RSS
Actress and teacher Joanna Merlin, original Tzeitel in Broadway’s ‘Fiddler,’ dies at 92
(JTA) — Joanna Merlin, a famed acting coach and casting director who early in her career as an actress created the role of Tevye’s daughter Tzeitel in the original Broadway production of “Fiddler on the Roof,”died Sunday in Los Angeles. She was 92.
NYU’s Graduate Acting program at the Tisch School of the Arts, where she became a member of the faculty in 1998, announced her passing on Monday.
Merlin was a student of the acting teacher Michael Chekhov and said to be the last surviving disciple still teaching his technique. Chekhov, a nephew of the playwright Anton Chekhov, was a student of Konstantin Stanislavski, putting Merlin in a direct line of influence with the Russian creator of the naturalistic acting technique that came to be known as “the system” (and, when adapted by the Jewish acting mavericks Lee Strasberg and Stella Adler, as “The Method”).
In an interview for the 2016 PBS documentary series “American Masters,” Merlin said she auditioned eight times before the director of “Fiddler,” Jerome Robbins, and creators Sheldon Harrnick and Jerry Bock were convinced she could handle the role of the daughter who ends up marrying Motel the tailor (a young Bette Midler later took over the role).
She also recalled how Robbins prepared the cast for their roles as Jews living in a 19th-century shtetl by talking about the world of the play, showing them paintings by Marc Chagall and taking them to a Hasidic wedding in Brooklyn.
“My own family actually came from a shtetl. My mother was actually born in a shtetl and my father was also born in Russia,” she recalled. “But a large portion of the cast was not Jewish, and so [Robbins] made sure that everybody felt as though they understood what that life was like.”
Merwin went on to other actor acting roles, including in the films “Sarah’s Key,” “Mystic Pizza,” “Fame” and “The Killing Fields,” and had a recurring part in the TV series “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” as Judge Lena Petrovsky.
But she had even greater success as a casting director, working with the film directors Bernardo Bertolucci and James Ivory, and most closely with the legendary producer Harold Prince in the original Broadway productions of several classic Stephen Sondheim musicals, including “Company,” “Follies,” “A Little Night Music,” “Pacific Overtures,” “Sweeney Todd” and “Merrily We Roll Along.”
She was the founder and president emeritus of The Michael Chekhov Association, or MICHA, an acting school in New York City. One student, Broadway actress Julie Benko, paid tribute to her teacher in an Instagram post Monday. “I will not forget the breakthrough I had in her class,” said Benko, who won praise as the understudy to Lea Michele and Beanie Feldstein in the recent Broadway production of “Funny Girl” and stars in the forthcoming Barry Manilow musical “Harmony.” “I will miss her beautiful presence. I am so honored to have been a small part of her life.”
Born Joanna Ratner in Chicago in in 1931, she took her mother’s maiden name as a stage name. She acted in community theater before graduating from UCLA and later studied under Chekhov, a Russian exile who died in 1955. Merlin made her first screen appearance in 1956 as one of Jethro’s daughters in Cecil B. DeMille’s film “The Ten Commandments.” “Fiddler” debuted in 1964, and she left the cast before the end of its tour to take care of her two small children. She took to the more flexible schedule of being a casting director and teacher.
Merlin was the author, in 2001, of “Auditioning: An Actor-Friendly Guide.”
“I think that actors respond to casting directors who are supportive and encouraging, and that if they feel that the moment they walk in the room they’re being challenged, then it’s a turn-off,” Merlin told interviewer Terry Gross in 2001. “But it’s very helpful to an actor if they feel that you’re on their side. And indeed, casting directors are rooting for you. I mean, they want to cast the role. And so they’re rooting for every actor that walks in the door.”
—
The post Actress and teacher Joanna Merlin, original Tzeitel in Broadway’s ‘Fiddler,’ dies at 92 appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
RSS
North London Synagogue, Nursery Targeted in Eighth Local Antisemitic Incident in Just Over a Week
Demonstrators against antisemitism in London on Sept. 8, 2025. Photo: Campaign Against Antisemitism
A synagogue and its nursery school in the Golders Green area of north London were targeted in an antisemitic attack on Thursday morning — the eighth such incident locally in just over a week amid a shocking surge of anti-Jewish hate crimes in the area.
The synagogue and Jewish nursery were smeared with excrement in an antisemitic outrage echoing a series of recent incidents targeting the local Jewish community.
“The desecration of another local synagogue and a children’s nursery with excrement is a vile, deliberate, and premeditated act of antisemitism,” Shomrim North West London, a Jewish organization that monitors antisemitism and also serves as a neighborhood watch group, said in a statement.
“This marks the eighth antisemitic incident locally in just over a week, to directly target the local Jewish community,” the statement read. “These repeated attacks have left our community anxious, hurt, and increasingly worried.”
Local law enforcement confirmed they are reviewing CCTV footage and collecting evidence to identify the suspect and bring them to justice.
This latest anti-Jewish hate crime came just days after tens of thousands of people marched through London in a demonstration against antisemitism, amid rising levels of antisemitic incidents across the United Kingdom since the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
In just over a week, seven Jewish premises in Barnet, the borough in which Golders Green is located, have been targeted in separate antisemitic incidents.
According to the Metropolitan Police, an investigation has been launched into the targeted attacks, all of which involved the use of bodily fluids.
During the incidents, a substance was smeared on four synagogues and a private residence, while a liquid was thrown at a school and over a car in two other attacks.
As the investigation continues, local police said they believe the same suspect is likely responsible for all seven offenses, which are being treated as religiously motivated criminal damage.
No arrests have been made so far, but law enforcement said it is actively engaging with the local Jewish community to provide reassurance and support.
The Community Security Trust (CST), a nonprofit charity that advises Britain’s Jewish community on security matters, condemned the recent wave of attacks and called on authorities to take immediate action.
“The extreme defilement of several Jewish locations in and around Golders Green is utterly abhorrent and deeply distressing,” CST said in a statement.
“CST is working closely with police and communal partners to support victims and help identify and apprehend the perpetrator,” it continued.
The Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) also denounced the attacks, calling for urgent measures to protect the Jewish community.
“These repeated incidents are leaving British Jews anxious and vulnerable in their own neighborhoods, not to mention disgusted,” CAA said in a statement.
Since the start of the war in Gaza, the United Kingdom has experienced a surge in antisemitic crimes and anti-Israel sentiment.
Last month, CST published a report showing there were 1,521 antisemitic incidents in the UK from January to June of this year. It marks the second-highest total of incidents ever recorded by CST in the first six months of any year, following the first half of 2024 in which 2,019 antisemitic incidents were recorded.
In total last year, CST recorded 3,528 antisemitic incidents for 2024, the country’s second worst year for antisemitism despite being an 18 percent drop from 2023’s record of 4,296.
In previous years, the numbers were significantly lower, with 1,662 incidents in 2022 and 2,261 hate crimes in 2021.
RSS
Germany to Hold Off on Recognizing Palestinian State but Will Back UN Resolution for Two-State Solution
German national flag flutters on top of the Reichstag building, that seats the Germany’s lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, in Berlin, Germany, March 25, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Lisi Niesner
Germany will support a United Nations resolution for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict but does not believe the time has come to recognize a Palestinian state, a government spokesman told Reuters on Thursday.
“Germany will support such a resolution which simply describes the status quo in international law,” the spokesman said, adding that Berlin “has always advocated a two-state solution and is asking for that all the time.”
“The chancellor just mentioned two days ago again that Germany does not see that the time has come for the recognition of the Palestinian state,” the spokesman added.
Britain, France, Canada, Australia, and Belgium have all said they will recognize a Palestinian state at the United Nations General Assembly later this month, although London said it could hold back if Israel were to take steps to ease the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and commit to a long-term peace process.
The United States strongly opposes any move by its European allies to recognize Palestinian independence.
Last week, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that the US has told other countries that recognition of a Palestinian state will cause more problems.
Those who see recognition as a largely symbolic gesture point to the negligible presence on the ground and limited influence in the conflict of countries such as China, India, Russia, and many Arab states that have recognized Palestinian independence for decades.
RSS
UN Security Council, With US Support, Condemns Strikes on Qatar
Qatar’s Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani attends an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council, following an Israeli attack on Hamas leaders in Doha, Qatar, at UN headquarters in New York City, US, Sept. 11, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz
The United Nations Security Council on Thursday condemned recent strikes on Qatar’s capital Doha, but did not mention Israel in the statement agreed to by all 15 members, including Israel‘s ally the United States.
Israel attempted to kill the political leaders of Hamas with the attack on Tuesday, escalating its military action in what the United States described as a unilateral attack that does not advance US and Israeli interests.
The United States traditionally shields its ally Israel at the United Nations. US backing for the Security Council statement, which could only be approved by consensus, reflects President Donald Trump’s unhappiness with the attack ordered by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“Council members underscored the importance of de-escalation and expressed their solidarity with Qatar. They underlined their support for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Qatar,” read the statement, drafted by Britain and France.
The Doha operation was especially sensitive because Qatar has been hosting and mediating negotiations aimed at securing a ceasefire in the Gaza war.
“Council members underscored that releasing the hostages, including those killed by Hamas, and ending the war and suffering in Gaza must remain our top priority,” the Security Council statement read.
The Security Council will meet later on Thursday to discuss the Israeli attack at a meeting due to be attended by Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani.