dlevy

Wed, 06 May 2009 17:38:23 GMT

My latest composition to arise from my participation in the Jewish Young Adult Writers' Forum.

When Worlds Collide

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Camp vs. Kitsch

Sun, 16 Nov 2008 04:37:24 GMT

What's better than watching horrendously ill-conceived performances on YouTube? Voting on them!

Ladies and gentlement, I proudly present Camp vs. Kitsch.

Stereophonics Rebooted as Idelsohn Society

Tue, 11 Nov 2008 20:24:14 GMT

I have re-entered the blogosphere, as a contributor to jewschool.com. And what better way to make my splash than with a post that talks about, among other things, the Barry Sisters?

Stereophonics Rebooted as Idelsohn Society

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new, original muppet content!

Fri, 04 Jul 2008 03:47:47 GMT

Earth Day

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 23:27:25 GMT

I'm not sure if it's the zeitgeist or living in Jamaica Plain or reading books like The Omnivore's Dilemma or simply getting older and feeling more responsible, but I'm noticing changes in the way I think about the environment. Or rather, The Environment.

For example, since moving to JP, I've started taking recycling much more seriously. Sure, I have curbside recycling, so it's easy, but I even wash out jars so I can recycle them. And I'm not just talking about things like applesauce that take a minute to wash out. I'm talking peanut butter.

I can't think of the last time I bought a water bottle (although I still drink more canned soda than I should). I have a nalgene on my desk at work and another in my car and I'm doing much better at reducing that kind of waste.

Today I even bought my very first reusable shopping bag. At the Harvest Co-op. Which I had walked to. In order to buy some organic produce.

And now that gas is hovering around $3.50/gallon, I really think I should buy a bike. I've wanted a bike for a while, but I'm nervous about riding in the city. Will I get hit by a car? Will I sweat too much to make it a feasible way to get to work? Can I afford a bike?

If I take it seriously, what I save in gas should pay for the bike in a month or two. And I'm pretty sure there are bike-safety classes in JP. And for heavens' sake, I don't live in Cambridge any more, so there must be safe routes for biking to work. (Is there a mapquest-for-bicycles? That would be excellent.)

So as I ponder this potential purchase, if anyone out there has suggestions about bike-riding and bike-owning in the city, please share your insights. (I already know I need to keep it indoors - one of my neighbors has already had her bike stolen from off our back porch.)

Telling Old Stories Anew

Thu, 20 Mar 2008 01:18:20 GMT

One of the most formative influences on my Jewish identity is, for good and for ill, the years I spent (and continue to spend) involved with USY. In the New England Region, we have a tradition that whenever the region spends Shabbat together, the regional president tells a Jewish story before mincha. Through my years as a USYer, I heard dozens of Jewish folktales. (I have since learned that some of these stories even have authors, and original versions! But at the time, I never connected their tellings and retellings to Peretz and Singer and the rest. Thank goodness for graduate school. But I digress.) As regional president, it fell to me to tell the stories, so I devoured collections of Yiddish tales and Chasidic tales and listened carefully when rabbis and friends told stories that I might adapt. In the years since, there have been many opportunities for me to hear successive generations of USY presidents tell stories, and on more than one occasion the current president has asked me to tell him or her a story in case I might have one that's usable.

One story that seemed to continually resurface in USY went something like this:

There was a town that had a group of holy men, and every year they would go out to the secret, appointed place with their secret, special implements to perform their secret, specific ceremony involving the secret, precise way to light a fire and the changing of a secret and beautiful prayer, and God was happy. As generations passed, the group of holy men dwindled until there was only one holy man left who knew the location of the secret place, the way to make the secret implements, the order of the secret ceremony, the procedure for lighting the secret fire, and the words to the secret prayer. But he faithfully enacted the ceremony every year and God was happy. When he passed away it fell to his son, who could not find the secret place, so ohe took the implements to a new place where performed the secret ceremony, lit the secret fire and chanted the secret poem. And God was happy. When he passed away, his son no longer knew how to make the implements, so... you get the idea. Until we come to today, where there's no one left who even knows whether God is happy or not.

The story is a very effective precautionary tale against assimilation, reinforcing the importance of teaching our traditions to successive generations. But today, the story seems all wrong to me. There's a piece missing. If a generation has lost their way to a holy place, perhaps the holiness of that place did not resonate with them. But instead telling the story that they compromised by doing their ceremony any place, shouldn't we celebrate their ingenuity at finding a new place that holds meaning for them? And instead of despairing that a later generation forgot the poem or the melody or the fire, why not celebrate that generation's yearning to approach God with their own words, with new music, with a different, personal ritual?

In my story, that's exactly what happens. And next time I have the opportunity to share a Jewish story, I know exactly what story I'm going to tell.

Being like Ephraim and Manasseh

Fri, 21 Dec 2007 23:11:57 GMT

This week Jews around the world conclude the reading of the book of Genesis in the annual Torah reading cycle. From this part of the Torah, we receive the tradition of blessing our children in the names of Ephraim and Manasseh. But what does that mean? I explore this topic in an essay for Jewish Mosaic's Torah Queeries, a weekly queer look at the Torah...

Click here to read it...

collecting latkes

Sat, 17 Nov 2007 14:55:22 GMT

I'm collecting recipes for latkes (and variations thereof) to use at the upcoming Keshet 20s/30s Latkes & Liquors party at my house.

So far, I've got Mark Bittman's Beet Roesti with Rosemary from How To Cook Everything, as well as Tex Mex Latkes and Celeriac-Scallion Latkes with Red Pepper Sauce, both from Jim Dixon's Real Good Food (by way of Amy). Plus, I will probably come up with some sort of Sweet Potato Latkes, although I like the frozen ones so much I might just stock up.

Anyway, if you have suggestions of other variations on the theme of latkes, please send them along!

film review in miniature

Sat, 03 Nov 2007 07:49:27 GMT

Today I saw Wristcutters: A Love Story, based on the Etgar Keret novella "Kneller's Happy Campers" (which I first read in its comic-book adaptation as "Pizzeria Kamikaze"). I can't believe the director tacked on a happy ending. To me, this supremely misses the point of the story. Even more than making the characters Americans, which also sort of bothered me. (As the film ended, I felt how I imagine Baum fans felt in 1939 when Judy Garland's Dorothy woke up.)

The movie wasn't bad - and Tom Waits in particular was great - but of the three versions of the story, it's by far my least favorite.

Folk Concert to benefit Keshet Safe Schools & Supportive Communities (Boston)

Thu, 16 Aug 2007 19:01:44 GMT

Hi everyone -

For those of you in the Greater Boston area, Keshet is holding a folk concert to benefit the Safe Scholls & Supportive Communities project, which is the branch of our programming that works with Jewish institutions like synagogues, schools, camps, etc. to help them become more GLBT inclusive.

I don't know much about folk music, but from what I understand, the acts are all top-notch. The concert features Liz Stahler, with P.J. Shapiro, Mark Lipman, and Rebecca Katz.

It's on Thursday evening, August 30, 2007. Doors open at 6:30, concert starts at 7:00 pm, at Ohabei Shalom, 1187 Beacon Street in Brookline.

Tickets are $20 in advance, $25 at the door, $15 for students and low-income. Children under 12 are free. There's also free childcare available for the younger set to those who RSVP by August 22nd (space is limited) to orly@keshetonline.org.

Tickets are available online at KeshetOnline.org or by phone - 617.524.9227.

To sample some of the music:

To sample some of the music, visit:

Liz Stahler: http://www.lizstahler.com/

PJ Shapiro: http://www.pjshapiro.com/

Mark Lipman: http://tinyurl.com/2we2zz

Rebecca Katz: http://tinyurl.com/3afqze

Feel free to distribute the information far and wide, and please come and bring lots of friends! (And if you're curious to learn more about what Keshet's Safe Schools & Supportive Communities project does, or how to bring us to your institution, just ask!)

Happy Purim!

Sun, 04 Mar 2007 14:12:49 GMT

Okay, so maybe I went bowling instead of to a megilla reading last night. But! I started baking hamentashen the minute I got home - just after midnight. I used this recipe (although with canned filling) in an attempt to recreate the yeastily delicious "traditional" hamentashen that I love far better than the more common cookie variety.

However, my dough didn't rise overnight, so I'm a little nervous about what they're going to taste like.

I will hear the megillah this morning, though. One of my friends is hosting a "pyjama reading" (her spelling, not mine) at 10am. Now I just need to make a last-minute gragger.

pardon my phraseology

Sat, 10 Feb 2007 16:37:01 GMT

two words I've now incorporated into my lexicon:

Manfume - perfume for men. So much description in two little syllables.

Shebrew - the more equally gendered language employed by progressive Jews in prayer, particularly at Havurat Shalom in Somerville, MA. (Last night I was complimented by one of thre regulars for my quick mastery of the Shebrew, although she didn't use the word. I guess all those hours of Biblical Hebrew are paying off in some way.)

My life in theatre... or at least my last couple of years

Sun, 15 Oct 2006 15:32:22 GMT

I just realized that since I've been writing for Talkin' Broadway, I've reviewed close to 30 shows. In the interest of being able to track these reviews down for later use, here's a quick reference guide:

Company
Ears on a Beatle
The Value of Names
Big River (and the Wang Center Family Series)
Johnny Guitar
The Sound of Music
john and jen and blue/orange
Homebody/Kabul
The Old Man and the Sea
The Trojan Whore
You Never Know
Into the Woods
Laughin Wild
Frogz
Carmen
Promises, Promises
Brooklyn Boy
Talley's Folly
Boots on the Ground
The Man Who
Caroline, or Change
Once Upon a Mattress
The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told
1776
The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Little Shop of Horrors, and The Women

I'm a winner!

Wed, 20 Sep 2006 02:15:37 GMT

Hey, it looks like I won the first week of the contest over at blankwhitecards. See if you can guess which card in this week's contest is mine. And now that I've actually used an LJ smart tag I think I need to go visit the mikveh.

1kbwc

Fri, 15 Sep 2006 02:52:16 GMT

I know I never ever ever post to lj, but I am submitting stuff for the weekly contest happening in the blankwhitecards community (ha! I don't even know how to do one of those little livejournaly links), so if you're interested in a glimpse into my twisted mind - now with graphics! - go take a peek.

Robin, The Boy Wonder

Sun, 06 Aug 2006 19:29:07 GMT

"Robin wasn't skinny. He had the build of a middleweight, the legs of a wrestler. He was obviously an 'A' student, the center of every circle, the one picked for greatness in the crowd -- God, how I hated him. You can imagine how pleased I was when, years later, I heard he was a fag." - Jules Feiffer

Vote for Judd!

Tue, 22 Feb 2005 14:35:47 GMT

Why am I posting on the livejournal for the first time in four years?

Because my friend Judd Harris is one of the finalists on this season of American Idol.

I've known Judd since 1999. Those of you who knew me then might recall a cross-country trip I took with one Sarah Knight. Certain rumors about my relationship with Sarah drifted back to the coast while we were still making our way across cornfields. We planned on remedying those rumors once school started. But in the two weeks in between our arrival and the start of school, she met Judd and everything changed.

Judd's a terrific singer and a great guy. He's very generous (I always stay on his couch when I visit New York), and a cutie to boot. He loves New Orleans funk - it's in his blood - but I think America will be blown away when he lets loose a ballad or a pop song, since they haven't heard that side of him yet. The man can do anything. And he looks mighty fine in tight pants.

Anyway, voting is over for this week - watch the results show on Wednesday to see what happens. And then next Monday, make sure your dialing finger is ready!

Judd Harris for American Idol!!!

Fri, 21 Dec 2001 03:03:34 GMT

browngirl asked for people to tell her their life stories. Mine wouldn't fit in the comment text box, so here goes:

If the lady asks for a story, she should get at least one story!

Here's mine:

My great-grandparents on all four sides, none of whom I've ever met, all came from the same area of the world that at times has been Poland, Latvia, or Lithuania. That may not be right, I'm not really sure where Latvia is. Also, my maternal grandfather (who liked to be called Papa Harold, so I will never likely call him that again) occasionally claimed that his ancestry was from Chelm, but I could never tell if he was serious. (In terms of derogatory jokes, Chelm:Poland::Poland:America; that is, Polish people tell jokes about how stupid the folks in Chelm are.) At any rate, I come from hearty Eastern European Jewish stock.

At least two sets of my great-grandparents divorced and remarried, which is interesting not only because it provided my Grandma Ida with a good supply of stories about her gambler father and no-good step-father, but also because growing up, my own nuclear family was one of the only families I knew with both parents still married to their original spouse.

My father, Barry Levy, is the youngest of three sons. He grew up in Rhode Island, which is entirely uninteresting. My mother, Lois Elaine (Schneiderman) Levy, is the middle child (surrounded by two brothers). She grew up in Sharon, Massachusetts, which is only slightly more interesting than Rhode Island.

My father has a BA from URI, although I'm not sure in what field (perhaps accounting?), and my mother earned her Associate's degree in Dental Hygiene from Forsythe School of Dentistry on the Northeastern Campus. They met in the late 60s - I think it was via a personal ad, although they claim it was a "blind date"- and married before the decade was out. By 1970, they had their first son (Frederick Alan Levy) and a house in the Boston suburb of Stoughton.

My conception was not only accidental, it was also incredibly dangerous for my mother's health. She had survived breast cancer years earlier, back when very few actually did. At the time, doctors told her she could never have children again. I gather than when I was conceived, my parents debated having an abortion. My mother risked her life to have me, something I only learned on my 21st birthday and still haven't really processed.

I was born on Valentine's Day, 1978, just after the big blizzard.

I am named for my mother's grandma Dora, my mother's favorite relative
I'll never get to meet. There's a certain irony here, since perhaps my most strained familial relationship growing up was with my mother's parents, who never seemed to get the hang of being good grandparents. When my grandfather died, I felt the most profound ambivilance I've ever experienced. It was then we discovered that my Grandma Eva (now my only living grandparent) has Alzheimers, which had gone undiagnosed for quite a while because she was so busy taking care of my grandfather. I still harbor quite a bit of anger at a man dead over a year.

Growing up, my first best friend was Daniel Levy (no relation), who was
born exactly one day before me. Together, he and I discovered the joys of computers, he with his Apple II, me with my TI-99/4A. We each got our first PCs around the same time and together learned about ANSI animation, BBSing, DOS, and more. He lived in a different town, but we spent nearly every weekend together from birth through junior high. By the time we hit puberty, we had drifted apart. He's in the Navy now, and we catch up once every couple of years.

My next best friend was {name supressed, but we'll cal lhim Jeff), whom I met on the first day of Hebrew School in the second grade when he broke my lunch box because I left it outside and he felt like jumping on it. For reasons I don't remember, we became friends anyway, which his parents encouraged quite a bit because I was a good influence on him. We had a stormy relationship - he was a mischiveous kid who knew how to press my buttons - but we also shared a formative time in our lives, when we discovered the joys of the human body. He invited me on a trip to Disneyworld in the fifth grade - just me, Jeff, and his dad - and one night in the hotel, when his dad had left to go for a walk, Jeff asked me if he could pretend I was his girlfriend, took off his pants, and changed the course of my life. I'm not saying he made me gay, but that moment crystallized it for me. Jeff and I stopped being friends around the eighth grade - utlimately, I couldn't take the bipolar aspect of our stormy friendship. Sometime during high school, he joined the public school system and sat near me in home room. We were friendly. We graduated next to each other. During the winter of my freshman year of college, he was found murdered in Troy, NY. I didn't go to the funeral, and I will probably always regret that.

I have a problem with closure. One of the problems with growing up gay at in the suburbs in the exact moment in time I did, right on the cusp of it being okay to be gay in high school, is taht rather than having boyfriends, I had friends I fucked around with without ever having a structured relationship. Not having a relationship means not having breakfups. Not having breakups means that now, years later, I still sort of ... not quite pine for, but wonder "what if" about some of these boys.

So yes, dear readers, I have never had a boyfriend. However, I did have quite a bit of hooking up behind the scenes in high school - with the lead trumpet player of my high school marching band, with friends from my Jewish youth group, etc. Meanwhile, I was a kid who did everything - three bands, three choral groups, editing the newspaper, remodeling the school store, starring in plays, and establishing a cult of personality within the structure of said Jewish youth group (USY). Somewhere in there I became Very Observant, keeping kosher, keeping Shabbat, etc. Also in there I discovered the internet, just before it got really cool, and became invovled in usenet via rec.arts.theatre.musicals, alt.tv.muppets, and more.

I made a deal with myself. I wouldn't enter college without coming out to my parents. I waited until the last minute and told them on September 1st, 1996, just outside the gates of Harvard Yard when they dropped me off for Freshman Year. Heh. I assumed they already knew, but my mom's response was "We always thought it would be your brother." Seven months later that prophecy would come true as well. Coming out to my parents was harder than it should have been - they're very accepting - mostly because for a long time I viewed myself as our family's only disfunction (back when that was a buzzword). Now I know that's not the case, nor has it ever been. My parents are incredibly okay with having two gay kids; every summer they host a kosher PFLAG barbeque/pool-party.

I started college with FAP, the Freshman Arts Program, which I applied to on a whim (having already decided I would leave drama behind at high school) and was accepted to because the proctors thought it was hilarious that among my achievements I listed having authored the Stephen Sondheim FAQ on the internet.The drama bug bit me again, and I spent the rest of college doing thigns like producing (and writing quite a bit of) the Freshman Musical, directing several other shows, producing a handful more, joining the business staff of the Hasty Pudding, and instigating a six-person production of EVITA in the basement of Adams House.

During those early college years, I had a part time job working in the contract management command of the US Department of Defense; I worked faster than the folks I worked for, so I spent a lot of time online. I got addicted to the harvard.rec.theatre newsgroup, and thanks to an e-mail from Michael Davidson, soon found myself basking in the waning days of alt.groppi. I was hooked. I came out on the newsgroup before I came out to all of my friends at Harvard, back when the confi clause meant something. The support here helped me come out the Shabbat before National Coming Out Day during services at Hillel. I gave quite a speech, considering it was off the cuff, based on mishnah, and entirely unplanned.

In later years, I traded the DOD job for one on-campus at the Office for the Arts. I ran for UC President on a platform of humor and later singlehandedly undermined the authenticity of the following elections by becoming a crooked UC Elections commissioner. I dyed my hair green and blue. I became less religiously observant. I became more fun. I still wasn't getting laid. I became Adams House Committee Chair, and in a last busrt of glory before randomization engulfed the house, managed to start many of the things Katie Murphy takes credit for in the current issue of Harvard magazine. I ran BAGELS with Talya Weisbard, and while we may have had 200 people show up for a sneak preview of Trembling Before G-d (featuring a talk by the filmmaker), I'm most proud of how much we did to make it okay to talk about gay things at Hillel. Well, that and the night twenty lesbians sat on my floor eating kosher chinese food and watching Yentl.

Just before I graduated, I started a web journal which now lives at www.itsdlevy.com. Even before I graduated, I was working for an exciting startup record label devoted to Broadway music called Fynsworth Alley. I moved to West Hollywood, CA the Tuesday after graduation and have lived there since. I currently live with two roommates (both from Harvard - Matthew and Anne) and one cat (also from Harvard - Maestro). The music gig ended about a month ago in a messy situation that generated some lovely press including a splash-page article on Broadway.com that called me a visionary. I am about to end my spate of unemployment with a part-time job selling retro toys at a store called Sparky's on CityWalks, Universal Studio's version of a mall as seen in Blade Runner filtered through The Jetsons.

My hobbies include learning to play the banjo, occasional trips to play gay bingo, and dicking around on the web. Things I don't generally admit in public: I meet men on planetout.com; I am not as psychologically put together as I claim to be, but probably not as fucked up as you suspect I am; I am far more shy in person than most people realize - I'm only really wacky and outgoing among people I already know.