{"id":87133,"date":"2025-04-05T20:24:20","date_gmt":"2025-04-06T01:24:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/?p=87133"},"modified":"2025-04-05T11:31:56","modified_gmt":"2025-04-05T16:31:56","slug":"thats-simchas-torah-the-jewish-val-kilmer-moment-you-might-have-missed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/thats-simchas-torah-the-jewish-val-kilmer-moment-you-might-have-missed\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018That\u2019s Simchas Torah\u2019: The Jewish Val Kilmer moment you might have missed"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By GRACE GILSON<\/p>\n<p>(JTA) \u2014 When the world got news of Val Kilmer\u2019s passing on Tuesday, many Jews surely thought of the movie star\u2019s iconic turn providing the voices for God and Moses in the 1998 animated feature \u201cThe Prince of Egypt,\u201d a perennial Passover favorite.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_87134\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot-2025-04-04-at-4.21.15-PM.webp\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-87134\" class=\"wp-image-87134 size-medium lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot-2025-04-04-at-4.21.15-PM-300x167.webp\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"167\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot-2025-04-04-at-4.21.15-PM-300x167.webp 300w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot-2025-04-04-at-4.21.15-PM-1024x569.webp 1024w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot-2025-04-04-at-4.21.15-PM-768x427.webp 768w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot-2025-04-04-at-4.21.15-PM-1536x853.webp 1536w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot-2025-04-04-at-4.21.15-PM-2048x1138.webp 2048w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 300px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 300\/167;\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-87134\" class=\"wp-image-87134 size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot-2025-04-04-at-4.21.15-PM-300x167.webp\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"167\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot-2025-04-04-at-4.21.15-PM-300x167.webp 300w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot-2025-04-04-at-4.21.15-PM-1024x569.webp 1024w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot-2025-04-04-at-4.21.15-PM-768x427.webp 768w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot-2025-04-04-at-4.21.15-PM-1536x853.webp 1536w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot-2025-04-04-at-4.21.15-PM-2048x1138.webp 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/noscript><\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-87134\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Val Kilmer in &#8220;Top Secret!&#8221; (Screenshot)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>But the late actor had a lesser-known Jewish movie moment, centered on another holiday, in his 1984 debut film \u2014 a Cold War spy spoof titled \u201cTop Secret!\u201d from ZAZ, the Jewish team behind the classic comedy \u201cAirplane!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In the movie, Kilmer plays a rockstar who is told the date of a nefarious plot by the movie\u2019s East German antagonists. He replies, \u201cSunday? But that\u2019s Simchas Torah.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Though Kilmer was not Jewish himself, his on-point pronunciation of the relatively obscure fall Jewish holiday \u2014 which celebrates the end and beginning of the annual cycle of Torah readings \u2014 resonated with viewers.<\/p>\n<p>In one comment on a YouTube clip of the dialogue, a user commented, \u201cA punch line designed to entertain .00025% of the audience. Lucky for me, I\u2019m amongst the select few!\u201d<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"&quot;Sunday? But that&#039;s Simchas Torah.&quot;\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/EfYtXIDtmco?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" class=\"lazyload\" data-load-mode=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>After his entrance into the spotlight in \u201cTop Secret!\u201d Kilmer\u2019s illustrious career included breakout roles as Iceman in \u201cTop Gun,\u201d Jim Morrison in the 1991 biopic \u201cThe Doors\u201d and Batman in 1995\u2019s \u201cBatman Forever.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The late movie star had an unusual Hollywood arc and put his mainstream projects on pause for a time in order to spend more time with his kids, according to a 2012 interview with The Hollywood Reporter.<\/p>\n<p>He was diagnosed with throat cancer in 2014 but later recovered. Kilmer died following a bout of pneumonia in Los Angeles on April 1 at age 65.<\/p>\n<div style=\"padding-bottom:20px; padding-top:10px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_toolbar\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" data-src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" class=\"lazyload\" \/><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\"\/><\/noscript><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services_t=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Google Plus\",\"Pinterest\",\"Linkedin\",\"Tumblr\",\"Email\");var hupso_background_t=\"#EAF4FF\";var hupso_border_t=\"#66CCFF\";var hupso_toolbar_size_t=\"medium\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_url_t=\"\";var hupso_title_t=\"%E2%80%98That%E2%80%99s%20Simchas%20Torah%E2%80%99%3A%20The%20Jewish%20Val%20Kilmer%20moment%20you%20might%20have%20missed\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share_toolbar.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":87134,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7139],"tags":[8790,8795,8788,14559],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87133"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=87133"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87133\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87135,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87133\/revisions\/87135"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/87134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=87133"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=87133"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=87133"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}