Amy Oppenheimer’s
Looking for Justice
(in all the wrong places)

Written & Performed by Amy Oppenheimer
Directed by David Ford

About the Show

A hippie, activist, lesbian, feminist, lawyer, judge’s search for identity & justice.

The at times humorous and at times deadly serious show begins when Amy moves  to Berkeley in the early 1970’s during second wave feminism.  Amy finds her identity as a lesbian feminist, goes to law school to fight for women’s rights, represents coal miners and battered women in Appalachia and returns to California to open a lesbian feminist law practice. She is representing women who had been sexually harassed – pre-Anita Hill – but keeps seeing all sides of things, becomes an administrative judge and starts a law firm to do mediation and impartial investigations of harassment and discrimination. She adopts two children – both biracial – and experiences racism up close and personal. 

In the meantime, she can’t stop revisiting her first experience with the criminal justice system in 1970 when she accompanied a friend to a rape trial. Her (white) friend had been raped by a (Black) boyfriend. The friend wanted him to get help, rather than serve a decade in prison. This restorative justice solution was not an option. Amy wonders about her role in the verdict and if real justice is possible in an unjust world. 

The performance will be followed by a discussion about how Jewish values impact how we see justice.

Trigger warning:

The content of this production includes topics and events that may be triggering to some people including sexual violence/rape, sexual harassment, racism and familial violence.

Artist Biography

Amy Oppenheimer, a lesbian feminist lawyer and retired judge, has spent her 45-year legal career advocating for women and people of color and speaking truth to power. She is co-author of Investigating Workplace Harassment: How to be Fair, Thorough and Legal (SHRM 2002).  Amy has been a member of Beth El since 1998, her children (Talia and Adin) were Bar/Bat Mitzvah here, were involved with Camp Kee Tov and Talia worked there after college. She was on the board for several years and was on the rabbi search committee for Rabbi Kahn.