The Broad Stage Announces An Evening With Fran Lebowitz

The Broad Stage presents An Evening with Fran Lebowitz, star of the recent Netflix series Pretend it's a City directed by Martin Scorsese. Lebowitz will appear on stage for four performances only April 28 through May 1, 2022. A Q+A with the audience follows the performance.

Tickets priced from $35 to $70 are on sale at thebroadstage.org. Performances are Thursday and Friday evenings at 7:30p; Saturday at 2p and 7:30p; and Sunday matinee at 2p. A limited number of premium tickets with a meet and greet with Lebowitz following are available at the three evening performances.

Lebowitz is an author, journalist and social observer, who in a cultural landscape filled with endless pundits and talking heads, stands out as one of our most insightful commentators. Purveyor of urban cool, Lebowitz is a cultural satirist whom many call the heir to Dorothy Parker.

Her essays and interviews offer her acerbic views on current events and the media - as well as pet peeves including tourists, baggage-claim areas, after-shave lotion, adults who roller skate, children who speak French, or anyone who is unduly tan. The New York Times Book Review calls Lebowitz an "important humorist in the classic tradition."

The Paris Review said, "Fran Lebowitz's trademark is the sneer; she disapproves of virtually everything except sleep, cigarette smoking, and good furniture. Her essays and topical interviews on subjects ranging from the difficulty of finding an acceptable apartment to the art of freeloading at weekend houses have come to be regarded as classics of literary humor and social observation."

"Hilarious," said The New York Times. "An unlikely and perhaps alarming combination of Mary Hartman and Mary McCarthy ... to a dose of Huck Finn add some Lenny Bruce, Oscar Wilde, and Alexis de Tocqueville, a dash of cab driver, an assortment of puns, minced jargon, and top it off with smarty pants."

Lebowitz off the cuff:

• "Special-interest publications should realize that if they are attracting enough advertising and readers to make a profit, the interest is not so special."

• "Spilling your guts is exactly as charming as it sounds."

• "Success didn't spoil me, I've always been insufferable."

About Fran Lebowitz. Fran Lebowitz worked odd jobs, such as taxi driving, belt peddling, and apartment cleaning ("with a small specialty in Venetian blinds"), before being hired by Andy Warhol as a columnist for Interview. That was followed by a stint at Mademoiselle. Her first book, a collection of essays titled Metropolitan Life, was a bestseller, as was a second collection, Social Studies. By turns ironic, facetious, deadpan, sarcastic, wry, wisecracking, and waggish, Lebowitz's prose is wickedly entertaining. Her two books are collected in The Fran Lebowitz Reader, with a new preface by the author. Lebowitz is also the author of the children's book, Mr. Chas and Lisa Sue Meet the Pandas.

Between 2001 to 2007, Lebowitz had a recurring role as Judge Janice Goldberg on the television drama Law & Order. She also had a part in the Martin Scorsese-directed film, The Wolf of Wall Street (2013). A raconteur if ever there was one, Lebowitz has long been a regular on various talk shows including those hosted by Jimmy Fallon, Conan O'Brien, and Bill Maher. In an interview with the Paris Review, Lebowitz said "I'm not a nervous person. I'm not afraid to be on TV. I'm only afraid when I write. When I'm at my desk I feel like most people would feel if they went on TV."

She can also be seen in various documentary films including the American Experience series on New York City, as well as Mapplethorpe: Look at the Pictures (2016), Regarding Susan Sontag (2014), and Superstar: The Life and Times of Andy Warhol (1990), among others. In 2010 Martin Scorsese directed a documentary about Lebowitz for HBO titled Public Speaking. A new limited documentary series, Pretend It's a City, also directed by Martin Scorsese, premiered on Netflix January 8, 2021.

Lebowitz was once named one of the year's most stylish women by Vanity Fair. She remains a style icon. Lebowitz lives in New York City, as she does not believe that she would be allowed to live anywhere else.

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