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updated February 28th 2014
A
bi-monthly internet magazine of the arts. Each issue is written largely
but not exclusively by Willard Manus. Such
outside contributors as Richmond Shepard,
Alan Bodian, Joseph
Kierland, Harriet Robbins, Dorothy
Sinclair and Mavis Manus are featured regularly,
but submissions to the magazine are BY INVITATION ONLY.
The
magazine seeks to present a generous but selective overview of the contemporary
cultural scene in the USA and abroad.
Publisher
WILLARD MANUS is a Los Angeles-based novelist, playwright and journalist.
He published two books recently: THIS
WAY TO PARADISE--DANCING ON THE TABLES, a memoir of time spent in
the Greek islands; and THE
PIGSKIN RABBI, a comic novel about pro football. His other novels
are THE FIXERS,
THE FIGHTING
MEN, CONNUBIAL
BLISS and MOTT
THE HOOPLE, the book from which the 70s British rock band took its
name.
Manus'
latest play, THE PENIS MONOLOGUES, just concluded a five-month run in
Los Angeles and is being translated into German and French. He has had
fifteen other plays produced in the USA, Europe and Australia.
He
is also a member of the Los Angeles Film Critics Association and has written
on film for SIGHT & SOUND, FILMS IN REVIEW, DAILY VARIETY and ATHENIAN
MAGAZINE. His freelance articles have appeared in such journals as NEW
YORK TIMES, CHICAGO TRIBUNE, WASHINGTON POST, SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE,
BOSTON GLOBE, HOLIDAY MAGAZINE, THE OBSERVER (U.K.), SUNDAY TIMES (U.K.),
FINANCIAL POST (Canada), DIVE MAGAZINE, SCUBA WORLD and many others. His
short stories have been published in NEW LETTERS, CONFRONTATION, MEN ONLY
and ARGOSY, among others.
Manus
served for four years as the southern California correspondent for PLAYBILL.COM
Assistant
publisher Mavis Manus co-wrote the successful cookbook, THE
ART OF RUSSIAN CUISINE (Macmillan Co.) She writes a monthly human
interest column for the HELLENIC JOURNAL.
MOVIES:
News & reviews; book reviews; occasional features & interviews.
THEATRE:
Reviews and news from Los Angeles, New York and other cities; book reviews;
occasional features and interviews.
MUSIC:
Classical news & reviews; Blues & Jazz news and reviews. Occasional
features and interviews.
TRAVEL:
Articles on travel spots around the world. Special interests: Greece &
the Mediterranean; Europe; Caribbean & South America; Freediving &
Spearfishing; Jewish travel destinations.
BOOKS:
News and reviews of new titles; occasional interviews and features.
FICTION:
Original contemporary short stories.
OPERA:
News and reviews; occasional interviews and features.
DANCE:
News and reviews.
HUMAN
INTEREST: Features, interviews and profiles.
MARKETPLACE:
Books, videos and audio tapes by Willard Manus.
Vladimir Orlov (see Fiction)
Harriet Robbins (see Book Reviews)
Richmond Shepard (see Theatre)
Dorothy Sinclair (see Book Reviews)
Alan Bodian (see Human Interest)
Richmond Shepard (see Theatre)
Louis Fantasia (see Theatre Features),
Richmond Shepard (see Theatre),
Dorothy Sinclair (see Book Reviews),
Martin Tucker (see Ficition)
Alan Bodian (see Human Interest),
Richmond Shepard (see Theatre),
Martin Tucker (see Ficition)
Louis Fantasia (see Theatre Features),
Joseph Scott Kierland (see Fiction),
Harriet Robbins (see Movie Features & Human Interest),
Richmond Shepard (see Theatre)
Harriet Robbins (see Human Interest),
Richmond Shepard (see Theatre)
Maxwell Epstein (see Book Review),
Harriet Robbins (see Human Interest),
Richmond Shepard (see Theatre),
Martin Tucker (See Fiction)
Louis Fantasia,
Robert Riche
About
the contibutors:
Janey
Bennett
Research for THE PALE SURFACE OF THINGS led Janey Bennett into the study of classical Greek, Byzantine icon painting, geology, botany, the vernacular architecture and sociology of Greek villages, Minoan culture and art, the science of archaeology, World War II on Crete, and criminal law in Greece. A cellist, freelance editor, and author, Bennett divides her time between Bellingham, WA and Hornby Island, BC.
Research for THE PALE SURFACE OF THINGS led Janey Bennett into the study of classical Greek, Byzantine icon painting, geology, botany, the vernacular architecture and sociology of Greek villages, Minoan culture and art, the science of archaeology, World War II on Crete, and criminal law in Greece. A cellist, freelance editor, and author, Bennett divides her time between Bellingham, WA and Hornby Island, BC.
The Pale Surface of Things is available through Partners/West distribution); Amazon.com; barnesandnoble.com; greeceinprint.com; or from the publisher, Hopeace Press at www.hopeace.ca or www.palesurfaceofthings.com.
(Alan Bodian with friend Muhammid Ali)
Alan
Bodian is a New York-based journalist and screenwriter.
One of the founding contributors to the Village Voice, he has written for many other newspapers and magazines as well. His script for Jim Jacobs' 90-minute documentary Jack Johnson won a gold medal at the 1970 Atlanta Film Festival and was nominated in 1971 for an Academy Award. With his painter wife Betty, Bodian is a longtime summer resident of Provincetown, MA.
Katherine
Clark
Katherine Clark is a writer, editor and translator of German and Greek. She first encountered Orthodoxy while teaching in Greece, following completion of her MA at the University of Michigan. After some years of study and discussion with Orthodox monks, priests and laypersons, she converted to Greek Orthodoxy in 1987. She has studied Byzantine chant and has written and translated articles about Orthodoxy and Orthodox Churches. She has also taught languages and literature at universities and schools in the USA, Greece and Germany, where she was director of Schiller International University Heidelberg. She then served as the Greenpeace International liaison to Greenpeace Athens. She now lives with her husband in Germany and Greece.
Katherine Clark is a writer, editor and translator of German and Greek. She first encountered Orthodoxy while teaching in Greece, following completion of her MA at the University of Michigan. After some years of study and discussion with Orthodox monks, priests and laypersons, she converted to Greek Orthodoxy in 1987. She has studied Byzantine chant and has written and translated articles about Orthodoxy and Orthodox Churches. She has also taught languages and literature at universities and schools in the USA, Greece and Germany, where she was director of Schiller International University Heidelberg. She then served as the Greenpeace International liaison to Greenpeace Athens. She now lives with her husband in Germany and Greece.
George
Constantin is a professional writer and editor born in Los Angeles.
George also lived and wrote in Fresno, California and in the metropolitan
Washington, D.C. area. George is a part-time English professor at Los
Angeles Pierce College. "Zandy" (Lively Arts March/April 2010)
and "Impossible Places" (Lively Arts September/October 2009)
are from his story-novel "The Autobiography of California".
Akrivoe
Emmanouilides was born in Philadelphia and has lived in Los Angeles
since 1961. She began writing in the 70's, her poetry, articles and fiction
have been published in Greek-American magazines and newspapers. She also
wrote a cookbook, The Greek Kitchen, and demonstrates Greek cooking at
two local Greek festivals.
Maxwell
Epstein grew up in Colorado. He earned a degree in sociology from
the University of Colorado, and his career was devoted to working with
international students at Iowa State University, UCLA and UC Santa Barbara.
He was motivated by the idea that the interchange between American and
foreign students would contribute to international understanding. Ten
years ago he retired as Dean Emeritus, International Students and Scholars,
UCLA. Since then he has become a serious woodworker, and is now devoting
much of his time writing, both fiction and non-fiction. He lives with
his wife Judith Carr, a painter, in Santa Monica Canyon.
Louis Fantasia's theatre reviews for National Public Radio can be found at www.kcrw.com. He is also the director of Teaching Shakespeare Through Performance at, the Shakespeare Globe Centre's teacher training institute.
Born on the island of Yap Micronesia: Occupation: Manager of the Pathways Hotel: Education: High school graduate and attended Hawaii Pacific University: for half of his full time. Hobbies: Scuba Diving, Cultural experiences, Traditional sailing and Celestial navigation, water skiing, Building and developing Pathways, and fishing.
Loves to: meet and make new friends, show visitors the culture and the island, and help others.
Age: 34 years old. Born and raised as an island boy, will grow old as an island boy and will die as an island boy
She has had exhibitions on every continent in the world except Greenland. She has made artworks for many public buildings including murals for the Barbican Art Centre, London, The High Commission, Dhaka, Bangladesh, Shakespeare's Globe Theatre, London and many others. This Autumn there is a show of her sculpture and paintings about South West Asia in London.
She works with composers, several of them Greek, and has recorded many of her song cycles. Her opera 'THE BIRD GARDEN' for which she wrote the book, the libretto and did the design for the sets and costumes, was produced by the Oper Am Rhein in Dusseldorf during the 2002- 2003 season. She has just completed a new libretto.
In 2006 she will be designing the sets and costumes for KISS ME KATE again for the Oper Am Rhein. A new cantata, which she has written the text for, will also be premiered in summer 2006.
A new exhibition of paintings is being planed for late 2006.
Polly Hope's website is: www.HopeArt.com
She lives in Fairbury, NE.
more than thirty years ago. A food and travel writer, she is the author of two Greek cookbooks, Prospero's Kitchen and Feasting and Fasting in Crete, and a regular contributor to the Athens News. Her most recent publication is Athens and Beyond, 30 Day Trips and Weekends, but she occasionally leaps the Adriatic to write about Italy.
Joseph Scott Kierland is a graduate of the University of Connecticut and Yale Drama School, and has been playwright-in-residence at New York's Lincoln Center, Brandeis University, and Los Angeles Actor's Theatre. His plays have been produced around the country and in Europe, and he has been published in Short Story International, Sgrafitto, and Arizona Literary Review. Mr. Kierland was the founder of the successful Los Angeles Playwright's Group and editor of their books, BEST ONE ACT PLAYS and SEX IN THE AFTERNOON. He continues working in film and television and has received awards from Cornell University, Chicago University, University of Iowa and Yale University.
Ross Manus is a filmmaker/editor, actor and creator/host of the AhabTV reality series. He grew up on a Greek island and was educated at Humboldt State University, California, where he was an all-star soccer player.
Irving Kronenberg
After a 47-year career in Health Care Management, Planning & Education,
it was time to write the stories I have accumulated: Stories even the
uninsured could read and appreciate. If I knew writing was so much fun,
I would have started earlier.
Dalia R. Miller
Dalia Miller is the former editor of Laografia: A Journal of the International
Greek Folklore Society. She has made nearly 30 trips to Greece since her
first visit in 1969.
Craig Pettigrew was born in Miami, Florida. He attended the Interlochen Arts Academy, the Eastman School of Music, and Northwestern University. His plays include "Brutal Mandate", "The Bed", and "The Lark Ascending." This selection from "About The Author" is the opening chapter of a novel-in-progress.. Craig lives in La Crescenta with his wife Judith and his boys Gordon and Aaron.
Guy Prevost's eclectic career spans both sides of the literary desk in TV and film. He recently co-wrote the screenplay for Dinoshark, a highly successful film for the SyFy Channel which aired last March. He has also written episodes for the acclaimed Showtime anthology series Dead Man's Gun and CBS' Walker Texas Ranger. His background includes work in feature film development, teaching for Ithaca College, and his fiction will be appearing in the next issue of The North Atlantic Review. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife and two dogs
Robert
Riche has published the novel "What Are We Doing in Latin
America? (A Novel About Connecticut)". His short stories have appeared
in Commentary and a number of literary magazines. His plays have been
performed off-off Broadway in New York, and in regional theaters in Berkeley,
Washington, Atlanta, and in Bristol, England. He has co-authored one self-help
book entitled "The Ten Most Troublesome Teen-Age Problems (And How
to Solve Them)", and he has had numerous comedy television assignments.
He writes periodically on food, wine and travel subjects. He is the recipient
of a National Endowment for the Arts grant, a Connecticut Foundation for
the Arts grant, Advanced Drama Research grant; and is a winner of the
prestigious Stanley Drama Award. He has also been a Breadloaf Writers
Conference scholar. He currently is finishing a new novel.
David
Ray - DAVID RAY’s most recent publications are One Thousand
Years: Poems About the Holocaust (Timberline Press, 2004) and The Endless
Search: A Memoir (Soft Skull Press, 2003). Ray has received many awards
for his writing, including the William Carlos Williams Award (twice) from
the Poetry Society of America. He lives in Tucson, travels for readings
and workshops, and can be reached at www.davidraypoet.com
Harriet
Robbins is a member of the Los Angeles Film Critics Association
and the Los Angeles Film Teachers Association. She is Entertainment Editor
for BRAZZIL, contributes articles for LA OPINION, a Spanish language daily
in Los Angeles, and has a monthly column for the KOREA TIMES for which
she writes theater, film and book reviews.
Sharon
Rosner lived in Athens, Greece since 1999, where she taught actors
and film directors, wrote investigative journalism, rescued and rehabilitated
trafficked women, and developed programs for Roma children. A native New
Yorker, Sharon has performed extensively in off-Broadway and regional
theatre, film, television, voiceover and commercials. She is extremely
proud to be a performing arts and writing mentor for at-risk youth with
the Virginia Ave. Project and a literacy mentor for SAG BookPALs. Sharon
holds a M.S. in Communicative Disorders, is a classically trained pianist,
and has listings in Who's Who of American Women and Who's Who in the World.
She is currently in Los Angeles, working on a book about her experiences
as an immigrant in Greece.
Richmond Shepard, New York correspondent for Lively-Arts.com, is co-publisher of Performing Arts INSIDER, a professional newsletter that tells everything coming into New York up to a year in advance. For more info on PAI, contact totalpost@totaltheater.com.
Dorothy Sinclair was associate editor of "The West Coast Review of Books" for over ten years. Her column, "The Feminist Front", was one of the first to deal exclusively with books on women's issues. Formerly head of the publicity department at the William Morris Agency in Beverly Hills, she is now focusing on a career as a television producer.
George
Dillon Slater: "I have spent nearly three quarters of the
last forty years living in Europe. Old Europe. I find writing there more
enjoyable because the people of Europe have very cherished languages,
in high states of evolution, as opposed to the creationist view of my
compatriots. Also, because I begat there once. Publisher David Hay Jones
is bringing out my latest book of poetry, The Silver Labyrinth in Spring
of 2005.
E-mail dhayjones@yahoo.com on
how to obtain a copy of the book."
Martin
Tucker is editor-in-chief of the prize-winning literary journal
CONFRONTATION. He has published two collections of poetry, ATTENTION SPANS
and HOMES OF LOCKS AND MYSTERIES as well as several literary critical
studies, among them the highly praised LITERARY EXILE IN THE TWENTIETH
CENTURY. He is the editor of more than 20 volumes of literary encyclopedia
and has published reviews and essays in THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW,
THE NATION, THE COMMONWEAL, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE SATURDAY REVIEW, CHICAGO
REVIEW, EPOCH and elsewhere. He is also a playwright; four of his one-act
plays were recently produced in London.
Yale
Udoff
Mr. Udoff is a playwright and screenwriter. The NY Times said of his A GUN PLAY, "Mr. Udoff is a discovery. It is clear he has a comic vision, verbal facility and a contemporary consciousness." He has twice been selected to participate in the Eugene O'Neill National Playwrights Conference and honored with The Stanley Drama Award for his first play, THE LITTLE GENTLEMAN; he is also the recipient of a Charles MacArthur Playwrighting Award.
Among his screen credits are EVE OF DESTRUCTION with Gregory Hines and the renowned Dutch actress, Renee Soutdenijk, THIRD DEGREE BURN for HBO with Virginia Madsen and Treat Williams directed by Roger Spottiswoode. He wrote the screenplay for Nicolas Roeg's greatly admired BAD TIMING/A SENSUAL OBSSESSON, starring Harvey Keitel, Theresa Russell and Art Garfunkel. He is a member of the WGA, the Dramatists Guild and the Playwrights Unit of the Actors Studio. Additional credits include his adaptation VERA, based on a Chekhov story, which starred Peter Weller and Madeline Stowe and received the short film fiction prize @ The Huston Film Festival. He has written fiction, both novels and short stories, of which A CITY PAST, A CITY PRESENT and SAGGITARIUS belong to a group, 'BEFORE IT CHANGED: STORIES FROM THE 50s"
Mr. Udoff is a playwright and screenwriter. The NY Times said of his A GUN PLAY, "Mr. Udoff is a discovery. It is clear he has a comic vision, verbal facility and a contemporary consciousness." He has twice been selected to participate in the Eugene O'Neill National Playwrights Conference and honored with The Stanley Drama Award for his first play, THE LITTLE GENTLEMAN; he is also the recipient of a Charles MacArthur Playwrighting Award.
Among his screen credits are EVE OF DESTRUCTION with Gregory Hines and the renowned Dutch actress, Renee Soutdenijk, THIRD DEGREE BURN for HBO with Virginia Madsen and Treat Williams directed by Roger Spottiswoode. He wrote the screenplay for Nicolas Roeg's greatly admired BAD TIMING/A SENSUAL OBSSESSON, starring Harvey Keitel, Theresa Russell and Art Garfunkel. He is a member of the WGA, the Dramatists Guild and the Playwrights Unit of the Actors Studio. Additional credits include his adaptation VERA, based on a Chekhov story, which starred Peter Weller and Madeline Stowe and received the short film fiction prize @ The Huston Film Festival. He has written fiction, both novels and short stories, of which A CITY PAST, A CITY PRESENT and SAGGITARIUS belong to a group, 'BEFORE IT CHANGED: STORIES FROM THE 50s"
Bonnie
Weiss has been an elementary school teacher. She is
now a performer and teacher of modern dance. And as a composer and
arranger of original music, she produced an album for the piano
called "French Carousel." She also enjoys writing. Her
first book, "With My Other Hand," came out in 2008.
This story is part
of her new book, "Writing in the Shower."
