Reboot’s Becky Adelberg spoke with The Floaters star Jackie Tohn and writer-director Rachel Israel about their hilarious and heartfelt new comedy set at Jewish summer camp—and why stories like this matter. The film captures so much of what makes Jewish summer camp unforgettable: lifelong friendships, awkward moments, music, competition, belonging and the joy of figuring out who you are. While Jewish audiences will recognize plenty of familiar details, at its heart The Floaters is a coming-of-age story about finding your people, a theme that resonates far beyond camp. That’s exactly the kind of storytelling Reboot is passionate about championing: stories that are unmistakably Jewish in their texture and perspective, yet invite everyone into the conversation. Read the Q&A below or watch the full video.
See The Floaters in theaters now!
Becky Adelberg: Jackie, you’ve talked about camp as a place where you learned how to be a person. When you stepped onto the set at a real camp, what came back first? Was it the sounds, the smells, the social panic, the freedom, or was something else?
Jackie Tohn: I like the question of social panic. I don’t know how I was raised by what wolves, but I didn’t experience a lot of social panic as a person. I still don’t. And I don’t know if it’s an unrealistic, not confidence, but I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me to be like, “Is everyone going to hate me? ” It just didn’t occur to me. And mind you, people did. So anyway, that’s the social panic piece of it that I did not experience. What was really interesting is that the camp I went to, Lakanda, was like a 15-minute drive from Tel Yehuda. We shot that we made into Camp Devid. And so I drove to Camp Lakanda to see the camp. And I let myself in and they were like, “Ma’am, you need to leave it. ” And so I left. So that was my first like, “Oh my God, I saw my old camp again. It looks completely different.” And then I saw Tel Yehuda and your heart just explodes. I mean, as you said in your intro, camp is so formative. It’s when I figured out who I was and we were actually staying in bunks. And even just like the smell is an interesting one because it’s just like the smell of the Northeast woods. I mean, truly for me, as I said, this camp is 15 minutes from the camp I went to for over a decade. And so just the feel in the air and the smell, the visuals, just the bunks, the wooden box bunks up on their stilts and just everything. Walking into the bunks with the cots, the shitty, coily springs under the gross mattresses.The whole thing was just like, “All right, baby, we’re back.”
Becky Adelberg: I love that. And Rachel, you said that you didn’t grow up going to a Jewish summer camp, but that making The Floaters became your initiation into that world. What was the first thing that you had to understand about camp in order to direct it, honestly?
Rachel Israel: I think with every film you’re hoping to create a new world that you haven’t seen before and that should be specific. So the not bringing assumptions about it was a positive thing for me. I think I connect to places kind of like what Jackie’s talking about in a very visceral way. And so the smells and the plumbing, I stayed at the camp during production and they were having some plumbing issues and I had to flush my toilet every morning with a waste paper basket. It never got resolved.
Jackie Tohn: Wait, how did you flush it with a waste paper basket?
Rachel Israel: Well, I learned that basically, if the water fills to a certain level, then a toilet automatically flushes. The water from the bathtub would run. So I’d fill it with water from the bathtub and put it in and then it automatically flushes.
Becky Adelberg: Wow. A true camp experience.
Jackie Tohn: Professional plumber.
Rachel Israel: Yeah. I was also six months pregnant at the time and the heat was intense. And I remember having one of those mini fans that they would hand out around set pointed upward between takes. But it was uncomfortable, but I felt like maybe that grounded me a little bit in the world.
Becky Adelberg: I feel like that was a true camp initiation. Jackie, in terms of Nomi, Nomi comes back to camp at a moment when her life is kind of falling apart. And what is it about camp that can make you feel like you’re 13 again, even when you’re supposedly the adult in the room?
Jackie Tohn: Yeah, that’s a good question. Obviously when you’re hanging out with young people, there’s a childlike wonder that’s going on. You’re seeing that these things and experiencing these things through the eyes of people who’ve never experienced them. And so you’re getting to watch them discover art and discover their own voices. And even if you’re a grownup and you’ve experienced those things, you kind of fall right back into the wonder of, as I’ve said, and I don’t want to be a broken record, of discovering yourself for the first time. Oh, that’s right. That’s what that felt like. This is what I… And I think the Nomi journey is so fun because it ends up being so validating for her, but it was kind of her worst nightmare to be there. It wasn’t like she was like, “Cool.” Like Mara where she was like, “Let’s be in camp.” It was like, “This is going to make me sick.
I’m going to hate this. I’m going to hate these people. ” And then she gets there and slowly but surely she’s like, “Oh, I just got chills.” She’s like, “Oh, they’re me. These little shits are me and I’m them.” And I think that sort of grown symbiosis that they end up experiencing, that’s probably the best part about being a grownup around young people is you’re just like, “I’m alive.”
Becky Adelberg: I think that was evident, the relationship. Rachel, you’ve talked about immersion being central to your process. What did being at camp tell you who to give you that couldn’t have been built on a set?
Rachel Israel: I think that shooting on location, you can feel that texture in the film in a way that couldn’t be replicated. I guess in terms of immersion being part of my process, I like to set myself up for success and not have to be that smart. And that goes from the location to the casting and casting great actors who can kind of be the police dogs of a situation and say when something isn’t true. So I guess surrounding oneself with honest locations and honest talented people is the best preparation that I think a director can make for success.
Becky Adelberg: And one of the things I loved about the movie, a question to both of you is that it doesn’t really stop to explain every Jewish reference, which I really appreciate. It kind of trusts the world. So Jackie, was that freeing for you as a performer? And Rachel, how intentional was that for you as a choice as a director?
Jackie Tohn: I think interestingly, I didn’t notice that we didn’t stop to explain the Jewish things because I’m Jewish and I got them. So I didn’t notice, but in your question I’m like, “Oh, that is really interesting.” And I kind of love that. And I don’t think it’s so not pandery. We’re making the movie we’re making, we’re telling the story we’re making. And if you have any questions, just like I do when I’m watching a movie and I don’t understand something, a word they use in a heist movie, I can look it up. What is that? Oh, that’s what that means. Bringing into a safe, that’s a big word for that, whatever. And so in the same way, I think it doesn’t take you out of it. You’re so immersed in the world. And if in the world they wouldn’t be explaining what that thing means, it would take me out of it to be like, okay, that’s so writery, that’s so pipey to be like, doesn’t that mean this? It’s like, leave me alone. I understand how watching movies goes. And also most of the movies I watch are not Jewish in nature and speak to my culture. And so I have questions all the time. And so I think it’s actually really cool that you notice that and that’s how we did it.
Rachel Israel: I think about it like eavesdropping. I think we’re human beings who are tuned to be eavesdroppers. And in that situation, a great scene is unfolding on the subway, which they typically don’t know because everyone’s on their phones. But you can understand so much if the emotions are real. And so that’s kind of how I feel like a film should feel like eavesdropping on these characters. In the course of the post-production, we did test screenings and where people were confused never had anything to do with the Jewish stuff.
Becky Adelberg
I thought I heard a Hebrew word or two in there. I think there’s still so much more to unpack.
Jackie Tohn
Oh, I’m sure you heard a bunch.
Becky Adelberg: Each time it’s like, maybe I’ll notice something new. Rachel, Aya Cash’s character, brings in Rabbi Simcha Bunim’s teaching about the two pockets. The world was created for me and I am but dust and ash. Why did that moment matter in the emotional architecture of the film?
Rachel Israel: Well, I think maybe Jackie can also speak to this for her character, but to me, thinking about Nomi’s arc in that time of life, and I certainly feel it at going through that similar time of life where one can so easily swing between those two poles. And I think never before in my youth, I’d say personally, the world was built for me was probably the more common feeling. And then as I feel I get older and kind of recognize that I’m often just a grain of sand, how to find balance between those two feels to me like maturity. And I think that’s where Naomi has to get to. So it felt very central to her character to me.
Jackie Tohn: I love that. I remember a friend of mine, his therapist said that how he would describe him, and this is very sort of crass, but it blows my mind, that how he felt about himself is that he’s the piece of shit the world revolves around, which is so amazing… It feels so inherently Jewish of just like, God, I don’t deserve to be here, but my story is the most important and I have to tell it and where can I go and what can I do? And that feels like the 2025, that was when I heard this, version of the rabbi’s wording of like, am I a speck of dust? Yes. Is this my journey though? And do I have to take the necessary steps to make my life the life I want it to be? Even if I’m a spec, what’s the difference? I’m the piece of shit the world revolves around. I have to make sure that I am living the life I want to live in. I think that’s definitely something Nomi had to learn. And she thought she was by focusing on her art, focusing on her music. And I couldn’t really relate more identically to that as a person who was touring the country with my guitar for 15 years and it was all that mattered to me and independently putting my records on iTunes and the whole thing. And at a certain point it’s like, yeah, you got to make other choices. And you realize that those other choices that maybe you’re forced into give you sort of a rest and an ease and a piece that you didn’t have when you were scraping your nails up the side of a mountain or something.I could be well spoken like the reb. See? Totally. I could be prophetic.
Rachel Israel: Jackie, I feel that what you get, having invested all of your identity in art prior as Nomi, the transmission of the connection with the kids for your character is where you find balance.
Jackie Tohn: Yeah, absolutely. Because she’s able to share her passion with them in a different way. And what’s really interesting. Before I was successful as an actor, I started when I was nine, but I majored in elementary education and psychology. I was always super into being around young people. I was like, This is where it’s at. This is where I learn. This is where they learn. I could be a grownup who’s not, I don’t know, pandery and cheesy and we could be sort of on the same level. And I think for Nomi, that’s absolutely what happens. She has been so uni-focused her entire life. And now she’s like, Well, wait a minute, maybe a piece of that focus can be pointed in this direction at these young people and we can sort of change each other’s lives. I don’t think she plans to change her own, but that’s what ends up happening. She decides to open herself up enough to even help someone else see something about themselves.
Becky Adelberg: You just touched on being a musician for 15 years.
Jackie Tohn: It was important to me that I sneak in there. That’s right.
Becky Adelberg: What did you recognize in Nomi immediately that you felt like you could relate to? And was there anything you had to forgive her for maybe?
Jackie Tohn: I remember running into someone at a backstage thing and I was telling a story or doing a thing or I had my guitar on and he pulled me aside. He was someone I knew from childhood. And he was like, “I’m telling you this as a friend. Jackie, it’s okay. I had this internal combustion engine going so fast and so nonstop. It didn’t rest. I didn’t rest. The hustle was so real. I mean, it’s mind-blowing to think about it really, but that’s Nomi. She’s just like, I’m going to do… If they weren’t talking about me before, I’m going to pop this glow in the dark condom. And even if they’ll talk about that. I had all these ideas when I was coming up with what I would do? What are people doing to be seen? Because I’m making these records which have good music, but that’s not enough. How do I connect…And that’s all Nomi. She’s just at the place in her career where she’s like, “I’m just going to do a bunch of crazy shit and see if that wakes anybody up.” And then it does the opposite. Her band is like, “That was enough and nobody’s paying attention to us and we can’t get a break and we’re done.” And that sort of was a similar thing to what happened to me when this friend pulled me aside and was like, “Bro, take a breath.” Also, there’s this really interesting and sad thing about a person who tries very hard, which is that it’s inherently not, I’m not going to say not attractive because that’s a little harsh, but it’s not welcoming. It’s not like there’s a direct proportion between the person that tries super hard and how successful they are or the person that tries super hard and how much people like them. It’s kind of the opposite. And I think that Nomi has a lot of that. She’s so eye on the prize that she can’t get out of her own way. It was a long answer.
Becky Adelberg: Rachel, as a follow-up, what did you recognize in Jackie that you thought she’d be great for the role as Nomi?
Rachel Israel: Besides the obvious. With casting, there are certain people who are just more compelling and who have the capacity to be vulnerable with a camera pointed at them and give access to that human connection that we’re all looking for. And Jackie has that. The person has to be right for the role and she’s perfect for the role. That’s a short answer, but it’s true. I think that you hold, Jackie, such an emotional intelligence and were brought to it not just the humor, but there were many times when we were filming where Jackie would say, or she might be talking about a scene that was going to happen the next day, “This doesn’t feel right. I don’t think that Naomi would do that. ” And so she always stayed very much in tune with the emotional arc and the spine. And that’s sort of, again, setting oneself up for success as a director is having people there who will tell you that, that this is wrong.
Jackie Tohn: Setting yourself up for success as a person in a movie is having a director who when you make a suggestion like that is like, “Okay, I hear you. Let’s look into it. What do you think it would be? How do you think it would go? ” Because I can’t tell you how many times in my career, I just couldn’t say it. So that was a wrap. You’re just like, “Okay, I guess this is not going to feel right, but it is what it is. You can’t say anything.” Or times when you’ve said something and it’s been like, “Thank you. The writer is here and this has been written. Thank you. ” There’s so many different levels of not being heard in this process. ARachel, you did an incredible job anytime somebody came up to you. It was most likely taken into account and changed, but at the least heard and validated and let’s fuck with it and see where we land.
Rachel Israel: I feel like the script is sort of this sketch. It comes alive with cast. I love that part of the process. I love how many times it changes. And I think that also happens in post that you keep breathing life into it. And I think the more that you allow for that, the richer it becomes and the more deeply rooted in something real.
Jackie Tohn: Have women make all movies. Agreed. Really good listeners. Empathetic.
Becky Adelberg: In the film, there’s this early line where you say, “Is everyone here going to be Jewish, Jewish?” What did that line open up for you, either of you, and about how people experience Jewish spaces from the inside and from the outside? And personally, how do either you or just Jewish people experience Jewish spaces from the inside and the outside, like being an insider or an outsider? Have you felt like an outsider in a Jewish space?
Rachel Israel: I’ve been an outsider in all other spaces. But in the Jewish spaces, I’m like, “No, I get this. That person acts like my mom.” I mean, something I like about Jewish, the very best Jewish spaces to me and something that I think is a thread through a lot of Jewish spaces is that there’s room for difference because there’s an embrace of argument. And obviously there’s cultures where there’s a lot of rigidity, but I think even there, there’s an embrace of positive disagreement and questioning. And as a person who has always felt to me as both it fits me because I’m Jewish, but it fits me as my soul. And it’s an identity in which I feel I can grow through and change through. And yeah, I like being in places that allow people to be different.
Jackie Tohn: I just like that answer. I’m good with that. She answered on both of our behalf. I think my tiny answer is just that culturally, when you’re in a space with people whose ancestors are similar to your ancestors, it’s like, “Well, your mother and your grandmother acted similarly to my mother and grandmother. So now we’re here.” And I do a lot of from Nobody Wants This also in a Jewish space and meeting all these amazing, strong Jewish women after a moderated Q&A or an event or a speaking engagement or at a comedy show. And it’s so funny. I’m like, “I mean, you’re not my sister.” I mean, when they come up, it’s just like they’ll come up to me and be like, “It’s insane.” People are like, “Are you related to that girl?” And I’m like, “You can tell them yes, because I’m her and I agree.” You just get it. And so I think that was a special part of making this movie too because you’re not normally surrounded by, especially artistically, by something that makes sense for you culturally.That’s your own private thing to go do and live your life in whatever way feels right to you. But then to be making art in that space with people who come from a similar cultural background as you, it’s really cool.
Becky Adelberg: That’s really special and unique. I connected personally deeply with the idea that kids can be a version of themselves at home and another camp because speaking about the feeling of being an outsider in a Jewish space, I went to an Orthodox Jewish high school, but did not grow up Orthodox. So that was a time when I was like, “I’m Jewish, they’re Jewish.”
Jackie Tohn: You went to Orthodox High School, but you weren’t Orthodox?
Becky Adelberg: Yes, and when I went to camp, it was sort of like my respite because I was with my friends who went to public school and a whole other world and the camp was very liberal and diverse. And so you kind of have that window in the film where people are reinventing themselves at camp or maybe they are one person when they’re not at camp and they’re another person when they are at camp. Do you think that there’s a sense of freedom and reinvention? Is that a universal part of camp? And what inspired you, Rachel, to explore that in the film?
Rachel Israel: That’s something that I’ve heard. Having not been to camp, I can’t speak personally to it, but I’ve heard that over and over again, that for many people, camp was a place they could become someone different. I think how that kind of expands in what the story is that hopefully that we continue to need, not just at that age of adolescence, but into our 30s and 40s and onward that sense of potential for big change and that we can become someone different and transform. I think that’s where Nomi is in her life. So I think I was inspired by the idea of that as not just an adolescent phase, but something that we can take with us.
Jackie Tohn: I think it’s interesting because I’m thinking back on my own journey and it made me think of the girls I went to camp with who were the cool girls, mean girls at camp. I didn’t go to school with them. So maybe they weren’t the cool girls mean girls at school. My suspicion is that they were. I sort of discovered who I was at camp. I’ve been a pretty straight arrow the whole time. I’ve been a version of this for just 40 something years where it wasn’t like, “Oh my God, I’m at camp. I’m different.” It was like, no, I was still a little much, a little loud. I was in every talent show, and wanted to do more than one number. I mean, I’ve kind of been unapologetically myself for better or worse as it were.
Becky Adelberg: Amazing. The movie is full of outsiders, but it doesn’t treat not fitting in as something bleak. It suggests that the misfits may actually be the people who are creating the community. Did that connect with your own understanding of Jewish identity or Jewish humor?
Jackie Tohn: The misfits are always the ones making the best art and the most interesting things and the weirdest inventions and the most social change. It’s always the weird artists that are behind all of that.
Rachel Israel: Yeah, totally. I was homeschooled, so I haven’t lost that sense of myself I think as just I’m naturally a misfit. I don’t know that I was objectively odd, but because I didn’t have a set of age peers that I was always sort of able to rank myself with, I just didn’t know if I fit. I went to art school as an undergrad and everyone there is so cool and finding their colors and tutus and rain boots. I guess I was also a misfit because I wore Sears sweatpants and men’s T-shirts. I bought a six-pack of men’s T-shirts and that was my wardrobe for the year. So even in art school, I feel like, which is often a time for people kind of coming into their weirdness, I was still stuck in my oddness maybe. But I’ve always had an appreciation for the independence and the independent, just a feeling of freedom of not fitting in, that I’m not getting my worth or direction by checking what everyone else is doing. And I loved that. And also a heart for the angst of that position and maybe how satisfying it can be when you find people that you can trust and that make you feel safe and loved. I think I’m drawn to stories of outsiders.
Becky Adelberg:
For people who went to Jewish camp, what do you think that they will recognize immediately? And for people who did not go to camp, what do you hope they understand about why these places matter?
Jackie Tohn: It’s not even a hope. If you went to camp, you are at least partially just watching your own experience because since we shot at an actual camp, you’re going to recognize the locations, the field, the sports, the kids, the bunks, the social hall, the cafeteria, the way that they eat the food with the grill and the chef. I mean, it’s camp. You are going to recognize camp.
Becky Adelberg: And for people who didn’t go, what do you hope they understand about why these places matter?
Jackie Tohn: It’s such a feel good movie and such a community building. The kids are experiencing community and independence at the same time because they’re not with their parents and they’re kind of stuck in this thing they don’t want to be in, but they’re all sort of learning in real time like, “Oh wait, these very different people can teach me something. I can teach them something.” And that’s camp. And I think for the people who never went to camp, this is such an authentic camp representation of a camp experience that I think you can walk away being like, “Oh, that’s what that was like. I’ve seen a lot of camp movies and I’m like, “Huh? Whose camp experience was that? ” Where this is like, “Oh yeah, yeah, copy. Got it. That’s what going to camp was like.
Becky Adelberg: Yeah, I think that definitely came through for both people who went or didn’t go to camp. Rachel, what did directing this film teach you about the Jewish community that you did not know before, if anything?
Jackie Tohn: Nothing. She’s an encyclopedia on Jews and she can’t be taught. Her last name is Israel. Good luck.
Rachel Israel: I’ll just say the new experience that I took away from it that was really beautiful was something that Jackie was touching on earlier was being with this largely Jewish… I mean, we were an entirely Jewish cast. All our Jewish characters were played by Jewish Actors. It felt very unique and there were many Jews behind the camera. And so to be with so many Jews making this movie felt, I don’t know, just very inspiring. And it’s not an easy time to be a Jew. So I really hold that experience very dear.
Jackie Tohn: Me too.
Becky Adelberg: And Jackie, if you could send teenage Jackie back to Camp David for one day, what would she do first?
Jackie Tohn: She’d probably sing Don’t Cry Out Loud by Melissa Manchester with her dad playing the piano. That’s going to make me cry. To go back to camp and my dad young and healthy and just playing piano and me singing, that would undoubtedly be what I would do.
Becky Adelberg: If you feel like singing in line now. No pressure.
Jackie Tohn: You know that I don’t. Nothing better than acapella singing Don’t Cry Out Loud over Zoom.
Becky Adelberg:
If you could finish this sentence, Jewish joy looks like…
Rachel Israel: Complicated.
Jackie Tohn: Jewish joy looks like an inherent sense of humor in your bones. It’s just like we can’t stop laughing, being self-deprecating. I mean, it’s Jewish joy. It’s just like we can’t help it. So we’re laughing at everything. The nightmares, the joy, this is what it is. We’re laughing at it. And a lot of people don’t understand it. Well, that’s not funny. It’s like, well, what am I going to tell you? It is now.
Becky Adelberg: I want to thank you both so much. It’s been such a pleasure to spend this time with you and get to meet you and learn more about the film and each of you. I really loved talking about the film, about Jewish camp and the communities that really help us become fully ourselves. And congratulations on The Floaters.
Rachel Israel: Thank you, Becky. This was such fun. Thank you.
*This interview has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.
Watch The Floaters now in theaters! Learn more and find out where to see it.
