Do "Jewish Jokes" Need to be Updated?

A very good friend in the Berkshires, a novelist, who knows more about Jews than I will ever know, and has the books behind him to show it, tells me: To be honest, Danny, this manifesto is one of your crusades that simply does not grab me. Popular culture has so little lasting impact that it’s not worth your intelligence or energy to go down this path.”

Says a 93 year old friend of mine in Australia, not Jewish but a longtime newspaperman: ”I support your viewpoint, Danny, but I fear you will have an uphill battle with this manifesto!”

Jewish Princess jokes? Are they still around or did they get the axe? Says a Jewish newspaper editor from Manhattan: “Danny, I don’t see what your manifesto is driving at. I myself haven’t heard a JAP joke in 20 years. I suggest you look for a topic that is more current and relevant to these times.”

So maybe those old stale and often tasteless and sexist JAP jokes have been jettisoned. Good! I always hated those JAP jokes and I am glad to hear they have been retired. Still, Marilyn Stasio, reviewing the play for variety, wrote: “By the time the show moves from Birth and Childhood, through Dating and Marriage and Business and Money and lands between Doctors and Death, Weston has tried on more accents than Jewish American Princesses do shoes.”

So the stale and sexist JAP joke is not dead, it seems, thanks to Ms Stasio, who may or may not be Jewish herself (not that it matters, or does it?)

But what about those stale and anti-female Jewish Mother jokes that are still around and even make their way into the Peter Gethers and Daniel Okrent co-production of “Old Jews Telling Jokes”?

Ms. Stasio, again for Variety, writes: “Marilyn Sokol …applies her genius for physical comedy to the adorably named Bunny. Her verbal forte is Jewish mother jokes (Question: “Why don’t Jewish mothers drink?” Answer: “They don’t want to dull the pain”).”

Stasio lands one more Jewish Mother punch: “Lenny Wolpe … is the genial guy, the funny uncle who can make even a Jewish mother laugh.”

[Ms Stasio, please! It's 2012, not 1912? Jewish mothers are doing fine, now. Stop the stereotypes!]

Says one critic of the play, Elisabeth Vincentelli, a native of France who has been living in the USA for the past 20 years, and who liked most of the jokes but had some reservations about some of the material: “Unlike the Old Jews Telling Jokes Website, which you can leave after a ba-dum-bump or three, the off-Broadway show holds you hostage. And no matter how funny the material is here, 90 minutes worth of doctor visits and “oy, my wife!” is exhausting.”

Another critic, also a woman, Jessica Shaw, was more critical: “This play, now playing at Off Broadway’s Westside Theatre, [is an add-on] to the simple website concept’s successful franchise and you’ve got a lot of jokes about overbearing wives who don’t want to have sex with their shlemiel husbands…In fact, the performance I attended left the mostly geriatric audience in stitches, often repeating punchlines for their hard-of-hearing seat-mates…Too often, ‘Old Jews Telling Jokes’ feels like a night of community theater put on for an Upper West Side nursing home.”

And another critic, again a woman, Eleanor J. Bader, said she liked the show for “its funny — and yes, sometimes corny — stuff” but added a note of caution: “Occasionally, however, the sexism is glaring and the Jewish mamma stereotypes are more annoying than amusing.”

Got that Gethers and Okrent? The sexism was glaring and the Jewish mother jokes were more annoying than amusing. Eleanor J. Bader, who liked the show as a whole, said that. It’s important to listen to her, too.

Okay, my friendniks: time to close the curtain on this broadside. Here are four jokes from the play to end with, with my comments, and you, dear reader, please, tell me which ones you like or don’t like:

* A Russian man, a French man and a Jewish man are lost in the desert. The Russian says, “Ach, I’m tired and thirsty — I must haf a wodka.” The Frenchman says, “Mon dieu, I am tired and zirsty, I must have some wine.” The Jew says, “Oy, I’m tired and thoisty — I must have diabetes.” [So Jews in 2012 are more likely to be hypochodriacs than other people?]

* I told my mother I was finally getting married. She was thrilled! She wanted to meet my fiancée so I said, “Ma, I’m gonna play a little game with you. I’m gonna bring in three women and you have to guess which one’s gonna be my wife.” She said fine, so the next day I brought in three beautiful women. My mom talks to each of them for 15 seconds and then she turns to me and says, “The one in the middle.” I said, “Ma, that’s amazing! How’d you do that?” She said, “That’s the one I don’t like.” [So Jewish mothers still act like this in 2012?]

* A man goes to see his rabbi. He says, “Rabbi, I think my wife is poisoning me. I don’t know what to do!” The rabbi says, “Give me a chance to talk to her and I’ll get back to you.” The next day, the rabbi calls the guy and says, “I had a long, long talk with your wife. Three hours at least.” The man says, “Yes, yes, so what’s your advice?” “Take the poison.” [This is funny? In 2012? In 1962, yes but now in 2012?]

NY Hosts Celebration of Jewish Humor [VIDEO]