This creative musical mashup celebrates Jewish tradition with a playful twist, uniting voices from near and far to uplift and inspire. Whether you’re a fan of Jewish music, baseball, or simply love seeing communities come together through song—this performance will make you smile.
Enjoy, and Shabbat shalom!
She has posted videos about the history of the Yiddish language. In this video Tamar focuses on eight Yiddish words that Israelis use every day, often assuming that they are Hebrew. But actually most of them have origins in Yiddish.
Enjoy!
After a series of theatrical
film shorts, also titled Candid Microphone,
Funt's concept came to television on August 10, 1948, and continued
into the 1970s.
The show involved concealing cameras filming ordinary people being
confronted with unusual situations, sometimes involving trick props,
such as a desk with drawers that pop open when one is closed or a car
with a hidden extra gas tank. When the joke was revealed, victims would
be told the show's catchphrase, "Smile, you're on Candid Camera."
Peter Funt joined the show professionally in 1987 when he became a co-host with his father. During this time the show was being broadcast on the CBS television network. In 1993, Allen Funt had a serious stroke, from which he never fully recovered. This required Peter to host the show full-time.
The show went through a few revivals. During his time on the show Peter was a producer, host and acted on the show. He also produced and hosted over 200 episodes.
In this classic episode from 2001, hilarious hidden-camera antics unfold at a pumpkin patch. People creatively—and sometimes comically—attempt to carry as many pumpkins as possible. Watch the many ways that people develop unique strategies for this fall challenge.
Enjoy!
Now it is streaming on Netflix.
As Natalia Winkelman wrote in The New York Times,
In the video below, Kyra Sedgwick, a leading actor in the movie, invites you to join in the fun. Enjoy!Those who have attended a Shabbat dinner — which occurs on Friday and kicks off the Jewish Sabbath — know that the traditional greeting is “good Shabbos.” The ensemble comedy “Bad Shabbos” telegraphs its silliness right from the title.
Directed by Daniel Robbins, the movie takes place over a disastrous dinner on the Upper West Side, where David (Jon Bass) and Meg (Meghan Leathers) — a newly engaged Jew and gentile — plan to introduce their parents for the first time. But before they can start, a disturbing prank by David’s brother, Adam (Theo Taplitz), goes awry, causing an emergency that the family must hide from the Midwestern in-laws. The crisis involves a body and a ticking clock, as well as a zany, meddlesome doorman (Method Man, always welcome) added for good measure.
Rabbi Jacobson, an American Chabad rabbi from Monsey, New York, is one of the most sought after speakers in the Jewish world today, lecturing to Jewish and non-Jewish audiences on six continents and in forty states, and serving as teacher and mentor to thousands across the globe.
He is considered to be one of the most successful, passionate and mesmerizing communicators of Judaism today, culling his ideas from the entire spectrum of Jewish thought and making them relevant to contemporary audiences.
He served as editor-in-chief of the Algemeiner Journal, and as a choizer (transcriber) for Lubavitcher Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson.
He also loves to tell jokes, and here's the setup: There was this fellow who would come each night to the bar and he would order two big glasses of Crown Royal. And then...
Enjoy!
David Steinberg, Canadian comedian, actor, writer, director, and author, was one of the best-known comics in the United States during the late 1960s and mid-1970s. He appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson more than 130 times (second only to Bob Hope in number of appearances) and served as guest host 12 times, the youngest person to guest-host.
Now 83 years old, David is the son of Yasha Steinberg, a strict, Romanian-born rabbi. He got his start in comedy at the Second City in Chicago, where he did improv for six years. He was known for his funny sermons based on suggestions from the audience.
In this 1968 video clip of his first appearance on Johnny Carson's show, he delivers a sermon based on the lives of Solomon, Job, and Moses. After his sermon, he sat on Carson's couch with Anne Meara and defended his biblical references as coming from a place of respect and warmth.
Enjoy!
As a Rabbinic Fellow at the Institute for Jewish & Community Research, he came to the U.S. to 2003 to study in a five-year graduate program at the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies at the American Jewish University in Los Angeles. He graduated in 2008 and was ordained as a rabbi under the auspices of Conservative Judaism.
In this video Rabbi Sizomu sings Lecha Dodi at a Kabbalat Shabbat service with Cantor Jenni Asher who has sung as a cantorial soloist since 2020. As of September 2024, Asher works as the music director and cantorial soloist for a Conservative synagogue in Los Angeles. She was ordained as a cantor in 2025, becoming the first known black woman to hold the role.
Enjoy, and Shabbat shalom!
In the end of the 1940s, Lea Koenig and her mother emigrated to Romania, where she began studying at National University of Arts in Bucharest and debuted at Jewish Theatre. In 1961, she emigrated to Israel.
Primarily acting in Hebrew, Koenig performs in Israel and all over the world also in Yiddish theaters.She speaks English, Hebrew, German, Polish, Romanian, Russian and Yiddish.Koenig, now 95 years old and nicknamed the First Lady of Israeli Theatre, had an important role in the popular Israeli TV series Shtisel, where she played Bubbe Malka, Shulem Shtisel's mother.
In this video she sings My Way in Yiddish, with the original English lyrics that Paul Anka wrote and gave to Frank Sinatra translated to Yiddish by Zvi Stolper. The clip was produced with the kind support of The National Authority for Yiddish culture.
Enjoy!
After a series of theatrical
film shorts, also titled Candid Microphone,
Funt's concept came to television on August 10, 1948, and continued
into the 1970s.
The show involved concealing cameras filming ordinary people being
confronted with unusual situations, sometimes involving trick props,
such as a desk with drawers that pop open when one is closed or a car
with a hidden extra gas tank. When the joke was revealed, victims would
be told the show's catchphrase, "Smile, you're on Candid Camera."
Peter Funt joined the show professionally in 1987 when he became a co-host with his father. During this time the show was being broadcast on the CBS television network. In 1993, Allen Funt had a serious stroke, from which he never fully recovered. This required Peter to host the show full-time.
The show went through a few revivals. During his time on the show Peter was a producer, host and acted on the show. He also produced and hosted over 200 episodes.
In this classic episode from 2001, Candid Camera staffer Jose casually removes items from other shoppers' carts as he stroll down the aisles of a supermarket.
Enjoy!
Shahar is an entertainer who paved his way through the best entertainment programs in Israel: Eretz Nehederet, Zahirut TV, TV at its best, Laughter from Work, Limited Edition, Fun Night, Express Hearts and more.
In this performance before a live audience, Shahar carries on about how glad he is to be living in Israel despite the need to be on the lookout for incoming missiles and siren alerts. His difficulty with the English language is funny and endearing, but the English subtitles make him easy to understand.
Enjoy!
Marshal (Mickey) Greenblatt received degrees from Columbia (BA and BS in Flight Sciences), a DC from Von Karman Institute (1963) and his PhD from Princeton in Aerospace Sciences. He worked as a researcher for NASA and the Naval Research Laboratory.
With four other scientists, he founded Fusion Systems Corporation, which invented microwave-powered UV lamps for drying coatings. He founded and served on the boards of technology companies and is active in volunteer work. He served on the executive committee of the Jewish Council for the Aging of Greater Washington for many years.
Mickey also loves Jewish jokes and sent us this one to share with you. Here's the setup: A couple went to see a marriage therapist after 15 years of a very unhappy marriage. The therapist brought them into the office and said "Sit down." Before he started anything else the woman started into a litany of all the problems that they've had in their marriage. And then...
Enjoy!
Since we started Jewish Humor Central in 2009 we have posted 130 different versions of Hava Nagila. The song
has shown up in many countries, including some unexpected ones (Scroll
down the left column on this page and click on Hava Nagila in the
Keywords list and you'll see what we mean.)
Today
we're posting a version of Hava Nagila that Russian figure skater Mark Kondriatuk used as background music for his performance last week at an open skating session of the Russian natiional team.
Enjoy!
Since October 7th, 2023, Noam performed at more than 80 communities around the world.
Noam brings his signature warmth and spirit to each amazing performance, inspiring audiences around the world with pride in their Jewish heritage.
In this video clip recorded at the 300-year-old Portuguese Synagogue in Amsterdam, Noam sings Shalom Aleichem to welcome Shabbat.
Enjoy, and Shabbat shalom!
The song was written by Herman Hupfeld in 1931. It became famous when it was featured in the 1942 film Casablanca, sung by Dooley Wilson as Sam. The song was voted No. 2 on the AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs special, commemorating the best songs in film (surpassed only by "Over the Rainbow" sung by Judy Garland).
Gormé was born in the Bronx to Sephardic Jewish parents Nessim Hasdai Gormezano and Fortuna "Fortunee" Gormezano. Both her parents were born in Turkey. The Gormezanos spoke several languages at home, including Ladino (also referred to as Judaeo-Spanish). Due to its close relationship with Castilian Spanish, Gormé was able to speak and sing in Spanish. She was distantly related (by marriage) to Neil Sedaka.
Eydie
and her husband and singing partner Steve Lawrence have been among our
favorite singers for many decades. Eydie died in 2013 and Steve in 2024. We miss them both but we still enjoy their duets and solos thanks
to YouTube.
Enjoy!
Just before Sukkot, Malkah Fleisher, wife of Yishai Fleisher, the international spokesperson for the Jewish Community of Hebron, went shopping.
In this video, recorded a few days before Sukkot which starts tonight, Malkah takes us on a tour of the Osher Ad store in Jerusalem, where everything you might want for the holiday and items you didn't know existed are available.
Yishai is a podcast host, pro-Israel advocate and political advisor. Malkah is an Israel-rights activist, host on the Yishai Fleisher Israel podcast, and a marketing communications strategist at JNS. She is a graduate of Cardozo Law School and a wife and mom raising three kids in Judea.
We will be celebrating Sukkot from tonight through Simchat Torah next Wednesday, so Jewish Humor Central is taking the week off and will return on Thursday, October 16.
Enjoy, and have a very happy Yom Tov!
As Clara Shapiro wrote in The Forward,
D’yan Forest leads a double life. By day, the 91-year-old singer and comedian is Diana Schulman, an aficionado of golf, swimming and cappuccinos. By night, like Clark Kent morphing into Superman, she transforms into D’yan Forest, a fedora-tipping, ukulele-strumming spotlight-stealer with as much material locked in her memory as a Homeric bard. She holds the Guinness World Record for “Oldest Working Female Comedian,” though her gleeful laugh and booming showbiz belt makes it easy to forget her age.
She has a comedy special, A Gefilte Fish Out of Water, a tour of her life from her earliest days (“I didn’t even know what Jewish was, or that I had it!”) to her nonagenarian ones. We'll be sharing some excerpts from the show in the coming weeks. Today we're posting her story about her encounter with Christian hymns at Middlebury College in Vermont.
Enjoy!
Hamakom is an inclusive Jewish community creating meaningful experiences through communal connection, celebrating, worshiping and learning. Hamakom means “The Place” and represents the understanding that spiritual life begins when you seek the extraordinary within the ordinary.
Hamakom has programs for all ages, from The Nook (Infant & Toddler Center) to an Early Childhood Center, one of the city’s most respected; from a vibrant and inclusive JLC Religious School to Adult Education programs and Shabbat services.
Enjoy, and Shabbat shalom!
We hope this melody puts you in the proper mood to experience a meaningful day of prayer and reflection. G'mar Chatimah Tovah!
