Comic book writer Stan Lee. He was the leading creative force behind the rise of Marvel Comics and is responsible for many of the best-known comic book heroes. Forty years ago, he co-created the character Spider-Man. He also helped create The X-Men, The Fantastic Four and The Incredible Hulk. He is now Chairman Emeritus of Marvel Enterprises, and is executive producer of the new movie, Spider-Man. It stars Tobey Maguire, Willem Dafoe and Kirsten Dunst. His new book is called Excelsior! The Amazing Life of Stan Lee.
Gino Yevdjevich is the lead singer of the Bosnian-Bulgarian punk rock band Kultur Shock. He was a rock musician in Sarajevo when the Bosnian War broke out. During the war, he played a major role in rewriting the musical Hair into a new version called Hair: Sarajevo, AD 1992 which played in Sarajevo for three years to standing room only crowds. Yevdjevich now lives in Seattle; he moved there in 1996 when a theatre produced his play Sarajevo: Behind Gods Back. His band Kultur Shock has a new CD called F.U.C.C. the INS
David Newman is a political columnist for The Jerusalem Post. He is also chairman of the department of politics and government at Ben Gurion University of the Negev and editor of The International Journal of Geopolitics. He'll discuss the history of the Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza. He's written about the settlements in The New York Times. Newman is also author of the book, Population, Settlement and Conflict: Israel and the West Bank.
Foreign affairs columnist for The New York Times, Thomas Friedman. He's just won his third Pulitzer Prize, this time for his "clarity of vision, based on extensive reporting, in commenting on the worldwide impact of the terrorist threat." Friedman was awarded the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for his international reporting from Lebanon and the 1988 Pulitzer Prize for international reporting from Isreal. He's also the author of From Beirut to Jerusalem, and The Lexus and the Olive Tree: Understanding Globalization.
He left the priesthood after 22 years to marry and has been married now for 25 years. Kennedy believes that celibacy should no longer be an absolute condition for the priesthood. Hes the author of the new book, The Unhealed Wound: The Church and Human Sexuality (St. Martins Gr
Father James Martin has written a new memoir about his spiritual journey from the corporate world to the priesthood. His book is In Good Company: The Fast Track from the Corporate World to Poverty, Chastity and Obedience (paperback, Sheed & Ward). Martin is associate editor of America, the national Catholic magazine and is the winner of three Catholic Press Association Awards. Hes also the author of This Our Exile: A Spiritual Journey with the Refugees of East Africa.
From the South African production of the opera Carmen, and Yiimimangaliso: The Mysteries, an opera based on the medieval Chester Mystery plays: Music Director Charles Hazlewood and Singers Sandile Kamle and Pauline Malefane. The operas were staged in Londons West End to rave reviews. They are currently making their American premiere at the Spoleto Festival in Charleston, South Carolina that runs May 24-June 9. (www.spoletousa.org). Hazlewood went to South Africa and auditioned over a thousand performers for Carmen.
He's been called the 'not-so missing link between soul and country'. His songs have been recorded by Vince Gill, George Strait, the Dixie Chicks, Shelby Lynne and many others. But he's also recorded over a dozen of his own solo albums and has sung background vocals on more than 40 albums. In 1999 he collaborated with his hero, blue grass legend Ralph Stanley on the album, I Feel Like Singing Today which was nominated for a Grammy.
Actor and rapper Will Smith. His film Ali in which he stars as fighter Muhammad Ali is now out on video and DVD. This summer he stars in Men in Black II. Smith also starred in the films The Legend of Bagger Vance, Men In Black, Independence Day, and Six Degrees of Separation. Smith got his start as a rapper, making his first record in high school. Known as the Fresh Prince he and his friend DJ Jazzy Jeff went on to make several albums and won two Grammys and three American Music Awards. He also starred in his own TV sitcom, The Fresh Prince of Bel Air.
Producers, writers, directors Justine Shapiro and B.Z. Goldberg. Their new documentary film Promises takes a look at the Palestinian-Isreali conflict thru the eyes of seven children living in or near Jerusalem. It was filmed between 1997 and the summer of 2000. SHAPIRO grew up in Berkeley, California and hosts and co-writes the award-winning travel series, Lonely Planet. Goldberg was born in Boston and grew up outside of Jerusalem and has been a television journalist. Promises was broadcast on PBS last December as part of the P.O.V. series.
Writer Noelle Howey has written a new memoir about growing up in a household where as she was coming of age, her father was coming out as a trans-sexual and her mother was coming into her own as an independent woman. Her new book is Dress Codes: Of Three Girlhoods-My Mother's, My Father's and Mine (Picador). Howey is coeditor of Out of the Ordinary: Essays on Growing Up with Gay, Lesbian, and Transgender Parents. She received a 2001 Nonfiction Fellowship from the New York Foundation for the Arts.
