The local paper for Downtown wn IT WAS HIS KIND OF TOWN < P. 12
WEEK OF NOVEMBER
10-16 2016
Performers Alex Farlow, Jeff Leatherwood and Marissa Ranalli rehearsing “Company.” Photo: Kerri Kearse
COMMUNITY THEATER IN THE BIG CITY St. Bart’s Players welcome ‘Company’ BY CHRISTOPHER MOORE
It’s community theater, but with a big-city twist. “It’s such a different thing in New York City,” says Jeff Leatherwood, who plays boyish Bobby in the St. Bart’s Players production of “Company,” opening Nov. 10. “We’re six blocks from Broadway and there are so many options for people.” And yet the St. Bart’s Players, born in 1927, are still around to call themselves New York City’s longestrunning not-for-profit community theater company. More than 100 members pay annual dues of $75 ($25 for those under age 25) to participate directly in something they love: creating theater. Many members are also congregants at St. Bartholomew’s Church, which provides significant administrative and logistical help, along with a home base for productions. Leatherwood, 36, had been a professional actor, but now he works in communications for the Ford Foundation. “Company” marks his first show in six years and his inaugural stint with St. Bart’s. So he’s seen up close how community theater compares with the professional variety. “It’s different because to me – the word community says it. Everybody is pitching in and doing everything to help. It’s ‘let’s build a set in the barn and put on a
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Maya Feero worked on her mural segment Wednesday afternoon. While some students invested 12 hours on their creations, Feero spent six hours on hers because of last week’s poor weather. Photo: Diamond Naga Siu
AT FIT, THE PAINTING IS ON THE WALL Illustration students created murals commemorating the city’s resilience after the Chelsea bombing BY DIAMOND NAGA SIU
They perched on benches, ladders and stepstools, applying vivid colors to the wall. Fashion Institute of Technology students lined 28th Street between Seventh and Eighth Avenues on a Wednesday afternoon to paint murals as their final project of
ience due to that bombing that happened in Chelsea [in September].” She drew faces adorned with iconic New York and Chelsea images, such as taxis for the city and flowers for the floral district. Feero said that she wanted to capture the diversity of the people in the area. Other students painted neon signs, dancers and pigeons — all symbols of what Chelsea and New York’s resilience means for them. Ian Beeck was working on an
the semester. Maya Feero, a senior studying illustration at FIT, said that drawing and painting on the outside walls of the school is a tradition for senior illustration majors. But the school plans to tear down this wall in the near future for expansion purposes. “We would do chalk drawings on this wall, but they decided this time to make murals on the wall that they’re going to be tearing down,” Feero said. “The theme is supposed to be resil-
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WEEK OF APRIL
SPRING ARTS PREVIEW < CITYARTS, P.12
FOR HIM, SETTLING SMALL CLAIMS IS A BIG DEAL presided over Arbitration Man has three decades. for informal hearings about it He’s now blogging BY RICHARD KHAVKINE
is the common Arbitration Man their jurist. least folks’ hero. Or at Man has For 30 years, Arbitration court office of the civil few sat in a satellite Centre St. every building at 111 New Yorkers’ weeks and absorbed dry cleaning, burned lost accountings of fender benders, lousy paint jobs, and the like. And security deposits then he’s decided. Arbitration Man, About a year ago, so to not afwho requested anonymity started docuhe fect future proceedings, two dozen of what menting about compelling cases considers his most blog. in an eponymous about it because “I decided to write the stories but in a I was interested about it not from wanted to write from view but rather lawyer’s point of said Arbitration view,” of a lay point lawyer since 1961. Man, a practicing what’s at issue He first writes about post, renders and then, in a separatehow he arrived his decision, detailing blog the to Visitors at his conclusion. their opinions. often weigh in with get a rap going. I to “I really want whether they unreally want to know and why I did it,” I did derstood what don’t know how to he said. “Most people ... I’d like my cases the judge thinks. and also my trereflect my personalitythe law.” for mendous respect 80, went into indiMan, Arbitration suc in 1985, settling vidual practice
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MANHATTAN'S APARTMENT BOOM, > PROPERTY, P.20
2015
In Brief MORE HELP FOR SMALL BUSINESS
The effort to help small seems to businesses in the city be gathering steam. Two city councilmembers, Robert Margaret Chin and Cornegy, have introduced create legislation that wouldSmall a new “Office of the within Business Advocate” of Small the city’s Department Business Services. Chin The new post, which have up told us she’d like to would and running this year, for serve as an ombudsman city small businesses within them clear government, helping to get through the bureaucracy things done. Perhaps even more also importantly, the ombudsman and number will tally the type small business of complaints by taken in owners, the actions policy response, and somefor ways to recommendations If done well, begin to fix things. report would the ombudsman’s give us the first quantitative with taste of what’s wrong the city, an small businesses in towards important first step fixing the problem. of for deTo really make a difference, is a mere formality will have to the work process looking to complete their advocate are the chances course, velopers precinct, but rising rents, -- thanks to a find a way to tackle business’ is being done legally of after-hours projects quickly. their own hours,” which remain many While Chin “They pick out boom in the number throughout who lives on most vexing problem. said Mildred Angelo,of the Ruppert construction permits gauge what Buildings one said it’s too early tocould have the 19th floor in The Department of the city. number three years, the Houses on 92nd Street between role the advocate She Over the past on the is handing out a record work perThird avenues. permits, there, more information of Second and an ongoing all-hours number of after-hours bad thing. of after-hours work the city’s Dept. problem can’t be a said there’s with the mits granted by nearby where according to new data jumped 30 percent, This step, combinedBorough construction project noise Buildings has data provided in workers constantly make efforts by Manhattan to mediate BY DANIEL FITZSIMMONS according to DOB of Informacement from trucks. President Gale Brewer offer response to a Freedom classifies transferring they want. They knows the the rent renewal process, request. The city They 6 “They do whatever signs Every New Yorker clang, tion Act go as they please. work between some early, tangible small any construction on the weekend, can come and sound: the metal-on-metal or the piercing of progress. For many have no respect.” p.m. and 7 a.m., can’t come of these that the hollow boom, issuance reverse. owners, in business moving The increased beeps of a truck has generto a correspond and you as after-hours. soon enough. variances has led at the alarm clock The surge in permits
SLEEPS, THANKS TO THE CITY THAT NEVER UCTION A BOOM IN LATE-NIGHT CONSTR NEWS
A glance it: it’s the middle can hardly believe yet construction of the night, and carries on full-tilt. your local police or You can call 311
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illustration of a strong, fashionable woman. He thought she captured the spirit of Seventh Avenue, whose alternate name is Fashion Avenue. “This brings in elements of the architecture and flowers, and I wanted this to be very statuesque and powerful,” Beeck said. “When I think of Chelsea, I think of models, fashion — kind of like strength — and I’m going to try getting a motion shot.”
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