The American Technion Society
Congratulates
the Detroit Jewish News
on their 75th Anniversary

jews d

in
the

continued from page 128

JUSTIN BARTHA

Justin Bartha based his role in the television series Teachers
on two teachers he admired at West Bloomfield High School
— Rob Leider, who headed up the theater program, and James
Corcoran, who taught English.
Bartha, whose family moved to Michigan
when he was 8, literally found acting in high
school by accident. After breaking his wrist, he
looked for an extracurricular activity he could
handle and discovered the impact of the stage.
At New York University, he moved from a con-
centration in acting to film.
In 2006, with the release of the film Failure to
Launch, he spoke with the Jewish News about
his career that also has placed him in produc-
tion.
“I constantly am making bigger goals for
myself and trying to look ahead,” said Bartha,
who had his bar mitzvah at Temple Israel. “I’d
love to make my own movies and just fulfill
any creative notion I have.”
Bartha is getting lots of creative oppor-
Justin Bartha
tunities.
According to the Hollywood Reporter, he is
working on a starring role in the film Sorry for
Your Loss, acting alongside Bruce Greenwood
and Inbar Lavi (an Israeli actress) for the inde-
pendent production being made in Canada.
On television, he was cast as an attorney for
the first season of The Good Fight, a spinoff of
The Good Wife.

DANIEL OKRENT

Come see why
the TECHNION is
ISRAEL’S TECH MIRACLE,
NEW YORK CITY’S FUTURE

TECHNION WORLD TOUR

LEARN MORE AT

NEW YORK CITY 2017

www.technionworldtour.org

OCTOBER 25-28, 2017

CONTACT: Joey Selesny,
Regional Director, East Central Region
248.593.6760 or joey@ats.org

c 2017 American Technion Society
0

c

130

July 18 • 2017

jn

Daniel Okrent first experienced the sense of
byline achievement as a youngster whose let-
ter was accepted by the Detroit News, and he
never wanted to let that feeling go.
His cornerstone job, after graduating
Daniel Okrent from the University of Michigan, was as
public editor of the New York Times, and he
continues eliciting public comment through
a Twitter page.
Okrent can point to special writing achieve-
ments that include magazine articles and
serious books, such as Last Call: The Rise and
Fall of Prohibition and Great Fortune: The Epic
of Rockefeller Center. Unrelated to writing, he
also has been noted for helping to launch fan-
tasy sports.
Recalling the joking nature of his family
as they lived in Detroit and attended Temple
Israel, he went on to develop the theater piece
Old Men Telling Jokes.
“We weren’t a very religious family, but there
was Yiddishkeit,” he told the Jewish News in
Mike Posner
2014, when the production was performed by
the Jewish Ensemble Theatre (JET) in West Bloomfield after
being seen by New York audiences.
“I remember Sunday mornings going to New York Bagel on
Schaefer near Seven Mile and picking up the bagels, cream
cheese and lox as well as the New York Times. All that, to me,
was a very Jewish experience.”

MIKE POSNER

When Mike Posner was nominated for a Grammy last year, he
invited his mom, Roberta, to travel from Michigan as his guest.
She bought a black evening gown for the event and was proud

continued on page 132