Meisner technique, fashion, Russian language and culture, Jewish culture and immigration.
People who spend their lives looking for the deeper currents in the universe, but who don't take themselves too seriously.
Ella Fitzgerald, Spanish Harlem Orchestra, Joni Mitchell, Dixie Chicks, Buena Vista Social Club, Indigo Girls, John Legend, Juanes, Madonna, etc.
The Little Mermaid, Idlewild!, Being Julia, Finding Nemo, Spaceballs, The Anchorman, Serenity, Brokeback Mountain, Monty Python sketches and movies, Eddie Izzard standup, Victor Borge's routines.
LOST, Grey's Anatomy, Veronica Mars, SATC, Will & Grace, Sports Night.
Magical realism, the English Romantics, popular science writing like Gerald Durrell and Richard Dawkins. Recent favorites: Absurdistan by Gary Shteyngart, A Thousand Splendid Suns and The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini.
My family, Professor Anne Lake Prescott, Suzanne Esper, Jane Staab, and Diane Groner Levine.