This unusual, all-immersive revival of the deservedly popular musical is simply unmissable ‘Immersive' and 'moving' are adjectives that one might use figuratively to describe a theatrical experience. I’m using them literally here. As a promenader following the action around the ever-shifting levels on the interconnected hydraulic platforms of designer Bunny Christie’s flexible staging, I was very much immersed. Frank Loesser’s ‘Musical Fable of Broadway’ with book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows, is based on the stories and characters of much-loved story writer Damon Runyon. His name has become ..read more

Introduce some fun into your Great British Spring Clean As you know, last year we announced that JR were Keep Britain Tidy’s official ambassadors to the Jewish community and we’re taking on that role once again for the Great British Spring Clean 2023. This annual campaign to get Brits doing their bit for their local areas kicked off last Friday and runs right up until the end of next week, when KBT urges people to fill as many bin bags (or even just one) full of rubbish they’ve collected. To infuse the task with a little more fun, the organisation has created Litter Bingo cards. So you can add ..read more

To mark the 150th anniversary of Hayim Nahman Bialik's birth, Agnon House pays tribute to the poet and his confidant, fellow writer Shai Agnon Shai Agnon and Hayim Nahman Bialik are the two Ukrainian heavyweights of modern Hebrew literature, the former in prose – in fact Agnon remains the only Hebrew author to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature – and the latter in poetry. Far from being in competition, they embraced each other's work. Indeed they were life-long friends and, although they had disagreements, they remained focused on their shared goal of creating Hebrew literature that, while ..read more

This startling new take on Shakespeare’s problem antisemitic play was well worth the wait For actor Tracy-Ann Oberman and director Brigid Larmour, this radical reimagining of the Shakespeare classic has been years in the making (including a two-year delay thanks to the pandemic). Indeed, Oberman herself said it's been "a lifelong dream of mine to bring this play to the stage in a new way". So, the opening night was filled with extra special meaning and resonance. The clue to Oberman’s unique response to the play lies in the title: The Merchant of Venice 1936. That year saw huge numbers of Jews ..read more

This 21st-century production of the Rodgers & Hammerstein classic is more unashamedly sexy than wholesomely home on the range Daniel Fish’s production of the first collaboration between composer Richard Rodgers and lyricist Oscar Hammerstein arrives in the West End from Off and then On Broadway via The Young Vic. As a daringly imaginative staging of this iconic musical, it deserves all the plaudits it's earned along the way. The "bright golden haze on the meadow" of the musical’s opening lyric is visible through panoramic kitchen windows (scenic design Lael Jellinek and Grace Laubacher). W ..read more

The artist unveilied his new sculpture this month in central London, where you can see it for free until summer A sphere of polished stainless steel shines proudly in London’s late-winter sun, reflecting the greenery and buildings of the slice of London that surorunds it. The piece is known as SISTER, a new installation by Jewish Londoner David Breuer-Weil, and it sits in Hanover Square, where it can be viewed freely until the end of July thanks to Westminster City of Sculpture and E & R Cyzer Gallery. From afar it resembles an egg, but up close you start to see the nuances that reveal th ..read more

The poems in Jeremy Robson’s eighth book of poetry, Chagall’s Moon, range from the heat of Alabama to a cool night in London, from a universe where Chagall’s lovers fly in a cloudless sky to a place where Beethoven, Picasso and Billie Holiday rub shoulders. Written in the aftermath of the depths of the Covid pandemic, they reflect the world’s current turmoil. But alongside images of nightly rockets falling on Ukraine and boats of refugees, the poems are also suffused with Robson’s warm, witty, personal reflections on love, loss and Jewish identity. Say It in Yiddish by Jeremy Robson I never l ..read more

Dora Levy Mossanen’s latest historical novel is a compelling account of love and community It is unlikely many Iranian Jewish women are involved in the ongoing protests in Iran. Historically they have been silent and invisible and there has always been an almost total absence of literature by Jewish women in Iran because it endangered the community. But in exile there has been an explosion of these women’s voices. Writers such as Farideh Goldin, Gina Nahai, Roya Hakakian, Dalia Sofer, Mojgan Kahen and Dora Levy Mossanen, who all fled from Iran following the revolution in 1979, have spoken out ..read more

Hugh Brody reveals the impulses that led him from a suburban Jewish home in Sheffield to a life working with Canada’s Inuit communities When I was five years old, I found a song-thrush nest. Gleaming blue eggs with tiny black flecks in a clay-white cup. It was in a small bush in the churchyard that lay across the road from our family house at the edge of Sheffield. Between the house and the graves, a steep hill led up into moorland and crags and, beyond them, to the Derbyshire hills. My childhood was given joy and wonder by the discovery of birds and their nests in that churchyard. Much of the ..read more

Jewish and Yiddish literature lovers rejoice – the entirety of Chaim Grade's work is now available online This month, the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research and the National Library of Israel (NLI) announced the completion of the digitisation of the papers of Chaim Grade, leading Yiddish writer, and his second wife and translator Inna Hecker. This includes poetry, literary manuscripts, typescripts of prose, lectures, speeches, essays, newspaper clippings, galley proofs, personal notebooks, correspondence and photographs. These span a whole century, from 1910, when Grade was born, to 2010, when ..read more