This fall, I am asking you to travel to Iran. Not the present-day, front-page, headline-grabbing, nuclear-developing, Holocaust-denying, Israel-hating Iran, but the Iran of just 20 or 30 years ago, as described in two newly published novels, Gina Nahai’s “Caspian Rain” (MacAdam Cage) and Dalia Sofer’s “The Septembers of Shiraz” (Ecco). Although Nahai’s novel takes place […]

In one of his most famous works, the French poet Francois Villon asked: “Mais ou sont les neiges d’antan? (But where are the snows of yesteryear?).” I might ask the same about where this summer went. It seems like just last week my daughter was getting out of class, and now she’s about to start […]

“I want a man with kindness and understanding. Is that too much to ask of a millionaire?” — Zsa Zsa Gabor Lately, I have been thinking about Zsa Zsa, and it makes me sad. A few years ago, she crashed her car on Sunset, and she has been wheelchair-bound since. She had been a recluse […]

with additional reporting by Natasha Teicholz When I heard that the circus was coming to town, I couldn’t wait to take my daughter. I’m talking about the Greatest Show on Earth, Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, appearing in Orange County until Aug. 5. I know that Cirque du Soleil has its fans — […]

“The plov is great.” Jonathan Gold, the LA Weekly’s restaurant critic and the 2007 winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism, e-mailed me the above about Uzbekistan (the restaurant on La Brea, not the country), where we were planning to meet. He assumed, of course, that I knew what plov is — I didn’t then, […]

Conversations with David Mamet and Nathan Englander: DAVID MAMET As part of the Nextbook Festival of ideas, held at UCLA on April 22nd, I interviewed Pulitzer prize winning playwright, screenwriter, novelist and essayist David Mamet. Nextbook had chosen the title of “Make Believe Jews” for our conversation and I took that to mean a conversation […]

NATHAN ENGLANDER About a month later, on May 21, 2007, I found myself on the stage of the Mark Taper auditorium at the Los Angeles Central Public Library, as part of the ALOUD series, in conversation with Nathan Englander whose new novel, “The Ministry of Special Cases” (Knopf) had recently been published. Englander is also […]

To see the article as featured in the Jewish Journal, click on: For the cover: http://tommywood.com/cover.pdf For the article, with photos http://tommywood.com/JJcoverarticle.pdf He left his mark fighting in the Shoah, spearheading postwar relief efforts, aiding migration to Palestine – and on me My father always said he wasn’t a hero. “All the heroes are dead,” […]

Great ideas and great literature are being championed, promoted and supported in Los Angeles, in public and private forums, in private homes and public spaces, through the age-old medium of conversation. Several years ago, the Jewish Museum in New York mounted an exhibition called “The Power of Conversation: Jewish Women and Their Salons.” Focusing on […]

Summer movies provide thrills, chills and laughs and are more noted for their special effects and star actors than for the acting and the seriousness of their purpose. Which makes this a good time to visit with Mark Rydell, a man whose more than 50-year career as an actor, director and producer speaks of his […]