Comedian Moshe Kasher is here to officially be your woke bae.

Wait, can we eve say “woke bae?” Don’t worry, Kasher is here to help with his brand new talk show, Problematic with Moshe Kasher, which premiered last night. The Comedy Central website describes the show thus:

“Moshe Kasher brings the internet’s most contentious topics into the studio for face-to-face discussions that are sure to make everyone uncomfortable. It’s a message board come to life – but this time, hiding behind a username isn’t an option.”

And, what do you know, without anonymity, the discourse becomes way more civil! (Plus, there’s some heavy editing at play— it looks like it took a lot to get the conversation down to the essentials at under half an hour.)

And that first half hour? Kasher dove in deep; the theme was “cultural appropriation,” with the central question: “Where is the line?” Over the course of the episode, he talked to a diverse group of artists about what cultural appropriation is, what it isn’t, and why it’s hurtful in the first place.

Since it is a Comedy Central show, there was also a rap explaining cultural appropriation, featuring white (and Jewish) rapper MC Serch. The only time Jewish culture made the list as a victim was kabbalah, but from Kenny G to the Beastie Boys, boy did Jews make the list of appropriators.

Kasher also referenced his own Jewishness a handful of times in the first episode, but it was almost always in a self-deprecating context. He doesn’t seem to be hosting the show as a member of a minority, but as a Straight White Dude. (Perhaps he’ll shift his perspective for future episodes, like people walking away from their traditional faiths in “Losing My Religion,” especially since he has Orthodox members of his family.)

Despite audience questions during the show as well, it wasn’t so much a message board as a 20-minute crash course. Kasher hosted delicately, and (rightfully) always deferred to his guests. And the show in general has a really gentle tone, which takes away most of the bite that could be entertaining but is ultimately more productive. There’s no time for real deep dives, so we’ll see what Episode 2, exploring “Is technology ruining our brains?” can do with the format.

But there’s value to a show that explores difficult topics like race in a thoughtful, if not particularly sophisticated way. Think of it like this: in the wake of recent family seders, maybe sitting down a relative in front of an episode of Kasher’s show will do more to teach them than yelling on your third glass of wine.

Problematic with Moshe Kasher airs on Tuesday nights at 10/9 p.m. Central on Comedy Central.

Image via Comedy Central

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Apparently, Comedy Central’s Roasts aren’t all fun and games, as they appear to be. On stage, the roasters laugh at the crude jokes that come their way, but for some, like Sarah Silverman, they hurt. On W. Kamau Bell’s show Totally Biased, Silverman explained that at the Roast of James Franco, the jokes targeted at her age, 42, left her “in bed for two days,” which may or may not have been hyperbolic—it’s hard to know with comics.

Me being old, first of all, at the roast? — completely took me by surprise … Because it’s personal, that is just so woman-based. I wasn’t even the oldest one on that dais. I’m the same age as fresh-faced new star W. Kamau Bell! I feel like it’s a part of, as soon as a woman gets to an age where she has opinions and she’s vital and she’s strong, she’s systematically shamed into hiding under a rock. And this is by progressive pop-culture people! You know what I mean? It’s really odd! I feel bad that it cut me. Because I should be like this about it (brushing her hand off her shoulder). I feel like your joke is that I’m still alive. My crime is not dying.

In the shadow of all the evening’s gay jokes, the jokes directed at Silverman’s age could’ve gone unnoticed. Thanks for speaking out, Silverman.

You can watch the whole thing here:

(Photo by Joan Garvin/Wikimedia)

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Guess what, you guys? Andy Samberg was added to the list of Comedy Central’s Roast of James Franco this Labor Day. Roasts are usually done on Hollywood’s easiest targets—Franco’s basically halfway there—like Pamela Anderson, and Charlie Sheen. The roasters are typically made up of the same crowd—Whitney Cummings, Jeff Ross, Lisa Lampanelli— but Franco’s appointment has garnered an impressive comedic roster, Entertainment Weekly reports:

Comedy Central is turning up the celebrity heat on its roast of James Franco: Parks and Recreation star Aziz Ansari and SNL vet/Brooklyn Nine-Nine star Andy Samberg have been added to the roster of comedians and actors who will take their best shots at the thespian/director/writer/producer/Oscar host. The network previously announced that Jonah Hill, Bill Hader, Nick Kroll, Natasha Leggero, Jeff Ross, and Sarah Silverman will serve as roasters, while Franco’s This is the End/Pineapple Express/Freaks & Geeks co-star Seth Rogen emcees the festivities as Roast Master.

This is going to be fun.

(Photo by Jason LaVeris/Getty)

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A hilarious new show debuted last night on Comedy Central, and it’s called The Ben Show. The show follows Ben Hoffman, a Southern Jew with a raunchy sense of humor and quick wit. Viewers get a picture of Hoffman’s day-to-day adventures, with segments featuring his real-life dad, therapist, and ex-girlfriends.

Throughout the premiere we find him obsessing over buying a gun (compensation for something else, we soon learn) and auditioning grandmothers for a fake ‘Gangster Granny’ movie.

Naturally, I had to talk to him.

So tell me a little bit about The Ben Show. What should viewers expect?

It’s out there. It’s pretty raunchy. It’s the oddest mix of filth and reality that I’ve ever seen on TV. And I have my nice Jewish dad on there a lot. On a later episode I introduce my dad via Skype to a prostitute, so there’s something for everyone. And to let Jewcy know, in Episode 5 I go back to Kentucky and visit the synagogue where I was a bar mitzvah. It is sadly now a pizza parlor.

Is there a big Jewish population in Kentucky?

The year of my bar mitzvah there were four Jews in my graduating Hebrew school class. My rabbi was blind and had one leg. The school was in this rickety, old building downtown. He didn’t like his fake leg so he took it off and put it on his desk when it bothered him. So I’m 13 years old staring at this rabbi with no leg and his black socks are rolled up high and match his dark black sunglasses. So I don’t see his eyes, but the sunglasses were also uncomfortable so he would take them off too. His eyes would be rolling back in his head and his fake leg was on the table. I would cling my fingers to the car door like please, mom, I don’t want to go in there!

What’s your favorite Jewish food? 

Growing up in Kentucky there was no such thing as a Jewish deli. My mom’s from Nashville, so I have a lot of family there. We’d go for Passover and have matzoh ball soup. Now that I’m in LA, the idea I can drive to a deli and get matzoh ball soup anytime I want. It’s is crazy. I eat it three times a week either at Greenblatt’s or Canter’s. I still can’t get over it. I used to get it twice a year.

Who are some of your comedy idols?

Being a neurotic Jew, my friends would show me Woody Allen movies and say, dude you got to see this, this guy is like you. I was such a neurotic kid, full of anxiety. I looked nothing like him but they were like you have to see this movie Annie Hall, Basically what they were saying was this Jew I know acts like the other Jew I know. And then I discovered Al Brooks later. Also Norm Macdonald, David Letterman, and Howard Stern.

In the first episode we see you in therapy. How long have you been going? 

I’ve been in and out for 15 years. They’ve got my money for life. 

Your dad seems like a great sport on the show. What’s he like?

He’s a doctor from Kentucky so he has no idea what’s going on, so he’s like ‘if you want me to do it ill do it.’ What I like about him on the show is that I’m not really making fun of him, my dad’s funnier than me. I like the idea of having a dad who is funnier than I am. Growing up people would always come over and say your dad is so cool, and later I got to appreciate his sense of humor.

What was your childhood like? 

I had undiagnosed ADD as a child so I only watched The Naked Gun and Letterman. When you have ADD you are blessed and cursed, but I had amazing memory skills. I would get good enough grades to not get yelled at but still spaced out. I had no interest in school but had great interest in music and comedy. So I would go home put in my headphones and watch Seinfeld and listen to Aerosmith and I’d go sleep.

Where did you go to college? 

I started at Tulane. My parents met there. Here’s how lazy I was: Senior year in high school my parents told me that since they went to Tulane, it would be the easiest place for me to get in. So it was the only application I filled out, that and Emory and Syracuse. I got in everywhere. I hated Tulane.

How realistic is your show? Is your love life as bad as you describe?

It’s all real. In Episode 4 you actually see me on a blind date. When I try to make out with her she pushed me off, but we stayed friends. Obviously the sketches are silly but everything between the sketches is real and everything I say is real, as are all the people in my life. So when I say I can’t get girls, I ain’t lying.

I got my face on a billboard on Sunset Blvd and still can’t get girls. My brother and I were driving around the other day and got out and took pictures in front. I felt like the biggest douche bag.

What was your career like leading up to The Ben Show?
 
I moved out here and I wanted to be a writer, so I kept getting writing gigs and I landed a job on this Current TV show, InfoMania. They hired me as a writer and then I was on camera and I did that for years, and as much as I complained about it and as much as no one was watching, it did get me enough attention to get noticed.

I got a job shortly after writing for Norm Macdonald, and Comedy Central liked my work and asked me to be a correspondent. So then I started writing for The Roast and other shows and they were like if you ever want to pitch a show to us let us know. I pretended I didn’t care but of course that’s what I wanted. I didn’t move to LA to be ignored.

I really made the greatest pilot they’ve ever seen. It was so out there and so dirty. They loved it. It was a mix of filth and heart. The pilot was a sample to get better writing gigs but they loved the pilot. They were like let’s make this show and that’s when the Jewish anxiety kicked in.

It seems like you incorporate a lot of your own music throughout the show. How long have you been playing guitar?

Since I was a kid. I’ve always been obsessed with music. My brother is in the band Scissor Sisters. You think I got it rough? He’s gay Jew from Kentucky. I take credit for getting him into music, and he became a rock star of course. But I was really into music before him so when he gets Grammy nominations and stuff I take credit. But a lot of the show you have this generic, catalog music and I hate that. I thought I could play my own music so I did most of it myself. It was half out of ego and half of just being sick of hearing the same old music on TV shows.

Why should Jewcy readers watch The Ben Show? 

If you want to see a neurotic Jew from Kentucky and how he navigates his life, watch my show. The viewers are going to feel like they’re looking in the mirror. Growing up Jewish in Kentucky, I wasn’t particularly religious but it was important to my parents that I have a bar mitzvah.

Being Jewish was a big part of my identity, more for other people than for me. I was known as the Jew. So basically what you’re seeing is the result of all that categorization. I go overboard sometimes with Jewish humor. My Jewish reference points were from documentaries on TV or from Mel Brooks on the tonight show. I had no culture of it in my life. It’s a weird life of a Southern Jew.

***

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The post Talking to Ben Hoffman of the New Comedy Central Series, ‘The Ben Show’ appeared first on Jewcy.

• Our columnist Dvora Meyers on the guy who really wanted her to try pork. [Pork Memoirs]

• How I Met Your Mother get renewed for a ninth (and final!) season, and Jewish star Josh Radnor is excited for the “victory lap.” [Access Hollywood]

• Joe Winkler talks to the guys behind the Comedy Central show Workaholics. [Splitsider]

• Rachel Shukert says Chuck Schumer is America’s Uncle Leo. [Tablet]

• Drew Barrymore talks about Olive, hew baby with husband Will Kopelman. [HuffPost]

• Naturally, Jon Stewart had his own take on the Israeli elections: Circumdecision 5773. [The Daily Show]

The post Daily Jewce: Jon Stewart on the Israeli Elections, Josh Radnor’s Victory Lap appeared first on Jewcy.

While we generally leave journalists and political pundits to discuss and predict what the immediate future may bring, there are scores of nerdy, computer-literate, and otherwise “indoor” types who formulate what will happen in the next millennia, instead of in the next fiscal quarter. These are our dear and not-so-near science-fiction writers, whose pimply-faced audiences are turning their inventions into realities as we tweet. One of their more lighthearted prophecies is the satirical animated series Futurama, created by David X. Cohen and The Simpsons’ Matt Groening, which addresses the issues of life in 31st-century “New New York.”

The series, which was canceled by Fox in 2003 and revived by Comedy Central in 2008 due to high DVD sales and a committed fanbase, much like Family Guy, follows the dysfunctional misadventures of the crew of Planet Express, a dismally inefficient intergalactic delivery service. Under the auspices of the geriatric mad scientist Prof. Farnsworth, the business serves as a courier for such futuristic items like dark matter energy, alien aphrodisiacs, and honey from giant space bees. In this not-so-advanced landscape, aliens and mutants live alongside humans, hovercars and pneumatic tube travel are realities, and the preserved head of Richard Nixon is President of Earth.

The world of Futurama can also provide us with some foresight on what the Jewish legacy might be like in a thousand years through Dr. John Zoidberg: The pathetic and klutzy lobster-like extraterrestrial with questionable medical skills and a strong Yiddish accent, who also happens to be the resident doctor of Planet Express.

Disliked and ignored by virtually everyone on the show, this lab coat-donning crustaceous alien is perpetually scavenging for garbage scraps as well as any iota of sociable interaction and approval—(he is so unlikeable that you might get punched in the face for even imitating him. Unlike most other secondary characters on the show, Zoidberg is rarely seen engaging in any dialogue with others—he exists mainly as an entertaining and foolish sideshow, recalling Chaplin-esque misadventures and the reckless blunders of the Three Stooges. His eager desire for attention has even found its way into Internet culture with the popular “Why not Zoidberg?” meme—something that he never actually says in the show but was created as a pastiche from his need for recognition and Yiddish rhetoric.

Despite Zoidberg’s accent, which voice actor Billy West claims was influenced by “marble-mouthed” Jewish actor George Jessel as well as other “rabbinical” and Bronx voices (which is complemented by telltale grammatical constructions along the lines of “You want I should put it here?”), he and others of his species are never explicitly referenced as Jewish. We get many clues, however, such as the episode featuring his burnt-out movie star uncle Harold Zoid—who was voiced by the inimitable voice and character actor Hank Azaria (the same year he starred in a TV movie about the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising)—that recalls the golden, and largely Jewish, age of Hollywood.

A later season showcases Zoidberg’s home planet Decapod 10, full of even thicker-accented Ashkenazi shellfish (perhaps planet Decapod 9 is full of Sephardic crabs?). Further solidifying his Jew cred, in my personal favorite Zoidberg moment and one particularly telling of his cultural and stereotypical Jewishness, he has a flashback of his mother reprimanding his dream to become a comedian and suggests he become a respectable doctor—yet she later reprimands him once more for being spineless and giving up his dream of becoming a comedian by going to medical school.

Yet aside from accents and behavior, nowhere does it ever mention that Zoidberg or his fellow trayf crustaceans are Jewish. Interestingly enough, the only explicitly Jewish characters on Futurama are a handful of robots—we witness a “Goldborg Bot Mitzvah,” complete with robot hora dancing, a banner reading “today you are a robot” in Hebrew, and a rabbi explaining his attitude toward Robot Jesus—he believes he was built, and well programmed, but not the robot messiah.

The Jewish robot life cycle also includes “Robanukah,” a holiday that spurs Bender, Planet Express’ mischievous robot, to sing a song explaining the traditional six and a half weeks of oil wrestling—which eventually faces a crisis when his oil supply runs short two weeks, prompting Bender to descry that he needs oil for the whole holiday since it isn’t a “lousy Reform Robanukah.” Although Zoidberg’s Jewishness is less explicit than the robots’, he is still clearly Jewish. As others have noted, unlike the Irish vaudeville comedy of The Simpsons, Futurama is pervaded by the Jewishness of its borscht-belt comedy and Woody Allen-esque despair, giving Zoidberg and others their distinct and not-so-kosher personalities.

Given his disguised yiddishkeit, Zoidberg appropriately plays the parts of the Jewish character types the schlemiel and schlimazel—the one who spills the soup and the one who gets spilled on. While one could lament that the legacy of Jewishness in Futurama is embodied by Zoidberg’s overwhelming ineptitude, it’s clear that the series serves as one more atomic bond in the ever-strong molecular chain between Jews and geekdom. And above everything else, I’m certainly glad that at least according to Futurama, Jewish humor has survived for another thousand years.

Previously on Network Jews:

Jean-Ralphio, the status-obsessed sidekick on Parks and Recreation.

Shoshanna, the scene-stealing afterthought on Girls.

Ruxin, the fantasy football-obsessed jerk on The League.

The post Network Jews: Dr. John Zoidberg, the Klutzy Jewish Crustacean on ‘Futurama’ appeared first on Jewcy.

• Orthodox rapper Shyne is not happy about Rick Ross’ “Black Bar Mitzvah” mixtape.

• Comedian Gabe Liedman, even funny over email.

• Art Spiegelman’s Manhattan high school now has a very cool glass-paneled mural made by the Maus artist.

• Emory Dental School, not a big fan of the Jews.

• Broad City, the hilarious Internet brainchild of Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer, is getting the pilot treatment on Comedy Central.

• New Girl, meet Jew Girl. What would Schmidt say?

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The very funny Julie Klausner, who was a 2010 Big Jewcy and is currently spearheading a bold campaign to pet Duke, the Bush’s Beans dog, also has a lot to say about politics. In an interview with Comedy Central’s Indecision, Klausner talks about Walter Mondale, Pitbull, and Eleanor Roosevelt’s sexy ghost. Here’s a snippet:

If you could meet any political figure, living or dead, who would it be?

Definitely not Hitler. I’m not looking to change any minds with a single example. I guess Teddy Roosevelt, unless he wanted to go hunting. I’m not into killing rhinos, but I’d love to watch him tuck into a meal and I’d happily walk his dog with him around his property. And depending on how things went, maybe I’d angle for a mustache ride as well.

You’re trapped in an elevator with the president. Strangely enough, you also have a superpower: the ability to make him do one thing of your choosing. What would you have him do?

Obama, right? Definitely oral. Haha! I’m joking. Obviously, I’d get him to commit to marriage equality.

She has our vote.

Previously: The Most Jewish Episodes Of Julie Klausner’s ‘How Was Your Week’ Podcast
The Big Jewcy: Julie Klausner, Writer
Jewcy Interviews: Julie Klausner

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Silverman also gives a visual example, using a small dog, of the sexual favor she’s offering the Jewish billionaire (to climax, she promises). She points out that all the other Republican billionaires are giving money to Romney, but “How many of them are getting scissored by a bikini-bottomed Jewess with big naturals?”

This isn’t Silverman’s first foray into politics, of course—in 2008, she famously urged Jews to go down to Florida and tell their grandparents to vote for Obama—but this year she’s going big. In an interview with Vanity Fair last week, Silverman shared a joke she had written with the Republican National Convention in mind:

I wanted to say that during that week, we should hold a vigil or ask for a moment of silence for the literally billions of tiny Republicans who will be lost in hookers’ assholes that week. I told it to my dad and he said, “You mean vaginas!” And I said, “No, Daddy. Because they don’t want to get [the women] pregnant, and they don’t want to wear condoms.” And he was like, “Oh, you’re right.” It was such a messed-up conversation.

(Art by Margarita Korol)

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But when South Park finishes its improbable run, future generations will view it as an incomparable document of its time. The show—arguably more sustained in both relevance and quality than its animated contemporaries The Simpsons and Family Guy—will endure because South Park manages the binary requisites for cultural longevity: it succeeds in explaining its era and, more importantly, the show has heart.

The tragedy of South Park is that it remains culturally defined by specific controversies. In a 2006 two-part episode, the writers attempted to feature animated images of the Islamic prophet Mohammed to protest censorship in the wake of the Danish cartoon scandal (Comedy Central blocked them out after receiving death threats). What was overshadowed by the episode’s controversial message were jokes the writers made about its rival Family Guy. As with many other episodes, the broader context remained unexamined and the show, which is consistently a thoughtful and equally-offending American conversation, was dismissed for its lowbrow flourishes.

With the Jews, it’s no different. While the show’s detractors see only anti-Semitism (or the myriad boundary lines of identity politics), many fail to even investigate the extremely blunt points the show attempts to make, which often stem from topical real life. Consider Kyle Broflovski, the major Jewish character, who was actually created in the image of the show’s co-creator Matt Stone.

In interviews, the Jewfro-ed Stone cites his experience growing up as the only Jewish kid in his predominantly Christian hometown of Conifer, Colorado. Accordingly, the character Kyle (whom Stone voices) is also Jewfro-ed and shares Stone’s birthday on the show. Kyle is outspoken, morally righteous, and often insecure about his place adrift in the Midwest. Fearing the worst about his brother Ike’s impending bris, Kyle helps him escape. When the school’s most unpopular kid is revealed to have no Facebook friends, Kyle befriends him, losing everything in the process.

In an episode early in the first season, South Park covers the War on Christmas controversy that dominated the news cycles in the late 1990s. For the sake of tolerance, citizens of the town attempt to wash out religion from the school’s Christmas pageant. Much of the episode is a treatise on the life of an American Jewish family in a place where Jews are scarce, especially for Kyle, a Jewish kid struck between belonging and not.

Kyle’s ridiculous song “A Lonely Jew on Christmas” is high on sentimentality and an insider brand of exlusion. When Kyle’s stereotypically Jewish mother Sheila (who in the episode becomes the target of a once-famous song about her particularly Jewish obstinacy; the Estonian version will blow your mind) argues that the emphasis on Christianity in the school play offends the Jewish community, a teacher replies by shouting back, “You are the Jewish community!” It’s hard to imagine that this line and its specific verisimilitude could work its way into an episode of the show without some authentic experience behind it.

But the approach to South Park’s Jewish themes comes most often through Kyle’s confrontations with his foil Eric Cartman, the show’s best known and most incendiary character. Consider this amazing collection of (just some) of Cartman’s anti-Semitic utterances throughout the series. In the course of this minute-plus clip, Cartman uses the word Jew as a noun, adjective, and verb. (A note for novices: The most pernicious of the utterances in this clip is during an episode in which Cartman pretends to have Tourette’s Syndrome so he can say whatever he wants and still seem noble.)

While this compilation would no doubt give Abe Foxman shortness of breath (the accompanying user comments enabled by this clip are also wildly problematic), these moments isolated from their context don’t show Kyle fighting back, a microcosm for the shortchange the show receives from worried parents and critics.

Then, of course, there is the episode when the town is about to be flooded and Cartman is willing to save Kyle’s life if Kyle hands over the bag of Jew gold that “all Jews carry around their necks.” Kyle tries to tell Cartman he’s insane, but Cartman persists. Kyle then produces a bag from around his neck and Cartman calls it out for being the decoy bag of Jew gold that every Jew carries. Rather than give him the real bag, Kyle throws into the maelstrom below. It’s funny. You have to see it.

Previously on Network Jews:

Ziva David, the ass-kicking Mossad agent on CBS’s naval drama NCIS

Rachel Berry, the overachieving Jewish superstar-in-training on Fox’s Glee

Maurice Levy, the shyster lawyer on David Simon’s HBO show, The Wire

Adam Chandler is a contributing editor at Tablet Magazine. He Tweets at @AllMyChandler.

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