Lifelong New Yorker Zack Weiner is preparing to dust off his tuxedo and be “dressed to the nines,” he says, for the red-carpet event for the 17th annual Israeli & Jewish Film Festival at the Weinstein JCC on January 8.
Weiner, a writer, actor, and producer, will be in town for the showing of Bad Shabbos, a dark comedy he co-wrote with Daniel Robbins who also directed the film. Released in 2024, the film won the Audience Award for Best Narrative at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York. The title is a play on the traditional Yiddish greeting Good Shabbos, which means good sabbath.
Bad Shabbos is one of six films that will be shown at three different locations during the festival.
The film, starring Kyra Sedgwick and Cliff “Method Man” Smith, features David and his fiancée Meg, whose meeting with their parents over a Shabbat dinner goes terribly wrong when someone is found dead just before Meg’s parents show up.
From Personal Experience to the Big Screen
Weiner used personal experiences to help fuel his writing.
“My mom does a bad Shabbos every Friday night, and I like to do pranks. That was the jumping off point,” he says.
The 31-year-old isn’t a stranger to the world of film. He wrote and acted in a series of shorts and then co-starred in Uncaged which streamed on Netflix, and he wrote and starred in the horror hit Pledges which streamed on Hulu. His run for public office was documented in the film Citizen Weiner now streaming on Amazon Prime.
His interest is film comes naturally. His mother is a playwright and his father is the co-creator of the popular children’s television series Dora The Explorer.
Weiner was making sketch videos by the time he was in high school. He did sketch TV and prank videos. By the end of high school, he was doing fully scripted films. At 19, he shot his film Uncaged.
“I have been doing this for a little over 11 years,” he says, noting he wrote Bad Shabbos in 2019, right before the pandemic began. “Now, I’m working on new scripts.”
Weiner says he prefers writing comedy but also enjoys delving into the horror genre. Both are somewhat similar, he believes, because they each build comedy or horror tension before concluding.
“Comedy is my favorite thing because it can fit in other genres,” he says. “I like to joke and some people say I joke too much.”
Even though there are peaks and valleys when it comes to writing, he likes the fact that writing is a process he can control. “Acting,” he says, “is so much waiting and chasing.”
The Importance of Film Festivals
He’s very supportive of film festivals and sees them as the “lifeblood of releasing a movie, especially for independent films.”
“It’s important to get feedback and talk to the audience,” says Weiner who will be doing a talkback following the screening of his film on January 8. “People talk to other people about the film. It’s an ecosystem for how movies can succeed. I love it. It’s my favorite part of the process.”
Weiner has never been to Richmond before, and he is thrilled to have his first visit coincide with the festival.
“This is a great way to go to Richmond. It’s the best way to go,” he says.
The 17th annual Israeli & Jewish Film Festival runs from January 8 to January 25 at the Weinstein JCC. To view the schedule of films, along with a brief synopsis of each, plus information about screening locations, viewing times and ticket purchasing, visit the Festival website.
