Exclusives, NOV 05

PATERSON - An American in Berlin
Our exclusive interview with the director of Berlin's 'CABARET'
by SIMONE KUSSATZ, special guest writer

Well. It wasn't my decision. It was the decision of the producers. It was their idea. They approached me. But I was enthusiastic about the project from the start. First, I always wanted to be in Berlin. Second, when I walked into the “Bar Jeder-Vernunft,” I was fascinated, and thought [that] this [would totally be] the place for CABARET. And third, I don't get involved with many musicals, except for the ones with deeper messages and [have] a darker edge to them, so "Cabaret" was something that intrigued me greatly.



BEN-HUR - The Creation of Art as a Mosaic of Methods
An interview with Israeli artist Daniel Ben-Hur
by Simone Kussatz, special guest writer

I then came across an ancient mystic and Kabbalah teacher by the name Abulafia. He lived about 700 years ago in the 14th century. He told his students to sit on the floor and to start thinking, however not in words, but letters. It could be one letter, or several, as long as they didn’t build a word. This seemed like meditation to me. He got back to the source of things, because before any word, any thought, or any theory could be established, there were only letters.



GERMANY – It’s the World’s Largest Pumpkin Exhibit!
Not in America . . . but in Ludwigsburg
by Simone Kussatz, special guest writer

Jucker was right, I had never seen wood-crafted cows, sheep, wagons, pigs, goats, oxen, or even a tractor (a Lanz Bulldog) decorated with pumpkins. What I had learned about Halloween and the pumpkin time in America was that one dressed up and went for a trick-or-treat.

Here, however, I had come across a pumpkin spectacle to an extent that I had no idea even existed. The menus were filled with everything from pumpkin sparkling wine to pumpkin jam, pumpkin noodles to pumpkin mustard, and the tables, likewise, were filled with people eating and drinking.