Casting a shadow

 I don't mean to belabor the whole Shylock topic -- I know I have written about him as character and as Jew elsewhere and I know that I have made reference to current controversy regarding a particular actor playing the role but I was struck with an idea this morning and it was too good not to share.

Let's assume that an acting troupe has the ability to play A Comedy of Errors. That play has within it 2 sets of twins. Leverage that in the casting of Merchant. Have two twins play Antonio and Shylock, and the other two play Bassanio and the Prince of Morocco (have those two be a bit swarthier in general appearance, or at least well tanned).

Then, for the Shylock character, don't have him wear anything that would make him externally associated with being Jewish. Don't have him "act" Jewish, or don ritual clothing. Have his Jewishness be a function only of what others say about him. Same for Morocco -- when he says that he is considered good looking where he lives, that will be doubly powerful if he looks like the person whom Portia "fell in love with" based only on those same looks.

There is nothing that I can recall, other than the labeling of the characters, that identifies Shylock as Jewish. Yes, he has a beard. I assume that that wasn't unique to Jews at the time. Yes, he says he will go to a synagogue, but that is external to who he is -- it can't be seen on him when he walks the streets. He is a money lender, but in a sense, so is Antonio. Yes, he wore gaberdine. Unless someone wants to make the case that this was a fabric reserved as a clothing for Jews (or if it is the fabric from which a yellow star is crafted so that there is some ability to differentiate between Jew and non-Jew) the calling it "my JEWISH gaberdine" would make the label the only distinguishing point.

Have characters put the stress on the one factor -- the name. Have them say it slowly and with derision, trying to force to "Jewishness" in to its sound (I recall anti-semites referring to me as "Shlomo" though that is not my name, because it sounded Jewish enough that they could say it as an insult). Have Shylock say his and his friends' names quickly and with little that would make them sound any different. True, Tubal, Chus and Shylock are not classic Italian names so they would naturally sound alien, but they can be glossed over (seasoned in the charge, if you will) so that they need not be a focus. But the non-Jews drag them out to make their point.

If we, as readers, want to see the true insidiousness of anti-semitism, wouldn't the best proof be exactly what Shylock argues -- that Jews are EXACTLY like non-Jews? Then the hatred is only about names and labels, not anything that really is part of the character! And Portia's racism (judging based on geography and association with a skin color which might not, were it associated with another area, be problematic) is laid bare.

Instead of trying to show that the Jew is visibly different, let's show that your average, run of the mill Jew, looks, sounds and lives much like those around him. He tries to blend in and even assimilate, at least in public, and yet it does him no good. He holds a hatred partially based in the same use of labels (hating because they are Christian) but he can also point to actions whereas they cannot.

To my mind, this would present a much more damning picture of the racism, anti-semitism and blind and blunt meanness of the Characters in the play. It would create a more resonating expose on how and why people hate when they hate without cause, distilling their venom through nothing more than a label, one that cannot be corroborated or correlated to any actions by the named "Jew."

You want a version of the play that blows the lid off of evil, try it this way.

---------------***---------------

Bassanio and Morocco never appear on stage together. The same actor can be used for both roles. No change in clothing.

Yeah I'm serious

 Over time, I have entered into a variety of arguments. Tis true, tis a pity, tis a pity, tis true. But arguments often develop because I apply critical thinking to positions and demand consistency, clarity or self-awareness and people don't like that stuff. What occasionally happens is that I, having looked at an opposing viewpoint, point out logical flaws and, even if I don't necessarily believe in the opposing side, assume it in order to force my sparring partner to more fully articulate his position.

This usually leads to the other person accusing me of being obtuse. Obtuse is a fancy word for "you don't accept the rectitude of my position even though you know you should because you pretend not to understand it." Truth is, though, that I understand it all too well and see that it isn't fully right. Or maybe, the truth is that, having looked at the position critically, I really don't understand it, either in its form or application.

Either way, I get accused of being argumentative and this seems to absolve my opponent from having to explore and explain the distinctions and specifics which would distinguish his position from any other and allow it to be right.

I'm in the midst of one of those arguments right now. And the fact is, I don't know exactly how I feel about the issue at hand. I do know that, on its face, the opposing position has problems.

Is it acceptable for a non-Jewish actor to play a Jew. I know, I have discussed this before. It is worth thinking about. Is it different from a white actor playing a non-white? Does the role matter? The method of associating the character with the ethnic group? The intent of the work as a whole? The actual content of the lines or actions of the actor? Was either Soul Man or White Chicks offensive? What about Olivier's Othello? Am I annoyed at Pacino's Shylock? What about Tom Hanks' Israeli on SNL (Jon Lovitz is Jewish) or Eddie Murphy's "White Like Me"? Peggy Lee in The Lady and the Tramp? Or Peter Sellers (among others) as Charlie Chan? Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll?

Which sub-demographic has the right to protect its presentation in media? Is that limited to some antiquated understanding of race? What about geography, gender, religion, political ideology or hair color? Does self-identification mitigate or does that actually inflame? Can only certain groups be offended while others have to accept being mis-represented for some point of equity or social critique? Is rage the province of only some?

People tell me "it's different" and I say, "how?" They say, "you know" and I say, "no, I don't." Then they call me obtuse but I really don't know how it is different. I want a clearly articulated difference that would excuse a non-Jewish actor playing a Jew in a Shakespearean play but still condemn a non-black actor playing a black role in a Shakespearean play in 2022. Then I want to see if that same distinction would help me differentiate when applied to every case of ethnic/racial (etc) appropriation. If, at any point, the answer is just "well, not that, but that's different" then I demand that whoever says that goes back, tweaks the definition so that it can be applied consistently and starts over.

Otherwise, I will stick to my ("argumentative") guns and insist, "if you can't explain to me how it is different, then what right do you have to insist that it is different?"

But remember -- this doesn't mean that I don't, deep down, accept that it is different. I'm just admitting that I'm uncomfortable with a dogmatic position and I would rather close scrutiny and analysis than blindly following.

------10 minutes later-------

I'm working on distinctions, just to help out.

First, we have 2 categories:

1. In which actors play a role in which a defining feature of that role is membership in a group and the actor is not a member. So the actor has to affect and adopt mannerisms, appearances or accoutrements that identify him as a member of a group. Think much of the cast of A Stranger Among Us. Those were actors playing Jews, so they adopt a look to come of as Jews.

2. In which characters, themselves, are trying to pass as another group so the actor adopts the various bits because that's what his character has to do (Mrs. Doubtfire, Gene Wilder in Silver Streak). The actor and role are not of that group and (false) group identification is part of the plot. 

I still don't know which one is worse, and this distinction clearly doesn't clarify the acceptability of some and not others. It also doesn't account for the history and other variables.

Honoring parents under the law

I used to feel bad for orphans. OK, that came out wrong. Please allow me to explain.

As a religious Jew, I try to view my responsibility to abide by and fulfill the commandments as an opportunity, not just as a burden. I tried to take on things that gave me the chance to complete myself through making myself bound to more laws. Yes, there are limits to this (I haven't moved to Israel and become a farmer, for example). I also recognized that being given more laws is, in some ways, a gift. Sure, it can be a burden -- demanding of my time and energy all day and night long, limiting my behaviors in uncomfortable ways, but to remove the burden also stops me from improving.

One major commandment is to honor parents -- it is not always easy or clearly defined, but it is really important and that's neat, but what of those who do not have parents? Like, you know, orphans. They don't have the opportunity to fulfill this obligation because they don't have parents and that's sad. Yes, not having parents is sad for many reasons, but I'm just looking at the "satisfying the law" dimension.

I looked at the commandment -- kabed et avicha v'et imecha. Honor your father and your mother. The talmud (in Ketubot 103, for example, using Sefaria.org's translation) looks at the precise wording and sees that the inclusion of potentially superfluous words and letters allows the law to be understood as applying to more than just the 2 biological parents

The Gemara asks: Honoring a father’s wife is also required by Torah law, as it is taught in a baraita: Honor your father [et avikha] and your mother [ve’et immekha]. The preposition et in the phrase: Your father; this teaches that you must honor your father’s wife. Similarly, the preposition et in the phrase: And your mother; this teaches that you must honor your mother’s husband. And the extra letter vav, which is appended as a prefix in the phrase “ve’et immekha” is included in order to add your older brother to those who must be honored.

But the orphan who is an only child? Still out of luck.

The Torah, though, has thought of everything. I was considering a completely separate story related to Moses and his brother, Aharon. The talmud understands the event as follows (Sanhedrin 19b, via sefaria again)

Rabbi Shmuel bar Naḥmani says that Rabbi Yonatan says: Anyone who teaches another person’s son Torah, the verse ascribes him credit as if he sired him, as it is stated: “Now these are the generations of Aaron and Moses” (Numbers 3:1), and it is written immediately afterward: “And these are the names of the sons of Aaron: Nadav the firstborn and Avihu, Eleazar, and Ithamar” (Numbers 3:2), but it does not mention the names of Moses’ children. This serves to say to you that Aaron sired his children, but Moses taught them Torah. Therefore, the children were also called by his name.

A write up at https://torah.org/torah-portion/ravfrand-5763-bamidbar/ clarifies that this occurs when the teacher acts in a way beyond just a generic passing along of information.

But this doesn't solve the problem that the orphan has, does it? Well, not until the mishna in Avot (1:6) comes along and connects the dots (from Sefaria emphasis mine) and says "aseh lecha rav":

Joshua ben Perahiah and Nittai the Arbelite received [the oral tradition] from them. Joshua ben Perahiah used to say: appoint for thyself a teacher, and acquire for thyself a companion and judge all men with the scale weighted in his favor.

 How does this help? The orphan, therefore, has an obligation to set for himself a rav, a teacher (but not some more generic voice -- someone who connects with him and teaches him in a closer and more significant way, even if the content is limited). Then the orphan will be obligated, under the terms of the "honor your father and mother" verse as applying to a teacher/rav, to honor that teacher. Now the orphan has the opportunity, indeed, the requirement, to honor in the same way (or at least a parallel way) as anyone who has parents, and even an adult who loses parents is not exempted, but in fact, must continue to find teachers throughout his life and honor them. The obligation to continue learning becomes a conduit through which anyone and everyone can fulfill the commandment to respect!

So, yeah, I still feel sorry for orphans, but I feel excited that they have a chance to fulfill a commandment that one might have thought excludes them, and that's still something special.

That playing is the thing

 

Now something a bit more serious and possibly controversial.

I'm not in favor of blackface, but I don't know why. While a minstrel show might have had an actor using makeup to lampoon a black person, and present a caricature of some stereotypical (and insulting) image of a black person, I'm still not exactly sure what is wrong with that (in an absolute sense). Making fun of people is either totally OK by you, or wrong. Let's explore:

If you think that making fun of a person or a group, by pointing out physical, intellectual, mental or sociological traits, practices or beliefs is a valid source for humor, then you are OK with Polish jokes, mocking reporters with physical limitations, and poking fun at Charles Manson because he's out of his gourd. Everyone is fair game and in all ways. Sticks and stones etc.

If you think that jokes focused on a person or group because of some aspect of group identity are wrong, then you are against the song "Short People," the TV show "Hogan's Heroes" most of "Blazing Saddles" and any comments which make fun of anti-vaxxers, flat earthers and any other conspiracy theorist. Membership in a group by dint of physical, ethnic or socio-cultural affiliation is sacred and we can't joke about it.

Next, we have to figure out if you are against cultural appropriation, one group's or group member's using some aspect of another group's identity when crafting its own sense of self (even if temporarily). If getting dreadlocks or using a particular style of speech or dress is improper because one cannot take that which "belongs" to another group, then we have to condemn the entirety of Hollywood. If the appropriation was to underscore the power of stereotypes then that act is doubly offensive, right?

Recently, it has even been seen as wrong to have roles that were intended for one group to be recast as not of that group so actors from outside can play the role (cf here for more). And having actors from one group PORTRAY someone of another group even if sincerely? No good, it seems.

Well, sometimes apparently. Sometimes not. No one raised a fuss when Cote de Pablo played an Israeli on NCIS. I guess that there just aren't any Israelis in Hollywood. And then I started getting an ad in my faMceEboTokA newsfeed for a new production of The Merchant of Venice. I'm a fan of the play and have written about it a few times. I'm too tired to link, but if you search my blog for "Shylock" you will find a couple of posts about him.

A recent, fancy movie version of it had Al Pacino as Shylock. Pacino is not Jewish. People have mixed reactions when talking about Olivier as Othello, but was there any backlash to Pacino playing a Jew? Not as far as I know. I guess there are no Jews in Hollywood so it is OK to use a non-Jew to play the role. Or maybe it is because some of his best friends are Jewish so he's an honorary Jew...I wonder if there can be an equivalent honorary status in other groups that would allow non-members to pass for the sake of their acting roles and not be vilified.

A new production of the play has a black actor named John Douglas Thompson as Shylock. As far as my research has shown (and if I am wrong, profuse apologies) this actor is not Jewish. But he will be playing a Jew on stage, and one who is, by some, thought to typify the worst racial stereotypes of Jews.

Why is this OK? Is the role being rewritten so the Shylock character is no longer Jewish? I don't think so. And does it matter to me that he is black? Certainly not -- there are plenty of Black Jews around. Simply put, he isn't Jewish, and his playing the role of a Jew, having to adopt whatever "mannerisms" he thinks would make his portrayal more believable is therefore as offensive to me as blackface might be to someone else. This is appropriation in the perpetuation of stereotypical and offensive presentation of a group.

And yet no one else seems bothered by this. One wonders why that is.

A Shot at the Olympics

 OK, hear me out -- I want to change some Olympic sports to make them better.

I found myself watching the Olympics last week. I wasn't looking for me, but there I was, right where I had left me.

Before the "opening ceremony" there were events being held and, with nothing else to watch on TV, I tucked in to some curling. I enjoy watching curling because it takes all the excitement of shuffleboard, throws in a dash of cornhole, and, like a good glass of rose, adds ice. People wearing comfy pants suits slide large rocks towards other rocks while other people furiously sweep the ice while sliding along on one foot. Then, once both teams have had ample opportunity to knock each other's rocks around, the announcer, clearly out of breath from all the tension, use figures of speech which mean nothing to anyone not currently curling, and point out that 3 rocks from one team are closer to a bulls eye than the closest rock from another team and this hasn't happened since some nail biting championship on a frozen pond in Sweden in 1805.

Like I said, I like curling.

But then I became engaged in a conversation about the Olympics (not about my guilt at watching them amidst the political debacle that is foreign policy and human rights) and the question was whether curling is my favorite sport in the winter games. Well, the conversation started with my heated defense of curling as a sport (and my attack on artistic demonstrations based on subjective scoring as "sports") and we started discussing other events and picking favorites. I do like ski jumping, as long as the score is based solely on distance and "did he not die" with no concern about form or such. I like speed skating because it is NASCAR on ice - we all only watch it to see when there will be a huge pile up with razor blades strapped to feet standing in for the internal combustion engine which could explode at any minute. I like hockey because, well, hockey and I think that luge (or skeleton) is every 8 year old's dream: maintaining composure while hurtling down an icy embankment on a minimal sled with only the illusion of control. Pretty awesome.

But my favorite is biathlon. Unlike other winter sports, participants get to shoot things. I know, right?

Skiers strap a rifle to their backs and start skiing. When they get their heart rate up to a ridiculous level, they then stop, have to calm the heck down and shoot targets. If they miss, they get docked time (or maybe they have to ski more, I don't know...). They then get up, ski more and then shoot more. So they are messing with heart rates, and firing guns. In terms of approach, it speaks to me. But I think that it could be made better. Why do we limit their skiing to cross-country, and why do they have to stop to shoot thing? If we have learned anything from such documentaries as the various James Bond films, it is that shooting guns WHILE skiing is really tough, possibly Olympic level tough. We should have the biathletes have to shoot during the skiing portion, and if we have someone shoot back, even better! And if the competitors have to shoot each other? Brilliant! We already have a "starter's pistol" all I'm asking is that we stop just aiming it up in the air.

Now hold on -- before you start accusing me of championing the senseless slaughter of the world's top skiers, understand: I'd be totally OK if we used paint-ball guns or some sort of lazer tag approach. I'm ridiculous, not evil so step the heck off, friend. I just want to see people shoot stuff. I'm not even demanding explosions (which made golf watchable), or snow mobiles or nothing. I'm not specifically saying "no" to these options, but I'm not demanding them. Explosions were a demonstration sport in 1996 but the idea was ahead of its time.

Then, on to other sports, because if there is one thing we can agree on, it is that using weapons makes sports more fun. Consider football. Yes, it is a hoot and a holler to watch grown men jump on each other until shards of bone stick through their skin, or they have to enter a blue tent and read the concussion protocols of the elders of something, but add in guns? Who could turn that off? Rollerball? Excellent (if you haven't read it or seen the movie, do so). Slapshot? A good bit of violence ruined by a male stripper.  Even the summer Olympics can get involved!

So, yeah, I like curling, but I can only imagine how much more popular the sport would be if the players could install punji pits or hide honey badgers in their stones? OK, maybe I am evil.

Citius, Altius, Fortius, Funestius!