Bumping into God

March 16, 2019 Irwin Keller

Or maybe you climb a mountain and spend 40 days and nights sitting in anticipation, maybe meditating, maybe praying. Until the hand of God appears, scribbling madly on stone.

Or maybe you follow a baby goat until you notice a burning bush. Or you chase a stray calf right into a cave filled with the light of Eden.

Or maybe you do nothing at all.

Serenissima

March 2, 2019 Irwin Keller

(L) The women’s gallery of the Scola Tedesca. (R) La Fenice.

And indeed as you stand in the Scola Tedesca and look up at the women's gallery, you see what looks like a theater loge. There are low upright pillars to about knee level, and then a gilded latticework screen up to perhaps the neck of a seated woman, and above that it is open. This gallery is not meant to hide the women, but to foster flirtation.

Torah The Musical – And Other Lessons from the Broadway Stage

January 18, 2019 Irwin Keller

After much thought, I decided Torah, as a musical, is maybe most like "Into the Woods." Here's why.

Joseph the Matriarch

December 5, 2018 Irwin Keller

We are now in the annual 4-week saga of Joseph, and I find myself eyeing him across the ages. I see him young, middle aged and, at long last, at the end of his life, settling in to be a grandmother, the matriarch of his line.

Retelling Kristallnacht

November 9, 2018 Irwin Keller

It is our task to tell this story lovingly, enchantingly; Scheherazade beguiling the prince or, in that story’s Jewish counterpart, Esther, full of charm, speaking truth to power. Scheherazade and Esther don’t win. They don’t defeat the king. They recruit the king. It is our task to tell this story in a way that recruits all of America.