Arquette celebrates Bar Mitzvah

In this handout photograph released by the Israeli Tourism Ministry, actor David Arquette (centre) celebrates his Bar Mitzvah at the Western Wall, the holiest site where Jews can pray, in Jerusalem's Old City.

In this handout photograph released by the Israeli Tourism Ministry, actor David Arquette (centre) celebrates his Bar Mitzvah at the Western Wall, the holiest site where Jews can pray, in Jerusalem's Old City.

Published Jun 12, 2012

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David Arquette had a Bar Mitzvah in Israel on Monday.

The 41-year-old actor underwent the Jewish ritual 28 years later than it is usually performed by most teenage boys.

The Scream 4 star - whose mother, Brenda Olivia, is Jewish - was in the country to film the travel show Mile High and was watching a boy go through his Bar Mitzvah, when it was suggested he to should do the same and get in touch with his roots.

Enthused by the idea, David took a kippah and tefillin and went to the Western Wall.

David was required to read from the Torah and had phylacteries - small leather boxes containing verses from the Torah - placed on his head while he held his arm in front of the Western Wall during the ceremony.

Shmuel Rabinowitz, the rabbi who conducted the ceremony, told Vosizneias.com: “He was very emotional, saying he was happy to be part of the chain of the Jewish people.

“I'm very pleased to see a man who is returning to his roots.”

David later posted on Twitter: “I had my bar mitzvah today at the wall. Finally I'm a man.”

David - who split from Friends actress Courteney Cox in 2010 - was not brought up in any one religion, and while his own mother did not practise judaism, his maternal grandmother was a Jewish refugee of the Nazi Holocaust of World War 2. His father, Lewis Arquette, converted to Islam. - Bang Showbiz

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