Sandi Klein's Conversations with Creative Women

Katie Hannigan

Katie Hannigan is a Brooklyn-based comic by way of Indiana. She's been performing stand up since 2009: her bent is theatrical with a wholesome midwestern darkness. Go figure. Katie's been featured on The Oxygen Network, Laughs on Fox, and Good Day New York. Listen in as she shares her backstory with us.

Elizabeth Van Meter

Elizabeth Van Meter's acting career includes live theater, independent films, comedy and video game voice overs - but it's her work as a documentary filmmaker and founder of The Purpose Project that drives her today. Its goal:  to find individuals here and abroad, who against all odds, are making positive changes in their corners of the world.  In Elizabeth's documentary Thaos' Library, we meet a young Vietnamese woman, who despite physical deformities caused by agent orange, wants nothing more than to bring books to the children of her village. Elizabeth says she didn't choose Thaos' story - it chose her and she had to tell it for her own sanity.  

Mary John Frank

Houston native and New York-based artist Mary John Frank's creativity has taken her in several different directions. The choreographer and director has worked in film, on stage, music videos, fashion, multi-media and installation art. Her latest project - Debutaunt, is an inter-active dance-based show that explores the age old tradition of being presented to society. In her adapation, the audience is invited to attend a debutante ball and gets to know 5 VERY different debs. In a time when 'coming out' has taken on an entirely new meaning, the concept of a young woman being formally introduced to society is jarring. Oh, by the way, Mary John is a former deb herself.

Aileen Bordman

Aileen Bordman grew up surrounded by beauty and art. Her mother Helen helped restore the gardens at Giverny, home of Claude Monet. Aileen's passion and first hand knowledge of the artist's life is evident in Monet's Palate, the 2008 documentary she wrote and produced after taking a sabbatical from her career on Wall Street. And now there is Monet's Palate Cookbook - The Artist & His Kitchen Garden at Giverny. Co-authored by Aileen, it recreates the artist's two-acre garden through detailed information about the vegetables he grew and the 60 recipes she created - inspired by his journals and extensive travels. You're in for a fascinating, first-hand conversation about the Father of Impressionism.

Lacey Schwartz - Revisited

This week we revisit our Conversation with Lacey Schwartz. Lacey is the director and subject of Little White Lie, a riveting, powerful, emotional documentary that traces her upbringing as an only child in a white, Jewish family in upstate New York. However, it was during her freshman year in college that she learned the truth.  When confronted, her mother finally acknowledged having had an extra-marital affair...and that her biological father was in fact, black. Lacey, who is also the CEO of Truth Aid, a company that makes movies, produces multi-media content and performs educational outreach on social issues, makes for a fascinating conversation.

Rachel Pasternak and Rachel Fisher - Documentary Directors and Producers

Meet Rachel Pasternak and Rachel Fisher, the women behind Joachim Prinz: I Shall Not Be Silent. This powerful, riveting documentary tells the story of Rabbi Prinz. His impassioned sermons at synagogues in Berlin helped save many lives by encouraging Jews to leave Germany in the 1930s. Arrested numerous times and eventually expelled by the Nazis, Rabbi Prinz came to the U.S. where he wound up becoming a major player in the civil rights movement... helping to organize the 1963 March on Washington. This is a conversation you'll want to hear and a movie you must see.

Michele Westmorland

An internationally recognized underwater and conservation photographer, Michele Westmorland is a much sought after speaker who has lectured all over the world. While her topics are usually about marine and cultural life, she prefers to share the story of a Caroline Mytinger, a young American portrait painter. She and a female friend set out from San Francisco in the 1920s on a 4-year journey to the South Pacific to "record some of these people before they vanished forever." More than 80 years later Michele and her team embarked on a 2-month expedition to retrace their steps. What Michele has to share is riveting.

Dr. Maya Tolstoy

You'll find Maya Tolstoy, PhD both on land and on the ocean floor. An Associate Professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Columbia, University, she is also a marine geophysicist, who specializes in seafloor earthquakes AND volcanoes. Dr. Tolstoy has participated in 31 ocean-going expeditions - leading or co-leading more than half of them. In 2005, she was part of director James Cameron's expedition that filmed the 3-D Imax documentary "Aliens of the Deep." Does Maya have plenty to share? You betcha!