Month: October 2018

Google Announces Firing of 48 Serial Harassers…Good for Them?

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“In 2018 America, utter disregard for women, their stories and their bodies starts at the top. This week, we learned that one of our country’s most powerful and influential global companies has taken steps to eradicate workplace harassment, with a clear if unspoken demand that we pat leadership on the back for its forward thinking.

On Thursday, reports emerged that Google fired 48 employees over a two-year period for sexual misconduct. Great news, right? The company sure seems to think so. Note the overt self-congratulation in an internal email sent to global staff:

‘In recent years, we’ve made a number of changes, including taking an increasingly hard line on inappropriate conduct by people in positions of authority.’

As a woman, a corporate worker and a thinking person, I’m not sure how I’m supposed to feel about this news, though Google would clearly appreciate my gender giving thanks for its wokeness.”

Read the full post at Contemptor.

Crumbs from the Table of Joy

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(l to r) Brandi Jiminez Lee, Brianna Buckley and Chanell Bell in Raven Theatre’s ‘Crumbs From the Table of Joy.’ (Photo: Michael Brosilow)

“The script from two-time Pulitzer Prize-winner Lynn Nottage (2009’s Ruined and 2017’s Sweat) also leaves open the distinct and tantalizing possibility that his wife’s ghost isn’t the only spirit Godfrey is fleeing. Lily, sister of the deceased, makes a reappearance on the relocated Crump doorstep that leaves everyone breathless. Loud, unabashed and full-on woke, in an era when Jim Crow laws and separate-but-equal instructed African-Americans to “know their place,” Lily is unafraid to take up space and speak her mind. For the damaged Crump family, this is both enticing and threatening.

The unvoiced dialogue between Godfrey and Lily is suggestive of a more complicated and intertwined past between the two. Their immediate and still-palpable chemistry sends Godfrey fleeing in yet another direction — right into the chaste arms of Gerte (Emily Tate), a recent white, German immigrant that Godfrey meets on the subway. Charmed by her submissiveness and willingness to follow the teachings of the never-seen Father Devine, Godfrey impulsively marries Gerte and installs her in his crowded and emotionally charged Brooklyn basement flat.

Within the cramped rooms of the Crump apartment, religious, racial and sexual tensions flare as Ernestine prepares to graduate high school and transition to adulthood. While all of the cast members acquit themselves well and present the audience with a complicated and authentic slice of Eisenhower-era Americana, it is Ms. Buckley who completely commands our rapt attention.”

Read the fill post at The Broadway Blog.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

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(l to r) Scott Allen Luke, Eunice Woods, Caroline Neff, Terry Bell, Christopher M. Walsh and Meg Thalke in Steppenwolf for Young Adults’ ‘The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.’
(Photo: Michael Brosilow)

“Steppenwolf’s production, helmed by Director Jonathan Barry, keeps what is great about the original staging mostly intact. For example, the work is no musical, but it definitely has rhythm. Movement Consultant Dan Plehal turns ensemble cast members into fulcrums and pulleys, deployed effectively to lift Christopher into the air in concert with manic descriptions of his dreams and wishes. For example, in Act I, Mr. Bell is balanced on an actor’s feet as Christopher describes the weightlessness and pleasant solitude he might enjoy as an astronaut. In these scenes, the audience is reminded that Christopher is a complex genius, but also still very much a child. Even the most literal of young minds still has a capacity for fancy.

By the end of the play, Christopher has physically and emotionally stretched himself in new directions that none in his circle could have rightly anticipated. He enacts change within his family circle, community, and his own formerly very rigid and linear worldview. To be spoiler-free in this review, it’s enough to say that his fractious parents Ed (Cedric Mays) and Judy (Rebecca Spence) find themselves outwitted by Christopher, leading them toward better versions of themselves and allowing them to serve as more persuasive behavioral models for their son.”

Read the full post at The Broadway Blog.

Susan Collins Shows Cynical, Female Face of Patriarchy

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“This is the second time that Baby Boomer and Generation X women have watched an articulate, brave and credible professional humiliated and dismissed by the men in the Senate Chamber. Anita Hill has been a rallying cry for feminists in search of equality and fair representation since 1991. Now Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s is another name we shall never forget.

But you know what hurts the most, as a voting American woman acutely repulsed by the Senate’s codification of a man’s right to take what he wants (and can get) on his uninterrupted march to the top? Though much of this scenario has felt similar to the events of 27 years ago, it is in fact the first time that a woman, a particular Senator, Maine’s Susan Collins, handed the judgement of another over to her male colleagues. And in so doing, she has reaffirmed the sneering dismissal of sexual violence allegations and the real pain behind the “#MeToo movement. She has communicated that the violation of a woman’s body is a normalized act of juvenile sport, rather than a disqualifying leadership behavior. And with her vote, Collins has also left settled law and precedent regarding a woman’s right to choose open for re-litigation.”

Read the full post at Contemptor.

Chicago Cubs Club 400

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With Cubsessions: Famous Fans of Chicago’s North Side Baseball Team, die-hard Cub fans Becky Sarwate and Randy Richardson interviewed a diverse collection of some of the team’s most famous fans: actors, comedians, broadcasters, musicians, restauranteurs, athletes, journalists. Even those who are ubiquitous precisely because of their fandom. Cubsessions tells the story of divergent life paths – the roads taken, the failures experienced, and the successes reached – and how those paths all come together for a collective passion.

Becky and Randy were interviewed by the Club 400 Radio hosts. The podcast is an extension of Club 400, a place where Cubs fans gather and the motto is “Cubs Fans Helping Cubs Fans.”

Click here to listen and/or download the full podcast.