US Entertainment Without Large Jewish Influence?

The Jewish contribution particularily to the American entertainment industry has been huge, specifically to cinema and tv and has been magificent! Imagine no Seinfeld, Larry David, Woody Allen etc! I heard a Golden bear winning director at a lecture stating that the Jewish influence came from Eastern European Jews going to Hollywood and bringing a great storytelling culture with them which had its own origins in classical Greek comedies, tradgedies and myths! My own race, the Irish are sometimes likened to the Jews in Hollywood with their influence on the British entertainment industry. I guess that ties in with the notion that the Irish are colourful entertaining eccentrics! Also The Germans are very often misjudged as a humourless race, but yet they had a great comedic theatrical tradition including stand up comedy, but the vast majority of the actors were Jewish despite being only a small minority of the population! Of course this was to decline in light of the Nazi horrors!
 

mowque

Banned
It gets tricky. The various Jewish refugee groups have added alot over the years to the United States. I'd be hard pressed to start. Also, why else do they go?
 
Just suppose they diverted their great skills and talents elsewhere or even more into areas such as finance and medicine where they also seemed to have particularily excelled!
 
I think open anti-Semitism would be far more common, at least in the United States, so I can imagine film villains with Jewish stereotypes (like a lot of fiction before film) being more common without actors, directors, producers, etc. voicing their disapproval.
 
How did their great and magnificent contribution in this area come into being and how did it become so large?
 
A tradition of violent Anti-Semitism and two world wars...well, it caused a brain drain in Europe and lots of Jews fled to America. Later on, the Soviet Union allowed its Jews to emigrate to America as well.
 
Meaning of Humor

You have to remember what humor is, namely incongruity.

It provides a safety blow off valve to vent high pressure
steam, something that jewish people typically had a lot of
while living on the knife edge. What kind of humor do
Roma (Gypsy) clans have? Never heard of it, but plenty
of musicians with many clans.

Without a presence we would get lower level humor and
less of a escape valve. I suppose we would have gotten
on well enough, but very much changed. Certainly the
scene would have been less interesting in entertainment.

Humor is also very temporary, however strong an emotion,
even less than a good meal. It is more like an appreciated
song.
 
My own race, the Irish are sometimes likened to the Jews in Hollywood with their influence on the British entertainment industry. I guess that ties in with the notion that the Irish are colourful entertaining eccentrics! Also The Germans are very often misjudged as a humourless race, but yet they had a great comedic theatrical tradition including stand up comedy, but the vast majority of the actors were Jewish despite being only a small minority of the population! Of course this was to decline in light of the Nazi horrors!

The Irish are not a race and neither for that matter are the Germans. The Jews (they aren't a race either) pretty much founded Hollywood, created many of the comic book superheroes and are even responsible for the mythical portrayal of cowboys.

No Jews and American movies would be more of the 'find a good woman and get married' and the odd revenge movie, pretty much like Bollywood.
 
I wish I had a resource for this, but I understand (from grandparents, etc.) that there was a stigma against going into the acting profession in the WASP culture of the nineteenth century. Entertainment was seen as an industry of rogues and con artists (and since a lot of modern US entertainment has its roots in circuses it's not hard to see why), and perhaps there was a little of the old "I work for my money" attitude.

Of course, they had no problems with enjoying the entertainment.

What this would mean of course, is that the cultures and people who don't care about this sort of taboo are going to become more dominant in the industry.
 
There's another factor to consider. Jews, even in the U.S., were outsiders to the mainstream POV, which allowed them to view the mainstream in a unique way & comment on it. It's why Canadian comics are so successful in the U.S.: a shared understanding, but a slightly skewed outlook.

If it happens, it transforms North American culture enormously. Depending on when, you could wipe out most of Hollywood.:eek::eek: You'd also wipe out most of the superhero comics,:eek::eek: since most of the characters were created by Jews. Would that make Superman into Ubermensch, instead?:eek: Can you imagine Peter Parker as a young German?:eek: (Hmm, does that mean Johnny Canuck is the most successful comics character in North America?:eek::p)
 

Thande

Donor
I wish I had a resource for this, but I understand (from grandparents, etc.) that there was a stigma against going into the acting profession in the WASP culture of the nineteenth century. Entertainment was seen as an industry of rogues and con artists (and since a lot of modern US entertainment has its roots in circuses it's not hard to see why), and perhaps there was a little of the old "I work for my money" attitude.

Very true. If you look at nineteenth century idiom, "actress" was considered a euphemism for "high class prostitute" as the vocation was so associated with loose morals. Interestingly, that attitude has carried over in modern India, though I'm not sure if it was because of the British Empire or something present in their culture already.
 

NothingNow

Banned
Because a sense of humor is required if you want to look back on Jewish history without constantly breaking down into tears.
That it is. Hence why Jewish humor is very different from most Goy Comedy. And why the Irishman and the Jew is such a classic comedy pairing.


How did their great and magnificent contribution in this area come into being and how did it become so large?

Because it was one of the few real options for a lot of jews, and Yiddish Theatre was already huge in New York and the north east by the time hollywood really got started.
 
In thinking about this further, I really do think there needs to be a better POD for this. Not that Jewish influence in entertainment is inevitable, but... well, it's hard to find a way to convince a bunch of young people who like to bring enjoyment to people to choose a different career (yes, I just heard that inevitable joke about the influence of Jewish Mothers on their children's decisions :)). It's far easier to make it so they never immigrate in the first place, and that is still quite difficult without completely altering European and American history.
 
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