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Stallone’s Barney Ross versus our Barney Ross

by
Liel Leibovitz
August 13, 2010

Sylvester Stallone’s new movie, The Expendables, opens today. Under other circumstances, Tablet Magazine would have happily let this unremarkable display of aging meat puppets (we have heard it called “Valentine’s Day for dudes”) go by unnoticed. But Stallone challenged us, naming his character—the movie’s lead, naturally—Barney Ross. You know, like the famous Jewish boxer and subject of Douglas Century’s great Nextbook Press biography. So who would win the Battle of the Barneys? Let’s compare and contrast.

Liel Leibovitz is editor-at-large for Tablet Magazine and a host of its weekly culture podcast Unorthodox and daily Talmud podcast Take One. He is the editor of Zionism: The Tablet Guide.