Characters Discussed
Heidi Holland
Heidi Holland, an art history professor and essayist who teaches at Columbia University. After attending Miss Crain’s School in Chicago in the mid-1960’s, she pursues her education as an undergraduate at Vassar and a member of the art history graduate program at Yale in the early 1970’s. Throughout her professional career, she advocates greater recognition for female artists, demonstrating at the Art Institute of Chicago in 1974, writing the book And the Light Floods in from the Left in the late 1970’s, directing the group Women’s Art in 1982, and arranging a show on Lila Cabot Perry in 1984. Although she has a deepening friendship with Peter Patrone and long-standing relationships with Susan Johnston and Scoop Rosenbaum, she feels lonely and stranded in 1986. Dissatisfied with social standards that discourage both women and men from recognizing and achieving their full potential, Heidi hopes that Judy, the Panamanian infant she adopts in 1988, will live in a more encouraging milieu than the one in which she came of age.
Scoop Rosenbaum
Scoop Rosenbaum, a man whom Heidi meets at a 1967 Eugene McCarthy fund-raiser in New Hampshire. Dressed in blue jeans and a work shirt, the Exeter graduate and Princeton dropout informs her that he is the editor in chief of The Liberated Earth News and displays a penchant for assigning grades to potato chips, music, people, and whatever else strikes his fancy. Describing himself as arrogant, difficult, and very smart, he simultaneously attracts and repels Heidi, with whom he carries on a sexual relationship while a Yale law student in 1970 and United States Supreme Court clerk in 1974. A junior associate at Sullivan Cromwell in 1977, he marries Lisa Friedlander, explaining to Heidi that, although he will always love the “A+” Heidi, the “A-” Lisa will prove to be a less competitive and, hence, more satisfactory wife. After becoming the influential editor of Boomer magazine, Scoop has an affair with his graphics assistant in 1980. By 1982, he and Lisa have two children, Maggie and Pierre. Increasingly estranged from Heidi in the 1980’s, Scoop visits her in 1988 with a silver spoon for Judy. He uses the occasion to tell Heidi that he has sold Boomer and decided to campaign for a congressional seat.
Susan Johnston
Susan Johnston, Heidi’s boy-crazy high school girlfriend. By 1970, she is a member of the Huron Street Ann Arbor Consciousness Raising Rap Group. She announces to the group that, instead of starting a women’s legal journal, she wishes to work within the system and accept a job with The Law Review, but she later leaves her clerkship alongside Scoop at the Supreme Court in 1974 to move to a women’s health and legal collective in Montana. In 1980, having attended business school, she accepts a position in Los Angeles as an executive vice president for a new production company. By 1984, she is a power broker, uninterested in Heidi’s emotional distress and unappreciative of the serious nature of her work, who callously proposes that her friend act as a consultant in creating a situation comedy about three female artists in a Houston loft.
Peter Patrone
Peter Patrone, a boy Heidi meets at a high school dance. He charms her with his cynical attitude toward the proceedings and remains in touch with her while a student at Williams College. Pursuing a career in medicine in Chicago in 1974, he reveals to Heidi that he is a homosexual and that he is involved with fellow doctor Stanley Zinc. A pediatrics resident at Bellevue in 1977, Peter earns the title of “The Best...
(This entire section contains 801 words.)
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Pediatrician in New York Under Forty” fromBoomer and becomes chief of pediatrics at New York Hospital by 1982. Concerned about the AIDS crisis, by 1987 he has started a special unit for AIDS-stricken children, using funds supplied by Susan Johnston’s production company. Although Peter and Heidi occasionally squabble, the two establish a strong friendship over the years. In 1988, he helps Heidi adopt Judy.
Lisa Friedlander
Lisa Friedlander, an award-winning illustrator of children’s books. Married to Scoop, she is happy to stay at home and care for their children but is distressed by her husband’s infidelity.
Denise
Denise, Lisa’s younger sister, who works for the talk show Hello New York from 1980 to 1982. Heidi, Scoop, and Peter appear on the show as a cross section of baby boomers. By 1984, she is a story editor for Susan.
Jill
Jill,
Fran
Fran, and
Becky Groves
Becky Groves, women who attended a meeting of the Huron Street Ann Arbor Consciousness Raising Rap Group in 1970. Jill is a forty-year-old wife and mother, Fran is a thirty-year-old lesbian physicist, and Becky Groves is a seventeen-year-old newcomer who is unhappy with her demanding live-in boyfriend.
April Lambert
April Lambert, the hostess of Hello New York. She is married to David Lambert, who owns sixty buildings in Manhattan in 1982.
Characters
Last Updated September 8, 2024.
Denise Friedlander
Denise is Lisa’s sister and works as a production assistant on the show
Hello, New York. When Susan Johnston becomes a Hollywood executive, she
hires Denise as her assistant.
Lisa Friedlander
Lisa Friedlander marries Scoop Rosenbaum and illustrates children’s books. She
takes on the role of housewife and mother to Scoop’s children, remaining
cheerful and sweet despite her husband’s infidelity. Lisa and Scoop have two
children, Maggie and Pierre.
Heidi Holland
Heidi is the central character of The Heidi Chronicles. The play follows
Heidi’s life from the 1960s to the 1980s, spanning ages 16 to 40. As an adult,
she works as an art historian, and her story unfolds through a series of art
lectures. In two of these lectures, she discusses overlooked female artists
known for their keen observational skills, who remained on the fringes of the
art world.
Much like the artists she lectures about, Heidi often finds herself observing rather than participating in her own life. As the play progresses, she becomes more disillusioned with her place in the world, the women's movement, the men in her life, and her pursuit of happiness. Despite achieving independence and professional success, she feels a void in her life. By the end of the play, she hopes to find fulfillment by adopting a baby from Panama.
Huron Street Ann Arbor Women’s Consciousness-raising Rap Group
This women’s group includes Jill, a housewife with four children; Fran, a
lesbian physicist and friend of Susan’s; and Becky Groves, a seventeen-year-old
high school student living with an abusive boyfriend. The group plays a
significant role in Heidi’s feminist awakening.
Susan Johnston
Susan is Heidi’s closest female friend. She frequently changes her career and
political views with the times. She enters law school but leaves a Supreme
Court clerkship to join a women’s collective in Montana. Later, she attends
business school, supposedly for the collective, but ends up accepting a job in
Hollywood as an executive for a new production company aiming at a young,
female audience. She justifies taking the job to prevent someone insensitive to
women’s issues from getting it. However, she eventually becomes a stereotypical
dealmaker, focused on greed and power. She even turns a lunch, where Heidi
wants to discuss personal matters, into a business meeting.
April Lambert
April is the host of Hello, New York, the show on which Peter, Scoop,
and Heidi appear to discuss their generation. She is married to David Lambert,
a significant real estate magnate with whom Scoop wants to do business.
Peter Patrone
Peter, one of Heidi’s closest friends, is a sharp-tongued cynic. They first
meet at a high school dance, where he is struck by her apparent boredom.
Throughout the play, Peter confides in Heidi about his homosexuality. After
college, he becomes a successful pediatrician in New York City. When Heidi
expresses her unhappiness, Peter retorts that he is weary of his friends dying
of AIDS and considers her dissatisfaction a luxury. When she decides to leave
New York City, Peter persuades her to stay for his sake.
Scoop Rosenbaum
Scoop Rosenbaum is another of Heidi’s friends and her former lover. They
initially meet at a political fundraiser for Eugene McCarthy. From the outset,
he is confident, slick, and self-assured, yet undeniably charming. Scoop
matches Heidi intellectually and has a tendency to rate everything, from
cookies to songs to experiences.
Scoop primarily works as a journalist, founding his own newspaper after leaving Princeton. He briefly practices law before launching a magazine aimed at Baby Boomers called Boomer. Scoop marries Lisa, who he expects will stay home, raise his children, and be a devoted wife. However, he cheats on her during her pregnancy. Although Heidi is essentially his soul mate, he does not marry her because she would be a competitor and challenge him.