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Lorraine Hansberry’s second play had a white Jewish protagonist. Oscar Isaac and Rachel Brosnahan are reviving it.
NEW YORK (JTA) — Sidney Brustein, Jewish Hamlet?
Anne Kauffman thinks so. She made the comparison in a phone interview about the play she’s directing — a buzzy production of Lorraine Hansberry’s “The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window” that opened on Monday at the Brooklyn Academy of Music starring Oscar Isaac and Rachel Brosnahan.
“One artistic director who was thinking of doing this [play] was like, ‘You know, it’s not like he’s Hamlet, but…’ And I thought, well, no, actually I think he is like Hamlet!” she said.
She added another take: “I feel like he’s Cary Grant meets Zero Mostel.”
Hansberry saw just two of her works produced on Broadway before her death from cancer at 34 in January 1965. Her first, “A Raisin in the Sun,” which follows a Black family dealing with housing discrimination in Chicago, is widely considered one of the most significant plays of the 20th century. The other, “The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window,” ran for a few months in the fall of 1964 until Hansberry’s death and has only been revived a handful of times since, all outside of New York.
Now, the star power of Isaac and Brosnahan is driving renewed interest in the play, which deals with weighty questions about political activism, self-fulfillment in a capitalist world, and racial and ethnic identity — including mid-century Jewish American identity.
The Brustein character, as Kauffman alluded to, is many things. A resident of Greenwich Village deeply embedded in that historic neighborhood’s 1960s activist and artistic circles, he is somewhat of a creative renaissance man. At the start of the play, his club of sorts (“it was not a nightclub” is a running joke) called “Walden Pond” has just shuttered and he has taken over an alternative newspaper. As the script reads, Brustein is an intellectual “in the truest sense of the word” but “does not wear glasses” — the latter description being a possible jab at his macho tendencies. Formerly an ardent leftist activist, he is now weary of the worth of activism and a bit of a nihilist. He’s in his late 30s and is a musician who often picks up a banjo.
Brustein is also a secular Jew, a fact that he telegraphs at certain key emotional and comedic moments. Others, from friends to his casually antisemitic sister-in-law, frequently reference his identity, too.
At the end of the play’s first half, for example, Brustein brings up the heroes of the Hanukkah story in talking about his existential angst — and his stomach ulcer. He has become belligerent to his wife Iris and to a local politician who wants Brustein’s paper’s endorsement.
“How does one confront the thousand nameless faceless vapors that are the evil of our time? Can a sword pierce it?” Sidney says. “One does not smite evil anymore: one holds one’s gut, thus — and takes a pill. Oh, but to take up the sword of the Maccabees again!”
Hansberry’s decision to center a white Jewish character surprised critics and fans alike in 1964 because many of them expected her to follow “A Raisin in the Sun” with further exploration of issues facing Black Americans, said Joi Gresham, the director of the Lorraine Hansberry Literary Trust.
“The major attack, both critically and on a popular basis, in regards to the play and to its central character was that Lorraine was out of her lane,” Gresham said. “That not only did she not know what she’s talking about, but that she had the nerve to even examine that subject matter.”
Hansberry’s closest collaborator was her former husband Robert Nemiroff, a Jewish New Yorker whom she had divorced in 1962 but maintained an artistic partnership with. Nemiroff was a bit Brustein-like in his pursuits: he edited books, produced and promoted Hansberry’s work, and even wrote songs (one of which made the couple enough money to allow Hansberry to focus on writing “A Raisin in the Sun”). But Gresham — who is Nemiroff’s stepdaughter through his second marriage, to professor Jewell Handy Gresham-Nemiroff — emphasized that his personality was nothing like Brustein’s. While Brustein is brash and mean to Iris, Nemiroff was undyingly supportive of Hansberry and her work, said Gresham, who lived with him and her mother at Nemiroff’s Croton-on-Hudson home — the one he had formerly shared for a time with Hansberry — from age 10 onward.
Instead, Gresham argued, the Brustein character was the result of Hansberry’s deep engagement with Jewish intellectual thought, in part influenced by her relationship with Nemiroff. The pair met at a protest and would bond over their passion for fighting for social justice, which included combating antisemitism. The night before their wedding, they protested the execution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, and they would remain highly involved in the wave of activism that blossomed into the Black-Jewish civil rights alliance.
“Bob and Lorraine met and built a life together at a place where there was a very strong Black-Jewish nexus. There was a very strong interplay and interaction,” Gresham said. “I think Lorraine was very influenced by Bob’s family, the Nemiroffs, who were very radical in their politics. And so there was a way in which she was introduced to the base of Jewish intellectualism and Jewish progressive politics, that she took to heart and she was very passionate about.”
Robert Nemiroff and Lorraine Hansberry were married from 1953-62. They are shown here in 1959. (Ben Martin/Getty Images)
Hansberry didn’t hesitate to criticize Jewish writers who said controversial things about Black Americans, either. When Norman Podhoretz wrote “My Negro Problem — And Ours,” an explosive 1963 article in Commentary magazine now widely seen as racist, Hansberry responded with a scathing rebuke. She also sparred with Norman Mailer, who once wrote an essay titled “The White Negro: Superficial Reflections on the Hipster.”
Gresham said Brustein’s nihilism represents what Hansberry saw in a range of Jewish and non-Jewish white writers, whom she hoped could be kickstarted back into activism. But Hansberry also nodded to the reasons why someone like Brustein could feel defeated in the early 1960s, a decade and a half after World War II.
“You mean diddle around with the little things since we can’t do anything about the big ones? Forget about the Holocaust and worry about — reforms in the traffic court or something?” Brustein says at one point in the play to a local politician running as a reformer.
Daniel Pollack-Pelzner, a Jewish scholar of literature who has written on Hansberry, said the resulting Brustein character is a very accurate depiction of a secular Jew at the time — both keenly attuned to prejudice in society and also lacking some understanding of the experience of being Black.
“I was just intoxicated that Hansberry could conjure that world, both so affectionately, but also so clear-sidedly that it seems like she can see the limitations of all of the characters’ perspectives,” he said. “But she also represents them with sympathy and humor.”
Kauffman, who also helmed a revival of the play in Chicago in 2016, is impressed with how “fully fledged” the Brustein character is.
“Who are the cultural icons who have sort of articulated the Jew in our culture in the last 50 years or 60 years, you know?” she said. “Brustein is not a caricature of a Woody Allen character, he’s not even ‘Curb your Enthusiasm’ or a Jerry Seinfeld character. He’s a fully drawn character.”
Isaac, who is of mainly Guatemalan and Cuban heritage, has played Jewish characters before, including a formerly Orthodox man in an Israeli director’s remake of the classic film “Scenes From a Marriage.” In the lead-up to this play, he has largely avoided getting caught in headlines focused on the “Jewface” debate, over whether non-Jewish actors should be allowed to play Jewish characters on stage and screen.
But when asked about the responsibility of playing a Jewish character in a New York Times interview, Isaac referenced the fact that he has some Jewish heritage on his father’s side.
“We could play that game: How Jewish are you?” he said to interviewer Alexis Soloski, who is Jewish. “It is part of my family, part of my life. I feel the responsibility to not feel like a phony. That’s the responsibility, to feel like I can say these things, do these things and feel like I’m doing it honestly and truthfully.”
When Kauffman directed a version of the play at the Goodman Theater in Chicago in 2016, her lead actor had “not a single drop of Jewish heritage…in his blood,” and she said she had to convey “what anger looks like” coming from a Jewish perspective. Working with Isaac has been different — instead of starting at a base of no knowledge, she has been pushing for more of an Ashkenazi sensibility than a Sephardic one.
“I believe that his heritage leans, I’m guessing, more towards Sephardic. And mine is pure Ashkenazi,” she said. “We sort of joke: ‘[The part] is a little bit more Ashkenazi than that, you know what I mean?’ Like, ‘the violence is actually turned towards yourself!’”
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Gal Gadot’s $1 Million Genesis Prize to Be Doubled to Help Israelis With Trauma Post-Oct. 7
Actor Gal Gadot gestures during the unveiling ceremony for her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Los Angeles, California, US, March 18, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni
The Genesis Prize Foundation (GPF) and the Jewish Funders Network (JFN) launched on Sunday a $2 million matching grant program in honor of 2026 Genesis Prize Laureate Gal Gadot to help Israeli healing with emotional and physical trauma in the aftermath of the deadly terrorist attack in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, the subsequent Israel-Hamas war, and now the ongoing war with Iran.
The initiative was spearheaded by Gadot, who was announced as the recipient of this year’s $1 million Genesis Prize in November 2025. The Genesis Prize Foundation has committed $1 million to the prize award, and members of JFN and other donors are expected to contribute at least $1 million more through participation in the new matching program.
The $2 million will be given to Israeli NGOs, nonprofits, and professionals who are helping Israelis in their long-term recovery from trauma and mental health issues. Participating NGOs must first secure funding contributions from individual donors or foundations, and can then apply to have those gifts matched by The Genesis Prize Foundation.
“The program will prioritize initiatives that train and develop frontline professionals, strengthen retention, well-being, and resilience among caregivers, expand human capital in mental health and community care, and deploy innovative tools that support and scale professional services,” GPF and JFN announced. “Emphasis will be placed on sustainability and long-term impact rather than short-term interventions.”
“At a time when Israel’s caregivers are stretched beyond capacity, we must ensure that those who are helping others heal receive the support they need,” said JFN President and CEO Andres Spokoiny. “JFN is proud to steward this collaborative effort, and we call on donors and foundations to join us in meeting these critical needs.”
“In this moment, and in honoring Gal Gadot, the most urgent investment we can make is in Israel’s human infrastructure: the therapists, educators, and caregivers who sustain national resilience, helping communities heal from the trauma of Oct. 7 and the ongoing conflict with Iran and Hezbollah,” said Stan Polovets, co-founder and chairman of The Genesis Prize Foundation. “Working with Jewish Funders Network allows us to mobilize philanthropy in a thoughtful, collaborative, and lasting way.”
The annual Genesis Prize is given to individuals “for their professional excellence, significant impact in their fields, and dedication to Jewish values.” Gadot was named this year’s Genesis Prize Laureate in recognition of her strong support and advocacy for her home country of Israel amid the Israel-Hamas war.
“I am humbled to receive the Genesis Prize and to stand alongside the amazing laureates who came before me,” she said last year. “I am a proud Jew and a proud Israeli. I love my country and dedicate this award to the organizations who will help Israel heal and to those incredible people who serve on the front lines of compassion. Israel has endured unimaginable pain. Now we must begin to heal – to rebuild hearts, families, and communities.”
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Harvard’s Jewish Enrollment Drops to Pre-World War II Levels, New Report Shows
Demonstrators take part in an “Emergency Rally: Stand With Palestinians Under Siege in Gaza,” amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, US, Oct. 14, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Brian Snyder
Jewish undergraduate enrollment at Harvard University has plummeted to lows not seen since the eve of World War II and the Holocaust, falling to just 7 percent, according to a new report issued by the Harvard Jewish Alumni Alliance (HJAA) that describes the statistic as an “anomaly.”
“We want to be direct about what this report does and does not claim,” HJAA said in a statement. “It does not assert that Harvard intentionally discriminates against Jewish applicants. What it finds is something more specific and, we believe, more actionable.”
The group went on to deny that declining Jewish enrollment at Harvard is alone the result of racial preferences in admissions — popularly known as “affirmative action” — which, in the name of “diversity,” affords preferential consideration to applicants whose academic achievement and standardized test scores fall outside the range of the typical elite students who schools like Harvard select for membership in the Ivy League.
In 2023, the US Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that Harvard University’s racial preferences in its admissions policy violated the Constitution for its discriminatory effect on Asian American enrollment.
HJAA found a similar trend occurring at Yale University, which infamously adopted racial preferences under the leadership of President Kingman Brewster in the 1960s, despite growing evidence that the practice created an environment of academic maladjustment and racial division. This led to the creation of segregated programming and amenities for African Americans, as well as a summer remedial program for minority students — PROP (Pre-Orientation Program) — that was eventually rebranded in the late 1990s when its apparent subtext proved unpalatable to a new generation of students.
“Yale added 1,281 undergraduate seats in 2018. Hispanic, Asian, and Black enrollment all grew in absolute terms. Jewish enrollment fell by approximately 256 students,” the group stated. “The report tests seven structural explanations for this divergence, including geographic diversification, socioeconomic targeting, Asian enrollment growth, international expansion, and athletic recruitment, individually and in combination. None of them explains the gap.”
The first Jewish alumni association in the history of Harvard University, HJAA was formed in the fall of 2023 in response to Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel and the wave of antisemitism around the world that it triggered. The following month, more than 1,200 of its members signed a letter which gave notice to then-Harvard president Claudine Gay that Jewish community members would no longer walk delicately around the college administration when it comes to the issue of campus antisemitism.
The HJAA report came after Harvard last year released a major report on campus antisemitism along with an apology from new campus president Alan Garber which acknowledged that school officials failed in critical ways to address the hatred to which Jewish students were subjected following Hamas’s Oct. 7 atrocities.
Recent political developments have caused some Jewish students affiliated with the Ivy League to temper their criticisms of elite higher education due to concerns that it validates US President Donald Trump’s coupling addressing campus antisemitism with pursuing higher education reform preferred by political conservatives. In pursuing his policy agenda, Trump has cconfiscated billions of dollars of taxpayer-funded research grants from private universities.
Just last month, The Algemeiner covered Harvard University student Sarah Silverman’s scolding Trump during a hearing on campus antisemitism held by the US Commission on Civil Rights. Screaming the entirety of her seven-minute statement, she at one point charged that “policy described as protecting Jewish students did not make me feel protected,” adding, “In a deeply troubling way, I felt blamed. I knew I had done nothing wrong, but when decisions are made in your name without ever speaking to you but are affecting your academic community in extremely negative ways, you begin to worry that others believed you asked for these actions.”
Nonetheless, HJAA is calling on Harvard to hold itself accountable, unfettered by politics and outside commentary.
“What we are asking of Harvard is straightforward: count, audit, and report. Harvard already tracks enrollment by race, gender, income, and first-generation status,” the group said. Its president, Adrian Ashekenazy added, “This report is not an accusation. It is an invitation to build the infrastructure that makes accountability possible.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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Top Iran Official Larijani Was No ‘Pragmatist,’ His Death Strikes Major Blow to Regime: Analysts
Ali Larijani, top Iranian national security official and former chairman of the parliament of Iran, attends a press conference after meeting with Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri in Beirut, Lebanon, Nov. 15, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani
Israel’s announcement that it had killed de facto Iranian leader Ali Larijani was cast by some Western analysts on Tuesday as a blow to any remaining chance of a ceasefire, but Israeli officials and Iran watchers pushed back sharply, arguing Larijani was not a pragmatic off-ramp figure but a central architect of the regime’s wartime strategy and internal repression.
Meir Ben-Shabbat, Israel’s former national security adviser, described Larijani’s removal as a significant escalation in the campaign against Iran’s leadership, arguing it further erodes the regime’s ability to function at the highest level.
“It is not merely a symbolic step,” he told The Algemeiner. “Larijani was considered one of the most influential figures in the Islamic regime … shaping Iran’s military and political responses. His elimination intensifies the regime’s disarray.”
The killing will severely impede the regime’s efforts to recover, Ben-Shabbat said, forcing its senior figures to lower their profile even further.
Larijani’s elimination, alongside that of other senior Basij officials, “sends a sharp and clear message to regime opponents and protesters: The opportunity to bring about change is real, perhaps even just around the corner,” Ben-Shabbat said.
Israel said it also killed Gholamreza Soleimani, the head of Iran’s Basij paramilitary force which is affiliated with the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The news of both killings was later confirmed by the regime in Tehran.
At the time of his death, Larijani had been overseeing multiple overlapping crises that defined Iran’s wartime posture.
The Iranian hardliner was deeply involved in shaping the country’s response to joint US-Israeli strikes, advocating for a long campaign and widening the conflict across the region, including pressure on Gulf states and maritime routes such as the Strait of Hormuz.
At the same time, Larijani was grappling with fallout from a surge of domestic unrest, which was met with a sweeping crackdown in January, killing tens of thousands of anti-regime protesters.
He was also managing Iran’s nuclear file, including stalled indirect talks with Washington that had already been thrown into disarray by the fighting. He previously played a central role in shepherding the Obama-led 2015 nuclear agreement between Iran and world powers — a deal later abandoned by US President Donald Trump.
Trained in Western philosophy, Larijani had close personal ties to the US, and his daughter, Fatemeh, lived and worked there as a doctor for more than a decade. Earlier on Monday, Larijani referred to the US as the “Great Satan” when he condemned the UAE and other Islamic countries for abandoning Iran.
“You know that America is not loyal and that Israel is your enemy,” Larijani said, arguing that “the unity of the Islamic ummah, if realized with full strength, can guarantee security, progress. and independence for all Islamic countries.”
“Iran continues on the path of resistance against the ‘Great Satan’ and the ‘Little Satan,’” he added, referring to the US and Israel, respectively.
Nevertheless, much of Western media has cast Larijani in more nuanced terms, often describing him as a pragmatic conservative or potential interlocutor with the West who could have played a role in future diplomacy.
The Guardian, citing a Middle East analyst, reported that Larijani was seen as a potential channel for any future diplomacy, someone who could have been tasked with advancing ceasefire discussions or follow-up talks with Washington.
“Larijani would have been the man to get that job done,” the newspaper cited Ellie Geranmayeh, an Iran expert at the European Council on Foreign Relations, as saying. She added that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s focus was on “on blocking Trump’s pathways” to ending the war.
Ron Malley, the former US special envoy for Iran, went further, describing him as “one of the smarter, maybe ‘pragmatic’ members of the leadership,” a figure some diplomats saw as capable of reengaging on nuclear talks.
BBC veteran correspondent John Simpson came under fire for casting Larijani as “clever and reasonable.”
“I’ve met Ali Larijani several times over the years. Yes, he was a top figure in a nasty regime,” Simpson wrote on X. “But he always seemed clever and reasonable – the kind of person you might want to negotiate a peace deal with.”
“Is it a good idea for Israel to take out people like him?” the journalist added.
Sima Shine, head of the Iran program at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, rejected portrayals of Larijani as a pragmatic counterweight within the regime, calling such characterizations “wishful” external projections to find a moderate figure inside the regime who could “take Iran on a different course.” She pointed instead to his record during the regime’s brutal crackdown on protesters earlier this year, saying “he was very much involved in the oppression of the Iranian people in January.”
Larijani was instrumental in reinforcing the regime’s strict religious and social controls, reshaping state broadcasting into a vehicle for official propaganda and targeting any reformist voices.
“He was nominated by [former Supreme Leader Ali] Khamenei to lead this operation not because he was a pragmatist, but because he could be counted on to stand fast and strong vis-à-vis the US and Israel,” she said on a call with reporters on Tuesday.
At the same time, Shine warned against assuming that removing senior figures would translate into a strategic breakthrough. “We’ve never succeeded in toppling a regime,” she said. “One cannot count on elimination as the main tool to a change of regime.”
Iran’s leadership, Shine continued, is “a system, not a person,” a structure built not only on senior officials but on institutions, coercive power, and a residual support base of “some millions that are still supporting the regime.”