Ben Jasper
October 26, 2017
Thomas J Kiefer Jr (TJ)
October 27, 2017
Ben Jasper
October 26, 2017
Thomas J Kiefer Jr (TJ)
October 27, 2017

Jessica Kaplan
1978 - 2003

Jessica Kaplan was courageous, honorable, tenacious, a comic, and a romantic of the highest order. She was also an accomplished writer who believed that, because you write what you are, you had better live an interesting life. She had an old mind which belied her age, and, while generous and consistently loyal to those she loved or respected, she could be stubborn to the point of arrogance about her artistic vision.

Jessica died far too young at 24, robbing the world of a gracious soul and a most original artistic voice. She began writing professionally at 15, lying about her age to work for a magazine reviewing films. At 17, she sold her first screenplay, "Powers That Be" to New Line Cinema. Jessica went on to pen a number of original scripts, adaptations from other media, and a television pilot. She considered it to be a tremendous blessing that her primary joy and passion also paid the bills.

Jessica's second greatest joy was roaming the streets of her beloved Los Angeles alone-observing and probing strangers' faces for secrets and the L.A. architecture for buried stories. Courageously traveling alone in Central and South America, she was inspired to write a book of short stories as well as a collection of poetry.

A great mimic with an offbeat sense of humor, almost never on time for anything, a lover of art, music, tea and sour candy, a horrible driver, an impeccably stylish young woman-that was also Jessica.

Jessica lived for those she loved, and she lived for her art. She inspires us still to follow her motto: "Attend to magic"-pour our passion into creating beauty in this world, aspire to grace and only then "cater to logistics"-tenaciously bringing our dreams to reality.