage, and to promote the amazingly titled 90-minute E! TV special “Lance Loves Michael: The Lance Bass Wedding,” which aired last night.

The couple, who married underneath a chuppah in a lavish ceremony in L.A. in December, are from totally different worlds: Bass is from a family of conservative Southern Baptists, and Turchin is Jewish.

Bass is hopeful that the broadcast will help to diminish the stigma around gay marriage, particularly in his family’s community: “Religion is the reason why we’re still fighting about the word ‘marriage,’ and I think this is going to be so important for people to see. Take religion out of it, it’s all just about love, and when you see my Republican, conservative, Southern Baptist parents… walk their gay son down the aisle, it shows you how everyone should act. You should just focus on the love and not worry about anything else.”

As for the interfaith aspect of their relationship, the couple plan to take a ‘spiritual but not religious’ approach to parenting.

“We’re going to introduce them to everything, and it’s up to them whatever they are drawn to. But I want to show them every walk of life and every culture and let them decide for themselves what they believe,” said Bass.

“I’m definitely going to teach them and show them their Jewish past, just so they have the understanding,” added Turchin. “But I’m not going to force them to believe anything or to adhere to any specific religious laws or anything like that. I think there’s more harm in that than good, I really do.”

(Image: Michael Turchin and Lance Bass, après-engagement, December 2013. Credit: Robin Marchant/Getty)

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Former NSYNC star Lance Bass married his partner, artist Michael Turchin, in Los Angeles on Saturday night. The couple met four years ago and became engaged in September 2013 after about a year-and-a-half of dating, but Bass told The New York Times that they were “best friends before anything got romantic.”

The grooms were given away by their mothers and “wed under a canopy in honor of Mr. Turchin’s Jewish heritage,” reports the Times. Sounds lovely, right? Right. But then, this is perplexing: “They decided to abandon the tradition of being surrounded by a wedding party and chose instead to ask four models, clad in ivory dresses, to mimic flower girls.” What does this even mean? Were the models children? Adult women pretending to be children? Why would you have complete strangers mimicking flower girls at your chuppah? I would love to know more. (Send tips/pics to elissa@jewcy.com).

Anyway, mazal tov Bass-Turchins! Long life and happiness to you both.

(Image: Michael Turchin and Lance Bass, après-engagement, December 2013. Credit: Robin Marchant/Getty)

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Drew Barrymore visited The View last week and talked about her marriage to Will Kopelman, who she called “a nice Jewish man from a nice Jewish family,” and their nearly four-moth-old daughter, Olive.

“We had a very traditional wedding ceremony with Rabbi Rubenstein,” Barrymore said to laughs from the crowd. “I did the ketubah and we wore the yarmulkes and we were under the chuppah.” There was some confusion among the hosts about the pronunciation of his last name, which means there might be some openings for a new intern over at ABC.

“I’m a shiksa. I do the seders, and we do Passover,” Barrymore explained, adding that daughter Olive will be raised Jewish. “It’s a beautiful faith and I’m so honored to be around it,” she told the hosts, “It’s so family-oriented and beautiful.”

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Rachel Shukert breaks down what Anne Hathaway’s recent Jewish wedding (omg!) says about the tribe in Tablet Magazine, and the verdict is good. We’re cool! And normal:

And that’s precisely the point. The current vogue for Jewishness, in weddings or otherwise, is less notable for its exoticism—the kind of thing that might seem irresistibly “edgy” to a Crayola-haired pop star who uses that word a lot—than for its normalcy. When Drew Barrymore stands under a chuppah, or Anne Hathaway accompanies her fiancé to Yom Kippur services, or the husbands of Queen Natalie and her lady-in-waiting Rachel Weisz (and believe me, the thoughts I have about Daniel “James Bond” Craig as the ultimate trophy husband could fill a doctoral dissertation) slip on a yarmulke or wrap themselves in a tallis, they’re doing so because it’s normal, and the mainstream nature of the ritual is the key to its desirability. For the first time in the history of America, Jewishness—and not just the bagels-and-lox part—is aspirational.

Intermarried A-Listers and Us [Tablet Magazine]

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In response, non-Jewish readers said they were inspired to include chuppahs in their own wedding ceremonies—prompting Keene to respond, fiercely, that it was “borderline offensive” for non-Jews to adopt some cultural and religious symbols for their own weddings. “We had people saying there are elements of our religion that are not open to appropriation, and there was a reaction of people saying, ‘How can you tell me no?’ ” Keene said. “But this is what happens in the wedding industry—people start to say, ‘Aren’t these all cute things to do at a wedding?’”

Brides’ Aid [Tablet Magazine]

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