John Heilpern, a contributing editor

Contributing editor

A contributing editor is a magazine job title that varies in responsibilities. Most often, a contributing editor is a freelancer who has proven ability and readership draw. The contributing editor regularly contributes articles to the publication but does not actually edit articles, and the title...

 to Vanity Fair

Vanity Fair (magazine)

Vanity Fair is a magazine of pop culture, fashion, and current affairs published by Condé Nast. The present Vanity Fair has been published since 1983 and there have been editions for four European countries as well as the U.S. edition. This revived the title which had ceased publication in 1935...

 (where he writes the "Out To Lunch

Out to Lunch

Out to Lunch may refer to:*Out to Lunch!, a 1964 album by Eric Dolphy*Out to Lunch , a 1974 ABC special*Out to Lunch , a radio show in Baltimore, Maryland...

" feature) and longtime drama critic for the New York Observer

New York Observer

The New York Observer is a weekly newspaper first published in New York City on September 22, 1987, by Arthur L. Carter, a very successful former investment banker with publishing interests. The Observer focuses on the city's culture, real estate, the media, politics and the entertainment and...

,

Heilpern, the son of a bookmaker, was born in Manchester, England

Manchester

Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...

, and educated at Oxford University

University of Oxford

The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...

. He began his career at The Observer

The Observer

The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...

 of London where his interviews with numerous cultural figures (including Graham Greene

Graham Greene

Henry Graham Greene, OM, CH was an English author, playwright and literary critic. His works explore the ambivalent moral and political issues of the modern world...

, Rudolf Nureyev

Rudolf Nureyev

Rudolf Khametovich Nureyev was a Russian dancer, considered one of the most celebrated ballet dancers of the 20th century. Nureyev's artistic skills explored expressive areas of the dance, providing a new role to the male ballet dancer who once served only as support to the women.In 1961 he...

, Henry Moore

Henry Moore

Henry Spencer Moore OM CH FBA was an English sculptor and artist. He was best known for his semi-abstract monumental bronze sculptures which are located around the world as public works of art....

, Artur Rubinstein

Arthur Rubinstein

Arthur Rubinstein KBE was a Polish-American pianist. He received international acclaim for his performances of the music of a variety of composers...

, John Gielgud

John Gielgud

Sir Arthur John Gielgud, OM, CH was an English actor, director, and producer. A descendant of the renowned Terry acting family, he achieved early international acclaim for his youthful, emotionally expressive Hamlet which broke box office records on Broadway in 1937...

 and Ralph Richardson

Ralph Richardson

Sir Ralph David Richardson was an English actor, one of a group of theatrical knights of the mid-20th century who, though more closely associated with the stage, also appeared in several classic films....

) received a British Press Award.

He has also worked as Peter Hall’s assistant director on Tamburlaine

Tamburlaine (play)

Tamburlaine the Great is the name of a play in two parts by Christopher Marlowe. It is loosely based on the life of the Central Asian emperor, Timur 'the lame'...

 at the National Theatre

Royal National Theatre

The Royal National Theatre in London is one of the United Kingdom's two most prominent publicly funded theatre companies, alongside the Royal Shakespeare Company...

 of Great Britain

Great Britain

Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...

 in 1976, and when he went to live in New York in 1980, he subsequently worked on Broadway as a librettist for Michael Bennett

Michael Bennett

Michael Bennett was an American musical theater director, writer, choreographer, and dancer. He won seven Tony Awards for his choreography and direction of Broadway shows and was nominated for an additional eleven....

 (of A Chorus Line

A Chorus Line

A Chorus Line is a 1975 musical about Broadway dancers auditioning for spots on a chorus line. The book was authored by James Kirkwood, Jr. and Nicholas Dante, lyrics were written by Edward Kleban, and music was composed by Marvin Hamlisch....

).

Heilpern is perhaps best known for his classic book, Conference of the Birds – The Story of Peter Brook in Africa. First published in 1977 by Faber & Faber

Faber and Faber

Faber and Faber Limited, often abbreviated to Faber, is an independent publishing house in the UK, notable in particular for publishing a great deal of poetry and for its former editor T. S. Eliot. Faber has a rich tradition of publishing a wide range of fiction, non fiction, drama, film and music...

 in England, it tells the story of a historic journey made by Peter Brook

Peter Brook

Peter Stephen Paul Brook CH, CBE is an English theatre and film director and innovator, who has been based in France since the early 1970s.-Life:...

 and an international troupe of actors (including the young Helen Mirren

Helen Mirren

Dame Helen Mirren, DBE is an English actor. She has won an Academy Award for Best Actress, four SAG Awards, four BAFTAs, three Golden Globes, four Emmy Awards, and two Cannes Film Festival Best Actress Awards.-Early life and family:...

) across the Sahara Desert through est Africa in search of a new form of theatre. The current paperback edition of Conference of the Birds, re-issued in America by Routlege, was described by The Sunday Telegraph as “one of the best books about theatre ever written”.

Among his other books, How Good Is David Mamet

David Mamet

David Alan Mamet is an American playwright, essayist, screenwriter and film director.Best known as a playwright, Mamet won a Pulitzer Prize and received a Tony nomination for Glengarry Glen Ross . He also received a Tony nomination for Speed-the-Plow . As a screenwriter, he received Oscar...

, Anyway? is a collection of theatre essays and reviews, and John Osborne

John Osborne

John James Osborne was an English playwright, screenwriter, actor and critic of the Establishment. The success of his 1956 play Look Back in Anger transformed English theatre....

 - The Many Lives of the Angry Young Man, is the authorized biography of the iconic playwright who revolutionized British theatre. First published in the UK by Chatto & Windus in 2006 under the title A Patriot for Us, the Osborne biography received the award for Best Theatre Book of the Year. On its publication in the US by Knopf in 2007, The New Yorker

The New Yorker

The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...

 described it as “compelling”, The Wall Street Journal

The Wall Street Journal

The Wall Street Journal is an American English-language international daily newspaper. It is published in New York City by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corporation, along with the Asian and European editions of the Journal....

 as “masterful”, and The Philadelphia Inquirer

The Philadelphia Inquirer

The Philadelphia Inquirer is a morning daily newspaper that serves the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, metropolitan area of the United States. The newspaper was founded by John R. Walker and John Norvell in June 1829 as The Pennsylvania Inquirer and is the third-oldest surviving daily newspaper in the...

 as “a model of what a literary biography ought to be.” The Wall Street Journal named it one its Ten Best

Top 10 list

The Late Show Top Ten List is a regular segment of the television program Late Show with David Letterman. It is adapted from Letterman's NBC show Late Night...

 Books of the Year.

His fable, A Children’s Crusade, will be staged by Lars Rudolfsson in Stockholm, Sweden

Stockholm

Stockholm is the capital and the largest city of Sweden and constitutes the most populated urban area in Scandinavia. Stockholm is the most populous city in Sweden, with a population of 851,155 in the municipality , 1.37 million in the urban area , and around 2.1 million in the metropolitan area...

, in 2010.

John Heilpern has been married twice; one of his former wives is editor and writer Joan Juliet Buck

Joan Juliet Buck

Joan Juliet Buck is an American writer, social critic, and actress. She was the editor in chief of French Vogue from 1994 to 2001.-Background:...

. His longtime companion is Sydney Weinberg. His daughter, Rachel, is a psychologist.