Kevin Bacon and I are connected. I was in a movie with Julia Roberts, who was in Flatliners with Kevin Bacon. Two degrees. (OK, so I was in a movie theater with Julia Roberts, but I am connected through my extra work in “Keeping the Faith”*.)

When you think about it, “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon” is really the original social networking (a phrase which a friend recently told me is “out” among her techie friends, who now prefer “social media”). And Kevin, as unofficial and inadvertent founder of the “we’re all connected to each other” concept, is now teaming with Network For Good to form, er, a network for good, and giving tzedakah a “Bacon number” of 1.

The idea behind SixDegrees.org is to connect people with charities, those supported by celebrities (like Jessica Simpson’s Operation Smile) and those supported by regular people. And because we’re all web-savvy these days, we can create our own accounts, and our own badges for our websites and blogs (that’s right, Kevin Bacon said “blogs”) that advertise our own personal causes.

I would have made my own badge right then and there, but I’ve been trying to identify the cause that’s the most important to me. Which cause would I want to be a non-celebrity spokesperson for? I even tried on a sample script:

“Hi, I’m Esther Kustanowitz. You know, I am sometimes known as the Urban Kvetch. But alot of people have real tzuris to kvetch about. Like [fill in particular brand of tzuris here], which affects more than [impressive number of people] daily. But now, for only the cost of a small cup of non-Starbucks, non-organic coffee, you can join with me in supporting [important cause] and helping to stop the brutal spread of [particular brand of tzuris].”

But no cause occurs to me. So that’s something I’m going to have to figure out. What’s your cause?

You can go here for a message of explanation from KB, or to view the YouTube clip, click here or below.

*I was in Keeping the Faith with Ed Norton, who was in Primal Fear with Alfre Woodard, who was in Beauty Shop with Kevin Bacon! Um, why was Kevin Bacon in Beauty Shop? Apparently to give me a “Bacon number” of 3.

About the author

Esther Kustanowitz

For more posts by Esther, see EstherK.com, MyUrbanKvetch.com and JDatersAnonymous.com.

5 Comments

  • I was in Keeping The Faith also.. so I guess I am one degree from you. Plus I took a class in college with Kevin Bacon’s father, so I guess I am one degree from him as well

    Speaking of YouTube and JEWtube… did anyone read in this week’s Chronicle of Philanthropy how charities are setting up profiles for their hip charity funds on MySpace and other social marketing sites to lure in younger donors. A nice idea that we should use in the Jewish Cyberia space. No?

    larry (Tzedaka.org, Jewishfilm.com, MyJewishbooks.com)

  • Nice, Larry! Do you have the text of that article on Chron Phil? I’m not a subscriber and they won’t let me access it…

  • Amechad, I was what is classically known in theater terminology as “off-camera.” But if you look at the scenes in which the late Anne Bancroft was filmed in the pews of the synagogue, and you wish hard enough, you can see part of my black sweater behind her and one seat over.