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s t a n l e y • F a i r f i e l d • S h o sh o n e • P i c a b o School’s almost here and Dr. Maricich talks about non-drug treatment options for ADHD. read about it on PG 14
6 at Sochi benefit to help send Nordic Skiers to Russia in 2014 Page 3
Kane says The Help brings 1963 back to life Page 10
Shakespeare Festival kicks off Thursday Page 13
A u g u s t 1 7 , 2 0 1 1 • Vo l . 4 • N o . 3 3 • w w w.T h e W e e k l y S u n . c o m
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Brandt: The Hit Guy Charlie Brandt Speaks at Writers Conference
PHOTO & STORY By KAREN BOSSICK
C Taj Weekes closes Ketch’em Alive.
Ketch’em Alive closes out with reggae By KAREN BOSSICK
K
etch’em Alive will close out its season next Tuesday with a musical import from Jamaica, while a California surf band plays FINALE Town Square Tunes This season’s and an Austin, final Ketch’em Texas, singer gives Alive concert is everyone their from 7 to 9 p.m. country music fix at this Tuesday, Aug. Mahoney’s Bar and 23 at Ketchum’s Forest Service Grill. Here’s where you Park (on First and Washington can hear your free streets). vibes this week: Roots RegTonight, King gae musician, Taj Louis and the Weekes will headChaperones will line the show. perform for The
Wicked Spud’s Back Alley Party from 6 to 9:30 p.m. Sales from beer and raffle tickets will benefit the Wood River Hospice. On Thursday, Safety Orange, a California reggae surf band, will play at Ketchum Town Plaza in an expanded Town Square Tunes concert to benefit the Sun Valley Ski Education Foundation’s efforts to send six local athletes to the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia (see related article in today’s theweeklySUN). Preceding them will be Cow Says Moo at 5 p.m. The legendary Moe Dixon, who played Sold Gold Hits from the ’60s and ‘70s at last spring’s Janss Pro Am, will play at 6 p.m. And Safety Orange starts at 7:30 p.m. Also on Thursday, George Devore, an Austin, Texas, singer, will perform on the deck of Mahoney’s Bar and Grill in Bellevue from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. Devore has played at the Braun Brothers Reunion and he’s also performed in concerts broadcast on German, Swiss and French TV. On Tuesday, Taj Weekes will play the final concert of the season for Ketch’em Alive from 7 to 9 p.m. at Ketchum’s Forest Service Park, First and Washington streets. The roots reggae musician, who has played Ketch’em Alive before, fuses his calypso and afro-folk music with passionate poetry and lyrics focused on his views of the world. His group’s second album won “Best Reggae Album” at the Just Plain Folks Music Awards and was shortlisted for a Grammy Award. They recorded their third—“A Waterlogged Soul Kitchen”—last year. tws
Charles Brandt will get an option payment for the film harles Brandt has no qualms about based on his book “I Heard You Paint Houses.” The scriptadmitting that “the Mafia’s been writing has been assigned to Steven Zaillian, whose credits very good to me.” include “Schindler’s List.” The mob has kinged him with four books, including one that Martin Scorsee is currently making into a movie starring Robert DeNiro, Al Pacino, Harvey Keitel and Joe Pesci. Another, “We’re Going to Win this Thing,” recently received 15 minutes of prime time on “60 Minutes” as the venerable news magazine explored the story of former FBI investigator Lin DeVecchio, who claimed to be framed for ordering four mob hits. And now, Brandt says, Hollywood is making noise about adapting that book into a movie. investigator who was voted one of the best Brandt, and accused of collaborating with “60 Minutes focused on the easy lawyers in America by his peers. the Mafia, accepting bribes and orchespart—Lin’s relationship to the mob, His first book, “The Right to Remain trating several hits. The charges were rather than taking on his betrayal by Silent,” was a novel spurred by Supreme dropped for lack of evidence in November the FBI. But, still, the night before ’60 Court’s passage of the Miranda rights. 2007. Minutes’ aired, we were ranked 238 on His second book, “I Heard You Paint “He was the victim of the greatest inthe book charts—811 from the top,” said Houses,” fell into his lap when Mafia hit justice I’ve ever seen. It’s an outrage how Brandt, who served as a consultant on the man Frank Sheeran — in prison for labor he was treated by Brooklyn’s attorney and “60 Minutes” piece. “Three hours after racketeering charges — hired Brandt to ultimately the FBI,” Brandt said. the show, we were ranked 604. You can’t secure his release from jail because of His second life as an author ushered beat that.” severe spinal scoliosis. Sheeran asked to Brandt—now 68 and a full-time resident Brandt’s latest book earned him his tell his side of the story because he was of Ketchum--into Mafia social clubs that second invite to speak at the Sun Valley tired of reading lies about himself. he quipped are “invitation-only unless Writers Conference, which runs from “I knew that meant he wanted to conyou have a search warrant “ Friday through Monday at Sun Valley fess,” said Brandt. It also ushered him into a shadowy Resort. A New York Times bestseller, the book world no one pays income taxes “so they Brandt commandeered a breakout sescreated a sensation when its subject can afford to generous” with the help sion at the conference a few years ago, as confessed to Brandt that he had killed and where many don’t even have a Social he discussed his book “I Heard You Paint Jimmy Hoffa—something the FBI had Security card “because they’ve never Houses,” which refers to a Mafia euphesuspected but never been able to get out worked a day in their lives—at least, at a mism for splattering blood on the walls of him. conventional job.” during a hit job. “He turned to stone when I mentioned And it earned him a four-hour meet“The Writers Conference has been a the JFK assassination. “He said, ‘I’m ing with Scorsee and DeNiro who wanted highlight for me—not just the speaking not going anywhere near Dallas,’ which material that was not in book. before the group but all the other events, meant to me he knew something about “I was very impressed with their including the chance to mingle with other the assassination,” Brandt said. intelligence—their questions were so writers at the breakfasts and dinners Brandt’s third book, “Unfinished Busisharp—they got everything,” he said. they have for the writers,” he said. “It’s ness,” revealed the things that couldn’t be “And because I grew up in New York in a very bright crowd—a very informed put into Johnny Depp’s “Donnie Brasco” an Italian family, Scorsee and DeNiro crowd. Every single person there is tws film about FBI agent Joe Pistone, who and I had a lot in common.” smarter than the average bear, as Yogi infiltrated the Bonanno crime family. would say, and they’re more accomplished It was Pistone who introduced Brandt than the average bear.” to DeVecchio, a former FBI agent who What makes Brandt’s story amazing is was a key player in bringing down the that he sat behind the prosecutor’s desk Mob in New York from the 1970s through before he began penning his best-sellers. the 1990s. DeVecchio was betrayed by He also is a former chief deputy attorney the very system he had worked for, said of Delaware and a welfare and homicide
READ ABOUT THE SUN VALLEY WRITERS CONFERENCE ON PAGE 6