Philadelphia City Paper, May 29th, 2014

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cpstaff We made this

Publisher Nancy Stuski Editor in Chief Lillian Swanson Senior Editor Patrick Rapa Arts & Culture Editor Mikala Jamison Digital Media Editor/Movies Editor Paulina Reso Food Editor Caroline Russock Senior Staff Writers Daniel Denvir, Emily Guendelsberger Staff Writer Ryan Briggs Copy Chief Carolyn Wyman Associate Web Producer Carly Szkaradnik Contributors Sam Adams, Dotun Akintoye, A.D. Amorosi, Rodney Anonymous, Mary Armstrong, Meg Augustin, Bryan Bierman, Shaun Brady, Peter Burwasser, Mark Cofta, Alison Dell, Adam Erace, David Anthony Fox, Caitlin Goodman, K. Ross Hoffman, Deni Kasrel, Alli Katz, Gary M. Kramer, Drew Lazor, Gair “Dev 79” Marking, Robert McCormick, Andrew Milner, Annette Monnier, John Morrison, Michael Pelusi, Sameer Rao, Elliott Sharp, Marc Snitzer, Tom Tomorrow, John Vettese, Nikki Volpicelli, Brian Wilensky Editorial Interns Maggie Grabmeier, Jim Saska, Diane Bayeux, Katie Krzaczek, Indie Jimenez Production Director Michael Polimeno Editorial Art Director Allie Rossignol Advertising Art Director Evan M. Lopez Senior Editorial Designer Brenna Adams Editorial Designer Jenni Betz Staff Photographer Neal Santos Contributing Photographers Jessica Kourkounis, Mark Stehle Contributing Illustrators Ryan Casey, Don Haring Jr., Joel Kimmel, Cameron K. Lewis, Thomas Pitilli, Matthew Smith Human Resources Ron Scully (ext. 210) Circulation Director Mark Burkert (ext. 239) Sales & Marketing Manager Katherine Siravo (ext. 251) Account Managers Colette Alexandre (ext. 250), Nick Cavanaugh (ext. 260), Amanda Gambier (ext. 228), Thomas Geonnotti (ext. 258), Sharon MacWilliams (ext. 262) Office Coordinator/Adult Advertising Sales Alexis Pierce (ext. 234) Founder & Editor Emeritus Bruce Schimmel

ADDICTION IS DIFFICULT. GETTING HELP ISN’T. We’re ready to help you right away. Simply contact us and within 24 hours you could be on your journey to recovery. •• NO WAITING LISTS •• •• NO COMPLICATED PAPERWORK••

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citypaper.net 30 South 15th Street, Fourteenth Floor, Phila., PA 19102. 215-735-8444, Tip Line 215-735-8444 ext. 241, Listings Fax 215-875-1800, Advertising Fax 215-735-8535, Subscriptions 215-735-8444 ext. 235 The printing of City Paper was provided by Calkins Media (215-949-4224). Philadelphia City Paper is published and distributed every Thursday in Philadelphia, Montgomery, Chester, Bucks & Delaware Counties, in South Jersey and in Northern Delaware. Philadelphia City Paper is available free of charge, limited to one copy per reader. Additional copies may be purchased from our main office at $1 per copy. No person may, without prior written permission from Philadelphia City Paper, take more than one copy of each issue. Pennsylvania law prohibits any person from inserting printed material of any kind into any newspaper without the consent of the owner or publisher. Contents copyright © 2014, Philadelphia City Paper. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written permission from the publisher. Philadelphia City Paper assumes no obligation (other than cancellation of charges for actual space occupied) for accidental errors in advertising, but will be glad to furnish a signed letter to the buying public.

contents Cover story, see p. 14

Naked City ...................................................................................7 A&E................................................................................................20 Movies.........................................................................................23 Agenda........................................................................................25 Food ..............................................................................................29 COVER PHOTOGRAPH BY MARIA POUCHNIKOVA DESIGN BY ALLIE ROSSIGNOL

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Grand Opening

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$ .99

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with purchase of soda and coupon Per Adult.Up to 8 person per coupon Coupon Expires May 29, 2014

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INVITES YOU AND A GUEST TO AN ADVANCE SCREENING

Monday JUNE 2ND, 7:30PM LOG ON TO WWW.CITYPAPER.NET/WIN FOR ENTRY DETAILS THIS FILM IS RATED PG-13 intense sequences of sci-ďŹ action and violence, language and brief suggestive material. Please note: Passes are limited and will be distributed on a ďŹ rst come, ďŹ rst served basis while supplies last. No phone calls, please. Limit one pass per person. Each pass admits two. Seating is not guaranteed. Arrive early. Theater is not responsible for overbooking. This screening will be monitored for unauthorized recording. By attending, you agree not to bring any audio or video recording device into the theater (audio recording devices for credentialed press excepted) and consent to a physical search of your belongings and person. Any attempted use of recording devices will result in immediate removal from the theater, forfeiture, and may subject you to criminal and civil liability. Please allow additional time for heightened security. You can assist us by leaving all nonessential bags at home or in your vehicle.

IN THEATERS JUNE 6 www.EDGEOFTOMORROWmovie.com

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naked

the

city

thebellcurve CP’s Quality-o-Life-o-Meter

[ - 3]

The Streets Department says it has already filled 35,000 potholes, double the number it usually fills in a year.“So, to save money, we’ve been filling them with little rocks and confetti and ice cubes.”

[ +1 ]

A pumptrack — a race course consisting of bumps and hills for bicyclists to ride and do tricks on — opens up in West Philly. And on every street everywhere else in the city.

[ - 2]

A truck carrying 460 bee hives overturns on I-95, freeing thousands of bees into the area. “Look at these idiots, attacking the driver,” said one bee, gesturing toward his swarm. “What are they so angry about? They’re free. Plus, it’s like YOSO, dudes. You only sting once. Is that a dated reference? I’ve spent most of my life in captivity.”

[ - 1]

[ - 2]

Cleanup crews use foam to contain the swarms of bees, part of a plan formulated in the ’90s, but never used until then.They didn’t read the fine print: “ATTENTION BEE CLEANERS OF THE FUTURE: The Killer Foam Protocol should only be enacted if the Earth is not, at the time of the accident, running out of bees for some reason. If that is the case, just let the bees fly around outside because why not? P.S. HOOTIE RULEZZZ 4EVR!” A Catholic school principal in Bucks County apologizes for using a photo of Ellen DeGeneres on an invitation to a graduation dance with an Oscars theme, because the TV star “lives her life outside the teachings of the Catholic Church.” Say, isn’t unlicensed photo use some kind of sin?

[ - 2]

An unknown wire-chewing animal is blamed for an outage in North Philly that knocked out power to 2,000 households. Philly Police launch an aggressive mynock stop-and-frisk program in response.

[ +1 0 ]

A federal judge overturns Pennsylvania’s ban on gay marriage, making this the 19th state to recognize same-sex marriage.

This week’s total: +1 | Last week’s total: +2

CRADLE TO THE GRAVE: The back of a tombstone belonging to Edith Gelman, who died when she was less than 2 years old. NEAL SANTOS

[ local mystery ]

CHASING A GHOST Why nobody’s buried beneath this tombstone at the edge of a garden in the middle of Northern Liberties. By Paulina Reso t the corner of Orianna and Poplar streets, next to a bustling dog park and across from a shuttered deli, there’s a manicured little park ringed by an iron fence that’s never locked. A few feet from an elephant-shaped kid’s slide and the adjacent community garden is an incongruous sight: a baby’s tombstone. After nearly 90 years of being battered by the elements, the grave’s edges are rounded like a bar of soap that’s been handled by many people. Its engravings, though faint, are still visible: “Our baby Edith Gelman, born December 14, 1925, died February 17, 1927.” Hebrew is etched into the reverse side and a sculpture of a lamb, a symbol of innocence, sits on top. Pebbles line the grave’s crest as if, in the Jewish tradition, visitors have come to pay their respects. Although the grave is unassuming, it raises an intriguing question: Could someone be buried in the middle of this tiny lot in Northern Liberties? It’s legal in Pennsylvania to inter a body on private property, but local ordinances can restrict this practice. In Philadelphia, for instance, it’s now illegal to hold a home burial.

A

But in the 1920s, when a young immigrant family might not have had the money to buy a cemetery plot for their child, other measures may have been taken. It wasn’t uncommon for infants to be buried in the backyard, says David Morrison, a Lancaster-based elder law attorney. “When their mother dies they’re dug up from the farm or wherever they were temporarily and then they’re reinterred at the cemetery with their mother.” Had the Gelman family buried Edith, thinking the location would be temporary, and left her behind when faced with unforeseen circumstances? After submitting a request for a copy of Edith’s death certificate (these records become publicly available 50 years after the death date), I scrolled through newspapers on microfilm at the library, but turned up no death notice or obituary. The census would not have recorded Edith, since she had been born after the 1920 one was conducted and died before the 1930 survey. Sorting through ancestry.com’s results for families with the last name ‘Gelman’ in Philadelphia, I found a married woman who, in 1930, said she had given birth to six children, even though only five, all of them close to Edith’s age, lived in her household. Suspecting that Edith could have been the missing one, I reconstructed this family’s history until the telltale death certificate reached me. I had it all wrong.

Pebbles line the grave’s crest as if visitors have paid their respects.

>>> continued on page 8

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RESTING IN PEACE: Although Edith Gelman has a tombstone in Northern Liberties, she has always been buried here at Mt. Lebanon Cemetery. NEAL SANTOS

✚ Chasing a Ghost <<< continued from page 7

Edith had been born in Philadelphia to Charles and Ida Gelman, who were both Russian immigrants. They had been living at 3126 Westmont St. in Strawberry Mansion when Edith died of pyelitis, or a kidney infection. If antibiotics had existed at the time, they could have cured Edith, but it wasn’t until September 1928 — a little more than a year after Edith’s death — that Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin. In the coroner’s brisk cursive, the certificate says the body was conveyed to Joseph Levine, a prominent Jewish funeral home still in business, and then buried at Mt. Lebanon Cemetery in Collingdale, Pa. The morning after a rainstorm, I drove to the cemetery to see if Edith was, in fact, buried there. Mt. Lebanon is like a labyrinth: Its graves are so close together there’s barely any room to walk and navigational markers are difficult to decipher. I stopped at the groundskeeper’s office to ask where Edith’s grave was located, and he pulled out a thick book, flipping through aged records until he found her. He led the way with his truck, and I followed. We parked and walked to the grave, our feet sinking into the spongy ground, soaked from the previous night’s downpour. On the edge of the cemetery, close to West Oak Lane Road, the graves were sparser. All of them belonged to babies, many of whom had died in the 1920s, and almost every tombstone was inscribed with a lamb. Some sunk into the earth, while others were askew, but Edith’s grave stood straight and glistened. Compared to the others, it looked brand new. When I called the groundskeeper later, he said her grave had been replaced in 1976, which accounted for the fresh appearance. Nearly 50 years after her death, Edith had not been forgotten. Edith’s parents immigrated separately to America in the early 1900s and married a few years after Charles arrived. The Gelmans, who had six children together, did not stay in one rented apartment for long, moving to a new address at least every 10 years. Over the decades, Charles worked as a shoe fitter, grocer and later as an “egg man,” putting in 60 hours a week at the store he owned in Pennsport, according to census records. 8 | P H I L A D E L P H I A C I T Y PA P E R |

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If Edith was buried in Mt. Lebanon Cemetery by a conscientious family and had never been disinterred, how did a second gravestone for her end up in that garden in Northern Liberties? Sally McCabe, who moved into that neighborhood in the 1980s, had the answer. Edith’s old tombstone had most likely been returned to the engraver when it was replaced and left there with the intention of being reused once it had been sanded down. When the engraver went out of business, people in the neighborhood found it among the grave heap. “In the ’70s and ’80s, there were these gravestones all over and people used them as doorsteps and in construction,” she says. “The place where they were stored, in the back, was on Leithgow right at Bishop Neumann. And there were hundreds of gravestones of the most amazing size and shape and variety that you could believe. Everyone had one in their backyard and the smaller ones are the ones that made it the farthest and the bigger ones didn’t make it as far because people just rolled them or put them on handcarts and they weigh hundreds and hundreds of pounds. “They were beautiful. Some of them were huge and in the shape of trees,” says McCabe. “We ended up with Bernard Yudelwitz in our yard. I finally figured out that his Hebrew name was wrong and so rather than redo the whole stone, they would grind the face off and start over. You might see three similar stones near each other that had the same names on them but different dates. It was like the engravers were drinking a lot.” When McCabe and her husband sold their house 10 years ago, they had two gravestones in their backyard. They gave away one with just an M on it and left behind Bernard’s tombstone because it was too heavy to bring to East Oak Lane, where they now live. “When people moved them they were a lot younger and had a lot less sense. It was like, ‘Let’s roll some gravestones,’” says McCabe.

“Everybody wanted a gravestone in their backyard.”

And by rolling, McCabe means this: “You need a couple of metal bars. You just tip and slip, tip and slip, just like that. Everybody wanted a gravestone in their backyard.” Edith’s tombstone was being rolled to a garden on Second Street, but McCabe says the movers quit before they reached their destination, leaving the grave in the lot where it remains today. Before 1976, an apartment building with a bakery on the first level had been there, until it was abandoned. “It got knocked down during the Rizzo administration,” says McCabe. “The whole strip of buildings there, kids kept ponies in them on Leithgow and Poplar. There were always ponies and chariot races. And one day they just came in and tore down all the buildings.” After the demolition, the neighborhood cared for the no-man’s lot until eventually, in 2000, the Redevelopment Authority sold it to the Friends of Orianna Hill Park, a community group which remade part of it into a dog park. “Every once in a while someone from another neighborhood would walk through and go to the deli that was across the street and they would go, ‘Why is there a gravestone there?’ and we’d say, ‘Oh, that’s where we bury the children,’ and then they would shake their heads and go away,” McCabe recalls mischievously. Edith’s monument may be all that remains of an era of backyard tombstones. McCabe doubts Bernard is still on her old property, which has been dramatically renovated. Janet Finegar, the board secretary of Northern Liberties Neighbors Association who helped create both Liberty Lands and Orianna Hill Park, echoed a similar sentiment. “I’ve always been sorry that I don’t have one of the tombstones — I’ll bet that all the ones that are around are either in people’s gardens or have moved away with their owners. Bummer,” she says. Finegar, who continues to work with Orianna Hill Park as the board’s secretary, is glad Edith’s tombstone hasn’t been touched. “I love the tombstone. I like big rocks in general, hence many of the ones at Liberty Lands,” Finegar says. “I think it’s funny and kind of pretty, and it’s hilarious that people think it’s a real grave.” (paulina@citypaper.net)

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[ the naked city ]

[ what is? ]

TRIVIA PURSUIT FOR $200 After years of trying, a Newtown Square data scientist finally got his chance to be on Jeopardy! But the woman standing next to him was quick on the buzzer. By Lini S. Kadaba y husband, Dilip, is the kind of guy who knows what occurred in 1066 (the Norman conquest of England), but is flummoxed when it comes to recalling the movie we saw a few months ago (American Hustle). He’s a trivia man. So, of course, he has tried for years to get on Jeopardy!, that Super Bowl of trivia enthusiasts. Ever since he came from India to the United States to study chemical engineering 25-plus years ago, he has lusted after a meet-up with Alex Trebek. It is, after all, the ultimate badge of clever. To help him, I did what any good wife would do. I nagged. “You should study,” I said. He wouldn’t do it. He took pride in acing the test to make the cut on what he already knew, through osmosis. More than once, we drove the Atlantic City Expressway to take a 10-question “gamble” in the lobby of a cheesy casino. I say we, because back then I thought I knew a thing or two. Turns out, that’s exactly how many I got right. Dilip usually did better, but, alas, never good enough. He kept at it, but he’d leave the tryouts disappointed, with only a lousy Jeopardy! pen. The ultimate downer: A Jeopardy! staffer once mentioned that Wheel of Fortune was looking for contestants in the next room. All the Jeopardy! wannabes groaned.

M

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Julia Collins, Dilip Rajagopalan and Donna Innes

Then, one day a few years ago, he got the call to come to New York for an in-person test and audition — step two after passing an online test. When the Big Apple visit went bust, he was ready to quit. But I cheered him on — as vested in his success as in our son’s wins and losses on the tennis courts. Last year, he reluctantly gave it one more try, just to appease me. Again, he got to New York. And this time, he got a call a few months later, inviting him to a taping in L.A. He’d made it! We jumped up and down as if we’d won the Match Six Lotto. Then came the real challenge — picking out three outfits (no yellows, no busy ties) that didn’t clash with the blue-and-purple set. Guess who was smart enough to know the answer to that one. In L.A. — no, Jeopardy! does not pay to fly you out — Dilip soon realized he was among the hardcore. On the shuttle ride to the Sony Pictures set, contestants started matching wits on the ’80s hits playing on the radio. Uh-oh. When his turn came to compete on the show, he knew he needed a bit of luck. He’s deepest in categories about history, geography,

science and international current events. Not so good on pop culture. As I watched from the audience with butterflies, he struggled in Round One with “Food-Titled Books,” “Top 40 Debuts,” and “On My Hands.” Double Jeopardy was more to his liking, except for the “Wit and Wisdom of W.C. Fields.” He came in third, winning $1,000. Back home, though, he was a mini-celebrity, despite his best efforts to downplay expectations. Even after the episode aired on April 22 — which he dubbed his “crash and burn” — the fact that he even made the show impressed our friends. It has helped to see Julia Collins, who won his segment, go on to become the winningest woman so far on Jeopardy! As of Friday, she was still the champion. So, it’s official. Dilip’s a smart one. But I know the flavors of the ice creams we ordered on an early date in 1986 at a Baskin-Robbins in Evanston, Ill. ✚ Lini S. Kadaba is a freelance journalist based in Newtown Square. Contact her at lkadaba@gmail.com.

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[ the naked city ]

[ a million stories ]

✚ SECOND STUDENT DEATH AT SCHOOL WITH NO NURSE PROMPTS OUTRAGE

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The presence of a school nurse might not have saved 7-year-old first-grader Sebastian Gerena, who died last Wednesday of a congenital heart defect after collapsing at Jackson Elementary School in South Philadelphia. Three adults trained in CPR, including a retired nurse who volunteered in the school’s library, responded to the situation and called 911. But the School District of Philadelphia’s severe budget crisis has cut the number of nurses in public, private and parochial schools from 289 in 2011 to 179. Jackson only has a nurse on duty Thursdays and every other Friday. “There is no net for the staff or the children,� says Jackson nurse Ann Smigiel. Following the tragedy, Philadelphia Federation of Teachers President Jerry Jordan and American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten signed an open letter to Gov. Tom Corbett condemning his budget cuts. “You have the power to fix what you have broken. Restore full and fair funding to all Pennsylvania schools. And do it now,� it read. Corbett said he was “deeply troubled that� they “would use the recent tragedy at Jackson Elementary as an opportunity to make a political statement.� Readers may recall that in September, sixthgrader Laporshia Massey died of an apparent asthma attack after falling sick at Bryant Elementary School in West Philadelphia while no nurse was on duty. The death caused an outcry against budget cuts, and Corbett soon released $45 million for the School District that had been withheld on the condition of teachers union concessions. Corbett denied that the funding was related to Massey’s death. Superintendent William Hite, who remained mostly silent in the wake of Massey’s death, last week issued a statement condemning understaffing in city schools. “During times of tragedy, our community should not have to question whether an extra staff member or program would have made a difference. We should all feel confident that our schools have everything they need.� —Daniel Denvir

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✚ ETHICS BOARD LOBS FINE FOR LOBBYING The Philadelphia Board of Ethics last week announced that the Philadelphia School Partnership (PSP) broke the city’s lobbying law. PSP is the city’s most powerful school reform

group, one that has campaigned against teacher seniority and for closing what they describe as low-performing public schools. The Ethics Board found that PSP leaders failed to register as lobbyists, and that PSP failed to register as a principal (an entity that hires a lobbyist), failed to file certain expense reports in 2012 and 2013, and made “material omissions� in their 2013 third-quarter expense report. The group was fined a total of $1,500. The Ethics Board waived a number of financial penalties and reduced others, citing PSP’s cooperation. PSP claims that it failed to file under the city’s lobbying law because the group did not understand it. “We later came to understand that the City’s

The group was fined $1,500. The Ethics Board waived other penalties. definition of lobbying is broader than those at the state or federal levels,� PSP said in a statement. But there are few differences between the state and city lobbying laws, according to the Ethics Board, and PSP would not say what would have caused confusion. The Ethics Board launched its investigation in response to a December 2013 complaint filed by Parents United for Public Education. “We filed because we think the public deserves to know what’s being said on matters of massive importance to our schools and our city,� says Parents United co-founder Helen Gym. “What’s being said and who’s paying for it.� —DD

PHOTO BY NEAL SANTOS

[ the naked city ]

JANE! 1-2 YEARS OLD

I’m Jane, a 1-2 year old cat who’s looking for a home! My kittens were all adopted, and now it’s my turn. I love other cats and am very playful!

Located on the corner of 2nd and Arch. All PAWS animals are spayed/neutered, vaccinated, and microchipped before adoption. For more information, call 215-238-9901 ext. 30 or email adoptions@phillypaws.org

Cameron’s Seafood Market COMPANY BASED IN MARYLAND

Visit our 2 other Philadelphia Locations:

906-916 North Broad Street, North Phila. 215-765-1000 62nd St. & Woodland Ave. West Philadelphia 215-726-9800

Store Hours: Sun-Wed 10:30 – 9pm * Thur 10:30am – 10pm * Fri-Sat 10:30am-11pm

www.cameronsseafood.com

*Special Platters Broiled Stuffed Tilapia Platter.………...$11.99 Stuffed Lobster Platter…………………$22.00 Broiled Chilean Sea Bass Platter………..$12.99 Fried Cajun Catfish Platter…………..….$8.99 Fried or Broiled Bluefish Platter…………$5.99 Seafood Linguine………………………..$11.99 Fried or Broiled Rainbow Trout Platter….$7.99 Broiled Ultimate Seafood Platter………..$14.99 Crab Cake Sub (Fries Only)……………...$7.99 Fried Fish Hoagie (Fries Only)……….....$6.99 Platters are served only with French Fries & Cole Slaw or Rice & Broccoli

SPRING SPECIALS $

45.00

2lb Fried Tilapia 1/2lb Fried Shrimp 1/2lb Steamed Shrimp 2lb Steamed Mussels 2lb Snow crab Legs And Choice Of 2 Sides

Cameron’s Seafood makes the best party platters for every occasion. Call us today and let us do your next catering event. We will custom-make any platter to your request. Good Through 6-11-14. MUST BRING THIS AD FOR SPECIAL PRICES. SUBJECT TO AVAILABILITY. BUSHELS MAY NOT BE AVAILABLE. DISCOUNTS MAY NOT BE COMBINED WITH ANY OTHER SPECIALS C I T Y PA P E R . N E T | M A Y 2 9 - J U N E 4 , 2 0 1 4 | P H I L A D E L P H I A C I T Y PA P E R |

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why forgiveness

IS SO POWERFUL, YET SO HARD WORDS BY NATALIE POMPILIO

T

|

PHOTOS BY MARIA POUCHNIKOVA

he shy young man walked up to the porch holding an unlit cigarette in one shaky hand. His eyes met those of the woman sitting there, then turned toward the ground, then met the woman’s eyes again. He was 15 minutes early for a meeting that was eight years overdue. Janice Meeks stood up and called out, “Hey, Michael! How you doing?” “I am so nervous you don’t even understand,” Michael Whittington replied.

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“Why are you nervous?” she asked, puzzled. “Come here.” He climbed the few steps to the porch and Janice opened her arms to him. The pair embraced, a long hug. It seemed that Michael had the harder time breaking off the connection. Eleven years ago, an act of violence had changed both of their lives. Janice’s 19-year-old son — a good-natured young man with endless potential — was shot in the neck and paralyzed. He died three years later. Michael was part of the group arrested in connection with his shooting. He was 16 at the time, and was sentenced to spend what many consider life’s best years behind bars. But time had passed, and much had changed. A few weeks ago, they met at Janice’s home in Tacony to talk about that horrible night — and more. Michael had lost a brother to violence, too. Would he be able to forgive another as Janice had forgiven him? It was approaching 11 p.m. on June 24, 2003. Janice’s son, Kevin Johnson, and his cousin were waiting for a trolley at 52nd Street and Chester Avenue in West Philly. A group of five teenage boys, Michael among them, approached the pair. Later, the news media would say Kevin and his cousin had been shot “execution-style,” a

RECONNECTION: At left, Michael Whittington embraces Janice Meeks at the end of their first meeting since 2006. At right, a portrait of Kevin Johnson, Janice’s son, who was paralyzed in a shooting. Michael was among those arrested in connection with the crime.

dramatic way of saying “at close range.” In city lore, the incident became known as “the shooting over the Allen Iverson jersey,” which Kevin was wearing at the time. In actuality, the jersey had little to do with the violent crime. The reality was much more complicated, involving a girl’s flirtations with either Kevin or his cousin, and the jealousy that it stirred in another partygoer. The result, however, was the same: Kevin was shot in the back of the neck and paralyzed from that spot on down. His cousin took a bullet to the jaw, but largely recovered. Michael didn’t know the cousins or have a problem with them. He did not pull the trigger. But he was there when the pair was shot. He was there the last time Kevin ever stood, the last time Kevin could breathe without the aid of a machine. Michael and the four other teenage boys were arrested and incarcerated for their roles in the shootings. In 2006, when Michael was on work release, he visited Janice and Kevin in their home. The two young men became fast friends. The conversation was light-hearted, mostly sports talk, Iverson versus Kobe. They played a video game together, Michael worked the controls while Kevin gave tips. Janice hovered nearby, occasionally pushing Kevin’s glasses up his nose. She brought Michael a heaping plate of spaghetti, Kevin’s favorite dish. Michael forked in the pasta heartily. Kevin would eat later, when the family was alone again and Janice would feed him. Not long after that meeting, Michael had a repeated problem at his halfway house, and, as punishment, was put back behind bars to serve the rest of his sentence. A few months later, Kevin’s breathing machine failed and he suffered irreparable brain damage. His family let him pass on, and honored his wishes of donating his organs. Janice divorced, moved and married again. They lost touch. THIS RECONNECTION, on the front porch of Janice’s home in early May, was the first time they’d seen each other since 2006. It was a reunion both had longed for, although Michael had been hesitant to make the first call. He hadn’t seen Janice since her son’s death. He was afraid of her anger. He need not have worried. “Kevin started it,” Janice said. “He wanted me to forgive. When he died, I wanted to be mad all over again, but it was too hard. I didn’t have it in my heart.” Her relationship with one of the men who played a role in her son’s pain and suffering and eventual death puzzles many of those around her. “It’s hard for my family to understand how I care about Michael,” she said. “They think he’d be a hoodlum or a gangster to be involved in something like that. But Michael’s not a bad kid — I mean, a man.” In fact, she said, “He reminds me of Kevin, with his shyness and his smile. … If he’d took the time earlier to get to know Kevin before this happened, I could have seen them as friends.” I met Janice and Kevin in 2005 when I was a staff writer at the Philadelphia Inquirer. Getting to know them was one of the most amazing experiences I have had during 20 years of reporting.

I was writing an article about the forgotten victims of gun crimes, those who had survived but found their lives forever altered. Kevin, who once loved racing up and down the basketball court, now spent much of his time moving only between his bed and a wheelchair. He didn’t like to go outside often, he said, because people would stare at him. Nearly all of his friends fell out of touch. But his mother was his near-constant companion. His beloved little sister, Jade, rushed back to the family’s Lower Northeast home after school each day to sit on the edge of his bed so he could help her with her homework. All this, and Kevin wasn’t angry. He was kind, friendly, frequently smiling. Sometimes, he admitted, he let himself cry, always at night when others slept so they wouldn’t become upset, too. He’d let the tears flow — and then not having use of his arms — he would let them dry in place. He’d try to refocus his brain, he said, on happy thoughts before he fell asleep so he would have pleasant dreams. In most of those light-hearted thoughts, he was playing basketball. In fact, Kevin took what many would have considered the end — his paralysis — and turned it into a new beginning. He made it a point to publicly forgive the five teenagers whose actions injured him. He and his mother spoke to local school groups and at anti-violence rallies, providing both a “this could happen to you” cautionary tale and a lesson in the power of forgiveness and absolution. That forgiveness, Janice said then and now, did not come easily to her. She was used to striking back, a lesson she’d learned as a child. Kevin showed her that forgiveness was better for everybody involved, that the hate she had inside was hurting her the most. I remember visiting Kevin and Janice after my first article about them had been published, about three years after he had been paralyzed. I told them about the man I was dating — now my husband — who worked as a public defender. Janice mistakenly thought I meant a prosecutor and seemed unhappy when I told her he defended indigent people who had been charged with a crime. “How can he do that?” she asked. “How can he help those people?” Then Kevin stopped her train of thought. “Everybody deserves a fair trial, Mom,” he said. “It’s an important job.” He told me he’d been watching a lot of courtroom dramas on television. He was thinking about taking online law classes. I remember thinking, “This kid is incredible.” JANICE TOLD ME that Michael seemed different from the other suspects when she saw him in court for the first time. He was a teenager, but she refers to him as “that little boy” when talking about it now. He looked “innocent.” >>> continued on page 16

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ADDS A DOVE: Janice Meeks shows her tattoo of her son, Kevin, on an upper arm. Every year, she tries to add a dove to the image.

“He seemed like a good kid, shy. He had a shirt that was way too big and a tie that was too big,” she said. “He was nervous.” What most convinced her of Michael’s inner goodness, though, was the fact that he apologized to Kevin in the courtroom. Michael’s mother did the same, and then asked the judge for permission to give Janice a hug. The two women embraced. The other four teens involved in the shooting did not reach out to her and Kevin, nor did their families. “I knew Michael was from a good family,” Janice said. “You could see he didn’t come up that way. He was just trying to fit in with the other kids.” Thinking back on his life right before the shooting, Michael wonders what would have happened to him if he’d stayed on the streets of Southwest Philly, sometimes known as “the Wild, Wild West.” That’s fair, he said, because the people around him “were into everything.” They were selling drugs. There were shootouts every day. “I survived,” he said. “I was never hit, but I was right there and stuff would happen. I was young and when you’re young, you’re dumb.” If he’s stayed on that course? “Honestly, the way I was back then, I’d probably be dead,” he said. When Michael was behind bars, Janice wrote him letters. He wrote back. In every letter, he asked how Kevin was doing and he apologized for his part in the events of June 24, 2003. WHILE INCARCERATED, first in a juvenile facility and then an adult one, Michael realized how amazing it was for Kevin and Janice to forgive him, what a precious gift they’d given him by accepting his apology. “There are a lot of people in jail and they’re wishing for forgiveness for the bad they did towards people. They’re praying because they can’t sit right with themselves,” he said. “To know you were part of something so messed up … the guilt, you think about it every day, you relive the whole situation, it’s bad.” Kevin and Janice said and did things that showed Michael that he mattered and that they cared about him. “How could I have lived with myself,” he asked, “knowing I played a part in this crazy situation that turned out so bad?” Something else helped him, too — his involvement in the city’s Mural Arts Program. Michael began working on MAP projects soon after his incarceration. He connected with executive director Jane Golden, who learned of his story. In January 2006, Golden drove him to Kevin and Janice’s home. Kevin and Michael stayed in touch by phone. It was 10 months later, while Michael was in lockup again for a minor infraction, that Kevin’s breathing machine failed and he died a short time later. Michael said he asked prison officials if he could attend Kevin’s funeral, but his request was denied. Not long after Janice buried her son, she began working with the Mural Arts Program on a memorial to Kevin. She joined a creative process that involved bringing together Graterford prison inmates, most of them

lifers, with juveniles from St. Gabriel’s Hall and the city’s House of Corrections, for art and conversation. “Her story is so amazing that it was hard for the men and kids to believe that she could forgive. They would love to have forgiveness, but that doesn’t happen very often,” recalled Robyn Buseman, who at the time worked at St. Gabriel’s and is now — oddly enough — Michael’s supervisor at Mural Arts. But Buseman understood Janice’s decision because she, too, has lost a child and she, too, chose forgiveness. In 2003, her 25-year-old daughter was killed in a car accident. The girl’s boyfriend was driving at the time. “If someone would tell me that I could forgive that kid, a young man at the time, for falling asleep at the wheel and killing my daughter, I would say, ‘No, no, I’d have to kill him,’” Buseman said. “Janice and I had a common story even though (mine) was a negligent act, not a violent one. Anybody that loses a child kinda has an immediate bond.” Forgiving is not easy, Buseman said, and it doesn’t mean forgetting, and it definitely doesn’t mean never again being angry or upset about losing someone you love. “But it’s one less thing you have to deal with. You just can’t carry that hate around,” she said. “And the person that you’re forgiving, it allows them to hopefully move on and not do the same thing again. It’s a win-win, but I understand everybody can’t do that.” The finished mural, titled Forgiveness, covers a wall at 13th Street and Erie Avenue. It features Kevin’s face, the image taken from his high school graduation photo. Janice is standing nearby, watching over him. IN SOME WAYS, it could be an injustice to Michael, who has worked so hard to turn a negative into a positive and to live a productive life, to even bring this story to the public’s attention again. A teenager then, Michael is now 27. He has a fulltime job as a supervisor with Mural Arts, working with at-risk youth. He’s been out of jail for five years and off parole since 2013. He says he hangs out with his cousins and other family members, avoids the street scene, stays out of trouble. He plans to ask the state for a pardon. Michael has an apartment in Northeast Philly. He has a girlfriend and three children — two daughters, ages 4 and 3, and a 1-year-old son. He said he never planned to tell his children about Kevin and the shooting that changed so many lives. Then he agreed to talk to me for this article and he realized he might not be able to keep the information from them. Still, he said he wasn’t worried about possible negative responses. “I can’t,” he said. “Everybody has a story. Everybody. This is mine and this is what happened in my life when I >>> continued on page 18

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FAMILY GALLERY: Janice and Michael catch up with each other by sharing photos of their children.

was a different person. I’m a whole new person now. That’s my past.” After his 2008 release from jail, Michael said he promised himself he would reconnect with Janice. It was at the top of his to-do list, he said. And then it didn’t happen for years. “When I came home, I was going to do a lot of things, a lot of things. But I was going through a lot, too,” he said. “And the last time I seen her, Kevin was alive. So this would be, kinda … you know. I didn’t know what to expect. I was real nervous.” Janice said she never stopping waiting for him to contact her again. She looked for him, she said, on Facebook and elsewhere. She didn’t know where he was and she wondered how he was doing. AFTER KEVIN’S DEATH, Janice met and married Dana Meeks. They live on a friendly street in Tacony where they can sit on their front porch and greet neighbors who pass by. When Michael arrived on May 2, Janice introduced him to Dana and their tan maltipoo, Cinnabon. Michael sat down and Cinnabon let Michael scratch her head. “I think she likes me,” he said, smiling. The conversation was casual at first. Janice talked about her youngest daughter — Jade is now 14 — and how she and Dana keep track of the girl’s whereabouts via the GPS on her phone. She was like any other mother, she said, just worried about her child. Dana, meanwhile, worried about his wife. “He won’t let me drive my own car to work by myself,” Janice said. “He gets in the car with me, every night, rides with me to work, and then he catches the bus home by himself. Now who is going to be worried about who? I’m worried about him riding the SEPTA bus.” After a half hour on the porch, Janice invited Michael inside. She showed him a corner cabinet that has been turned into a memorial to Kevin, featuring photos and the program from his funeral. She showed Michael a tattoo of Kevin’s face on her upper arm. “I want to get a dove every year, but I didn’t get one yet this year,” she said. Michael seemed tense as he took a seat on the edge of the couch. Janice sat back, on the other end of the sofa. A basketball game was on the TV and they briefly talked sports before Janice said, “So tell me about your nerves.” Michael took a deep breath and said, “I don’t know. It’s been a long, long time since the last time I saw you. I made it a goal to contact you but …” Janice interrupted, rescuing him. “You have pictures of your babies?” He pulled out his phone so Janice could coo appropriately at photos of his three children. She did and, learning one of his daughters was 3 years old, segued into a story about Jade, who was almost 3 when Kevin was shot. “[Jade] was Kevin’s heart, and she was afraid to go into the hospital room when she saw Kevin with all that stuff on him,” Janice said. “Then Kevin talked to her and told her it was OK and then she was OK with

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Kevin being that way.” Michael nodded, the story obviously affecting him. Then Dana came inside and the talk turned again to basketball, then boxing, then rap, then video games. A family member who Janice thought had already left for work came down the stairs, said hello, and then left through the front door. Janice would later say she was glad he left without recognizing Michael. The man had been Kevin’s favorite cousin, she said, “and he might not be comfortable with Michael being here.” Janice decided to change clothes so she could demonstrate a rock-climbing game they had. “It makes you sweat,” she said. Michael went outside to finally smoke the cigarette he’d now held for an hour. He said he was feeling better. “She keeps telling me not to be scared. I told her how scared I was. She told me it was OK now. It’s still hard for me, though.” Janice rejoined Michael and Dana on the porch. Somehow, the conversation turned to the night Kevin lost his mobility and Michael lost his freedom. “I don’t know if you know everything that happened,” Michael told Janice. “I remember it like it was yesterday. I think about it all the time.” On June 24, 2003, Kevin and his cousin attended a house party in Southwest Philly. Among those present were three girls, one of whom had recently had a child with the boy police said shot and paralyzed Kevin. The girl was flirty with Kevin’s cousin, Michael said. The spurned lover talked about wanting to scare the cousins and needing a gun. Later, when Kevin and his cousin were waiting for the trolley, the girls joined them outside, teasing and flirting. A trolley pulled up, but one of the girls held Kevin’s arm and waved at the driver and told him to “go on, go on.” “If [Kevin] would have gotten on that trolley, this wouldn’t have happened,” Janice said. “And those girls wanted Kevin to invite my other son over, too. I do have one son left and I thank God for that.” Janice choked up at times as she recounted some of the details of that night: She and her then-husband, Wayne Burke, had returned home from work after midnight, tired from hours of cleaning restaurants. She saw a piece of paper stuck to the front door and ignored it, thinking it was a restaurant advertising flier. She thought Kevin was home, asleep. Then Wayne noticed that the paper was a police document, asking them to contact detectives. She called, but no one would tell her what was going on over the phone. Instead, the police told her to go the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. She tried calling her

MEMORIAL: In this mural, titled “Forgiveness,” Kevin Johnson’s image covers a wall at 13th Street and Erie Avenue. His mother’s likeness watches over him. | PHOTO BY NEAL SANTOS

son and his cousin repeatedly, but neither picked up their phones. She jumped in a car with Wayne and a neighbor. “I kept saying, ‘Something’s wrong. Something’s wrong.’ I pulled over, and my ex-husband said, ‘Nothing’s wrong. They probably just got into a fight.’ ‘But Kevin don’t fight! Give me another, give me something else.’ Now I’m about to cry. Now, I’m scared.” Hospital officials led the group to a small room. They waited for 15 minutes, then 30, and still no one would tell them what had happened. Janice walked outside to get some air. A short time later, Wayne and the neighbor walked outside to get Janice. “I’d never seen my husband cry like that. I mean, he’d cried, but not like that. … His eyes were bloodshot red. I guess he was trying to hold his tears in, but they just came out. His whole face was wet.” The neighbor wrapped his arms around Janice. “He just starting squeezing me and he said, ‘They shot both of them.’ I fell to the ground,” she said. Hearing this for the first time 11 years later, Michael looked anguished. “We didn’t know [the kid with the gun] was going to do that.” MICHAEL, TOO, HAS FELT the pain of street violence. On April 11, 2012, his brother was shot and killed when he walked out of a Southwest Philadelphia convenience store and into a gun battle. Markel Wright was only 22. Like so many other homicides, this one received scant media attention, even though some early reports noted Markel was unarmed and was most likely an innocent bystander. The “undeserving victim” angle is one that usually garners news coverage. Markel’s death did not, possibly because he was killed in a neighborhood where violence is unfortunately common. Yet like any death, his devastated those who knew and loved him. Buseman of the Mural Arts Program saw the impact on Michael. “It was a real setback for him,” Buseman said. “Of course, we gave him time off and he didn’t come to work for a while. But he was pretty close to his little brother, and it still affects him. … His birthday’s hard, the anniversary of the shooting is hard, it’s just been really difficult.” Michael does not like talking about his brother and, when asked about him, grows visibly upset. His responses to questions, while still polite, become more curt. “He got shot one time and that was it. I’ve seen people get shot nine times or five times and they still survive. He got shot one time,” Michael said. In December 2012, 35-year-old Leon Owens was arrested in connection with Markel’s slaying. His trial is scheduled to start June 2. Michael brushes off questions about his feelings toward Owens and anyone else who might be implicated in the case. Kevin, he said, was strong and was able to forgive. Michael doesn’t know if he can do the same.

“I stay away from it,” he said. “I don’t let myself get into situations. I stay away, be with my kids all the time.” Michael told Janice about his brother’s murder during an earlier phone conversation. That day on the porch, after both had suffered through a retelling of the night of Kevin’s shooting, Janice brought up Markel’s death. She asked Michael if he could forgive the person who had killed his brother. Michael seemed unable to speak for a moment. “The thing is, I never understood how (Kevin) did it. It takes a strong. … I don’t know. I don’t know.” He paused, then finished: “I can. I can. If Kevin forgave me and you forgave me, come on …” “That’s what I wanted to hear,” Janice said. “That’s good. That’s good.” AFTER A FEW HOURS, Michael said he had to go. Work, he said. Kids to pick up. He was smiling when he opened his arms to her. She came in for an embrace. Again, the hug lasted a beat longer than expected. As Michael drove away, Dana told his wife that she was beautiful. Simply amazing. After leaving Janice, Michael said he was “probably glowing that whole day. Just hearing it from her mouth that it was OK now, and then she sent me a real nice text.” But some pain and guilt lingered. “ I still feel kinda messed up,” he said. He reflected on looking at the memorial to Kevin in Janice’s living room, “I didn’t know to be happy or sad. It looked good and it was good to see him. But he wasn’t there.” Michael and Janice have kept in touch since that faceto-face meeting earlier this month via texts and emails. Janice said Michael is always welcome at her home. He mentioned not having a computer at his apartment. She has two, she said, and he could come over and use one whenever he wanted. She’d also like to bring Michael closer, into her family, but she knows that could pose some challenges. “I would love to have Michael come to a cookout and bring his kids and bring his girl. I would love that,” she said. “But some people don’t understand and we’d have to make sure the people we know and love — like my other son — are OK with it.” Forgiveness is hard, she said. She isn’t sure Michael was truthful when he said he could absolve his brother’s killer. But she hopes he does, since she knows it helps with the healing. “I didn’t see it in his face,” she said. “But it’s OK. Make sure you say that it’s OK. Not everybody can do what I did, not everyone can have the heart to forgive.” (editorial@citypaper.net) ✚ Natalie Pompilio is a freelance writer based in Philadelphia.

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a&e

artsmusicmoviesmayhem

soundadvice By A.D. Amorosi

EVERYTHING IS ➤ WHEN ALTO AND BARITONE saxophonist Kyle Press started Impressionist, he dreamt of an outfit equally comfortable playing weird rock, oddball hip-hop and jazzy, experimental instrumental music. Different albums would reflect its diverse moods and skill sets. For Impressionist’s first, Everything, the Philly sextet is in “psychedelic rock orchestra” mode. The lyrics concern “earthly issues like relationships, romance and drinking,” says Press, “which can also be read as being about God, whatever that means. I haven’t really figured it out yet.” Another of Press’ goals for Impressionist was to incorporate throat singing — a brand of rumbling harmonic vocal tones associated with Mongolia, Tibet and Siberia — into Western musical genres. “I know that the rest of the guys are very committed to pushing their instruments as far as extended techniques go, so when I learned how to throat sing, I just had to start a band around it,” he says. With that, the throat-singing saxophonist says Everything’s defining moment is “You Are Not Alone,” a melancholy track that makes use of an insistent groove, a lilting melody and icy improvisation. “There’s also still a healthy heaping of chaos,” says Press. Speaking of chaos, the other headliner on tonight’s show at the Boot is noise ensemble Cowardice, Impressionist’s best buds. The bands frequently share a bill and play on the other’s records. Press also started a label with Cowardice’s members, Walrus Mode Records, and both bands’ new releases are that imprint’s first recordings. “I’m just a big nerd, and we’re a band of music nerds, making music that music nerds will love,” says Press. (a_amorosi@citypaper.net) ✚ Thu., May 29, 7:30 p.m., $7, with Left of Logic and Candice Martello, Boot & Saddle, 1131 S. Broad St., 877-435-9849, bootandsaddlephilly.com.

✚

Impressionist

Everything (WALRUS MODE)

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NORTHERN ALLIANCE: The story starts with the two guys seated in the center — L-R: Keith Richard Peirce and Eric Bandel — finding out they were dating the same woman. MAX GAINES

[ rock/pop/americana ]

BROTHERS IN ARMS How two dudes found each other, lost each other and found each other again to build the fascinating and fortuitous 10-strong rock band Northern Arms. By Dotun Akintoye he story of Keith Richard Peirce and Eric Bandel’s first encounter some 14 years ago is a meet-cute that’d make the most vapid Hollywood rom-com writer blush. “Well, we were dating the same woman,” says Peirce, his matterof-fact tone playing against the posture of a storyteller who knows he’s got a real gem on his hands. One morning, Peirce was supposed to play some music he had been working on for his friend Jamie Mahon of the Philadelphia band The Three 4 Tens, who happened to live near Peirce’s then-girlfriend. He got up and threw on some clothes, and when he arrived at Mahon’s there were people crashing on the floor from a party the previous night. Bandel, himself a keyboardist, was on that floor. He recognized Peirce without knowing why. When he heard the music Peirce was playing for Mahon upstairs, Bandel walked into the room to listen. “A beautiful guttural dog in an opera house” — that’s how Bandel remembers Peirce’s voice from that morning. “It was

T

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unhinged, all emotion.” It was a powerful moment for Peirce, too: “I felt like I found my brother in a second.” It wasn’t until later that Bandel realized Peirce had been wearing his shirt — one he left at his girlfriend’s apartment. The next few years are filled with stories of their false starts as a band (first as a duo, then a quartet), alcoholism, heartbreak, departures from each other and the city, aimlessness, sobering up, reunions and an eventual second chance. “We were really self-destructive people,” confesses Peirce. “We were drinking and drugging to run.” The substance abuse drove them apart. Bandel moved to Brooklyn, got married and got sober. Peirce moved to Florida, fell in love and quit drinking by 2011. They both quit music, and although they stayed in touch intermittently, they didn’t reunite until the summer of 2012, when Bandel, fleeing a divorce, went to visit Peirce in Florida. There, the two recorded a song they had written for a friend’s wake, the lovely country ballad “Last Horse,” to positive responses online. And all of a sudden they got a glimpse of who they might have been, who they had wanted to be all along, and who they could still manage to be. By 2013 they were both back in Philadelphia, committed to making a record, and assembling a band that would eventually swell to their current ensemble of 10 members.

“A beautiful guttural dog in an opera house.”

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[ free of the awful burden of appearing meaningful ] 19102review

[ album reviews ]

➤ Christian Löffler | A

➤ Fatima | B+

This German producer’s 2012 debut was a lush, tenderly organic thing that fully earned its pointedly nonelectronica-ish title, A Forest. Briefer but no less enchanted, Young Alaska (Ki) breathes even more warmth and melody into a similar palette of woody plinks and crinkles, mist-shrouded synths, gently thrumming grooves and the kind of ineffable, twinkling bell tones patented by sleepytime house master Pantha du Prince, making particularly fine use of —K. Ross Hoffman murmuring, almost subliminal vocals.

This NYC-based Gambian-Swedish soul sister is clearly a fervent disciple in the church of Baduism, evoking Ms. Erykah in both her smoked honey pipes and gritty, simmering, Dilla-fied grooves. Her sneakily addictive debut Yellow Memories (Eglo), though crafted with a small army of producers (Floating Points, Oh No, Flako), asserts a distinct identity within its omnivorous array of stripped-down jazzy funk, kalimbakissed shuffles and a cappella canticles. —K. Ross Hoffman

➤ Tori Amos | B Unrepentant Geraldines (Mercury Classics) is not a conceptual

opus, but its ostensible return to “pop” still proceeds very much on Tori’s terms, which means quirky, suite-like songs, slyly experimental arrangements, sumptuous piano ballads, willfully affected English diction and tangled, poetic ruminations on family, aging, relationships and contemporary politics refracted through art, history, fairy tales and mythological metaphor. Her vision hasn’t felt this lucid or approachable in some time. —K. Ross Hoffman

flickpick

The review of Philly books

➤ Coldplay | BI, for one, am done beating Coldplay up for not being possessed of genius. Chris Martin is what he is — a talented tune monger and mediocre artist. And if anyone was listening anymore, they’d notice that the breakup has freed him of the awful burden of appearing meaningful or even clever. He’s plainspoken, sad, wrung out; the music is relatively subdued, ambient, melodic; the falsetto as sickly sweet as ever. Which isn’t to say Ghost Stories (Parlophone) makes me —Dotun Akintoye care; they’ve never been capable of that.

[ movie review ]

IDA [ A- ] STARK AND STONE-FACED, director Pawel Pawlikowski’s Ida reveals itself slow-

ly; the secrets it hides are not only those of its characters but of exactly what this story is and where it will ultimately lead. In its opening minutes it appears to be a near-silent Bressonian drama set in a Polish convent. But then the young, pretty novitiate known as Anna (Agata Trzebuchowska) is called before the mother superior, who encourages her to visit her only living relative before taking her vows. Thus Anna meets Wanda (Agata Kulesza), a former state prosecutor who informs her niece that her name is not Anna but Ida, she’s Jewish, and her parents were killed during the Nazi occupation. (Ida covers some of the same territory as the controversial Aftermath, which explored the killing of Polish Jews by their neighbors in much more melodramatic fashion.) The pair set off on a road trip to find their graves, providing Anna with her first exposure to the outside world, including “carnal thoughts,” anti-Semitism and John Coltrane. Set in early 1960s Poland and shot in stunning, severe black and white and Academy ratio, Ida looks like it could have been released at that time, resembling the European art films of the period. The Paris-based Pawlikowski, returning to his native country for the first time in his career, keeps the focus on the two women and the subtle ways in which their journey changes them. At first they’re bemused by one other; Wanda stifles laughter at her niece’s unsullied innocence, while Ida reacts to her aunt’s cynicism and provocations with the self-satisfaction of the genuinely faithful. These small gestures are indicative of the film’s tone, which faces unfathomable horror with subtle grace, making its conclusions all the more harrowingly resonant. —Shaun Brady

Facing unfathomable horrors with grace.

DIVINE INTERVENTION: Before taking her vows to become a nun, Anna (Agata Trzebuchowska) meets her only living relative, a worldly woman who tells her the truth about her origins.

THE UNSILENCED ➤ CERTAIN NARRATIVES, relegated to niche

publications before the emergence of online media, have risen in visibility in the past 15 years. More widespread understanding of what it means to be marginalized — and, in tandem, what it means to be privileged — is certainly a sign of progress. But many writers still desperately need platforms to advocate their positions. Philadelphia-born writer and activist Mia McKenzie (currently based in the Bay Area) acutely understood this need when she founded Black Girl Dangerous (blackgirldangerous. org), an online forum for queer and transgender writers of color. Now this forum is a robust nonprofit with contributors regularly exploring racism in popular LGBTQ movements, sexism within advocacy organizations, and every intersection in between. Black Girl Dangerous: On Race, Queerness, Class and Gender is an anthology of several of McKenzie’s best-known essays. Regular readers of the BGD blog will probably recognize some of these pieces. But this is more than a compilation of McKenzie’s greatest hits. The book also explores the controversies of contemporary microaggressions (including CNN’s mishandled coverage of the Steubenville rape verdict, the post-mortem condemnation of Trayvon Martin and a handy list of “8 Ways Not to Be an Ally”). It is proclamatory, a crash-course in an emergent discourse of which McKenzie is the most visible figurehead. Fans of McKenzie’s work will probably purchase this book. Anybody who cares about strengthening progressivism, principally by empowering those who are often unintentionally silenced, should get it as soon as they can. —Sameer Rao

✚

Black Girl Dangerous: On Race, Queerness, Class and Gender

Mia McKenzie (SELF-PUBLISHED, 2014, 180 PP.)

✚ If you know of any really good books to review please email mikala@citypaper.net.

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[ arts & entertainment ]

✚ Brothers In Arms <<< continued from page 20

“What did Bowie say about the terror of knowing what the world is really about?” The result of their journeys is Northern Arms (BITBY), their eponymous debut album, due out June 17. It is a dark, eerie record whose thematic and sonic roots are in traditional country, folk, gospel and blues, with touches of orchestral music filtered through a horn-heavy, melodic, big band sound. Ask about influences and, among other things, Peirce will tell you about attending a now largely defunct public school program called Religious Release as a boy, which would get him out of school for a devotional period where he developed a love for old hymns. Bandel mentions legendary gospel and bluesman Rev. Gary Davis. “We go to the original sources, the dirt and the blood and the bones,” says Peirce. On the role of Biblical and Gothic imagery in their songs, Peirce is reluctant to go into details. “I’ve seen too many of my heroes really fucking shit the bed with letting me know exactly what they thought. … These songs are a representation of a feeling.” Then he laughs. “What did Bowie say about the terror of knowing what the world is really about?” For all this, the band still achieves moments of intense release. Listen to the performance of soul singer PJ Brown on the closer “Flesh of Arms,” which she transforms from another dirge into blistering existential blues, or the hymnal refrain that forms a coda to “Let the Water Come Down.” There, you get a sound like a group of strangers who have stumbled into each other singing the same song. They find and hold a brief harmony before their voices fray apart as the notes rise, taking up the passage again and again. Each time the harmony is a pleasure, a genuine surprise, a recognition of each other, a feeling of community. (dotun.akintoye@citypaper.net) ✚ Northern Arms plays Fri., May 30, 9:15 p.m., $10, with Weird Hot and A Brood of Vipers, Johnny Brenda’s, 1201 Frankford Ave., 215-7399684, johnnybrendas.com. 22 | P H I L A D E L P H I A C I T Y PA P E R |

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movie

shorts

FILMS ARE GRADED BY CITY PAPER CRITICS A-F.

events

EVENTS

events A3/@16 0G

date genre venue price ]` Xcab P`]eaS

citypaper.net/ events photostream

WE WANT YOUR PHOTOS

The Dance of Reality

✚ NEW

scenes, personal yet profound, are seared into the viewer’s memory. —Paulina Reso (Ritz at the Bourse)

THE DANCE OF REALITY | ABreaking a 23-year dry spell, cinematic provocateur Alejandro Jodorowsky returns to the screen with a movie about his childhood in the small seaside town of Tocopilla, Chile, during the 1930s. This being Jodorowsky, his remembrance of things past abounds with disfigured miners who sing about the dynamite explosions that deformed them, a hunchback love interest and a shocking (and near-impossible-to-fake) scene in which his mother urinates on his father to cure him of the plague. Unlike his earlier work, The Dance of Reality has a relatively straightforward narrative, which makes it easier to digest all of the symbolism that baffled viewers of his more free-form, psychedelic films. Raised by JewishUkrainian parents, Jodorowsky (Jeremias Herskowits) is a sensitive boy who’s treated as an outsider by the anti-Semitic locals. His stern father, Jaime (played by Jodorowsky’s real-life son Brontis), reveres Stalin, and fashions himself in his image, cultivating a thick mustache, wearing army fatigues and testing his son’s bravery and tolerance for pain. His mother Sara (Pamela Flores), a voluptuous woman who sings all of her lines with an operatic voice, exerts a different kind of power, one that is supernatural and dismissed by her husband. The second (not-so autobiographical) half of the movie humanizes the heartless father, following him on a meandering (and ultimately redemptive) quest to kill Chilean dictator Gen. Carlos Ibåùez del Campo, Jaime’s physical and emotional twin. Although the movie’s two halves don’t seamlessly mesh, both are necessary for the soul-healing the 85-year-old director seems to desire. Events from his youth are reimagined with surreal flourishes, and these vivid

IDA | ASee Shaun Brady’s review on p. 21. (Ritz Five) A MILLION WAYS TO DIE IN THE WEST Read Drew Lazor’s review at citypaper.net/movies. (Wide release)

✚ CONTINUING CHEF | B+ Little details make a big difference in Jon Favreau’s searingly sincere peek into the insecure world of modern chefs, where passion and creativity fight for breath amid a crush of egos as puffy as well-set soufflĂŠs. A former hotshot who’s lost direction but refuses to admit it, Carl Casper (writer/director Favreau) walks out on his cantankerous boss (Dustin Hoffman) after a brutal writeup from a wide-reaching web critic (Oliver Platt). After starting a viral Twitter spat with the reviewer, the chef parlays the buzz into a food truck he hopes will coax him back into relevance. There’s never any question whether or not cheffy will get his groove back, but the predictability of the proceedings is tempered by the growth of Casper’s bond with his young son (Emjay Anthony), who’s eager to pick up pop’s trade. Favreau mostly avoids culinary clichĂŠ by reminding us that many sets of human hands are responsible for what’s placed on your plate. —Drew Lazor (Ritz East)

Show us your Philly. Submit photos of the City of Brotherly Love, however you see it, at photostream@citypaper.net and we’ll publish the best in each week’s paper and online.

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THE DOUBLE | B Before 2010’s Submarine, Richard Ayoade’s greatest achievement as a director was Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace, a spoof of low-budget horror that demonstrated an uncanny ability to emulate a source while nonetheless making it his own. That’s essentially the approach taken by his second feature, The Double, which notwithstanding its Dostoyevskian origins, knocks several large-size chips off the block of Terry Gilliam’s Brazil. Perhaps it’s only fair that a doppelganger movie should itself so closely resemble another film, but it’s distracting, certainly in the beginning. Fortunately, The Double discovers its singularities, thanks mainly to Jesse Eisenberg(s)’ lead performance(s). A workaday schlub, Eisenberg’s Simon James finds himself with a new colleague in the preternaturally self-confident James Simon. The understated gag, a dark and cruel one, is that James is so nondescript that no one seems to notice that he’s suddenly acquired an exact physical duplicate. Ayoade doesn’t go for glib distinctions: James’ passive aggression is as nettlesome as Simon’s breezy entitlement; you can see why people would prefer the one to the other, while not necessarily caring for either of them. But that also leaves The Double in a tricky spot, trying to keep us involved in a battle when we don’t care who, if anyone, wins. Stylistically, The Double makes great strides past the already confident Submarine; you get the feeling Ayoade could be a major director if he put down certain crutches. But without the redeeming

personal touch of his coming-of-age charmer Submarine, it’s a cold and clinical affair. —Sam Adams (Ritz at the Bourse)

FED UP | BAs Katie Couric underlines in the opening moments of Stephanie Soechtig’s doc, she’s been reporting on America’s obesity epidemic for most of her broadcasting career. So why hasn’t anything been done to fix the problem? A parade of talking-head experts gather to blame a complacent, often compliant, government swayed by lobbyists from corporate food interests, fast food, sugary cereals — sugary everything, in fact. Soechtig makes the case that sugar is the nicotine of today, that the cigarette industry’s warning labels and shame-faced execs lie in the future for present-day sweets-peddlers. The ammunition is already in hand — the film includes jaw-dropping footage of a McDonald’s exec testifying before Congress that the company doesn’t market to children, that Ronald McDonald simply “informs and inspires through magic and fun.” —Shaun Brady (Ritz Five)

THE IMMIGRANT | B+ Although the Weinstein Company’s release plan is more reminiscent of clandestine border crossings than entering through Ellis Island, James Gray’s evocative period piece follows Marion Cotillard’s wayward Pole through the golden door and onto the mean streets of Manhattan. She quickly falls prey to Joaquin Phoenix’s mercurial wheeler-dealer, who

treats her like an object of affection one moment and a piece of property the next. Gray doesn’t spare the portentous symbolism (see the prostitute garbed as Lady Liberty for proof), but he’s working in an old-fashioned idiom that supports it. The film’s classicism can be stifling — it has a touch of the self-willed masterpiece about it — but it falls away when Jeremy Renner comes on the scene as a stage magician whose dedication to sleight of hand makes him paradoxically honest. The movie’s centerpiece, a pageant for quarantined deportees at Ellis Island, is a tragic encapsulation of the American Dream in all its chimerical promise, part aspiration, part lie — and one of the most thrilling sequences in recent memory. —SA (Ritz Five)

LOCKE | B There’s massive risk and considerable reward in Steven Knight’s impressionistic pocket film, which takes 85 minutes to track a successful man’s swift sinking into shit. Loading into his vehicle after a long shift, steadyhanded foreman Ivan Locke (Tom Hardy) begins working the hands-free device the second he sets off toward London. A paragon of muddy-boot reliability, he shocks his employee Donal (Andrew Scott) with the bombshell that he will not be around for next morning’s complicated concrete pour. The long-buried secret keeping him from his work is a big one, and it’s something he must reveal to his happy wife Katrina (Ruth Wilson) and two young sons while he speeds toward the big city. His phone’s rapid ringing

INVITE YOU TO SEE

RITZ FIVE Monday, June 2 7:30PM To enter for the chance to receive a complimentary pass, text ENGLISH and your ZIP CODE to 43549 (EXAMPLE TEXT: ENGLISH 19103) THIS FILM IS RATED PG-13. Under 13 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian. No purchase necessary. Texting services provided by 43KIX are free of charge. Standard text message rates may apply. Check your plan. Limit one entry per cell phone number. Late and/or duplicate entries will not be considered. Winners will be drawn and sent a mobile pass at random. Seating is not guaranteed. Sponsors are not responsible for lost or redirected entries, phone failures or tampering. Deadline for entry is Thursday, May 29, 2014 at 5:00 PM EST.

IN THEATERS JUNE 6 wordsandpicturesthemovie.com

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and the voices on the other line create a three-dimensional understanding of Locke’s spotless professional and personal existence, forming a quick-setting mix of sympathy and resentment that Hardy manipulates with force and grace. Not even Knight’s rapiered screenplay can fully prevent the inevitable eye glaze that comes with being stuck in a claustrophobic cockpit from its first page to its last, but it helps that the guy in the driver’s seat is the sharing sort. —DL (Ritz at the Bourse)

PALO ALTO | B+ Palo Alto is drawn, apparently loosely, from a book of short stories by James Franco, but there’s not much story here: Think back, and you’re more likely to remember a mood, or a color palette, than an event. If there’s a core plot, it involves the rapport between Franco’s high school soccer coach and a student played by Emma Roberts, whom he coaxes into a sexual relationship after she babysits his kids. Double, no triple, ick, but first-time director Gia Coppola doesn’t just act outraged or horrified so much as she marinates in it, like a teenager soaking up experience for future study. Coppola’s directorial stance might best be parsed as passive engagement: She’s watching through the wrong end of a telescope, but the distance gives her perspective. It’s hard to feel like anything matters, but that malaise is a defense mechanism as well as a means of alienation. Here, adolescence is less a crucible than a gauntlet; the trick is to keep your head down and get through it any way you can. —SA (Ritz at the Bourse)

[ movie shorts ]

✚ SPECIAL SCREENINGS INTERNATIONAL HOUSE 3701 Chestnut St., 215-387-5125, ihousephilly.org. The Human Scale (2012, Denmark, 77 min.): A doc about revolutionary urban planners. Presentation by creative director of Next City, Anthony Smyrski post-screening. Thu., May 29, 7 p.m., $9. Je T’Aime, Je T’Aime (1968, France, 91 min.): A new 35 mm print of Alain Resnais’ underrated movie about a man testing a time machine. Sat., May 31, 7 p.m., $9.

PHILAMOCA 531 N. 12th St., 267-519-9651, philamoca.org. Trancers (1985, U.S., 76 min.), The Day Time Ended (1979, West Germany, 79 min.): A bounty hunter pursues a criminal with hypnotic powers; and a family is transported back to prehistoric times. Fri., May 30, 8 p.m., $10.

More on:

citypaper.net ✚ CHECK OUT MORE R E P E R T O R Y F I L M L I S T I N G S AT C I T Y PA P E R . N E T / E V E N T S .

events LISTINGS@CITYPAPER.NET | MAY 29 - JUNE 4

[ waitin’ on superman, losin’ all patience ]

BOYZ BAND: 11th Hour Theatre Company’s production of Altar Boyz continues at the Arts Bank through June 1. JOHN FLAK

Events is our selective guide to what’s going on in the city this week. For comprehensive event listings, visit citypaper.net/events. IF YOU WANT TO BE LISTED: Submit information by email (listings@ citypaper.net) or enter it yourself at citypaper.net/submit-event with the following details: date, time, address of venue, telephone number and admission price. Incomplete submissions will not be considered, and listings information will not be accepted over the phone.

5.29 thursday [ theater ]

ALTAR BOYZ $31 | Through June 1, 11th Hour Theatre Company at the Arts Bank, 601 S. Broad St., 267-987-9865, 11thhourtheatrecompany.org. Imagine congenial religious satire Nunsense crossed with doo-wop fantasy musical revue Forever Plaid as performed by One Direction, and you have

the ninth longest-running offBroadway musical of all time. The Barrymore Award winners at 11th Hour Theatre Company give a first-rate production to a confounding show, if we think too hard about it: The satire of both boy bands and evangelical zealotry is inoffensively gentle, and the earnestly cartoonish faith of this “Raise the Praise” tour is too slight to take seriously. The best way to approach director Megan Nicole O’Brien’s production is to enjoy Jamison Foreman’s on-stage band, Samuel Antonio Reyes’ authentic choreography and the dynamic quintet’s harmonies, plus the occasional jibes at boy band clichés and the few innocent innuendoes hidden in the lads’ earnest piety (hopefully without bristling at Nicholas Park’s over-the-top portrayal of the swishy gay who doesn’t know he’s gay). It’s brisk and enjoyable, though without the redeeming value of 11th Hour hit comedies like The Bomb-itty of Errors,

Reefer Madness or even The Great American Trailer Park Musical. —Mark Cofta

[ theater ]

27 $15-$25 | Thu.-Sat., May 29-31, New Paradise Laboratories at the Painted Bride, 230 Vine St., 215-9259914, paintedbride.org/theater/27. New Paradise Laboratories, the award-winning theater company (Batch, Prom, The Fab 4 Reach the Pearly Gates), revive this 2012 Fringe hit set in the afterlife. The ghosts of rock legends Kurt Cobain, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison and Jimi Hendrix — all dead at 27 — while away the time in eternity. When Amy Winehouse, the newest member of this tragic club, arrives, they’re not sure what to do with her. NPL director Whit MacLaughlin — who’s created another unique niche for himself by directing the Arden’s annual holiday children’s show — di-

rects NPL’s newest ensemble members, with music by guitar prodigy Alec MacLaughlin of the Austin band Id. “We love and admire the 27ers,” says Whit MacLaughlin. “They all burned with a bright flame that was extinguished absurdly early. Their stories are both moving and a bit ridiculous, depending on your perspective.” NPL conceived 27 to be as mind-bending as these legends’ music in an abstract show that explores how our culture links notions of talent and mortality, as well as our myths about passage into the afterlife. —Mark Cofta

5.30 friday

Spring Garden Street, 800-7453000, ticketmaster.com. This Wired 96.5 electro-fest is a curious jawn for Diplo considering his Mad Decent Block Party plays the same venue in August. That said, it’s nice seeing him, and the rest of this bill is audacious. Iggy Azelea has been drubbed for her Australianfashion-model-turned-Southern-trap-rapper routine, but when I caught her at the TLA earlier this month, she was a hot mess in the best way. Calvin Harris is probably the finest practitioner of clean-and-clear electronica, and his new single “Summer” is suitably warm and fuzzy. Get there early to hear DJ Vice and Mike Taylor do “The World is Our Playground” — it’s 2014’s sultriest danz-hop anthem. —A.D. Amorosi

James Hunter, Union Transfer, 1026 Spring Garden St., 215-232-2100, utphilly.com. Plucked from uncredited background vocalist obscurity (to say nothing of that gig as a corrections officer at Riker’s Island), Jones somehow became the toast of Britain’s funky northern soul scene in the late ’90s. Soon enough, she became the voice of passionate vintage-sounding R&B, dropping one top-notch album after another with the Dap-Kings. More recently, Jones got, then beat, cancer. Give the People What They Want (Daptone) sounds just like the sweetest victory. —A.D. Amorosi

5.31 saturday

[ pop/hip-hop ]

[ pop/r&b ]

WIRED FEST

SHARON JONES & THE DAP-KINGS

[ rock/pop/hip-hop ]

$30 | Fri., May 30, 8:30 p.m., with

$40-$149 | Sat., May 31, noon,

$65 | Fri., May 30, 7 p.m., Festival Pier, Columbus Boulevard and

THE ROOTS PICNIC

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Festival Pier, Columbus Boulevard and Spring Garden Street, 800-7453000, rootspicnic.com. A list of all worthwhile acts on The Picnic would eat up all my space. Get there early for Philly’s The War on Drugs and A$AP Ferg, but the event’s

[ events ]

cover of Bowie’s “Heroesâ€? as her latest single. Snoop Dogg? That momentary career in reggae? Whatever. He’s hip-hop’s most elastic and dangerous (sounding) rapper when provoked. For the finale, watching The Roots tackle their most poetically downbeat album yet, ‌ And Then You Shoot Your Cousin (Def Jam), should be fascinating. —A.D. Amorosi

[ community ] boldest highlights hit when the sun goes down. Janelle Monåe’s jacked-up, kinetic nu-soul routine is a must, especially now that she’s touting an eerie

Celebr ating Americ an Craft Beer and Classi c Arcade Games

/'-& $+.*"#, !) !(!%'+*# 1 /'-& !.,! #((

OPEN MON-THURS at 4PM | FRI-SUN at NOON 0

0 0 0

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FUNERAL FOR A HOME FREE | Sat., May 31, 11 a.m., 3711 Melon St., funeralforahome.org. Think of the hundreds of homes demolished every year in our

city (it’s estimated that about 600 fall annually). Behind each razed structure is a story — the legacies, no matter how insignificant, of the people who inhabited its walls and the surrounding neighborhood. In Mantua, an area that’s slowly on the rise, a row home on Melon Street will be demolished this week, but not without ceremony. The home’s “funeral,” also being called a “homego-

gospel choir will also speak and entertain, and residents are invited to pay their respects. The Philadelphia Inquirer will even write an obituary. “The project,” according to a statement from presenting organization Temple Contemporary, “is meant to generate critical thinking, discussion and action around issues of housing redevelopment and preservation.” Row homes in our city are so ubiquitous as to seem of no consequence. But considering how they represent the very fabric of how we live, and how the cityscape continues to change, perhaps each and every one is indeed worth such a sendoff. —Mikala Jamison

[ theater ] ing” celebration, will bring together longtime residents, artists Billy and Steven Dufala and representatives from local organizations to offer spoken testimonies about the home and the neighborhood, as well as music and food and a procession through the surrounding area. Clergy, a youth orchestra and a

UNSPOKEN $10-$15 | Sat., May 31 and June 12, Tongue & Groove at the Adrienne, 2030 Sansom St., 215568-8077, tongue-groove.com. Tongue & Groove defies expectations for improvisation: The group doesn’t perform the punchline-generating absurdity of many comedy improv groups

[ events ]

and TV’s Whose Line Is It Anyway? Instead, it creates long-form improv through realistic characters, real-life situations and a wide range of emotional tones. Since 2006, founder Bobbi Block’s talented troupe has premiered seven unique formats, even incorporating musicians and dancers. Unspoken uses texts, posts, emails and other unvoiced communications submitted anonymously by each show’s audience to explore what Block calls “the fun — and sometimes fear — of choosing not to speak face to face.” The group will create a collage of scenes and monologues that always tie together in delightfully clever and insightful ways. Tongue & Groove hasn’t performed locally in some time, having taken a hiatus to re-group and re-energize. The four upcoming performances, presented through Philly Improv Theatre

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citypaper.net [ NEW AND IMPROVED ]

f&d

foodanddrink

feedingfrenzy By Caroline Russock

Say hello to the city’s first vegan bar, Charlie was a sinner. ➤ NOW SEATING CoZara | Chef Hiroyuki “Zama” Tanaka’s U City outpost is open but there’s not a single roll on the menu. Instead of sushi, Tanaka has opted for an izakaya concept for his second restaurant. CoZara is focusing on drinking-friendly fare with a menu of bar bites ranging from classics like tsukune (chicken meatballs) and yakitori to Sichuan-marinated lamb chops and edamame hummus with lotus chips. The daytime menu is looking good with lunch sets, ramen and rice bowls. The bar is pouring an impressive selection of Japanese imports like Hitachino Nest Nipponia, an ancient barley ale and house-brewed white and tan. Open Mon.-Thu., 11:30 a.m.-10 p.m.; Fri., 11:30 a.m.-11 p.m.; Sat., 5 p.m.-11 p.m.; Sun, 5 p.m.-9 p.m. 3200 Chestnut St., 267-233-7488, cozaraphilly.com. Charlie was a sinner. | Say hello to Phila-

delphia’s first vegan bar, Charlie was a sinner. Nicole Marquis of vegan favorite Hip City Veg tapped The Mildred’s chef Mike Santoro to oversee the menu at this newly opened 13th Street cafe-by-day, bar-by-night. The three-part menu begins with a sizable cocktail list (wheatgrass with a shot of Chartreuse?), 11 wines by the glass, a short and sweet collection of beers and a handful of good-looking mocktails. Santoro has drafted an all-over-the-board menu of sharable vegan plates like beet-root dumplings, char-grilled young leeks with romesco and a selection of toasts. Open Sun.-Thu., 8 a.m.-11 p.m.; Fri.-Sat., 8 a.m.-midnight. 131 S. 13th St., 267-758-5372, charliewasasinner.com. Rival Bros. | The coffee forecast in Fitler Square

just got a who lot sunnier. Jonathan Adam’s and Damien Pileggi’s Rival Bros. flagship is open for business. Along with single origin and custom blend coffees from a shiny new La Marzocco espresso machine and Fetco Extractor brewer, Rival Bros. is serving pastries and toast from High Street on Market with butter from Trickling Springs and jams from neighboring Green Aisle. Open daily 7 a.m.-7 p.m. 2400 Lombard St., rivalbros.com. (caroline@citypaper.net)

CATCH UP: Striped bass and cockles at Society Hill Society. NEAL SANTOS

[ review ]

HERITAGE BREED Pennsylvania regional fare blends in at Society Hill Society. By Adam Erace SOCIETY HILL SOCIETY | 400 S. Second St., 267-273-1434, societyhi-

llsociety.com. Sun.-Wed., 4-10 p.m.; Thu.-Sat., 4-11 p.m. Snacks and appetizers, $4-$12; entrees, $17-$32; dessert, $8.

ong before there was a chef at Society Hill Society, there was a menu. If that sounds kind of backwards, that’s because it is. “It looked a lot like a Caesar salad and a burger and a chicken sandwich,” remembers Yun Fuentes, the Puerto Rico-born Garces vet More on: who would become the head chef at this quietly gorgeous reboot of Headhouse Square’s old Artful Dodger. Fuentes was leery. So Reed Barrow, SHS’s owner, asked him what he would cook. “I told him, ‘I want to do exactly what you’re doing with the space — with food.’” What Barrow has done with the Society Hill Society space is “standing out by blending in,” a catchphrase Fuentes repeats like a mantra at a biotech retreat. After gutting the dirty Dodger, Barrow filled in the design blanks by taking cues from the neighborhood’s Federalist architecture: chestnut woodwork, soft gray wainscoting,

L

citypaper.net

stained glass, schoolhouse booths. A small solar system of globe lights illuminates the cracked plaster ceilings, and the chairs look lifted from Betsy Ross’s crib. Seated in a cozy bracket-shaped booth tucked into a window nook, one of my dinner guests observed, “This is what City Tavern should look like.” The bar greets you first, an island of hammered copper with a counter-mounted citrus press and a wood-and-brass Czech draught fountain that looks like something sourced from an antique locomotive. It pours one beer only: Pilsner Urquell. Sadly, my lanky, bearded server informed me that the Urquell had run dry, so I shifted focus to the neat cocktail menu by Paul McDonald, who escaped Farmer’s Cabinet for Society Hill Society. For the Drink of Summer 2014, look no further than his Fuzzled, a rumand-club swirled with rhubarb-thyme syrup. As promised, what Barrow did for the MORE FOOD AND bricks, Fuentes has done for the food. The DRINK COVERAGE menus, printed on papyrus-like pamphlets, AT C I T Y P A P E R . N E T / are love letters to Pennsylvania’s past. M E A LT I C K E T. Recipes culled from Fuentes’ thorough research — dude even went to the library! — include snapper soup, pierogies, shad and shoofly pie. “Things that have been left in the past,” he explains, “but how they should be now.” Keystone heritage cuisine, if you will, from a chef who’s spent his time in Philadelphia cooking Spanish (Amada, Tinto) and Latin (Rosa Blanca) food. It’s a valiant endeavor, and one that paid off intermittently at Society Hill Society. Dark and tender pretzels with housemade mus>>> continued on page 30

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29

[ food & drink ]

✚ Heritage Breed <<< continued from page 29

“Standing out by blending in,� a catchphrase Fuentes repeats.

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30 | P H I L A D E L P H I A C I T Y PA P E R | M A Y

2 9 - J U N E 4 , 2 0 1 4 | C I T Y PA P E R . N E T

tard stood in for bread service with aplomb. Egg cheese, a ricotta-like recipe Fuentes unearthed in an old cookbook, was a cool, creamy contrast to charred toast and pickled asparagus. April’s shad is now May’s striper, a pristine brick of fish in a smoky pond of cockles and elegant ham broth conjured from hocks, clam juice and lardo. Fuentes has even given his stocks, the foundations of any restaurant, a Pennsky bent — instead of chicken and vegetable stocks, his larder has ham and “orchard,� the latter suffused with tons of local apples. Molasses, the pre-sugar sweetener of choice in the old commonwealth, is a go-to, too, and not just in desserts (though it figures heartily into the shoofly pie, whose layer of fig gives a pleasant Newton effect). It lends complexity to Vidalia onion jam, paired with unfortunately truffled pierogies, and to the ketchup dabbed on a juicy, backyard-style burger. That burger, I can’t believe it’s only $8. I’d pay twice that for the simple construction of beef, lettuce, tomato, onion and cheddar, served, if you wish (I did), on a house-baked potato bun. The burger was a calling card for Fuentes’ bordering-on-obsessive attention to detail. The onions are triple-soaked to draw out their bitterness. The bun isn’t just made from potato flour, but actual potatoes. “I wanted to see the flecks of skin,� and sure enough, you do. The coarsely ground, plancha-seared patty pulled the best qualities from brisket and sirloin. “I decided to have a sirloin steak on the menu, just so I could use the scraps for a burger,� Fuentes says. That’s some brilliant reverse engineering right there. The actual sirloin, sourced from Oregon’s Painted Hills and beautifully cooked, is also worth having, by the way — even if its bed of succotash and crown of raisins bloomed in white wine are not. Fuentes loves a bloomed raisin! Their cousins, currants, stumbled onto a scrapple salad drunk with Madeira. My main gripe with the whole Pennsylvania theme is its senseless disregard for the season. Don’t get me wrong, Fuentes is cooking with seasonal produce — but the recipes are wintry as hell. A bowl of roasted mushrooms and chestnuts was lovely, but who wants that when it’s 70 degrees out? Block o’ pork belly with apples and dumplings? Call me in October. Chicken-pot-pie croquettes? That’s what Pennsylvania cuisine is built from — unforgiving winters and a sturdy German backbone. Then again, I ate my words when the faschnauts came. Plumped with smooth, housemade bourbon apple butter, these plush, oval Dutch doughnuts screamed fall, and I did not care. The sidecar of dip was not caramel, but dulce de leche. “I know we’re calling it ‘heritage cuisine,’ but this is my heritage, so we had to do dulce,� Fuentes laughs. I’m good with that. Pennsylvanians do most, but not everything, better. (adam.erace@citypaper.net)

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31

[ i love you, i hate you ] To place your FREE ad (100 word limit) ➤ email lovehate@citypaper.net BITCH! I don’t know what your problem is but, I wanted you to know that I did fuck your husband, and you didn’t think that I knew that he was your husband! Yeah I knew that he was your husband but I didn’t care! I just wanted to do what I wanted to do with no regard! Who the hell do you think that you are asking my sister if I liked you! You know that I don’t or I wouldn’t have fucked your husband! He likes me anyway better than you and I think that you know that! How does this shit feel now since you always said how lucky you were to not get cheated on!

and then tried to sleep with my best friend in the world. It isn’t easy to look at you knowing what you did and now you are just pretending that it never happened. I want you to come to my house and get all the things out of my house and go on with your life! The only thing is that I wish that I could keep your dog..him and I got a special bond! And I know that you don’t deserve that dog...I hate you so much! I am glad that you are almost fucking gone! Oh did my best friend tell you that she has fucking herpes? If not, have fun at the doctors!

LATER BITCHES Man, it is so awesome not having to look or listen to you uptight, ignorant, self-absorbed bitches anymore! No more listening to you talk about how great you all are, your stupid degrees that are so much better than anyone else’s, your attempts to trying to be attractive, when my dog wouldn’t even hump your leg. Idiots like you stay right where you are, while the rest of the world just moves around you-maybe that is because you’re nothing but a bunch of fat messes. If I saw you choking in front of

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GET A LIFE BITCH

MOVIE TIME Hi since I know that you are reading this section in particular because you know that I write something in there for you, What is you real deal..you promise me to come over my house and you never come, you promise me that you are going to call me and never do that also...I just don’t understand why you do what you do...you should not even say anything if you are going to lie about it...I am not going to pursue this anymore...it just isn’t worth it at all....learn to be real with yourself and others. I am done!

NO MORE DRAMA Hey lady...I am so happy that you have a new place and that you can move and be stress-free from the dumb stuff. You are too good of a person to have to go through all this nonsense. I wish you nothing but happiness and success at your new place. Your ex will never understand or know what he has lost. You are truly a gem and if I were a lesbian I would think about dating you! You are an amazing person, just keep doing what you are doing and keep hope alive!

PLEASE DON’T You told me that you wanted to stop by my house. I am saying to myself. He didn’t hear from me why is he playing them games saying he is coming over. I don’t appreciate that shit at all. If you come by my house and my boyfriend answers the door, please don’t get angry because he is not going to be too happy. How would I introduce you...Such and Such this is my former pussy eater. Pussy-eater this is my man! NOT! Stay away weirdo. PLEASE!

SHITTY BITCH To the small titty bitch who wasted my weekends.. I would like to say big fucking thank you for telling me not to call you anymore...it is cool though cause karma is a bitch..I hope your house and car catch the fuck on fire..because you need a reality check...it is cool you got what you wanted out of me...I put your tables and chairs together and buffet table together and took up the stupid tile on your basement floor, it is cool once again, because I am going to meet a female who will appreciate me for the things that I do...unlike your ungrateful-fat ass!

STUPID SHOULD BE...

Why the fuck are you worried about who I am talking to! You stupid-ass bitch, then you are going to sit there and tell on some fucking body! I hate you for that. I really don’t want to share my life with you! Why would you think that I would. I have a life outside of the miserable-ass workplace! Your job doesn’t mean shit to me! You love your job so much so you go ahead and keep yourself stressed the fuck out! Nobody is going to worry, we are just taking one day at a time like the alcoholics.

I CAN’T BELIEVE I can’t believe that you pretended that you loved me 32 | P H I L A D E L P H I A C I T Y PA P E R |

what you are looking for in your life! I am defintely thinking of moving forward.

INCREDIBLE LOVE Once in a while you meet that special someone...I know that you are the one...I just want you to open up to me and let me know what is going on...I love you so much and you already know that I put you on a pedestal along with my parents! You mean the world to me and nothing would be greater than to say that my last name is yours! When we are together you make me feel so good. I smile when you enter the house when I hear your voice. I know that I am in love with you...I just hope that you feel the same way about me! Forever ever yours, Boogie!

M A Y 2 9 - J U N E 4 , 2 0 1 4 | C I T Y PA P E R . N E T

me, I would spit in your face and keep walking. You hated me because I would say to your face what you would say behind anyone’s back that walked out of the room. At least I kept it real assholes. I hate you, plain and simple.

LONG TIME! I haven’t seen you in a long time and I am just wondering when I do see you if the spark is going to be lit! I really don’t think that it is going to be lit so you need to go your own way and I go mine! I am totally not in love with you! I am in love with myself at this point. I hope that you don’t call me and I hope that you find

your name...you dumb-ass bitch every week you call me and tell me that your boyfriend is whipping your ass! What the fuck is wrong with you, didn’t any woman learn from these different movies about abuse? This shit is real and need to be dealt with in the proper manner. I don’t even feel sorry for you anymore. I did in the beginning but now, I don’t feel sorry for you. You are just another pathetic basket case. ✚ ADS ALSO APPEAR AT CITYPAPER.NET/lovehate. City Paper has the right to re-publish “I Love You, I Hate You”™ ads at the publisher’s discretion. This includes re-purposing the ads for online publication, or for any other ancillary publishing projects.

7&3: (00% “..#&&3 -*45 )"4 (308/ 50 &1*$ 1301035*0/4 ,*5$)&/ )"4 "%%&% "/ &953" #&-- 8*5) 1&3)"14 5)& $*5:µ4 #&45 '3*5&4 40.& 45&--"3 #&&3 #"55&3&% '*4) "/% 7&3: (00% .644&-4³ Craig LeBan, Philadelphia Inquirer,

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