Brandeis Magazine summer issue: Let us entertain you

Themed issue explores the world of alumni in entertainment

The summer issue of Brandeis Magazine, packed with news and stories about alumni in showbiz, is available on campus and online.

The themed issue explores the world of alumni in entertainment — TV, film and theater — on-screen, onstage and behind the scenes.

In an in-depth profile, filmmaker Debra Granik ’85 talks about indie tenets to which she holds fast despite Hollywood’s attention and several Academy Award nominations for her 2010 film “Winter’s Bone.”

With her Manhattan studio as the backdrop, famed photographer Lois Greenfield ’70 captures three rising stars — J. Bernard Calloway, M.F.A.’00, McCaela Donovan, M.F.A.’11 and Samrat Chakrabarti ’97 in a sassy photo spread.

Other stories feature production designer Steve Saklad ’78 of “Juno” and “Up in the Air” fame, and young actors, producers and a writer trying to adapt to a shifting theater landscape where success and uncertainty seem twinned forever.

Kathy Lawrence, the wife of President Fred Lawrence and a senior lecturer in the English department, offers a poignant tale of celebrity-limned life growing up in Betty Grable’s French provincial mansion. And film historian Thomas Doherty portrays the Jewish movie makers who escaped Nazi Germany to create a golden age of Hollywood cinema.

Last but not least, in “Turning Points” master sergeant Benari Poulton ’99 describes how he kept his cool during last year’s 125-degree fighting season in Afghanistan.

There’s also Commencement photos, news about the Rose Art Museum’s new director and, of course, Class Notes and alumni profiles.