When we returned to Sundance this week for the third time, I felt like a pro. I knew how to navigate Main Street and where to stay to be close to the local kosher restaurant. Once again, we came back to a packed room for our panel, but this time we had hard data to […]
For years, the Jewish Institute for Television & Cinema has observed the same patterns in Hollywood: Jewish characters reduced to familiar tropes, Jewish identity flattened into caricature, and Jewish stories told through a narrow lens that rarely reflects the depth or dignity of real Jewish life. Those observations were recently confirmed by data. JITC’s Jews […]
At JITC’s 2nd Jewish Media Awards, we were proud to honor Hasidic Jew Professor Aaron D. Twerski with a Jewish Media All-Star Award. A leading legal scholar and educator, Professor Aaron Twerski is the Irwin and Jill Cohen Professor of Law at Brooklyn Law School, a former dean at Hofstra University School of Law, and […]
In 2026, the Jewish Institute for Television & Cinema (JITC) will return to the Sundance Film Festival for the third time, once again serving as the only Jewish organization hosting an official panel on Jewish representation in film and television. JITC first brought this conversation to Sundance in 2023, where its inaugural panel drew a […]
At JITC’s 2nd Jewish Media Awards, held at Lincoln Center on November 12, 2024, Amazon’s “Destination NBA” documentary received a Jewish Media Award — in part for featuring observant Jewish professional basketball star Ryan Turell and sharing his powerful story with the world. Accepting the award, Executive Producer Dave Check shared why Ryan’s presence in […]
I was an Orthodox Jewish kid growing up in a small, out-of-town Jewish community when a commercial on the Disney Channel for a new movie stopped me cold. At first, it looked like every other made-for-TV sports story: a struggling basketball team, an unlikely coach, a familiar underdog arc. And then something caught my eye. […]
