Harrison Ford famously (well, famously to us!) once corrected Adam Sandler when he called him a quarter Jewish in his first “The Chanukah Song.”
When they met after the song’s release, the “Indiana Jones” actor was quick to fact-check the Sandman with a succinctly yelled: “Half!”
Ford is, indeed, half Jewish, or fully Jewish according to halacha (traditional Jewish law), because his mother, Dorothy Ford (nee Nidelman), was Jewish. In fact, Harrison is named, in accordance with Ashkenazi tradition, after his late maternal grandfather, who died when Dorothy was a child.
Ford, 83, didn’t have a particularly observant Jewish childhood. The actor, who is known for his jester ways, joked that his parents raised him and his brother “democrat.” He also said at an Actor’s Studio interview: “My mother is Russian Jewish, and my father is… was… Irish Catholic… As a man, I’ve always felt Irish, as an actor, I’ve always felt Jewish.”
It’s clear that as an interviewee, he also feels Jewish, a la Jewish Borscht Belt tradition, because he certainly knows how to dish a Jewish mom joke from time to time, as he did on Ted Danson’s (and sometimes Woody Harrelson’s!) delightful podcast, “Where Everybody Knows Your Name.”
The interview does get serious at moments, especially when the three talk about Ford’s ocean conservation efforts throughout the years (a reminder that he isn’t just an iconic actor but also a mensch) and the environment, and when Ford kvells about Jewish actor and writer Brett Goldstein (“he’s the best,” Ford says effusively) who co-showruns his show “Shrinking,” which he calls “a dream.” He also adds that his co-star, Jason Segel, is “a good, good person.”
But serious moments aside, the episode is mostly full of lots of humor.
As they start on a question about “Star Wars,” Ford, who is known for being a particularly funny and sharp interviewee, pretends to doze off. “I don’t need to be interviewed!” he tells the two hosts, which is when Danson decides to bring in the heavy guns: a question about Ford’s mother.
“Did your mother love you?” Danson asks, half jokingly.
Ford seems to sober up — but anyone who has watched him knows that sobering up is deceptive and just a sign that he’s just about to start on another joke.
“Well, now we’re getting down to brass tacks, aren’t we?” Ford replies somberly.
“My mother was Jewish, she didn’t need to love me that way,” he then says. “She loved me in the Jewish way.”
And like any semi-professional interviewer, Danson takes it as a cue to press deeper. “Elaborate,” he says.
“Well, first they take a piece of you and throw it away,” Ford answers dramatically to the hosts’ laughter. “Then they teach you a whole bunch of stuff that’s supposed to be good for you.”
I have to say, it took me a second to understand what Ford meant about “taking a part of you,” because I was not born a Jewish man and so I assumed that Ford meant something a little dark, melancholy and metaphoric — but then I realized that he’s likely just talking about his bris. That’s when they take something from you and throw it away or, rather, bury it. Get it?
Ted Danson, who is not Jewish, kept things PC by saying that Jewish mothers are “good family,” which Ford then, in a rare moment of interview sincerity, agreed with. “Yes, yes,” he says. “It was normal, a normal family.”
Ford then goes on to refute the claim that his mother was a radio actor, though his father was a vaudeville radio actor who did radio plays. The confusion likely stems from the fact that Dorothy Ford is the name of a famous actress and model from the 1940s, though she doesn’t seem to be related to Harrison in any way.
It’s not the only Jewish mother joke in this very enjoyable interview. When Danson declares that Ford is considered one of “the greatest movie stars of all time,” Ford asks, “By whom? My mother?!”
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