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Creator and host of @thislife (Facebook)/@thisamerlife (X/Twitter) @IraGlass (Instagram/X/Twitter) and world-renowned Israeli author @EtgarKeretOfficial (Facebook)/ @Etgar_Keret (Instagram)/@its_etgar_keret (X/Twitter) combine their skills for an evening of powerful and funny stories @KimmelCC (X/Twitter)/@KimmelCulturalCampus (Facebook/Instagram) on 11/15. For more info, visit www.kimmelculturalcampus.org.
Press Contacts:
Lauren A. Woodard Hall Hannah Palermo
484-832-1963 267-765-3724
lhall@kimmelculturalcampus.org hpalermo@alliedglobalmarketing.com
KIMMEL CULTURAL CAMPUS PRESENTS IRA GLASS AND ETGAR KERET, NOVEMBER 15, 2023
The This American Life host and renowned Israeli author present a live performance of their shared podcast, Half-Baked Stories about my Dead Mother
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE (September 21, 2023) – The Kimmel Cultural Campus presents podcast guru and host of This American Life Ira Glass and world-renowned Israeli writer Etgar Keret as they combine their skills for an evening of powerful and funny storytelling at the Miller Theater on November 15, 2023, at 7:30 p.m. Their shared podcast, entitled Half-Baked Stories about my Dead Mother, reflects simultaneously the intimacy of normal life that is neither the zeitgeist of This American Life, nor the quasi-reality of Keret’s imagination. In a live performance of their podcast about Etgar’s mother, Glass and Keret bring Orna and their own storytelling prowess to life.
“This show really began on a bus heading out of Tel Aviv last summer,” Glass explained. “Etgar told me a story that went off like a dense little bomb of feeling – really one of the most remarkable things I’d ever heard – and I thought ‘I have no idea how this can be a show[,] but we have to make it into a show.’” It was a story about his mom. Keret had spent his life writing books on every conceivable subject, but somehow was never able to write about his mom. Then he started writing these tiny stories, each just four or five paragraphs long, that captured different sides of her. His mom, Oma Keret, was complicated. She was vengeful and loving. Maria in West Side Story and Thanos in the Marvel Cinematic Universe – capable of extreme action.
Glass has spent his life telling stories about extraordinary ordinaries. “I’ve been putting together collections of stories every single week for decades on my radio show,” says Glass. “This is one of the most extraordinary and enjoyable sets of stories I’ve ever been lucky enough to work with. They’re beautiful, and it’s fun presenting them with Etgar."
Keret has an affinity for the absurd and a penchant for shaping dreams into logic. “When I began publishing my stories, they were immediately classed as “fantastic” and “unrealistic[,]” but I was just trying to tell things as they were. It was only when I started sharing my mom’s life story with Ira and saw him listening the way you listen to a fairytale that I realized that the stories I write are fantastical because I was raised by a fantastical mother who made me take the surreal for granted.”
“Each a master storyteller in his own right, Glass and Keret share a profoundly touching narrative that's as much about human resilience as it is about loss,” said Matías Tarnopolsky, president and CEO of The Philadelphia Orchestra and Kimmel Center, Inc. “This live podcast event speaks to the heart of our mission to connect humanity through the transformative power of the arts.”
Ira Glass is the host and creator of the public radio program This American Life. Under Glass’ editorial direction, This American Life has won the highest honors for broadcasting and journalistic excellence, including seven Peabody Awards and the first Pulitzer Prize ever awarded for audio journalism. He has participated in other NPR programs, including Morning Edition, All Things Considered, and Talk of the Nation.
In 2001, Time magazine named Glass the “Best Radio Host in America,” and Samuel Fishwick of the Evening Standard called Glass “the godfather of podcasting.” Glass’ work in radio and television has won him awards such as the Edward R. Murrow Award for Outstanding Contributions to Public Radio and the George Polk Award in Radio Reporting.
Etgar Keret is a leading voice in Israeli literature and cinema. His writing has been published in The New York Times, Le Monde, The New Yorker, The Guardian, The Paris Review, and Zoetrope. Keret has received the Book Publisher’s Association’s Platinum Prize several times, the Prime Minister’s Prize (1996), the Ministry of Culture’s Cinema Prize, the Jewish Quarterly Wingate Prize (UK, 2008), the St Peterburg Public Library’s Foreign Favorite Award (2010), and the Newman Prize (2012). Keret’s book, The Seven Good Years, was chosen by The Guardian as one of the best biographies and memoirs of 2015.
Other featured upcoming performances on the Kimmel Cultural Campus include Tony Hinchcliffe: Fully Groan Tour (September 29, 2023, Miller Theater); Aunty Donna: The Magical Dead Cat Tour (October 7, 2023, Perelman Theater); My Brother, My Brother and Me: The Twenty Sun + Sea Tour (October 11, 2023, Miller Theater); Nurse Blake: Shock Advised Tour (October 14, 2023, Miller Theater); The Moth Mainstage (October 21, 2023, Miller Theater); An Evening with the Late John Cleese (October 25, 2023, Academy of Music); Steve Martin & Martin Short: You Won’t Believe What They Look Like Today! (October 27, 2023, Academy of Music); Golden Girls – The Laughs Continue (October 27 – 28, 2023, Miller Theater); Ilana Glazer Live! (November 2, 2023, Miller Theater); The Wait Wait Stand Up Tour (November 10, 2023, Miller Theater); Jimmy Carr: Terribly Funny (November 11, 2023, Miller Theater); Lauren Graham: Have I Told You This Already? (November 16, 2023, Perelman Theater) and David Spade: Catch Me Inside (December 2, 2023, Miller Theater).
Tickets
Tickets can be purchased by calling 215-893-1999 or online at www.kimmelculturalcampus.org. In-person ticket sales can be conducted daily from 10 a.m. - 6 p.m. at the Academy of Music Box Office, located at 240 S. Broad Street. See www.kimmelculturalcampus.org for more information.
Ira Glass and Etgar Keret
Miller Theater on the Kimmel Cultural Campus
Wednesday, November 15, 2023, at 7:30 p.m.
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KIMMEL CULTURAL CAMPUS
Located in the heart of Center City, Philadelphia, our mission is to engage the region's diverse communities with art through performance and education. Our Cultural Campus serves more than 1-million guests per year and includes Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts (Verizon Hall, Perelman Theater, and SEI Innovation Studio), the Academy of Music, and the Miller Theater (formerly the Merriam Theater) – representing more than 160 years of rich history for the performing arts along Philadelphia's Avenue of the Arts. We are home to The Philadelphia Orchestra and esteemed Resident Companies: Opera Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Ballet, PHILADANCO, The Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, The Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, and Curtis Institute of Music. With nearly 9,000 seats per night, we are the region's most impactful performing arts center, and the second largest in the country. Our Cultural Campus serves as a preeminent and inclusive place to enjoy exceptional experiences that reflect the spirit of our region by cultivating a creative and socially responsible environment where our community shares experiences that are delivered with pride, integrity, and respect. As a 501 c 3 nonprofit organization, we collaborate on, present, and produce a broad range of relevant and meaningful events, we serve as an active gathering space for social and community events, we educate the region's young people through access to quality arts experiences, and we provide support to artists in the creation of new work. Read Kimmel Cultural Campus' vision statement, world view, and mission statement here. Learn more about our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion and how it encompasses our mission, coworkers, and programs here.
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For photography, please visit https://kcccpress.smugmug.com
For a PDF version of this press release, click here.