Tag Archives: Yiddish Culture

YI Love JewishTo Host SUNDAY SCHMOOZE SERIES at the Coral Springs Center for the Arts

26 Thursday Sep 2024

Posted by in Clients, Yiddishkayt Initiative

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , , , ,

YILove Jewish
To Host a
Sunday Schmooze Series
at the Coral Springs Center for the Arts
Beginning in October

For Immediate Release
Contact:  Carol Kassie
carol@carolkassie.com / 561-445-9244

September 26, 2024

CORAL SPRINGS, FL:  YILove Jewish (a division of the Yiddishkayt Initiative) will host a Sunday Schmooze series beginning October 13th at the Coral Springs Center for the Arts.  Each event will begin with coffee, bagels, and ‘schmoozing’ (‘talking with someone in a friendly and engaging way!’), followed by lively, educational, and entertaining programming.

 YI Love Jewish, founded by actor/producer/Jewish cultural activist Avi Hoffman and his mother, Miriam Hoffman, world-renowned scholar and professor of Yiddish language at Columbia University, is not-for-profit organization that celebrates and promotes Jewish history, life, and culture and their positive and far-reaching impact on the world. From performing arts, publishing, and education to language, philosophy and literature, YI offers a global clearinghouse of Jewish learning, culture and entertainment.

The Sunday Schmooze Series will offer a wide variety of programming and discussion opportunities and fits neatly into the YILove Jewish goal to utilize the arts to promote Jewish culture and identity both within and outside the Jewish community.

The first four programs to be offered are:

October 13th:  Anne Frank:  A discussion centering on how Anne Frank’s Diary influenced people’s perception of the Holocaust.  There will be a video interview with playwright Ron Elisha and star Alexis Fishman introducing their play Anne Being Frank, which will be presented at various venues in South Florida in November. 

November 17:  How are Jews portrayed in the media?  Igor Shteyrenberg, founder of the Miami Jewish Film Festival will discuss how Jewish culture has made its way into mainstream cinema.

December 22:  Chanukah Around the World.  How do Jews around the world celebrate?  Explore the different customs and traditional foods associated with ‘The Festival of Lights’ while enjoying latkes and donuts, and perhaps even playing a round or two of a dreidel game.

January 19:  Rhythm and Schmooze ‘Singalong’.  Join Avi Hoffman and Aaron Kula for a celebration of Jewish music.

For more information about YI Love Jewish and the Sunday Schmooze Series, and/or to purchase tickets, visit the organization’s website at https://yilovejewish.org or contact Sheri Smith – sheris@whyilovejewish.org / 561-254-5494 or Carol Kassie – carol@carolkassie.com / 561-445-9244.

~

Sunday Schmooze Series at the Coral Springs Center for the Arts
October 13/November 17/December 22/January 19
For tickets and Information:  https://yilovejewish.org
Single Schmooze tickets are $18 per person/series tickets are $54
All Schmoozes will take place from
11:30 am (Schmooze) 12 pm – 1:30 pm program at
The Coral Springs Center for the Arts
2885 Coral Springs Drive
Coral Springs, Florida 33065

Avi & Miriam Hoffman

Miriam Hoffman Reads From Her Latest Book – A BREED APART: REFLECTIONS OF A YOUNG REFUGEE – January 15 at the PGA Arts Center

02 Tuesday Jan 2018

Posted by in Clients

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , ,

Yiddishkayt Initiative
Invites audiences to join
Professor Miriam Hoffman
with her son Avi Hoffman
for a FREE Reading, Q & A, and Book Signing for
A Breed Apart: Reflections of A Young Refugee

For Immediate Release
Contact: Penny Landau
MayaPRNY@gmail.com /917-592-3149
Contact:  Carol Kassie
Carol@CarolKassie.com  / 561-445-9244

January 2, 2018

PALM BEACH GARDENS, FL: Miriam Hoffman, author, scholar, journalist, playwright and survivor will read selections from her new book A Breed Apart: Reflections of a Young Refugee, on Monday, January 15, 2018, at 7pm at the PGA Arts Center in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. She will be joined onstage by her son, Avi, the award-winning actor and performer who is currently appearing in the 20th Anniversary Production of his Too Jewish? at the PGA Arts Center through January 21st. The evening will also include a multimedia presentation, discussion, Q & A and book signing. The event will be FREE and open to the public.

Published by YI Press (a division of Yiddishkayt Initiative, Inc.), A Breed Apart is an engaging non-fiction tale of war and survival, seen through the eyes of a young Miriam Hoffman and her father. Hoffman’s personal tale captures the beauty and importance of keeping the Yiddish language and Jewish culture alive during the twentieth-century, despite countless attempts to destroy it. A Breed Apart follows Miriam Hoffman’s emotional journey as a young refugee girl growing up in a post-war DP (Displaced Person) camp to her new life in the United States.

Miriam Hoffman is an author, scholar, playwright, and survivor of the Russian gulag and the post-World War II DP camps. She has spent her life preserving the Yiddish language and culture that she cherishes so dearly. Her accomplishments in education, arts and literature have impacted both Jews and non-Jews alike. From her time as a child in the post-war DP (Displaced Persons) refugee camp in Ulm, Germany, she brought with her an album of pictures of life in the camp, as well as a journal she kept of over 80 songs in four different languages – Yiddish, Hebrew, Russian and Polish. The Ulm Album has been shared with the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. She has also written over a dozen plays which have won awards and have been produced all over the world. Hoffman recently retired after 25 years as professor of Yiddish Language and Culture at Columbia University. She has published over 2,000 weekly columns in New York’s Yiddish Forward Newspaper as a feature writer. Recently inducted into the Bronx Jewish Hall of Fame, Miriam has written university textbooks and is the founder of the Joseph Papp Yiddish Theatre, with the world-renowned Broadway impresario. www.YiddishkaytInitiative.org

For more information about Miriam Hoffman, A Breed Apart: Reflections of a Young Refugee, or Avi Hoffman, contact Penny Landau (MayaPRNY@gmail.com/917-592-3149) or Carol Kassie (Carol@CarolKassie.com/561-445-9244).

~

A Breed Apart: Reflections of a Young Refugee
A FREE Reading, Q & A, and Book Signing
With Miriam Hoffman and Avi Hoffman
Monday, January 15 at 7 pm
To reserve tickets contact Carol Kassie at Carol@CarolKassie.com
PGA Arts Center
4076 PGA Boulevard
Palm Beach Gardens, FL  33410

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

AVI HOFFMAN’S TOO JEWISH? at Stage Door Theatre – July 19 – August 3 Only!

05 Wednesday Jul 2017

Posted by in Clients

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , ,

Avi Hoffman Returns to the
Stage Door Theatre after 20 years
in the original
Avi Hoffman’s Too Jewish?
July 19 – August 3 Only!

“Delightful tour of Jewish humor, language, and music. Avi has an instant rapport with his audience.  Touching, moving, and delightful.”  NY Newsday

July 5, 2017
MARGATE, FL:  20 years ago, multi-talented actor, director, comedian, singer, and Jewish cultural activist Avi Hoffman brought his award winning New York show Avi Hoffman’s Too Jewish?  to the Stage Door Theatre. His life was never the same. Now, he’s back! Avi Hoffman’s Too Jewish? will open on July 19th, and run through August 3rd.

Avi Hoffman’s Too Jewish? premiered Off-Broadway at New York’s Houseman Theatre in 1994 and has been presented thousands of times all over the world, as well as on the national PBS network.  Hoffman, a child of Holocaust survivors, was taught at an early age to appreciate the beauty and depth of Jewish literature, music, and tradition.  In Avi Hoffman’s Too Jewish? he combines a delightful mix of music, comedy, impersonations, and personal reminiscences to take his audiences on a journey through his own Jewish roots, and to illustrate the traditions and history of his beloved Yiddish culture.

“I couldn’t be more excited to be returning to Stage Door for the 20th anniversary of the production that changed my life,” Hoffman says. “With the incredible success of Too Jewish? at the Stage Door, we moved our family to Florida, and the rest, as they say, is history!  This will be the ORIGINAL production, with some new perspectives on how my life has dramatically changed since then.”


Avi Hoffman’s Too Jewish? has won multiple awards, including Performer of the Year ’95 by NY Press Magazine, and the prestigious Los Angeles Ovation Award as Best Actor in a Musical in 2001. His recent portrayal of Willie Loman in the Yiddish production of Death of a Salesman garnered him a NY Drama Desk Award nomination for Best Actor in a Play, and was featured last summer at The Ashkenaz Festival in Toronto, the largest Yiddishkayt Festival in North America. He has also been nominated for both the NY Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle awards.  His 2012 Carbonell Award for Best Supporting Actor in a Musical was in recognition of his work as Wilbur Turnblad in Hairspray at Actors Playhouse in Miami. He performs worldwide and has proudly worked in nearly every professional South Florida theatre, garnering multiple awards and nominations. Hoffman was also featured in the hit Starz series ‘Magic City’ and Netflix’s ‘Bloodline’, as well as USA’s ‘The Glades’ and NBC’s ‘Law and Order’. His upcoming Yiddish film Shehita (Slaughter) will be featured in next season’s Miami Jewish Film Festival. Hoffman recently directed and performed in the world premiere of Unlikely Heroes, and performed in the Daryl Roth Florida tour of Stars of David. His two popular sequels to Too Jewish? – Too Jewish Two!, and Still Jewish After All These Years, have been seen throughout North America.


Avi Hoffman’s Too Jewish? will run from July 19 – August 3 at Stage Door Theatre. The theatre is located at 8036 Sample Road, in Margate.  Performances are Wednesdays at 8 p.m. and Thursdays at 2 p.m.

Tickets for Too Jewish? are $36. Tickets may be purchased at the Broward Stage Door Theatre box office at 954-344-7765 or on line at www.stagedoorfl.org.

For more information about Too Jewish? contact: Carol Kassie (carol@carolkassie.com / 561-445-9244). For more information about Avi Hoffman visit:  www.avihoffmanactor.com

Mr. Hoffman can be contacted through:
Margie Sernik | JWI PR |margie@jwipr.com | 786-200-2516
Jessica Wade Pfeffer | JWI PR | jessica@jwipr.com | 305-804-8424

Yiddishkayt Initiative, Inc., in association with Stage Door Theatre
Presents:
Avi Hoffman’s Too Jewish?
July 19 – August 3
Created and performed by Avi Hoffman
Tickets:  $36
Phone:  954-344-7765
On line: www.stagedoorfl.org
Showtimes:
Wednesday at 8 p.m.
Thursday at 2 p.m.
The Stage Door Theatre
8036 W Sample Rd
Margate, Fl 33065
www.stagedoorfl.org
Like Us on Facebook!

This slideshow requires JavaScript.