Avenue K

Brooklyn, NY — Dovid Taub has two main inspirations: Jim Henson and the Lubavitcher rebbe. Knitting threads of holy matters and kabalistic wisdom into the fabric of his puppetry, Taub has created an on-line sitcom whose witty humor and wacky characters draw legions of fans — fellow hasidim and others. The Itche Kadoozy Show features a bearded rabbi and his troublemaking young neighbor who poke lots of fun at each other and see the world through very different eyes, yet learn life lessons from each other. Through these contrasting cloth characters, Taub brings a new dimension to the genre — secularism and sacredness commingled.

Taub’s talent was recognized at the 11th annual Webby Awards celebration. The awards, honoring excellence on the Internet, are presented by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences. The Itche Kadoozy Show was selected as an Official Honoree in Online Film and Video, among the fewer than 15 percent of the 8,000-plus entries so distinguished.

To get to the source of The Itche Kadoozy Show, a visitor must climb four long, narrow staircases at 770 Eastern Parkway in Brooklyn, enter the crowded office of Chabad.org’s headquarters, and look for a small oasis of creativity and invention.

In a small room equipped with a green screen, bright lights, and a camera on a tripod, Taub is busy with his hand-made puppets, which fill the room. It is here that Taub, 25, a member of the Crown Heights, Brooklyn, hasidic community, performs his puppetry while using his camera’s remote control to tape the action. He then digitally inserts props, backdrops, and sets, bringing his puppet players — virtually — to any location.

Taub created “Rabbi Itche” by accident, he said.

Four years ago, while entertaining boys in a hasidic camp where he was a counselor, he was disappointed by the hand-sewn puppet he was using. He purchased a book on puppet-making and proceeded to create “Itche,” a 60-ish rabbi sporting a long gray beard, a black yarmulke, and a raspy voice.

When Taub shared his invention with Jonathan Goorvich, a childhood friend, he was “blown away.” Taub taught him puppet-making, and Goorvich created a figure that reflected himself: casual college student with open plaid shirt, baseball cap, and dark glasses — and “Jono” was born. The show’s other main character, he is a secular Jew who lives in the rabbi’s basement. The two become friends and together experience adventures and mishaps, learning esoteric and practical lessons along the way.

Like Itche and Jono, Taub and Goorvich are, despite their differences, great friends. They grew up five houses apart in Deerfield, Ill., together making comic books, animated videos, and action figures. Their “collective creativity,” Goorvich said, continued as the two became adults and chose different paths. Goorvich headed to film school in Chicago and now works for a major movie studio in Los Angeles, while Taub, previously associated with the Reform movement, attended yeshiva in Brooklyn to become an Orthodox rabbi.

In the yeshiva, he struggled to find a way to incorporate his talents with his newfound observance and desire to teach others deeper lessons in Judaism.

“I always imagined as a kid that I’d continue doing fun things with animation,” Taub said. Then, three years ago, Chabad.org hired him to create animation for its Web site, and he brought the seeds of the show that he and Goorvich had developed as weekly “webisodes” for their own site.

Taub began filming episodes that taught basic concepts in Judaism, then went on to produce a full year of “Parshah Reports” (a show within a show conveying the weekly Torah portion as a comic news bulletin). This year he’s been focusing on longer holiday series and “The Quest for Fish,” an eight-part journey Itche and Jono take with their friend Gefilte Fish — who wears a carrot slice (what else?) for a yarmulke — to find his family and heritage.

Taub works on a small budget and handles every aspect of production himself — from writing, taping, and editing to recording voiceovers and sewing.

Part of the show’s appeal seems to be the quirky characters and original, funny plots. It was Henson’s work with the Muppets and Sesame Street that inspired Taub to explore puppetry as a vehicle for comedy. He has borrowed Henson’s approach, he said, creating a children’s show that adults appreciate, spiced with humor that “doesn’t talk down to children.” He said the greatest thing he learned from Henson is “the un-limitation of the imagination, to create anything I want and bring it to life.”

The references and style Taub employs are meant to appeal to a wide audience without alienating observant fans. The show “speaks to different types of Jews in an equal way,” he said. Although Itche is the rabbi stacked with the facts, “Jono brings out more of an emotional, universal message that Itche learns from.”
“Everyone is trying to grow in their Jewish identity,” said Taub. On the show, “one isn’t considered right or wrong; they’re just different types of people.”

Goorvich, who is still a creative source for Itche Kadoozy and helps Taub edit drafts, said the show has made him “a lot more in touch with Judaism. I’m a regular Jewish guy like Jono, learning through the process about my religion and culture.” Although Jono is a “younger, more naive caricature” of himself, Goorvich said, they both use “humor [to] express something more poignant.”

The main motivation behind the show, Taub said, is the aspect of loving others that the late Lubavitcher rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, often stressed. “The show doesn’t want to change people; it wants to celebrate everyone’s Jewish identity.”

The show will be released on DVD within the next few months.