Triple-threat filmmaker Jonah Feingold sat down to discuss 31 Candles, Jewish joy on screen, and teased his next rom-com and a potential Chanukah film. This conversation took place last Tuesday.

In our 20-minute conversation about 31 Candles, Feingold discussed how he approached themes of Jewish identity, handled depictions of antisemitism with humor, and navigated the independent film landscape. He also highlights audience reactions at film festivals and teased an upcoming project, Young at Heart, a high-concept rom-com exploring what happens when two 70-year-olds wake up in their 20-year-old bodies.

When Jewish filmmaker Leo Kadner Jonah Feingold), known for making Xmas movies in New York City—for a billionaire selling drones across America—decides to have his Bar Mitzvah at 31, he must juggle exes, family, and romantic mishaps to complete his Mitzvah project and win over his childhood camp crush, Eva Shapiro (Sarah Coffey). Inspired by Feingold’s own life, 31 Candles is a heartfelt rom-com about love, identity, and finally growing up.

In addition to Feingold—who writes and directs—31 Candles stars Caroline Aaron, Djouliet Amara, Seth Barrish, Megan Bitchell, Sarah Coffey, Lori Tan Chinn, Catherine Cohen, Joey Dardano, Derrick Delgado, Noa Fisher, Jared Freid, Judy Gold, Zoe Hoffman, Antoinette LaVecchia, Dale Moss, Larry Owens, Hannah Pilkes, Kareem Rahman, Jackie Sandler, Lauren Servideo, Talia Suskauer, Kuhoo Verma, and Katarina Zhu.

31 Candles is currently playing in New York. The Los Angeles release is scheduled for December 5. For screenings and other information, please click here.

It’s so great to chat again. How’s the apartment doing?
Jonah Feingold: Likewise, likewise, great to see you. It’s good. I’m looking at the molds and the leak and what looks like it could be black mold. It’s constant phone calls from my landlord saying, “Come and fix it.” And then I said “I’ll stop paying rent,” and they were like, “Don’t do that.” Yeah, it’s a bummer. It’s a beautiful apartment, but literally when it rains, I get a leak. That’s crazy. It’s 2025 and it’s a New York City—I don’t know, but I’m doing okay.

You’d appreciate this. I had my Douglas Fairbanks Zorro poster near where the leak was, and I had to move that, but that’s now back up in my room, which is exciting news.

I know you were unable to make the trip but how honored were you to have 31 Candles premiere at the Miami Jewish Film Festival?
Jonah Feingold: I was so stoked and I was so bummed I couldn’t be there. I got Igor and everyone down there to send videos and screenshots of people in the audience. It’s actually just been really amazing to see.

We were at the Minnesota Twin Cities Jewish Film Festival, and we did the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival. We’re doing Boston on Saturday, which I won’t be at because of New York, but we’re doing Boston. It’s just been a delight to be on that film festival circuit, see the same films and filmmakers and the incredibly kind festival programmers. Miami really crushed it this past year. I feel like they’ve really come to become their own brand in a really cool way.

They’re one of the largest Jewish film festivals. In fact, I didn’t cover Sundance this year because I was covering Miami remotely.
Jonah Feingold: Oh, that’s amazing. I feel like they went through some huge rebrand because obviously I’ve known about it throughout the years, but I feel like they’ve really expediated their growth or had a big splash recently, which is awesome.

I don’t know. All I know is that I went into this year deciding to triple down on Jewish Pride, cover as many Jewish films, Jewish film festivals as I possibly can.
Jonah Feingold: I love that. Thank you for doing that.

It’s been months since watching the film but there was so much about it that reminded me of the classic Woody Allen movies.
Jonah Feingold: Yeah, it’s funny. I forget if we’ve ever spoken about this movie Marty, with Ernst Borgnine in it. But that’s the movie—I was watching that, and I remember yelling at my screen excitement because I was like, oh my G-d, it’s so simple, but it’s so effective emotionally. I hadn’t seen a character like that in a long time.

I was like, oh my gosh, okay, well, I’m late to the game. It won an Academy Award and obviously people thought it was great. And then, of course, I went on to look at the other inspirations.

The Woody Allen movies that I love that I think people don’t talk about enough, obviously beyond Annie Hall and Midnight in Paris and gosh—I mean, the list could literally go on. But the ones that I visually referenced or took away from, there’s one called Anything Else with Jason Biggs and Christina Ricci. There’s another one called Alice that I was blown away by. Manhattan Murder Mystery, which I recently gave a rewatch in honor of Diane Keaton as well—that I really loved.

Some of these ones did well when they came out, but for some reason don’t get talked about every day, which is kind of fun. Crimes and Misdemeanors, I think people do talk about a lot. But some of these really elevated films that he was making were definitely an inspiration.

What was the most challenging aspect of making the film?
Jonah Feingold: Oh, I’ve been thinking about what that is. I gotta say, a couple of these movies in, the hard part is no longer about making the movie. The making the movie part is so enjoyable and collaborative, especially in a movie like 31 Candles, because that was a movie where I got to go call all my friends who worked on Dating & New York, and say, “Hey, do you want to come make another independent film?”

We’re gonna have fun. We’re gonna shoot for 15 days, whatever it ended up being, 15, I think about, and we’re gonna be in the fall, and it’s just gonna be a blast. There’s no studio involvement. The reality is it becomes very—it’s not easy, but it’s so fun.

The hard part is getting the word out there about the movie. The hard part is now the movie’s done, now what do you do? Independent film is really hard because of the profit splits and the theater shares and all these things in the way of just the artists seeing the profit from the movie.

I find that right now, with how much media there is out there, it’s just hard to make noise. Even when something’s good or niche, the hard part is, Hey, people, show up to a theater or tweet about the movie, and that’s how you can support.

I know what you mean about getting the word out. These last few years, especially after Twitter was bought by Elon, I feel like my audience has gotten so fractured.
Jonah Feingold: It’s an interesting point. I’m curious if you’ve converted to Threads at all. I’m not familiar with Threads. I just know it exists as people have migrated over, maybe, or anything.

But you’re right. I feel as if post-Covid, because people are sometimes not going to a theater or because there is this newfound energy behind YouTube and direct-to-consumer through Patreon, Substack, TikTok, and Instagram, there’s simply so much material out there that that movies are in a more niche vertical than they used to be.

It used to be that a movie came out—I mean, Annie Hall was in theaters for a year. If you wanted to go see Annie Hall, you saw it at the theater. And now, it’s like we’re fighting for even an opening weekend, even though we’ve sold out a couple of our screenings.

It’s just odd and it’s just hard to compete. It kind of makes you wonder—it makes you value the strong parasocial relationship. Like your loyal readers and my loyal watchers are at the end of the day who I want to be satisfying the most so maybe it’s a good thing in terms of building that.

Yeah. I’m not on Threads. I did switch to Bluesky, but that’s basically Twitter, antisemitism and all, but from the left.
Jonah Feingold: Oh, no. Okay, copy. Interesting.

Yeah. You would think it would be without the Jew-hatred, but every day, there’s more people—
Jonah Feingold: We can’t go anywhere.

I know! Speaking of which, given what we’ve experienced as a community over the past two years, I appreciated how the film had its own approach to dealing with antisemitism.
Jonah Feingold: Yeah. It’s a tough thing to navigate when you’re making a movie and what you want the audience to take away. And luckily, my experience in New York is fairly accurate to that movie.

But it’s kind of like in Annie Hall when Woody Allen has that line. He said “Jew” when he’s walking with his friend Max, and he’s like trying to find out if that was offensive in the way he said it or not. I think that when you can make light through the truth, then maybe more people see it, understand it, and have a perspective, and they say, “Okay, that maybe what I did was antisemitic, and I need to rethink about how I perceive things.”

I don’t know, but it’s a hard thing to walk and it is ultimately unavoidable, which I find to be obviously hurtful.

Yeah. You think you know your friends and allies, and then they turn out to be antisemites!
Jonah Feingold: That’s exactly correct.

Yeah. You’re appearing in a second season episode of And They’re Jewish with Hen Mazzig. How excited were you for the opportunity?
Jonah Feingold: Yeah, I was incredibly honored. That might even come out this week. What was really cool was that he called and he was like, “We want to do something special because you make romantic comedies and we want to shoot the episode like a rom-com.”

I was like, “Oh, that’s so cool.” What a dream interview. We met in Central Park, they had two cameras, they staged out the entire thing, and we had a meet-cute.

I’m really just proud of what they’re doing for their second season and future seasons. They’ve upped their production value and they’re shooting longer episodes. They brought in a really great producer named Maya, who’s been helping. She used to work for America’s Got Talent, and now she’s spiriting this podcast. It was just a delight, and I’m excited for people to see the episode and see our conversation.

What was the thought process behind placing a Torah reading of Vayetzei a few weeks later than it’s usually read in shuls?
Jonah Feingold: Thematically—I don’t know if you’ve ever met my friends, Jonah Weinstein or Todd Schatz. Todd Schatz is a consultant on a bunch of shows on Netflix that deal with Judaism in some capacity. He thought thematically that that would be okay, given the theme of the movie and given some of the messaging. We wanted to have it linked back to Leo’s arc, if I’m remembering correctly. I consulted all my favorite Hebrew school teachers and advisors on what I could get away with.

Yeah. Thematically, I get it, but I’m also one of those that’s a stickler for the calendar.
Jonah Feingold: I know, I know, I know.

I mean, the other day I wrote a review of a short film, and did not expect to dive into the Torah as much as I did.
Jonah Feingold: Oh my gosh. Wait, which one?

The Unburdened.
Jonah Feingold: Okay, cool. I haven’t heard of that one yet.

Elana Safar co-wrote it. Arnon Z. Shorr directed it.
Jonah Feingold: Oh.

Yeah. Now that we’ve gotten past the holidays and the World Series, I’ve got so much time in my schedule again to catch up on everything.
Jonah Feingold: Oh my gosh, yeah. Who’s your team?

St. Louis, but I always watch the World Series and postseason baseball.
Jonah Feingold: Yeah.

What do you hope people take away from watching the film?
Jonah Feingold: I hope that people feel a sense of Jewish joy. I hope that they feel a sense of warmth, love, and that it’s never too late to do anything in life. Whether that’s confess your love for your camp crush, have a bar mitzvah, or grow up in any capacity.

I think I also really just—there’s not that many Jewish-adjacent romantic comedies—not even adjacent—Jewish romantic comedies that are being made these days. Obviously, there’s classics and there’s films that are inherently Jewish, but I just hope it inspires people and I hope that they feel warm and fuzzy inside.

That’s kind of why I make the movies I make, is just to—if you’re watching it in a theater or watching it under your covers in bed—that’s the dream.

I love that you bring up Jewish joy because we really need a lot more of that on film and TV.
Jonah Feingold: I agree with you. That was one of the special things about screening at some of these festivals and at the JCC in New York was you could feel it in the room.

A lot of the feedback we got was just how happy it made people and just how happy it made them to see that kind of representation on screen. It inspired me definitely to try to figure out a great Hanukkah rom-com to make in some capacity after this.

I’ll be looking forward to that. Just think of this past year, Bad Shabbos, an independent film, did $1 million in the theaters. I mean, that’s just amazing.
Jonah Feingold: It’s amazing, yeah. Daniel is actually hosting one of the Q&As for 31 Candles a week from today in at the Quad. I’m so excited to have him and have him speak to their process and his success and everything like that. He’s just the nicest guy.

I hope that’s taped and put up on YouTube because I cannot be two places at once.
Jonah Feingold: I’ll have someone film it for sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s a good idea, actually.

I’ve even noticed some of these home entertainment releases—every now and then, they’ll have one of their film festival Q&As on the Blu-ray.
Jonah Feingold: I think people are filming them more. I think it’s definitely people are realizing that it’s the same as DVD bonus features, which is obviously a lost art form for some of these independent movies.

I want to have at least an iPhone there or something like that to film to film these Q&As.

Yeah. I’m all for bonus features on home releases, especially to see the making of or those other featurettes. I’ve seen some where they go behind the score. It’s just incredible getting a piece of that process.
Jonah Feingold: Yeah, it’s funny because a lot of the time—I want to do that, and I’m sure I’ll try to do that, but now because we’re in indie, it just takes resources, time. It’s time. It’s not money at this point, it’s really just like—I don’t mind filming it, I don’t mind editing, but it’s just a lot of time.

But I agree with you. I mean, I used to like scratch-burn the DVDs of from repetition watching Pirates behind-the-scenes. Oh my G-d, that was one of my favorite ones. Mask of Zorro had great BTS. You don’t see them often for rom-coms, but maybe we could bring them back for that.

I know CODA just came out on 4K Ultra HD. No bonus features.
Jonah Feingold: Wait, no bonus features?

No bonus features.
Jonah Feingold: That’s crazy. Sundance—the movie that was Best Picture.

Yeah, exactly.
Jonah Feingold: That’s weird. I know. That’s so odd, especially because Apple bought it. I’m like, maybe they didn’t film when they were filming it because it was an indie at first, but still, you can go make some stuff.

Yeah. It wasn’t Criterion or one of those specialty ones like Kino Lorber. They’ll put new stuff on there every now and then.
Jonah Feingold: Yeah. Interesting.

Back to this Chanukah rom-con you just mentioned, where are you in the stages of that or is it just an idea at this point?
Jonah Feingold: It’s just an idea at this point. I just think because of the Jewish joy around the world right now and in 31 Candles, it’d make sense to do that.

The movie that I’m working on actively, that I just sent in the draft of my script to my manager—which I’m curious what you think of the log line—but basically, it’s called Young at Heart. It’s a movie that’s basically Big meets Something’s Gotta Give.

It’s about two 70-year-olds that wake up in their 20-year-old bodies and they must decide, will they go through life together again or will they choose a different path? They have a kid and they run into their kid. It’s supposed to sort of be like one of those old Touchstone, Buena Vista distribution, like Three Men and a Baby or Splash.

It’s high-concept commercial, but the movie’s called Young at Heart because ultimately, it’s a movie about if you could go back and do it all over again, would you? I think it’s like an interesting question. My favorite movies are the ones that just ask questions. I just turned in the first draft of that, and that’s the one I kind of want to make great and figure out how to go to do.

I mean, that sounds fascinating. I’m not just saying that because I just watched Something’s Gotta Give the other day.
Jonah Feingold: There you go. That’s literally in the script, the characters are named temporarily Jack and Diane. I’m gonna change that eventually, but when you send it to executives or people, it just helps to have in your head there’s Jack Nicholson and Diane Keaton, and now they wake up and they’re in their 20-year-old bodies, they run into—hilarity ensues.

But the movies we love, whether it’s Bringing Up Baby or His Girl Friday, tons of room for physical comedy, slapstick in that capacity. I think it’s just an interesting opportunity for an actor to play someone—imagine you’ve had the experience of 70 years of your life, and now you’re 20 again, and your physicality and your vocabulary is different than a normal 20-year-old.

So to me, there’s something just very challenging and hilarious and interesting to an actor about what they could do with that, which is exciting as a director.

That definitely sounds fascinating. I’d watch it.
Jonah Feingold: Well, hopefully I’ll see in the theater get you a link to that in maybe—let’s give it two years from the Zoom.

Yeah. All right. Thank you so much. It’s been great getting to catch up. (Moves screen to show the Jurassic Park poster)
Jonah Feingold: I was just gonna say, I saw Obi-Wan. I was gonna ask you where Jurassic Park was.

It’s always on the side.
Jonah Feingold: So that’s always on the side, okay. Copy.

Yeah, because it’s on that wall.
Jonah Feingold: Yeah.

Because at the time, I know there was a Casablanca one behind me—one of those small ones—and then at some point, I got the Obi-Wan, and I was like, I want to hang this up.
Jonah Feingold: No, it looks great. I’d never seen that Obi-Wan poster. I wish I had something equally as cool.

The only cool thing that you’re seeing right here—this is a little insight—the Club 33 playing cards, which is kind of cool from Disney. It’s like their club. I got someone who went and got me playing cards, and I’m like, this is a pretty cool easter egg.

I love that Jurassic Park poster. And of course, thank you as always for making the time to chat it and for supporting the film. I hope the world likes it and appreciate all you’re doing for spreading Jewish joy yourself. It’s awesome always reading your work.

Thank you. I appreciate it.
Jonah Feingold: I’ll see you on IG and then if we don’t talk, I’ll see you when we’re talking about Young at Heart, hopefully, or something like that.

All right.
Jonah Feingold: Perfect.

Take care. Bye.
Jonah Feingold: Bye.

Level 33 Entertainment released 31 Candles in New York on November 7, 2025. The Los Angeles release is scheduled for December 5.

Please subscribe to The Solzy Report and visit Dugout Dirt.