How Billie Saved My Life

A story of one woman’s journey through the mine field of a Jewish American family’s disintegration.

The fate of immigrant communities coming to the land of opportunity is often a rejection of their past in an attempt to integrate as quickly as possible into the host culture of their new home. Here in New York, the city that became the hub of the Jewish world in this hemisphere, we have become all too familiar with the image of the neurotic, self-conscious, self-denigrating Jew. One way to cope with these difficult and painful feelings is to cast them in a comic mold. Rarely does one see them dealt with head on and with brutal honesty.

In this provocative tale of a Jewish American family’s disintegration into chaos and abuse, Amy Coleman reveals how she found solace and strength from two cultures different from her own and different from each other. Through the music and lyrics of the great African American artists Billie Holiday and Bessie Smith, and the joyful hope of the Beatles she found an outlet for feelings she was still too young to understand, and shelter from the cold lonely world of an isolated and battered young person.

Sure its great to be able to laugh at yourself. But laughter without understanding leads to an unending cycle of self hate and despair. In this courageous one woman show Amy Coleman combines her talents as a writer and performer to come up with a mesmerizing, and in the end exhilarating evening of theater. Amy Coleman is a singer, actress, writer, and director and the daughter of a first generation American Jewish family.