Abigail Pogrebin
Abigail Pogrebin (born May 17, 1965) is an American writer, journalist, podcast host for Tablet magazine, and former Director of Jewish Outreach for the Michael Bloomberg 2020 presidential campaign. Family and early life. Pogrebin was born in New York to a Jewish family, the daughter of an author and feminist activist Letty Cottin Pogrebin, the co-founder of "Ms". magazine, and Bert Pogrebin, a management-side labor lawyer, and is the identical twin sister of "New York Times" journalist Robin Pogrebin. She graduated summa cum laude from Yale University. Pogrebin married David Shapiro in 1993, and they have  two children. Career. After graduating from Yale in 1987, Pogrebin became a broadcast producer for Mike Wallace, Charlie Rose and associate producer for Ed Bradley at 60 Minutes and Bill Moyers at PBS and before that for The MacNeil/Lehrer Report and Fred W. Friendly. Afterwards she turned to freelance journalism and published articles in magazines and newspapers like "Newsweek", "New York" Magazine, The "Forward", "Tablet", and "The Daily Beast." She has moderated conversations for The Jewish Community Center in Manhattan (JCC), the Streicker Center, UJA Federation, and the Shalom Hartman Institute. Pogrebin is the author of "My Jewish Year : 18 Holidays, One Wondering Jew," published in 2017, which was a finalist for the 2018 National Jewish Book Award, and the 2005 book "", for which she interviewed 62 famous American Jews — from Ruth Bader Ginsburg to Steven Spielberg — about their religious identity. Her second book, "One and the Same: My Life As an Identical Twin and What I’ve Learned About Everyone’s Struggle to Be Singular", was published in October 2009. Her 2011 book "Showstopper" documents her time in the cast of Stephen Sondheim’s musical “Merrily We Roll Along,” which was the subject of the 2016 Netflix documentary  film "Best Worst Thing That Ever Could Have Happened." She served as the president of New York's Central Synagogue from 2015-2018, and in November 2019 she joined former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg’s presidential campaign as the Director of Jewish Outreach. "Tablet" Magazine’s podcast, “Parsha in Progress” features a regular Torah discussion with Pogrebin and Rabbi Dov Linzer, who is the president of Yeshivat Chovevei Torah. Awards. Pogrebin received the “Impact Award” from the JCC in Manhattan, and the “Community Leader Award” from "The Jewish Week" in 2017. Her 2017 book "My Jewish Year: 18  Holidays, One Wondering Jew" was a finalist for the 2018 National Jewish Book Award.