KIDNAPPING; JEWISH 
JEANS, COLLEGE 
JEOPARDY, A CLEVER 
SCAMMER

Suspicion is an original 
eight-episode Apple TV+ 
series that begins stream-
ing on Feb. 4. It’s based on 
False Flag, an Israeli series. 
Uma Thurman plays a busi-
nesswoman whose son 
is kidnapped. If Suspicion 
follows False Flag, as I 
expect it will, several “total-
ly ordinary” persons will be 
accused of being involved 
in the crime, and the mys-
tery will be — are they inno-
cent or just good liars? 

Noah Emmerich, 56, 
has a big supporting role. 
You might not recognize 
his name, but you’ll proba-
bly know his face. He has 
worked steadily in TV and 
films since the late 1990s. 
He played Jim Carrey’s 
best friend in the film The 
Truman Show and Stan 
Beeman, a major charac-
ter on The Americans TV 
series.
His father, Andre 
Emmerich, was a famous 
art dealer. He fled Nazi 
Germany at age 7, with his 
parents, and arrived in New 

York in 1940. Noah’s aunt 
was a classmate of Anne 
Frank. Noah’s brother, Toby 
Emmerich, 58, is the CEO 
of Warner Bros. Pictures. 
On Feb. 7, most PBS 
stations will premiere The 
History of Jeans, a new 
American Experience docu-
mentary. Much of it is about 
Levi Strauss (1828-1902) 
and tailor Jacob Davis 
(1831-1908). Davis invented 
the jeans we know by put-
ting copper rivets in them 
so they would stand up 
to hard use. Davis bought 
his cloth from Strauss. He 
asked Strauss to co- 
finance a patent application. 
Strauss agreed and they 
shared the patent (1873). 
I imagine that the epi-
sode will mention that 
Strauss was Jewish. I am 
not sure that they will note 
that Davis was Jewish, 
too. Davis was born Jacob 
Youphes in Riga, Latvia. He 
came to America in 1854 
and soon headed West. In 
1869, he was living in the 
mining town of Virginia City, 
Nevada. A woman asked 
him to make really strong 
pants for her “big” husband. 
Davis had some copper riv-
ets in his shop that he used 
to attach leather straps to 
horse blankets. He used 
them to hold the pants’ 
seams together and that 
worked beautifully!
Levi Strauss was univer-
sally viewed as an hon-
orable businessman. His 
good treatment of Davis is 
but one example. Strauss 
hired Davis to be his head 
of manufacturing. Davis 
worked for the Levi Strauss 
company until his death in 
1908. Strauss and Davis 
are buried in the same San 

Francisco-area Jewish cem-
etery. 
Jacob’s son, Simon 
Davis, struck out on his 
own and, in 1935, founded 
the Ben Davis clothing com-
pany with his young son, 
Ben. The company made 
“tough” clothes (including 
jeans) for working folks. It 
is still very much in exis-
tence and actually became 
chic in the ’90s when hip 
hop musicians, including 
the Jewish Beastie Boys, 
touted Ben Davis clothes. 
Ben Davis is still “hip” and 
still makes some clothes in 
America. Ben’s son, Frank, 
70, has been head of the 
company since 1995.
Here’s one detail I recent-
ly read. Today, the Napa 
Valley is a playground for 
the vintage-sipping rich. 
But, in the late ’30s, it was 
a disaster area. Prohibition 
(1920-33) virtually destroyed 
the vineyard business. Then 
the Great Depression (1929-
39) hit the Valley hard. The 
Valley got a lifeline when 
the Davises opened a 
(unionized) factory in Napa 
in 1937. It quickly employed 
10% of the Valley’s work-
force. 
The Levi Strauss compa-
ny is, of course, also still 
in existence and it is still 
controlled by the descen-
dants of Levi Strauss (they 
are direct descendants of 
his sister. Levi never mar-
ried and had no children). 
Notable descendants 
include Daniel Goldman, 
45, who served as the chief 
Democratic counsel during 
the former president’s first 
impeachment trial. 
A new evening tour-
nament game show, 
Jeopardy!: National 

College Championship, 
will premiere on Feb. 8 
(ABC, 8 p.m.). The series 
will be hosted by Mayim 
Bialik, 46. Bialik is also the 
co-host for the “regular” 
daily Jeopardy! until the 
end of the 2021-22 season 
(unclear what happens 
then). No matter what, Bialik 
will host “special events,” 
like the college champion-
ship, for the foreseeable 
future.
Inventing Anna is an 
original, nine-part Netflix 
mini-series that will stream 
(whole series) on Feb. 11. It’s 
based on the real-life story 
of fraudster Anna Delvey, 
a non-Jewish woman who 
was born in Russia (1991) 
and grew up in Germany. 
She moved to New York 
City in 2013. Until her arrest 
in 2017, she pretended to 
be a rich heiress, and she 
cleverly used this façade to 
scam banks and friends out 
of about 200K.

Julia Garner, 27, stars 
as Delvey. Garner has won 
two best supporting actress 
Emmys for her work on the 
Netflix series Ozark. 

CELEBRITY NEWS

NATE BLOOM COLUMNIST

ARTS&LIFE

56 | FEBRUARY 3 • 2022 

Noah 
Emmerich

BY REG2600 VIA WIKIMEDIA

Julia 
Garner

BY HARALD KRICHEL VIA WIKIMEDIA

