Tablet Studios

This week, El Al helps herd biblical sheep to Israel. Our Jewish guest is Matthew Futterman, senior special writer for sports at The Wall Street Journal and the author of Players: The Story of Sports and Money, and the Visionaries Who Fought to Create a Revolution. He tells us how NFL quarterbacks used to sell real estate in the off-season to support themselves, plus what he’s looking forward to a...

This week on Unorthodox: public swimming pool drama in Brooklyn, and one Jewish man’s unusual sperm donation program. We don’t have a Jewish guest this week, but we have reached peak gentile: award-winning architect Duo Dickinson, a cradle Episcopalian, joins us for a lively discussion about Jews, WASPs, and the difference between designing a church and a synagogue. We also get a visit from our pr...

This week, Unorthodox jumpstarts the Father’s Day festivities with a special episode—because is there any figure more overlooked and misunderstood than the Jewish father? Liel talks to Tablet’s Gabe Sanders about archetypal father figures, starting with the biblical Abraham, and how their own identities changed when they became fathers. Stephanie sits down with Unorthodox regular Marjorie Ingall t...

This week on the show: Nazis, Taylor Swift, and cats—the Unorthodox trifecta. Our Jewish guest is Chicago native Jeff Aeder, who founded the online Jewish Baseball Museum. The Cubs fan tells us about some of the lesser-known Jewish figures in America’s national pastime, why he thinks we need a museum dedicated to Jews in baseball, and when we can expect a brick-and-mortar outpost. Our Gentile of t...

This week on Unorthodox, the '90s are back: The Intifada is all the rage at UC Irvine, 90210's Andrea Zuckerman is on our minds, and a Clinton is running for president. Our Jewish guest is BuzzFeed News national reporter Amanda Chicago Lewis, who covers the burgeoning marijuana industry and the politics of legalization. In lieu of a Gentile of the Week, we read from a Jews for Jesus pamphlet left...

This week, Unorthodox goes back to high school. This episode was recorded live from the American Hebrew Academy in Greensboro, N.C, the world's only International Jewish College Prep boarding school. Our Jewish guest is former North Carolina State Senator Marshall Rauch, who when he was elected in 1967 became the first Jew in the state senate, where he spearheaded legislation making Yom Kippur a s...

This week on Unorthodox: Gentiles love Manischewitz, the new Han Solo’s Jewish, and Nazi pugs exist. Our Jewish guest is Rosie Schaap, “Drink” columnist for the New York Times Magazine and the author of Drinking With Men: A Memoir. She tells us why there’s more to bars than drinking and the cocktail essentials every drinker should have at home. Our Gentile of the Week is Doug Henwood, publisher of...

This week on Unorthodox: Broad City skewers Birthright. Our Jewish guest is literary agent and author Betsy Lerner, whose latest book, The Bridge Ladies, tells the story of the women in her mother’s bridge group, which has been meeting weekly for 50 years. Our Gentile of the Week is CNN political reporter Nia-Malika Henderson, who covers the 2016 election with a special focus on identity politics,...

This week on Unorthodox, we’re searching for chametz and waiting for the Red Sea to part. Our Jewish guest is comedian David Tuchman, who hosts the lively and irreverent-er OMGWTFBIBLE podcast, which each week features a guest reading from Tuchman’s own translation of the Bible, while he chimes in with jokes. He tells us how getting started in comedy unexpectedly brought him back to his yeshiva ro...

This week, Unorthodox heads to Palo Alto, California, for a special live taping at the Oshman Family JCC. Our Jewish guest is Eddan Katz, a cyber-crime lawyer who founded Sudo Room, a hackerspace in Oakland. Our Gentile of the Week is Amanda Bradford, founder and CEO of The League, an invite-only dating app that uses data from Facebook and LinkedIn to match its highly selective pool of ambitious s...

This week on Unorthodox: Tel Aviv, so hot right now. Our Jewish guest is writer Jillian Keenan, whose first book, Sex with Shakespeare, explores her dual passions for the Bard and BDSM. She tells us why she identifies with Caliban from The Tempest, and who she thinks is the most underrated Shakespeare character. Our Gentile of the Week is Jeff Yang, editor and publisher of aMagazine, an Asian Amer...

This week on Unorthodox: Scottish Jews get their own official tartan. Our Jewish guest is L. Jon Wertheim, executive editor of Sports Illustrated and the co-author of the book, This is Your Brain on Sports: The Science of Underdogs, the Value of Rivalry, and What we Can Learn from the T-Shirt Cannon. He tells us how he got into sports journalism, and what he thinks the least Jewish sports are. Our...

This week on Unorthodox: Israeli actress Gal Gadot proves she’s Wonder Woman off-screen, too. Our Jewish guest is Ladino singer-songwriter Sarah Aroeste, who tells us what Ladino is, and why it’s so important to keep the Sephardic language and culture alive. She performs a song from her new Ladino children’s album, and (warning!) even gets the hosts to sing along. Our Gentile of the Week is ACLU l...

This week on Unorthodox: Name-calling at a basketball game between a Catholic high school and a heavily Jewish public school in a Boston suburb takes a weirdly dark turn. Our Jewish guest is Jessamyn Hope, whose debut novel, Safekeeping, tells the intertwined stories of several strangers who find their way to a kibbutz in the summer of 1994, and was partly inspired by her own brief stay on a kibbu...

This week on Unorthodox: Israeli settlers and Palestinians working together… to grow marijuana. Our Jewish guest is Eric Weiner, author of the new book, The Geography of Genius. He tells us the cities throughout history most conducive to breeding genius, how he really feels about Silicon Valley, and whether cats are smarter than dogs. Our Gentile of the Week is Katherine Connor Martin, editor of t...

This week on Unorthodox: the Oscars' Jewish highlights (and lowlights). Our Jewish guest, Adam Kantor, plays the tailor Mottel Kamzoil in the Broadway revivial of "Fiddler on the Roof," which opened in December. He made his Broadway debut in 2008 as Mark Cohen in "Rent." Our Gentile of the Week is writer and comedian Mandy Stadtmiller. She discusses her new Unwifeable column for New York magazine...

Our Jewish guest this week is Ben Ostrower, whose design firm created Bernie Sanders’ logo. He tells us how campaign logos have evolved over time and how the Obama campaign catapulted branding and logos to the forefront of election-season consciousness. Our Gentile of the Week is Chris Eigeman, who made his acting debut as preppy New York City teen Nick Smith in Whit Stillman’s 1990 film, Metropol...

This week on Unorthodox: Klezmer aerobics and the strangest bris story you've ever heard. Our Jewish guest is Daniel Oppenheimer, author of the new book, Exit Right: The People Who Left the Left and Reshaped the American Century. He’s also—you guessed it—the brother of our host Mark Oppenheimer. Our Gentile of the Week is novelist and essayist Roxane Gay, whose latest book, Bad Feminist, cleverly...

This week on a special Valentine’s Day episode, Unorthodox plays Yenta. Our Jewish guest is Jill Kargman—creator, writer, producer, and star of the Bravo comedy Odd Mom Out, a thinly-veiled satire of life and motherhood on the Upper East Side, a world the lifelong New Yorker is no stranger to and isn’t afraid to lampoon. A few weeks ago we put out a call for listeners who wanted to be set up by Un...

This week on Unorthodox: Miley meets Woody. Our Jewish guest is word maven Lizzie Skurnick, whose book, That Should Be A Word, is based on her popular New York Times Magazine column of the same name. In 2013 she founded Lizzie Skurnick Books, which reissues classic young adult literature. Our Gentile of the Week is Bill Schulz, former co-host of Fox News Channel's 3 a.m. satirical talk show, Red E...

This week on Unorthodox: Bloomberg, Bernie, and Trump, oh my! Our Jewish guest is Mark Seidenfeld, vice president and deputy general counsel at Scholastic, publisher of the wildly successful Harry Potter and The Hunger Games series. He tells us about traveling to Scotland to pick up a manuscript from Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling—and then sitting on it during the flight back to New York to keep...

Our Jewish guest this week is Rebecca Vilkomerson, executive director of Jewish Voice for Peace, an organization whose mission includes ending the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem, and which supports the controversial Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement. She explains why she believes her organization's work is more important now than ever, and spars with...

This week on Unorthodox: Bar Refaeli baby watch begins, and Mel Gibson returns (shudder). Our Jewish guest is painter Archie Rand, whose new book, The 613, is the culmination of his most ambitious project yet: painting visual representations of each of Judaism’s 613 mitzvot, or commandments. Our Gentile of the Week is Catherine Burns, the longtime artistic director of the hit storytelling series T...

This week on Unorthodox: kosher marijuana, the great bagel scooping debate, and one very WASPy cardigan. Our Jewish guest is Bethany Mandel, author of the Convert's Bill of Rights, which she wrote after learning she was one of the women videotaped by Rabbi Barry Freundel while using the mikveh, or Jewish ritual bath. (The Orthodox rabbi was sentenced in May 2015 to 6 1/2 years in prison for filmin...

From Drake to Bernie Sanders, Amy Schumer to the presidential election—and, of course, Israeli cats—we’ve covered a lot this year on Unorthodox. We’re ringing in the new year with a special compilation of our favorite moments from 2015, including never-before aired segments, highlights from our live shows, and guests Simon Doonan, sex therapist Bat Sheva Marcus, comedian Dave Hill, lexicographer E...