Riverfront Times, July 31, 2019 by Riverfront Times

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JULY 31-AUGUST 6, 2019

RIVERFRONT TIMES

JULY 31-AUGUST 6, 2019

riverfronttimes.com

JULY 31-AUGUST 6, 2019

RIVERFRONT TIMES

JULY 31-AUGUST 6, 2019

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THE LEDE

“I was laid off, and I wasn’t making no money, and I thought, ‘I got all these comic books here, and why don’t I start putting them out here?’ ... It’s like the good Lord said, ‘It’s not what you got but how you use what you got.’ You know what I mean? It’s like he’s telling me I got all these comic books — well, use them efficiently.”

PHOTO BY THEO WELLING

GARY LEE DUNN, PHOTOGRAPHED SELLING COMIC BOOKS ON JULY 28 riverfronttimes.com

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RIVERFRONT TIMES

TABLE OF CONTENTS Publisher Chris Keating Interim Editor in Chief Doyle Murphy

E D I T O R I A L Arts & Culture Editor Paul Friswold Music Editor Daniel Hill Digital Editor Jaime Lees Staff Writer Danny Wicentowski Restaurant Critic Cheryl Baehr Film Critic Robert Hunt Columnist Ray Hartmann Contributing Writers Mike Appelstein, Allison Babka, Thomas Crone, Jenn DeRose, Mike Fitzgerald, Sara Graham, MaryAnn Johanson, Roy Kasten, Jaime Lees, Joseph Hess, Kevin Korinek, Bob McMahon, Lauren Milford, Nicholas Phillips, Tef Poe, Christian Schaeffer Proofreader Evie Hemphill Editorial Interns Katie Counts, Joshua Phelps, James Pollard

COVER

Lost and Found A spouse. A case. A finger. Everybody loses something. It’s only a question of how much Cover photo by

A R T Art Director Evan Sult Contributing Photographers Virginia Harold, Tim Lane, Monica Mileur, Zia Nizami, Andy Paulissen, Nick Schnelle, Mabel Suen, Micah Usher, Theo Welling, Jen West, Corey Woodruff P R O D U C T I O N Production Manager Haimanti Germain

CAITLIN FORD

M U L T I M E D I A A D V E R T I S I N G Sales Director Colin Bell Sales Manager Jordan Everding Senior Account Executive Cathleen Criswell, Erica Kenney Account Managers Emily Fear, Jennifer Samuel Multimedia Account Executive Chris Guilbault, Drew Halliday, Jackie Mundy C I R C U L A T I O N Circulation Manager Kevin G. Powers

INSIDE The Lede Hartmann

News Feature Calendar

Missouri leads the pack for pure cruelty

12 22

Police Story | MO Game Con | Pulitzer Prize photographs | Matilda: The Musical

Film

Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood

Cafe

Oaked

E U C L I D M E D I A G R O U P Chief Executive Officer Andrew Zelman Chief Operating Officers Chris Keating, Michael Wagner VP of Digital Services Stacy Volhein Creative Director Tom Carlson www.euclidmediagroup.com N A T I O N A L A D V E R T I S I N G VMG Advertising 1-888-278-9866, vmgadvertising.com S U B S C R I P T I O N S Send address changes to Riverfront Times, 308 N. 21st Street, Suite 300, St. Louis, MO 63103. Domestic subscriptions may be purchased for $78/6 months (Missouri residents add $4.74 sales tax) and $156/year (Missouri residents add $9.48 sales tax) for first class. Allow 6-10 days for standard delivery. www.riverfronttimes.com The Riverfront Times is published weekly by Euclid Media Group Verified Audit Member Riverfront Times 308 N. 21st Street, Suite 300, St. Louis, MO 63103 www.riverfronttimes.com General information: 314-754-5966 Fax administrative: 314-754-5955 Fax editorial: 314-754-6416 Founded by Ray Hartmann in 1977

Short Orders

Culture

Adam Bingham of Retreat Gastropub | Mac’s Local Eats | Bissinger’s | Bar Tab: Frosé

The Torchlight Parade | fnnch

Out Every Night

Lake Street Dive | Redbait | Jade Bird

Savage Love

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Riverfront Times is available free of charge, limited to one copy per reader. Additional copies of the current issue may be purchased for $1.00 plus postage, payable in advance at the Riverfront Times office. Riverfront Times may be distributed only by Riverfront Times authorized distributors. No person may, without prior written permission of Riverfront Times, take more than one copy of each Riverfront Times weekly issue. The entire contents of Riverfront Times are copyright 2018 by Riverfront Times, LLC. No portion may be reproduced in whole or in part by any means, including electronic retrieval systems, without the expressed written permission of the Publisher, Riverfront Times, 308 N. 21st Street, Suite 300, St. Louis, MO 63103. Please call the Riverfront Times office for back-issue information, 314-754-5966.

HARTMANN Medicaid For None? Missouri is without parallel in its cruelty toward the poor BY RAY HARTMANN

reat news, Missouri, we’re finally number one Yes, Missouri ranks at the very top of the 50 states in the decline of health care coverage for poor children between March 2017 and March 2019. ombining Medicaid and the hildren’s Health Insurance rogram HI , Missouri’s enrollment decline of 12.8 percent is numero uno in America. The findings, published July 17 by the national enter on Budget and olicy riorities B ,

haven’t gotten local coverage that I can find. But they dovetail with the widely discussed recent news that the number of children falling off of Medicaid rolls is at 95,000, a fifteen-percent, one-year decline, also tops in the nation. HI is a federal-state partnership like Medicaid for children ineligible for Medicaid but who still live in low-to-moderate-income working families. olitically, HI isn’t quite reviled as Medicaid among those offended by the Affordable are Act — aka Obamacare — so when one combines the two programs and measures enrollment decline over a twoyear period, it’s quite a statement to have, by far, the largest coverage drop in the United States. The bottom line is simple Missouri is cutting health care for its neediest children at a dramatically faster rate than any other state. And the malfeasance isn’t even limited to the customarily vilified Medicaid program. Lest you think it’s all a func-

tion of Missouri’s rollicking-good economy, consider that, according to B , the drop in the state’s unemployment rate during the two-year period was well below the decrease nationally. Also, justreleased federal job statistics for June show Missouri lost 2,237 jobs in the past year. One explanation for the coverage decline might have been that the state had done a better job during the past two years of rooting out welfare cheats, thus reducing the numbers. But had that been going on, why did ov. Mike arson declare at a news conference last December he was creating a new Medicaid and Fraud Abuse Task Force designed to catch welfare cheats who, he claimed, had stolen 170 million from the state Why was there no mention by the governor of having trimmed welfare rolls The only mention of numbers came when arson and former House Speaker Todd Richardson — head of MO HealthNet, which

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oversees the state Medicaid program — were asked if they’d consider joining 3 other states in expanding Medicaid coverage, a step that would bring billions of federal dollars into the state. That would be no. Ah, those were the good old days, when a man could talk proudly about Medicaid being all about fraud and financial peril, when cutting poor people off of their health care was a sign of fiscal responsibility. In January, arson touted a 50 million cut in state health spending because of reduced Medicaid rolls that he had failed to mention a month earlier in unveiling the task force. His budget director attributed the good fortune to presumed improvement in the economy. Spoiler alert That wasn’t it . But a funny thing happened on the way to zero spending on Medicaid eople started noticing that poor children were losing their health coverage. That’s not a good

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HARTMANN

Continued from pg 7

look, even for Obamacare opponents. The first public coverage of slashing children from the Medicaid rolls came in early February, when Sen. Scott Sifton, D-Affton, demanded that Richardson explain why 57,000 children — among 71,000 people overall — had lost Medicaid coverage in the previous year. “The state should provide answers to ensure that no one — no child — was cut from Medicaid simply because of red tape,” he said, prophetically. At that time, it was learned publicly that in 2018 the state had begun automating its verification system for Medicaid eligibility. Using technology from the previous century, the state had sent letters to recipients and those who didn’t respond — either because they’d moved and didn’t get them, didn’t understand the letters or otherwise failed to prove their eligibility — were booted. And, of course, there were understaffed call centers with average waits of 45 minutes or more that frequently dropped calls and were largely derelict. Timothy McBride, a Washington University health economist who chaired the MO HealthNet oversight committee publicly questioned that the enrollment drop was related to an improved economy “The process,” he said, “is breaking down because we don’t understand the situations of low-income people.” It was announced last week that McBride had been dumped from his oversight post by arson in May. In the ensuing months, the only changes that occurred were in the numbers, which skyrocketed. So last week, House Minority Leader rystal uade, D-Springfield, released a letter she had recently sent to Republican House Speaker lijah Haahr, father of four, wondering about all those kids dropping off the rolls. But now the number was 95,000 children. I guess that’s the threshold for admitting the problem. In a revealing sentence, Haahr noted that “more than a month ago” he had asked a subcommittee chairman to investigate the enrollment drop that had been revealed publicly five months earlier. Haahr assured uade he “personally requested” Richardson explain the numbers to two key Republican House colleagues and himself. And if that weren’t bold enough, he promised that “if MO

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HealthNet’s response fails to adequately answer our concerns or new ones arise, I will give my full support to Rep. David Wood and Rep. Jon atterson to hold hearings on this issue.” Wow Hearings This man sounds like a member of the Squad or something. With no apparent sense of irony, Haahr noted in his letter that Wood and atterson “have extensive knowledge of MO HealthNet and the utmost care for the most vulnerable Missourians, especially our children, that extends beyond partisan lines” emphasis mine . That’s certainly nice to hear from one of the top leaders of the Republican arty, the one that “along partisan lines” read, hatred of Obamacare has turned away as much as 10 billion federal dollars — dating back to 2014 — that would have provided health coverage for somewhere between 230,000 and 350,000 “vulnerable Missourians,” the large majority of whom remain without coverage. Not to mention saving lives. Missouri is one of fourteen states that continues to refuse to expand Medicaid, a cost of at least 1.5 billion annually to the state. But as awful — and frankly, stupid — as that might be, it pales in importance to the immorality of allowing children to go without their medications or treatment of their illnesses or preventive health care or vaccinations or maybe even the examination they need to get into school in the coming weeks. It cannot be overstated that in many of those 95,000 cases, the parents don’t know they’ve lost coverage. They’ll find out the hard way, when they try to get medical care for their uncovered children. This is abhorrent, but not an aberration. It’s the perfect storm of incompetence meeting inhumanity. Missouri’s state government is chronically underfunded, so it’s hardly a shock that its technology is scandalously outdated and its health care employees unable to perform their basic duties. But most important, let’s not forget the more recently imbedded culture of ignoring and denigrating the poor. In that regard, apparently, Missouri is second to none. n Ray Hartmann founded the Riverfront Times in 1977. Contact him at rhartmann@sbcglobal.net or catch him on St. Louis In the Know With Ray Hartmann and Jay Kanzler from 9 to 11 p.m. Monday thru Friday on KTRS (550 AM).

NEWS

Dogfighters cut the lips off their dogs, making the animals look ferocious. | COURTESY MIKE BIZELLI

Remembering Missouri’s Biggest Dogfighting Bust Written by

JAMES POLLARD

arly on a dark morning in July 2009 in the rural northern Missouri town of Hannibal, Mike Bizelli photographed his first dogfight rescue. He looked inside one plywood box and saw only teeth. Out walked a dog, dragging her chain, her mouth open in a snarl. He turned to Tim Rickey, then head of the Humane Society’s animal-cruelty task force, and said, “Watch out, Tim, here’s a mean one.” Rickey then knelt down and embraced the dog, whose hips were wagging “like crazy.” “She’s not mean,” Rickey told Bizelli. “She’s had her lips cut off.” To Bizelli’s surprise, he was right. “She wasn’t mean at all,” the photographer says now. “It was pretty cool to get licked by a pit bull fight dog with no lips and all you could feel was her teeth and her tongue running over your cheek.” The lipless dog was Fay, one of 407 dogs rescued ten years ago in Missouri and Illinois by a multiagency task force. The investigation had begun in northern Missouri and eventually expanded across eight states. It was the big-

gest dogfighting bust in U.S. history. The number of rescued dogs soon surpassed 500 — 21 of those seized were pregnant and gave birth to nearly 150 puppies. The sting operation would come to be known as the “Missouri 500.” Rescuers were overwhelmed by the sheer number of animals. They had been expecting only 250 to 300 dogs. When as many as double that number arrived at facilities across the Midwest and South, volunteers encountered dogs suffering from severe injuries and illnesses. Originally, only fifteen percent were expected to be in good enough condition to be relocated. Of the dogs taken in by the Missouri Humane Society, more than 50 percent were relocated. Still, not all were so lucky. Fay passed away just over five months after her rescue and adoption in a mouth repair surgery. Others were euthanized. But another dog from that rescue, Dharma, found with an amputated leg, trained as a therapy dog for children with missing limbs — one of many such redemptive stories. A year and a half earlier, the story was different. In 2008, an FBI-led domestic terrorism task force received a tip that an organized mi-

Rescuers cared for more than 500 dogs following raids in eight states. | COURTESY MIKE BIZELLI litia group had a sideline guarding dog fights in rural Missouri. After three months of trying unsuccessfully to crack the dogfighting ring, the FBI pulled out of the investigation. But a Missouri state trooper who had worked on the task force decided to push forward on the investigation along with a fellow trooper. It wasn’t easy. Star NFL quarterback Michael Vick had been sentenced to prison the year before for his involvement in dog fighting, and fighters were particularly paranoid of any newcomers. The agents decided that to be successful, they’d have to put actual dogs in the fights — a decision reached after long discussion with the top officials in highway

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patrol. The Missouri Humane Society then joined the effort, with Rickey helping the undercover agents pass as dog fighters. After establishing a relationship with a prominent breeder, they were inside the ring. Beginning in Missouri and southern Illinois, the undercover officers eventually found themselves in Oklahoma and Texas, amassing over 150 contacts and 80 fights. By July 2009, the investigators had identified a massive network of dog fighters, spanning across the eight states. On the morning of the raids, law enforcement teams swarmed 29 properties from Missouri to Texas. Along with the dogs, they seized more than 200 firearms and

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RIVERFRONT TIMES

Teen Schools Florissant Councilman

It’s worth noting that, as far as parking lot arguments go, this one was remarkably civil. The only profanity comes from Jones, though none of it is directed at the teen. And name calling was restricted to Jones’ insistent use of the word “dude” while he steadily (and badly) tried to argue that the teen had dented his car. Over the short video, Jones digs himself deeper and deeper into the hole of his own stubbornness. The pinnacle of this descent comes at the 1:15 mark: Pointing to the spot where Jones has identified as the dent, the teen conducts a demonstration. “Wait,” the teen says, “You see where

I’m parked, right?” Then he opens his car’s door, which extends ... to a completely different part of Jones’ car. It’s nowhere close to the alleged “dent” Jones was just pointing. “It doesn’t even hit over there!” the teen says, pointing out the obvious. Jones bends to get a closer look. He runs a hand on the surface of his passenger-side door. It’s like he can’t believe his own eyes. Jones’ silence is ... palpable. The teen again points out that there’s no way for his car to have made the dent Jones himself pointed out on his own car. “But anyway,” the teen adds, “let’s call the police like you said.”

This could have been the opportunity for Jones to acknowledge that he made a mistake and apologize. And for a second, it sounds like that’s what the councilman is actually doing. “You’re right, you’re right, I agree, dude,” Jones finally says. He then tells the teen to shut the door so he can get a better look at the surface, which he rubs down vigorously with a palm. But Jones is not done, on the contrary, he scolds the teen: “Dude, that was uncalled for, you could have said something.” As the teen laughs and protests, Jones tries to change the subject to how the teen’s parents raised him (really) and then, pushing his bold counterattack further, Jones changes the subject to how the teen apparently knocked his phone out of his hand. The teen, wielding a vast supply of patience, simply opens the door to his car, showing again that his door couldn’t have marked Jones’ vehicle: “Please tell me,” the teen repeats, “what dent did I put right here?” As a finale, the teen suggests calling the police, to which Jones confidently responds, “Yeah, call ‘em up, dude.” When the teen laughs and remarks that it was Jones who said he would call the police, Jones backtracks further. “Dude,” says the adult politician bullying a teenager over a fantasy dent in a parking lot, “just have a little common courtesy, it’s all I’m asking for, dude.” Thankfully, the police never get to waste their time on the incident, as the teen exercised not just uncommon courtesy, but common sense. On the video he gets back into his car, remarking to Jones, “Hey man, just go on with your day, I’m not even worried about it.” n

been medically examined. Formal behavioral evaluations began two weeks later. Hill gave bi-weekly updates on the animals’ conditions and placement recommendations to federal courts. Support poured in from across the continent. Hill says 329 volunteers from across the country and anada helped take care of over 400 dogs during that hot summer — a “monumental undertaking.” The emergency shelter ran for seven months. Aided by other animal welfare organizations, the Humane Society found permanent homes in eighteen different states for more than half of the dogs. But Hill says they couldn’t place every animal from the group, and it was not safe for some to re-enter the community. Those dogs were eventually euthanized. “These animals were victims,” she says, describing the horrible exploitation the animals had endured at the hands of dog fighters. “It’s because of a aw in other people’s humanity. And

we have to do what we can to stop that, and we have to do what we can to educate people about how the animals ended up where they did and what their capacity really is.” Hill says the pit bull, contrary to popular belief, is a “human-friendly animal” that is focused on pleasing people. For Bizelli, meeting Fay taught him that lesson immediately. He followed some of the rescued dogs from their abusive environments to new homes. He says that these dogs possess great compassion. He turned the experience into a new book, “Last Day On A hain Stories of ompassion, Salvation and Misperceptions,” that he hopes will break those misperceptions. Hill also hopes to help people understand. “That is part of the saddest thing — when you take man’s best friend and you make him do this for your entertainment,” she says. “If given a choice, most of these animals would much rather be in your lap picking ice cream from your

fingers than anything else in the world.” In the decade since the Missouri 500, expectations for dogs rescued from fighting has changed. More work and resources are now devoted toward identifying animals that can be rehabilitated and re-homed. Hill says that wasn’t the standard ten years ago. “We worked really hard to have as many good outcomes as we had,” she says. “To have any kind of positive outcome had been almost unheard of to that point.” And while Hill would love to say that dog fighting has been eradicated, she knows there is more work to be done. It can be challenging, frustrating, dirty and smelly — she says her clothes are covered in hair — but she thinks it’s important. “Animals touch every part of our lives,” she says. “It’s part of our story, our humanity, that makes these animals important to us. And how we treat them is important, and it’s indicative of how we treat each other.” n

Written by

DANNY WICENTOWSKI

bizarre confrontation over whether a teen dented the car belonging to a Florissant city councilman has become a viral video, racking up 4.5 million views in five days on Twitter and, more remarkably, possibly setting a record for the amount of times a single human being can own himself. The video, which runs less than two minutes, opens with Jones identifying himself by name and position on the city council of Florissant. The camera swings around, briefly capturing the amused face of the unidentified seventeen-yearold doing the filming. Evidently, Jones had already threatened to call the cops, and now the video showed him throwing around his clout as a local politician. He accuses the teen of denting the front passenger door of Jones’ vehicle. So Jones confronted the teen, who in the video appears to be suppressing laughter (badly) throughout the entire exchange. “So, are we going to call the police or what?” the teen asks, to which Jones replies, “You’re fucking right I’m going to call the police, dude.” But no police are called. When the teen’s sister posted the video on July 25, she praised her sibling for capably responding to harassment and “respectfully” making a fool out of a local politician.

DOG RESCUE

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arrested 26 people on more than 100 felony charges. For Debbie Hill, vice president of operations for the Missouri Humane Society, the raids on that July morning presented the beginning of her challenge. She was among a tight circle of people who knew about the sting operation in advance. But she was sworn to secrecy, giving her little ability to prepare for the massive in ux of animals. She called a 7 a.m. meeting on the day of the raids with her staff — the first they’d heard anything about the operation. “We went into an open warehouse, and we built cages,” Hill says. “We didn’t have hoses and drains. We had to modify a lot of this stuff sometimes by the seat of our pants to make it all go.” She and her staff took care of the hundreds of emotionally and physically abused dogs. Within three days, every rescued dog had

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Dent expert and Florissant city council member Timothy Jones. TWITTER SCREENSHOT

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RIVERFRONT TIMES

veryone loses. It could be as trivial as a bet or a single sock and as shattering as a job or a life. But if you’re a human, you’re going to lose. And that means things are going to change, often in ways you never anticipated. That’s part of the deal, too. It’s arguably the most interesting part, painful as it may be. In this week’s issue, we look at four tales of loss — St. Louisans who took the hit and now find themselves re ecting from the other side. There are silver linings and unexpected victories here but also heartache and confusion. What happens when your spouse dies or you are forced to leave everything you know? Could you cope with losing a cause you believe in — or how about a finger Take a look at how our four subjects reacted, and how they changed in the face of loss. They’ll make you think — but you’re still going to sort out those missing socks by yourself. – Doyle Murphy

A spouse. A case. A finger. Everybody loses something.

It’s only a question of how much

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Fahime Mohammad was a homesick teen when he moved to St. Louis. Now, he sees it as the catalyst to his success. | KATIE COUNTS

FINDING HOME

Fahime Mohammad still feels the loss of his native Afghanistan, but he discovered success in St. Louis Written by

KATIE COUNTS

ahime Mohammad loves to talk. He even jokes that some of his friends call him Chatty Kathy. “I can go for a walk in the street and get into a conversation with a stranger,” Mohammad says. But that wasn’t always the case. Mohammad moved in 1991 to the United States. As an immigrant from Afghanistan, he spoke no English. He remembers nights where he would walk through north St. Louis, replaying scenes from his lost home, Kabul. The homesick teen thought of the days he spent drinking fresh pomegranate juice, ying kites, playing soccer.

“If someone gave me that life over there, I would buy it for whatever I have,” he says now. Growing up in Afghanistan was good for Mohammad. His family was well-off. He went to private school. He remembers eating incredible food — a favorite snack was a atbread called bolani topped with leeks straight from the garden. Afghanistan, however, was changing. The carefree days of Mohammad’s childhood had begun to give way in his teens to the violence that came with a regime change. He says the Cold War was “being fought hotly” at the time in Afghanistan. “Every second, every minute, every hour of our life was under constant threat,” Mohammad says. He recalls the day one of his soc-

cer tournaments was cancelled. The field had been bombed. It was not long after that Mohammad’s parents decided their only choice was to send the teenager and his brother away. “My parents said enough is enough, you have to ee, and then we ed,” Mohammad says. He was seventeen years old when he left with his brother. First, he says, they lived in Pakistan, and then they traveled to Thailand with counterfeit Danish passports before finally arriving in Los Angeles. Later, he and his brother moved to Missouri to live with their uncle in a tiny north St. Louis apartment. He says their rent was $106. At the time, Mohammad wasn’t even a legal citizen. Still, he soon began adjusting to the loss of his old life in Afghanistan and the beginning of a new one in America. One of his first jobs was as a busser at a local country club. Mohammad worked his way up, and eventually his connections at the country club helped him get a job working in information technology at Edward Jones. Mohammad says he’s always been one to look for new op-

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portunities and, given his early experience working in the restaurant business, he decided to open his own eatery. He left that job at Edward Jones and opened Sameem Afghan Restaurant in 2005, moving it in 2012 to become a part of the Grove’s diverse food scene. Before moving to America, he wondered whether he would ever further his education, get a job or even marry. Mohammad took classes at a few local colleges while working at Edward Jones, and he got married after meeting his wife on a 2004 trip to Pakistan. In April 2008, he became a citizen. Now, he’s in his 40s, a restaurant owner and a father to three kids. His brother Qayum is his partner at Sameem, and Mohammad is about to open an international restaurant, called Cafe 7even, in the Kingshighway East neighborhood. He still feels the loss of the boyhood home he left to move to the United States, but without that change he doubts that he would be as successful as he is today. “I’ve gained way more than what I’ve lost,” he says. n

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David Wraith says the ‘planets just kind of aligned’ when he met his wife, Elaine Goble Dandridge. | COURTESY DAVID WRAITH

CARRY THAT WEIGHT

He found an unlikely love story, only to lose his wife all too soon Written by

JAMES POLLARD

avid Wraith carries cards with the words “you are beautiful” emblazoned on them. He’ll hand them out to men, women — anyone. Anyone, that is, he does not intend to pursue romantically. Until he met Elaine Goble Dandridge. Dressed for a party as “Blandy Warhol” — aka the black Andy Warhol — the black man in his late 30s handed the white-haired woman in her 60s one of those cards. And he had every intention of asking her out. So the first time Dandridge noticed her future husband, he was wearing a white wig. But it wasn’t the first time he had noticed her. Looking at pictures from a friend’s modeling gig, Wraith says he saw a photo with two

young, beautiful naked people at the center. But his eyes went to a “little old lady” sitting in the background, drawing. “I always say there’s certain types of people’s faces that are like the key to a lock that’s been buried somewhere in my brain for years,” he says. “And I see those faces and I feel like that lock gets opened. And that happened when I saw a picture of my wife the first time.” And while the polyamorous cofounder of Sex Positive St. Louis hoped their relationship would blossom, he was cautious because of the age difference. He had just come off a series of “tumultuous” relationships, breaking up with his primary partner right before he began seeing Dandridge. And as someone attracted to older women, Wraith was used to older women not taking his romantic interest seriously. In a video interview with Wraith, Dandridge would later say she was not ex-

pecting it either. “So the planets just kind of aligned,” he says. The two ended up spending more than six years together — but just six months married. In 2015, Dandridge was diagnosed with breast cancer. After many treatments, including chemotherapy and radiation, the cancer spread to her brain. She decided to forego treatment and went into hospice care. On January 11, 2017, she died, sleeping on a couch between Wraith and her daughter. His wife’s death was initially devastating. Wraith says he was “kind of not functioning” in the aftermath, rarely leaving the house and struggling with panic attacks. A writer and storyteller, Wraith says he’s not at a point to share stories specifically about his wife’s death, but that it permeates any story. “It’s forced me to dig deeper into my own emotions and be more emotionally vulnerable,” he says.

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The experience has shifted the focus of his advocacy to the concerns of older people and those with chronic health issues. Living in a society that associates sex with youthfulness, Wraith says he has internalized some of that. But having a significantly older partner who died opened his eyes. “We asked my wife’s doctor, was it safe for us to have sex while my wife was on chemotherapy,” he says. “If I’m going down on my wife without barrier, am I ingesting chemotherapy drugs? We didn’t know. And they didn’t know because people don’t think about sex and cancer.” The couple didn’t have many regrets, only decisions they wish they’d made sooner, such as getting married and starting hospice care. Two years after his wife’s death, he says that, with the help of therapy, support groups and meditation, her death is no longer the “debilitating weight” that it was for more than a year. “You really don’t appreciate time until it is eeting,” he says. “That’s cliché as fuck, but it’s true.” n

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A table saw accident cost Caitlin Ford her finger but not her passion. | CAITLIN FORD

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THE CUT

Hairstylist Caitlin Ford lost a finger — but got back behind the chair four weeks later Written by

HAYLEY ABSHEAR

hen Caitlin Ford saw her hand without the index finger, a pool of blood surrounding it, her first thought was that it couldn’t be happening. It had to be a nightmare. Her next thought: Did I just destroy my entire career? It all happened in a split second. She was building shelves with a table saw in her Northampton backyard, and then a stream of blood was shooting out of her right hand where her index finger was supposed to be. Trying to stop the stream of blood felt like putting a hand over a hose. She initially couldn’t find her missing digit, lost somewhere in the grass. “Oh my god, oh my god,” she cried. “Kickback” is the word for what happens when wood that’s being cut suddenly propels backward without warning at a high rate of speed. It is the most dangerous thing that can happen with a table saw. More than 40,000 Americans go to the emergency room for table saw injuries each year, according to the National Consumer League. Four thousand of those — more than ten daily — are amputations. Ford knew this. She has loved carpentry for years. The 29-year-old has jet black and rainbow hair, and she never leaves the house without bright red lipstick. She picked up the hobby from her parents when she was homeschooled as a child and found her love of styling hair around the same time. That has been her career for more than a decade. Ford’s husband, Bobby Duebelbeis, was on a bike ride in Madison County on the day of the accident. Her neighbor heard her screams and came over to help. He called 911. Also a carpenter, he had seen this type of injury before. What he was not familiar with was using an iPhone. While gripping her disfigured hand to

keep from bleeding to death, Ford gave her neighbor step-by-step instructions. After far too many rings, Duebelbeis answered. “I need you to come home right now,” Ford recalls telling him. “What’s wrong?” “I cut my finger off.” “I was shocked,” Duebelbeis says today. “I didn’t want to believe what she was saying. I just remember pedaling as fast as I could. Fueled by expletives and anxiety, I covered eight miles in under twenty minutes.” The paramedics arrived first. They asked if she was feeling lightheaded; up until that point, she says, she wasn’t. But then a paramedic gagged at the sight of her hand. She panicked. “I was getting the tunnel vision, I started seeing spots, it sounded like somebody was turning the volume down on life,” Ford says. “I said, ‘I think that I’m going to pass out. I think that is the point where we’re at right now.’” Ford was rushed into surgery, where surgeons worked to reattach her finger. It was a success. She was told she would soon be fitted for a splint, and then sent home for recovery. The road looked bright, so her husband posted her progress on Instagram. She woke up to more than 500 notifications. Her original inspiration as a hairstylist, Rebecca Taylor, started a GoFundMe to help pay for medical costs. Ford started thinking about how soon she could get back into the salon. But something went wrong. During the fitting for a splint, in an instant, the pulse of her finger at-lined, and she was rushed into surgery again. The doctors found a blood clot and had to remove graphs from the veins in her wrist to fix it. When she woke up, she was given a choice: More surgeries, with no promise that

her finger would work normally again, or amputate. She chose to go on without her finger. Ford’s doctors said that if you have to lose a finger, the index finger is the one. Since the middle finger seems to follow the index wherever it goes, it can be trained to be a replacement with the help of strength training. Once again, Ford found herself thinking about the salon. “The question of if I’m gonna do hair or not wasn’t a question anymore. I was definitely going to do it,” she says. “I don’t think not doing hair was ever something that I would have seriously considered. Even if somebody were to say to me, ‘You’re never going to do this again,’ I’d be like, ‘Yeah, we’ll see about that.’” Ford’s object of choice for physical therapy was, not surprisingly, a pair of scissors. She was imme-

Still, says Cheeseman, “When all was said and done, the color looked really good. And she finished her half before I did.” Ford spent a lot of time blaming herself for her accident. At first, she was convinced everyone would think she is an idiot. The year 2018 had been the best of her career yet. She was featured among Modern Salon’s Top 100 stylists. She opened her first studio. She won a “Behind the Chair” award. Then it all crumbled. She had trouble sleeping the first weeks home. She’d wake up with nightmares that the table saw had taken her whole hand. “One night, I remember feeling her get out of bed, and I listened to her walk downstairs and into the basement,” Duebelbeis says. “I think she just needed to sort of face the machine and survey the aftermath. She was fearful that she’d never be able to do what she loves again.” Ford’s studio is a small space at 4131 Manchester Avenue in the Grove. She calls it the Rainbow Room. The curtains, striped with primary colors, perfectly match the color of her hair. Rainbow art is in all corners. Folk music plays softly in the background. “I did not ever have a loss of confidence in my own ability,” Ford says as she carefully trims a client’s bangs. “I always knew from the beginning that no matter what, I was going to get back to hair. That’s what I meant to do, and I’m going to keep doing it. I think it was more a loss of confidence in myself.” And she also means to get back to carpentry, eventually. Weeks after her last surgery, her father came to town to finish the shelves she never got to build. Ford spent the day watching him and handing him wood, wishing for the day she could take his place again. The shelves they made from that day are now mounted on the back wall of her studio, re ected back into the giant salon-style mirror she faces every day when doing hair. “I never expected to be in such awe of her,” Duebelbeis says. “She’s been able to channel this trauma into courage.” n

After far too many rings, her husband answered. “I need you to come home right now,” she recalls telling him. “What’s wrong?” “I cut my finger off.” diately surprised at how easy they were to hold. Two weeks after her amputation, her good friend and mentor Kristina Cheeseman called to ask if Ford wanted to help do some color on a hair model to get her mind off of the accident. Ford showed up at the salon the next day. Cheeseman did one half of the head, Ford did the other. “I just really remember that day trying not to even focus on it,” Cheeseman says. “Just trying to get her mind away from that, because I think sometimes we like focusing on things that don’t matter. We need to focus on the big picture, and the big picture is doing hair and we’re doing something together. Let’s not focus on our limitations, and let’s create something with no pressure.” Easing back into work, Ford was slower at first. She needed patience from both her colleagues and her clients.

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JULY 31-AUGUST 6, 2019

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Dave and Jenifer Roland found love in the aftermath of defeat. | COURTESY DAVE ROLAND

HOW HE MET THEIR MOTHER Dave Roland lost the case of a lifetime — and found true love Written by

JAMES POLLARD

t begins like every Hollywood romance. He works for a libertarian law firm. She works for a libertarian think tank. His team falls on the losing side of a massively unpopular U.S. Supreme Court decision and now needs a legislative affairs attorney to try to change state laws. Lo and behold, she’s hired. And on May 6, 2007, nearly two years after that fateful Supreme Court decision, two of the few Christian libertarians living in Washington, D.C., are married. Let’s rewind this tale of chance meetings and the long-shot union of Dave Roland and Jenifer Zeigler.

ACT I, SCENE 1: The Little Pink House Riding the upswing of the Viagra bonanza, drugmaker fizer Inc. was courted by the city of New

London, Connecticut, to build their new headquarters there. But getting it up wouldn’t be so easy. When fizer officials said they wanted the Fort Trumbull area, city officials used eminent domain to seize the properties from the homeowners. And Susette Kelo, who owned a little pink house along the Thames River, took them to court. After a narrow loss in state Supreme Court, the Institute for Justice, a libertarian law firm seeking to limit government power, petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to take Kelo’s case. Finally, in the summer of 2004, the justices on the highest court in the land agreed to hear it.

ACT I, SCENE 2: The Supreme Court Enter Dave Roland. After graduating from Vanderbilt University that summer with a law degree and a master’s degree in theology, he began working for the Institute for Justice. As the “low man on the

totem pole,” he helped with “relatively small, quick-and-dirty” research assignments. His primary role was to watch and learn. The legal team knew winning was a long shot. Every eminent domain case the U.S. Supreme Court had decided since 1954 had gone against property owners, Roland says. Most legal scholars wondered why they even bothered. But after presenting arguments before the court in February 2005, Roland’s colleagues thought there was a realistic chance. There’s an old legal adage — “bad facts make bad law.” And Roland thought the optics of a private citizen fighting to save her little pink house from a big-business land grab favored his team: These were lovely, wellkept homes being taken by the city for a private developer under the hazy justification of economic development. “Courts are not generally supposed to be affected by things like that, but they are,” he says. “And that’s one of the things that as public interest attorneys we try

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and do — we look for the most outrageous examples of a bad policy and put it in front of a court and say, ‘Seriously? This is the ultimate consequence of this policy. You can’t let this happen.’”

ACT I, SCENE 3: The Conference Room On June 23, 2005, the Supreme Court handed down its decision. “We all gathered around a computer and hit refresh, refresh, refresh, waiting for the decision to post,” Roland says. And then came the bad news: Susette Kelo and the property owners had lost by a 5-4 vote. After the initial “gut punch,” Roland says the president of the Institute for Justice pulled the team together and resolved to continue the fight. ondemnation of the court’s decision was widespread. Polls showed more than 80 percent of the public disapproved. Critics came from across the political spectrum, including the NAACP, Texas

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LIBERTARIANS IN LOVE Continued from pg 19

Republican John Cornyn and California Democrat Maxine Waters. Kelo and her little pink house might have lost in the courts, but the institute thought it could still win by changing laws across the country. To do that, it needed to hire a legislative affairs attorney. “And it just so happened that Jenifer was the one we ended up with,” Roland says.

ertarian love birds made their home. They got married on May 6, 2007, under an arbor made from Missouri river birch at a winery in the Shenandoah Valley — a location balancing their D.C. connections and rural upbringings.

ACT 2 SCENE 3: Missouri Despite their success in Washington, Roland and Zeigler knew they didn’t want to raise a family there. And Roland, who Zeigler says was itching to leave, suggest-

While their relationship strengthened, eminent domain laws were weakening state by state and city by city. ACT 2 SCENE 1: An Arlington Coffee Shop Dave Roland and Jenifer Zeigler, who earned a master’s in public administration and a law degree from the University of MissouriColumbia, had met more than a year earlier at a dinner co-hosted by her employers at the Cato Institute and his employers at the Institute for Justice. Roland, coming off a broken engagement and “horribly overweight,” ordered the ribs. “Let’s just say I was not exactly putting my best foot forward,” he says with a laugh. “But we did enjoy talking to each other.” They exchanged contacts and kept in touch, but it was nothing romantic. A year later, Roland walked into an Arlington, Virginia, coffee shop where Zeigler was on a date. Zeigler, who recalls crying at her desk over the Kelo decision, told him she’d just applied for a job at his workplace. Roland offered to help her prepare for an interview. After the interview, she took him out to dinner as a thank-you. (Roland will describe this as their first date. Zeigler disagrees.) She got the job. They went out to celebrate. And they decided to continue seeing each other.

ACT 2 SCENE 2: Shenandoah Valley While their relationship strengthened, eminent domain laws were weakening state by state and city by city. In the aftermath of the 2005 decision, more than 45 states have made it harder to do what New London did. And fizer, despite its legal victory, never even built the headquarters.) And then the two “little L” lib-

ed they move to her home state of Missouri. They ended up taking jobs at the Show-Me Institute in St. Louis, hoping to start a litigation firm under its umbrella. “A lot of people, they love their spouse, but it’s also nice to have a life separate from their spouse, you know?” Roland says. Not this pair. “And so, to have the opportunity to both continue working at the same place, it really spoke to us.” Eventually, they started their own litigation firm. The Freedom Center launched in October 2010, with Zeigler as the executive director and Roland the director of litigation. Now they’ve collaborated on some high-profile cases even while collaborating on bringing up Viola Faye, six, and William Lysander, three, in Zeigler’s hometown of Mexico, Missouri. To Zeigler, their work is a calling, one that requires the “irrational optimism” to take cases that she knows will likely lose in the courts but hopefully get the ball rolling. (It’s an irrational optimism she says she has been preparing for her whole life as a Mizzou sports fan.) “You have to have a degree of delusion to do the kind of work we do,” she says. “But you know what? You keep doing it and doing it, and one of these days you’re going to win one, and that’s gonna get the law changed.” And while Roland still believes that the Institute for Justice winning the case would have been better for the entire country, a difficult, fascinating truth remains. “If we had won the case, we wouldn’t have needed a legislative affairs attorney,” he says with a chuckle. “So, literally, if we had won that case, I probably would not have married my wife.” n

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CALENDAR

BY BY PAUL PAUL FRISWOLD FRISWOLD

David C. Turnley/Detroit Free Press/Getty Images. Freedom Uprising.

FRIDAY 08/02 Chan Is the Man Jackie Chan has a lot of things going for him as an actor, but the top keys to his success are his charisma and his bravado. In his 1985 action thriller Police Story, he plays Hong Kong cop Chan KaKui, who’s single-handedly dismantling the empire of crime lord Chu Tao while clearing his own name. The stunt work is insane (Chan hangs off moving buses using an umbrella, crashes through acres of glass and braves a heartstopping slide down a light pole), the action is breakneck and Chan, as ever, is charming and funny. The Reel Late film series presents Police Story at 11:55 p.m. Friday and Saturday (August 2 and 3) at the Landmark Tivoli Theatre (6350 Delmar Boulevard, University City; www.landmarktheatres. com). Tickets are $8.

SATURDAY 08/03 Go Retro Despite all the advances in video

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game graphics and storylines, there’s still a hardcore audience for retro video games. For those who love Metroid Prime, Street Fighter II: Hyper Fighting and Chrono Trigger, the MO Game Con is as vital as the Contra cheat code. Now in its third year, the convention will bring in a slew of YouTube gamers, cosplayers and local players alike. MO Game Con founder and attorney Chad Hager expects this year’s attendance to be bigger than ever. “It will be a good time for people that love old games or maybe for people who want information about old games,” Hager says. “There will be a lot of good people to meet and a lot of fun to be had.” Held at St. Charles Community College (4601 Mid Rivers Mall Drive, Cottleville; www.mogamecon.com), the convention features arcade gaming, tournaments, oldschool Nintendo consoles and a cosplay panel. Gaming YouTubers such as Jay Hatfield “The ame Chasers”) and Brett Weiss (“Tales from a Retro Gamer”), and the Kansas City-based “Video Game Dads Podcast” are all scheduled to attend. “We’re also going to have the Nintendo-PlayStation prototype,

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which is a one-of-a-kind thing,” says Hager. The Nintendo-PlayStation was a hybrid cartridge and CD-ROM console that was made by Nintendo and Sony Entertainment in the late ’80s. The project was shuttered in 1993, and the prototype was picked up by a man named Terry Diebold, who now travels to various gaming conventions showing off the old hardware. Hager says the idea for the convention originated in a now-closed St. Charles gaming shop owned by his friend Chuck Shaw. “He and I were discussing that there were no conventions close by for retro gamers, and it’d be nice to get one started,” Hager recalls. “He and I got the ball rolling.” With the help of Shaw and friends Jake Friedel and Jason Hoefe, the group launched their first convention in 201 in Affton. In their first year, Hager says, 00 people attended the event. Subsequent events have welcomed around 1,000 participants. MO Game Con takes place from 10:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Saturday, August 3, at St. Charles Community College. Tickets are $15, and limited VIP tickets are available for $100. VIP members will be giv-

en early access to the event at 9:30 a.m. and will receive a T-shirt, badge and an invitation to the Mo Game Con VIP party that will take place Sunday, August 4. — Joshua Phelps

The Prizewinners Photographs are a key element of narrative storytelling, which is why it’s so ba ing that newspapers have deemed staff photographers an expendable luxury. You probably recognize many of the photographs that won Pulitzer Prizes, from Joe Rosenthal’s shot Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima, to Alan Diaz’s memorable photo of U.S. federal agents seizing Elian Gonzalez, to St. Louis Post-Dispatch photographer Robert Cohen’s 2014 image of a protestor throwing a tear-gas canister back at police while protesting the killing of Michael Brown. These photographs shock us, inspire feelings of pride and anger, and inform us, just as great written journalism does. The Newseum in Washington created a traveling exhibit of some of the most beautiful images to win the Pulitzer, and it’s a show that will make its St. Louis debut on Saturday, August 3, at the

WEEK WEEK OF OF AUGUST AUGUST 1–7 1–7 to 11), and tickets are $15 to $105.

TUESDAY 08/06 Man-Tamer

Don Don Bartletti/Los Bartletti/Los Angeles Angeles Times. Times. Journey Journey ofof Hope. Hope. Missouri History Museum (5700 Lindell Boulevard; www.mohistory.org). A second exhibition organized by the Missouri History Museum collected 75 photos of everyday life in St. Louis from the Post-Dispatch archives. Pulitzer Prize Photographs and In Focus: St. Louis Post-Dispatch Photographs remain on display through January 20, and admission is free. Parents are cautioned that some of the photographs are intense and may be too much for younger children.

SUNDAY 08/04 Meet & Eat The Great Muslim Food Festival is one of the best lunch dates in town. For $20, two people can buy a surprising amount of food and eat their fill. Double your budget and you’ll have to be rolled back to your car. Cevapi, rice dishes, chai, falafel, ice cream — it’s all amazing. Make sure to talk to your vendor whether you have questions about what something is or just to find out how business has been. A major impetus for the festival is so people can meet

Joe Rosenthal/The Associated Press. Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima.

and talk, and nothing facilitates conversation like something delicious. The third Great Muslim Food Festival takes place from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday, August 4, at the World’s Fair Pavilion in Forest Park (www.greatmuslimfoodfest. com). There will be live entertainment ranging from poetry to music to traditional dance, a bazaar, a kid’s area and some truly amazing food. Admission is free.

her beleaguered classmates. The Muny in Forest Park (www.muny. org) closes its season with Matilda the Musical. The show features music and lyrics by Tim Minchin, a book by Dennis Kelly and design inspiration by Mary Engelbreit. The show is performed at 8:15 p.m. Monday through Sunday (August 5

William Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew can be an uncomfortable play in the wrong hands. Kate, the headstrong woman who must be married before her sister Bianca can marry, often ends up as a cowed wife who has been dominated by love. At the best of times, she is paired with a Petruchio who understands her and simply asks her to play the game according to convention. In Justin Audibert’s new production for the Royal Shakespeare Company, Padua is a matriarchal society in which men wield no power. Lady Baptista puts her sons, Katherine and Bianco, on the market for the highest bidder. Petruchia, a wily woman, takes a liking to the headstrong Katherine and proceeds to get him under her thumb. It’s a wild, gender-switched take on a play about power and marriage. The Royal Shakespeare Company rebroadcast its stage production of The Taming of the Shrew at 7 p.m. Tuesday, August 6, at the Landmark Tivoli Theatre (6350 Delmar Boulevard, University City; www.landmarktheatres. com). Tickets are $15. n

MONDAY 08/05 The Great Matilda Like most of Roald Dahl’s books, Matilda features an intelligent child, a mean adult who is allergic to kindness and at least one adult who is sympathetic and compassionate. Matilda is the bookish, quiet child whose parents, Mr. and Mrs. Wormwood, view her as a burden and a nuisance. The new school she’s been sent to has a brutal disciplinarian in charge — Mrs. Trunchbull — and a kindhearted teacher in Miss Honey, who immediately takes a liking to Matilda. When Matilda discovers that she has unique powers, she realizes that she can stand up for

Bring your appetite to the Great Muslim Food Festival. | COURTESY OF CAIR-MISSOURI

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FILM

[REVIEW]

Life Is But a Dream Tarantino’s daring fairytale Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood is a dazzling triumph Written by

ROBERT HUNT Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood Written and directed by Quentin Tarantino. Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt, Margot Robbie and Al Pacino. Now playing.

ny discussion of Quentin Tarantino’s new film Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood would do well to look beyond the Leone-esque homage of the title and focus on the first four words. Tarantino is exploring his love for Hollywood’s past, but don’t let your guard down. He’s a modern Scheherazade, blending his fanboy enthusiasm with an ambitious recreation of the film world as it reacted to a changing society. This is a film that subtly walks the line between fantasy and reality, the line that Hollywood — the concept, not the town or the industry — has always blurred. Once Upon a Time is a fairy tale disguised as history and we already know from Inglourious Basterds that Tarantino isn’t the least bit afraid of performing acts of historical revisionism . It recreates a particular time and place — the moment when Old Hollywood made the messy transition to New Hollywood — but it’s seen through an opaque and slightly distorted looking glass. It’s the story of two friends facing an existential crisis that unbalances their relationship and pushes them toward an unsteady future. Rick Dalton Leonardo Di aprio is — or was — a big name as the star of the TV series “Bounty Law” back in the early ’ 0s, the kind of square-jawed masculine hero whose value is suddenly dropping as cultural norms change. Hanging on to stardom, he gets by taking guest roles, usually as a villain, on every TV series from “The FBI” to

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Brad Pitt and Leonardo DiCaprio at play in late-1960s Hollywood. | ANDREW COOPER © 2019 CTMG, INC. “The reen Hornet.” As agent Marvin Schwarzs Al acino warns him, he’s guest-starring himself into oblivion, each appearance letting his rising co-stars show that they’re the new star in town. For Tarantino, Dalton is just a cog in the Hollywood machinery, one of the Tys, Rods, and Troys whose Icarus-like ight paths take them from red carpet premieres to barely released Italian action films. Though mindful of Hollywood’s unspoken hierarchy he jokes that he was only offered a part after the “three eorges” — eppard, Maharis, and hakiris — have turned it down , he’s never been much for self-re ection and doesn’t like what he sees. liff Booth Brad itt is Dalton’s shadow, his laid-back doppelganger. He describes himself as Dalton’s stunt double, but when that work dries up due to declining fortune and his own temperament in one of the film’s brightest ights of fantasy, he picks a fight with Bruce Lee on the set of “The reen Hornet” , he’s just as content to be Dalton’s driver, repairman, errand runner and professional friend. Unlike Rick, liff is at peace with their changing fortunes. Living in a modest trailer behind a Valley drive-in, he’s content to sit back and watch the spectacle of L.A. society from the wheel of Dalton’s car.

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And what a spectacle unfolds. Theirs is an exclusively masculine world, the Playboy mystique without the bunnies and centerfolds, and it’s under invasion. As the song says, young girls — very young — are coming to the canyon, hitchhiking, rummaging through garbage or catching liff’s eye with a Lolita-like pout as he drives by. Also dancing her way through is beautiful young starlet Sharon Tate Margot Robbie , one of Hollywood’s new faces, seen at all the right parties, living with the town’s hottest new director, Roman olanski, and enjoying her rise to fame with a bemused innocence. The core of the movie takes place in a single day, with each of the main characters facing different challenges. Dalton, filming an episode of the TV western “Lancer” an actual show starring James Stacy and Wayne Maunder , is forced into a costume that hides his good-old-boy charm and coaxed into reconsidering his lazy habits by a precocious child actress. Booth begins the day high above Benedict anyon repairing Dalton’s TV antenna — Tarantino poses itt like a octeau angel hovering comfortably above the aptly named ielo Spanish for “heaven” Drive — then he casually picks up one of the young hitchhikers and gives her a ride to

the Spahn movie ranch, a former film set now inhabited by a cultish and somewhat threatening family of runaways and hippies. And Sharon Tate ducks into a movie theater to enjoy the decline of Old Hollywood — in the form of her latest film The Wrecking Crew, the last of the Dean Martin “Matt Helm” series. Both Dalton and Sharon are facing an uncertain future, stepping away from their pasts, and the film gives the sense that they’re each leaping into the unknown. For a Tarantino film, this is surprisingly leisurely. For perhaps the first time, he’s showing us characters who aren’t generic archetypes — gangsters, outlaws, ninjas or assassins. They’re real people with actual everyday concerns from feeding the dog to fretting over job security. Tarantino, production designer Barbara Ling and music supervisor Mary Ramos have gone to extraordinary lengths to recreate the sights and sounds of half a century ago. The streets and marquees of Hollywood are filled in with such detail that I wished the characters wouldn’t drive past them so quickly, while the soundtrack provides a steady stream of radio announcements and golden oldies from the infectious pop of aul Revere and the Raiders to the excruciating psychedelia of Vanilla Fudge. There

For perhaps the first time, Tarantino is showing us characters who aren’t generic archetypes — gangsters, outlaws, ninjas or assassins. They’re real people with actual everyday concerns.

are occasional anachronisms, but I couldn’t tell if these were accidents the 19 8 film Candy, cited on a billboard, would have been long forgotten by the spring of ’ 9 or signs that Dalton was clinging to his glory days in the recent past who was still listening to the Royal uardsmen . The film is worth multiple viewings just to absorb the details. ou can guess where this is heading. iven the time, the place and the presence of Tate, olanski and the Spahn Ranch “family,” it’s inevitable that Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood will end up on ielo Drive on that hot August night. Watching the recent documentary Charlie Says, I had come to the conclusion that no film could ever recreate the Manson murders without falling into exploitation. Tarantino confounds that idea, setting up a long, hallucinatory climax that plays skillfully on our expectations and twists them into a stunning sequence that turns our notions of screen violence upside down. It’s a daring move from a filmmaker who has consistently shown his willingness to walk to the edge when it comes to manipulating form and content. By the time the sun comes up again over Benedict anyon, Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood has changed how we see its two heroes and transcended its well-crafted nostalgia to become a profound existential fable. n

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PING PONG TABLE • POOL TABLE • BOARD GAMES WEDNESDAY TRIVIA • LIVE MUSIC / DJS 5 DAYS A WEEK

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Duke’s in Soulard Evangeline’s Frida’s George’s Diner Half Baked Cookie Dough Hamburger Mary’s Harpo’s Hi Pointe (2 locations) HopCat Hops House Restaurant (Argosy Casino) Horseshoe (2 locations) Hwy 61 Roadhouse J Smugs Gastropit Jefferson’s (2 locations) Johnny’s West Layla (2 locations) The Mack Maya Cafe Mike Duffy’s Pub & Grill - Kirkwood O’Connell’s Pub riverfronttimes.com

Piccadilly at Manhattan Poke Doke Riverside Diner Ryder’s Tavern Schlafly Bottleworks Schlafly Tap Room Shamrocks Pub n Grill Sharpshooter Pit and Grill Spencer’s Grill Spikes Pub & Grub Stone Turtle Tattooed Dog Tilted Skillet Trueman’s in Soulard Tucker’s Place TURN The Village Bar White Cottage The Wood Shack

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FEATURED DINING SEDARA SWEETS

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314-553-9440 6316 DELMAR BLVD UNIVERSITY CITY, MO 63130

In May of 2019, Sedara Sweets joined the community of Affton. Sedara serves a variety of baked goods including fifteen types of baklava—both Iraqi and Turkish. Just like the name says, Sedara sells ice cream, using products from Wisconsin-based Cedar Crest, and milkshakes. The cafe offers a small savory menu featuring breakfast bread, falafel and shawarma sandwiches, with rotisserie versions of beef or chicken both on offer. Whether you are looking for something to satisfy your sweet tooth, or a new option for lunch and dinner, Sedara has you covered. “We want to have something for everybody” Sedara Sweets is both family owned and operated. They offer dine in and take out food services, as well as an amazing Baklava gift box that can be ordered online, or even delivered! Owners George and Esraa Simon look forward to meeting their new neighbors and sharing some of their favorite dishes with the community!

Poke Doke offers St. Louis their energized recipes intertwined in a fast-casual model. Best part is every bowl is customizable to the patron -- whether you know what you want and can come up with your own flavor pairings — but it’s certain your heart will be content with the rich, high-quality seafood. Customers choose a size, a base, (such as rice, greens, or soba noodles) and choose from proteins (such as salmon ahi tuna, spicy tuna, shrimp or tofu), then add as many toppings and drizzles as they wish. If you’re less interested in the simple pleasures of fish and more in playing around with accoutrements, both the shrimp and tofu are neutral enough that they benefit from the enhancements. The menu also offers appetizers such as pork-filled pot stickers, miso soup, and crab rangoon, along with an assortment of bubble milk teas and soft serve ice cream. With locations in both the Central West End and the Delmar Loop, Poke Doke is the perfect spot to grab a quick bite!

J. SMUGS GASTROPIT

CAFE PIAZZA

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314.499.7488 4916 SHAW AVE ST. LOUIS, MO 63110

314-343-0294 1900 ARSENAL STREET ST. LOUIS, MO 63118

Housed in a retro service station, J. Smugs GastroPit serves up barbecue that can fuel anyone’s fire. Married teams of Joe and Kerri Smugala and John and Linda Smugala have brought charred goodness to the Hill neighborhood, nestled among the traditional Italian restaurants, sandwich shops and bakeries. Part of St. Louis’ ongoing barbecue boom, the J. Smugs’ pit menu is compact but done right. Ribs are the main attraction, made with a spicy dry rub and smoked to perfection. Pulled pork, brisket, turkey and chicken are also in the pit holding up well on their own, but squeeze bottles of six tasty sauces of varying style are nearby for extra punch. Delicious standard sides and salads are available, but plan on ordering an appetizer or two J. Smugs gives this course a twist with street corn and pulled-pork poutine. Several desserts are available, including cannoli – a tasty nod to the neighborhood. Happy hour from 4 to 7pm on weekdays showcases half-dollar BBQ tastes, discount drinks, and $6 craft beer flights to soothe any beer aficionado.

Like pizza? Nobody does it better than Café Piazza, a Sicilian Café &amp; Bar in Benton Park &amp; a stone’s throw from Anheuser-Busch (enjoy this iconic St Louis vista from our patio). Our “Big Momma” (a 4-ton laser wood-fired pizza oven) has been firing out pizzas since 2017. Try the original 11” Italian style: bestsellers include our Pizza Bianca (garlic infused alfredo sauce, grilled chicken, bacon and parmigiana) or Queen Margherita (fresh mozzarella, tomato and basil). Prefer a deeper dish? Try our Sicilian pizzas baked in Extra Virgin Olive Oil &amp; tomato fillet sauce with your choice of toppings. Heard of our famous graffiti mural which covers the entire ceiling? Created by legendary artist Paco Rosic, it depicts famous St Louis luminaries: kudos to those who can name all eleven! If pizza isn’t your thing, our appetizers, paninis, and salads definitely will be. Open for lunch &amp; dinner daily. Brunch served Saturday, Sunday 10am – 2pm. $7 original 11” Italian pizzas all day every Monday! Happy Hour 4pm – 6pm weekly ($3 draft beer), all-day Sunday. Open until midnight Friday &amp; Saturday. Group catering also available.

CARNIVORE STL

OAKED

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314.449.6328 5257 SHAW AVE, ST. LOUIS, MO 63110

314.305.8647 1031 LYNCH ST, ST. LOUIS, MO 63118 Treat yourself to an elevated culinary experience. With spring’s arrival, OAKED introduces its Pink Moon menu. Diners can order the entire menu inside the speakeasy-feeling lounge, upstairs in the spacious dining room, and now on the beautiful New Orleans-style patio dubbed “the Veranda”. Chef Stephan Ledbetter and crew create new dishes each menu using the finest available ingredients while keeping past winners. This time around includes Duck Breast with charred Cabbage; Ratatouille with Spaghetti Squash and Vegan Burrata; and the housegem - Wild Mushrooms served with Duxellé, Truffle and Mushroom Tea. OAKED ensures their menu includes several vegan and gluten-free options so everyone can savor their evening. OAKED also has one of the better curated wine list in town alongside a selection of whiskeys and craft cocktails. It even has a small cigar bar outside on “the Gallery”. Offering Happy Hour specials from 4-6 daily. Music in the lounge Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays. Ample parking. Walk-ins are welcome, but reservations are recommended.

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Carnivore fills a nearly 4,000-square-foot space on The Hill with a dining area, bar lounge, and adjoining outdoor patio gracefully guarded by a bronze steer at the main entrance. Always embracing change, Joe and Kerri Smugala, with business partners Chef Mike and Casie Lutker, launched Carnivore STL this summer. As the Hill’s only steakhouse, Carnivore offers a homestyle menu at budget-friendly prices appealing to the neighborhood’s many families. Steak, of course, takes center stage with juicy filet mignon, top sirloin, strip steak and ribeye leading the menu. Customize any of the succulent meats with sautéed mushrooms, grilled shrimp, or melted housemade butters, such as garlic-and-herb and red wine reduction, on top of the flame-seared steak. Other main dishes include a thick-cut pork steak (smoked at J. Smugs) and the grilled chicken with capers and a white wine-lemon-butter sauce. St. Louis Italian traditions get their due in the Baked Ravioli, smothered in provel cheese and house ragu, and in the Arancini, risotto balls stuffed with provel and swimming in a pool of meat sauce. With an exciting new brunch menu debuting for Saturday and Sunday, Carnivore should be everyone’s new taste of the Hill.

CAFE

[REVIEW]

Great by the Glass Oaked succeeds with flawless hospitality, excellent food and a stunning wine selection Written by

CHERYL BAEHR Oaked 1031 Lynch Street; 314-305-7517. Wed.-Fri. 4 p.m.-midnight; Sat.-Sun. noon-midnight (closed Monday and Tuesday).

ohn Cochran had no intention of ever being anything more than a restaurant patron. A 35-year veteran of the logistics business, he certainly loved going out to eat and enjoying the city’s nightlife. In fact, that’s what made him encourage his wife to move from their longtime Ballwin neighborhood and closer to the city center when they became empty nesters a few years ago. They chose Soulard as their new home, eager to frequent the bars and restaurants in their new neighborhood. And they did. The problem was, there was nowhere that checked all the boxes of what they were looking for in a restaurant. No one questioned that Soulard was ush with wonderful entertainment and dining options. The problem for Cochran, his wife Anne and their friends, Chris and Venessa Schwarz, was that none of these establishments hit that note of being the sort of place you could go to for a sophisticated dinner, nightcap or to simply have a glass of wine while listening to music. That realization prompted them to begin dreaming with their new circle of friends about the sort of restaurant that the neighborhood needed. On one particularly wine-fueled night, the friends filled in the details of all they wanted in a restaurant — what it would look like, what sort of menu it would have, the colors and aesthetics of the space. The very next day, Venessa happened to pass by the former Lynch Street Tavern and noticed

Gnudi, served with the restaurant’s sensational pork shoulder, is a standout dish on a formidable menu. | MABEL SUEN that the building was for sale. It was the sign they were waiting for. Roughly nine months after that fateful night, the Cochrans and Schwarzes (who are no longer partners in the restaurant) brought their vision to reality in the form of Oaked, which opened on February 15. The massive restaurant, which sits directly across from the Anheuser-Busch brewery, has seen many restaurant concepts come and go, including Lynch Street Tavern, Fleur de Lilies and Sage Bistro. Unlike its predecessors, however, Oaked seems to have found a winning formula. Part of that has to do with John ochran’s fierce commitment to hospitality and innate knack for the business, demonstrated through his recognition of raw talent. Cochran’s vision for a warm, welcoming environment hits you the moment you walk through the front door and encounter Gayle Hantak, the restaurant’s hostess,

who greets you as if you are a treasured friend arriving at her own personal dinner party. More than a simple “Welcome” or “How many in your party?” Hantak looks you in the eye as if you are the only person in the room, genuinely interested in who you are, what you have to say and why you’ve come to the restaurant that particular night. It’s a master class in the role of maitre d’ — and it also happens to be Hantak’s first job in the restaurant business. You’d expect this level of hospitality know-how from someone who’s been in the restaurant business for decades, but until Oaked opened this February, Hantak had never worked in the industry. For the past ten years, she’d held a job with Cochran’s logistics company, where she was put in the difficult position of being the middle-woman between the company’s drivers and its executives. Her passion for taking care of people was so striking that when Cochran was look-

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ing for someone to be the face of his new restaurant venture, he knew that person should be Hantak. It was a smart move, and one that sets the tone for the entire dining experience. In addition to this warm hospitality, Oaked also succeeds in navigating its significant real estate footprint by dividing the building’s ample space into different experiences. This includes a firstoor bar and sultry lounge area, a light-filled formal dining room upstairs, a cozy cigar patio on the second oor and a lush, tree-covered, street-level patio that, when Sunday brunch service begins in a few weeks, will be the best place in town to sip a mimosa. It’s an ambitious undertaking, but one for which Oaked proves up to the task, not only in its hospitality and atmosphere. The other key to Oaked’s success is the food, an elegant and approachable menu of American bistro fare

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brought to life by executive chef Stephan Ledbetter. A former veteran of Gamlin Restaurant Group, Ledbetter dazzles right out of the gate with an appetizer of pork belly that is so silken it melts on the tongue like tempered butter. Served over a creamy, coconut-infused celery root puree, the meat is paired with cooked apples, whose sweetness underscores the pork’s gentle fruit wood smoke. Street corn, served on the cob, is equally delightful. The tender kernels are coated in parmesan and chiles that form a warmly spiced glaze. The subtle, cumin-scented heat combines with the sweet corn and a sprinkle of cilantro to evoke the sort of complex avors you get from a wonderful garam masala. Those layers of complexity are also present in the coconut and celery root soup. The mildly herbal vegetable, softened by coconut milk, is accented with lime and fresh basil. There’s a subtle heat to the dish that sneaks up on you, adding an extra dimension of depth. My only quibble is that the texture — a whipped, coconutty uff — is too thick for soup. Though I loved

the taste, it was so rich I could only eat about a third of it. Baked burrata was less impressive. The molten cheese is served in a dish of creamy vodka sauce. The avor was fine enough, but the burrata got lost in the tomatoey sauce and seemed more like a garnish than an essential component. The trout cakes were a bigger miss. Not only were the cakes tasteless, their exterior became tough when cooked, wrapping the delicate interior in a thick layer that required a knife and some elbow grease to cut through. Entrees, across the board, were well executed and generally delightful. Large scallops, seared awlessly and gilded with brown butter, rested atop a bed of creamy risotto. Pieces of grapefruit added a vibrancy that beautifully cut through the richness of the shellfish and rice. Salmon confirms Ledbetter’s skill at preparing seafood. Seared skin-on, the delicate meat was like silk, a wonderful contrast to the skin’s crunchy texture. Without adornment the dish would have been wonderful, but Ledbetter makes it even more so with a summery mélange of spinach, white asparagus and fava beans. The chef knows how to cook

more than just seafood. He smartly serves a gorgeous, medium-rare duck breast with slivers of warm peaches and almonds; they coax out the meat’s sweetness without being overbearing. The meat’s jus mixes with the juicy fruit and foie gras butter, forming a delectable, sweet and savory glaze. A fourteen-ounce ribeye is another showstopper. The meat is seared so that the outside develops a crisp, bitter char that contrasts with the sweetness of the accompanying creamed corn. Smashed fingerling potatoes complete the dish, their black pepper coating providing the bit of spice needed to counter the otherwise decadent dish. The standout, however, is the pork gnudi, which pairs pillowsoft, ricotta-infused dumplings with Ledbetter’s stunning pullapart pork shoulder. Like the belly served as an appetizer, the shoulder is kissed with a subtle fruit wood smoke that enhances, but does not mask, the succulent meat. A saute of kale, tomatoes and shallots is spooned over the top of the pork and gnudi; topped with ricotta, it reads like the sort of Sunday ragu you’d find in a Bolognese grandma’s kitchen. Oaked’s desserts — a lavenderand-lemon tart in the shape of a

cannoli, a trio of peaches with ginger snaps — offer a fine ending to the meal, though, really, the best ending is another glass of wine. Perhaps Oaked’s most compelling feature is its ambitious wine program. Not only is the list impressive both in size and scope, the restaurant offers every bottle (with the exception of a few proprietor’s bottles) by the glass. If that fact fails to impress, consider that the wine list is about two and a half inches thick. It’s nothing short of extraordinary, and it makes Oaked perhaps the best place in town for wine enthusiasts. The list can be overwhelming, but that’s where Hantak comes in. By the time you arrive at your table, chances are she’s found out what kind of wine you like, introduced you to the sommelier and knows the wine you and your spouse had when you conceived your firstborn. It may not make choosing between a Barolo and a Brunello any easier, but, when paired with Oaked’s delightful food, it sure makes for a lovely time.

Oaked Pork belly .................................................. $11 Scallops .................................................... $24 Ribeye ....................................................... $45

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SHORT ORDERS

Retreat Gastropub’s Adam Bingham thought he would be a physical education teacher but found himself returning to his roots in the kitchen. | JEN WEST

[SIDE DISH]

At Retreat Gastropub, Adam Bingham Makes His Mom Proud Written by

CHERYL BAEHR

dam Bingham had two brothers and one sister, but, for some reason, he was the one his mom always relied on for help in the kitchen. “When mom cooked, I was the

one she always leaned on,” Bingham recalls. “Whether it was peeling potatoes, washing dishes or taking out the trash, I was always there with her. It was my way of showing her I cared.” Bingham, now executive chef at Retreat Gastropub (6 North Sarah Street; 314261-4497), had a lot opportunities to help his mom. An avid entertainer, she loved cooking and would regularly have people over at the house where she would put together large spreads. It would take all day to make these feasts, but Bingham could see that she put forth all the effort because she loved making people happy. That was the part of cooking that appealed to him the most. Bingham experienced that feeling firsthand while working his first kitchen job at Nachomamma’s. Though he never though he’d make a career out of cooking, he still took every opportunity to learn as much as he could and worked his way up through the kitchen’s ranks. When Bingham headed off for college at Mizzou, he thought he’d left behind his work in the profes-

“When mom cooked, I was the one she always leaned on. I was always there with her. It was my way of showing her I cared.” sional kitchen. His plan was to become a physical education teacher. However, it didn’t take long for him to realize that the field wasn’t for him. “As soon as I started taking classes I learned there was a surplus of teachers and it would take several years for me to get a job,” Bingham says. “Plus, the class load wasn’t what I thought it would be, and we focused on things I wasn’t

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so sure about. Every semester it got a little bit harder, and I got a little bit more uninterested.” Bingham was not sure whether to continue with his studies, but that decision was ultimately made for him when tragedy struck his family. A few years into Bingham’s college career, his mother suffered a ruptured brain aneurysm and was left paralyzed. Knowing his mom would need him more than ever, Bingham left Mizzou to return home so that he could take care of her. To make money during that time, he returned to his former job at Nachomamma’s. At first, he viewed it simply as a way to pay the bills, but as he grew more and more comfortable in the kitchen, he realized he had a knack for cooking. Eventually, his path became clear. “School was not going well and I was doing well in the kitchen, so I thought, ‘Maybe I should go to culinary school,’” Bingham says. “My mom was supportive; my dad said it was a hard business. He was right, but I did it anyway and

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ADAM BINGHAM Continued from pg 35

ended up on the dean’s list four semesters straight. It was crazy, because I had been struggling with school before this.” During and after culinary school, Bingham continued to work at Nachomammas as well as other area restaurants such as Nippon Tei, Pastaria and Sardella. He filled his time off work by learning as much as he could about cooking on his own, researching recipes, following food blogs and watching food-centric television programs. By the time he made his way to Retreat Gastropub, Bingham had figured out what was important to him in the kitchen: putting out simple yet refined food that allows the ingredients to speak for themselves while cultivating a collegial environment where people can speak their minds. “I try to push out good food and learn as much as I can,” Bingham says. “I tell people that I’m not perfect, and that if they see anything, we should talk. It’s the only way I can get better.” Bingham has been in his role as

executive chef for a little under a year and feels like he has hit his stride. During his tenure, he’s realized the importance of the favorite dishes Retreat’s regulars have come to expect while putting his own spin on things. He admits it can be a delicate balance, but he comes in every day with a positive attitude, grateful to be where he is. “I genuinely like waking up and going to work,” Bingham says. “It’s a change of pace from most places. I’m happy to say I really love my job. I feel like I am just getting started.” Bingham took a break from the kitchen to share his thoughts on the St. Louis food and beverage scene, why you should never ask him to microwave something for you and the lovely, outdoorsy way he and his mom stay connected. What is one thing people don’t know about you that you wish they did? I’m a great gardener. From cultivating veggies and potting herbs to caring for roses, I love it all. We have a 34-square-foot raised bed. My grandpa taught me how to garden with the seasons at a very young age, and when my mom became paralyzed, I started gardening for her. I’ve been composting

for seven years and growing on my own for four years. It’s something that I’ll be doing for the rest of my life. What daily ritual is non-negotiable for you? After-work wind-down with midnight SportsCenter. If you could have any superpower, what would it be? Mind control would make my job in the kitchen a lot easier. What is the most positive thing in food, wine or cocktails you’ve noticed in St. Louis over the past year? I really love what Schla y Beer does. They support local business and even grow their own herbs and veggies for the kitchen in addition to brewing their own beer. I also love the Schla y Farmers Market on Wednesdays! What is something missing in the local food, wine or cocktail scene that you’d like to see? A 24/7 or later-than-3 a.m. eatery with scratch food. Who is your St. Louis food crush? The Laotian-Thai cuisine at Han Lao. It’s fresh and fast and the perfect fusion of the two cuisines. It’s also super affordable, one-ofa-kind food, and their spring rolls are ridiculous. Who’s the one person to watch

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right now in the St. Louis dining scene? Kate Wagoner, the executive chef at Yellowbelly. Which ingredient is most representative of your personality? Jalapeño. Bright, but with a slight kick. If you weren’t working in the restaurant business, what would you be doing? Probably coaching football or baseball. Name an ingredient never allowed in your restaurant. I’ll use any ingredient, but there are definitely no microwaves allowed. What is your after-work hangout? The Gramophone or Parlor. I love great sandwiches with a laidback vibe. What’s your food or beverage guilty pleasure? Anything sweet, like a milkshake with twenty different ingredients. What would be your last meal on earth? Mom’s chicken and dumplings. It takes all day to make them, and you can taste the love. It’s a family recipe passed down for generations, and it can’t be replicated by anyone! n

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Mac’s Moving Out of Dogtown Written by

CHERYL BAEHR

ac’s Local Eats (1225 Tamm Avenue, 314-4798155), the wildly popular burger counter operated by Chris “Mac” McKenzie, is closing one door and opening another: The restaurant is ending its partnership with Tamm Avenue Bar to focus exclusively on its new location inside brand-new Bluewood Brewing (1821 Cherokee Street, 314-376-4166). McKenzie announced the news in a press release on July 26, stating simply that “Mac’s Local ats Mac’s Local Buys and Tamm have decided it’s in the best interest of all parties to move forward in different directions.” Mac’s Local ats’ last day of service inside the Tamm Av-

[FOOD NEWS]

Bissinger’s Sells to a Friendly Rival Written by

CHERYL BAEHR

an Abel Jr. remembers a time — not that long ago — when Bissinger’s Handcrafted Chocolatier was his company’s biggest competitor. However, unlike most rivals, the Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Company executive always felt a sense of fondness toward the storied brand. “Bissinger’s was our main competitor,” Abel Jr. recalls. “But I always felt that to be in competition with them was an honor. Most competitors do not have that sort of good feeling toward the other company, but we always did.” Now, Abel has even more reason to feel fondly toward Bissinger’s. On July 22, it was announced that his family’s business, Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Company, has acquired Bissinger’s and will continue running the brand — with the same recipes and ingredients — that people have known and loved for generations. According to information released by the St. Louis-based Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Company, the Abel family assumed all operations of Bissinger’s in

Mac’s Local Eats is leaving Tamm Avenue with plans to resurface on Cherokee Street. | MABEL SUEN enue Bar location will be August 31. Mc enzie opened Mac’s Local ats inside Tamm Avenue Bar in 2017, bringing the ethos of farm-to-table cooking to a humble, fast-food July. The release notes that “the kitchen, staff and some original equipment has moved into a new addition of the Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Company factory and facility down the street from its main plant on the Hill.” “We have invested millions into our manufacturing infrastructure in the last 24 months, [and the] timing was perfect to add a legendary company like Bissinger’s to our portfolio,” says Dan Abel Sr., Abel Jr.’s father and the president and CEO of Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Company. However, as Abel Jr. explains, the two companies began their relationship as early as the beginning of the year without skipping a beat. “We’ve been making the Bissinger’s famous raspberries since January, and no one even realized it,” Abel Jr. explains. “It proves that people can expect the same quality and products from Bissinger’s as they always have.” According to Abel Jr., he and his father had heard “through the grapevine” that Bissinger’s was going up for sale and felt compelled to keep the local brand in town. They approached Tim Fogerty, Bissinger’s former president and CEO, and made an offer to buy the company that was ultimately accepted. Fogerty, owner of 23 City Blocks Hospitality Group, will leave the chocolate business to focus on his restaurant concepts that include the Caramel Room, Lumen Private Events Space and the Chocolate Pig. For their part, Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Company plans to maintain

concept. A longtime champion of local eating and ethical farming, McKenzie got his start running an animal share and CSA before partnering

with Tamm’s owner Bob Brazell to run the bar’s food program. In the two years since that partnership began, Mac’s has become one of the city’s most popular restaurants, garnering critical acclaim and national attention for its mouthwatering smash burgers and “rip fries” (fries dusted with Red Hot Riplets seasoning). It is not uncommon for Mac’s to have a line that runs to the bar’s front door — in part because of its popularity, in part because of Mc enzie’s penchant for taking his time to chat up each guest with the sort of hospitality often reserved for finedining establishments. In June, McKenzie announced a new partnership with Bluewood Brewing that would bring a second Mac’s Local Eats location to the brewing company’s new herokee Street operation. At the time, he planned to keep the Tamm location going as well, though that will no longer be the case. “We look forward to our new opportunities at Bluewood Brewing Company, and we thank Tamm Avenue Bar for the opportunity to serve their patrons,” says McKenzie. n

Bissinger’s is now owned by its longtime competitor, Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Company. | LAURA MILLER the Bissinger’s brand, both in name and with its unchanged recipes, as a separate entity. However, Abel Jr. notes that his company sees several opportunities for the brand, such as additional products that, while still of the highest quality, appeal to customer’s looking for a lower price point. “A $20 box of chocolates can be a harder sell than a $5 chocolate bar,” Abel Jr. explains. “We plan to expand that part of Bissinger’s and get our products into the Straub’s of the world. We see a lot of opportunity there.” The acquisition marks a new chap-

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ter for the legendary Bissinger’s, whose roots run all the way back to 17th-century France and the courts of kings. The brand has been synonymous with St. Louis chocolate making since arriving on the scene in 1927 — a factor that weighs heavily on the Abel family’s decision to take over the brand. “When we heard Bissinger’s was for sale, we were really bummed at the thought of it leaving St. Louis,” Abel Jr. says. “It would have been really sad to have such a local company leave, which is why it’s so great that we are able to keep it here in town.” n

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BAR TAB What We’re Drinking: Frosé Where We’re Drinking: Sardella (7734 Forsyth Boulevard, Clayton; 773-7755) When We’re Drinking: 5 p.m., or literally anytime

here are certain firsts that just stick with you: your first job, your first kiss and, for me, the first time I sipped the frozen drink perfection of frosé. The icy pink concoction is served in a berry-topped glass, and frosé (aka frozen rosé) is undoubtedly the official drink of summer. The wine slushie is made with frozen rosé wine, strawberries, an optional splash of vodka and lemon juice. Just add ice and blend. Upon my first sip, I didn’t know what to expect. I love rosé, but most frozen drinks are super sugary, so my expectations were not particularly high. Flash forward two years: I have spent my summers since that day lobbying chefs and bartenders to add this new seasonal staple to menus in St. Louis. It’s that good. My dreams were finally answered when Gerard Craft, the James Beard Award-winning chef and

by Ellen Prinzi owner of the Niche Food group, added frosé to the offerings at his Clayton hotspot Sardella. Both frosé and frozen negronis went on Sardella’s menu in late June, and the restaurant has seen high demand for the slushy cocktails ever since. “When I first started making slushies, I knew it was something we had to master,” Craft says. “Everyone loves frosé.” After purchasing a slushie machine, the team spent the past few months perfecting the sugar-to-alcohol ratio of the drink. The popularity of rosé has risen dramatically in the last decade, with demand worldwide surging since 2014. It can be enjoyed still, semi-sparkling or sparkling. The beauty of rosé is that it has a wide range of sweetness levels, so don’t assume it all tastes like the Franzia white zin that was popular with suburban moms in the ’80s. The slushie version called frosé wasn’t invented until 2016 at Bar Primi in New York City after the fateful purchase of a slushie machine. Since that time, frosé has taken over bars and restaurants (and even high-end ice cream parlors) across America, and most recently here in St. Louis. The

Sardella’s delectable frosé is your new favorite summer drink. | ELLEN PRINZI recipe that Craft and his mixologists came up with has its own spin, but retains the classic flavor. “Michael Petres, our corporate chef, developed the recipe using elderflower liqueur, fresh lemon juice, Peychaud’s bitters and, of course, rosé,” says Craft. The result is an extremely refreshing and drinkable cocktail, just in time for the muggy dog days of summer. Normally, frozen drinks come with an unspoken warning to not have more than one or two because of the sugar content and hangover implications, but frosé has

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a lower ABV, meaning you can imbibe more freely. The frosé will be on the drink menu at Sardella until the weather turns cooler, which in St. Louis means it could be a mainstay well through September. This allows plenty of time to have your first sip of frosé, or to be reunited with a favorite summer staple. Ellen Prinzi is our bar columnist. She likes strong drinks and has strong opinions. You can catch more of her writing via Olio City, a city guide app she started in 2017.

JULY 31-AUGUST 6, 2019

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JULY 31-AUGUST 6, 2019

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CULTURE

[HOMESPUN]

Dead Set on Rock & Roll Torchlight Parade’s bonkers live show features real-life funeral home employees, coffins, murders and, sometimes, even Riverport Riot’s own Stump Stephenson Written by

THOMAS CRONE

n Tuesday, August 22, 1989, the self-titled debut album by Enuff Z’Nuff was released by Atco Records, spawning a pair of radio hits in the rocker “New Thing” and the midtempo ballad “Fly High Michelle.” Those were heady days for the colorfully attired, platinum-coiffed band from Chicagoland. Those two tracks would set in motion a career that would extend for another nineteen albums, the band sticking to a sound that’s surfed atop their in uences of powerpop, glam, hair metal and crunchy garage rock. Flip tape, hit fast forward. On Tuesday, July 2, 2019, a version of that band, led by salty bassist/songwriter Chip Z’Nuff, would play a headlining show at Lascelles Granite City, a bistro in GC’s rebounding downtown. It was the biggest concert in the four-year history of the venue, with about 135 people taking up every chair, table, nook and cranny inside the restaurant, reconfigured for the evening into a rock & roll club, complete with stage, lighting, merch table and a cast of characters. That batch would include: Johnny Rod, the bass player of ’80s metal titans W.A.S.P.; Katy Kruze, a longtime voice on KSHE-95, now involved in some new radio/ pod ventures; and in a co-starring role, none other than Stump Stephenson, the catalyst for 1991’s Riverport Riot. He prowled through the club doing a little of everything, from securing press seating to handling roadie duties

Three of the members of Torchlight Parade work at a funeral home, and they bring that energy to their live shows. | ERIN NICHOLS to serving as a kind of hype man for the bands, shaking hands and greeting pretty much everyone in the room. It was a big weekend, and he noted at one point that he “hadn’t been home in two days” as he personally marked the 28th anniversary of his famous scu e with Axl Rose. While Enuff Z’Nuff was the night’s headliner, the band in the middle of the bill, STL’s own Torchlight Parade, didn’t slouch in bringing out the fans. Their gear was rocked by a number of folks in the audience, their logo prominently mixed into a T-shirt blend that included Anvil, Poison, LA Guns, Armored Saint and, most of all, KISS. The band’s an originalsheavy group, with a sound that leans toward the classic metal of Iron Maiden and Judas Priest, Twisted Sister and Quiet Riot. Their stage show doesn’t cheat the audience in effort. By the closer of their set, the bombastic “Red, White and Blue,” the band had a confetti cannon shot off on one side of the stage, while a two-man team on the oth-

er end of the stage scattered red, white and blue balloons into the air using a modified Ryobi leaf blower. Earlier in the evening, a friend dressed as Michael Meyers of Halloween fame had “killed” rhythm guitarist Danny Nichols in a mid-show slaying and a Bible had burst into ames, while the band’s onstage torch burned bright through the entire, ninesong set. Guitar picks, glow sticks and rosaries were tossed into the crowd, sometimes caught, other times bouncing off of hands, tables and heads. For this venue, the group couldn’t incorporate props like their full-sized coffin, or human resources like the three bagpipers that have been rehearsing with them of late. About that coffin At the core of the band are three funeral home employees, and the group’s name “was chosen to invoke an ancient funeral procession.” The band has stayed true to that idea in its staging, songwriting and even names, with the group’s vocalist going by Torch (a.k.a. Matt Engel), whose day job is spent as

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an embalmer. His brother, Doug Engel, is the lead guitarist and the funeral home’s hearse driver. The trifecta’s completed by original TL drummer reg Um eet, a funeral director at the same facility, which they only name as “one of St. Louis’ best-known funeral homes.” Guitarist Nichols and bassist Larry Hunter don’t share the profession, though Nichols joins the Engel brothers in a bit of rock & roll cosplay, dressed for gigs like a metal ninja while the Brothers Engel channel versions of Jack the Ripper, terrorizing the 1990 Sunset Strip. Fun is at the core of it all, says Nichols, who claims that “we couldn’t fit our whole stage show in here. But the thing is, when it’s our turn, it’s always like Madison Square Garden for us. It’s only rock & roll and it’s supposed to be fun.” For Enuff Z’Nuff’s gig, he apologized more than once for not being able to “run around on stage,” due to its being built into a corner of the room normally given over to dining tables. By any

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Continued on pg 45

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TORCHLIGHT PARADE Continued from pg 43

fnnch included a nod to the St. Louis Blues in his honey bears mural on the Centene Center for the Arts in Grand Center. | JOSHUA PHELPS

[BEARS]

A New Mural for Grand Center Written by

JOSHUA PHELPS

an Francisco artist fnnch has returned home to St. Louis to paint a massive 35-by-50-foot mural at the Centene Center for the Arts. fnnch (pronounced Finch) has partnered with the Arts and Education Council and the Gateway Foundation to paint four honey bears on the wall of the building. Each bear will have a theme: a paintbrush symbolizing St. Louis’ art culture, a top hat to the “gilded age past of St. Louis,” a hockey stick symbolizing the Blues winning the Stanley Cup and a bear with a violin to represent the city’s performing arts scene. “It’s pop art,” fnnch says. “It’s like pop music. It’s designed for people to enjoy.” A Kirkwood native, fnnch, 32, has made a name for himself in San Francisco with various honeybear-themed pieces of art around the city. As for why he paints them, fnnch says the figure is a universal symbol of happiness. “It’s nostalgic, and I also find it to be inclusive,” he says. “The honey bear is really bizarre, it’s really surreal. Why is there honey in a bear?” fnnch says the bear and other

works are meant to catch the attention of passersby because he believes many people don’t visit their local art museum. “I share murals and art for the 95 percent of people that don’t engage in the arts that way,” he says. “Hopefully, they find it interesting and that can be used as a gateway towards having fine arts play a role in people’s lives. It played a role in my life.” Coming from an artistic family and known as the stepson of St. Louis sculptor Carol Fleming, fnnch got his start by illustrating in high school and using online resources to improve his technique. He later transitioned into stenciling and spray painting. fnnch now focuses more on painting murals and has traveled the world, leaving his mark in Chicago, Hong Kong and Tel Aviv. In St. Louis, fnnch has art in places such as the City Museum’s second oor and Atomic owboy, and he has even left his mark by spray painting ice cream on a bench outside of Clementine’s Creamery in Lafayette Square. Not all his paintings are honey bears, though. “It’s 50 percent bears and 50 percent everything else,” he adds. fnnch says on top of making the popular bears, he also paints various birds such as cardinals, swans and penguins. In California, he’s often commissioned to paint a lot of California poppies. “Oftentimes, it’s a collaboration between me and whoever commissions the mural,” he says. “It’s all my work, but sometimes it’s dictated by when I get permission to do it.” fnnch can be followed on Instagram @fnnch, and merchandise can be bought on his website at www.fnnch.com. n

measure, it was an unusual gig. Torchlight Parade has played a few unusual gigs of late, though they make sense in their own way: car shows, bike shows, clubs that cater to a harder rock sound. Mostly, though, the band has carved out a unique place for themselves in the local rock & roll scene, one that the Enuff Z’Nuff gig helped solidify. “We’ve gotten our name out to different promoters, and we’ve been pretty good at selling tickets,” Nichols says. “Some like to throw local bands on with touring acts.” Those of certain ilk have become the heart of what the band does and where it plays. In the past year or so, the group has appeared on bills with Stryper, Faster Pussycat, Metal Church and Beasto Blanco, a band closely affiliated with Alice Cooper’s camp. On Friday, August 9, Torchlight Parade will appear again with Faster Pussycat, who’ll be out on the road with Bang Tango. And, for this one, they promise the full monty, with the return of Meyers plus the coffin, the bagpipes, the confetti, the works. In addition to the band’s originals, the group is able to reach into its personal catalog of favorites, picking covers that make sense to their audience, and those cuts only help in hyping a crowd in advance of a headliner. For the Lascelles show that meant a roughed-up version of CCR’s “Fortunate Son,” as well as Accept’s 1983 metal chestnut “Balls to the Wall.” A few fans sang along. They got it — they were in on the fun. “We’ve hit on this niche,” Nichols says. “We’re one of the local metal bands that’s become a go-to for these gigs. A lot of these bands are our heroes.” And the members of Torchlight Parade not only get to meet their heroes, they get to share an occasional Marshall stack and a selfie. On an increasing amount of these dream evenings, T-shirts are sold, chicken clubs are eaten, personalized guitar picks are tossed and Stump Stephenson carries away a pedal board. What’s more rock & roll than all that?

Faster Pussycat with Torchlight Parade 8 p.m. Friday, August 9. Delmar Hall, 6133 Delmar Boulevard. $25-$30. 314-726-6161.

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JULY 31-AUGUST 6, 2019

RIVERFRONT TIMES

Wednesday July 31 9:30 PM

Sean Canan’s Voodoo

Tribute to The Allman Brothers

Friday August 2 10PM

Clusterpluck

Saturday August 3 10PM

Marquis Knox

Sunday August 4 8PM

Soul and Blues Diva Kim Massie Monday August 5 9PM

The Longest Running Blues Jam in The World hosted by Soulard Blues Band

Wednesday August 7 9:30PM

Sean Canan’s Voodoo

Tribute To Soul Music Featuring the Lauren Loveless Revival

Friday August 9 10PM Steely Dan Tribute by

JD Hughes and the Fuze

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