WEEKEND IN MICHIGAN PART 2

Friday night we had a fantastic dinner party (lots of really good restaurants in Ann Arbor) with Florine Mark, President CEO of Weight Watchers International and Carol Rosenberg, mother of Paul Rosenberg who is long time manager of Eminem and Richard’s college friend who is President and CEO of Jewish Community Services. Turns out the woman who will replace her when she retires (soon) has a Coton de Tulear like my pooch, Tulea, and GOT IT FROM THE SAME BREEDER IN MONTREAL AS I GOT TULEA. Imagine, at a dinner table in Ann Arbor I eat with a couple whose dog is related to mine…an uncommon breed!!!! Today we will continue to tour the campus, give a Q and A, and go the football game!

We stayed at the Bell Tower Inn in Ann Arbor.

Outside Rackham Auditortium where Richard and I spoke—together today. A first.

Inside The audience--a mix of community people and students.

I'm used to doing Questions and Answers before large groups. Richard isn't and he did a great job, instructive, a rare perspective and funny too.

Richard with Carol Rosenberg who was in Theatre and education. Richard was in music education majoring in playing the oboe.

Richard with Andrew Goulston who is attending the School on a Richard Perry Music Scholarship.

University Symphony Band in Hill auditorium rehearsing.

The Green glass wall is the Arthur Miller Theatre.

Nice architecture, huh?

Inside the Arthur Miller Theatre. Stage set for a Community theatre group doing "Death of a Salesman." Miller insisted the theatre be very flexible so it can be proscenium or the apron can extend out over an orchestra pit as shown here. It holds about 222 people.

We passed by some Frat parties on the way to the game.

Richard and me meeting with the President of University of Michigan, Mary Sue Coleman. President for 10 years.

U of M Stadium View Box

This was my first University of Michigan Football game and I was excited! And they won, which made it even more fun. They call this stadium "the Big House." I even learned the fight song: "Hail to the victors valiant, hail to the conquering heroes, hail, hail to Michigan, the champions of the west." Sometimes their chants sound like the Tomahawk chop song. Okay, so I'm a little homesick to the Braves.

In fact, this is the first football game I've been to since a Harvard-Yale Game when I was 18. Between then and now it's all been baseball. This is the View from the University President's box. We actually sat most of the game down near the field on the forty five yard line, until we got a little too cold.

87 year old Mrs Pilcher's husband was a Prof of Finance at U of M. She's been coming to games for 65 years. Now she comes alone but still comes. Has 17 grandchildren all involved in sports.

Following the game we attended a dinner party at the home of Florine Mark, President and CEO of Weight Watchers International who is hosting a speech I am giving on Sunday.

Florine Mark asking the assembled 40 guests to speak briefly about the one material thing they can not live without. I thought about it and I can say, that there is not one single material thing I can't live without. I know that because I have lived without all the things I used to think I couldn't live without and found life quite fine without them. Sleep is the one thing I can't live without, 8 or 9 hours of it a night.

Here I am with former mayor of Detroit, Dennis Archer, who knew friends of mine from Detroit from years ago like Hamish Sinclair and Ken Cockrel.

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11 Comments
  1. is weightwatchers and Dr. OZ teamed up on doing something?

  2. Jane,

    9 of my friends and I came to see you in Dearborn for the ReMARKable Women event which Florine Mark hosts every year. I have been to several of these fundraisers, and they are always fabulous; this year was no exception, and in my opinion, the best one yet! I am so impressed by your honesty, willingness and openness in speaking to us. It felt as if we are all old friends, and we related to your reference to the 12 steps. Thank you for your message of hope; and I can’t wait to read Prime Time!

  3. How fun to see you enjoying the sights of Michigan! Ann Arbor is a wonderful, beautiful city with great character! And a U of M football game is the perfect first football game to attend as an adult! Folks in Michigan are greatly dedicated and enthusiastic about their sports teams. 🙂
    Next time you are in Michigan check out The Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield Village. You can check out the vast collections of Henry Ford, the chair Lincoln got shot in, the car President Kennedy got shot in, the famous Rosa Parks bus, as well as the homes of the Wright Brothers, Noah Webster, Firestone, and Henry Ford himself. Plus Edison’s Laboratory and the courthouse where Lincoln practiced law. (Sorry, but a little advertising for a fantastic Museum complex can’t be passed up.) By the way, love that you take the time to talk to people around you such as Mrs. Pilcher.
    I loved to finally meet you this weekend, but I will write more about that when, I am guessing, you write Michigan Part 3. 🙂

    • SUSAN K!!!!! What a wonderful surprise for you to come up at the book signing and say your name. You’ve ‘friended’ me since the beginning. I love it. I just got your letter which means the world to me. I’d love to share it on my blog but what do you think? Too personal? Too much like I’m sounded my horn? What do you think? xx

  4. I have to say how interesting to see and read about your visit to Michigan, my home state. I was raised in California and like you my mother was born within Ontario, Canada. My grandfather worked for Henry Ford in the early 1920’s, one forgets what a rich culture there is. Other than Richard Perry,of course there are many, from Malcolm X, raised in Lansing) to Rosa Parks, or Madonna and Tom Hayden or John Sinclair. Huwaida Arraf, co-founder of the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), a pro-Palestinian organization, (born in Detroit). The creative side of cold weather moves people like Lucille Ball,Francis Ford Coppola, film director, or Jeff Daniels, actor, writer, filmmaker even the great Jason Robards, Sr., actor (born in Hillsdale),George C. Scott,Tom Selleck or your good friend Marlo Thomas, and father Danny Thomas, Lily Tomlin, actress and comedian,Robert Wagner,Robin Williams and the late great Gilda Radner, to look at a few , hope if did not over do it.

    with love and care,

  5. Looks like you had a great time. 🙂

    for our edification: The Word of God came as a son of man to show God’s true character. “No one has ever seen God, the only Son, who is at the Father’s side, has made Him known” (John 1:18). “No one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal Him” (Matthew 11:27). When one of the disciples asked, “Show us the Father, Jesus said, ‘Don’t you know Me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen Me has seen the Father'” (John 14:8, 9).

  6. Jane,
    We were thrilled to hear that “Jane Fonda” is in the suites at the Michigan game Saturday! Everyone was trying to get a glimpse of the famous movie star, exercise fitness guru and most importantly in my book activist! You walked past my brother in laws suite and I couldn’t contain myself when I saw you, I blurted out “Jane, you are gorgeous”, which you graciously replied, “Thank you, and so are you.” Well needless to say, I’ve told EVERYONE that Jane Fonda said I was gorgeous…(stretch as much as I can)…

    Thank you for visiting our part of the world, for the work that you do…and for making my week!

    Come back anytime… Go Blue.

    Pam Junge

  7. Ms. Fonda:

    Thank you for visiting the University of Michigan last weekend and I hope you enjoyed your time in Ann Arbor. I am certain that all who were able to attend your talk and have an opportunity to meet you were thrilled. I was especially excited to have an opportunity to cheer on the Wolverines with you at the stadium during my homecoming visit and a Michigan Victory.

    HAIL TO THE VICTORS!, and I hope to see you in the stadium again next time.

    GO BLUE!

    ~Fred (the guy in the Michigan mask)
    ’05 UofM School of Music Alum, voice performance

    • Fred, OMG! the guy in that cool mask. I love t!

  8. It was thrilling beyond words to finally be able to shake your hand! AND have you sign one of your fantastic books! Who would have thought you would actually have an event in the city I live in! I wanted to say SO much to you, all positive of course :), but I knew there were many people eagerly awaiting your signature on their treasured books.
    You are an excellent speaker. I have heard you speak twice now, once with Oprah and now at the ReMarkable Women Luncheon. I love seeing the audience’s reaction. At first I don’t think they know what to expect, guessing you are going to speak about fitness or such. After they hear you, after you speak about things that we can all relate to and touch us all in different ways, the audience is always in awe. Just like at Oprah, at the end I heard the people at my table say “Wow, that was incredible.” Thank you for sharing and thank you sooooo much for taking the time to sign my book!
    I am delighted that you received my letter! I didn’t know if it would find it’s way to you or not. You may absolutely share it if you want. I think everyone, of all ages, should read your book, Prime Time. It really does allow one to look at one’s own life and realign what is important in life.
    Thank you for being who you are and thank you for allowing us to take part on your journey through life.

  9. Jane, “BOTH” Janes in fact. (My mom, Jane Pilcher, and of course, the Acadamy Award winning actress, Ms. Fonda) I’m so glad you two somehow met.

    My mother was such a huge fan of your father’s work, (who wasn’t?) and my mother took me to many of your films first-run showings in the “little college town” of Ann Arbor.

    Jane Pilcher has indeed “lived well”, and certainly “aged well”.

    Your courtesy and graciousness in dealing with my mother this past weekend is most appreciated by me, her son, my brothers, and my sister, who still lives in A2.

    “Jane P.” is a great woman, and is a “Mom” to an awful lot of former students at U of M and kids in Ann Arbor in general. By her very nature, she has been a surrogate mom for friends and students who have 1)Lost their birth mom. 2)Are away from home. 3)Need a motherly figure. 4)Just need a friend.

    It just comes naturally for her, perhaps a product of her Iowa farm-girl upbringing.

    Perhaps the best example I can give of how much she has impacted others, in her own way, is during my junior high years, when my best friend, and family friend, Matt Schembechler, called the local radio station, and encouraged listeners to vote for Mrs. P. as “Mother Of The Year”.

    She won. But of course anyone who knew her knew that, us kids, well, we knew it, we just didn’t tell her that at the time.

    To me, she’s still the “Mother Of The Year.”

    Thanks for making her weekend just a little bit more special.

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