Emily S. Mendel, a writer and photographer, has been a regular contributor to culturevulture.net since 2006, where she reviews theater, art, film, television and destinations. Ending her 30-year law practice has given Ms. Mendel the time to indulge in her love of travel and the arts, and to serve as the theater reviewer for berkeleyside.com.
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Writes in: Art & Architecture, Dance, Destinations, Etc, Features, Film, Television, and Theater.
TheaterBerkeley,
“Temple,” a U.S. premiere production at the Aurora Theatre, is a powerful exposition on how the religious officials of London’s St. Paul Cathedral reacted to the Occupy movement’s 2011 encampment outside Sir Christopher Wren’s renowned church. Artfully directed by Aurora ...
TheaterBerkeley,
“Hershey Felder as Irving Berlin” is one in a series of one-man musical biographies written and performed by Hershey Felder. Berkeley Rep theater goers and critics, myself included, have already sung the praises of Felder, the gifted concert pianist, composer ...
TheaterSan Francisco,
Robert Lepage’s 1991 creative drama of transatlantic love, loss and foreign complications intersperses tales of American jazz trumpeter Miles Davis (1926-1981) (outstanding Wellesley Robertson III) and French writer, playwright and filmmaker, Jean Cocteau (1889 –1963) (marvelous Olivier Normand) with a ...
TheaterBerkeley,
“Leni,” a powerful two-person high wire act, examines the controversial Leni Riefenstahl (1902-2003), the 1930s extraordinary filmmaker and vilified Hitler propagandist. “Leni” is part exposition, part cross-examination and part psychoanalysis. This intermissionless 80-minute production explores, but of course, cannot ...
TheaterBerkeley,
Since its Supreme Court ruling in 1973, Roe v. Wade, which legalized abortion in the United States, has been a lightning rod that continues to electrify public opinion. It serves as a seismograph that registers politicians’ and citizens’ ...
Art & ArchitectureSan Francisco,
“Matisse always surprises me…. It’s the restraint coupled with the sensuousness that’s so utterly exceptional.” Richard Diebenkorn
The distinguished artistic career of the prominent postwar California painter Richard Diebenkorn (1922–1993) began with his unique style of abstract expressionism (ca.1946–1956), ...
Art & ArchitectureSan Francisco,
“Monet: The Early Years” is visually gorgeous and academically significant. Presenting Monet’s work from the early phase of his career (1858-1872) starting when Monet was 18 years old and ending when he turned 32, the show traces the development ...
TheaterBerkeley,
“Hand to God,” a Tony-nominated, riotously funny romp, shaded with black undertones, uses a foul-mouthed sock puppet to demonstrate the shocking results when one is freed from society’s moral restraints. Playwright Robert Askins accomplishes this lesson using ribald humor overlaying ...
TheaterSan Francisco,
Against the current rage of Islamophobia infecting our nation, the world premiere of "The Thousand Splendid Suns" at ACT's Geary Theater explores the plight of Afghani women.
Based on Khaled Hosseini’s best-selling 2007 novel, this theatrical adaptation by ...
TheaterBerkeley,
”I believe in mess, tears, pain, self-abasement, loss of self-respect, nakedness. Not caring doesn’t seem much different from not loving.” ― Tom Stoppard, “The Real Thing”
Aurora’s outstanding production of Tom Stoppard’s award-winning 1982 play, “The Real Thing,” ...
