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I’m going to miss the ‘Marty Supreme’ press tour
Lately, the internet hasn’t been able to stop talking about Timothée Chalamet. First, an account clipped a dismissive statement he made during a town hall event about opera and ballet. The next was a video of him, in China, playing an elderly woman in ping-pong. Then, there was a clip of him serving tofu from a street stand using a ping-pong paddle.
All of these moments were absurd elements of his press tour for Marty Supreme. And every piece of this has been so fitting for Chalamet’s louche and chaotic ping-pong star, Marty Mauser that it almost feels as though he is still doing some sort of Method acting.
Fittingly, a lot of this press tour has made people mad.
Take the opera and ballet comment, in which Chalamet said that “no one cares” about those art forms. In context, he was stating an objectively true fact — indeed, opera and ballet are not popular mass entertainment. Out of context, however, he sounded like an anti-intellectual who hates the fine arts. Yes, Chalamet, who went to the renowned Manhattan performing arts school LaGuardia, and who comes from a family steeped in ballet.
“I’m just taking shots for no reason,” he laughed after dissing ballet.
This kicked off a truly absurd news cycle in which operas and ballets across the country projected “We Care” across their stages in response to Chalamet’s comments, used his name as a discount code for tickets to their performances or otherwise threw shade.
As this was unfolding, Chalamet was ignoring the drama to focus on what really matters. Which is to say he was in China playing ping-pong against elderly people who seemed to generally be kicking his ass. People presented him with gifts emblazoned with “Sweet Tea,” his nickname in China. In honor of that nickname, he drank some sweet tea. He cut tofu with a ping-pong paddle.
It’s just so pitch perfect. Mauser, in the movie, is charming, yes, but wildly arrogant. He also leaves a trail of injuries — both physical and emotional — in his wake all in the name of pursuing greatness. Chalamet is pursuing an Oscar. Potato, po-tah-to.
This year, the complaints about the opera and ballet comment are not the only things that have plagued the Marty Supreme Oscars bid. The movie has been catching strays in the general discourse that has grown since Oct. 7, with a whole host of viral posts accusing the film, which is very Jewish in feel but makes basically no mention of Israel, of being Zionist propaganda.
One could rail against this, point out all the ways it is both stupid and antisemitic. Like that Marty is a fairly despicable character so as far as propaganda goes, it wouldn’t be very effective. Or that making a movie by and about Jews doesn’t mean anything about a movie’s political message. Have people totally lost the ability to watch and interpret movies? Maybe Jewish stories are in just as much trouble as opera and ballet, though obviously in a different way. They are so constantly read as a metaphor for or commentary on Israel that people can no longer appreciate them for their own merits.
Chalamet, however, has simply been ignoring the noise and having fun. The actor has become somewhat famous for his oddball press appearances. Before Marty Supreme even came out, he dropped a nearly 20-minute long surreal parody of his own marketing tour, in which he spent a video call pitching his team on ideas such as dyeing the Statue of Liberty orange.
It’s an unusual strategy in an era of constant statements, apologies and explanations. Whether or not it will be successful we will find out this weekend at the Academy Awards. It wasn’t last year, when he made sports predictions during his press tour for A Complete Unknown, the Bob Dylan biopic; Adrien Brody ultimately won for The Brutalist, a movie I still have not seen. (I want to, truly, but it is just so long.) Brody had a much more traditional press tour, giving interviews about the importance of his role, of the Holocaust, of art. He generally took himself very seriously in both his defense of his art, and of his Jewish identity and Jewish movie.
That’s all well and good, and probably appropriate for The Brutalist. But it’s far more fun to watch Chalamet play ping-pong against China’s elderly. And I think it’s a better way to handle the criticism, whether it’s about Zionism, Judaism or um, anti-opera-ism. Chalamet refuses to dignify his critics; he simply carries on enjoying himself. And I, for one, have enjoyed watching him do it. I’ll miss him when this press tour ends.
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UK adopts sweeping measures against antisemitism in schools
(JTA) — The U.K. has adopted sweeping measures to combat antisemitism in English schools, prompting pushback from the country’s largest teachers’ union.
The move came after a new government-commissioned review found that three in five Jewish students reported experiencing antisemitism in English schools. The most common incidents were jokes, stereotypes and comments about Jewish people. About half of respondents who witnessed or experienced antisemitism said the incidents were not reported, most often because they did not think they would be taken seriously.
The government on Wednesday accepted 27 recommendations from the report, including dedicated antisemitism training for leaders and staff, improved recording of antisemitic incidents and moves to build a better understanding of Jewish life, identity and contemporary antisemitism.
The government commissioned the report following a spate of high-profile attacks on Jews in Britain, including an attack on a synagogue in Manchester last year that left two men dead.
The report’s author, Sir David Bell, the vice chancellor of the University of Sunderland and former chief inspector of schools in England, recommended addressing antisemitism distinctly from other forms of racism. He argued that antisemitism was a “uniquely complex” problem because of intertwined racial and religious dimensions, since Jewish identity can encompass both an ethnicity and a religion, along with expressions of prejudice that hold all Jews responsible for the actions of Israel.
The government will also encourage English schools to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism. The definition is supported by many mainstream Jewish organizations and has been adopted by 47 countries, including the U.K., but critics say that it conflates some forms of antisemitism with criticism of Israel.
British Education Secretary Lucy Powell called Bell’s review a “generational moment” and said that “implementation is now my priority.”
However, the National Education Union, the largest union representing teachers, lecturers, teaching assistants and support staff in the United Kingdom and Europe, raised concerns on Wednesday about recommending the IHRA definition for schools. NEU general secretary Daniel Kebede said in a statement that the definition “risks deepening the problem rather than tackling it, and actively undermining efforts to confront antisemitism.”
“The IHRA’s contested framing risks blurring the line between antisemitism and legitimate criticism of the Israeli government and the genocide in Gaza, leaving teachers with uncertainty when they need clarity,” said Kebede. He cited a risk that “children who cannot critically explore issues through classroom discussion will instead seek their answers in online and unsafe groups.”
Kebede also encouraged Britain’s Department for Education to strengthen guidance on all forms of racism, not only antisemitism, saying that 65% of teachers report they have not received any antiracism training in the past year.
The Board of Deputies of British Jews, an umbrella organization for British Jewish communities, celebrated the antisemitism report and the government’s adoption of its proposed measures. The group specifically praised the report’s “clear recommendations that schools and local authorities follow government guidelines by adopting the IHRA Working Definition of Antisemitism as a tool to deepen understanding of contemporary antisemitism.”
“We remain concerned about undue external influence on schools driven by narrow political agendas, and tendentious materials seeping into schools and increasing disharmony, and we will continue to press for vigilance against this,” said the Board of Deputies.
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Orthodox Jewish man stabbed in midtown Manhattan
(New York Jewish Week) — An Orthodox Jewish man is in stable condition after being stabbed on Wednesday evening in the Diamond District of midtown Manhattan. Police are investigating the attack as a possible hate crime.
Police told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that the NYPD’s Hate Crimes Task Force is investigating the incident as a possible antisemitic attack, and Manhattan Shomrim — the Jewish community watch group — has asked people to share footage as police search for the suspect. No arrests have been made.
The victim was identified by police as a 26-year-old man, and Orthodox Jewish outlet COLLive identified him as a resident of Crown Heights, the neighborhood that is home to the Chabad-Lubavitch Hasidic movement’s headquarters.
He was taken to Bellevue Hospital in stable condition. Police said they were called at about 5:50 p.m. on Wednesday after the man was stabbed in the back with “an unknown sharp object” on 47th Street near Fifth Avenue. ABC7 reported that the victim told investigators he believed he was stabbed with a needle or syringe.
According to the Chabad website, which published an interview with the victim, he is a recently ordained Hasidic rabbi named Joseph, who commutes to Midtown each day to wrap tefillin with Jewish merchants. The attacker, Joseph told the website, was a woman who seemed to be following him prior to the stabbing.
The attack comes as Jewish New Yorkers have been targeted in more than half of the hate crimes committed in New York City this year, despite making up about 12% of the city’s population.
In July, an assailant stabbed two men on the Upper West Side, including one who was leaving a synagogue, while yelling “Allahu akbar,” and was charged with committing hate crimes.
Louis Keene contributed reporting.
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VIDEO: A Hasid gives us a tour of Morocco in Yiddish
דער ירושלימער יוטוב־שטערן וועלוול קירשנבוים האָט לעצטנס אַרויסגעשטעלט אַ ווידעאָ אויף ייִדיש פֿון אַ פּרעכטיקן וויזיט, וואָס ער האָט געמאַכט אין מאַראָקאָ. עס באַגלייט אים זײַן חבֿר אַבֿרהם פּרץ.
אינעם ווידעאָ זעט מען ווי קירשנבוים דאַוונט שחרית מיט די אָרטיקע ייִדן און באַזוכט אַ גוט אָפּגעהיטענעם בית־עולם, וווּ עס ליגן באַערדיקט גרויסע צדיקים ווי למשל הרבֿ חיים בן עתר (1696–1743), באַקאַנט ווי דער „אור החיים“. „מענטשן מיינען, אַז נאָר אין אייראָפּע זענען דאָ קבֿרים פֿון צדיקים!“ זאָגט קירשנבוים.
מיר זעען אַ גרויסע, שיינע שיל מיט אַ פֿײַנער אַרכיטעקטור אין קאַזאַבלאַנקאַ; דעם גרויסן אַראַבישן שוק, וווּ קירשנבוים קויפֿט זיך אײַן מלבושים פּונקט ווי די מאַראָקאַנער גייען אָנגעטאָן. ער באַוווּנדערט אויך די שיינע טיי־גלעזער און טשײַניקן, וואָס מע פֿאַרקויפֿט דאָרט, און באַקענט זיך מיט אַ ייִדישן סוחר וואָס האַנדלט מיט זילבער און גאָלד, פּונקט אַזוי ווי זײַן טאַטע און זיידע האָבן געטאָן פֿאַר דור־דורות.
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