By Jessica Hanewinckel
The Lawrence Family JCC and Center for Jewish Culture have never been short on performing arts programming, but beginning this year, they’re taking it to a whole new level. In the past, patrons of the JCC and CJC could attend various musical concerts, a few comedy shows, staged readings and an occasional dance performance, but most were organized and promoted independently of one another; though ticket sales were decent, finding underwriting was a challenge.
Last July, the JCC and CJC formally began planning a way to link all of the various performing arts that had perviously occurred separately, and only between September and May. Their plan was to create the Look and Listen Performing Arts Series, which would offer year-round performing arts, ranging from music and dance to theater and comedy. The series kicked off last October, with a handful of events through December, but the majority begin this month and continue through May.
According to D. Candis Paule, the series’ producer, the hope is two-fold: that underwriters will be excited at the prospect of a comprehensive, year-round performing arts series and will want to support it, and that patrons and performing arts fans will be more enthusiastic and more aware of upcoming events when they’re presented in a series.
“It was hard to be as successful as we knew we could be [before we had the series],” Paule says. “They were all individually successful but not great. Wendy Sabin-Lasker, the executive director of the CJC, and I chatted about it … We said we have these phenomenal programs and people love them. How can we get people more interested in making sure they’re funded?”
So far in the series, Paule says, they’ve seen growth in underwriting for its performances, though it’s still not where they’d like it to be. As far as ticket sales, she says the community is responding positively to the new series.
“The CJC will always create quality programming,” she says. “That’s what we’re known for, and that’s why we’re so supported by the community, because they know if we’re doing it, then it’s going to be done well.”
Paule — who is an actor by trade, a casting director for TV and film and who first worked at the JCC in the late ‘90s as an actor in a staged reading and most recently as director of the Gotthelf Art Gallery — says the local Jewish acting community is as supportive of one another as fans are of the performances.
“The play I did in 1996 as an actor for the CJC was directed by David Ellenstein, now of the North Coast Repertory Theatre. He came in as a director; he didn’t even live in San Diego at the time. The Jewish acting community is so intertwined. That’s part of the joy of it. I have dialogue with Yale Strom and John Malashock and David Ellenstein. It’s one of the joys of being in the San Diego community. Everyone’s in it for the same reasons and the right reasons. We love what we do, and we celebrate performing arts, so it’s a joy to have so many people who support it too.”
One reason to support Look and Listen is that the series marks the very first time in the history of the CJC that San Diegans can enjoy year-round programming there (other than J*Company’s youth theater), with programming throughout the summer months. (Programming in summer 2012 is yet to be determined.) The expansion of the calendar year for the series is also creating countless partnership opportunities that never before existed; the JCC’s ongoing relationship with the Leichtag Family Foundation has carried over to the series as well, allowing some of its programming to come to North County venues.
“We had an event that was downtown,” Paule says. “We have an event where we’re able to partner with Cygnet Theatre. We’re partnering with the Lipinsky Family San Diego Jewish Arts Festival in May. We’re partnering with the America Israel Cultural Foundation in February. All these different organizations wanted theater, wanted music, so it just opens us up to a world of possibility, which is very exciting.”
The series’ many partnerships, as well as its variety of performers and artists, many of whom are from out of the area, are what make it unlike anything else arts patrons can find in San Diego.
“We want to bring cultural performances that are new to the San Diego audience,” she says. “We want to be relevant, current, and bring them something they’re not going to see otherwise, so that we can make it worth their while. Of course, everything we do has to meet the mission of the CJC, so there’s always some component [that’s Jewish].”
So what are a few highlights of the remainder of this first series season? Paule is excited about each performance, she says, but here are a few standouts (see Page 58 for a complete calendar):
COMEDY: New York-based comedienne Judy Gold, performing stand-up at the Lawrence Family JCC Jan. 14. “She’s fabulous, bold, sarcastic and has a really engaging sense of humor,” Paule says. “She talks about her mother a lot. It’s a very Jewish relationship the two of them have. And she’s great.” Gold, an Emmy Award-winning actress and comedienne, will appear fresh from her Off-Broadway show, “The Judy Show: My Life as a Sitcom.”
DANCE: New York-based Nicholas Andre Dance Company, featuring nine dancers performing modern dance at the Lawrence Family JCC Feb. 4. They’ll combine athletic concepts with modern dance movements to create performances that are conceptual, emotional and passionate.
MUSIC: Israeli pianist Ory Shihor performing at the Dove Library in Carlsbad Feb. 26. “He’s one of Israel’s finest pianists,” Paule says. “He happens to be living in L.A. right now. He plays really beautiful music. Ory is extremely well known and well considered. He is currently the director of the academy at the Colburn School of Music. It’s going to be a lovely afternoon.”
THEATER: Look and Listen buys the house at the Cygnet Theatre in Old Town for an exclusive performance of “Parade,” part of Cygnet’s current season, April 21. “It’s about the true story of Jewish factory manager Leo Frank, accused and convicted of murder in Atlanta, Ga., in 1913. The entire house will be supporters of the CJC and of the Look and Listen Performing Arts Series. We’re also going to have a special guest at the top of the show to discuss the play, to make it a unique evening.”
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Look and Listen Performing Arts Series
2012 Season Calendar
Staged Reading: Short Attention Span Theatre
Jan. 9 • 7 p.m. • Lawrence Family JCC
Comedienne: Judy Gold
Jan. 14 • 8 p.m. • Lawrence Family JCC
Musicians in the Making
Jan. 29 • 2 p.m. • Lawrence Family JCC
Nicholas Andre Dance Company
Feb. 4 • 8 p.m. • Lawrence Family JCC
Classical Piano Concert with Ory Shihor
Feb. 26 • 2 p.m. • Dove Library, Carlsbad
Staged Reading: “A Railway to Damascus”
March 12 • 7 p.m. • Lawrence Family JCC
“Parade”
April 21 • 8 p.m. • Cygnet Theatre, Old Town
Staged Reading: “Natasha and the Coat”
May 7 • 7 p.m. • Lawrence Family JCC
Jazz Concert with Howard Alden
May 19 • 8 p.m. • Lawrence Family JCC
An Afternoon of Jazz
May 20 • 1-4 p.m. • Lawrence Family JCC
www.sdcjc.com • tickets.lfjcc.org
Box Office: (858) 362-1348; open 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Fri.
