SOAPS IN STRANGE PLACES (BRILLIANT JEWISH WOMEN EDITION)

After my personal review of "The Goldbergs" at Kveller.com, I tackled the new ABC series from a more academic perspective at BlogHer.

Of course me being me, I could pass up the opportunity to slip a little soap talk into the mix:

Developed for the radio in 1929 and making the switch to television in 1946, The Goldbergs was the brainchild of the amazing Gertrude Berg, who initially not only wrote and directed every episode, but also played the lead role of Molly Goldberg, the Jewish mother from the Bronx who, when not fussing over a husband, children and live-in uncle, loved nothing more than to gossip out her window with the neighbors –- and then fuss over them, too.

At one point, the show aired daily and was even considered by some to be as much a soap opera as a

sitcom (putting Berg in the same league as another Jewish-American broadcasting pioneer, Irna Phillips, who, more or less, created the soap opera genre and also wrote all her own scripts –- though she only produced, without acting and directing. Slacker.)

Read the entire piece, here.