Jews in American Film and
Television
By Mark Weber
America's motion picture industry is so keenly attuned to Jewish
concerns and sensibilities that even some Jewish observers seem
amazed. Noting that a Jewish-theme film has received the Oscar award
in the documentary film category for three years in a row, Ami Eden,
a writer for the Jewish Exponent - a paper serving the Jewish
community of Philadelphia - offered this tongue in cheek commentary
in a recent column (March 30, 2000, p. 5):
Rumor has it that non-Jewish films are actually eligible to win
the Oscar for best documentary, but someone seems to have forgotten
the judges. This year, the choice was "One Day in September," which
examines the murder of eleven Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich
Olympic Games. Two Holocaust-related films, "The Long Way Home" and
"The Last Days," took home the honor in 1998 and 1999,
respectively
So as not to raise any more false hopes among producers of
non-Jewish films, rumor has it that the Academy of Motion Picture
Arts and Sciences has decided to change the name of the category Next
year, expect the announcement to read something like this: The Oscar
for Best Documentary on a Jewish Topic goes to ...
'Incredibly Favorable' Media
Treatment
No less than Hollywood, American television is keenly sensitive to
Jewish interests and concerns. Joseph Aaron, a regular writer for the
Chicago Jewish. News and other Jewish community papers, candidly
observed in a recent column: "The fact is that Jews get just about
the most favorable media treatment of any group in this country ...
Not only are we not covered unfairly but we are, in fact, portrayed
incredibly favorably ..." (Jewish Journal, Los Angeles, April 7,
2000, p. 66)
Aaron went on to write glowingly of a recent episode of the
popular television series "Touched by Angel," in which Judaism is
portrayed in affectionate detail. One of the episode's script
writers, Aaron noted, is an Orthodox rabbi. So sympathetic to Jews
and Judaism is this episode that Aaron gushes: "Amazing, remarkable
... How many other religions get their sacred moments shown lovingly
and accurately on national TV on a prime time series?"
"Part of our problem, I think," Aaron goes on to tell his Jewish
readers, is that we've elevated being suspicious to an art form. Even
though no one is chasing us anymore, we can't shake the feeling that
there must be someone out there gunning for us. And so if there
isn't, we imagine it.
... We complain and moan about how the media treat us, portray us
and yet we fail to see how often and how much they portray us as they
did on Sunday night's "Touched by an Angel."
Reprinted from
The
Journal of Historical Review,
(March/April 2000)
The Journal of Historical Review:
P.O. Box 2739 , Newport Beach, CA 92659, USA. Subscription: $40 per
year (domestic).
