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About Me
I am an experienced Philadelphia-and-Colorado-based editor, freelance theater critic, and arts and culture features writer, with forays into lifestyle and news features. Happy to meet any challenge and rise to the occasion.
Samples of My Work
2022 Fellows Feature: Clarissa Ward
November 30, 2022 • Featured, Quill Archives
CNN Chief International Correspondent Clarissa Ward often cites her “peripatetic upbringing” as the spark for her wanderlust.
Born in London, the only child of an American mother and British father, she moved to Manhattan, then back again to London, with a rotating cast of nannies (11 by the time she was 8) along the way. Her father soon moved to Hong Kong, though her parents never divorced, and she was shipped off to boarding school at age 10.
An un...
CNN Chief International Correspondent Clarissa Ward often cites her “peripatetic upbringing” as the spark for her wanderlust.
Born in London, the only child of an American mother and British father, she moved to Manhattan, then back again to London, with a rotating cast of nannies (11 by the time she was 8) along the way. Her father soon moved to Hong Kong, though her parents never divorced, and she was shipped off to boarding school at age 10.
An un...
Philly’s Protect the Artist protestors take their demands to the…
Before the Mummers showed up on opening night to drown out dissent, before a team of white guys showed six women actors how to lighten up the civil rights era in this, the first WST mainstage show since Covid-19, a plethora of factors led to what may be the most baldly hubristic moment in WST artistic director Bernard Havard’s career. Prior news stories abound, including BSR’s coverage of a June 2021 protest pointing to accusations of Havard barging into women’s dressing rooms after a cursory kn
A Museum Exhibit Devoted to Ruth Bader Ginsburg Is Coming to Philly
A Museum Exhibit Devoted to Ruth Bader Ginsburg Is Opening in Philly
Take a moment to recall the last time you attended a major museum exhibition entirely devoted to a pop-culture icon. Was that icon a woman? Still alive, working, and in her 80s? Jewish? I bet the answer is no.
Such are the boundaries still being smashed by the first Jewish woman to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, whose life and pop-culture status are celebrated in the National Museum of American Jewish H
Take a moment to recall the last time you attended a major museum exhibition entirely devoted to a pop-culture icon. Was that icon a woman? Still alive, working, and in her 80s? Jewish? I bet the answer is no.
Such are the boundaries still being smashed by the first Jewish woman to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, whose life and pop-culture status are celebrated in the National Museum of American Jewish H
"A Doll’s House" in a #MeToo World
Matt Lauer. Harvey Weinstein. Charlie Rose. I could go on. High-profile men are feeling the wrath of the women they’ve wielded their power over, making this a timely moment for the Arden to produce Henrik Ibsen’s 1879 drama A Doll’s House.
The play was considered shocking in its day. The central couple, Nora and Torvald, rely, like so many married partners do, on the fictions they create: Nora is a twittering “sparrow,” banned from eating macaroons lest they ruin her pretty mouth. Torvald is a
The play was considered shocking in its day. The central couple, Nora and Torvald, rely, like so many married partners do, on the fictions they create: Nora is a twittering “sparrow,” banned from eating macaroons lest they ruin her pretty mouth. Torvald is a
'Lizzie': Great voices, great theme, needs cutting
Lizzie Borden took an axe, and with it she smashed the patriarchy. Or at least that's the idea presented by 11th Hour Theatre Company's production of Steven Cheslik-Demeyer, Tim Maner, and Alan Stevens Hewitt's Lizzie, a bare-bones (no pun intended), eardrum-rattling musical about the best-known citizen of Fall River, Mass.
The show's set and lighting design, by Thom Weaver, takes its cues from concert stages and maybe a little bit from another musical, Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, with risers
The show's set and lighting design, by Thom Weaver, takes its cues from concert stages and maybe a little bit from another musical, Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, with risers
Veganism grows up
Five months ago, I went from lapsed vegetarian to full-blown vegan, and somehow, by cutting my caloric options in half, gained five pounds. I'd always associated vegans with teeny-tiny hippie chicks in dreadlocks and yoga pants, arranging kombu in a pressure cooker before leaving for a job at the co-op.
Obviously, times have changed. These days, going vegan requires almost no planning and, better yet, no dreadlocks. With the spread of Whole Foods and Trader Joe's, and the mainstreaming of the h
Obviously, times have changed. These days, going vegan requires almost no planning and, better yet, no dreadlocks. With the spread of Whole Foods and Trader Joe's, and the mainstreaming of the h
In Cirque shape
Cirque du Soleil's newest touring show to arrive in Philadelphia, a slip of a girl leans backward, folding herself in half and touching her toes. Another performer stands on stilts perched atop one end of a teeterboard. He flies into the air, stilts and all, turning several somersaults and landing with perfect poise, still firmly on his stilts.
Acrobatics are Cirque's particular hallmark, but in each new show the troupe creates, performers weave a dramatic tale while making extraordinary feats
Acrobatics are Cirque's particular hallmark, but in each new show the troupe creates, performers weave a dramatic tale while making extraordinary feats
Not so marvelous: Why I’m done with ‘Mrs. Maisel’
And I finally caved, bingeing the first two seasons, and then, out of guilt (did I mention I’m Jewish?), the third. I did not love it. I suppose my friends like it for the same reason they like The Goldbergs, which premiered in 2013. This network sitcom (set in 1980s Jenkintown, PA) treads similar shticky ground and gets extra points for eastern Montco accuracy. Maisel and Goldbergs are comfort food, both harking back to a time when Jews ostensibly had the same backgrounds, aspirations, and sens
