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Jonathan Safran Foer’s online flirtation with Natalie Portman inspires a new play
(New York Jewish Week) — When Jewish literary power couple Jonathan Safran Foer and Nicole Krauss divorced in 2014 — amid rumors that he was in love with his longtime friend Natalie Portman — it captivated the nation.
Well, maybe not the nation, but certainly the literary and media worlds, as well as the hipster set in brownstone Brooklyn. Safran Foer and Krauss were rare literary megastars, whose “extremely loud and incredibly expensive” Park Slope brownstone was the subject of numerous articles (and a hefty dose of envy) when it hit the market for $14.5 million in 2013.
Portman, of course, was an actual megastar, and when the confessional correspondence between the celebrated actress and the “Everything Is Illuminated” writer was later published in 2016 in the New York Times, it elicited a fresh round of jealousy, speculation and eye-rolls from the masses, as well as numerous journalistic “takes” on the topic.
I was a teenager at the time, and had only a vague idea of why any of this mattered. But apparently it stayed with me for nearly a decade, because when I saw “The Wanderers,” a new Off-Broadway play running at the Roundabout Theatre Company, it didn’t take long for me to make the connection between this fictional production and the very real but mysterious drama that occurred between these famous Jewish writers.
“The Wanderers,” directed by Barry Edelstein, follows two couples in two different timelines. In the present day are Abe and Sophie, secular Jews and writers who live in Brooklyn and have been together since they were teenagers. The other storyline, set in the 1970s, centers around Esther and Schmuli, a Hasidic couple living in Satmar Williamsburg. The latter are introduced to the audience on the eve of their wedding, one of the first times they’ve ever been alone together.
Throughout the play, the couples, seemingly from different worlds, try to balance their careers, personal lives, internal desires and family obligations.
Abe (Eddie Kaye Thomas) is a writer who boasts a Pulitzer Prize and several other literary awards. But he struggles with certain aspects of his life — his frayed relationships, mostly — and is hamstrung by an immense ego that is tempered only by a hefty dose of insecurity. As I watched the play, I began to feel like I knew the man, but I couldn’t quite place him. Was he just a stand-in for every genuinely talented, semi-pretentious, self-important male writer living in Brooklyn?
Abe eventually finds an outlet for his woes by striking up an email correspondence with fictional Hollywood actress Julia Cheever (Katie Holmes, the real Hollywood actress), whom he met when she came to a reading of one of his novels. Eventually, he declares his love for her — a pronouncement that essentially goes ignored by the actress. (In the play, Holmes sports a chic brunette bob not unlike a Jewish actress near and dear to our hearts.)
It became pretty clear who served as the inspiration for this play — and when I asked playwright Anna Ziegler about it, she said I was one of the few she had spoken with who had made the connection.
“In the summer of 2016, when I was writing, Natalie Portman and Jonathan Safran Foer were writing to each other in a correspondence they published in the New York Times,” she said. “She was promoting a new movie of hers, and I guess they had a previous relationship — that sparked the idea for one of the storylines in the play.”
What’s funny, Ziegler said, was that most audience members haven’t made the connection. “We haven’t really been talking about [Safran Foer and Portman] as one of the inspirations, and not many people have raised it,” she said. “I assumed that that resonance would be there for a certain percentage of the audience but, to be honest, I don’t think it’s there for the vast majority of people.”
At one point in the play, after learning his father died, Abe even says the line “Hineni, here I am,” to ground himself and calm his emotions. It’s a phrase in the Torah that usually translates to “I am ready,” which Abraham says to God before being asked to sacrifice his son, Isaac, as well as a prayer of humility chanted on Rosh Hashanah. But it’s also, possibly, a nod to Safran Foer’s 2016 novel “Here I Am.”
Neither Krauss nor Safran Foer responded to requests for comment on the play. “For people in my generation and younger, the recognition might be there, but it was also so many years ago now,” said Zielger, 44. “So I guess the only people who remember it are the people on whom it made an impact.”
Which is fine — “The Wanderers” stands on its own even if you don’t know the backstory. Plus, the themes of the play stretch far beyond infidelity: It also explores loneliness, free will and inherited family trauma.
Originally, Ziegler set out to write something about arranged marriages, specifically within the Jewish community. “I had always been kind of fascinated and beguiled by the idea of arranged marriage — thinking about what it would be like spending that first night together, that notion always kind of haunted me,” she said.
“I had these two different plays [one about Portman and Safran Foer and the other about arranged marriages], and they seemed thematically related,” she added. “At some point, I concluded that they really were two strands at the same play and so I started weaving them together.”
Ziegler chose to write about the Hasidic Jewish community in particular because she was “somewhat familiar with that culture and community,” she told me.
Still, as a secular Jew, it’s a topic she approached delicately. She hired a cultural consultant and an accent coach for the actors who were both from the community. Ziegler herself, who lives in Brooklyn, spent time in Williamsburg, and read memoirs and watched documentaries.
In the play, the Hasidic wife Esther (Lucy Freyer) struggles to be seen by her community and to feel in control of her life. She doesn’t know where to turn and wonders if she’s fulfilled her potential — as a parent, wife, human and Jew. “One of the great joys of being an actor is being able to learn and dive head first into a community that you ordinarily wouldn’t get to know,” Freyer said.
As the story unfolds, it’s revealed that Esther left the community with her infant son, who grows up to be the renowned Jewish author Abe, who marries his childhood friend Sophie (Sarah Cooper, the comic and actress who broke big with videos mocking Donald Trump). The younger couple is almost entirely secular, yet they grapple with the same search for meaning and belonging, the same doubt as to whether they’ve chosen the right path for themselves — or if it had been chosen for them.
“All five characters, not just Schmuli and Esther, are trying to figure out how can you be happy with what you have, with where you stand in your own skin,” said Dave Klasko, who plays Schmuli.
“We say in the play the Hebrew phrase, ‘Ein ba’al hanes makir b’niso,’ which [Ziegler] poetically translates to ‘We are never aware of the miracles, especially when we are inside them,’” Klasko added. “How can I, in my own life, realize the miracle that I’m living in before I’m on the other side of it?”
For Ziegler, these are very Jewish questions — and the questions of the “Xillennial” generation. “We’re left [with] the complex heritage of feeling chosen, but also self-hating,” said Ziegler, whose previous plays include “Photograph 51,” about Rosalind Franklin, the Jewish X-ray crystallographer who helped Watson and Crick crack the DNA model. “I think this is the most Jewish of my plays, and it’s funny because I’m not that religious, but I have found in my career that there seems to be a hunger for plays about Judaism.”
“At some point in my career, I began to be thought of as a ‘Jewish writer’ — for better or for worse,” she added.
Safran Foer, 46, and Krauss, 48, have also wrestled with the “Jewish writer” term, as well as the play’s big questions of identity, self-doubt and complicated family relationships. In fact, as Ziegler and the actors point out, issues of the play are universal, and have nothing to do with how famous you are, how expensive your home may be, or how strictly you adhere to religious law. The celebrity allusion — plus the chance to see an actual celebrity, Holmes — may be a reason to buy a ticket to see “The Wanderers,” but the timeless message is what will keep you in your seat.
“The Wanderers” is playing at the Roundabout Theatre Company (111 West 46th Street) through April 2. Find tickets and more information here.
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Woody Allen’s biggest fans were easy marks for a fake monologue about antisemitism
Those still wondering “what would Woody Allen say about today’s antisemitism” were treated to what looked like an answer last week in the form of a viral monologue bemoaning the price of coffee in a roast of Ivy-educated anti-Zionism.
The only issue: It seems to be entirely fake.
The post, according to X, where the post first gained traction, was initially posted in Spanish by a pro-Israel writer named Simy Benarroch and was originally the work of a previous Russian writer named Rami Yudovin.
As hoaxes go, this one seemed credible at first glance. It’s hard not to read it in Allen’s nasal voice. It has his cadence, his references to philosophers and the inclusion of an intrusive female relative that are his hallmarks, leading many who didn’t believe this to be genuine to conclude a prompt was fed through an AI mimic. (It’s not the first time something like this has happened.)
But there are tells for those looking. See the fourth paragraph, in which Allen encounters protesters outside a synagogue: “I was walking through Brooklyn thinking about death.”
From a ripe young age, Allen has perseverated on the end, but walking through Brooklyn? Now? That far from the Upper East Side? I’m skeptical.
This could all, of course, be a rhetorical flourish. The types of woke stereotypes the author plays with, i.e.: “someone with a scarf [presumably a keffiyah], who looks like he writes poems about his own beard, explains to you — with help from Heidegger and Nietzsche — why the existence of Jews is a form of aggression and a threat to humanity,” have a home in his native borough.
The thrust of this argument, that pro-Palestinian protesters use the language of the academy to justify the oldest hatred is hardly novel. They are in fact facile to the point of tracking with Allen’s own “witch hunt” comments about #MeToo (for which he said he should be the poster boy; he achieved this in a sense, but not in the way he meant.)
But if this is any type of Allen, it’s one of his characters, not the man himself.
“My grandmother, by the way, lived through actual Nazis,” the author writes, of hearing a protester indulging in Holocaust inversion. “She hid in a basement in Poland with a man who coughed so hard the Germans could have found them just from the bronchial racket.”
Allen’s grandparents were in the U.S. during World War II, but nice line.
John Podhoretz slammed this forgery, remarking how the real auteur has been “shamefully silent since October 7.”
This is an odd kind of indictment, aside from not being strictly true.
Who, exactly, would Allen reach in his activism for Jews? Should he shift to advocacy, he would likely find the exact same audience that shared the fake and found themselves nodding reverently along.
Perhaps this bodes well for Allen’s continued influence on the segment of the population still dying to hear his insights. Woody Allen may be 90, cancelled and taking a break from making movies, but Woody A.I.len can live forever.
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U.S. launches attacks on Iran as negotiations over a peace deal drag out
(JTA) — The United States announced it had launched defensive strikes on Monday in Southern Iran, targeting Iranian missile sites and boats it believed were placing mines.
The move threatens to derail an already fragile ceasefire between the United States, Iran and Israel aimed at giving the U.S. and Iran space to hammer out a deal to end the hostilities. It also comes as U.S. President Donald Trump told several Muslim allies participating in consultations over a deal that they should normalize relations with Israel in exchange for the U.S. inking the agreement.
U.S. Central Command Spokesperson Navy Capt. Tim Hawkin said in a statement issued Monday that strike targets “included missile launch sites and Iranian boats attempting to emplace mines.”
He added that U.S. forces “conducted self-defense strikes … to protect our troops from threats posed by Iranian forces,” and that CENTCOM “continues to defend our forces while using restraint during the ongoing ceasefire.”
The attacks were conducted in the port city of Bandar Abbas around the strait of Hormuz, according to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, as cited by CNN.
The strikes came just 24 hours after President Donald Trump posted on his Truth Social platform that he had instructed his representatives to “not rush into a deal,” stressing that “time is on our side.” Trump emphasized in the message that Iran “cannot develop or procure a Nuclear Weapon,” a key aim of the American military effort but one the president had not referred to in comments over the weekend that a deal was close.
Trump noted in another post Sunday that the deal was not yet “fully negotiated,” but that if he makes a deal with Iran it “will be a good and proper one,” and that he does not “make bad deals.”
Trump’s comments came as several GOP voices have expressed concerns about a deal he said Saturday was “largely negotiated.” Trump’s posts Sunday came after Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) posted on X that the reported terms of the agreement would be a “disastrous mistake.”
Trump also stated on Truth Social Monday that Muslim countries should “mandatorily” sign on to the Abraham Accords as part of any agreement to end the war between Iran and Israel.
He named Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Pakistan, Turkey, Egypt and Jordan, though he said it might be possible for a couple to be exempted.
Following the U.S. strikes on Monday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters in India Tuesday that the Strait of Hormuz has to be open, “one way or the other,” and that negotiations with Iran could “take a few days.”
Meanwhile, several media outlets reported that Iran announced Tuesday that it had executed Gholamreza Khani Shekerab for alleged espionage and intelligence cooperation with Israel.
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
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A stronger shekel has become a pressing problem for Americans building lives in Israel
(JTA) — Yisrael HaBahiyir saved for more than a year to make his dream of moving to Israel come true.
But just weeks after leaving upstate New York, where he had been managing operations for a synagogue, he got a cruel reality check when he transferred his rent money from his American bank account to Western Union to pay his Tel Aviv landlord.
“I sent the same amount I normally transfer and went to pick it up. It was about 300 shekels short. I said something to the cashier, like, ‘I think you gave me the wrong rate,’” HaBahiyir recalled. “That’s when I realized the shekel was strengthening.”
It’s an experience that Americans in Israel — and Israelis who depend on American dollars — are increasingly facing, as the Israeli shekel has strengthened to near-record highs. While the currency’s strength has been good news to many Israelis who worried that years of war would harm the economy, it is having wide-ranging and often challenging ramifications for immigrants and Israeli nonprofits.
Many Americans who move to Israel have chosen to keep some or all of their assets in dollars, whether to hedge against shekel volatility, maintain financial ties to the United States or preserve flexibility should they ever return.
When the dollar is relatively strong compared to the shekel, as was the case for much of the past decade, that arrangement is advantageous. Assets held in dollars go further in an Israeli economy priced in shekels, giving American immigrants greater purchasing power for everyday expenses.
But now, with the shekel trading at less than three to a dollar, its most favorable rate in three decades, anyone trying to make a life in Israel using U.S. dollars is feeling the squeeze.
“Before, $1,500 would get me close to 6,000 shekels and cover my bills,” said Lauren Adilav, who works as a freelance editor for American authors. “I’m relying on money from the U.S. to cover my rent. If the shekel gets any stronger, I don’t know if I can.”
The exchange rate isn’t just punishing Americans in Israel. It’s also putting extreme pressure on the many Israeli charities and organizations that depend on donations from Jews abroad. Aish Hatorah, the Orthodox outreach organization based in Jerusalem, announced last month that it had laid off several employees and twice delayed salary payments to staff amid funding shortfalls driven largely by the strengthening shekel.
Leket Israel, the food rescue organization, has also felt the pressure. Its founder, Joseph Gitler, said the shift had made clear that Israeli nonprofits can no longer rely solely on overseas support. Shmulie Russel, director of Makom LaLelev, told JTA that his nonprofit, which provides direct aid to those recovering from addiction, is facing a similar financial crunch and might soon be forced to find ways to cut expenses.
“This is the biggest conversation happening in the Israeli NGO sector right now — how to deal with the strength of the shekel,” said Leah Aharoni, executive director of the group Our People, which helps Russian-speaking Jews immigrate to Israel. The majority of donations to Our People are made in dollars.
So far, Aharoni said, the organization has delayed making new hires. She anticipates more challenges ahead.
“It has made it absolutely impossible to plan,” she said. “This is happening across the NGO sector. We haven’t been forced to cut programs yet, but it’s only a matter of time.”
Aharoni added that she hasn’t wanted to raise the issue with her donors. “Everyone is reluctant to speak out, as donors are already feeling the fatigue of three years of war. Israel just isn’t at the top of their priorities anymore, and now we’re coming back to ask them to make up the difference,” she said. “So we cut where we can.”
The strength of the shekel has come as a surprise to many Israelis, who expected the economy to be weakened by yet another war, this time with Iran, that cratered tourism and heightened instability in daily life. Yet much of the shekel’s gain against the dollar has actually stemmed from the war, as the dollar has weakened and investors have flocked to Israel’s high-tech sector, and particularly its defense industry, which has been buoyed by the conflict.
“The high-tech industry, which historically leads growth in Israel, has been minimally hurt by the war given its reliance on international connections — and it continued to grow even in 2024, the worst year of the war,” said Michel Strawczynski, professor of economics at Hebrew University.
High-tech exports reached $78 billion in 2024, and in the first half of 2025, high-tech accounted for 57% of all Israeli exports, the highest share ever recorded.
For Adilav, who moved from Jerusalem to the West Bank to manage her costs since moving to Israel from upstate New York more than two decades ago, spending in the tech sector is cold comfort.
“The shekel being strong might be good for the 10 billionaires who dream up some app and sell it to Google for $40 billion, but it really affects the rest of us,” she said.
Exporters, meanwhile, have counter-intuitively watched their profit margins dwindle as the shekel gains. They are paid for their products in dollars, so as the shekel strengthens and the dollar weakens, they end up with fewer and fewer shekels to fund their operations and pay workers’ salaries.
The pinch is also coming for Americans who are buying Israeli real estate — a transaction that often happens “on paper,” or with Americans entering a contract to buy an apartment or home that is still being built. Those contracts rarely account for a volatile exchange rate.
“When their upcoming payment might have been 400,000 shekels, now they’re getting hit harder in dollars,” said Nachi Paris, a Jerusalem-based real estate agent who specializes in high-end properties.
Paris said contracts for apartments in development typically prohibit transfers before a buyer takes possession, leaving buyers legally obligated to spend more than they expected when they signed.
He said he believed concerns about antisemitism in the United States could drive middle-class American Jews who cannot afford second properties to make Israel their primary residence instead. But the exchange rate could be an obstacle.
“There’s a point where they can’t afford it,” Paris said. “Right now, it’s still psychological. They can still afford it, and Zionism is involved, and they want to move here, but there comes a point when you can’t afford it.”
With economists warning a stronger shekel can lead to employment drops and other negative consequences, calls have been growing on the Bank of Israel to intervene. But its options are limited, according to Strawczynski, who noted that paused rate cuts and rising inflation from oil prices and flight costs constrain the bank’s ability to act at least until the war ends.
For now, Americans in Israel are paying the price. Judy Diamond moved from New York four years ago with the goal of fully retiring from her career in finance. Not only has she set that aside as an immediate ambition, but she is trying to break her lease in the upscale Katamon neighborhood of Jerusalem because she can see that her savings, in dollars, won’t stretch as far as she anticipated.
“I just can’t afford my rent anymore,” Diamond said. “It’s keeping me up at night. It worked for three and a half years, and now the financial aspect of it has fallen apart.”
For Joel Haber, a Jerusalem-based guide who moved to Israel in 2009, the shekel’s rise has come at an especially painful time, when yet another war stopped the flow of travelers who pay hundreds of dollars for his food tours of his adopted city and its famous market.
“The battered dollar has been more of an added insult to the injury of the war,” he said.
Haber always quotes his prices in dollars, even for visitors not from the United States. “It’s a lot less scary to see a price of $300 than 900 shekels, especially for unfamiliar tourists,” he said.
Now, due to the strength of the shekel, Haber has taken what amounts to a 20% pay cut over the last year. He would like to raise his prices, but with the cost of visiting Israel already so high and a 50% reduction in tourist visits compared to 2022, Haber can’t afford to lose any more customers.
“I want to raise my prices so I can still pay my bills,” he said. “But if I look at it from the tourists’ perspective, it’s getting even more difficult for them to afford Israel. It hurts us both.”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
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