Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg

Aviva Kempner’s well-intentioned portrait of Gertrude Berg continues the director’s focus on unsung Jewish-American heroes (The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg). One of the first female hyphenates in the entertainment industry, Berg was the producer-writer-director of The Goldbergs, a sweet-and-schmaltzy TV show that’s considered the genesis of the domestic sitcom. Her talents are unassailable, but a more detailed study of the gender and cultural barriers she encountered might have resulted in the compelling profile this media pioneer deserves.