Title: If These Knishes Could Talk: The Story of the New York Accent
Genre: Documentary
Release year: 2013
Length: 51 min

FESTIVALS
World Premiere Art of Brooklyn Film Festival (Best Documentary – nominated), Manhattan Film Festival (New York Spotlight Award – winner), Red Hook International Film Festival (Best Director – winner; People’s Choice Award - winner), Big Bear Lake International Film Festival, Queens World Film Festival, Hoboken International Film Festival

Press

“A perfect New York story.”

— WSJ

“… a tribute to what New York sounded like when the working class stood as a more central cultural presence.”

— New York Times

“Incredible”

— Jessica Chastain

“[Quinlan] exceeds all expectations … her relentless investigation of the subject covers every conceivable base: from experts like linguists, historians and speech pathologists…to nitty gritty New Yorkers from all walks of life and every imaginable ethnicity.”

— Travalanche

CREDITS
Director: Heather Quinlan
Producers: Gary Greco, Jeffrey Guarino, Barbara Mensch, Lawrence Paskowitz, Heather Quinlan, Pamela Vanderway
Story: Heather Quinlan and Richard Svinkin
Editor: Hilary Walker
Composer: Elliot Goldkind
Cinematographer: Mitchell Reichler
Featuring: Penny Marshall, Amy Heckerling, James McBride, Pete Hamill, Joe Franklin
With support from: City Lore, City Reliquary, Kickstarter, Library of Congress

“‘Knishes' offers a broader obituary: the New York accent is being displaced … Quinlan [went] looking for bastions of survival.”

— The New Yorker

‘"If These Knishes Could Talk' is said by my native friends to be the definitive documentary on the New York accent—watch it!”

— Gothamist