Arts Help Set the Stage for Synagogue Services

Hundreds of people poured into the Wadsworth Theater in Westwood on a recent Friday evening. The two podiums were decorated with the dual comedy-tragedy theatrical masks.

Behind the scenes, the stage manager, his assistants and the performers quietly completed preparations.

Was it show time? No. Actually, it was time for the Shabbat service. But at the Synagogue for the Performing Arts, L.A.’s unusual haven for Jewish show-business people, there’s a certain similarity between the two.

For 20 years now, once a month, entertainment industry insiders, from actors to producers to back-lot employees, have gathered for creative, innovative religious services that always incorporate some element of performance or entertainment.

Although the idea is to worship, that’s not always the primary motive among those attending services. Indeed, as synagogue officials regretfully admit, would-be visitors sometimes call simply to find out who’s performing.

“It’s not a show,” insists Cantor Judy Fox. But she also acknowledges that the arts experience is integral to the theme of the service.

However brief, those eclectic arts segments have been a big draw. Past segments have included actor Theodore Bikel singing about the Exodus and a comic routine by humor columnist Dave Barry. At one memorable service, the H. B. Barnum gospel choir brought down the house with rousing renditions of “Go Down Moses” and “Let My People Go.”

At this month’s service, singers Cindy Paley and Koleet--sporting colorful, flowing matching pantsuits--performed vibrant Israeli folk songs to piano and taped accompaniment.

Over the years, many celebrities have been affiliated with this synagogue without walls. Members and guests have included Walter Matthau, Milton Berle, Joan Rivers, Jack Benny, Jerry Lewis, James Caan, Buddy Hackett, Ed Asner, Jackie Mason, Richard Dreyfuss and Sammy Davis, Jr. Executives have included Paramount Pictures’ Chairman Sherry Lansing, producer/director Jerry Zucker and director Arthur Hiller.

So just what kind of temple is this?

“We’re not any one type of synagogue,” said synagogue president Barry S. Rubin, senior partner of Leslie & Rubin, a Beverly Hills law firm. He has worked as writer, lyricist and executive on the original “Batman” TV series. “We have elements of Reform, Conservative and Orthodox throughout.”

Aside from the performances, the services are usually quite traditional, though much heavier on English than Hebrew.

Rabbi Joseph Telushkin, who has been at the pulpit since last summer, acknowledges that it’s a curious mix.

“I’m traditional. This place is untraditional,” said the Orthodox-trained Telushkin. “Here you feel like it’s Judaism at the cutting edge.

Telushkin, who commutes from New York for the monthly services but plans to move west soon, is a former director of education at the Brandeis-Bardin Institute, a Jewish education facility in Simi Valley. A prolific writer, his books include “Jewish Literacy,” “Jewish Humor,” the forthcoming “Words that Hurt, Words that Heal” and several Jewish murder mysteries.

He has one additional credential that makes him suited for this job: He collaborated with writer/producer David Brandes on the the current film, “The Quarrel,” which has won several awards.

The Synagogue for the Performing Arts has come a long way since its founding in 1973 by Jerome (Jerry) Cutler, who, besides being a rabbi, was also a personal manager, Broadway producer and comedian.

“My initial intent was to get as many Jews back into the fold by giving them a very palatable service which they’d never been privy to,” Cutler said in an interview.

He said he believed the way to do so was to provide an inexpensive place for unemployed actors and struggling writers--as well as successful celebrities--to worship as often or as rarely as their schedules permitted.

Cutler said that for himself, “it was a natural segue from doing stand-up . . . to being a pulpit rabbi. I used to tell people that on Friday night I represented God and the rest of week it’s (comedian) Slappy White.”

From the beginning, some looked askance at the upstart congregation, according to board member Lee Miller, a TV producer and director. “When people would ask what denomination we were, we’d say ‘unorthodox,’ ” Miller recalled. “It sort of became a joke--but our services were always ritually correct.”

At any rate, the congregation, which for many years held its services at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, grew quickly.

There was, however, turmoil along the way. According to current and former members, the synagogue has been rife with infighting, personality clashes and dismissals for much of its 20 years, not to mention squabbles over money, administration and venues. Three rabbis have moved on. Hundreds of members have left, too.

Former congregants or rabbis have since formed three more synagogues that cater in some degree to the entertainment industry.

In 1981, founding rabbi Cutler started what is now called the Creative Arts Temple, which he says has drawn such personalities as Marty Allen, Sid Caesar, Red Buttons, Jack Carter, Jerry Vale, Norm Crosby and Jan Murray. Services, which are held at Hollywood Temple Beth El, are on the first Friday of the month, the same night as in the original temple.

Cutler still relishes this rabbinical/show-business mix. “I’m having my matzo and I’m eating it too,” he says.

In 1986, Charles Powell, a founding member of the original group, started Shofar, which has services at Temple Emanuel in Beverly Hills.

Yet another Jewish house of worship was born last July after a nasty dispute that triggered Rabbi David Baron’s resignation from the Synagogue for the Performing Arts. Baron then founded Temple Shalom for the Arts, which meets at the Wilshire Theatre in Beverly Hills. Membership is extended to non-entertainment people, according to Baron, who said that 400 of the older synagogue’s 1,100 members came with him. Like Shofar, services fall on the third Friday of every month.

Neither Baron nor synagogue president Rubin would discuss details of the dispute. Baron said it was “very painful,” but spoke with enthusiasm about his new congregation. “In every death there’s a rebirth,” he said. (Baron’s claim to show-biz fame, incidentally, is that he performed what he says was the only Jewish wedding in soap-opera history, on “Days of Our Lives.”)

Meanwhile, the original Synagogue for the Performing Arts is surviving, deficit and diminished membership notwithstanding.

Telushkin is working hard to bring an added spiritual dimension and new guests. A promotional effort is just wrapping up: membership, which costs $200 a year for adults and $60 for children, has been opened during the month of May to people outside the entertainment industry.

Many members say they find the blend of Judaism and the arts, along with Telushkin’s instructive comments and brief sermon, very appealing.

“It’s easy to be Jewish in this temple,” said casting director Sheila Manning.

“This is very uplifting,” added entertainment publicist Ellen Friedberg. “This is fun.”

Temples to the Stars There are now four Jewish congregations on the Westside with entertainment-industry ties. They are: * Synagogue for the Performing Arts: Meets at the Wadsworth Theater the first Friday of each month. (310) 472-3500. * The Creative Arts Temple: Meets at Hollywood Temple Beth El the first Friday of each month. (213) 656-6685. * Temple Shalom for the Arts: Meets the third Friday of the month at the Wilshire Theatre in Beverly Hills. (310) 395-3680. * Shofar: Meets the third Friday of the month in one of the chapels at Temple Emanuel in Beverly Hills. (310) 275-9640.