Richard Kind has done it all.
He starred in sitcoms like “Mad About You” and “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” was nominated for a Tony Award for his performance in “The Big Knife” and even played a bug, a car and a child’s imaginary friend in various animated movies.
And on March 12, he will bring his wit to Charm City for an appearance at Chizuk Amuno Congregation.
“A Night of Laughs with Richard Kind” is designed to be fun and entertaining, but also to raise money for a good cause, said event co-chair Amanda Levine.
“We’ve never done a big event like this,” she said. “We’ve had smaller fundraisers through the years … so we’re hoping to raise enough money to provide for scholarships, capital improvements, security improvements, tech improvements … that’s what this is about.”
Tickets cost $100 a person for an hour-and-a-half-long program with Kind and a dessert reception after. There is also a pre-event reception available to event donors who contribute $1,000 or more. The event starts at 6 and will run until 9 p.m. at the synagogue.
“What we really want is for people to have a good time, number one,” Levine said.
“Number two, we want good feelings towards what goes on on our campus, so that somebody walks away and says, ‘Wow, that was really fun!’ and ‘I enjoyed being there.’ It’s fun; it’s low-key; it’s low stakes. We try to price point it at a place that is accessible to most people. We don’t want to turn people away if we don’t have to. We just want our community to come together for something that’s nice, a little bit elevated and accessible and fun.”
The event will bring together members of all corners of the Chizuk Amuno community: the Goldsmith Early Childhood Center, Rosenbloom Religious School, Krieger Schechter Day School, Chizuk Amuno camps and the synagogue.
“The building itself is really teeming with opportunities for families, and so this is really the first year we’re doing a big fundraiser to help all the different communities within the campus,” Levine said.
She added that Kind is the right man for the job, not just because he is a big draw as a prominent actor, but because his work fits the way that the Chizuk Amuno community functions.
“Richard Kind felt like a perfect fit because of his warmth, humor and authenticity, which align beautifully with the spirit of our community. We also wanted talent that would resonate across generations, and Richard’s decades-spanning body of work allows him to connect with audiences in a way that feels both entertaining and personal,” Levine said.
The program will include a Q&A session, and while Levine isn’t exactly sure what else Kind will be up to at Chizuk Amuno, attendees can expect entertainment and laughs. She projects that his appearance will include “a little bit of everything.”
Kind’s most recent work includes acclaimed roles in “Only Murders in the Building” as well as “Big Mouth.” He also appeared at an event with the Jewish Federation of Greater Washington just a few months ago, participating in a conversation about storytelling, comedy and life as an American Jew in the past and present.
This event will be a night of fun and laughs as well as a fundraiser, but it will also serve as an important reminder to the community at large of how special Chizuk Amuno is. Levine said that the organization manages to meet the needs of everyone who walks through its doors, and that’s something that you can’t find everywhere.
“What we offer to our community is really something magnificent. We just offer everything to everybody, for every stage of life. And that’s, that’s, I think, that’s rare to find an organization that can offer you that,” she said.
