Shows With Jewish Targeted Humor?

[Phantom of London]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 8:04pm

I was talking with a friend of mine who is also into musicals, about shows with humor which is aimed at Jewish people, obviously The Producers is the one that springs to mind, was this the first show to make fun out of Jewish people? Can you think of any other shows and what they say?

[ghostlight2]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 8:20pm

I'm not sure what you mean by " to make fun out of Jewish people". That sounds to me like making fun of Jewish people, which I don't think The Producers did. If you mean shows that use Jewish humor - well, hell, they've been around as long as the Jews have. The most recent one I can think of was The People in the Picture, which, despite its pathos, focussed quite a bit on the humor of Yiddish theater.

Though if you're looking for specific earlier examples, Gypsy is one. Updated On: 11/27/11 at 08:20 PM

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 8:27pm

Any Jackie Mason show.

[Gaveston2]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 8:36pm

Jewish humor--like Jewish harmonies--is so central to the American musical, it would be easier to list shows that DON'T employ a Jewish comical sensibility.

(In case anyone wonders, this is by no means a complaint. As Mel Brooks once wrote, "Without Jews, fags and gypsies, there would be no theater." Substitute African-Americans for gypsies and you have the historical recipe of the American musical.)

[bwaylvsong]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 8:38pm

Fiddler on the Roof

[JKlock]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 8:47pm

Spamalot

[broadwaydevil]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 9:03pm

"You won't succeed on Broadway if you don't have any Jews."

New York City's theatre scene has a massive Jewish presence (actors, directors, writers, etc.) and Jewish jokes, culture, and tradition thus play a pretty major role in shaping the industry. I'm not saying it's positive or negative, it just is.

[SingOutLouise2]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 9:05pm

Funny Girl

[chewy5000]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 9:05pm

Pacific Overtures

[Gaveston2]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 9:06pm

Well, I'm one goy who has no trouble saying the Jewish influence has been and continues to be very positive indeed.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 9:08pm

Watch your phrasing! The word "targeted" in your subject line and the phrase "make fun out of" make your post seem to be offensive, at least to American ears.

Assuming your post was NOT anti-Jewish, the answer to your question is that Irving Berlin was probably the first, starting around 1910, with a series of songs he wrote for Jewish-dialect comedians, like the young Fanny Brice, with titles like "Yiddisha Nightingale," "Becky Is Back in De Ballet," "Jake! Jake! De Yiddisha Ball Player," and the classic "Sadie Salome, Go Home!"

In this clip from the 1936 movie The Great Ziegfeld, Fanny Brice sings the 1910 "Yidl, With Your Fiddle, Play Some Ragtime":

http://youtu.be/NTwq_Fxr5ak


Here's an interesting page on "Sadie Salome":

http://sadiesalome.com/about.html?KeepThis=true&TB_iframe=true&height=600&width=800

Updated On: 11/27/11 at 09:08 PM

[goober1632]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 9:43pm

Falsettos - the whole show
Wedding Singer - Today You Are a Man, George's Prayer
Hairspray - Velma's Revenge

[WhizzerMarvin]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 10:49pm

"A Broadway Musical" had a camp number called "Yenta Power," literally about the power Jewish matinee ladies had to control a show's success or failure.

[Jane2]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 10:59pm

I'm scratching my head after reading the first post regarding The Producers ostensibly "making fun out of Jewish people." All I can come up with is that The Producers made fun of Hitler. Am I missing something here?

[WhizzerMarvin]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 11:02pm

Jane- there were jokes throughout the producers about Jews like, "let's play a game where there's absolutely no sex: The Jewish princess and her husband."

I don't know if it was lines like this that made the OP think that.

[Jane2]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 11:13pm

Thanks Whizzer- and it just occurred to me that I saw the show so long ago, that I was referencing the films instead.

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 11:22pm

Rags had that Hamlet number that's rather cute.

[gypsy4]

Posted: 11/27/11 at 11:45pm

Hairspray!- You're Timeless to me
Updated On: 11/27/11 at 11:45 PM

[beccaface]

Posted: 11/28/11 at 2:45am

Make Me A Song, which is half revue and half Falsettos, has songs such as "Four Jews In A Room Bitching" and "Passover". William Finn is Jewish and a lot of his work has either traces of what can be called Jewish humor, or is just outright loud and proud of it's Jewish humor.

[Eris0303]

Posted: 11/28/11 at 3:01am

It's not on Broadway but I saw Shoulda Been You at the George Street Playhouse. It was about the wedding of a Jewish woman and a Catholic man and their mothers (played by Tyne Daly and Harriet Harris respectively). The religious humor went both ways.

[adam.peterson44]

Posted: 11/28/11 at 9:57am

My Mother's Lesbian Jewish Wiccan Wedding (Not on Broadway - at Toronto Fringe and NYMF)

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 11/28/11 at 12:11pm

Shows without Jewish humor (excluding, of course, the multitude of shows without any humor at all):

Me And My Girl

and, um....