You Don't Have to Be Jewish/When You're in Love the Whole World Is Jewish [Live]

Bob Booker | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (February 6, 2007)
• Original Release Date: 2007
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Live
• Label: Shout Factory
• ASIN: B000LXHGKS
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (24 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,788 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #5 in Music > Folk > Jewish & Yiddish Music
  • #6 in Music > World Music > Middle East > Israel
  • #16 in Music > World Music > Europe > Eastern Europe

Track Listings

1. Call from Long Island

2. Home from the Office

3. The Reading of the Will

4. The Diamond

5. Quickies: The Astronaut/The School/The Confession

6. The Jury

7. The Presidents

8. The Cocktail Party

9. Final Discussion

10. More Quickies: Cry for Help/Panic/Two Husbands

11. The Convicts

12. The Housewarming

13. The Luncheon

14. Still More Quickies: The Storm/The Newspaper Reporter/The Home Remedy

15. Conversation in the Hotel Lobby

16. The Agony and the Ecstacy

17. My Son, The Captain

18. Secret Agent, James Bondstein

19. Enough Already with the Quickies: Dinner/The Elevator/Classified Ad, Is

20. Goldstein

See all 36 tracks on this disc

Editorial Reviews

One of my fondest family memories of my wonderful childhood in the 1960's was listening to record albums on the hi-fi set in the den. Real records, that you had to flip over after side one, and be careful not to leave on top of the toaster oven. This was a time where my Little Golden Books and little transistor radio were my essential bedtime companions. Not to mention the hot mug of Ovaltine that Mom would make us before hitting the sack.

"You Don't Have To Be Jewish" and it's follow up, "When You're In Love, The Whole World Is Jewish" were both staples in the Lifson home. Jewish comedy was not available to me as a kid through visits to the Catskills, so these albums, along with "Chanukah Carols" (also available on JMG) were my first exposure to a genre which would help prepare me for the Woody Allen and Albert Brooks movies I would love watching in the next decade, the '70s, and have enjoyed ever since. These very funny records were the brainchild of producer Bob Booker, who had produced a hugely successful pair of albums called "The First Family" which lampooned the Kennedy clan, with actor Vaughn Meader doing a brilliant JFK. These were essential listening for the early '60s, but after JFK's assassination, were quickly antiquated.

For "You Don't Have To Be Jewish," Producer Booker, pairing with writer George Foster, assembled a first class ensemble of comedic actors to play the jokes and blackout type sketches on this LP. Lou Jacobi was seen on countless sitcoms as the "Jewish Dad" type, and Valerie Harper, who would later star as "Rhoda" on "The Mary Tyler Moore Show." Also featured were Arlene Golonka, who played Ken Berry's girlfriend on "Mayberry R.F.D." and Bob Mc Fadden, who were the voices behind many cartoon characters including one version of "Popeye" and one of my '60s faves, "Milton The Monster." And who could forget actor Jack Gilford from the many "Crackerjack" commercials he did, where he is caught eating the kid's Crakerjack late at night?

The sketches on these two wonderfully nostalgic albums played like a prequel, maybe more Jewish version, of TV's "Laugh In" which would appear just a couple years later, in the Fall of 1968. The cast of "You Don't Have To Be Jewish" were invited to appear on the Ed Sullivan show, because of the broad appeal of the album's humor. It was clean and quaint, not biting and unsettling, like several of the "hipper" '60s comics, like Lenny Bruce and Mort Sahl. These Jewish jokes were ones that could be repeated at any office gathering or weeknight Pan and Poker games, like the ones I recall my parents having in the mid '60s. They still have the black card table with the white leather top that was used at their gatherings back then, when albums like "You Don't Have To Jewish" were such a unifying force.

Classic bits on these two albums, released for the first time as a double disc CD here, include "Secret Agent James Bondtstein" and "The Cocktail Party" which is reminiscent of "Laugh In's" party scenes with the one liners floating in and out of martini glasses. "The Plotnick Diamond" bit is funny too, where Mrs. Plotnick complains that her large diamond comes enshrouded with a curse..."What's the curse her friend asks, in a Yenta-like way, "Mr. Plotnick!" is the reply. You see, these albums showcase the qualities of Jewish life we have all come to know as "trademarks," like: guilt, marrying a nice young doctor, eating as a remedy for anxiety, worrying too much, and of course, more guilt!

Jewish people throughout the ages have relied on humor as a survival technique, and have always been noted for their sardonic and revelatory abilities to translate "agony" into "ecstasy" in the form of humorous dialogue. One can see where comics like Woody Allen got a lot of his early material from gleaning the cultural mores predominant in both these albums, that show Booker and partner Foster's true genius for defining a genre through humor. The live audience present here makes the material play even more like television, helping to create a real "visual" presence for these playets, which are both timeless and charming in their appeal.

May these hilarious records provide you and your family the same "sitting around the hi-fi" happiness that I experienced when I first listened to them, wearing my pajamas that had all the gas station signs on them (my favorite was "Gulf") and eating my strawberry "Whip 'N Chill" light meringue pudding that Mom would make in those little glass dessert cups that were so evocative of the era for me. Food and humor always go well together in Jewish culture...Enjoy!

Hal Lifson

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Loved it as a kid, love it as an adult, November 6, 2007

By 

Edward Barnett (Cambridge, MA United States) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: You Don't Have to Be Jewish/When You're in Love the Whole World Is Jewish (Audio CD)

I was thrilled to find this album on Amazon. I have great memories of listening to the LP version of this album during the 1960s with my parents. It was a testament to the comedy that parents and kids alike would laugh out loud during the routines, and that everyone from Grandma to the baby of the family (that would be me) could recite the lines in unison. Forty years later, I can still remember the jokes! I thought that this great show would live only in my memories, but then I discovered the CD version on Amazon. I ordered copies immediately for myself and my parents. I'm delighted to report that the comedy routines are as hilarious today as they were forty years ago. The routines have aged well, and the delivery is timeless.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great comedy never gets old!, February 6, 2007

By 

Lezlie K. King (Dallas, TX United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: You Don't Have to Be Jewish/When You're in Love the Whole World Is Jewish (Audio CD)

It may be somewhat ironic that "You Don't Have to Be Jewish" was a great Christmas tradition in my family. When the extended family would gather for the holiday at least one evening would be spent sitting around the stereo listening to incredible comedy albums.

The top 3 that were always requested year to year were "You Don't Have to Be Jewish", "To Russell, My Brother, Whom I Slept With" by Bill Cosby, and "The Wit & Wisdom of Andy Griffith". Of the three this is the one that still gets punch lines quoted every time we get together.

This past Christmas I gave copies of this to my nieces and nephews to continue the tradition. Now when one of us says, "Does that mean you're not coming?" and we all break into gales of laughter, they no longer have to look like we have completely lost our minds. They'll understand the reference and be able to laugh along with us.

I've also completely converted my husband. Anytime we are getting ready for a road trip, this is one of the first cds to get packed into the travel case. We could both quote the entire cd by heart, but it still cracks us up like it's the first time we've heard it.

The title is completely accurate. You don't have to be Jewish to completely love this humor.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Finally able to replace our worn-out LP passed down by Baba (my bubbe), June 16, 2007

By 

NCTejana (Texas, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: You Don't Have to Be Jewish/When You're in Love the Whole World Is Jewish (Audio CD)

The title, as everyone will tell you is true: My gentile mom was just as big a fan of the 1965 album as my dad and his Ukrainian Jewish mother. "The Reading of the Will" is one favorite family classic, as is the hide-and-seek playing wife who, drawn out by her husband's offer of expensive jewelry, coyly proclaims, "I'm hiiii-ding ... IN THE FRONT CLOSET!" More than 40 years later, the jokes still hold up, though Mom did observe when we listened to the CD that more of the jokes than she remembered are slightly mean-spirited. Don't misunderstand: They are never mean-spirited toward Jewish people, only toward whichever person is the butt of the joke. The second album in this double CD was a 1966 follow-up to the Grammy-nominated original, and contains one version of "The Ballad of Irving," a song that will be familiar to any Dr. Demento fan. (Sorry to say, this version does NOT have the line, "He came from the old Bar Mitzvah spread / With a 10-gallon yarmulke on his head"!)



You don't have to be Jewish, indeed, but familiarity with the turf does help you understand some of the humor, particularly on the follow-up "When You're in Love...." On that album, there's a whole bit about a woman who can't remember her son's surname; even as an adult, I didn't get it until Mom explained that it's a reference to the tendency to choose a less "ethnic" name to get along. But the majority of the material was funny even to my little grade-school self in the 1970s, and it still holds up well today in its universal themes as well as in its culture-specific jabs.