Zoe Lister Jones (L) and Francis Benhamou star as fervently religious Jewish and Muslim women who forge a friendship in Arranged

Story of Jewish and Muslim arranged marriages opens film festival

By Debra Nussbaum Cohen, The New York Jewish Week

Devout Jews and Muslims in New York, particularly in Queens and Brooklyn, are like next-door neighbors who see each other every day yet remain strangers. But for a quick hello as they enter the same apartment building or rub elbows at the local fruit stand or discount store, most members of these communities have virtually nothing to do with one another.

The movie Arranged, however, shows an unlikely friendship developing between two young, female public school teachers. Rochel is a fervently Orthodox Jew dressed in an appropriately conservative style, and Nasira is a strictly religious Muslim with her head covered by the hijab.

Both women, in their early 20s, come under pressure from their families to find husbands, and are set up with men their parents (and matchmakers) consider good prospects. And both chafe at their choice of suitors.

When Rochel and Nasira bring the other to her family’s home to visit, each is met with suspicion bordering on hostility by the parents.

Arranged is the almost-true story of Yuta Silverman, who lives in Borough Park and teaches remedial reading in public schools. Silverman became close friends with the mother of one of her former students from a religious Muslim Pakistani family.

When she first met her friend, in reality a young mother named Asma, “we were a little leery of each other,” Silverman says. But “once I was taking off from teaching on a Jewish holiday and she was telling me about one of her holidays, and we discussed them.”

The relationship grew, and they were soon sharing more personal thoughts. “I remember her telling me that ‘you Jewish people seemed like strange scary people and now I see we’re not that different,’” Silverman said.

“We’d talk about our religions and compare the shidduchim (dating for marriage) processes; she told me about herself and her sisters. There are a lot of similarities,” she said.

She made the movie because “I want people to be able to relate to other religious groups as people, and not make judgments based on assumptions or myths or whatever it is that catches your eye first,” Silverman said. “It’s about stripping away the outside and getting to people on the inside.”

The dubiousness that her mother conveys to Rochel when she brings Nasira home is based on Silverman’s own experience.

“My family thought it was a little odd that I befriended her. But I’m kind of a strong-willed person, so they thought it was typical Yuta. They would make jokes like asking me ‘you’re sure you don’t want to become Muslim?’”

At the same time, her family was sufficiently supportive of the movie that her parents opened up their Borough Park home to the filmmakers, and it is used as Rochel’s family home in the movie.

Though she saw few movies growing up, and always at a synagogue or other private gathering rather than at a theatre, Silverman thought her family history would make an interesting film, so she cold-called small movie companies. She eventually found her way to Cicala Filmworks, whose principals, Stefan Schaefer and Diane Crespo, developed the idea for Arranged based on stories Silverman told them.

Neither of the filmmakers is Jewish, though both of its female leads are. But whatever their religious background, those who worked on the film say that making the movie was a learning experience about unfamiliar worlds.

“I knew very little about the Orthodox community before this project,” said Crespo, who was raised in a Catholic family.

“Yuta allowing us into her life and world, insisting that we come in and giving us a window into this community was amazing. We all probably have preconceived notions of the roles of women in an Orthodox community.

“Before I knew better it seemed oppressive and lacked any equality. As a woman, as a feminist, you always want to free women from that. But meeting Yuta and her mom I really saw the freedom, that they don’t feel limited in any way, and it was nice for the women on set to see that,” said Crespo, who co-wrote and co-directed the film with Schaefer.

“The closer I got to the community the more I understood,” she said. “And that’s the message of this film, that when we meet each other and have conversations, everything becomes less strange.”

Arranged has been making Jewish film festival rounds, but finding ways to bring it to Muslim audiences has been harder, said Crespo.

“It’s been a bit more difficult to get it out to the Muslim community because they don’t have the same infrastructure for cultural events,” she said. “We’ve reached out to Muslim student communities and gotten a very good response. It is also harder to penetrate that community because we don’t have the same kinds of connections. But when we’ve invited Muslims to the general screenings it’s gone over really well.”

Asked if Arranged has been shown in Borough Park yet, Silverman chuckles. “It probably has not shown in my neighborhood. I guess it depends on how it’s perceived. We’ll have to wait and see.”

Arranged opens the Dayton Jewish International Film Festival, on Wednesday, April 22 at 7 p.m. at the Dayton Art Institute. For more information, go to www.jccdayton.org.