The Catskills Borscht Belt Museum is bringing a brand-new film festival to Ellenville, celebrating 75 years of Borscht Belt cinema. It’s the first annual Borscht Belt Film Fest, set to take place November 1 – 3, at Shadowland Stages (157 Canal St).

Over the course of three days, the fest will screen a total of 12 fiction films and documentaries. Visitors can enjoy both recent features and forgotten gems including a rare 1949 musical called Catskill Honeymoon. The musical, filmed partially in Yiddish, offers a look inside the now-abandoned Young’s Gap Hotel – one of the most lavish hotels in the region and one of the first of the large Catskills hotels to go out of business. Its 1967 demise is sometimes considered the beginning of the end of the Golden Age of the Borscht Belt.

The main event, a Saturday evening screening of Taking Woodstock (2009), will include a live discussion with Oscar-winning director Ang Lee, who will be the guest of honor at the festival. Lee is also the man behind the mega-hits Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000) and Brokeback Mountain (2005). Festival Director Melody Gilbert promised “films about the famous Kutcher’s resort, singles searching for love at the Concord Hotel, a new film about the rise and fall of the Borscht Belt, a documentary about famed Black entertainer and resort owner ‘Peg Leg’ Bates and more.”

That last film is a newly-restored 1993 PBS documentary called The Dancing Man, telling the story of local icon Clayton “Peg Leg” Bates, a one-legged Black tap dancer who lived in Ellenville and operated an interracial country club in Kerhonkson in the early 1950s.

The full lineup is online at borschtbeltfilmfest.org/films-2024.

Discussions with filmmakers, actors and historians will fill out the festival, and award-winning actor Judd Hirsch will be among the speakers. His talk will open the festival Friday afternoon.

A competition of Borscht Belt-themed short films will also be screened. Winners will be chosen by a jury at the end of the festival.

“This fest is a golden opportunity to fill the streets of Ellenville with Borscht Belt enthusiasts reliving cherished memories through cinema,” said Gilbert.

The film fest follows the success of the museum’s second annual Borscht Belt Festival, which hosted an estimated 8,000 visitors in July. Both events are part of the Catskills Borscht Belt Museum’s mission to preserve the legacy of the Borscht Belt resort era as a refuge from bigotry and a cultural incubator for comedy and art.

“These movies will make you laugh, cry and reminisce about the golden age of the Borscht Belt resort era,” said Programming Director Jay Blotcher. “Whether you personally spent summers in the mountains or you’re new to Borscht Belt history, you'll find something to kvell over.”

Get your tickets at borschtbeltfilmfest.org and see the Borscht Belt come back to life on screen!