PDA Entertainment Search Results

Name Description
The Def Poetry Experience A thrilling evening of spoken word infused with hip-hop music featuring the stars of HBO Def Poetry…Daniel Beaty, YOLANDA KAE WILKINSON, & Helena D. Lewis. Join these three internationally renowned, award winning poets as they electrify the mike tackling themes such as womanhood, bad relationships, Jewish identity, sexuality, racism, and bad breath!
Branford Marsalis Quartet Billboard jazz writer Steve Graybow recently described the Branford Marsalis quartet as "a unit with telepathic intuition and unbridled adventurousness, held together by a singular creative vision." For his first quartet album in nine years, Branford has made a requiem for a heavyweight. Requiem is a tribute to pianist Kenny Kirkland, Branford's friend and colleague for nearly 20 years, whose sublime performances on the new album proved to be his last recorded work.
Beyond Beats and Rhymes: The Sundance Film Festival selected Beyond Beats and Rhymes for this year's festival in Park City, Utah, January 19-29, 2006. This news came on the heels of receiving word that the Emmy award-winning PBS series Independent Lens (www.independentlens.org) had also selected Beyond Beats and Rhymes for a 2007 national television broadcast. Beyond Beats and Rhymes: A Hip-Hop Head Weighs in on Manhood in Hip-Hop Culture is a riveting documentary that examines representations of gender roles in hip-hop and rap music through the lens of filmmaker Byron Hurt, a former college quarterback turned activist. Conceived as a "loving critique" from a self-proclaimed "hip-hop head," Hurt tackles issues of masculinity, sexism, violence and homophobia in today's hip-hop culture.
Coach Carter Coach Carter is a coach, author, educator and inspiration for the movie Coach Carter, featuring Samuel L. Jackson. The movie recounts Carter’s decision to literally lock his undefeated, state play-off bound basketball team out of the gym and force them to hit the books. Coach Carter is an advocate for Richmond's youth and is active in his community. He is diligent in providing them with opportunities to build meaningful relationships with their peers and caring adults, and recognizes the advantages inherent in a sound sports program. In October, 2000 he announced his plans to travel from Richmond High School to the steps of the California State Capitol in Sacramento. Using only a kick scooter, Carter traveled for 3 days to Sacramento hoping to draw awareness to the deteriorating state of our schools and the need for students, parents, teachers, and school board officials to commit to making a difference. His efforts proved successful, and subsequently Richmond High received building enhancements and computers from the Office of the Secretary of Education. Under the direction and guidance of Coach Carter, in December of 2000, 11 students from Australia arrived in the U.S. to promote peace and to learn first hand what it takes to be an American high school basketball player. Coach Carter found a way to bring something positive to the lives of Richmond High students, where heroes and positive role models are few and far between. Using basketball as the common bond, the intention of the visit was to offer these students an opportunity to meet each other, gain awareness about each others' culture and communities, and to learn hands-on about what it takes to be a top-notch American athletic. Carter feels that exchanges such as these are needed to promote a more just and peaceful place for us all to live in.
Lost Boys of Sudan Lost Boys of Sudan is a feature-length documentary that follows two Sudanese refugees on an extraordinary journey from Africa to America. Orphaned as young boys in one of Africa's cruelest civil wars, Peter Dut and Santino Chuor survived lion attacks and militia gunfire to reach a refugee camp in Kenya along with thousands of other children. From there, remarkably, they were chosen to come to America. Safe at last from physical danger and hunger, a world away from home, they find themselves confronted with the abundance and alienation of contemporary American suburbia. Lost Boys of Sudan won an Independent Spirit Award and screened theatrically in 70 cities across the U.S. to strong audience and critical praise. The film was broadcast nationally on the PBS series POV in the fall of 2004 and earned two Emmy nominations. The story of the Lost Boys of Sudan has touched people from all walks of life. From movie stars and politicians to the average housewife, people from around the world have fallen in love with these courageous young men. Joan Hecht was no exception. When hearing of their story for the first time, Joan Hecht’s eyes filled with tears and she felt a deep stirring in her soul. She knew that helping them was not an option. It was a call to her heart from God and Joan Hecht responded. She hoped to be instrumental in making their new lives in America better than the ones they had left behind. Like many others, Joan Hecht felt compelled to be a mother to these young men who couldn't even remember the faces of their own mothers. “Mama Joan” hoped only to help change their lives, never realizing how knowing each of them would so drastically change her own.
One-Man Star Wars Best known as the mastermind behind the in famous One Man Star Wars Trilogy and One Man Lord of the Rings. Word of Ross's one of a kind talent has spread across North America, from Toronto, Orlando, Atlanta, and Boston, to Chicago, San Diego, and Vancouver. To mark the release of Star Wars: Episode 3: Revenge of the Sith, Charles was honoredto perform at Lucasfilm's official movie release convention, Celebration 3. Even the likes of Vin Diesel and Sir Ian McKellan have taken in his performances with ravereviews.
Raiders of the Lost Ark Professor Eric Meyers, a leading biblical archaeologist, has been hailed as the real-life Indiana Jones, the archaeologist/hero of Raiders Of The Lost Ark. His fascinating slide lecture compares and contrasts his discovery of the oldest sacred ark ever found with the movie's version of that event.
Step Afrika Step Afrika! is a powerful collaborative project between young artists from the United States and the South Africa based Soweto Dance Theatre. The project highlights the African American fraternity and sorority art form of steping and it's link to traditonal South African dance. Recently performing at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., reviewers describe Step Afrika!'s perfromance as " a dance genre considered by some to be one of the most exciting created by Americans in the 21st century." Step Afrika! displays the roots of stepping in South Africa's gumboot dance and declares it's relationship with tap dance and hoofing
Buzz Aldrin The image of Buzz Aldrin standing on the moon's surface on July 20th, 1969 will forever mark the technological achievements of the 20th Century. It leaves an indelible mark in our public consciousness, representing the highest values of the human spirit, of teamwork and of vision. Buzz brings this vibrancy to his relationships as a corporate spokesperson for Fortune 500 companies seeking the dimension and authority of a living legend and an icon. Buzz works closely with organizations associated with innovation, technology, and advancement through commercial endorsements and promotional appearances. Buzz is entering his 4th year as corporate spokesperson for the Accutron line of Bulova watches--America's premiere watch brand. Bulova provided NASA with the timekeeping technology for America's first trip to the moon. Radio Shack chose Buzz Aldrin to serve as the Tandy brand's space spokesperson as part of their Vacations in Space commercial advertising campaign. The highly successful marketing effort also featured Buzz in a series of personal appearances at the openings of megastores across the United States.
Miguel Algarin Miguel Algarin is the "poet laureate" of Loisaida - also known as the Lower East Side - and founder of the Nuyorican Poets Café in New York City, where he has nurtured the spoken and written word for nearly three decades. Through the Café Algarin helped cultivate the popular "slam" poetry movement. Colliding the gritty topics of urbanity with the art of literature, Algarin's Café has provided a venue for words to jump from the page to the stage. Since 1974, the Nuyorican Poets Café has captured the flavor of the streets serving as a haven for poets, writers, thespians, performance artists, musicians, visual artists and hip-hop renegades, running the cultural gamut from acclaimed theater productions to hip-hop open mikes to celebrations of salsa and merengue music. The Café is the living room hosting the freshest art to immigrate to New York City, from not only the Caribbean and the Americas, but from all over the world. The Nuyorican Poets Café is a stage of words made visible. Situated in Manhattan's Lower East Side, Loisaida, the community, is a mixture of various ethnic backgrounds: Puerto Rican, Dominican, African-American, Ukrainian, Polish and Irish, to name a few. The community also hosts a great number of artists. This diverse energy is reflected in the performances of the Nuyorican Poets Café. Algarin, along with the emerging artists of the Nuyorican Poets Café, bring their talents to the forefront, dazzling audiences with their vibrant presentations. Mixing the traditional arts of oral story telling and classical poetry with the edgy raw rhythm of the hip-hop influenced streets creates the soulful heartbeat which is the Café. Recognized as a long-term cultural worker of the Lower East Side, Miguel Algarin's Nuyorican Poets Café has become a Loisaida institution. The Café and its milieu have provided a blueprint for the development of the international slam poetry movement that first surfaced in Chicago.
Maria Alonzo Well known actress and Hispanic film star.
Chris Angel Angel has been doing his Mindfreak performances since 2001; his television show debuted on July 20, 2005. Yet, his skills showcased on TV were developed through stage magic and conjuring in clubs. He also did a television special in 2003 called Supernatural. His brothers and mother are also regulars on the Mindfreak television series. Among the stunts Angel has performed for television audiences are: Being towed 80 feet into the air while handcuffed inside a barrel filled with water. The barrel was then released after Angel had taken off the handcuffs and tied himself to a safety rope. He often levitates himself and strangers off the street. Also he has been hung from fish hooks in his back and dangled from a helicopter. He has been filmed performing the illusion of walking on water. He has also lit and levitated a light bulb without electricity. Angel won the Merlin Award from the International Magicians Society in 2001, 2004 and now in 2005; he is the only two-time, and three-time winner of that award. He was named 2005 Magician of the Year by The Academy of Magical Arts (AMA) at a press event at Hollywoods Magic Castle. Criss Angel is currently starring in the second season of Mindfreak which is filmed at the Aladdin Resort in Las Vegas, Nevada. Some allege that Angel uses camera special effects, forced viewing angles and assistants acting as amazed spectators for the tv audience, and this has caused controversy among fellow magicians. Many magicians who perform magic without camera tricks resent these methods while others simply see them as modern tools of magic on televison . Criss Angel himself claims he does not use camera trickery.
Ken Burns Ken Burns Celebrated documentary filmmaker Program Title: An Evening With Ken Burns Ken Burns has been making documentary films for more than twenty years. Since the Academy Award nominated Brooklyn Bridge in 1981, he has gone on to direct and produce some of the most acclaimed historical documentaries ever made, including The Civil War (1990) and Baseball (1994). Stephen Ambrose, the historian, has said of Ken's films, "More Americans get their history from Ken Burns than any other source." JAZZ (a GM Mark of Excellence Presentation that will air on PBS in January, 2001) is Burns's third epic documentary, a ten-part that follows this most American of art forms from its origins in blues and ragtime through swing, bebop and fusion. As with The Civil War and Baseball, which with JAZZ constitute a unique trilogy of American life and culture, Burns explores in detail the culture, politics and dreams that gave birth to this most integral part of American history and life. As he wrote in the introduction to the companion book (Knopf, 2000), "having grappled with many Constitutional issues in our Civil War series and many other films, and having explored our national pastime and its exquisite lessons in our series on Baseball, we have over the last six years struggled to understand the utterly American art form of jazz. Ken's epics have received numerous accolades. The Civil War was the highest rated series in the history of American public television and attracted an audience of 40 million during its premiere in September 1990. The columnist George Will said, "If better use has ever been made of television, I have not seen it and do not expect to see better until Ken Burns turns his prodigious talents to his next project." The series was honored with more than 40 major film and television awards. The eighteen and a half hour long Baseball, for which Ken was also the director, producer, co-writer, chief cinematographer, music director and executive producer, attracted more than 45 million viewers. David Bianculli of the New York Daily News said that the film "resonates like a Mozart symphony." Time Magazine wrote that "Baseball is rich in drama, irresistible as nostalgia, and...an instructive window into our national psychology." The film won numerous awards, including an Emmy, the CINE Golden Eagle Award, the Clarion Award, and the Television Critics Award for Outstanding Achievement in Sports and Special Programming.
Augusten Burroughs Augusten Burroughs has rapidly become one of America's most successful young writers, with multiple titles on the national and international bestseller lists. His legions of devoted fans devour every hilarious, stunning, thought-provoking and moving sentence in his rapidly growing body of work, and often line up for hours to see and hear him in his live performances. To say that Augusten Burroughs had an unusual childhood would be an understatement. Somehow, Augusten survived, and turned his experiences into two of the most successful memoirs ever published. These two books, Running With Scissors, and Dry: A Memoir, chronicle his life in his foster family, follow him to New York City, into adulthood, out of the closet, and through rehab for drug and alcohol addiction. Running With Scissors has been on The New York Times list for over 70 weeks, and was recently joined by his critical smash, Magical Thinking. Entertainment Weekly included Augusten in its definitive "It List" and named him one of the "Fifteen Funniest People in America." The film version of Running with Scissors, which is being directed by Emmy Award-nominated writer/director Ryan Murphy (Nip/Tuck), began filming in March, 2005. The largely Oscar-nominated/winning cast includes Annette Bening, Gwyneth Paltrow, Alec Baldwin, Jill Clayburgh and Joseph Cross (as Augusten). A film version of his novel Sellevision is also in the works. Augusten's new book of true stories, Possible Side Effects, which The New York Times called "(H)ilarious, wildly fanciful reminiscences," was released in May, 2006. ------------------------------------------------- What does Augusten Burroughs talk about? An Evening With Augusten Burroughs: Stories From A Remarkable Life Augusten Burroughs' lectures and readings are a tour de force performance—funny, moving, and inspiring, they draw sell-out audiences to theatres and lecture halls across the country. Not without reason did Entertainment Weekly name Augusten Burroughs the 15th Funniest Person in America. His live performances are hilarious and provocative, displaying the same dry wit and eye for the absurd that have made his books so wildly popular. A natural and gifted storyteller, Augusten delves into his own bizarre, disturbing, but ultimately life-affirming childhood and young adulthood in a tour de force performance that can only be described as amazing. Howlingly funny and devastatingly moving, Burroughs' lectures inspire audiences to embrace humor, accept difference, overcome challenges, and create the conditions for their own tremendous success. He is one of that rare breed—a world-class writer who can go from paper to podium without losing any of the force, vitality, and sophistication of the written word.
Vanessa Bell Calloway One of Americas hottest actors, Vanessa Bell Calloway has won critical acclaim for her portrayal of Jackie in the movie, What's Love Got to Do With It. Other movie roles have included Daylight starring Sylvestor Stallone, A Private Affair and Coming To America with Eddie Murphy. Vanessa is co-host of BET's new morning talk show, Oh Drama, which features news, information and celebrity guests.
Alexis Caputo Alexis Caputo is a Multidiscipline Performance Artist, Poet, Writer & Activist. Her artistic portfolio began in performance studies and educational theatre. Upon personal exploration, looking at the historical context of womens contributions in the arts and her contribution to the educational community where her instruction was received, she identified these experiences as chief in her emergence. The interest and strengthening endorsements of her work by theatre scholars Dr. Nancy Putnam-Smithner, Dr. Lowell Swortzell and Playwright, Karen Malpede, all whom she studied under, were instrumental and pivotal references. To this, she has steadily increased her voice beyond the university level as a writer and performance artist creating notable works for theatre. Her course to augment the womens movement in the arts is evident in her portfolio. Her work includes poetry, spoken word, narratives/texts, audio/media, dance (movement) and visuals (iconic symbols). She has created an impressive and distinct body of originally written and performance work, addressing human rights issues, political, cultural, gender, racial, class and social differences. This has enhanced her cultural awareness while entertaining, educating, sharing history and life-affirming work. Solo projects written and performed include SOULED OUT, Truths Carved from the Belly, Woman of the Drum, The Proud Pilgrim and Deconstruction & Deliverance, which toured at noteworthy off Broadway theaters in New York (Harlem Theatre Company, Henry Street Settlement/Abron's Art Center & Dixon Place). The Proud Pilgrim, Truths Carved from the Belly & SOULED OUT were presented at the Langston Hughes Cultural Arts Center in Corona, New York. Woman of the Drum was presented at the Miami-Dade Cultural Center. She represented Delray Beach, Florida as a member of DADA Slam, an assembly of poets who performed at the National Poetry Championships in Madison, Wisconsin 2008. Her published journalism and writing portfolio are for the news houses: The Tribune & Nassau Guardian (Nassau, Bahamas) Broward Times, Miami New Times & the Miami Times.
Michael Caracciolo I would like to take the time to introduce myself to you. My name is Michael Caracciolo. I am the president of a ticket company in New Jersey. However, although I have been in the ticket business for many years, I am certain that I am in the wrong profession. I should be an actor instead. I believe that I possess all the qualities necessary for success as an actor. I am a very conversational person, my voice easily projects, via my six foot six inch 400 pound amplifier! I also sing. My unique background, persona and life’s experience truly qualify me as one of a kind .The material recorded here is ad-libbed, improvisational and spontaneous. It contains profanity which is offered only in support of demonstrating my dramatic intensity and the context of the material. I am certain that after watching it once you will immediately want to contact me.
Nancy Cartwright Emmy Award-winning actress Nancy Cartwright is the voice of "Bart" on The Simpsons, the longest-running animated show in history. She has voiced hundreds of characters in such favorites as Rug Rats, Kim Possible, Richie Rich, The Critic, God,The Devil and Bob, The Pink Panther, Animaniacs, Pinky and the Brain, Toonsylvania, Pound Puppies, My Little Pony, Glo-Friends, and the online cartoon Timber Wolf. While establishing herself as a voice-acting professional, Cartwright balanced that role with an on-camera career, landing guest roles on Fame, Empty Nest, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air , Cheers, Godzilla and The Twilight Zone: The Movie. Cartwright is the author of My Life as a Ten-Year-Old Boy, the ultimate insider's guide to The Simpsons.
Chris Cherot Filmmaker and actor, Chris Cherot wrote, directed, produced and starred in the critically acclaimed movie, "Hav Plenty".
Judy Chicago Internationally know artist and writer whose work has contributed to the development of a female point of view in art.
Rosa Clemente Rosa Clemente Hip-Hop Activist Hip Hop journalist, activist. As a Black Puerto Rican she is dedicated to scholar-activism. It was her experiences at the University of Albany and Cornell University that led her to become a leading progressive voice for her generation. Rosa’s academic work has been dedicated to researching national liberation struggles inside the United States, with a specific focus on the Young Lords Party and the Black Liberation Army. Rosa has written for Clamor Magazine, The Ave. magazine, The Black World Today, The Final Call and numerous websites. She has been the subject of articles in the Village Voice, The New York Times, Urban Latino, and The Source magazines. She has appeared on CNN, C-Span, Democracy Now and Street Soldiers. In 2001 she was a youth representative at the United Nations World Conference against Xenophobia, Racism and Related Intolerance in South Africa and in 2002 was named by Red Eye Magazine as one of the top 50 Hip Hop Activists to look out for. In 2003 Rosa helped formed and coordinate of the National Hip Hop Political Convention that drew over 3000 activists brought together to create a national political agenda for the Hip Hop generation. Currently she is a radio host and producer with WBAI’s (99.5 FM/NYC), an organizer with the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, a Malcolm X Fellow with the Institute of the Black World, coordinator of the State of the Black world forums and the national spokesperson for the R.E.A.C.H. Hip Hop Coalition. She is a board member for the NYC based Brecht forum and is committees In 1995 she developed Know Thy Self Media Messengers, seeing a need for young people, particularly young people of color to be heard and taken seriously she began presenting workshops and lectures at colleges, universities, high schools, and prisons. In the past ten years she has presented at over 200 colleges, conferences and community centers on topics such as; African-American and Latino/a Intercultural Relations, Hip-Hop Activism, The History of the Young Lords Party, and Women, Feminism and Hip Hop. KTSP now includes an expanded college speakers bureau which has produced three major Hip Hop activism tours, Dare to Struggle, Dare to Win with M1 of dead prez and Fred Hampton Jr.; The ACLU College Freedom Tour with dead prez, DJ Kuttin Kandi, Mystic and comedian Dave Chapelle; and the Speak Truth to Power Tour a collaborative tour of award winning youth activists. Beginning August 14th 2006, she will become a contributor to Air Americas, On The Real, hosted by Chuck D and Gia Gareal.Currently she is a producer with WBAI’s (99.5 FM/NYC), an organizer with the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, spokesperson for the National Hip Hop Assembly.
Patrick Combs Patrick Combs tells the amazing-but-true story of how he deposited a $95,093.35 junk-mail check marked non-negotiable hoping to spread a little banking cheer to tellers and how it erupted into a staggering and funny David vs Goliath-like adventure that still continues today if you count his internationally touring, award winning, off Broadway one-man show about the incident. What happens after the bank cashes the ridiculous check? To name only a few things: angry banking officers threatening jail time and death; the nations leading authority on banking coming out of retirement; astonishing legal twists; and worldwide media coverage (including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Good Morning America and calls from Letterman & Leno).The show sold out in New York during its off-Broadway run at the Lambs Theatre in the heart of Times Square. It also sold out at HBOs 2004 U.S. Comedy Arts Festival held in Aspen; sold out its six show run and garnered Critics Choice at the Spoleto Festival in Charleston; sold out its 10 show run in Winnipeg where it created 3 hour ticket lines, hundreds were turned away and it garnered the Best of Fest award; sold out the Comedy Central Stage in Los Angeles; won Best of Fest at the San Francisco Fringe where it also sold out and was awarded Best Solo Comedy; sold out in Auckland where it was an official selection of the New Zealand International Comedy Festival; sold out in Montreal and won the Just For Laughs prize for Best Comedy.
Billy Currington Although success has carried country singer/songwriter Billy Currington far away from his beloved hometown of Rincon, Georgia, he remains the same simple man who was indelibly shaped by his upbringing in this small Southern town with a population of 4,376. Currington burst onto the music scene in 2003 with his eponymous debut CD, which contained the powerful Top 10 hit “Walk a Little Straighter” and the fun Top 5 smash “I Got a Feelin’,” which was accompanied by the memorable video co-starring Baywatch beauty Gena Lee Nolin. When superstar Shania Twain heard Currington’s soulful Southern voice, she knew she had found the perfect partner for the country duet “Party for Two,” so Currington excitedly boarded a plane for Europe to work in the studio with Twain and legendary producer Robert “Mutt” Lange. Currington and Twain performed the song live on the 2004 Country Music Association Awards and a special Good Morning America show from Nashville. His musical success brought national media attention, including People magazine and USA Today, which named Currington an “On the Verge” artist. Soon the media began celebrating the bachelor’s other attributes as well: Playgirl magazine featured a (clothed) Currington on its March 2005 cover and Nashville Lifestyles magazine named him one of its “25 Most Beautiful People.”
Philippe deMontebello Distinguished director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Kate Dillon Plus-size model Kate Dillon talks about body acceptance and the necessity of having self-esteem- no matter what your size. Named one of People magazine's "50 Most Beautiful People," she is also the founder of Echo, a nonprofit organization that develops programs in the arts for children. Kate Dillon started modeling and walking the Paris runways at age 16, landing such major campaigns as L'Oreal, Christian Dior and Missoni. Pegged to be the "New Cindy Crawford," she was, however, anorexic and run-down from years of starving herself. Finally, she began eating normally and gaining weight- against the advice of clients and her manager, who wanted her 5'11" figure to stay a bony size six. At first, she tried to lose the pounds again, but then had a revelation that she was free to look however she wanted and did not have to conform to the modeling business' standard of beauty. Now a natural, healthy size 14, Dillon is taking the full-figure market by storm and not limiting beauty to what the scale says. One of People magazine's "50 Most Beautiful People," she was named the 1998 "Model of the Year" by Mode magazine and has been featured on a Times Square billboard. Called the "Curvy Comeback Kid" by Glamour magazine, she has appeared on several television spots, including The Maureen Boyle Show and Today, and has graced ads for Liz Claiborne, Gucci and Lane Bryant. Dillon is also the founder of Echo, a nonprofit organization benefiting arts programs for children. "We don't have enough role models who used to be skinny but gained weight and said, 'That's okay.' We're all different; we all have different bodies - so let's stop trying to make them all alike." -Kate Dillon
Roger Ebert Emmy Award and Pulitzer Prize winning film critic for the Chicago Sun Times and co-host of the nationally syndicated program, "Ebert and Roeper at The Movies."
Hector Elizondo Veteran Hispanic actor known for films like "Pretty Woman," and the television series "Chicago Hope."
Eric Estrada Popular Hispanic actor who starred for many years on the hit television series "Chips."
Morgan Freeman Morgan Freeman earned his first Academy Award nomination for his chilling performance as a homicidal pimp in the drama Street Smart, which also brought him the LA, N.Y., and National Society of Film Critics Awards for best supporting actor of 1987, as well as an Independent Spirit Award and a Golden Globe nomination. The part of the pimp, Fast Black, was a far cry from his big screen debut as the genial character Afro in his film debut, the 1971 childrens adventure Who Says I Cant Ride a Rainbow, and it signaled the film world that one of its most versatile stars was on the rise. The 16 year span between those titles saw Freeman range from Shakespeare to an undercover policeman in Eyewitness. The next two decades would see him become one of Hollywoods true luminaries. Freeman earned his second Oscar nomination in 1989, this time as Best Actor, recreating his award-winning Broadway role in Driving Miss Daisy. He garnered his third Academy Award nomination playing opposite Tim Robbins in the critically praised 1994 hit The Shawshank Redemption. His fourth nomination for Clint Eastwoods Million Dollar Baby won him the Best Supporting Actor Oscar in 2005. The Memphis-born actor began his career on New York stages in the early 1960s, following a stint as a mechanic in the Air Force. A decade later, he became a nationally known television personality when he created the popular character Easy Reader on the popular childrens show, The Electric Company. Throughout the 1970s, he continued his work on stage, winning the Drama Desk Award, the Clarence Derwent Award and receiving a Tony Award Nomination for his outstanding performance in The Mighty Gents in 1978. He also won an Obie Award for his portrayal of Shakespearean anti-hero, Coriolanus, at the New York Shakespeare Festival. In 1984, Morgan won another Obie for his role as The Messenger in the acclaimed Brooklyn Academy of Music production of Lee Breuer's Gospel at Colonus. In 1985, he was winner of the Dramalogue Award for the same role. The part of Hoke Coleburn in Alfred Uhrys Pulitzer Prize-winning play, Driving Miss Daisy brought him his third Obie Award. His last stage appearance was as Petruchio in The Taming of the Shrew at the New York Shakespeare Festivals Delacorte Theater with Tracey Ullman. In 1993, Freeman made his film directorial debut with Bopha!, starring Danny Glover and Alfre Woodard, and soon after formed Revelations Entertainment, a production company developing entertainment product in all existing and emerging media that enlightens, inspires and glorifies the human experience. Their most recent production was the Brad Silberling comedy 10 Items or Less, in which Freeman starred with Paz Vega. His other early film acting credits include Brubaker, Harry & Sons, Teachers, Marie; That Was Then, This Is Now, Clean & Sober, Johnny Handsome, the multiple award-winning Glory, Chain Reaction, the Steven Spielberg production, Amistad, Hard Rain, Deep Impact, Nurse Betty, Along Came a Spider, Kiss the Girls, High Crimes, The Sum of All Fears and Warner Bros Dreamcatcher and The Big Bounce. Other recent films include Luc Bessons Unleashed, Robert Redfords An Unfinished Life, Batman Begins and narration on the Academy Award-winning documentary March of The Penguins. He also recently starred in Lucky Number Slevin, with Bruce Willis and Josh Hartnett and will soon be seen in the comedy sequel Evan Almighty, Ben Afflecks Gone Baby Gone, Robert Bentons The Feast of Love and the next chapter in the Batman saga The Dark Knight.
Ernest Gaines Gaines was born in Louisiana in 1933 but moved to California when he was 15 because he had no access to high school in the segregated South. He entered a public library for the first time when he was 16 and ultimately decided to become a writer. A graduate of San Francisco State College, he has been writer-in-residence at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette since 1983. In addition to A Lesson, his works include The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman (1971) and A Gathering of Old Men (1984), both of which were adapted for television.
Bruce George Co-Founder of the critically acclaimed award winning Russell Simmonss Def Poetry Jam. Bruce is Co-Founder of Def Poetry Jam and visionary, executive producer, writer, poet and activist. He was born and raised in New York City. He has written poetry/prose & articles for over 37 years. His work has been published in major magazines, anthologies, and literary publications. He has written testimonials from the likes of Essence Magazine, Emerge Magazine, Class Magazine, Harlem River Press etc Bruce has won multiple poetry & talent contests. He has won several awards such as a Peabody Award for Russell Simmons Presents, Def Poetry (HBO), a Miky Award for Russell Simmons Presents, Def Poetry Jam (HBO), an Upscale Showcase Award, a Trail Blazer Award etc for his outstanding vision, production, writing and performance. Bruce is the Co-Founder of the critically acclaimed award winning Russell Simmonss Def Poetry Jam. Hes also the Founder/Managing Editor of The Bandana Republic, an Anthology of Poetry & Prose by Gang Members & Their Affiliates. Bruce is the Founder/Executive Producer of a spoken word documentary entitled: Bone Bristle, A Spoken Word Documentary which is in post-production. The film features critically acclaimed writers, poets & spoken word artists. As an activist Bruce has been and currently is associated with major grassroots organizations that fosters and uplifts people in struggle. Bruce has served on numerous panels (Hampton, Harvard, The New School, Fordham University, Medgar Evers, Schomburg Center For Research in Black Culture etc) and judged hundreds of poetry/spoken word competitions.
Marcia Ann Gillespie Marcia Ann Gillespie has been a trailblazer in the publishing world for more than two decades. As former Editor in Chief of Essence, she transformed the then-fledgling publication into one of the fastest-growing women's magazines in the United States. Time magazine named her "One of the Fifty Faces for America's Future." She was voted the March of Dimes' "Outstanding Woman in Publishing" for her efforts in inspiring all humankind to combat hatred and violence. She has written extensively on issues of gender and race. Under Gillespie's leadership, Ms. magazine has attracted increasing numbers of younger women to the magazine's fold. Marcia Ann Gillespie is a trailblazer in the magazine industry, a leader in the women's movement, a champion of gender of racial justice. A provocative writer and thinker, hers has been a consistent eloquent voice affirming the human potential for good, challenging inequality, pushing herself and others to hope, dare and strive for a better world. She has been a driving force behind two of this nation's most important women's magazines, as the editor in chief of Essence from 1971-1980 and most recently as the editor in chief of Ms. from 1993-2001. Named the Editor in Chief of Essence at the age of 26, Gillespie quickly proved her mettle by rapidly transforming the then fledgling publication into one of the fastest growing women's magazines in the United States. During her tenure (1971-1980), Essence became a trusted source of inspiration, information and affirmation for millions of African American women and won a National Magazine Award the industry's most prestigious honor. A vice-president of Essence Communications, Inc. and a member of the board of directors, Gillespie was named "One of the Fifty Faces for America's Future" by Time magazine. Gillespie's association with Ms. magazine dates back to 1980 when she became a contributing editor. She then went on to become a featured columnist and the executive editor of Ms. before being named the top editor in 1993. At Ms. her mission was "moving the discussion of feminism forward" and making the magazine a "welcome table" for a range of voices and views. Under her leadership the magazine reached an ever more diverse readership, attracting increasing numbers of younger women to the fold. In addition to her role as editor in chief, Gillespie was named the President of Liberty Media for Women, a limited liability corporation comprised of women investors that purchased the magazine in November 1998 and successfully relaunched the publication in March 1999. To further secure the publication's future, Gillespie negotiated the magazine's transfer to the Feminist Majority Foundation in December 2000 and officially turned the reins over in February 2001. Gillespie's extensive knowledge about the national and international women's movements, issues of racial and gender justice, the media and business, and her keen interest in history and observations about current events and the changes and challenges confronting the American society, and her deep faith in our ability to rise informs her life and her work. A rousing, eloquent and in-demand public speaker, who brings both wit and wisdom to her talks, Gillespie regularly appears on university and college campuses and as a keynoter at conferences and events in the United States and abroad. In addition to her numerous public appearances, she maintains a thriving consultancy advising corporate and other clients on issues ranging from diversity to communications. An award winning writer, Gillespie has also received a number of awards from professional and civic organizations including the Matrix award from New York Women in Communication, the Mary MacLeod Bethune award from the National Council of Negro Women. Awarded a Doctor of Letters by her alma mater, Lake Forest University, she is also a recipient of the Missouri Honor Medal for Distinguished Service in Journalism, from the University of Missouri School of Journalism. Gillespie also serves as a member of the board of directors of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, the Arthur Ashe Institute for Urban Health, the Violence Policy Center and the Global Fund for Women.
Jonathan Greenstein A dapper gentleman of 41, Jonathan Greenstein is proprietor of J. Greenstein & Co. of Brooklyn, which he describes as the only auction house completely devoted to Jewish ritual objects in America. Recently, Greenstein brought his Jewish version of the popular Antiques Roadshow television program to Toronto. He was the main attraction at the event, which wasnt filmed for TV and which included several other appraisers. Sitting earlier this month at the front of an audience of about 100 at Torontos Beth Tzedec Synagogue, Greenstein rapidly and entertainingly pronounces judgement on the parade of mostly ritual and some cultural objects brought his way. Most are kiddush cups, candlesticks, menorahs, matzah covers and other items commonly found in Jewish homes in centuries past as well as today.
Mel Gussow Drama and film critic for The New York Times.
Jon Haggins Motivational speaker who inspires people to get up and go, that anything is possible. My background includes fashion, travel, interior and food. I have been featured in and have written for numerous publications. I have also been a spokesperson for Procter and Gamble's Ultra Detergents. The Museum of the City of New York is presently exhibiting a retrospective of my fashion designs. And the Schomburg Library has acquired my fashion archive of photographs and editorials. I am the producer and host of GlobeTrotter Jon Haggins TV; a half-hour weekly travel show that's available in 2 million Time Warner subscriber homes in New York City and streamed over the Internet. In addition, I have contributed travel segments to NPR Radio. NPR has a listening audience of 25 million. GlobeTrotter Jon Haggins TV is a fun, informative and entertaining program that features destinations, foodies and guests from around the world. The main goal is to expand our audience horizon beyond their couch and allow them to discover many dreamy far away places where they can reach for the stars. I have written The African American Travel Guide, which is an informative book, that offers advise on where to get a passport, where to exchange money, security precautions, bartering in the markets and what to pack etc. I also share narratives of my travel experiences. In addition to my book, I have contributed short stories to Eric Copage's -Soul Food Book. I was an invited speaker at the Smithsonian Museum in DC and have appeared on numerous radio and TV shows such as: CNN-Daybreak, Joan Hamburg-WOR Radio, Sunday Classics with Hal Jackson WBLS Radio, Sean Cort-Breakfast Cort and the Bob Law show on WWRL Radio, Geraldo, Regis & Kathie Lee, Saturday Morning Tribune, Midday Live, Evening Magazine and The McCreary Report, just to name a few. And let me not forget that I was a voice for FOX-TV's public service announcement, "It's Ten PM. Do you know where your children are?" My fashions have graced seven Cosmopolitan Magazine covers and eighty-five inside pages. They have also appeared in Harper's Bazaar, Vogue, Essence, New York Magazine, Town and Country, New York Times etc. Celebrities such as Diana Ross, Helen Gurley Brown, Sheryl Lee Ralph, Debbie Allen, Felicia Rashad, Racquel Welch, Diahann Carroll, Lynn Redgrave have worn my fashions. Cornel University honored me with a month long exhibition of my designs in the Johnson Museum. I have also designed costumes for several Off-Broadway shows and several Soap Operas and TV shows, such as: The Debbie Allen Special, As the World turns, One Life to Live, Love boat, Star Search and Good Day-New York. And special projects for Clairol, Matrix, Estee Lauder, Revlon, Seagram, Procter & Gamble and Chesebrough Ponds.
Leslie Harris One of today's youngest and hottest filmmakers, Leslie Harris made her directorial debut with the critically acclaimed movie, "Just Another Girl on the IRT."
Kitty Carlisle Hart Actress, civic leader and chairwoman of the New York State Council on the Arts.
Shirley Horn World renowned jazz pianist and vocalist in a concert with her trio.
Thomas Hoving The director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City from 1969 to 1977 and one of the American art scene's most flamboyant figures. Thomas Hoving is the author of Making the Mummies Dance, a chronicle of his years at the Met; Tutankhamen: The Untold Story; King of the Confessors; and False Impressions: The Hunt for Big-Time Art Fakes.
Black Ice Black Ice was born Lamar Manson in Philadelphia, where he began perfecting his craft on the streets of North Philly. Russell Simmons discovered Black Ice at New York's Soul the pitch for HBO's Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry. The meeting led to Black Ice being the first spoken-word artist signed to Simmons' Def Jam Records. Performing spoken word since 1994, Black Ice has received standing ovations from audiences as diverse as those at the Hip-Hop Summit, the Black Congressional Caucus, the Source Youth Foundation and SHiNE. Black Ice's focus is in the sharing of messages that help nurture and build character among our young people. Black Ice was a cast member of the critically acclaimed, Tony Award-winning show Def Poetry Jam on Broadway which traveled as far as Scotland for the 2003 Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and he has appeared on all three seasons Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry on HBO.
Eugene Jarecki Eugene Jarecki is an award winning dramatic and documentary filmmaker and visiting senior fellow at Brown Universitys Watson Institute. After training at Princeton as a stage director, Jarecki turned to film in 1992, and his first short film, Season of the Litterbees, premiered at the 1993 Sundance Film Festival before winning both a Student Academy Award and the Time Warner Grand Prize at the Aspen Film Festival. His most recent film, Why We Fight, won the 2005 Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival. He also directed the award-winning film The Trials of Henry Kissinger, 2001s dramatic feature The Opponent, and Quest of the Carib Canoe. His experience behind the camera and tackling challenging topics makes Jarecki an exciting keynote speaker. In 2008, Eugene Jarecki released, The American Way of War: Guided Missiles, Misguided Men, and a Republic in Peril. The book reveals America at a crossroads, and focuses on what can be done to get the country back on track. Examining American military might, it is a unique appraisal of the balance of power in American democracy and what can be done to preserve our goverment as a beacon of hope around the world.
Shirley Jones Oscar winning actress presents a motivational and entertaining program.
Karl Kani Leading African-American fashion designer who is known as the originator of urban fashion in America, Karl Kani has quickly became on e of the most respected and renowned leaders in the fashion industry today. As a designer innovator, entrepreneur and educator, founder of Karl Kani Infinity, he has built an empire that 12 years later has quadrupled in size. In 2001, Kani founded his own record label called Kani Life. Karl has also pioneered an entrepreneurial program that educates children and teaches them how to run their own business.
Aviva Kempner Respected filmaker, director and producer of such award-winning documentaries as The Life & Times of Hank Greenberg and Partisons of Vilna, a feature-length, documentary film on Jewish resistance against the Nazis.
Margot Kidder Once the glamorous co-star of "Superman," Margot Kidder has been to hell and back! Suffering from an automobile accident, unable to walk and in constant pain, she turned to alcohol and pills, leading to manic depression, a disease that affects over two million Americans. Margot Kidder hit bottom when on the streets of Los Angeles she was found wandering by the police. Ms. Kidder speaks of her recovery. She delivers an inspirational and moving message for the millions of Americans who suffer from this illness.
Carol Lawrence Popular actress, singer and dancer who is best known for her role in “West Side Story,” Ms. Lawrence has helped raise millions of dollars to eradicate world hunger.
Spike Lee Spike Lee is one of the world's most talked-about film-makers. Inflammatory rabble-rouser or cinematic visionary? Opinions vary wildly on this film-maker who has been completely unafraid of chronicling modern-day America. Over the past fifteen years, only Oliver Stone has matched Spike Lee's politically explosive cinema, and controversy is never far away when a Lee film is released.Spike Lee made a name for himself in 1986 with the hit independent film She's Gotta Have It, a frank comedy about the many lovers of an independent Brooklyn woman. The film established Lee's as a rising young black filmmaker, a rarity at the time, and his skills and independence, along with his outspoken African-American perspective and feisty public persona, kept him in the public eye throughout the 1980s and 1990s. In later films he continued to tell stories with racial themes and New York settings, including the Brooklyn drama Do the Right Thing (1989), the jazz-tinged Mo' Better Blues (1990, with Denzel Washington and Wesley Snipes), the interracial romance Jungle Fever (1993, with Snipes and Anabella Sciorra), the biopic Malcolm X (1992, starring Washington and based in part on the book by Malcolm X and Alex Haley), Summer of Sam (1999, with John Leguizamo) and controversial racial satire Bamboozled (2000). His most recent films are The 25th Hour, starring Ed Norton (2002), and She Hate Me (2004).
Ang Lee Award winning filmmaker who is best known for his films, "The Wedding Banquet"; "Eat Drink Man Woman," "Sense and Sensibility" and "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon."
Christopher Lehmann-Haupt Senior Book Reviewer for The New York Times. Christopher Lehmann-Haupt has written over 3,000 book reviews and articles, on every subject from trout fishing to Persian archaeology. He is the author of Me and DiMaggio: A Baseball Fan Goes in Search of His Gods; and A Crooked Man. A charming and engaging speaker, Mr. Lehmann-Haupt talks about books, literacy and “How to Read 5,000 Books a Year.
Ananda Lewis Award-Winning Host of “The Ananda Lewis Show” A combination of deep compassion, true intelligence, striking beauty and a big mouth has helped award winning television host Ananda Lewis reach new heights. Her talents have garnered a wealth of achievements, yet she has only just begun! Ananda, Sanskrit for "bliss", has been touching lives on and off screen since the age of 13. The San Diego, California native was a Head Start volunteer while a student at the San Diego School of Creative and Performing Arts. For nine years (4th through 12th grades) Ananda studied theater, vocal music, photography, and dance at the prestigious school that she credits with giving her the ability to maintain a free spirit and cultivate her confidence. "The teachers I had at SDSCPA and the supportive, nurturing environment of the campus in general are probably the #1 reason I am seeing success now," she says. After graduating from high school, Ananda left San Diego to attend Howard University in Washington, D.C. For three seasons Ananda served as Host of BET’s Teen Summit, one of the station’s top rated shows which reached 42 million household’s LIVE each week. Her gift for affecting the lives of young people beamed out at us through the screen and her natural and obviously genuine relationship with co-host DaJour, had a lot of us thinking they were siblings. "Everybody would ask if Dajour, was my brother. I guess in a way he was - through talking about our lives, families and how to improve ourselves and our show." The teamwork obviously served them well. Teen Summit’s "It Takes a Village" show earned them a 1997 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Youth Series in large part because of Ananda’s interview with Hillary Rodham-Clinton. Teen Summit was also nominated for 1996 Cable Ace Award for its special on "homeless teens". During the summer of 1997, Ananda faced another life-changing decision when an opportunity at another television network arose. MTV had come knocking and Ananda was not sure about opening the door. "Up until that time I had been doing a show that meant great deal to not only me, but our viewers and the continued progress and healing of everyone it touched. I knew that I would not readily have access to doing a show like this again for a very long time and I had a real problem with that. For years it had been clear to me that I came to this planet to impact people’s lives, change things and help people heal by increasing their personal power and rejecting the lies we’ve all been taught since birth about ourselves and our potential. Yet I understood that in order to do that effectively, I would need the attention of the masses, not just my own people. I saw MTV not only as access to the masses, but also as an opportunity to be more of the woman I am and cultivate my ability to have fun, my social skills and whatever else the Creator had in store for me with this new opportunity."
John Lithgow John Lithgow is a two time Tony Award winner and was most recently nominated for his starring performance in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. Previous credits on Broadway include: Mrs. Farnsworth, The Retreat From Moscow and Sweet Smell of Success. TV credits include 3rd Rock from the which he received three Emmys, a Golden Globe, an American Comedy Award and two SAG Awards - Twilight Zone (Emmy Award) and Don Quixote (SAG Award nomination). Mr. Lithgow's films include The World According to Garp (Academy Award nomination), Terms of Endearment (Academy Award nomination), Shrek, Cliffhanger, The Pelican Brief, Memphis Belle, Footloose, Raising Cain, OrangeCounty, Ricochet and A Civil Action. Recent releases include a starring role in the feature film Kinsey and a HBO tele-film, The Life and Death of Peter Sellers, in which he portrays Blake Edwards (November 2004). Lithgow is also the New York Times best-selling author of Carnival of the Animals, I'm a Manatee, Micawber, Marsupial Sue, Marsupial Sue Presents: The Runaway Pancake and The Remarkable Farkle McBride. He has performed in numerous concerts for children across the country - including four appearances at Carnegie Hall and shows with the Chicago, San Diego, Baltimore, Pittsburgh and Detroit Symphony Orchestras, the New York Pops Orchestra and the Orchestra of Saint Luke's - as well as with New York City Ballet in Carnival of the Animals. Lithgow has also recorded two CDs, Farkle & Friends and Singin' in the Bathtub. His first non-fiction book, A Lithgow Palooza!: 101 Ways to Entertain and Inspire Your Kids, was released in April 2004, and has received the Parents' Choice Silver Honor Award. Five sequel books, Lithgow Party Paloozas! 52 Unexpected Ways to Make a Birthday, Holiday, or Any Day a Celebration for Kids, Lithgow Paloozas! Boredom Blasters: Rainy Day Edition, Halloween Edition, Sick Day Edition and Travel Edition are currently in bookstores.
Frederick Marx Award winning filmmaker and director of the award winning documentary, “Hoop Dreams.”
Michael Medved Well known film critic.
Michael Moore Michael Moore, director of the controversial films "Bowling for Columbine" and "Fahrenheit 9/11" and New York Times best-selling author of "Dude, Where's My Country?"
Joan Morgan Joan Morgan is an award-winning journalist and author and a provocative cultural critic.Journalist and executive editor for Essence magazine A self-confessed hip-hop junkie, she began her professional writing career freelancing for The Village Voice before having her work published by Vibe, Madison, Interview, MS, More, Spin, and numerous others. Formerly the Executive Editor of Essence, she is the author of When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost, a fresh, witty, and irreverent novel that marks the literary debut of one of the most original, perceptive, and engaging young social commentators in America today. Her work appears in numerous college texts, as well as books on feminism, music and African-American culture.
Toni Morrison Morrison is one of the most prominent authors in world literature. Her eight major novels (The Bluest Eye, Sula, Song of Solomon, Tar Baby, Beloved, Jazz, Paradise and Love) have received extensive critical acclaim. She won the National Book Critics Award in 1978 for Song of Solomon and the 1988 Pulitzer Prize for Beloved. In 1993, Morrison was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. Since 1989, Morrison has been Robert F. Goheen Professor in the Council of the Humanities at Princeton University. She holds degrees from Howard University and Cornell University, and has also taught at Yale University, Bard College and Rutgers University. Morrison has been awarded honorary degrees from numerous institutions, including Harvard University, the University of Pennsylvania, Oberlin College and Columbia University. Morrison, who was a senior editor at Random House for twenty years, co-authored the children's books Who's Got Game? The Lion or the Mouse?, Who's Got Game? The Ant or the Grasshopper?, The Book of Mean People and The Big Box. Her books of essays include Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination; the edited collection Race-ing Justice, En-Gendering Power: Essays on Anita Hill, Clarence Thomas, and the construction of Social Reality; and the co-edited collection Birth of a Nation'hood: Gaze, Script, and Spectacle in the O.J. Simpson Case. Additional awards she has received include the 2000 National Humanities Medal; the 2000 Library of Congress Bicentennial Living Legend award; the 1996 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters; the 1994 Condorcet Medal, Paris; the 1989 Modern Language Association of America Commonwealth Award in Literature; the 1988 Anisfield Wolf Book Award in Race Relations; and the 1978 Distinguished Writer Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Morrison is a founding member of the Academie Universelle Des Culture, a trustee of the New York Public Library, a member of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She served on the National Council of the Arts for six years, and is a member of the Africa Watch and Helsinki Watch Committees on Human Rights.
Stanley Nelson An award-winning filmmaker, Stanley Nelson is a producer, director, and writer of documentary films and videos such as Pan African Film Festival winning "Marcus Garvey: Look For Me in the Whirlwind". His PBS productions include "The Black Press: Soldiers Without Swords", a history of African American newspapers; "Shattering the Silences", the growing presence of and challenges to minority faculty in higher education; "Methadone: Curse or Cure", methadone's maintenance program for the treatment of heroin addiction.
Ehud Olmert Former mayor of Jerusalem and for many years a member of the Israeli Knesset
Harvey Pekar Harvey Pekar Creator of the Comic Book Series American Splendor American Splendor - A Day in the Life of Harvey Pekar Before there was reality television and Jerry Seinfeld, there was Harvey Pekar. And Harvey Pekar knows that ordinary life is pretty complex stuff. For over 30 years, his autobiographical comic book series “American Splendor” has elevated day-to-day existence into art. Now the HBO Films/Fine Line Feature film about his life, American Splendor, has won the Sundance International Film Festival Grand Jury Prize, Cannes International Film Festival Fipresci Award, and the National Society of Film Critic's Best Picture Award and brings Pekar to the masses, solidifying his place as a counter-culture hero. At the podium, he is mundane yet poetic, honest and profound and shares his unique views in a not-to-be-missed multi-media presentation. The inauspicious ascent of Pekar began in the halls of the VA Hospital in Cleveland, Ohio, where he worked full-time as a file clerk from 1966 to 2001. In his spare time, beginning in 1972, Pekar has written and self-published the comic book series “American Splendor,” while his friends—icons in their own right including R Crumb, Frank Stack and Joe Stacco—illustrate his self-professed “rants.” “American Splendor’s” first-person account of Pekar’s down-trodden life ranges from the sublime—like chatting with co-workers, going to the market and taking road trips—to the profound, including adopting a daughter and his 1990 brush with cancer. From a stint as a David Letterman recurring guest to a prolific career as a jazz music and book critic, Pekar’s storied existence is always interesting—even when it’s just about eating a piece of fresh-baked bread. Now, don’t just read about Harvey Pekar in “American Splendor”—get up close and personal with the man, the myth and the master of the mundane when he lectures at your venue.
Def Poetry The acclaimed late-night series RUSSELL SIMMONS PRESENTS DEF POETRY COMES TO YOUR SCHOOL. The audacious, uncensored late-night series Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry returns to HBO with a fifth season. This year the seminal spoken word series presents seasoned and up-and-coming poets performing their work onstage before a live audience, interspersed with a big-ticket lineup of celebrities also trying their hand at poetry.Praised by the New York Times as an "exuberant, daringly fresh series that breaks poetry out of the neat little boxes it's so often put it," Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry features a spectrum of voices.
Robert Redford Internationally acclaimed movie star and director.
Mike Reiss Mike Reiss has won four Emmy Awards for his work on The Simpsons, the wacky animated series that has kept America laughing for more than a decade and earned Time magazine's vote as "the greatest TV show of the twentieth century." During his eleven seasons on the show, Reiss penned a dozen scripts and produced over 200 episodes. His other television credits include The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, Alf, Eddie Murphy's The PJ's and It's Garry Shandling's Show, where he earned an ACE award for writing and producing. Reiss is also the co-creator of The Critic, an animated series starring Jon Lovitz as a lovable movie critic. The well-reviewed series has been running on Comedy Central for five years. Reiss also created Queer Duck, the animated adventures of a gay duck. An Internet hit with rave reviews in the U.S. and Europe, the series recently made the jump to the Showtime network. Culled from more than two decades of creating the funniest and most outrageous shows on television, Reiss' presentation is a unique glimpse inside the cutting edge of entertainment, including rare video clips from The Simpsons and The Critic. He takes audiences inside the lives of Springfield's first family, revealing how The Simpsons was almost cancelled before it hit the air, secret trivia of the show, insane dealings with network censors, and lots of juicy gossip about celebrity guest stars. Reiss also delves into the current state of television programming, describing with his characteristic wit why TV is so rotten and what steps need to be taken to bring the medium back to life. A former editor of both The Harvard Lampoon and The National Lampoon, Reiss continues as a consulting producer on The Simpsons. In addition, he is a frequent contributor to Esquire and Games Magazine, and is an award-winning mystery writer. He has published four children's books, including the surprise best seller How Murray Saved Christmas, a Christmas story for Jewish kids. His latest work is Santa Claustrophobia. He has lectured on comedy and animation at more than two dozen colleges, as well as the Smithsonian Institution.
Tara Roberts Hip, young and happening, Tara Roberts is a young African American woman whose personal mission as Lifestyle Editor of Essence magazine is to include the voices, stories and ideas of Black women under 30. Tara's article "Am I The Last Virgin?" was so controversial and generated so much reader feedback that she has compiled and edited a new book entitled,Am I The Last Virgin?: African American Reflections on Sex and Love.
Matthue Roth Matthue Roth is a novelist and performance poet who lives in California. He has filmed for HBO’s Def Poetry Jam and Rock the Vote, performed with Deepak Chopra and Carlos Santana, and completed three national tours with his own brand of poetry that isn’t quite hip-hop and isn’t quite storytelling, and manages to be funny and sweet and brutal and brutally honest. He has performed at high schools and universities nationwide, including Yale, Harvard, and Brown. His first novel, Never Mind the Goldbergs, will be released in softcover by Scholastic in April 2006, and his second, Yom Kippur a Go-Go, was released by Cleis Press in November 2005. He has also appeared in the National Queer Arts Festival, and in the short film The Waves, by Yael Braha, which was featured in the 2004 Cannes International Film Festival. He’s written and self-published several poetry chapbooks, including Yom Kippur A Go-Go and A Child’s Garden of Gender. He also is a staffwriter for Bitch, Bust, Zero, and the San Francisco Bay Guardian. Matthue has also been featured in the book Quirkyalone and the film Can’t Touch This: Young Orthodox Jews and Sexuality.
Richard Roundtree Popular actor who is best known for his role as John Shaft, private detective and super cop hero in the hit movies "Shaft", "Shaft in Africa" and Shaft's Big Score." He also starred in the 90 minute television series, "Shaft."
Kathe Sandler An independent filmmaker whose documentary film, "A Question of Color," opened to glowing reviews at New York City's Film Forum. "A Question of Color" is a one hour film that explores attitudes about skin color, hair texture and facial features in the African American community.
Mary Schmidt Campbell Former New York City Commissioner of Cultural affairs. Ms. Campbell is the author of the book Harlem Renaissance: Art of Black America. Topic: Cultural Diversity and the Arts.
Gene Shalit A veteran of "The Today Show," Gene Shalit is one of the nation's most respected film critics.
Mike Shiley Mike Shiley, producer/director of Shidog Films is a photographer, filmmaker and freelance journalist. He has recently returned from two months in Iraq, developing exclusive stories for ABC World News Tonight, Nightline and Good Morning America as well as ABC-TV affiliates KATU-Portland, OR, KMGH-Denver, CO and WFTS Tampa/St. Petersburg FL, international humanitarian aid groups and a variety of online news services. His new film is entitled Inside Iraq: The Untold Stories, an 80-minute documentary that highlights the challenges, opportunities and the inside lives of the Iraqi people and the US soldiers stationed in Iraq. Mike traveled extensively throughout Iraq from the Kurdish controlled region in the North, through the infamous Sunni Triangle in central Iraq and to the sacred Shiite controlled cities in the South. He visited impoverished villages with Western medical teams, went on night patrols along the Syrian border in a tank squadron, flew over the country in a Blackhawk helicopter and walked the streets of Baghdad uncovering the lives of the Iraqi people. Mike literally risked his life every day to bring you this film. Mike has also worked as a freelance photographer for CNN covering the war in Sarajevo, trekked to Everest Base Camp in Nepal and completed a 3,000 mile solo bicycle trip from British Columbia, Canada to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. Mike is also an accomplished scuba diver and as a certified Divemaster, he has guided over 250 dives in the Red Sea in Egypt. Mike has produced travel films on Iraq, Nepal, Thailand and Cambodia. He has visited 36 countries and loves meeting people, especially children, from around the world. Mike is 37, single and lives in Portland, Oregon with his dog, Bear.
Joan Micklin Silver Filmmaker best known for “Hester Street” and “Crossing Delancey.”
Kevin Sites Kevin Sites is re-defining journalism for the digital age. As Yahoo!'s first news correspondent, he is spending a year covering every major global conflict for "Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone" on Yahoo! News. One man. One year. A world of conflict. This project is an audacious attempt to bring the very best traditions of battlefield reportage into the 21st century. By combining Sites' remarkable skills as a solo journalist ("SoJo") with Yahoo!'s global reach, 400 million Internet users around the world have instantaneous access to eye-witness reporting of some of our planet's most ferocious and intractable conflicts. The project has generated widespread publicity and discussion, and has cemented Sites' place as one of the rising stars of American journalism. Sites is a highly respected war correspondent. He has spent the past five years covering global war and disaster for several national networks. He is a pioneer of solo journalism, in which he works completely alone, carrying a backpack of portable digital technology to shoot, write, edit, and transmit multimedia reports. In November 2004, as an NBC News correspondent, he filmed and reported on one of the defining moments of the current Iraqi war when he videotaped a U.S. Marine shooting a wounded Iraqi insurgent in a Fallujah mosque. The story turned Sites into a flashpoint of pro- and anti-war controversy, and he was both praised as a journalist willing to reveal the harsh realities of war and vilified as a traitor to both the Marine unit in which he was embedded and to his country. His innovative approach to his work can be seen on his award-winning war blog, www.kevinsites.net. In 2004, Sites was honored with the Payne Award for ethics in journalism for both his television and Web coverage of the mosque shooting. He garnered an Emmy nomination for the same story. Recently, Wired magazine named Sites as the recipient of their RAVE Award—the first ever for blogging. Sites is a former university lecturer who is frequently invited to speak at many national and international media forums, including London's famous "Frontline Club," which supports independent war correspondents. He is also a regular speaker at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, as wells as the Arab American Media Forum, sponsored by Aspen Institute.
Jane Smiley Over her 20-year career, Pulitzer Prize winner Jane Smiley has authored many novels, two of which were made into movies, A Thousand Acres and The Secret Lives of Dentists. However, despite her wildly successful career, her impulse to write faltered in the weeks after 9/11. That is when she approached the medium from the reader’s angle: She read 100 novels, ancient and new, from classics to little-known gems. TALKING POINTS: Smiley discusses the pleasure of reading; why a novel succeeds, or doesn't; and how the form has changed over time. She delves into the character of the novelist, and reveals how her favorites books have affected her own life. Smiley takes us deep into the process of writing, sharing the secrets of her own habits, and her theories of creativity.
Gary Snyder Gary Snyder has worked as a logger, a trail-crew member, and a seaman on a Pacific tanker. Snyder has won numerous literary prizes, including a Guggenheim fellowship and the Pulitzer Prize. Snyder thinks of himself as a "holistic" poet, and blends his interest in the environment, Zen Buddhism and nature into his work. He is often described as the "laureate of deep ecology," and his image has even appeared on a U.S. postage stamp. The "eco-poet" will speak about the evolution of our society and public policy regarding the environment over the last half century. Snyder will also read poetry from his latest collection, Danger on Peaks.
Art Spiegelman Art Spiegelman has almost single-handedly brought comic books out of the toy closet and onto the literature shelves. In 1992 he won the Pulitzer Prize for his masterful Holocaust narrative Maus — which portrayed Jews as mice and Nazis as cats. Maus II continued the remarkable story of his parents’ survival of the Nazi regime and their lives later in America. His comics are best known for their shifting graphic styles, their formal complexity, and controversial content. In his lecture “Comix 101.1" Spiegelman takes his audience on a chronological tour of the evolution of comics, all the while explaining the value of this medium and why it should not be ignored. He believes that in our post-literate culture the importance of the comic is on the rise, for “comics echo the way the brain works." Having rejected his parents aspirations for him to become a dentist, Art Spiegelman studied cartooning in high school and began drawing professionally at age 16. He went on to study art and philosophy at Harpur College before becoming part of the underground comics movement. As creative consultant for Topps Bubble Gum Co. from 1965-1987, Spiegelman designed Wacky Packages, Garbage Pail Kids and other novelty items, and taught history and aesthetics of comics at the School for Visual Arts in New York from 1979-1986. In 1980, Spiegelman founded RAW, the acclaimed avant-garde comics magazine, with his wife, Françoise Mouly. They've more recently co-edited Little Lit, a series of three comics anthologies for children published by HarperCollins ("Comics-They're not just for Grown-ups Anymore"). In 1997 Spiegelman created a picture book for young children called Open Me… I’m A Dog with the same publisher. His work has been published in many periodicals, including The New Yorker, where he was a staff artist and writer from 1993-2003. A collection of his New Yorker work is soon to be published by Pantheon, who also published his illustrated version of the 1928 lost classic, The Wild Party, by Joseph Moncure March. In 2004 he completed a two-year cycle of broadsheet-sized color comics pages, In the Shadow of No Towers, first published in a number of European newspapers and magazines including Die Zeit and The London Review of Books. A book version of these highly political works was published by Pantheon in the United States, appeared on many national bestseller lists, and was selected by The New York Times Book Review as one of the 100 Notable Books of 2004. Spiegelman is working on a comix format memoir, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Nerd, which will incorporate a reprinting of his most significant underground comix work, as well as a forthcoming anniversary edition of Maus, entitled Meta Maus.A major exhibition of his work has been arranged by Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art, as part of the "15 Masters of 20th Century Comics" exhibit (November 2005). In his spare time he's working on the libretto and the sets for a music-theater piece about the rise and fall of comic books entitled “Drawn to Death: A Three Panel Opera" with composer Phillip Johnston, to be produced with The Improbable Theater company in 2007. In 2005, Art Spiegelman was made a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in France.
Akuyoe... Spirit Awakening Akuyoe presents her critically acclaimed one-woman play, "Spirit Awakening" with poetry, monologues and music. In the play, Akuyoe assumes multiple roles representing different perspectives in her life decisions which begins in Africa and concludes in America. It is a search for roots that go far deeper than ancestry. "Spirit Awakening" is Akuyoe's archetypal journey in search for self. Akuyoe can now be seen co-starring in the hit movie, American Pie.
Oliver Stone After serving in Vietnam, Stone returned to the US in 1968, and attended film school at New York University, where he was tutored by Martin Scorsese.After graduating, he directed a short student film entitled 'Last Year in Vietnam', and worked as a New York taxi driver.He first gained acclaim as a writer, when he won an Oscar, a Writers Guild Award and a Golden Globe for his screenplay, 'Midnight Express'. This movie earned him a shot at directing a major studio movie - 'The Hand'. However, its failure gave him a temporary career setback. Oliver concentrated on screenwriting for a while, with 'Conan the Barbarian', 'Scarface', and 'Year of the Dragon'. He then directed the low budget political drama, 'Salvador', which brought an Oscar-nomination for co-writing the screenplay. He received an Oscar for 'Platoon', and returned to the subject of Vietnam, to win a Best Director Oscar for 'Born on the Fourth of July'.Perhaps Stone's most ambitious and controversial work was 'JFK', a dramatization of the attempts by Jim Garrison (Kevin Costner) to uncover a conspiracy behind the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. It earned Oliver Oscar nominations as Best Director and co-writer of the screenplay. That same year, he appeared as himself in the political comedy, 'Dave', and had his first TV credit as executive producer, with the sci-fi miniseries, 'Wild Palms'. Stone then made a sharp turn a year later, with his next project, the dark comedy, 'Natural Born Killers'.Two years later, Oliver returned to politics and history, with his controversial study of US President Nixon, with Anthony Hopkins in lead, then he directed, produced, and wrote the football-themed drama, 'Any Given Sunday'.
Allan Tannenbaum Allan Tannenbaum's first real break into the photography business was a five-dollar assignment for the Soho News, a downtown New York City weekly. At the time, Tannenbaum was one year shy of a personal deadline: find a steady job or quit the profession. Until that day in 1974, the self-taught photographer had done freelance work in San Francisco, taught photography and filmmaking at Rutgers University in New Jersey and schlepped around the city with a portfolio, trying (in vain) to pick up assignments from major news magazines. While the Soho News weekly $40 salary was hardly enough to live on, the paper did provide Tannenbaum with the legitimacy and training he needed. "Initially I was very shy," says Tannenbaum. "At the Soho News I learned how to be better at telling people how to pose, at getting into places and pushing and shoving if necessary." In his post-Soho years, Tannenbaum has focused on international news. Here he is covering Desert Storm. Tannenbaum quickly made a name for himself with his shots of New York night life, celebrities, and political events. He earned the respect of prominent New Yorkers and eventually landed an exclusive photo session with John Lennon and Yoko Ono, one week before the Beatle was killed. Those photos drew world-wide attention for Tannenbaum, who, according to an early agreement with the Soho News, maintained complete copyright on all his photos. Despite the low pay and his dwindling interest in covering the decadent New York scene, Tannenbaum stuck with the weekly until it closed in March 1982. He then signed up with the photo agency Sygma and pursued his true passion -- international news photography. He traveled to South Africa for Nelson Mandela's release from prison, to Colombia in order to document the volcanic disaster that left over 20,000 people dead, to Berlin to cover the reunification of Germany and to the Gulf to shoot the aftermath of the war. His photos of the Arab-Israeli conflict won him First Prize for Spot News from the World Press Association. Despite the excitement and significance of his recent work, Tannenbaum still credits his decade at the Soho News as being a crucial period in his career. He is now working on a book, Soho Blues, about his time with the weekly.
Denise Uyehara Denise Uyehara is an interdisciplinary performance artist/writer/playwright whose work has been presented across the United States (the Walker Art Center, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Highways Performance Space), and internationally (the Institute for Contemporary Art in London, the Kiasma Museum in Helsinki, Dokkyo Performance Studies Conference and the Morishita Studio in Tokyo, the Fourth World Conference on Women, Beijing, Women in View Festival in Vancouver). She was a founding member of the Sacred Naked Nature Girls. Her most recent work, "Big Head", links the U.S. government's incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II with treatment of those perceived as "the enemy" now, including Arab Americans, Muslims, and South Asian Americans. The recipient of numerous awards, Uyehara recently received a fellowship from the Asian Cultural Council, a California Civil Liberties Public Education Program grant, and was a Poets & Writers 'Writer on Site' at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and Beyond Baroque Literary Center. She is a member of the California Arts Council Touring Roster. (see listing below) Uyehara teaches workshops in the community, and has taught performance for the Dept. of World Arts & Cultures at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), and for the Depts. of Asian American Studies and Studio Arts at the University of California, Irvine (UCI). Education: BA in Comparative Literature (UCI) and an MFA from the Dept. of World Arts & Cultures (UCLA). Publications: Maps of City & Body: Shedding Light on the Performance and Process of Denise Uyehara (Kaya Press, 2004). Her work also appears in O Solo Homo, Asian American Drama, Getting Your Solo Act Together, and The Asian Pacific American Journal, and as part of Meiling Cheng’s In Other Los Angeleses: Multicentric Performance Art.
Mario Van Peebles Movie star, director and producer.
Kurt Vonnegut Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. prolific and genre-bending American novelist known for works blending satire, black comedy, and science fiction, such as Slaughterhouse Five (1969), Cat's Cradle (1963), and Breakfast of Champions (1973).
John Wagner Come Academy Award time this year comic readers will have a reason to cross their fingers: A History of Violence, David Cronenberg’s filmic adaptation of the graphic novel. While much of the press’ emphasis will be on the famed director and the stars Viggo Mortensen, William Hurt and Ed Harris, the original source material, written by John Wagner and drawn by Vince Locke mustn’t be forgotten. A History of Violence’s first half adheres very closely to Wagner’s book about a Midwestern man who on the spur of the moment commits a great act of courage which gets him nationwide press. That press, however, alerts some mobsters back east who have been looking for him for many years so they come looking for him. And while Cronenberg and Wagner’s versions of the story may veer away from each other, at the end of the day, A History of Violence is another feather in comics’ collective cap. A month before the film opens; Newsarama had the chance to speak with Wagner. Through the writer hasn’t had a chance to have seen the film yet (“I’ll see it for the first time at the premiere”) Wagner did admit that even with his limited connection to Cronenberg’s version of the story, the experience was “infinitely” better than seeing once of this other co-creations, Judge Dredd, make the leap to the screen in the 1995 film starring Sylvester Stallone. “I had no control at all over what happened with Dredd,” Wagner said. “Of course, once you’ve signed the contract you have no control anyway, but up until that point things were far more satisfactory.” The deal to adapt the film from the 1997 graphic novel published by DC’s now defunct Paradox imprint was made a couple of years ago, Wagner said. “So I suppose they’ve moved pretty quickly in movie terms.” And though he wrote the initial story, Wagner was willing to the let A History of Violence go once the deal was done, eschewing even the chance to write the screenplay. “If I said anything about being a part of it at all, it was more likely to be that I didn’t want to write the screenplay,” Wagner said. “I’d written the book, and I felt that this might cloud my judgment when it came to turning it into a film. A fresh mind wouldn’t be so burdened.”
Cornel West One of Americas most gifted and provocative public intellectuals, Dr. Cornel West's writing, speaking, and teaching weaves together the American traditions of the Black Baptist Church, progressive politics, and jazz. Dr. West graduated from Harvard in three years, magna cum laude, and Martin Kilson, one of Dr. West?s professors, recalls him as the most intellectually aggressive and highly cerebral student I have taught in my 30 years here.? He has published 17 books and edited 13 text. In his major bestseller, Race Matters, philosopher Dr. Cornel West burst onto the national scene with his searing analysis of the scars of racism in American democracy. Race Matters has become a contemporary classic, having sold more than 400,000 copies. Praised by The New York Times for his ?ferocious moral vision,? Dr. West speaks with an utterly distinctive voice about the thorniest social and political issues of our day and bridges the gap between black and white opinion. In Democracy Matters, Dr. West returns to the analysis of the arrested development of democracy?both in America and in the crisis-ridden Middle East. In a strikingly original diagnosis, he argues that if America is to become a better steward of democratization around the world, we must first wake up to the long history of imperialist corruption that has plagued our own democracy. Dr. West is Class of 1943 University Professor at Princeton University. He has held previous positions at Union Theological Seminary, Yale University, Harvard University and the University of Paris. Dr. West was an influential force in developing the storyline for the popular Matrix trilogy. Not only is he the spokesperson for this box-office hit series, Dr. West also had recurring roles in the final two volumes. Speech Topics: *The African American Century: What Next? *Reflections on Hip-Hop: The Role of Black *Music in American Culture *Democracy Matters *Heart of American Darkness *Race Matters