The animated television series Rugrats has been noted for the portrayal of Judaism, a rare dynamic depicted in the American animation program during the broadcast of this series (1991-2004). Two episodes of this series are devoted to Jewish holidays and explain their history, and the Pickles family proves to be a Jewish-part.
The Rugrats specifically the first Jewish holiday was recommended to production staff in 1992 by Nickelodeon executives as specifically devoted to Hanukkah. Germain instead turned it into an Easter episode and the series did not explore Hanukkah specifically until 1996. The critical reaction to the Jewish theme at Rugrats is largely positive. Each special holiday achieves high viewing rates according to Nielsen Media Research and receives positive reviews. However, portrayal of Grandfather Boris's grandfather character in a 1998 comic strip Rugrats was criticized by the Anti-Pollution League for real antisemitism.
Video Judaism in Rugrats
Jewish Themes
In Rugrats, the root of the Jewish theme comes from Boris and Minka Kropotkin, the grandfather of Russian Russian mother, baby Tommy Pickles. Boris and Minka followed traditional Jewish practices and spoke with a heavy Yiddish accent. The Tommy and Pickles families took part in several Jewish activities throughout the series, mainly through holidays.
The first incident of this is in the episode "A Rugrats Passover," which originally aired in the United States on 13 April 1995. In that episode, Tommy and the rest of Rugrats, accompanied by their respective parents, attended the Easter seder hosted by Boris and Minka. Boris and Minka argue and Boris goes to the attic, where the Rugrats find him and find them now locked up. To pass the time, Boris read the Passover story. The Rugrats imagine that they are the characters in the story, including Tommy as Moses and his evil cousin, Angelica as the Egyptian Pharaoh.
In "A Rugrats Chanukah," originally aired on December 4, 1996, Minka rearranged Rugrat with the tale of Hanukkah, and once again the babies threw themselves as characters in their imagination. Meanwhile, Boris is angry that he is reorganizing as Judah Maccabee in the procession of Hanukkah and even more so that Schlomo, his sole opponent, will play the king of Greece.
Finer Jewish references are also included in other aspects of the Rugrats franchise. In the 1998 film Rugrats Movie, based on the series, Tommy is ready to pour banana baby food on his brother Dil, who will attract a group of malignant monkeys that are likely to harm young infants; the scene is parallel to Sacrifice Isaac, a primal covenant in Jewish studies.
Maps Judaism in Rugrats
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Boris and Minka are based on East Europe's great aunt and uncle from Rugrats co-creator Arlene Klasky, who himself is Jewish. Including Jewish themes in this series is considered important by Klasky; in particular, he believes that making the father of Didi Jewish and Tommy Stu a Christian is a crucial dynamic, because "it is important to show the differences between families." Klasky himself grew up with a Jewish mother and a Gentile father.
Boris and Minka first appeared in the first episode of this series, "Tommy's First Birthday". Melanie Chartoff, the voice of Minka and Jews himself, was cast to play Didi when he was summoned by his agent to try for a second voice role on the series as Minka. When given a character description, Chartoff feels he is very cliche, but still wants to try for the role. While reading the sentence, he finds it difficult to understand the character's personality, such as "Although the show was made by the Jews, it is clearly not written by them;" so he rests so he can do research on his family memorabilia and understand his personality to reflect that character's voice.
In 1992, Nickelodeon executives proposed the idea of ​​making Chanukah specials to the Rugrats production team. However, Germain responded with a special Easter, because he regarded it as "funny idea" and "historical interest". While writing the episode, now titled "A Rugrats Passover", the authors were forced to audit many elements of the Ten Plagues, especially the latter, so that the episode remained accessible to the children and not too scary. Due to the overall success of "A Rugrats Passover," the Rugrats staff decided to revisit the special Hanukkah and create "A Rugrats Chanukah." One of the co-authors of the episode, David Weiss, had converted from Christianity to Judaism shortly before writing a teleplay.
Reception
Rugrats is not uncommon among contemporary animation in its attention to Jewish rituals and traditions. The "Rugrats Passover" photo shoot of Seder's dinner received press attention as a rare occurrence in a children's program. This episode also marks a special Easter special broadcast broadcasted by Nickelodeon, while "A Rugrats Chanukah" marks the first animated television program Hanukkah.
The fan reaction to the Jewish theme at Rugrats has been very positive. "A Rugrats Passover" and "A Rugrats Chanukah" are the two most popular episodes in the run broadcast series. The special Easter reached Nielsen's 3.1 rating with 4.8% share of American viewers, making it the sixth most watched American cable broadcast that week. The special Hanukkah, meanwhile, received a Nielsen 7.9 rating in the Children's 2-11, the event's key demographics. Chartoff received many fan letters praising the series for details of Judaism in a sensitive way. He received only one complaint, from his mother, who claimed that the characterizations of Boris and Minka were anti-Semitic.
Critically, Rugrats ' the treatment of Judaism has also been recognized. Danny Goldberg writes in his book How Left Lost Teen Spirit: "I can not think of other TV shows, animations or anything else, where the Jewish tradition is very clearly expressed in the context of mass entertainment entertainment. [ > Rugrats ]. "Writers Michael Atkinson and Laurel Shifrin, in their book Flickipedia: Perfect Films for Every Occasion, Holiday, Mood, Trial, and Whim praised this series for celebrating" secular Jews in the most wise and most entertaining way ". TV Guide listed "A Rugrats Chanukah" number 5 in their "10 Best Classic Family Holiday Specials" list in 1999, argued that with the episode, "Nickelodeon Rugrats secured its place in television history. "Jewish online magazine Schmooze listed Tommy as the number one Jewish fictional figure of all time. They also wrote that if one has not seen one of the holiday specials, "their Jewish education is incomplete."
The series has received several awards for Jewish themes. In 2001, Rugrats won the Jewish Image Award for "Extraordinary Achievement." "A Rugrats Passover" alone received three nominations from various television award programs. It was nominated for the Emmy Primetime Prize in the category of "Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Animation Program (for Programming Less Than One Hour)," but lost to Lisa's Wedding episode "The Simpsons". At the 23rd Annual Awards Annie, she was nominated in the "Best Individual Achievement for the Animation Writing category," but was beaten by "The Tick vs Arthur's Band Account" episode of the animated Fox Kids series. The Tick. In 1995, it was the Rugrats 'submission for the CableACE award; received a nomination but did not win. In 2007, the Sherwin Miller Jewish Art Museum in Tulsa, Oklahoma opened an exhibition of biblical drawings in pop art and culture, including posters to Let My Baby Go !: An Easter Story, a picture book based on " A Rugrats Passover ".
However, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) criticized Grandfather Boris's design and accused it of being anti-Semitic. Controversy erupted when the 1998 comic strip Rugrats was published, presenting Boris in a synagogue depicting Kaddish the priest. ADL issued a statement saying that its design resembles Nazi-era depictions of Jews, and the fact that the character is reading a sacred prayer misleads his patience. The Washington Post, strip newspaper, issued a similar statement in their Editor's Notes section, criticized Nickelodeon for not showing a better rating in editing strips.
Although former president Nickelodeon Albie Hecht, the Jews themselves, was astonished by the accusations and considered unreasonable, Herb Scannell, the company's president in 1998, responded to complaints and apologized to the ADL. Scannell issued a promising statement that neither strip nor character will ever be published again. In the statement, he also noted, "Unfortunately, the strip creator made a mistake in the assessment by referring to Kaddish, I agree with you that, no matter how good, the use of Kaddish in comics is inappropriate." Abraham H. Foxman, National Director of ADL, responded through a press release in which they thanked Scannell for his quick response and praised the company in general for understanding the problems at hand; Foxman concluded by saying, "We appreciate Nickelodeon's long notes about creative and quality programming and understand that it's not their intention to offend."
See also
- List of fictional Jews
References
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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