For generations of Jewish campers, summer camp has been a place where lifelong friendships are forged, first romances blossom and awkward teenagers discover where they belong. Those experiences take center stage in “The Floaters,” an offbeat ensemble comedy opening in Los Angeles theaters on July 17.
Directed by Rachel Israel, the film stars Jackie Tohn (“Nobody Wants This”), Sarah Podemski (“Reservation Dogs”), Seth Green, Steve Guttenberg, Jonathan Silverman and Judah Lewis.
In the film, Tohn plays Nomi, a struggling musician who is kicked out of her band just before it is set to embark on tour. With no prospects for the summer, she’s recruited by her oldest friend, Mara (Podemski), director of a Jewish summer camp, to supervise a group of teenage outsiders known around camp as the “floaters” because they never quite fit anywhere else.
Nomi reluctantly accepts the job just as the camp faces a financial crisis severe enough that it can barely afford essential repairs, including a new septic system. Mara strikes a high-stakes wager with a rival, wealthier camp run by an effectively obnoxious director, played by Green. The prize money could save the camp — if Nomi’s misfit campers can stage a better play than their privileged rivals.
As rehearsals unfold, Nomi gradually bonds with her campers, encouraging them to embrace their individuality, work through their differences and channel their quirks into a delightfully unconventional production.
Although Israel didn’t write the screenplay — it was penned by Brent Hoff, Andra Gordon and Amelia Brain — she immediately connected with its setting.
“I really fell in love with the idea of a film set within the world of Jewish summer camp,” Israel told The Journal. “It felt both familiar in the spirit of a summer movie, but also very new in how specifically Jewish it was.”
Rather than dilute that specificity, Israel embraced it.
“The dream with this film was that we would make something super Jewish — crazy Jewish — but that would also be universally relatable whether you’re Jewish or not,” she said. “The films I enjoy most often introduce me to a culture I don’t know. Even if I don’t understand every reference, I understand the emotions.”
That authenticity extends beyond the dialogue. “The Floaters” was filmed almost entirely at Camp Tel Yehudah, the longtime Young Judaea leadership camp in the Catskills, which was transformed into the fictional Camp Daveed.
“It was a true labor of love by people who knew this world intimately,” Israel said.
The filmmakers’ familiarity with Jewish camping culture shines through in dozens of small details. Mara grumbles that the camp’s mashgiach is a “shakedown artist” who nearly shut down the kitchen the previous year over crossbred grapes deemed treif. A quirky rabbi, played by Aya Cash, oversees an Israel-shaped ice cream cartography contest that blends, as she puts it, “the geopolitical” with “the edible,” only to marvel when one camper appears to have solved the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in frozen dessert form.
The screenplay is equally attuned to the emotional landscape of adolescence. Among the film’s strongest storylines is Jonah, one of the floaters, played with understated charisma by Judah Lewis. Sporting a torn T-shirt, a mop of hair and a vaguely Leonardo DiCaprio-esque look, Jonah arrives at camp unconvinced by his father (Jonathan Silverman), who insists camp will be an excellent networking opportunity.
One memorable sequence finds Jonah working kitchen duty when he catches two campers spitting into tubs of strawberry ice cream before serving it. Pressured to join them, Jonah instead cleverly alerts the head chef that fleishig spoons have been mixed with dairy, prompting the horrified staff to throw out the contaminated dessert before anyone eats it.
Israel intentionally cast Jewish actors in Jewish roles, believing the story deserved an authentically Jewish ensemble.
“Because this film says so much about Jewish community, it was important to me that we cast all Jewish characters with Jewish actors,” she said. “I wanted people to see the diversity of the Jewish world.”
Production wrapped just weeks before the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks on Israel. Since then, Israel believes the film has acquired unexpected resonance.
“I was in the edit, kind of high off this feeling of Jewish community coming together,” she said. “The film has gotten deeper and more relevant post-Oct. 7.”
Still, she deliberately resisted making a political statement.
“We intentionally didn’t want to make a political film,” she said. “What we wanted to present was a world that embraces healthy argument.”
Instead, Israel hopes audiences leave with something far simpler.
“Laughter,” she said. “I want them to laugh. I want them to feel that restless joy of summer.”
“The Floaters” opens at Laemmle locations in West L.A. and Encino on July 17. For details, visit laemmle.com/film/floaters.
