Photo by Seth Olenik

I Arts & Entertainment

Funny Girl

Last Comic Standing winner brings her standup
to Adat Shalom Synagogue.

Suzanne Chessler
Special to the Jewish News

I

liza Shlesinger, the first female and
youngest winner of TV's Last Comic
Standing, doesn't tell any specifically
Jewish jokes, but she will have a Jewish
sensitivity when entertaining Friday eve-
ning, Nov. 21, at Adat Shalom Synagogue
in Farmington Hills.
Shlesinger will be part of the SYNergy
weekend filled with family programs.
"I always think about the audience that
is coming to see me although my humor is
observational," says Shlesinger, 25, single
and recently on a 63-city tour with a road
show of Last Comic Standing.
"I have a way that I look at the world
and see things through whatever tinted
glasses I'm wearing. I find humor, just like
I find joy, in everyday situations. It's the
human condition that inspires me."
Shlesinger, who always wanted to earn
a living being funny, grew up in Dallas,

where she was a bat mitzvah and also was
confirmed. The entertainer, who has vis-
ited Israel, earned a bachelor's degree in
film from Emerson College in Boston and
gained her early experience performing
and writing material with a sketch com-
edy troupe.
Shlesinger moved to Los Angeles after
graduation to pursue standup, and she has
found work in comedy clubs around the
country, including Mark Ridley's Comedy
Castle in Royal Oak. Television credits
include Byron Allen's Comics Unleashed,
Chelsea Lately and The Soup.
Shlesinger, winner of the Web's So You
Think You're Funny contest in 2007, has
performed in various Asian cities for
Armed Forces entertainment.
"Whenever I listen to people talk, I try
to understand the subtext of what they're
saying so I can make generalizations [for
my routine]," says Shlesinger, who recently
performed at the Macomb Center for the
Performing Arts.
"I've been doing standup for nearly two

years, and it's a privilege getting to do
comedy every night, polishing my act and
connecting with fans."
Shlesinger, who credits her parents with
being funny and nurturing her own sense of
humor, will have her synagogue performance
preceded by Kabbalat Shabbat services and a
Teen Service & Shmooze at 5 p.m.; a Limud
Shabbat Service and Shabbat Shaboom for
preschool families at 5:30 p.m.; and a buffet
dinner at 6:15 p.m.
Childcare will begin at 6:45 p.m. and
extend until the end of the 7 p.m. comedy
program (Children not yet teenagers will
see a "Science Alive" presentation at 7 p.m.)
The Saturday schedule, in addition to
morning services, will include a Talmud
study. Havdalah services for families begin
at 5 p.m.
"When I was in college, I was around
like-minded people for the first time,
and that's when comedic opportunities
started coming my way:' says Shlesinger,
who relaxes by staying home and watching
cooking shows.

Iliza Shlesinger

"The realization that I was on the right
path was made clear. My goal now is to be
happy and build my career out of being
funny." 0

"An Evening with Iliza Shlesinger"
begins 7 p.m. Friday, Nov. 21, at Adat
Shalom Synagogue in Farmington
Hills and is suitable for both adults
and teens. Except for the buffet din-
ner on Friday, all SYNergy programs
on Friday and on Saturday, Nov.
22, are free and open to the public.
(248) 851-5100.

Jews

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I

Nate Bloom

Special to the Jewish News

Baby Brigade

On Nov. 2, Adam Sandler, 42, and
his wife, Jackie, had a baby girl
they named Sunny Madeline, sister
to daughter, Sadie, 2. According to
Sandler's Web site, "Everyone is
healthy and happy."
Maybe Sandler could arrange a
play date with Mayim
Bialik's kids. The for-
mer star of the NBC
series Blossom, Bialik
and her husband,
Michael Stone, had a
baby boy last August
whom they named

Frederick Heschel.
Bialik says: "His first
name is for my grand-
pa; and his middle name is for Rabbi
Abraham Joshua Heschel, who
marched with Martin Luther King Jr.
in Selma." Bialik and her husband
also have a 3-year-old son, Miles.

Mayim Bialik

C12

November 20 • 2008

Bialik, 32, received her doctorate
in neuroscience at UCLA in 2007
and still takes an occasional acting
job. The first two seasons of Blossom
(1991-1993) will appear on DVD this
January.

Emanuel - isms
Illinois Democratic congressman
Rahm Emanuel, 48, will be chief of
staff in the incoming Obama admin-
istration. Yes, Emanuel has a reputa-
tion as a tough and smart partisan.
Nonetheless, he maintains friend-
ships with Republican lawmakers and
is able to make fun of his own image.
In 2007, Emanuel deftly satirized
himself and others
at the Washington
press corps' annual
Gridiron dinner.
Here are a couple
of his remarks:
"As a teenager,
I was working in a
restaurant and acci-
Rahm
dentally
sliced off
Emanuel

the middle finger on my right hand.
Of all the fingers to lose! I could not
express myself for months.
"I am a man who has been called
temperamental, vindictive, foul-
mouthed and mean. And that's just
my mom bragging about me."

New Flicks
Opening Friday, Nov. 21, are the
animated film Bolt and the French-
language film I've Loved You So
Long.
John Travolta is the voice of Bolt,
a canine who plays a "superdog" in
the movies. When Bolt is acciden-
tally shipped from Hollywood to New
York, he has to be a "superdog" for
real and somehow find his way home.
He has two traveling companions, a
housecat (voiced by comedian Susie
Essman) and a hamster. Teen idol
Miley Cyrus voices Bolt's owner.
I've Loved You, playing at the
Detroit Film Theatre, co-stars British
actress Kristen Scott Thomas and
French actress Elsa Zylberstein,

40, as a pair of
sisters who are
long estranged
and then reunited.
Zylberstein, whose
father is Jewish,
identifies as Jewish
and has played a
Elsa
number of Jewish
Zylberstein
film roles.
Opening
Wednesday, Nov. 26, is Milk, direc-
tor Gus Van Sant's biopic on the
life of Harvey Milk (1930-78), the
San Francisco supervisor who was
the first openly gay elected official
in the United States. Sean Penn,
whose late father was Jewish, plays
Milk. James Franco, whose mother
is Jewish, plays Scott Smith, Milk's
long-term lover. Josh Brolin co-stars
as Dan White, the homophobic San
Francisco supervisor who mur-
dered Milk and San Francisco Mayor
George Moscone. (See a review in
next week's JN).

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