October 18, 2010

A profile on Big Sunday founder David Levinson, author of the new book, “Everyone Helps, Everyone Wins,” which blends memoir with handbook – offering useful advice for any person, family, school, faith group or business interested in giving back – appeared in the latest issue of the Jewish Journal, the week of Oct. 15-21. Read below for an excerpt from the interview.

Jewish Journal: You use the phrase, ‘It’s all good,” a lot in the book.

David Levinson: I wanted to call [the book] that actually. But someone else had already used that title, for something else. But I actually do believe it’s all good. I think people get…sure some things are more valuable than others, like it’s more worthwhile if you’re clearing landmines in Cambodia than if you spend an hour talking to an old lady to keep her company, yes. But it doesn’t mean there’s no value in spending time with the old lady who needs a visitor.  And I think people get moralistic and judgmental, and I have no idea why.

JJ: Were you hesitant about writing about your friend who comes up to you and says, “I just can’t deal with Darfur…I’m overextended already, and it just doesn’t speak to me.”

DL: No, I applauded her for it. It was honest.

I really wanted to write a book that said, ‘You know what, if you can’t do Darfur, it doesn’t mean you’re a bad person.’ We always see Gandhi, Mother Teresa and Martin Luther King. Yeah, sure, they’re amazing. But I’m not going to be Martin Luther King [laughs]. I’m not going to be Mother Teresa. These are extraordinary people, but most people can’t do that.

JJ: Actually, reading the book, I saw you as a mix of Mother Teresa and The Dude.

DL [laughs]: Alright, if that works, I’ll go for it. That’s very funny. I don’t think Mother Teresa was ever quite as cranky as I was.  But maybe she was.

JJ: Well, who do you look at as role models?

DL: Um, that’s a really good question. I’m trying to think of a non-political example. I always thought Paul Wellstone was an incredibly cool guy, the senator from Minnesota.

I try to be non-political when I have my Big Sunday hat on. Although I will say, I really admire Jon Stewart. He’s a smart guy and despite his couching it all with a lot of humor, he really is outraged by some of what he sees in the world and is trying to make a difference in a positive way.

Q: How was the writing process? Was it ever like 3 a.m., you pulling your hair out?

DL [laughs]: When you get to my age, you want to leave as much hair on your head as you can—no, it easy and fun to write. It was just sort of jogging my memory. If I have any regret about the book, there were certain people I wish I could have told their story more because they inspired me. I’ll tell you one thing, can I go back to something else?

JJ: Yeah, absolutely.

DL: I’ll tell you something I found really inspiring. I thought that after the tsunami, when Bill Clinton and George Bush Sr. hit the road together, to raise money for people, I thought that was incredibly inspiring. Because it was my impression that these guys really didn’t like each other personally. And that they put that behind them, presented a united front—I thought that was really cool. I really admired them both for doing that. I think that made a big difference for people to see something like that.

JJ: On another topic, do you don’t think that there’s sort of an issue of self-absorption with twenty-to-thirty-year-olds? Do you think they’re getting our there, volunteering?

DL: You know what, people have complained that twenty-to-thirty-year-olds are self absorbed—it drives me crazy. People talk about kids now, how they’re only on Facebook and texting—I have three teenagers, two teenagers now, one of them is twenty—these guys are so much more involved and committed than people in my generation were. I think this generation is incredible, actually.

David Levinson will read from and sign copies of “Everyone Helps, Everyone Wins” at Barnes & Noble at the Grove, Third Street and Fairfax Avenue, Oct. 20, 7 p.m. Free. (323) 525-0270.

West Coast Matisyahu fans will have to travel cross-country to see the Chasidic reggae star on his just-announced “Festival of Light” tour.

The all-East Coast tour, an “annual Hanukkah celebration,” according to music site Jambase.com, only goes as far west as Baltimore, MA, taking place between Nov. 29 and Dec. 5.

On Nov. 13, though, local Matisyahu fans/curious folk who want to see him live will have their chance. He performs at the Luckman Fine Arts Complex California State University, Los Angeles. The Jewish Journal sponsors the show, along with KCRW, the Alliance Francaise de Pasadena and the Consulate General of Israel in Los Angeles.

For more information about the “Festival of Light” tour and the upcoming L.A. concert, visit matisyahuworld.com/tour.

Jews are always talking about how Israel needs better PR — in Hebrew, hasbara, a term that connotes something between promotion and propaganda — so it’s worth asking, with so many Israelis working in Hollywood, what are they doing about it?

Some of Israel’s best exports have come to Hollywood. In recent years, a stream of Israeli products, from television shows to movies and talent, have flooded Tinseltown: HBO’s “In Treatment,” based on the Israeli program “B’Tipul,” became a fast hit; the films “Beaufort” and “Waltz With Bashir” both were nominated for foreign language film Oscars; actresses Ayelet Zurer (“Angels & Demons”) and Gal Gadot (“Fast & Furious”) have appeared in big-budget blockbusters; and a slew of Israeli producers, from billionaire Arnon Milchan to Marvel Entertainment’s Avi Arad, have helped cement the legacy.

Like any immigrant experience, competing impulses shape the Israeli experience in Hollywood: a desire to succeed, to escape the conflict, to assimilate into a society without religious orthodoxies or compulsory military service. But apart from the drive to build their own bank accounts, how are Israelis using their success? What of their values remain even though their surroundings change?

As Los Angeles raises the curtain on its 25th Israel Film Festival, two Israelis — from opposite ends of the industry — reveal their deeply personal (and deeply disparate) motives for success.

“With the exception of one movie in my life, I am always thinking about the business side,” said producer Avi Lerner, co-founder of Nu Image and Millennium Films, who will be honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the festival’s gala on Oct. 20.

Growing up in Israel, Lerner found solace in movies from an early age. “Instead of going to school, I went to see movies,” he told me. He began his career as a theater operator in Israel, and then worked as a producer in the UK and South Africa before moving to Los Angeles, where he has produced more than 300 films. At 63, Lerner is comfortable with his niche producing B-level action flicks featuring stars past their prime — his most recent, “The Expendables,” with Sylvester Stallone and Bruce Willis, has grossed more than $100 million at the box office (it cost $80 million).

Hollywood, Lerner told me, is about a bottom line, pure and simple. Commercial success is enough for him so long as it continues: “I always feel the place in which you are successful, you want to do better — that’s the nature of everyone.”

Lerner attributes the influx of Israeli influence in Hollywood to the Jewish penchant for storytelling, and to Israel’s complex society for providing good fodder. But he doesn’t believe films can change the world. In fact, he doesn’t see Hollywood films as reflecting the real world at all. Even the suggestion of a parallel between his growing up in a violent society and making action movies for a living is met with dismissal.

“In a movie, it’s very easy to distinguish who is good and who is bad — the hero is always trying to catch the bad guy; the hero always saves the girl. But life is not like that. We are selling illusions; we are selling nice stories to people.”

For Yafit Josephson, a young Israeli actress, Hollywood hasn’t been such a welcoming place. Her one-woman show, “New Eyes” (neweyesplay.com), about life on the audition circuit, is a heartfelt, humorous and sometimes harrowing account of being endlessly typecast as “the villain.”

“I was always getting cast as the Middle Eastern terrorist, the witch, the evil producer — whatever it was, I thought, ‘Why? Is it because I’m from the Middle East? Is it because of the conflict? Am I representing this conflict?’ ” Josephson said during a phone interview.

Her show, inspired by her own experience, is the story of how she worked through an identity crisis — from visiting a plastic surgeon who could fix her nose (to which her mother says, “A nose job? Are you out of your mind? It’s like giving away Jerusalem!”), to telling off a casting director who wants her to play a “merciless” Israeli soldier (“In Israel my friends saw me as a whiny, fearful little poodle, but in the U.S. I’m a Doberman.”). Eventually she comes to terms with being both visibly Jewish and undeniably Israeli in an industry that desperately wants her to conform.

“I represent my country, and I would feel like I was betraying myself and everything I stand for if I portrayed Israel in a negative way,” Josephson said. “Before I put this play on stage, I went to my parents and said, ‘Mom and Dad, I’m not going to make it in Hollywood because of my strong opinions.’ What I represent with my identity is stronger than my desire to do anything it takes to be in Hollywood.”

Josephson, 28, has been living in Los Angeles for seven years and says she understands why some fellow Israelis will do anything to ascend the ladder. But that doesn’t mean she is like them. In her eyes, she has a mission.

“In the play I’m encouraging Israelis to remind themselves where they’re coming from, and I’m encouraging them to support Israel, even if they’re away from Israel,” she said.

For his part, Lerner is unapologetic about a lack of a higher calling in his work, but he does share Josephson’s (and much of Jewish Hollywood’s) desire to be embraced by the American mainstream.

“The bottom line is the Jewish people have to succeed,” Lerner said. “And it all comes from the fear that if you don’t succeed, they won’t accept you.”

Carl Paladino, the Republican candidate for governor of New York, sparked controversy last week by declaring in a speech at an Orthodox synagogue that children shouldn’t be “brainwashed” into considering homosexuality acceptable. He later apologized, saying that he supports gay rights but opposes gay marriage. The Rabbi who hosted Mr. Paladino’s speech then retracted his endorsement of the candidate. Likewise, the Jewish Standard in New Jersey recently sparked a community-wide uproar by publishing a gay wedding announcement.

People of faith insist that homosexuality is the most serious of sins because the Bible calls it an abomination. But the word appears approximately 122 times in the Bible. Eating non-kosher food is an abomination (Deut.14:3). A woman returning to her first husband after being married in the interim is an abomination (Deut. 24:4). And bringing a blemished sacrifice on G-d’s altar is an abomination (Deut. 17:1.). Proverbs goes so far as to label envy, lying, and gossip as that which ‘the Lord hates and are an abomination to Him’ (3:32, 16:22).

As an orthodox Rabbi who reveres the Bible I do not deny the Biblical prohibition on male same-sex relationships. Rather, I simply place it in context. There are 613 commandments in the Torah. One is to refrain from gay sex. Another is for men and women to marry and have children. So when Jewish gay couples come to me for counselling and tell me they have never been attracted to the opposite sex in their entire lives and are desperately alone, I tell them, “You have 611 commandments left. That should keep you busy. Now, go create a kosher home with a mezuzah on the door. Turn off the TV on the Sabbath and share your festive meal with many guests. Put on tefillin and pray to G-d three times day for you are His beloved children. He desires you and seeks you out.”

Once, I said to my friend Pat Robertson, whom I have always found engaging and open in our conversations, “Why can’t you simply announce to all gay men and women, ‘Come to Church. Whatever relationship you’re in, G-d wants you to pray. He wants you to give charity. He wants you to lead a G-dly life.” He answered to the effect that homosexuality is too important to overlook, seeing as it poses the most grave risk to the institution of marriage. Other evangelical leaders have told me the same. Homosexuality is the single greatest threat to the family.

But with one of out two heterosexual marriages failing, with seventy percent of the internet dedicated to the degradation of women through pornography, and with a culture that is materially insatiable even as it remains all-too spiritually content, can we straight people say with a straight face that gays are ruining our families? We’ve done a mighty fine job of it ourselves, thank you very much.

The extreme homophobia that is unfortunately to be found among many of my religious brothers and sisters – in many Arab countries being gay is basically a death sentence –  stems from an even more fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of sin. The Ten Commandments were given on two tablets to connote two different kinds of transgression, religious and moral. The first tablet discusses religious transgressions between G-d and man such as the prohibitions of idolatry, blasphemy, and desecrating the Sabbath. The second tablets contains the moral sins between man and his fellow man, like adultery, theft, and murder.

The mistake of so many well-meaning people of faith is to believe that homosexuality is a moral rather than a religious sin. A moral sin involves injury to an innocent party. But who is being harmed when two, unattached, consenting adults are in a relationship? Rather, homosexuality is akin to the prohibition of lighting fire on the Sabbath or eating bread during Passover. There is nothing immoral about it, but it violates the divine will.

For the record, I am in favor of gay civil unions rather than marriage because I am against redefining marriage. But I hardly believe that gay marriage is the end of Western civilization. For me the real killer is the tsunami of divorce and the untold disruption to children as they become yo-yos going from house to house on weekends. The American religious and electoral obsession with all-gay-marriage-all-the-time has lead to a values-vacuum in America where it is near impossible to discuss real solutions to the erosion of family life.  For instance, making marital counselling tax-deductible would, I believe, do infinitely more to bolster the crumbling institution of marriage than any opposition to gay relationships. Likewise, promoting a code of gentlemanly conduct for men on American College campuses and negating the prevailing hook-up culture where sex even precedes dating could spark a return to romantic and long-term commitments. Finally, getting more families to sign up for our international ‘Turn Friday Night Into Family Night’ would give children in general, and girls in particular, greater self-esteem as they are focused on by their parents for at least two hours each week without any electronic interference. And children with self-confidence later create stronger adult relationships.

I have countless gay friends whose greatest fear, like so many straight people, is to end up alone. Should we merely throw the book at these people? Does not the same book, the Bible, also say, “It is not good for man to be alone?” And all I’m asking from my religious brethren is this: even as you oppose gay relationships because of your beliefs, please be tortured by your opposition. Understand that when our most deeply held beliefs conflict with our basic humanity, we should feel the tragedy of the conflict, rather than simply find convenient scapegoats upon whom to blame all of America’s ills.

Rabbi Shmuley Boteach is the author, most recently, of ‘Renewal: A Guide to the Values-Filled Life, and is founder of This World: The Values Network, a national organization that promotes universal Jewish values to heal America. Follow him on Twitter @Rabbishmuley and at his website: www.shmuley.com