The Jewish Federation of Greater Ann Arbor is thrilled to announce its upcoming Main Event on February 9th will feature a live podcast recording of the Unorthodox podcast, which calls itself “the universe’s leading Jewish podcast.” The event will take place in-person at Washtenaw Community College’s newly renovated Morris Lawrence Building. The program will be live-streamed for those unable to attend in person.
Launched in 2015, the Unorthodox podcast is a production of Tablet magazine. It is hosted by Tablet journalists Mark Oppenheimer, Stephanie Butnick, and Liel Leibovitz. A typical episode showcases “news of the Jews,” interesting guests—both Jewish and not—and genial banter from three very different Jewish perspectives.
Co-host Stephanie Butnick describes the podcast as “a fresh, fun take on Jewish news and culture.” Butnick, who studied Religion at Duke and got her Master’s in Religious Studies from NYU, is currently Deputy Editor of Tablet and co-founder of its podcast network, Tablet Studios. Other podcasts produced by the studio include “Radioactive,” hosted by Ann Arbor-based journalist Andrew Lapin, and “Adventures with Dead Jews,” hosted by last year’s Main Event headliner author Dara Horn.
In addition to Butnick, the podcast features Liel Liebovitz, an Israeli-born journalist and senior writer at Tablet. Liebovitz describes himself in his profile on a major online retailer’s website by saying, “I come from a long line of rabbis, and even though I’m a few cheeseburgers removed from the faith of my fathers, I take religion very seriously.” Liebovitz’s varied interested have led him to write books on the comics and life of Stan Lee, the musician and poet Leonard Cohen, and on France’s late-nineteenth century Dreyfus Affair.
The podcast’s third co-host and creator, Mark Oppenheimer, suggests on his website that, “if you have never listened [to Unorthodox], maybe start with the episode on nose jobs, or [one] on conversion to Judaism, or [the one from August 29, 2019] that was just really funny.” In addition to the podcast, Oppenheimer is a Senior Editor at Tablet. His 2021 book Squirrel Hill: The Tree of Life Synagogue Shooting and the Soul of a Neighborhood brought him to Ann Arbor’s Temple Beth Emeth for a talk last year.
“These three hosts, who are all thoughtful journalists in their own rite, share their unique voices to make the podcast vibrant and entertaining,” says Eileen Freed, Executive Director of the Jewish Federation. “They balance each other well, and I’m looking forward to the energy they’ll bring to celebrate so many different ways of being Jewish in our community.”
Bringing the community together is a primary goal of the Main Event, and last February’s Main Event featuring author Dara Horn was an early foray into large-scale gatherings in the age of Covid. Significant Covid-related precautions were taken to encourage the community to participate in-person. Following the event, participants commented how wonderful it had been to see people face to face (or at least mask to mask). It is the Federation’s hope that, nearly three years after the start of the pandemic, this year’s event will feel even more connected.
The Main Event is also the widest-reaching fundraising event of the Jewish Federation’s Annual Community Campaign. The Annual Community Campaign provides significant unrestricted funds to Federation’s communal partners in Ann Arbor, Israel and around the world. With funds raised from the Campaign, organizations like the JCC and Jewish Family Services are able to focus on their missions of serving the community instead of on securing the funds to pay staff, building and program costs. The Campaign also supports community-wide initiatives of the Federation, such as combatting antisemitism and ensuring financial sustainability of local community institutions through the LIFE & LEGACY® program. Participants in the Main Event will be asked to support the community with a minimum $100 pledge to the Jewish Federation’s 2023 Annual Campaign; students and young adults will be asked to make a meaningful gift.
For details and tickets to this year’s Main Event, visit www.JewishAnnArbor.org, email info@jewishannarbor.org or call (734) 773-3535.