NOVEMBER 5 • 2020 | 33
MAYBE ANOTHER LORRE
CLASSIC; ROCK & ROLL
HEBREWS; KID STUFF
The comedy/drama series B
Positive premieres on CBS
Nov. 5 (8:30 p.m.). Drew
(Thomas Middleditch) is
a therapist and the newly
divorced father of a 12-year-
old daughter. He needs a
kidney transplant, and he
finds a match in Gina, a past
acquaintance. Sara Rue,
41, co-stars as Julia, Drew’s
ex-wife. You might remember
Rue as the star of the sit-
com Less than Perfect. She
was born Sara Schlackman
(“Rue” is her mother’s maid-
en name).
Appearing in recurring
roles are Bernie Kopell, 87,
and Linda Lavin, 82. Both
play residents of an assist-
ed living facility where Gina
works. Lavin plays Norma,
a woman who came out as
a lesbian after the death of
her husband. Lavin is most
famous as the star of the
1970s sitcom Alice.
Koppel is best known for
playing Dr. Adam Bricker,
the ship’s doctor, on the hit
program The Love Boat.
Lavin and Koppel had recur-
ring roles in early seasons
of Mom, the hit CBS sit-
com. Mom begins its eighth
season after the B Positive
premiere. Both shows were
created by Chuck Lorre, 68,
the man behind a slew of
hits, including The Big Bang
Theory.
HBO will first stream a
video of the 2020 induction
ceremony into the Rock and
Roll Hall of Fame Nov. 7 (8
p.m.). The band Nine Inch
Nails is being inducted. Ilan
Rubin, 32, who has been
the group’s drummer since
2009, is being inducted as a
band member. Rubin was a
child musical prodigy, show-
ing great talent at age 8.
Also inducted as a per-
former is Marc Bolan (1947-
77). Bolan, born Marc Feld,
was the son of working-class
English parents. His father
was Jewish; his mother was
not. Marc spent much of his
teen years hanging out at a
community club for Jewish
young people. He’s credited
as a father of the “glam-rock”
look and sound. He was the
lead singer and songwriter
for the group T-Rex (“Bang a
Gong, Get It On”). Bolan died
in a car accident. He had a
Jewish funeral and is buried
in a Jewish cemetery.
Non-performers are
inducted into the Hall via the
Ahmet Ertegun Award for
Lifetime Achievement. The
two Ertegun award winners
this year are Jewish: Jon
Landau, 71, and Irving Azoff,
72. Landau is most famous
as the producer of many
Bruce Springsteen albums,
including Born to Run. Azoff
is a leading record company
and concert ticket company
executive.
The Mighty Ones is a
child-friendly animated
series that begins stream-
ing on Hulu and Peacock
TV on Nov. 9. It follows
the fun adventures of a
group of creatures: a rock,
a strawberry, a stick and a
leaf. Self-named the Mighty
Ones, they live in a backyard
belonging to three people
whom they mistake for gods.
Josh Brener, 36 (Silicon
Valley), voices one of the
Mighty Ones.
ARTS&LIFE
CELEBRITY JEWS
NATE BLOOM COLUMNIST
PAMELA LITTKY/2020 WARNER BROS. ENTERTAINMENT INC.
A still from
B Positive
I
n Borat Subsequent Moviefilm
(now streaming on Amazon
Prime), the high-fiving fake
Kazakh journalist successful-
ly gets a bakery to decorate
a cake with “Jews Will Not
Replace Us” and goads a plas-
tic surgeon into mimicking a
caricature of a Jewish nose. In
a recent talk show appearance,
he also insists the coronavirus
was created in a lab in Israel.
Jewish comedian Sacha
Baron Cohen has been playing
Borat on and off for more than
two decades, first on TV and
then in movies. Even more
than rampant misogyny and
general buffoonery, antisem-
itism has been central to the
character’
s identity — even
though Cohen speaks fluent
Hebrew (that’
s usually the lan-
guage he uses when mimicking
Borat’
s “Kazakh” tongue).
When the original 2006
Borat movie became a huge hit,
the Anti-Defamation League
criticized Cohen, saying that
many viewers wouldn’
t get that
he was making fun of bigots
instead of encouraging them.
That concern takes on new
layers in the age of “fake news”
and social media bubbles.
Much of the new movie
focuses on Borat’
s efforts to
offer his “daughter,” Tutar
(played by Bulgarian actress
Maria Bakalova), as a bride to
various members of President
Trump’
s inner circle — includ-
ing, in one deeply uncomfort-
able scene, Rudy Giuliani. But
Cohen also allows plenty of
time for Borat’
s antisemitism.
In the film’
s craziest scene, a
depressed Borat enters a syna-
gogue “to await the next mass
shooting;” he’
s “disguised as a
Jew,” with a hook nose, devil
horns and “puppetmaster”
strings.
One of the Jews he meets
there is Judith Dim Evans, a
Holocaust survivor. She con-
fronts him about his bigotry:
“Look at me. I am a Jew,” she
says. “The Holocaust hap-
pened.” Borat weeps; they
embrace. It’
s a moment that
finds tenderness in the absurd.
Cohen dedicates the film to
Evans (she died after the scene
was shot). He has also made
up with the ADL: The actor
is now an outspoken advocate
of the Stop Hate for Profit
campaign to limit the spread
of misinformation and hate
speech on social media.
But there may be no better
illustration of the confusing
role Borat plays in society
than what followed: Evans’
daughter sued Cohen and the
film’
s producers, alleging they
coerced her mother to partici-
pate in a film that “mock[s] the
Holocaust and Jewish culture.”
This lends credence to ADL’
s
original concern that many
people won’
t get the joke.
Regardless of where Borat’
s
morals lie, his new movie is
full of his signature: deeply
uncomfortable laughs.
AMAZON STU-
ANDREW LAPIN EDITOR
‘Borat’ Returns,
Along with His
Antisemitism
ARTS&LIFE
MOVIE REVIEW