Alanis Morissette appeared on a recent episode of PBS’ Finding Your Roots, during which the singer discovered that her great-uncles, Gyorgy and Sandor Feuerstein, died in the Holocaust.
Morissette already knew that her Hungarian Jewish grandfather, Imre Feuerstein, miraculously survived the Holocaust before relocating his family — including Morissette’s then-six-year-old mother — from the Soviet Union to Ontario, Canada in 1953. They decided to keep their Jewish heritage a secret from then on, so the “Ironic” singer had no idea she was Jewish until she was 28.
“I think there was a terror that is in their bones, and they were being protective of us and not wanting antisemitism,” Morissette said of the Feuersteins. “They were protecting us, keeping us in the dark around it.”
As for Gyorgy and Sandor, it was long believed that the two had disappeared during the Holocaust after being forced into a work battalion in Russia. But, as the the Finding Your Roots team learned through records at the World Holocaust Remembrance Center, they both died while working in the slave labor army.
“It’s unfathomable for me,” Morissette said, imagining the conditions her great-uncles were laboring in.
Morissette’s grandfather died in a car accident shortly after her birth, and since he fled from Hungary, the musician had no idea of her ancestry before World War II. On Finding Your Roots, she also learned that her great-great-grandfather was born in what is now Ukraine.
“It’s interesting, because when my mom watches the news [about war in Ukraine], my immediate thought was [her] trauma with her escape,” Morissette added. “But now hearing this, it’s a whole other level.”
Overall, the Finding Your Roots team was able to trace Morissette’s family back to what was then Galicia, in eastern Europe, over 200 years ago.
“I had no idea how super Jewish I am!” Morissette said with a laugh. “I feel welcomed into a community that I always had a crush on. I’ve always had a crush on Judaism and I would just show up on Passover and at Seder. Now I know why!”
Watch Morissette’s segment of Finding Your Roots below.
Get Alanis Morissette Tickets Here
Despite her Jewish roots, Morissette covered Wham!’s classic “Last Christmas” during NBC’s Christmas at Graceland special and on Fallon. You can get tickets to her 2024 tour dates here.