Remembering 9/11: The 9/11 attacks, 23 years later - US remembers day of tragedy

Photo by Jin S. Lee

By The Associated Press


The U.S. is remembering the lives taken and those reshaped by 9/11, marking an anniversary laced this year with presidential campaign politics.


Sept. 11 — the date when hijacked plane attacks killed nearly 3,000 people in 2001 — falls in the thick of the presidential election season every four years, and it comes at an especially pointed moment this time.

President Joe Biden, on the last Sept. 11 of his term and likely his half-century political career, is headed with Harris to the ceremonies in New York, in Pennsylvania and at the Pentagon, the three sites where commercial jets crashed after al-Qaida operatives took them over on Sept. 11, 2001.

Officials later concluded that the aircraft that crashed near rural Shanksville, Pennsylvania, was headed toward Washington. It went down after crew members and passengers tried to wrest control from the hijackers.

The attacks killed 2,977 people and left thousands of bereaved relatives and scarred survivors. The planes carved a gash in the Pentagon, the U.S. military headquarters, and brought down the trade center’s twin towers, which were among the world’s tallest buildings.


The catastrophe also altered U.S. foreign policy, domestic security practices and the mindset of many Americans who had not previously felt vulnerable to attacks by foreign extremists.



Effects rippled around the world and through generations as the U.S. responded by leading a " Global War on Terrorism,” which included invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. Those operations killed hundreds of thousands of Afghans and Iraqis and thousands of American troops, and Afghanistan became the site of the United States’ longest war.



As the complex legacy of 9/11 continues to evolve, communities around the country have developed remembrance traditions that range from laying wreaths to displaying flags, from marches to police radio messages. Volunteer projects also mark the anniversary, which Congress has titled both Patriot Day and a National Day of Service and Remembrance.

The Memorial

The 9/11 Memorial is a tribute of remembrance, honoring the 2,977 people killed in the terror attacks of September 11, 2001 at the World Trade Center site, near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, and at the Pentagon, as well as the six people killed in the World Trade Center bombing on February 26, 1993.

Names on the Memorial

Photo by Jin S. Lee


Prior to its opening in 2011 on the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, the National September 11 Memorial & Museum underwent a multi-year process to verify and arrange the names that would be inscribed into the Memorial’s bronze parapets. All inscribed names represent 9/11 attack homicide victims: people who died as a direct result of injury sustained in the attacks on September 11, 2001, including the impacts of the planes and the building collapses.

Every name can be located by the panel on which it is inscribed. A panel address is comprised of the letter N or S (N for North Pool, S for South Pool) followed by a number 1 through 76. See a full list of names on the Memorial.

Homepage | National September 11 Memorial & Museum (911memorial.org)

This Was Toscanini The Maestro, My Father, and Me - written by Samuel Antek & Lucy Antek Johnson

This Was Toscanini   
The Maestro, My Father, and Me

LISTEN
to today's show
featuring Lucy Antek Johnson

Written by Samuel Antek & Lucy Antek Johnson

Narrated by Lucy Antek Johnson & David Garrison

Available for the First Time in Audiobook Format, Featuring Original NBC Symphony Excerpts!

“This Was Toscanini: The Maestro, My Father, and Me, which was produced at our own Verso Studios at the Westport Library … brings to life violinist Samuel Antek’s firsthand portrait of Maestro Arturo Tos canini and features his daughter’s recollections of a memorable time in classical music history. Added bonus! Excerpts from some original NBC Symphony performances are featured throughout. Take a listen!”

—Bill Hermer, Executive Director of Westport Library (CT)

“[Samuel Antek] wrote very beautiful about me. Very simpatico.”

—Maestro Arturo Toscanini

Live from New York, it’s Saturday night … 1937–1954! This riveting new audiobook about Arturo Toscanini, widely considered the greatest conductor of the modern age, features recordings from original NBC Symphony performances, broadcast from Studio 8H Radio City in Rockefeller Center as well as Carnegie Hall.

This Was Toscanini: The Maestro, My Father, and Me by Samuel Antek and Lucy Antek Johnson, with narration by Lucy Antek Johnson and David Garrison (Brown Books Publishing Group; Audiobook on sale June 4, 2024), is an intimate, firsthand portrait of Toscanini, one of the most influential conductors and musicians of the 20th century. Originally released as a special expanded hardcover edition in 2021, the book will now be followed by the release of its companion audiobook in June 2024 — timed perfectly for Father’s Day. This Was Toscanini is told from the perspective of Samuel Antek, the Maestro’s first violinist for all seventeen years of the NBC Symphony Orchestra’s existence — an orchestra specifically created for the purpose of being conducted under the legendary Maestro himself.

Antek’s timeless story of what it was to rehearse, record and go on tour both nationally and internationally with the famed Toscanini is brilliantly delivered by narrator Garrison. Newly added musical sequences bring listeners right into the seats of the orchestra players. Witnessing the crackling crescendos alongside the vehement strokes and slashes of Toscanini’s baton, it’ll feel as though attending the master class of an artistic genius.

About Toscani - from Encyclopedia.com

For more than half a century, Arturo Toscanini was one of the world’s most respected conductors, a musical powerhouse whose performances packed orchestra halls—and filled the radio waves—in every major city in the United States. Toscanini dominated the classical music world, leading the debut performances of numerous important operas and symphonies. In a time when the majority of Americans craved popular music and novel trends, Toscanini did more than any other artist to increase the audience for classical symphonies and operatic works. A New York Times reporter noted that the fiery conductor “represented absolute, uncompromising integrity. He strove earnestly to realize as exactly as possible the composer’s intentions as printed in the musical score. To achieve perfection he drove musicians relentlessly, himself hardest of all.”

Toscanini conducted entirely from memory. Nearsighted from childhood, he memorized hundreds of intricate operas, symphonies, and concertos and then—in performance and often in rehearsals as well—led without ever consulting the score. The temperamental former cellist kept a full schedule of touring, recording, and performing until well into his eighties, finally retiring just three years before his death. The New York Times praised Toscanini for his “judgment, experience, vast musical knowledge, uncompromising standards and the touch of incandescent brilliance he infused into every performance he conducted.”


Toscanini was born in 1867 and grew up in Parma, Italy. His father was a tailor, and as a youth Arturo, too, wanted to make clothes. His ambitions changed at the age of nine when he began cello lessons at the Parma Conservatory of Music. He was fascinated by the instrument and by classical music in general. Within two years he won a full scholarship to the conservatory, where he was known to sell his lunch in order to buy more sheet music.

After graduating from the conservatory in 1885, Toscanini immediately found work with travelling orchestras in Italy. In 1886 he joined a company that journeyed to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to stage some operas. On that particular trip the company conductor one day refused to lead a performance. The musicians persuaded Toscanini to step in as conductor—his penchant for memorizing whole scores had already marked him as extraordinary. Toscanini reluctantly accepted the assignment and, with no prior preparation, made his conducting debut on June 25, 1886. He was 19 at the time.

This Was Toscanini - The Maestro, My Father, and Me

“I don’t want to hear notes anymore, there shouldn’t be any more notes ... Abandon yourself to your heart!” —Maestro Arturo Toscanini

This Was Toscanini began as an essay by Samuel Antek called “Playing with Maestro,” which detailed what it was like to work with the world-famous Arturo Toscanini. The essay was so well received that Antek was approached for a book publishing contract, to which he responded, “I will describe what I have actually seen, felt and heard Toscanini say. What he asked of us, those of us who made music with him.” Samuel Antek had written all but the final chapter when he died suddenly at age 49. His book was published five years posthumously to many rave reviews, including praise from The New York Times. It had been out of print for several years before Lucy Antek Johnson decided to rerelease it.

Calling this reworking “a memoir wrapped in a memoir,” Antek Johnson expands the spotlight on Arturo Toscanini to include her virtuosic father, relaying a story about two musicians whose paths fortuitously crossed when the historic NBC Symphony Orchestra was formed. Providing her own audio narration in the prelude, coda and introductions to each chapter, she vividly regales us with memories of her father’s rise from first violinist for NBC Symphony Orchestra to simultaneously conducting the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra and Philadelphia Young People’s Orchestra, while becoming musical director of several major American orchestras under the influence of Toscanini. With moving reflections on her father’s career and what it was like to grow up in an era of musical performance celebrity, Antek Johnson shares a remarkable contemporary look into the glamourous “heyday” of classical music history.

“Toscanini often said, ‘Any asino can conduct — but to make music... eh? Is difficile?’ Playing with Toscanini was a musical rebirth. The clarity, intensity, and honesty of his musical vision — his own torment — was like a cleansing baptismal pool. Caught up in his force, your own indifference was washed away. You were not just a player, another musician, but an artist once more searching for long-forgotten ideals and truths. You were curiously alive, and there was purpose and self-fulfillment in your work. It was not a job; it was a calling.”

—Samuel Antek

“First published in 1963, my father’s book remains the most comprehensive personal narrative about working with the Maestro. It is a story about the passion and dedication it takes to make great music and about Toscanini’s singular and often volatile approach to music making. It is also a story about the formation of a new orchestra under the baton of a musical genius who not only was a force throughout his twentieth-century career but who possessed an artistry and style that resonate even now, more than sixty-five years after his last concert.”





About the Authors


Samuel Antek began his violin studies in Chicago and was then invited to New York to become a pupil and protégé of the famous teacher Leopold Auer. In 1937, Mr. Antek was selected to become a first violinist for the NBC Symphony, specially created by RCA for the legendary conductor Arturo Toscanini. He was a member of the orchestra for all of its 17 years.

While continuing to play first violin for NBC, he was appointed musical director and conductor of the New Jersey Symphony in 1947; was named the associate conductor of the Chicago Symphony under Fritz Reiner; and, after inaugurating his distinctive Young People’s Concerts series in New Jersey, was soon named the director of all Young People’s Concerts of the Philadelphia Orchestra. He was invited to guest conduct many of the nation’s major orchestras.

Samuel Antek died suddenly at age 49 in January 1958. This Was Toscanini, his unique evaluation of the Maestro, was published posthumously.

Lucy Antek Johnson, Samuel Antek’s daughter, was born and raised in New York City. After studying music, fine art and ballet, she was drawn to the world of television production and spent her entire career in the entertainment industry, producing movies for television before joining the ranks of NBC as a network executive. She soon worked her way up to senior vice president of daytime and children’s programs for CBS. Lucy and her husband, Bill Klein, live in Connecticut.




Praise for This Was Toscanini

“Toscanini was not only a genius as a conductor but also a revolutionary of musical interpretation. In fact, he placed the performer totally at the service of the composer, in sacred respect for and fidelity to the written text.” —Maestro Riccardo Muti

“When This Was Toscanini was first published in 1963, Samuel Antek’s classic account of playing in Toscanini’s orchestra brought the Maestro back to life. In this new edition, Lucy Antek Johnson revivifies not only her father’s text and its subject — along with many of Robert Hupka’s original photos — but also her father’s own remarkable story. This book will fascinate everyone interested not only in Toscanini but in symphonic music and music making in general.”

—Harvey Sachs, Author and Music Historian

“Few authors can have the combination of gifts and experience, of love and intellect, which Samuel Antek brought to the writing of this posthumous memoir. ... We can almost hear the hoarse Toscanini voice in his fierce admonitions to the players, his wildly picturesque mixture of Italian and English in an idiom all his
own. After the recordings, this book will probably remain the most enduring and endearing monument to the art of Arturo Toscanini.”

—The New York Times (1963)

“For decades, This Was Toscanini has been my favorite book about the conductor. ... Antek’s book … is not only one of the most valuable writings on Toscanini but is one of the most insightful documents by any musician, analyzing how one painstakingly creates the aural picture of a piece of music. Lucy Antek Johnson expands our knowledge of her father and reveals the musician and human being behind the words.” —Bob Kosovsky, Librarian, Music & Recorded Sound Division,
New York Public Library for the Performing Arts

“My admiration and interest in the recordings and career of Arturo Toscanini were piqued by the original publication of this book in 1963 ... I pored over and over it ... as well as the excellent photographs of the maestro ‘in action’ at his rehearsals taken candidly by the late Robert Hupka, whom I met and befriended
several years later. It was because of this book that I pursued my ultimate career in audio engineering. Now that this important book is being reissued ... a new generation of music lovers, musicologists and musicians can get acquainted with one of the greatest conductors of the past.”

—Seth B. Winner, Original Sound Preservation Engineer, ret., The Toscanini Legacy, Performing Arts Research Center, New York Public Library

“As the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra nears its centennial in 2022, the lasting legacy of Samuel Antek, its fourth music director, can be found in his conviction in sharing the glories of orchestral music with New Jersey’s youngest citizens.”

—Gabriel van Aalst, President and CEO, New Jersey Symphony Orchestra

“Already considered one of the most insightful books on the career of the conductor Arturo Toscanini, Johnson expands upon her father’s memoir with her own recollections and reflections.” —Ryan Patrick Irvin, Artistic Producer, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts

“[Samuel Antek] was as gifted as an observer, a portraitist and a prose writer as he was a musician. The vigor of his sensory images makes its own literary music. This unique, doubly moving memoir unites an outstanding musician with his invaluable impressions of the world-famous maestro, and it also animates him as a man of his time — a loving husband and an adoring father to the daughter who writes insightfully and lovingly about the career in which [Samuel Antek] was poised to achieve even greater heights.” —Sybil Steinberg, Contributing Editor and Former Book Review Editor for Publishers Weekly


“One shares the experience of being under Toscanini’s baton ...

it is as though one were in the maestro’s living presence.”

—Kirkus Reviews (1963)

Esquire's Best Book of 2024, Oprah Summer Book Club Pick- FAMILIARIS by David Wroblewski

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to today's show
featuring David Wroblewski

“Already having drawn comparisons to Russo, Irving, Strout, McCarthy, and Gilbert, with García Márquez added here, Wroblewski earns them all, amply rewarding readers who have been waiting impatiently for fifteen years…This colossus of a book will own you, and you will weep to be freed.”—Kirkus Reviews, STARRED review

David Wroblewski, author of Familiaris and The Story of Edgar Sawtelle joins Janeane to talk about his latest book. In addition to being a beautiful writer, David is an interesting and articulate author with impeccable research behind his books. He has now been chosen for the SECOND time as Oprah's Book Club pick--in fact, Familiaris is the read for the entire summer!


Sixteen years ago, David Wroblewski’s debut—The Story of Edgar Sawtelle—was hailed an instant classic by critics and readers alike, reaching #1 on the New York Times bestseller list. Iin addition to receiving incredible praise from authors like Tom Hanks, Richard Russo, and Margot Livesey; starred reviews from Kirkus Reviews and Library Journal; and was recently named one of Esquire's Best Books of Summer 2024.

Blackstone Publishing | On Sale June 11, 2024
Available in Hardcover, E-Book, and Audiobook


 

Part saga, part love story, part historical —all with a dash of backwoods science fiction—Familiaris takes readers from the halls of the Kissel Motor Car factory to the Sawtelles’ small-town Wisconsin northwoods farm, through an ambitious WWII dog training program, and back into mankind’s ancient past. Through the story of John and Mary Sawtelle, Wroblewski’s triumphant return examines the dynamics of love and friendship, the vexing nature of families, the universal desire to create something lasting and beautiful, and of course, the species-long partnership between homo sapiens and canis familiaris.


“By taking us back to the origins of the Sawtelle family, Wroblewski has set a storytelling bonfire as enthralling in its pages as it is illuminating of our fragile and complicated humanity. Familiaris is as expansive and enlightening a saga as has ever been written.” –Tom Hanks, Academy Award-Winning Actor, bestselling author of The Making of Another Major Motion Picture Masterpiece and Uncommon Type


“[An] impossibly wise, impossibly ambitious, impossibly beautiful book.”—Richard Russo, Pulitzer Prize winner, author of the North Bath trilogy

“Like many readers, I adored The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, with its gripping tale of treachery and the magnificent Sawtelle dogs. Now I adore Familiaris. David Wroblewski is a wonderfully inventive writer; he knows so much—how to test a tractor, how to make a table, how to borrow money, how to see the future—but best of all he is a writer of extraordinary characters, human and canine, who will take up residence in your mind and heart. A dazzling and irresistible novel.”—Margot Livesey, New York Times bestselling author of The Road from Belhaven and The Flight of Gemma Hardy


“David Wroblewski is one of the few contemporary authors who can create a world that the reader doesn’t merely visit but fully inhabits. And what a world it is, rich with love and joy and heartbreak. And wonder, especially in the way human and canine form inseparable bonds. It has been a long wait for a new Wroblewski novel. The wait is worth it.”—Ron Rash, New York Times bestselling author of Serena and The Caretaker

“No writer understands the depths of dogs’ natures the way David Wroblewski does, and once again we have a vital, absorbing, and remarkable fiction fueled by this understanding. Familiaris is a rare novel, modest and epic.”—Joan Silber, PEN/Faulkner Award-winning author of Secrets of Happiness and Improvement

“Tender, ambitious, fierce, deeply human, and of course wonderfully canine, David Wroblewski’s second novel is an American tour de force…This is a big brave book that is old-fashioned in the very best sense of the word."—Colum McCann, author of Apeirogon and Let the Great World Spin.

About David Wroblewski

David Wroblewski is the author, most recently, of the novel Familiaris, his followup to the internationally bestselling The Story Of Edgar Sawtelle, an Oprah Book Club pick, Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers selection, winner of the Colorado Book Award, Indie Choice Best Author Discovery award, and Midwest Bookseller Association's Choice award, in addition to being selected as one of the best books of the year by numerous magazines and newspapers.

David received an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from the Warren Wilson M.F.A. Program for Writers, and a Bachelor’s degree in computer science from the University of Wisconsin. He lives in Colorado with the writer Kimberly McClintock and their dogs, Pie and Luci.

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September is Suicide Prevention Month - Arna Vodenos is the WarmLine clinical director for NAMI OC. She joins Janeane 8/28 at 9:30am on KUCI 88.9fm

NAMI is the National Alliance on Mental Illness, the nation’s largest grassroots mental health organization dedicated to building better lives for the millions of Americans affected by mental illness. 

LISTEN
to today's show
featuring Arna Vodenos.

From the National Alliance for Mental Illness, NAMI's website:

Suicide Prevention Month

Suicidal thoughts, much like mental health conditions, can affect anyone regardless of age, gender or background. In fact, suicide is often the result of an untreated mental health condition. Suicidal thoughts, although common, should not be considered normal and often indicate more serious issues.

September is Suicide Prevention Month — a time to raise awareness of this stigmatized, and often taboo, topic. We use this month to shift public perception, spread hope and share vital information to people affected by suicide. Our goal is ensuring that individuals, friends and families have access to the resources they need to discuss suicide prevention and to seek help.

About Arna Vodenos

Arna Vodenos, MA, Ch.t., specializes in holistic psychology with an emphasis on the importance of a balanced mind, body and spirit for optimal wellness. With over two decades in the field of wellness and healing, Arna specializes in many complementary, evidence- based mind-body techniques and integrates mindfulness, imagery healing, biofeedback, clinical hypnotherapy, breathing techniques, art and sound therapy into her practice. 

Arna utilizes the combination of both traditional and non traditional modalities for the treatment of anxiety, mood disorders, trauma, along with increasing self-love and self-esteem through a daily self-care practice. Arna has worked with clients from ages 12- 80 years old over the past 24 years.

In addition, Arna has an extensive background in mental health working closely with NAMI, the National Alliance for Mental Health and with families who have a loved one with a mental illness. She is a teacher for NAMI’S Family to Family signature program and regularly volunteers as a trained suicide crisis counselor.

Arna is completing her Psy.D at the Chicago School for Professional Psychology, and earned a M.A. in Spiritual Psychology from the University of Santa Monica and a B.S. in Psychology from Boston University. Arna is currently a Registered Psychological Associate (PSB94027008) under the supervision of Dr. Emi Iijima.

Crisis Resources

If you or someone you know is experiencing a mental health crisis,
call or text 988 immediately.

If you are uncomfortable talking on the phone, you can chat the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988lifeline.org.

You can also text NAMI to 741-741 to be connected to a free, trained crisis counselor on the Crisis Text Line.

24/7 WARMLINE: 714-991-6412

Know the Warning Signs and Risk Factors of Suicide
Being Prepared for a Crisis
Read our guide, “Navigating a Mental Health Crisis”
What You Need to Know About Youth Suicide

COMING UP NOVEMBER 16th!
https://www.namioc.org/namiwalks2024

714-544-8488

August 21st 9:30am - Suspended by No String: A Songwriter's Reflections on Faith, Aliveness, and Wonder by Peter Himmelman - out Aug 13, 2024

Suspended by No String

A Songwriter’s Reflections on Faith, Aliveness, and Wonder

A thought-provoking collection of spiritual reflections echoing the lyricism of Leonard Cohen and the uplifting messages of Anne Lamott

Suspended by No String is for readers of all spiritual stripes: those who are consistently devout, those who aren’t sure what to believe, and those who may not be religious in the traditional sense but who nevertheless want to view the world as something other than a place of randomness and build a relationship with a force infinitely beyond themselves.

LISTEN

Echoing the lyricism of Leonard Cohen and the lighthearted poignance of Anne Lamott, Suspended by No String is a thought-provoking anthology of spiritual reflections that will inspire readers to reclaim their childlike sense of wonder.

Suspended by No String is a collection of essays, personal narrative, and poetical reflections for readers of all spiritual stripes—those who are devout, those who aren’t sure what to believe, and those who may not be religious in a traditional sense but who nevertheless want to build a relationship with a force infinitely beyond themselves.

ABOUT

Peter Himmelman is a Grammy and Emmy nominated singer-songwriter, visual artist, best-selling author, film composer, entrepreneur, and rock and roll performer with over 20 critically acclaimed recordings to his credit.

In addition to his own creative work, he is the founder of Big Muse, a company, which helps organizations to leverage the power of their people’s innate creativity. Clients include The Wharton School, The UPennCLO Executive Doctoral Program, 3M, McDonald’s, Adobe, and Gap Inc. His most recent book, Let Me Out (Unlock your creative mind and bring your ideas to life) was released in October, 2016.

Peter also holds an Advanced Management Certificate from The Kellogg School of Business, at Northwestern and a Certificate of Leadership Development from the United States Army War College.

Coming up August 21st 9:00am - Picturing Summer, a new UCI exhibition is on view now. Janeane speaks with curator Susan Davidson about this new exhibit depicting our state's unique geography and lifestyles

LISTEN

Janeane speaks with Susan Davidson, a curatorial advisor to Langson IMCA, and the curator of Picturing Summer. Over her distinguished career as a curator and art historian, Susan has served as a curatorial advisor to the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation and has worked at the Guggenheim Museums (New York, Venice, Bilbao, and Abu Dhabi) and The Menil Collection in Houston.

Newest exhibition, Picturing Summer, opened on July 20 in the interim space at 18881 Von Karman Avenue, Suite 100 in Irvine. Curated by Susan Davidson with interpretive text written by Dada Wang. 


The selection of over 30 paintings depicts our state's unique geography and lifestyles across a range of eras and landscapes, ocean views, and leisure activities—all specific to the summer months.

The student Gallery Guides and Visitor Experience colleagues are on site to greet you and introduce you to art-making activities inspired by the artworks on view. Please stop by, say hello, and tap into your own creativity!

Admission is always free—we are open to all—and parking is validated for up to two hours in the adjacent Airport Tower parking structure.

And when you visit, please take a moment to explore our new In Focus gallery, featuring work from The Buck Collection as well as recent art acquisitions. Our new Reading Lounge also awaits you and is ideal for learning more about the artists represented in our collection and their responses to the California experience.

Langson IMCA produced a brief video about the exhibition. Get a sneak peak at the in-gallery visuals. The video is produced by Bower Blue and Mike Rosetti.

 

Langson IMCA, "Picturing Summer" exhibition introduction

ABOUT SUSAN DAVIDSON

As an art historian and curator, Susan Davidson is an authority in the fields of Surrealism, Abstract Expressionism, and Pop Art, with an expertise in the art of Robert Rauschenberg. She has been engaged with Rauschenberg’s work since 1990, serving as a curatorial advisor to the artist from 2001 until his death in 2008 and as a board member to the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation from 2009 until 2014.

Her numerous exhibitions and publications on the artist include Rauschenberg in China (Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing, 2016), Robert Rauschenberg: Photographs 1949–1965 (Schimer/Mosel, 2011), Robert Rauschenberg: Gluts (Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice, 2009), Rauschenberg: On and Off the Wall (Musée Contemporain, Nice, France, 2005), Robert Rauschenberg (IVAM, Valencia, Spain, 2005), and Rauschenberg (Palazzo dei Diamanti, Ferrara, Italy, 2004). 

She curated with Walter Hopps the definitive Robert Rauschenberg: A Retrospective for the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and its international tour (1997–99) and was assistant curator on Hopps’s seminal Robert Rauschenberg: The Early 1950s (The Menil Collection, Houston, 1991).

In her previous role as Senior Curator at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2002–2017), Ms. Davidson oversaw the stewardship of the institution’s collection in addition to organizing notable exhibitions that include Jackson Pollock: Exploring Alchemy, 2017; Robert Motherwell: The Early Collages, 2014; John Chamberlain: Choices, 2012; No Limits, Just Edges: Jackson Pollock’s Paintings on Paper, 2005; and Peggy and Kiesler: The Collector and the Visionary, 2004. 

Prior to joining the Guggenheim’s constellation of museums, Ms. Davidson was Collections Curator at the Menil Collection, Houston (1985–2002). She holds advanced degrees in art history from the Courtauld Institute, London, and George Washington University, Washington, D.C.

L.A.’s legendary retired meteorologist Fritz Coleman will be performing his comedy act at The Z! (The Z Playhouse in Mission Viejo) on Sat., August 24.

Since retiring after 40 years as KNBC’s weathercaster, Fritz did a Tubi special called “Unassisted Living.” He is also starring in a one-man show- “Unassisted Residency” at the iconic El Portal Theatre in North Hollywood

Fritz Coleman returns to solo comedy with the release of “Unassisted Living” on Tubi, reflecting on growing old in the era of social distancing and social media

In his latest solo comedy show “Unassisted Living,” now airing on Tubi, Fritz Coleman reminds audiences why he’s been welcome in people’s homes for nearly four decades, whether as a legendary Los Angeles weatherman or as a tireless comic always developing new material for his act. “This one is about getting older,” says Coleman, “and, as always, it’s just the truth of my life lately.”

As a young-ish 70-something who has dealt with aging in the time of Obamacare, big pharma and the pandemic, Coleman was actually eager to get back to a “regular” comedy routine after two years of pandemic-era entertainment. He continued to co-host the Media Path Podcast with Louise Palanker, trading observations on pop culture with a variety of guests from Pat Boone to Henry Winkler to Congressman Adam Schiff, but was eager to get back to performing comedy in front of an audience, even as nightclubs were still closed. Fortunately, his age and peer demographic started working for him. "Most baby boomers don't really go to comedy clubs anymore, but I started to get invited to speak at a lot of lunches and dinners as Covid wound down. That gave me a chance to really work on some material in front of good audiences, so it’s been almost two years’ worth of developing this show.”

Coleman and his production team on “Unassisted Living” also took advantage of a Covid-era bingeing – in this case, the acclaimed HBO series “Hacks” – for inspiration. Delighted by the episode where Deborah Vance (Jean Smart) “revives” her tired act in a small nightclub, they sought out the same venue (“The Marilyn Monroe Forum” room at the El Portal Theatre) as a location. “It was a great cabaret-style setting, about 80 people, and we staged it the same way, lit it the same way, because it was perfect for the act.”

In an hour-long routine about dealing with aging in the era of social distancing and social media, Coleman delights in serving his loyal demographic in their current frame of mind. It’s the same generation of comedy fans who grew up with the hilarious extended riffs of George Carlin, Robert Klein, and Richard Pryor – but Coleman delivers with a gentler touch developed over years of working on local television news. “Because of the way it was when I was on TV in the 70s and 80s, I’ve always worked very clean,” says Coleman. “You had to have a squeaky clean act to get on ‘The Tonight Show.’ That’s perfect for my audience because they don’t want to be assaulted by comedy, or feel uncomfortable with it.”

Still delighting his fans and sharing his stories after over forty years, Fritz Coleman proves all over again how he'll be getting by - somehow - just fine.


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