The Advent Calendar of Great Holiday Movies: Day 2 "The Hebrew Hammer"

The pre-Christmas Day season of Advent is upon us. Here at SeedSing we love the chocolaty goodness of getting a piece of candy once a day until we get to open our presents. As our gift to you we will present a great movie associated with the holiday season. Many will be awesome, some will be extra awesome. Enjoy.

Day 2: “The Hebrew Hammer”

Opened Doors: Day 1

Christmas dominates the holiday season like a cultural and shopping Death Star. There are other holidays celebrated, some of them culturally important, but Christmas does not give way to these so called “other” celebrations. Many of our late year holidays have religious and cultural importance, but one should not look at Christmas as a day of celebration for religious reasons. Christmas is the monolith that looms over every other festive day, or days, during the season. That is just the way it is.

It should not be that way. Today marks the the first day of Hanukkah, one of those “other” celebrations. Hanukkah has been celebrated far long than Christmas, but it gets a far second place finish in the holiday season. One reason may be that Hanukkah is not even one of the most important holidays in the Jewish faith, Christmas is equal to Easter for most Christians. The real reason that Hanukkah is an afterthought is that most people in the western world, Jewish and Gentile alike, just give up on the big eight night celebration and just let the dark shadow of Christmas take over the season.

In 2003 the film “The Hebrew Hammer” had an extremely limited release in Australia and later the United States. The story is about an (uncircumcised) private dick named Mordechai Jefferson Carver, played by Adam Goldberg, who is enlisted by the Jewish Justice League to stop an insane Santa, played by Andy Dick, from destroying Hanukkah. “The Hebrew Hammer” is described as a “jewsplotation movie” and it matches that description. It is filled with offensive language, it looks like it was made on the cheap, it is borderline racist, and it is funny as hell.

“The Hebrew Hammer” uses the idea of Christmas being some warlord trying to take out Hanukkah, and later Kwanzaa, as a way to make a movie about the greatness of these “other'“ celebrations. Holidays like Hanukkah and Kwanzaa are steeped in tradition and important to cultures that have a history filled with suffering, Christmas is a huge economic machine. The first ten minutes of “The Hebrew Hammer” will perfectly explain the monsters of society who have degraded Hanukkah as a not Christmas. In the end we learn that all holidays need to get along and let each other be who they want to be. That is one of the best lessons for us all during the festive season.

There are not many Hanukkah movies, and that is a shame. Many people will point to the animated Adam Sandler flick “Eight Crazy Nights” as the standard bearer for Hanukkah movies. That is a shame because “Eight Crazy Nights” is just not that good. Do you want to feel pride and righteous indignation this Hanukkah? Go watch “The Hebrew Hammer” and let Mordechai Jefferson Carver put you into the mood for the next eight nights. Just try not to put too much pressure on him.

RD

RD is the Head Editor for SeedSing. Hanukkah is different year to year. Let Melee serenade you with their struggles on the question of “When is Hanukkah This Year?”

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"The Jim Gaffigan Show" Season Finale and Looking Forward to Season 2

All set for the next great show

This past Wednesday the season finale of the first season of "The Jim Gaffigan Show" aired.

I wrote about the show after the premiere and, as I wrote back then, I really enjoyed the episode. The season only got stronger as the first season went on. The show consistently got better and funnier. Gaffigan is a hilarious comedian and he and his wife wrote a very, very good show. Michael Ian Black and Adam Goldberg were pretty fantastic in their roles. Michael Ian Black was Jim's wife's ex boyfriend. It's quickly revealed that he's gay now and he and Jeanie are best friends. He's a realtor, but that's not what made him so good in this role. He and Jim Gaffigan are not friendly towards each other. Their scenes together are great. Every time they were on screen together, it was hilarious. Adam Goldberg plays Jim's comic friend Dave that still lives with his mom in her nursing home. He's the complete opposite of Jim Gaffigan. He has no wife and kids, therefore, no responsibilities. I didn't know what to expect from Goldberg in this role, he seems like an intense dude, but he was really, very funny. I enjoyed him a lot. Ashley Williams plays Jeanie, Jim's wife. As I mentioned in my previous blog, she's really excellent on this show. I knew nothing of her before, but I really liked her on this show. Besides Jim Gaffigan, she was the best one on the show by far.

There's other primary characters, the Gaffigan's nanny, the people that work at the deli, the children, but the one non main cast member I want to point out was Macauly Caulkin. He played himself and he would show up in random spots throughout the season. He was an employee at a coffee shop, you saw him walk out of Scores Strip Club with a date, he showed up at a party full of comics, and he made an appearance in the finale hanging out with Alec Baldwin. It was so bizarre and excellent. I loved that he took this role, and the fact that he played it so well. Kudos to Macauly Caulkin.

But, I'm here to talk about the finale. It was really good. The show has already been renewed for a second season, so I think this kept the writers and actors at ease, and they all had a really good time doing this episode. The finale started with Jim Gaffigan and Dave going to lunch at the Katz Deli they frequent throughout the season. Dave is telling him that he's going to Melbourne, Australia for the Melbourne Comedy Festival. It's a one month commitment and Jim lets him know that he turned down his offer because of his wife and kids. He has five children after all. They both run into another comic, John Mulaney, and he and Dave are talking about the great time they're going to have in Melbourne. Gaffigan seems jealous of what the two of them are planning. He definitely wants to go, but he just can't. His house is also all getting over the stomach flu, adding more insult to the injury of him not being able to go to Melbourne. This does produce a hilarious line from Gaffigan talking to Dave. Dave is "scared" to visit his house because it's "crawling with disease" and Gaffigan counters this by saying, "you ever puked while having diarrhea? You go right through the five hole". Absolutely hilarious. Gaffigan returns home and all the kids may or may not have lice. There was an out break at the school and Jeanie, always one to over prepare, is making sure no one has lice. This annoys Gaffigan. He is tasked to watch one of the kids in the tub and he looks away for a split second and another one of his children throws his laptop in the full bathtub. This makes Gaffigan extremely angry. He's yelling at his wife and kids and he needs to leave the house to get some air. He feels like he's suffocating. While out, he runs into his preacher and tells him, in a fit of rage, that he wishes he never had a wife and kids. He then sees Steve Buscemi about to get hit by a bunch of bicyclists, steps in the way and he gets knocked out. Then, the "Scrooged" effect comes into play. Buscemi plays his guardian angel and takes him around town in a world where he never met Jeanie and they never had kids. In this world he's a filthy comic, we all know Gaffigan works clean, and his comic friends hate him. He has a full head of hair, but he looks like an a hole frat boy. He now lives with Dave. In this universe, Dave is the responsible one, threatening to kick Gaffigan out if he doesn't stop bringing home loose girls and not paying his part of the rent. His preacher thinks he's a crazy homeless person and doesn't try to help him. But, in Gaffigan's mind, the worst thing of all, Jeanie owns a bar and is married to Michael Ian Black's character, who's put on a lot of weight. Jeanie looks like a punk rocker and proclaims to Jim that she would never marry him and that she hates kids. Meanwhile, Michael Ian Black is a huge fan of Gaffigan's and tells him his standup is not only great, but it makes him love all food. Everything is different, for the worse. After the Jeanie from this universe claims she hates kids, she punches Jim in the face. This takes us back to present day in real time. Gaffigan wakes up, realizes everything is normal again and immediately runs home. We get to his house and his real wife Jeanie is cooking in the kitchen. His real children all come to hug him and Gaffigan is happy once again. When Jeanie asks him why he's acting so weird, he says he had a dream that a television network filmed a bunch of actors portraying their real lives. Then, the cast of "The Gaffigan Show" all appear and start singing "Auld Lyn Syng". They all proclaim they're excited for season two and the finale ends.

It was a great ending to a great first season of "The Jim Gaffigan Show". I'm excited for season two and I'm happy that Jim Gaffigan has a platform to put his family friendly standup and stories on the air. Thanks TV Land and Nickelodeon. You guys made a great choice. And thank you Jim and Jeanie Gaffigan for sharing these excellent stories with us.

Bring on season two.

Ty

Ty is the pop culture editor for SeedSing and the co host of the X Millennial Man Podcast. Ty does not envy the choices one makes when they have diarreha and have to puke. Follow Ty on twitter @tykulik.

Ty finds Nick at Night and the Jim Gaffigan Show

Last night the "Jim Gaffigan Show" had it's season premiere.

The program was on Nick at Nite at 10:30/9:30pm. I have to say, I was pretty impressed with the pilot episode. The show's premise is basically Jim Gaffigan's real life. He's a stand up comedian, but also a dad to five young children, has a wife that's way out of his league and they live in a 2 bed room apartment in Manhattan. The pilot episode was about vasectomies and, should Jim get one or not. The topic of vasectomies was brought up when his wife Jeanie, played very well by Ashley Williams, thought that she may be pregnant, adding to an already over crowded apartment. Turns out she wasn't pregnant and then the idea of a vasectomy was talked about, with many different people throughout the episode. We see Jim at lunch with one of his buddies Dave, played by Adam Goldberg, chatting. Dave is a single guy that lives with his mom in a nursing home that, as he points out, is only a block away from the strip club. Dave lives with no attachments or responsibilities. The exact opposite of Gaffigan. Dave tells him, better yet warns him, about the dangers of getting a vasectomy, saying that it's a terrible thing to do to your body. Later, Jeanie and Jim go looking for an apartment with Jeanie's gay ex boyfriend, played hilariously by Michael Ian Black. He of course knows that Jim is looking into the procedure because Jeanie tells him, and everyone else for that matter, their personal business. Jim eventually doesn't go through with the procedure and all's well that ends well.

This was a pretty decent pilot episode, and a little risqué for a show on Nick at Nite. It reminded me of a mash up between "Maron", "Louie" and "Seinfeld". Those are three pretty great shows to model your show after. All three of them have professional comedians as the lead actor and writers as well. That's a great idea, especially when basing a show after your own life. The "Jim Gaffigan Show" is going to be good. I just have a really good feeling about this and being on Nick at Nite is the perfect channel for the show. Gaffigan works as a clean comic and, even though I said it was risqué earlier, it's only feels that way because of the channel it's on. Any other cable channel and it would be like any other show. If you're a fan of Gaffigan, as I am, when you watch this show you'll like. As of early reviews, the critics seem to enjoy it to. In my overall opinion, this show is good, with the chance to be great.

Watch it.

Ty 

Ty is the Pop Culture Editor for Seed Sing. This is the first time he watched, or heard of, Nick at Night. Follow him on twitter @tykulik.