2012 Benefit
Tickets are available at the door starting at 6 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 28.
Use the Trinity Commons entrance from Prospect Avenue just east of E. 22nd St.
Download the 2012 Benefit Press Release
Please Join Us for Near West Theatre’s Annual Benefit:
Consider Yourself One of Us!
As we honor Joanne Lewis, long-time friend and supporter
Saturday, January 28, 2012
6:00 to 9:30 p.m.
Trinity Cathedral, 2230 Euclid Ave., Downtown Cleveland (use Prospect Ave. entrance)
Ticket sales start at the door at 6:00 p.m. (Online and phone sales are now closed.)
You’ll experience:
• An energetic and timely performance by Near West cast members
• Food provided by Euro USA and prepared by Spice of Life Catering Co.
• Desserts provided by Gypsy Beans & Baking Co.
• Dancing and a live DJ
• A silent auction and raffle highlighting the best that Cleveland has to offer
Tickets are $85 (or a 10 pack of tickets for $800!)
Questions? Call 216-961-9750.
Sponsors
Lead Sponsor ($10,000 level)
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Director Sponsors ($7,500 level)
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Producer Sponsors ($5,000 level)
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Choreographer Sponsors ($2,500 level)
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Designer Sponsors ($1,000 level)
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Benefit honoree: Joanne M. Lewis
author, activist, founding Board member
Joanne M. Lewis of Cleveland Heights, the honoree at Near West Theatre’s 2012 Annual Benefit, is “devoted to the belief that ‘you can make a difference in the way the world turns.’” What she describes as “the 78 years of my life adventure thus far” have included work in education and the arts, founding and running a center on global issues, writing or editing five books, and raising five children.
Lewis recently wrote that Near West Theatre is “a sanctuary, offering within its intimate space the chance for each of us to grapple with our eternally flawed humanity. Through the power of heartfelt and profound performances, we come to share a sense of optimism.” She regularly attends the classic musicals the theater produces with people of all ages, and saw Oliver! in December 2011.
Executive Director Stephanie Morrison-Hrbek, who founded the theater in 1978, appreciates the guidance and encouragement she received in the early years from Lewis and her late husband, Robert L. Lewis. In 1983 the couple joined the new advisory board of what was then known as Near West Side Community Theatre; Joanne served for over a decade. “Joanne’s bold truth-telling, insights and wisdom have shaped mission, vision and decision-making at the theater over these almost 30 years of participation,” Morrison-Hrbek says. “In moments of difficult discernment, I always call Joanne and her recommendations are spot-on. There is no one like her in my personal and professional life. She is a source of inspiration to our community and always has you laughing amidst the profound conversations.”
Joanne Lewis’s recognition by the theater is the most recent of several honors for her work in Greater Cleveland. She founded the Global Issues Resource Center at Cuyahoga Community College and directed it for 20 years. She founded, and continues to advise, the Robert L. Lewis Academy of Scholars at Tri-C. She was a founding Trustee of the Cleveland Opera, the Footpath Dance Company of Shaker Heights, and the Fairmount Center for the Arts. She has served on the boards of such varied organizations as the Cleveland Center for Contemporary Art (now MOCA), the League of Women Voters Education Fund, and the Gun Control Federation of Ohio.
Four local history books bear her name as author, editor or contributor: To Market, To Market – An Old-Fashioned Family Story: The West Side Market (Edgewater Book Company, 1981); In My Day (1978) and In Our Day (1986), oral and architectural histories of Cleveland Heights, published by the Heights Community Congress; and My Recollections of Old Cleveland: Manners, Mansions, Mischief (1978), a biographical study of the Millionaires’ Row district.
Born in Cleveland, Lewis is a graduate of Cleveland Heights High School (1951) and the University of Michigan (1955). She also studied at the University of Geneva, Switzerland; Barnard College, New York City; and Western Reserve University, Cleveland. She has five children (Brian, Paul, David, Pavia and Clea Lewis) and nine grandchildren.
Her past honors include the Award of Achievement in Education from Northern Ohio LIVE (1996-97), the “Woman Who Dares” Award for Global Security Education from the Cleveland Section of the National Council of Jewish Women (1998), and the “Innovator of the Year” Award from the League for Innovation in the Community College (2000).
The benefit will be held Saturday, Jan. 28, 2012, from 6:00 to 9:30 p.m. at Trinity Cathedral, 2230 Euclid Ave., in downtown Cleveland. Entrance is from the Prospect Avenue side, just east of East 22nd Street. Tickets will be sold at the door starting at 6:00 p.m. Jan. 28 at the cathedral (advance ticket sales by phone and Internet have now closed).