ICON Magazine by ICON Magazine

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contents 16

SEPTEMBER ~ 2012

INTERVIEWS THE TONGUE SPEAKS | 26 KISS co-founder and star of his own reality show, Gene Simmons has life lessons to share.

RELIGION, FILM NOIR AND MUSIC FOR CHAMELEONS | 28 David Olney’s concerts could be mistaken for performance-art roadhouse séances. On any given night Olney may summon the spirit of John Dillinger. Or Socrates. Or Dizzy Dean. Or a French prostitute

ART IN THE AGE OF TECHNOLOGICAL PROPULSION | 30 Susan Sarandon, Frank Langella, and the Tricky Tech Themes of Robot & Frank.

Dreama Walker in Compliance.

TAJ MAHAL | 32 For seven decades he’s been building stately pleasure joints of blues: global, tropical, topical. He’s influenced two generations of influential musicians—Bonnie Raitt, Keb’ Mo’, Jack Johnson—with his jaunty guitar, voice and presence.

OPINION The Real Medicare Question | 5

WINE A Few Good Reads | 38

Alliteration of the Month | 6

COLUMNS

Rossa Corsa | 7

City Beat | 5

Alex Kanevsky | 8

Sally Friedman | 40

Seeing, With More Than Just Eyes | 10

Jim Delpino | 41

Cinematters | 16 Compliance

Jazz Library | 54 Shirley Scott

STAGE

Day Trip | 55

Regional Theater | 44

Harper’s Findings | 55

Melody Gardot; New Jerusalem;

L.A. Times Crossword | 56

Arsenic and Old Lace;

Keresman on Film | 18 The Bourne Legacy

Cooking With the Calamari Sisters;

Bad Movie | 20 28 Weeks Later

The Edge of Our Bodies; La Boheme

Reel News | 22

Quartet; Pete Smyser; Abiah

ETCETERA

Exhibitions | 14

Edward Norton in The Bourne Legacy.

Neil Cowley Trio; John Abercrombie; Matthew Silberman; The Eric Mintel

ART

FILM

Nick’s Picks | 52

Angels in America, Part II;

Harper’s Index | 57 Calendar | 59

Footlights | 45 Bring It On

Monsieur Lazhar; The Avengers; Stealing Las Vegas; Genetic Chile Film Roundup | 24 You’ve Been Trumped; For a Good Time, Call; Arbitrage; Keep the Lights On

MUSIC Classical Notebook | 46 Marvin Hamlisch Singer / Songwriter | 48 Lyle Lovett; Omar & The Howlers; Los Lobos; Ry Cooder; Caroline Herring

FOOD Beau Monde | 35 Martine’s | 36

Gene Simmons and Shannon Tweed.

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Keresman on Disc | 50 Hot Club of Detroit; Delta Moon; Taj Mahal; Annbjorg Lien; Gentle Giant

ON THE COVER: Susan Sarandon is nterviewed, along with Frank Langella, by R. Kurt Osenlund on page 30.

opinion

city beat

Romney and Ryan’s disdain for the working class EUGENE ROBINSON

MITT ROMNEY’S SELECTION OF Paul Ryan as his running mate underscores the central question posed by this campaign: Should cold selfishness become the template for our society, or do we still believe in community? Romney wanted the election to be seen as a referendum on the success or failure of President Obama’s economic policies. Instead, he has revealed that the campaign is really a choice between two starkly different philosophies. One could be summed up as: “We’re all in this together.” The other: “I’ve got mine.” This is not about free enterprise, and it’s not about personal liberty; those fundamental principles are unquestioned. But for at least the past 100 years, we have understood capitalism and freedom to exist within a larger context — a complicated, real-world, human context. Some people begin life at a disadvantage, and it’s in the national interest to open doors of opportunity for them. Some people make mistakes, and it’s in the national interest to create second chances. Some people are too young, too old or too infirm to care for themselves, and it’s in the national interest to secure their welfare. Paul Ryan. This sense of the balance between individualism and community fueled the American Century. Romney and Ryan apparently don’t believe in it. It is well known that Ryan, at least for most of his career, has been enamored of the ideas of Ayn Rand, the novelist (Atlas Shrugged, The Fountainhead) whose interminable books tout self-interest as the highest, noblest human calling and equate capitalist success with moral virtue. Ryan now disavows Rand’s worldview, primarily because she was an atheist, but he lavishly praised her ideas as recently as 2009. What about Romney? While he has never pledged allegiance to the Cult of Rand, his view of society seems basically the same. At least three times in recent days, as part of his response to President Obama’s “You didn’t build that” peroration, Romney has told campaign audiences variations of the follow-

EDITED BY THOM NIICKELS

ThomNickels1@aol.com

WE WERE HOPING THERE’D be a significant event in the city honoring the 50th anniversary of the death of Marilyn Monroe. The numerous little theaters here weren’t offering anything (for that we had to check out the Off-Off Broadway production of Siren’s Heart— Norma Jean and Marilyn in Purgatory, a one-woman show starring Louisa Bradshaw). The Daily News printed a bio- acknowledgment of sorts, but there wasn’t much else. Still, the anniversary got us thinking about Monroe’s career and her descent into Lee Strasberg’s Method Acting Netherworld. Method Acting was all the rage in the 1950s, about the time Monroe left Hollywood for New York (at the urging of playwright Arthur Miller) where she wound up learning how to become a “real actress” at Strasberg’s Actors Studio. Monroe had lots of student company—Shelly Winters and Marlon Brando to name two—as well as pressure from Strasberg to see a psychoanalyst who would prescribe barbiturates and tranquilizers. Referrals like this were Strasberg’s MO; it almost ruined Brando (who later confessed that his experience with the Actors Studio left him no better off than before). Thanks to the deleterious effects of Method Acting, Monroe would never do another successful film like The Seven Year Itch, but at least—like those women in The Valley of the Dolls—she had her pills. Was it really Lee Strasberg who killed the star? Or do we blame Miller, who urged her to move to New York in the first place? Of course, had Monroe survived perhaps she would have gotten caught up in that other mental barbiturate: Scientology. Every month, the lobby of many Center City high-rises becomes a boxing ring with ICON magazine vs. Philadelphia Style going at it neck and neck. While ICON rarely fails to disappoint in terms of content, Philadelphia Style, with its mega photo spreads of celebrities and people who want to be celebrities, proves that if you get your picture taken often enough you can become a self-created star. While a pretty face can hardly be called a professional accomplishment, a TMZ-style plunging neckline with tanned cleavage does provide the right sizzle when the subject is the opening of a new steak house or an Old City Virgin America launch party. Does ICON need to go to more parties and focus on professional party-goers? We might be tempted to take the plunge if we knew who these people were in the first place. We know regular photo-opers like Cole Hammels, Sharon Pinkenson, John DeBella, Sam Katz or Dawn Timmeney; but what about that larger gallery of anonymous faces with the uncanny ability to sniff out the location of every city party, both great and small? One good thing: At least all the PR posing gives Philly’s local amateur paparazzi something to do. While we’ve certainly had our fill of Chick-fil-A, we did take a little stroll down to the Chick-fil-A outlet in the Gallery for Kiss-In’s National Marriage Equality Day. We saw a few people in line for chicken and even noticed a special “free drink” table that management had set up. We looked far and wide for kisses—Eskimo nose rub kisses, cheek-to-cheek pecks or the full mouth French express kind—but found only an uptight-looking security guard by the waffle fry section who didn’t look like he was about to kiss anybody, but rather pounce (eyes wide shut) should those activist kisses morph into a riot. (The Gallery, traditionally, has never been on the cutting edge of anything, although its lavatory stalls provide the homeless with a motel-like shelter). Just being at the Gallery, however, seemed like the perfect opportunity to look for our favorite men’s cologne, Dior Homme at one of the kiosks near the food court. Dior Homme is not sold at Macy’s on Chestnut or anywhere else in Philly for that matter. (Macy’s colognes run the teenage gamut from Vintage Black to Le Male). When we didn’t find the cologne at the kiosks, at least one purveyor knew what we were talking about, and offered to order it. Now, that was worth a kiss. Angels in America was big stuff when it burst upon the theater scene in 1990-91, with its story of a closeted Mormon married man and the self-hating HIV-infected Roy Cohn. Last year, when the Wilma announced it was bringing Tony Kushner’s play to Philly, there was an audible gasp in the audience. “Really!?” people exclaimed. Many went on to say that Angels was a far cry from the Wilma’s penchant for obscure esoterica, and that they were happy the theater was finally letting in some “mainstream light.” But what a difference a year makes. At the conclusion of the interminably long Part I earlier this year we left the theater with an impression of the Wilma’s seats stuck to our derrieres; we also became nostalgic for traditional Wilma esoterica. (Blanka Zizka, please tell Mr. Kushner he’s no exception when it comes to editing or getting a dramaturge.) That’s why when we read that Angels, Part 2 will be staged

> SEPTEMBER 2012

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5 / OPINION / DISDAIN FOR THE WORKING CLASS

ing: “When a young person makes the honor roll, I know he took a school bus to get to the school, but I don’t give the bus driver credit for the honor roll.” When he delivered that line in Manassas on Saturday with Ryan in tow, Romney drew wild applause. He went on to say that a person who gets a promotion and raise at work, and who commutes to the office by car, doesn’t owe anything to the clerk at the motor vehicles department who processes driver’s licenses. What I hear Romney saying, and I suspect many others will also hear, is that the little people don’t contribute and don’t count. I don’t know whether Romney’s sons ever rode the bus to school. I do know that for most parents, it matters greatly who picks up their children in the morning and drops them off in the afternoon. It may not be the driver’s job to help with algebra homework, but he or she bears enormous responsibility for safely handling the most precious cargo imaginable. A good bus driver gets to know the children, maintains order and discipline, deals with harassment and bullying. Romney may not realize it, but a good driver plays an important role in ensuring a child’s physical and emotional well-being—and may, in fact, be the first adult to whom the child proudly displays a report card with all A’s. School bus drivers don’t make a lot of money. Nor, for that matter, do the clerks who help keep unqualified drivers and unsafe vehicles off the streets. But these workers are not mere cogs in a machine designed to service those who make more money. They are part of a community. The same is true of teachers, police officers, firefighters and others whom Romney and Ryan dismiss as minions of “big government” rather than public servants. And what do the Republicans offer their supposed heroes, the entrepreneurs who start small businesses? The few who succeed wildly would be rewarded with tax cuts so huge that they, like Romney, might one day have a dressage horse competing in the Olympics. Most of those who just manage to scrape by, or whose businesses fail, could look forward to only as much health care in their senior years as they are able to afford, and not one bit more. This is a campaign Democrats should relish. The United States became the world’s dominant economic, political and military power by recognizing that we are all in this together. School bus drivers, too. ■

alliteration of the month

5 / CITY BEAT

at the Wilma this fall, we ran full tilt further down South Broad to see what Suzanne Roberts had up her sleeve, The Philadelphia Fringe Festival started life as a cornucopia of short bohemian productions, when the only aim seemed to be to out avant garde the avant garde. This was well before hipsters and others started stretching their ear lobes, wearing tribal Ethiopian rings, and sporting tattoos to prove their coolness. In today’s world, everyday life is pretty much of a Fringe Festival although the FF in general has much more polish now than it did then. We’re thinking especially of the Tina Brock-directed Ivona: Princess of Burgundia by Witold Gombrowicz, an absurdist comedy about a medieval kingdom where appearance is everything. That’s why the princess in question has a hairdo that can only be described as architectural: it towers so high in the air that Ivona’s hairdresser must take a ladder to attend to the upper eaves, window casements, lintels, balusters and hidden patios among the sprayed hair follicles. Ivona runs through September at the Walnut Street Studio 5 and stars the Fishtown-based identical Dura twins, Tomas and Michael. The Kelly Writers House at U of P is famous for packing in area intellectuals, the extreme opposite of a paparazzi photo op. Here, the tanned plunging neckline attractions are writers like John Barth (who visited Kelly’s earlier this year), and Susan Sontag (now dead, but when she appeared at Kelly’s years ago it was a pleasure to bump into her while she creamcheesed a bagel). This year will be a triple TMZ explosion for KWH—that’s three Virgin America Launch parties in one—with the announcement of Kelly House Fellows John Ashberry, poet (February), and The New Yorker’s Janet Malcolm (March). Poets—unless your name is Maya Angelou or Sonia Sanchez—rarely get any mention outside of Larry Robin’s Moonstone poetry circuit. But KWH is living proof that to be a poet in Philly you don’t have to be weird, dress up like Emily Dickinson, or even wear an opera cape while mumbling a defense of Mumia Abu-Jamal. . A recent headline in The Philadelphia Weekly read: Why Are So Many Philly Art Galleries Closing? ICON asked that question many months ago, and the answer is the same now as it was then: the economy. We found some of the online comments to the PW piece amusing, especially, “Oh, you want thousands of dollars for exhibiting a cat litter box full of poop in the middle of your gallery?” One thing we were glad to see was a shout out by Newman Galleries, the gallery that everybody seems to forget in the rush to idolize the hottest and latest art space in town. Newman Galleries is, in fact, the oldest gallery in the city, dating from 1865, the year Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. ■

icon The intersection of art, entertainment, culture, opinion and mad genius

Filling the hunger since 1992 1-800-354-8776 • voice: 215-862-9558 fax: 215-862-9845

www.iconmagazineonline.com Publisher & Editor-in-Chief

Trina McKenna trina@icondv.com

ADVERTISING 800-354-8776

City Beat Editor Thom Nickels Fine Arts Editors Edward Higgins

Burton Wasserman Classical Music Editor Peter H. Gistelinck Music Editors Nick Bewsey

Mark Keresman Bob Perkins Tom Wilk Theater Critic David Schultz Food Editor Robert Gordon Wine Editor Patricia Savoie Contributing Writers A.D. Amorosi

Robert Beck Jack Byer Ralph Collier Peter Croatto James P. Delpino Sally Friedman Geoff Gehman George Oxford Miller Thom Nickels R. Kurt Osenlund Victor Stabin

PO Box 120 • New Hope, PA 18938 (800) 354-8776 Fax (215) 862-9845 ICON is published twelve times per year. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is strictly prohibited. ICON welcomes letters to the editor, editorial ideas and submissions, but assumes no responsibility for the return of unsolicited material. ICON is not responsible for claims made by advertisers. Subscriptions are available for $40 (shipping & handling). Copyright 2012 by Prime Time Publishing Co., Inc.

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a thousand words

STORY AND PAINTING BY ROBERT BECK

Rossa Corsa AH, SWEET INFATUATION. YOU are mindlessly pecking your way through the day when next thing you know your heart is racing and you’re being dragged along by an irresistible promise of ecstasy. It doesn’t take much—a beautiful smile, the flash of an eye, that certain “look.” Or maybe a boat. That’s what happened to me when I first glimpsed the Arno XI in a magazine. A publicity shot for an auction house showed the hydroplane on its cradle, and the claws sunk deep. I’m not the first guy to fall in love with a boat, but a hydroplane of that vintage will capture the soul of any man. Like horses and motorcycles, you don’t drive them—you ride. In this case, straddling 600 horsepower. It awakens the inner cowboy. This hydro, which established the world record in 1953 and was still competitive well into the ‘60s, has wild ride written all over its Ferrari red cockpit. It’s that audacious bodywork that seized me. In its record-setting form, Arno XI had a basic round nose and tail, and even then looked plenty rough and ready. But the subsequent addition of the rear fin and shark-nose unleashed the flying fantasy monkeys and turned it into the ray gun of hydroplanes. Buck Roger’s boat. Froth was coming out of the sides of my mouth and I couldn’t take my eyes off it. I texted Phil, my long-time commiserator for all things man-boy related. He recognized the

symptoms and in moments flooded my inbox with links to models of the Arno XI on Ebay— a dangerous gambit. The cheap ones weren’t good and the good ones weren’t cheap. I went from item to item and back again in a frenzied loop of seduction and indecision seeking resolution. As fatigue set in I had a premonition of being found dazed and unwashed, slumped over my laptop surrounded by liquor bottles, granola bar wrappers and crushed cigar butts, emitting moaning sounds resembling a Ferrari V-12, and figured there had to be a better way. Painting it was the answer. There was more to my obsession than the Arno’s styling. I clearly remember the smaller hydroplane that someone kept at the New Hampshire lake of my youth. Our house was on the east side, with a 30-foot drop to the dock. There, hand-made clunky but sweet rowboats, some modified for sail, rocked with the lapping water. A scattering of ordinary wood powerboats with their ‘50s-vintage Johnsons and Evinrudes would be out playing by noon, but on clear days the early hours were owned by the hydroplane, darting across the placid water in the silver light, etching a thin line in the sky’s reflection, joyfully throwing a spray into the air as it bounded the lake and back. Sitting in a natural bowl roughly a mile square, the lake had mountain acoustics. Sound would bounce directly off the water, but the surrounding reflection points would change as the boat took its course. You had to lead the

growl to locate the source as it popped out from behind the peninsula or the island; first at low throttle to clear the docks then high to get up on the plane, the revs straining when the sponsons dragged the surface, then leaping free again—nyarrr…nyarrr…nyarrr…nyarrr. You could hear the slap of the hull as it crab-danced around a turn, a big plume of water jetting up behind. A few quick laps on a summer morning before the water-skiers disturbed the glassy lake—nyarrr…nyarrr…nyarrr. It’s the soundtrack to my painting. I used the auction house catalogue shots of the restored boat on its stand for reference, and searched images of other period racing boats at speed to put mine in context. I do that sort of thing often—sit around imagining stuff—and then tell people that it’s work. Now I have a twelve-foot painting of a hydroplane on the wall, which in all its redness is rather hard to ignore. My sweet Doreen came up to the studio to see the painting and asked, “What are you going to do with it?” in the gentle voice she uses to let me know when I’m wearing two different shoes. Not sure. Look at it, I suppose. And listen. ■ Robert Beck maintains a gallery and academy in Lambertville, NJ. His exhibition, Home Again, opens Oct 20. To view his work visit www.robertbeck.net SEPTEMBER 2012

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art

EDWARD HIGGINS

Alex Kanevsky, Ten Times.

[ Alex Kanevsky

An abstract artist, fond of realism. Born in Europe with work full of American color. Classically trained but violating established dogma. Contemporary in outlook that’s rooted in the past.

]

ALL THIS AND MORE is Alex Kanevsky, currently showing a small selection of his works at the Woodmere Art Museum, Some Paintings and Drawings, through the end of the month. Kanevsky is not only at the Woodmere as an exhibitor, but also as a curator for the 71st Annual Juried Exhibition which features works in a variety of media from 46 artists living within 50 miles of the Museum. According to the Museum: “Works were chosen to create a cohesive presentation that explores contemporary ideas within the arts of Philadelphia.” The solo show of Kanevsky’s paintings and drawings are from the last ten years. Kanevsky has said, “If painting is a form of language, an artist attempts to create a language, foreign to all but himself, and then say a few things in that language in such a way that would make these things clear to anybody who listens, even if the language remains foreign to them.” Actually, some of the works do have a comfortable and familiar quality to them. Kanevsky, who was born in Russia in 1963 and educated at the University of Vilnius in Lithuania before coming to the United States, graduated from The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 1993 and currently teaches there. His work shows a strong foundation of drawing and—especially in the drawings—he has demonstrated the ability to create realistic images. One of his teachers at the Academy was Sidney Goodman, a local artist whose realistic works have convinced many that realism is not only not dead, but thriving. The drawings have a curious feature of a number of lines used over and over with a single subject that gives the illusion of a stutter-step or a silent movie run too quickly. He has said that in making the works he would create a line, then seek to improve it a number of times with erasing the original line. The effect pleased him and so it stayed. It is his abstract work that shines with references to the art historical canon from around the world, a strong sense of color that is decidedly American, and a choice of location that reflects Philadelphia. It’s clear from a list of those who have inspired him that Kanevsky covers a wide spectrum of interest—he cites such 20th-century painters such as Richard Diebenkorn and Lucian Freud, and Rembrandt van Rijn and Diego Velázquez from cen-

Edward Higgins is a member of The Association Internationale Des Critiques d’Art.

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art

Seeing, with more than just eyes MARLENE MILLER IS A widely respected, retired professor of art who taught for many years at Bucks County Community College. She lives in Sellersville, PA and continues to make profoundly moving artworks in a variety of two- and three-dimensional media. The cornerstone of her commitment to aesthetic expression is a deeply rooted social consciousness. Miller’s intense feeling for the fundamental worth of all humankind transcends the tendencies felt by many lesser artists to compose, show and sell essentially decorative accessories for various interior settings. Instead, by virtue of her capacity for empathy and her creative efforts, she calls attention to the sufferings of the poor, the sick, the downtrodden and the homeless. You look in vain at her image content for the sight of affluent people, luxurious surroundings, fashionable dress and other possible forms of lavish self-indulgence. Examining her stark and impressive oeuvre, one may be inclined to recall the novels of Theodore Dreiser, James T. Farrell, John Steinbeck and other writers who have turned a critical eye on the inequities that beset innocent victims caught up in the struggle for survival within a hostile world. Currently, Miller’s outstanding solo exhibition, I Look, I Listen, is currently on view in the James A. Michener Art Museum at 139 South Pine St., in Doylestown, Pennsylvania. It is scheduled to remain on public view in the Museum until October 14, 2012. While Miller’s work is powerfully magnetic, profoundly passionate and unquestionably sincere, the haunting pathos of her work can be rather off-putting. Without question, her pictures are not charming, pretty or trivial. This is not said as criticism. Instead, it is offered as a token of admiration for the pithy integrity of her language of vision.

Dr. Burton Wasserman is a professor emeritus of Art at Rowan University, and a serious artist of long standing. Dr. Wasserman’s program Art From Near and Far can be heard on WWFM in Central and Northern New Jersey and Bucks County and WGLS in South Jersey. 10

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Marlene Miller (b. 1935), Broadway Baby Says Goodnight, 1989, charcoal on paper, H. 13.5 x W. 16.5 inches, James A. Michener Art Museum. Museum purchase funded by an anonymous donor from the Bucks Biennial I Exhibition.

Sadly, some visitors, due to their own narrow compass of acceptance, may not be able to pay attention to these selections since they find them horrifying and upsetting. In response, exercising infinite patience, Miller simply says, “I look, I listen,” to describe her need to see the plight of people trapped and burdened by the agonizing circumstances in which they find themselves. The depth of expression given voice in her work offers society pause for judgment and reflection on moral dilemmas, preferably free of saccharine sanctimony and syrupy platitudes. In this respect, I find very significant affinities between her accomplishments and the vision of such masters of French and German modernism as Picasso, Rouault, Kollwitz and Grosz. Over the years, Miller has employed her talent to illuminate the realities of the Holocaust in Europe, the misery of both emotional and social rejection, the facts of inadequate

health care, the exploitation of the disadvantaged and the severe injustices made real by racial and sexist discrimination. The only olive branch she extends in her opposition to the unfeeling and the uncaring are artworks based on sights she has observed at firsthand in hospitals, asylums, women’s shelters and on the street. To be sure, her grammar of expression is raw and unsettling. Refusing to look the other way, they are pictures crying out for justice in a day and age when deceitfulness and blind arrogance are frequently in the ascendant. Again and again, these sad facts of life take shape in visions that urge her audience to care about troubled desperation, tragic isolation, agonizing pain and petrifying fear. The selection titled, “If I Can’t Have You, No One Will,” projects an image, rendered in charcoal, of the body of a woman decomposing in a concrete block. The body was originally discovered entombed within the basement wall of

BURT WASSERMAN

a building in Philadelphia’s Society Hill neighborhood. The corpse was a 36-year-old mother of two, wrapped in duct tape and covered with plastic and a painter’s tarp. Construction debris and cinder blocks surrounded the remains. A tube of toothpaste was wedged in her throat. The killer was eventually found to be her husband. Granted, it is a forbidding scene, but it does speak to the facts of savage, domestic wounds that exist, that are not fictional. “Broadway Baby Says Good Night” is a black and white drawing of a figure lying alone in a box-like enclosure on the street. Covered in raggedy, clothes, she appears to be deep in sleep while a little pigeon, perched on the left, looks at her silent, weary presence. It’s a profoundly moving image of a person completely estranged from the rest of the world, perhaps close to the very end of her days.

The artwork titled “Bag Lady” is a somber composition in which a standing figure, holding bags in her hands, is seen up front against the background of an urban locale. The general mood and atmosphere of the scene are principally treated in tones of blue and red. They generate a measure of cold despair, so low it can virtually freeze the marrow in your bones. The ultimate purpose of Miller’s grammar of expression is the pursuit of civilized decency. With total dedication, her work condemns belligerent combat, racism, sexism and the many inequities suffered by those who are, figuratively or literally, lame and needy. Their presence is abundantly evident for everyone willing and able to take the time to look and then, dare to see. ■

Marlene Miller (b. 1935), If I Can't Have You No One Will, 2001, charcoal on paper, H. 29.75 x W. 41.75 inches, James A. Michener Art Museum. Museum purchase.

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Swing Ride, Point Pleasant, New Jersey.

Third Annual Sweet Edge Sculpture Tour www.SweetEdgeSculpture.com 267-337-1818 October 13 and 14, 10-5 Free admission Six of the area’s finest sculptors open their studios and sculpture gardens to the public. All studios are five to fifteen minutes apart. Participants are George Anthonisen, Constance Bassett and David Cann of Moorland Studios, Raymond Mathis of Tutto Metal Design, John McDevitt of McDevitt Sculpture, and Steven Snyder of Cedar Maze Sculpture Garden and Studio. Anthonisen’s public works in permanent collections include U.S. Capitol, Capitol Visitors Center, Washington, DC; World Health Organization, Geneva, Switzerland; New York’s Carnegie Hall; Please Touch Museum; Woodmere Art Museum; Curtis Institute of Music; James A. Michener Art Museum; Clark Atlanta University; Center for Interfaith Relations. www.ganthonisen.com Moorland Studios’ client work ranges from monument conservation on outdoor public and private sculptures, to The Statue of Liberty in 1983, The Statue of William Penn for Philadelphia’s City Hall, as well as objects from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Philadelphia Museum of Art, and many private collectors. www.moorlandstudios.com In addition to receiving several awards in juried exhibitions and for historic preservation, Raymond Mathis’ work has been featured in House Beautiful, Philadelphia Magazine and many Bucks County regional publications. www.tuttometaldesign.com John McDevitt has exhibited at a wide range of local venues, including Grounds for Sculpture Member Exhibition; Morpeth Contemporary; Sculpture New Hope; Aisling Group in Washington, DC. www.mcdevittsculpture.com Steven Snyder’s work has been featured on HGTV’s Our Place and Country Living Magazine, and his public works are displayed in Buckingham and Doylestown as well as The Children’s Hospital of New Jersey. www.stonesculpture.net

George Anthonisen throwing plaster.

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Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow Photographs by Brian Lav Red Filter Gallery 74 Bridge St., Lambertville, NJ (347) 244-9758 www.redfiltergallery.com Open Thursday-Sunday afternoon September 6-November 4 Opening Reception, 9/8, 3-5 Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow breaks the Red Filter Gallery’s tradition of black and white photography by also including some select contemporary color work by Brian Lav alongside his brilliant monochrome work. Gallery owner, Forrest Old states, “Brian’s work, then and now, encompasses a broad evolution of style with substance. His new ventures into color work are exciting and worth experiencing by a broad audience”. Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow explores the everyday life of New Jersey resident and photographer, Brian Lav. While everything from Jersey Shore sights to garage windows, old sofas and train stations are examined with a soulful eye, they are given new meaning through careful composition of angles, lines, forms and light. Lav transforms the ordinary into images of nuanced emotion with his control and attention to detail. Craft meets art, leaving a visual history of creative artifacts. Brian Lav teaches photography at Parsons the New School for Design; an institution he has taught at since 1974. He has been photographing and teaching since 1969, and earned Parsons’ Distinguished Teaching Award in 1988. He has had over forty one man and group exhibits of his work and is represented in many permanent collections including The International Center for Photography, The Rochester Institute of Technology, The New Jersey State Museum, The Newark Museum, and The Museum of Art and History in Fribourg, Switzerland. Brian Lav is recognized as a prominent contemporary photographer, a master printer, and an exceptional educator. The Red Filter Gallery also offers an extended viewing of the nostalgic group show “Summers Past” and Chip Forelli’s “Terra Emota,” both in upstairs Gallery II.

Garage Window.

After Vermeer.

Si Lewen Kardon Gallery 139 South Main Street Doylestown, PA 18901 (215) 489-4287 www.kardongallery.com Meet the Artist October 13, 2-4 Artist’s Statement: “A life as refugee, migrant and wanderer was bound to create an art of constant change, transformation and metamorphosis. Unsettled (and possibly unsettling), such art is not to be constrained by any one medium, manner, style or subject. Step by step, in long, ever-changing processions, time becomes its primary dimensions (as in a movie) leading to interconnected relationships and ‘pictorial dialogues.’ I see not peaceful evolution but cycling from creation to destruction and on to reconstruction and resurrection… . I must face the ongoing specter and imagery of War and Holocaust. But no matter how ugly and gruesome the reality, recreated as Art, aesthetics should redeem the subject, as well as the artist and, hopefully, the observer. I insist on aesthetics and ethics—inseparable and ultimately essential to the future of homo sapiens.”

Oasis.

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cinematters

Compliance

ICON

“I JUST KNEW IT was going to happen,” says the young woman (Dreama Walker) victimized by a prank call that festers into an abomination in Craig Zobel’s masterpiece of discomfort, Compliance. That quote doesn’t just refer to the film’s central incident. The story, based on true events, unfolds at an Ohio fast food restaurant managed by the middle-aged Sandra (Ann Dowd), whose approach to life is to get along. The delivery guy screams at her, Sandra apologizes to him. Fifteen hundred dollars in food gets spoiled— someone didn’t close the freezer door—and the staff gets off with more of a plea than a warning. Self-respect left Sandra’s world years ago, probably after her first argument. Her words to boyfriend Van (Bill Camp) say it all, “Just don’t get too drunk.” Sandra would qualify as a doormat if she weren’t so afraid of scuffing your shoes. That makes her a perfect, unwitting henchman. On the eve of the dinner rush, an Officer Daniels calls the restaurant saying that Becky (Walker) stole money from a customer. The call is odd from the start. You would think that the police officer would visit the restaurant and talk to witnesses. But he sounds convincing enough, and he has Sandra’s boss on hold. Sandra tells Becky about the charges, which she fervently denies. It’s caught on tape, the officer says. There are two options. Becky can come down to the station or she can agree to a strip search right there. Becky is incredulous; Sandra is skeptical. But the officer knows exactly what to say to the manager: “I have to take the full responsibility on this.” Sandra has no time to ask questions. It’s a busy night and a secret shopper may come in. Plus, her boss and the police have everything covered. It’s out of her hands now. Over the course of several hours, the prank caller (Pat Healy, The Innkeepers) takes his power out for a spin. He has Sandra deposit Becky’s clothes in her car, spins a story about the girl’s involvement in a drug deal, and even involves poor Van. Everyone plays along, because the caller knows he’s dealing with powerless people. Work in the service industry for five minutes—I sold books at Borders, ripped concert tickets, and punched register keys at a multiplex—and you know that “the customer is always right” isn’t just a credo; it’s a “kick me” sign that is permanently affixed to your back. Firmly connected in the day-to-day, nothing feels preposterous in Compliance. A large part has to deal with the acting. Dowd’s agonizing, complex performance doesn’t paint Sandra as dumb or brainwashed. She’s just so used to acquiescence that it’s become as normal as breathing. We can hear the yearning for acceptance in her voice. Healy, gleeful and slick, is profoundly unsettling, which is amazing since we rarely see him. Dowd and Healy flourish because writer-director Zobel treats us with intelligence. He embraces ambiguity, so we feel sorry for Sandra even as she counts Becky’s escalating humiliation as a job well done. The titillating aspects get handled with a clinical detachment. Zobel’s goal is to show that this event wasn’t the result of a bizarre series of circumstances. It came from real life. The movie’s washed out color schemes, its repeated images of small-town misery (parking lots, snow drifts), and shots filled with sad, weathered faces speak of a world where it’s best to keep your head down. Zobel doesn’t amplify. The tension in Compliance comes from simple things: the bubbling of a fryer interrupting the endless quiet; Heather McIntosh’s score reinforcing the film’s grim inevitability, a Greek tragedy with nametags. Zobel relishes not showing us what’s behind the curtain. We never fully understand the background behind Healy’s character, making his actions all the more maddening. When does this deviant say enough is enough? And the fact that we only see Walker topless is more than Zobel showing good taste. Piecing together the possibilities on our own is infinitely more terrifying than seeing them. What Zobel wants us to see is Sandra. She has spent so much time pleasing others and following orders that she can no longer speak for herself. “I did what I was told to do,” she says afterward. The great tragedy of Compliance isn’t that Sandra cannot tell her side of the story. It’s how many of us are in the same position and don’t even know it. We accept our roles, unaware that a willingness to follow the script shapes us—and the lives of others. Weakness is a destructive weapon we’re all carrying. [R] n

A senior critic at Filmcritic.com from 2002 to 2007, Pete Croatto also reviews movies for The Weekender. His essays, reviews, and feature writing have appeared in The Christian Science Monitor, Publishers Weekly, TCNJ Magazine, Deadspin, and The Star-Ledger. You can read more on his blog, whatpeteswatching.blogspot.com.

Dreama Walker.

PETE CROATTO

SEPTEMBER 2012

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keresman on film

MARK KERESMAN

The scoop: The previous Bourne film left the CIA with a bit of egg on its collective face—Jason Bourne was something of a loose cannon. So, the program in which these super-operatives thrive is in danger of being not-so-secret— the big cheeses, the behind-the-scenes bosses, the cats that give the orders for these not-so-official operations, decide the best solution—for them, anyway—is to wipe their assets off the books. More simply: Kill the operatives and anyone lower on the food chain who knows anything, including the doctors and scientists that “maintain” them. That includes super-soldier Aaron Cross, played by Jeremy Renner, and Dr. Marta Shearing, played by Rachel Weisz, one of the biochemists that gives Cross his every-2,000-miles check-up. Naturally, these characters’ survival instincts stand in the way of Operation: Flush the Assets. Legacy was directed by Tony Gilroy, who scripted this and the other Bourne movies. Like many action movies in the past few years, the way the fight scenes are filmed it is decidedly difficult to see who is hitting whom and how…it’s a bit hard on the eyes, sometimes. As an action movie, it’s OK, but what gives The Bourne Legacy its “kick” is the “paranoia” aspect—like the underrated The Anderson Tapes (ripe for a remake) and Enemy of the State, we get to see how relentless, impersonal, and omnipresent technology is used to track our heroes and the frosty, Machiavellian persistence of the spymasters. A palpable sense of suspense is sustained for much of this movie. (For those who haven’t seen many of these kinds of movies: “Intelligence community” bosses are just like mob bosses and real-life corporate bosses, i.e., they require loyalty but rarely demonstrate any.) Jeremy Renner is a most capable action hero, but he’s more of a somewhat human one. He displays weariness, hurt, and tenacity, with nary a smirk or quip. But he falls a bit short of Matt Damon in giving us a super-agent we can actually care about. However, I don’t think Renner is at fault—many of the characters are not particularly fully formed. The magnificently icy Stacy Keach and the usually excellent Edward Norton don’t really register much beyond Generic, In-Authority Villains. About two-thirds of the way through another villain is introduced, and aside from menacing glares, isn’t given a character at all. Weisz is very good as an ask-no-questions person-of-science who finds herself thrust into an untenable situation. There is a very fine, highoctane, winding chase scene therein, but aside from that, some of the action scenes seem a little longer than need be. Then there is the “ending.” Without being Mr. Spoiler, it pretty much comes out of nowhere, leaving some rather hefty questions unanswered. Now, this writer likes ambiguity, but in this kind of movie, it simply comes off as a “WTF?” moment. Perhaps the filmmakers laid the basis for the inevitable sequel, or they simply ran out of time or budget. The Bourne Legacy is a good action movie (with some science-fiction overtones), but it could’ve been much more. ■ In addition to ICON, Mark Keresman is a contributing writer for SF Weekly, East Bay Express, Pittsburgh City Paper, Paste, Jazz Review, downBeat, and the Manhattan Resident. 18

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Rose Byrne, Jeremy Renner, Mackintosh Muggleton, and Imogen Poots

bad movie

MARK KERESMAN

28 Weeks Later

YOU PROBABLY KNOW THAT a very popular cable TV series is The Walking Dead, about a group of survivors of what is known as a zombie apocalypse. That is a very popular fictional genre that essentially began with George Romero’s 1968 groundbreaking low-budget horror film Night of The Living Dead, in which an unknown contagion causes unburied dead people to be reanimated and possessed of a hunger for the flesh of the living. As the dead can outnumber the living—and living people can be infected—this can be a potentially hellish scenario, causing society to break down (it’s hard to conduct businessas-usual if many folks are trying to eat you) and especially in that the dead can be de-animated only by a bullet in the head or decapitation. There have been many sequels, remakes, parodies/tributes (Shaun of the Dead, Return of the Living Dead), and variations. One of the better of the latter is 28 Days Later (2002), in which a fellow awakens from a coma to find that London has been ravaged by a plague (or by a chemical or biological weapon—it’s not definitively explained) that turns those infected into a zombie variant. Most zombies—in the movies, at any rate—are lumbering, essentially mindless, driven-by-instinct creatures. (Imagine vampires with no social skills, witty repartee, or table manners.) In 28 Days Later, the infected aren’t strictly speaking flesh-eaters—they are more like rabid, rage-driven, reason-free savages. (Imagine the Tasmanian Devil or Mike Tyson on PCP.) Unlike most movie zombies (motivated purely by hunger), this lot do not awkwardly shamble in the streets—they RUN swiftly and pounce upon prey with immense, maniacal enthusiasm. This scenario is perhaps more likely than that of your typical zombie movie; imagine a chemical or biological weapon that causes victims to flip-out and attack the uninfected, then eventually die. That would be a rather effective way of decimating/destroying a population while leaving most structures standing. Because of this contagion, London has become a hellhole that must be navigated by a small group of the uninfected. Not only must they evade the infected, but there are some uninfected folks that have decided to turn the situation to their advantage. No law enforcement around? “Heck, then we’re the law!” As with many good movies, there is the temptation to make a sequel. In this case, 28 Weeks Later is what the title says. (However, no characters from the earlier film are here.) A U.S.-led NATO force has arrived in England to do some nation re-

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building—the contagion has been “confined” to some off-limits areas and (it’s never definitively explained if the contagion ravaged other entire nations or only portions thereof) our troops have made much of London habitable again. Brits lucky enough to be living or visiting abroad when the plague hit are returning home…nice and rosy, huh? Those feisty Americans are back in Albion to save the day! Of course, there’d be no movie if it were that simple. 28 Days Later was a harrowing, white-knuckled thrill-ride with plenty of gloom, gore, and human tenacity. 28 Weeks Later, after a promising, riveting beginning, devolves into an unbearably dumb, uninspired thriller with a not-so-subtle anti-American (or to be more appropriate, anti-American military) subtext. As with many horror and science fiction films, characters do appallingly STUPID things that get themselves and others killed. [Spoilers ahead.] Two tweener youths return to the UK from a holiday in Spain. They are reunited with their father, played by Robert Carlisle, who is one of the natives empowered by the U.S. military to organize the backto-normal program. As happy as the kids are to be home, they miss their mom (among the missing) and decide to go to their family home to get some keepsakes—and their home is, naturally, in the quarantined area. (You know, the area wherein infected Rage Zombies are likely to be meandering.) Of course they don’t tell dad. Even though the Americans have checkpoints all over the place, we (audience) overhear our boys telling each other that they see two youths exiting the safe zone. Do they even try to stop them? (No.) Do these two hearts-in-the-right-place kids basically catalyze the end of London? What do you think? For one thing, it’s a little…um, unbelievable…that there is no U.K. military presence at all. No French or Germans, either. But, it’d be a lot more difficult to make the U.S. Army appear to be an incompetent-bordering-on-criminal “occupying force” with them around, wouldn’t it? Golly, do you think this could be a metaphor for the U.S. “presence” in Iraq? Jeremy Renner and (Australian) Rose Byrne portray American military personnel with humanity (see, we’re not all bad) and without the shoot-first-ask-question-later mindset. But we’re supposed to believe that when a survivor is found in the infected zone and brought back to the U.S. facilities, she is left completely unattended, with no guards, doctors, or nurses around? Yeah, right. As you knew it would, the excrement hits the fan and the Americans kill everything that moves— even each other. (We’re good like that.) Now, I can get why there’s bad blood…er, negative feelings…among our British and European brethren regarding the military-oriented decisions of our former Commander-inChief during his eight-year reign. Really, I can. A few American aren’t pleased with them either. But isn’t it a little unfair to paint our armed forces so badly with such a broad brush? (Also considering that the British Empire’s virtually-global historical presence hasn’t always been exactly benign. Ask the Irish.) What could’ve been a great semi-apocalyptic horror film turned into a gory live-action episode of Scooby-Doo: “Britain could’ve been saved, if it weren’t for you meddling kids and American soldiers.” The ending left it open for, I suppose, the sequel—28 Months Later: French Go Batshit. ■

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REVIEWS OF RECENTLY RELEASED DVDS BY GEORGE OXFORD MILLER

Robert Downey, Jr. as Tony Stark/Iron Man in The Avengers.

Ratings: ★=skip it; ★★=mediocre; ★★★=good; ★★★★=excellent; ★★★★★=classic

Monsieur Lazhar (2012) ★★★★ Cast: Mohamed Fellag, Sophie Nelisse Genre: Drama Rated PG-13 for language and disturbing image. Running time 94 minutes. Awards: Oscar nominated 2012 for Best Foreign Film Death in the schoolroom, whether by suicide of psychotic gunman, leaves a permanent scare on the lives all concerned. Grief councilors have the hard task of helping students adjust, but teachers inevitably play an important role. Based on an actual occurrence in Montreal, this film starts its fiction where the newspaper accounts ended. The elementary school where a teacher hangs herself in a classroom can’t find a replacement teacher until Monsieur Lazhar (Fellag), an Algerian immigrant with 19 years of teaching experience, applies. His cross-cultural approach and open-minded dialogue about death, grief, and guilt help the students adjust, but also bring up painful demons that haunt the refugee’s own tragic past. As this fully absorbing story progresses through the school term, the teacher and class go far beyond where most films stop when dealing with personal loss and shared tragedy. The Avengers (2012) ★★★ Cast: Robert Downey Jr., Mark Ruffalo, Scarlett Johansson Genre: Sci-fi thriller Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of violence and action. Running time 142 minutes.

George Miller is a member of the Society of American Travel Writers and believes that travel is a product of the heart, not the itinerary. See his webmagazine at www.travelsdujour.com. 22

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Superhero movies follow a well-defined formula: Evil threatens Good and is on the verge of winning when a Superhero comes to the rescue. Then after an hour of mayhem by aliens and monstrous machines, Manhattan, or some other city, is demolished, but the world is saved. Oh yes, and the movie nets hundreds of millions in profits. After separate features and sequels of individual superheroes, this flick brings six of the wonders together to save the world from alien invaders. The mildly entertaining plot is inane, the acting mediocre, the humor stilted, the violence intense, and the CGI dazzling. Go figure—the worldwide audience loved it to the tune of $1.4 billion gross. So we can expect to see continuing sagas of Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Hulk, Hawkeye, and the Black Widow in the not-so-distant future. Stealing Las Vegas (2012) ★★ Cast: Eric Roberts, Ethan Landry, Antonio Fargas Directed by Francisco Menendez Unrated, includes violent action. I haven’t seen this formula heist movie, but the back story makes it worth the gamble. When Francisco Menendez, head of the University of Nevada Las Vegas film department, showed his first-ever feature film, Primo, at the 2008 CineVegas film festival, legendary B-movie producer Roger Corman offered to finance another movie. The professor wrote the script and his students mapped out each step of production as class projects. He signed on veteran actor Eric Roberts (The Cable Guy) and premiered the film this year in Vegas. Set in 2008 after the economy crashed, casino owner Alex Stratholme (Roberts) steals the employee pension fund to stage a desperate giveaway to save his casino from bankruptcy. The staff, led by washed-up baseball player Nick Davis

(Landry), schemes to steal the cash before it disappears. Of course, nothing goes as planned. The UNLV film department gets half the profits, if any. Genetic Chile: the History of Genetically Modified Food (2012) ★★★ Genre: Documentary Unrated Running time 60 minutes. Today an estimated 70% of food products in our supermarkets contain traceable genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Since Monsanto introduced corn immune to the herbicide glyphosate (Roundup), the giant has developed numerous GMO crops and cornered one-fourth of the world’s seed suppliers. Agri-industry claims genetic engineering will feed the hungry by increasing yields, protect farmers by providing a sustainable crop, and preserve the environment by decreasing the use of toxins. This eye-opening epic explores the effects of GMOs on the global price of food (80% increase 2005-2008), starvation (80% occurs in food-exporting countries), and increased use of pesticides (26% more). No GMO crop has ever been engineered to increase yield, salt or heat tolerance, enhance nutrition, or decrease pesticide use—only to increase profits. Monsanto’s genetic patents prohibit independent studies on the effects of GMOs on humans, even though their own studies released by court order indicate that residual glyphosate in GMO crops can—and does—present significant health problems. Only four nations refused to sign the Cartegena Protocol requiring labeling of foods with GMOs: Somalia, Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, and the United States. ■

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film roundup You’ve Been Trumped (Dir: Anthony Baxter). In the Scottish village of Aberdeenshire, real estate magnate/reality TV buffoon Donald Trump has bought hundreds of acres of beachfront

property to build a luxury golf resort that should serve as a gaudy monument to conspicuous consumption. Local residents, led by the defiant, blunt Michael Forbes, are outraged. The project was originally denied on the local level until the federal government, seduced by dollar signs, granted approval. Now, townspeople could lose homes in a place they cherish. Scientists are appalled at Trump for treating an environmentally precious swath of land with the tact of a brat in a sandbox. Baxter, who gets arrested by local police for no reason and evaded by Trump (who only wants to answer questions from “real journalists”), captures the bewilderment of the little guy and his determination for justice. But what stays with you is how in the hands of a wannabe titan like Trump, celebrity and money can smash decency, logic, and legal rights into a million pieces. [NR] ★★★1/2 For a Good Time, Call… (Dir: Jamie Travis). Starring: Ari Graynor, Lauren Anne Miller, Justin Long, Mark Webber, James Wolk, Nia Vardalos, Mimi Rogers, Don McManus. New York City’s unforgiving real estate market forces disorganized aspiring writer Katie (Graynor) to take in recently dumped straight arrow Lauren (Miller) as a roommate, even though the women’s hatred for each other goes way back. The arrangement proceeds as expected until Lauren applies her business savvy to Katie’s skill as a phone sex operator, creating a lucrative partnership that leads to an unforeseen development: friendship. Funny, smart comedy avoids reveling in odd couple clichés and dirty talk shock, honestly exploring the difficulty that comes with making friends in adulthood, when change becomes harder to embrace. Graynor and Miller, sparkly and witty and with zero starlet posing, are terrific as the two young women coming to terms with a new kind of love. Miller served as a producer and co-wrote the script with longtime friend Katie Ann Naylon. Seth Rogen, Miller’s husband, and director Kevin Smith have memorable cameos as two of Katie and Lauren’s “customers.” [R] ★★★1/2 24

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PETE CROATTO Ratings: ★=skip it; ★★=mediocre; ★★★=good; ★★★★=excellent; ★★★★★=classic

Arbitrage (Dir: Nicholas Jarecki). Starring: Richard Gere, Susan Sarandon, Tim Roth, Brit Marling, Laetitia Casta, Nate Parker, Stuart Margolin, Chris Eigeman, Bruce Altman, Graydon Carter. Latest modern-day mo’ money, mo’ problems parable stars Gere as Robert Miller, a financial maven facing two competing, life-altering crises. The sale of his business keeps getting delayed, a potential disaster since Miller’s trading empire is built on fraud and Madoff-like ma-

neuvering. Meanwhile, an overzealous, rumpled NYC detective (Roth, who steals the film) is intent on nailing Miller—who cannot afford any negative publicity—for his role in a fatal latenight car accident. Writer Jarecki (The Informers), in his directorial debut, lets the story unfold in a way that resembles a dripping faucet: slow, predictable, and with nothing of substance accumulating. For all of Arbitrage’s twisty moral ambiguity and crumbling ivory penthouses, Jarecki’s talky original script keeps suspense at arm’s length, explaining away twists and giving us covert conversations as conspiracy. Solid performances by everyone, including Vanity Fair editor-in-chief Carter (as Miller’s skittish buyer) and model Casta (as Miller’s impatient mistress), gives the film some juice. [R] ★★ Keep the Lights On (Dir: Ira Sachs). Starring: Thure Lindhardt, Zachary Booth, Julianne Nicholson, Souleymane Sy Savane, Paprika Steen. Struggling documentary filmmaker Erik (Lindhardt) meets Paul (Booth), an attorney for Random House, on a phone sex line in 1998. And so begins a lengthy, loving, and overall tumultuous relationship. Distrust, drug use, and fighting make frequent appearances as the men appear and reappear in each other’s lives. There is plenty to like in this award-winning, semiautobiographical drama. Directorco-writer Sachs’ minimalist, lowkey approach to the material is perfect. Veteran actors Lindhardt and Booth deliver performances without pretense, allowing us to see a situation where both parties share some blame in the dysfunction. Since no one is a clear-cut villain, and there’s such a history between the two lovers, neither man (especially Erik) can leave for too long. Moments and accents only take us so far, unfortunately, and Sachs (the overlooked Married Life) uses these to stretch the movie to a length that isn’t sustainable. Keep the Lights On never comes together, though you keep hoping it will. [NR] ★★1/2 ■

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interview

The Tongue Speaks He’s been around the block a few times, and now Gene Simmons has life lessons to share.

ENE SIMMONS IS HAVING what would seem like an arduous day even before we speak. KISS’s longtime co-creator and bassist/vocalist is dealing with lawyers, label marketers handling photo approvals and even A&E Network representatives as he and his clan (Shannon Tweed and their two children, Nick and Sophie) are wrapping up their Family Jewels reality show after seven seasons to focus on long tours and other business dealings. “These days are swamped for me,” says the always loquacious Simmons. And he loves the hassle, balancing his own enterprises (a comic book, a record label, backstage beer gardens, speaking engagements, etc) with the affairs of KISS, the likes of which include the quartet’s seafaring Halloween week KISS KRUISE and overseeing the band’s legendary large scale merchandising ventures. To an extent, that is, after nearly 40 years of being together, Simmons has left the endeavors of producing KISS’s albums to his partner-in-rhyme, guitarist Paul Stanley. He just doesn’t have the time (Simmons has, for the record, co-produced KISS records in the past, along with those by Black & Blue, KISS’s current guitarist Tommy Thayer’s first band, along with the original demos for Simmons’ big discovery, Van Halen). Presently, Simmons, Stanley, Thayer and drummer Eric Singer are readying KISS’s twentieth studio album, Monster, as well as its latest tour with fellow masters of lewd disaster Motley Crue (the tour hits Susquehanna

When we first started to put on make-up we were going for a fey look, an androgynous thing. But that doesn’t work if you’re 6’2” and 200 pounds… You can’t come in with a tutu and try to be Lou Reed. It didn’t work.

If A.D. Amorosi can’t be found writing features for ICON, the Philadelphia Inquirer, doing Icepacks and Icecubes (amongst other stories) for Philadelphia City Paper or appearing on NBC-TV’s The 10! Show, he’s probably hitting restaurants like Stephen Starr’s or running his greyhound.

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Bank Center in Camden on Sept. 19). And, for the record, the new album is a beast. How has Gene Simmons’ life and recent developments, like getting married and having a reality show, affected the business and art of KISS? That’s an interesting point, I like the way you positioned that, art and business. It depends on your point of view but, from the start, there was a simple idea that we had when we started. A long time ago, four knuckleheads from the streets of New York City had a bizarre idea: to put together the band we never saw on stage. We were not marketing gurus. We didn’t understand what branding was. Trademark wasn’t a word we understood. It was just dreaming in the same way that the Wrights dreamt of flying into the sun after having made bicycles. We had to have this leap of faith without having too much planned. And very quickly—I mean quickly as in six months—it became obvious that we were onto something. Even on a local level there was something very big here, that we were something people were paying attention to. We needed a great manager. We need television because print wasn’t enough. We believed that KISS was bigger than print.... And this was at a time when print was king, was absolute. Yes. For us and then our fans, KISS was something that you had to see, smell and feel. In making a personae you have to make sure that you make it large, then larger. Godzilla isn’t Godzilla until you see him on the big screen. Best of all is when the monster comes and tramples your city. That’s the real essence of Godzilla. And therefore the real essence of KISS: You were too big—oversized, overstuffed—from the start. You couldn’t do justice to us in a small two-dimensional fashion. The rest was just plain hard work. Mike Tyson, who happens to be a friend, had the same sort of epiphany as to what we had to do to be somebody. He was too short to box and too small a guy to be a heavyweight. He talks with a lisp and a high voice. But when he hit people they hurt. That’s a leap of faith to be able to go beyond what could be shortcomings to

eventually become a champion of the world. That’s what we did. Then once you’re there you have to continue the work ethic and own up to the responsibilities that come with it. Knowing who you and what you can be from the beginning is so important. That’s the real power of KISS, then and now. We know who we are, who we were and who we will be before anybody else does. Was that an answer to my initial question? Yes, because everything else—Gene Simmons the mogul, the television guy, the marketing company, blah blah blah—takes a backseat to KISS. It starts with you. Or in my case, me. The United States military has a much better way of stating this: “Be all that you can be.” That’s the best marketing phrase. It says it all and it’s a good piece of advice for everybody. And as far as I’m concerned—I’m 63 years old—my voice doesn’t go out. I challenge any 20-year-old to show me what they got. Especially with all that body armor and heavy make-up on stage. We just did shows in Phoenix and Houston where the temperatures—you can check it, we certainly did—was 116 degrees on the floor. Onstage, you can add on 45 pounds of armor and vintage platform heels under hot lights with fireballs going up and by some estimates the stage temperature was over 125 degrees. Dangerous, by the way—so much so that the road crew kept pouring water on us. We could not take a breath because it was thick and heavy. The audience was drenched in sweat. And proudly we rocked. It was a source of pride. Now, with that, realize that we have all the money that you can imagine—though I can always imagine more—to go with the chicks and the power, what have you. Whatever it is that you got, it’s Aladdin’s Magic Lamp. But, once you get everything you wanted will you still work your ass off? If you will and you do you’re a champion. We’re champions. It’s not about the reward they give you—it’s about being all that you can be.

A.D. AMOROSI

KISS, with Paul Stanley, second from left and Gene Simmons on the far right.

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interview

David Olney. Photo: Paul Needham.

DAVID OLNEY DOESN’T WRITE songs as much as he composes stories. Most musicians make records by stringing random tunes like laundry on a line; his CDs are repertory companies, with Olney trying on characters and conditions like clothes. And his concerts, well, they could be mistaken for performance-art roadhouse séances. On any given night Olney may summon the spirit of John Dillinger. Or Socrates. Or Dizzy Dean, the daffy Hall of Fame pitcher. Or a French prostitute nursing the wounded souls of World War I soldiers. Or a magician tricked by passion. Every evening Olney dips into a deep bag of vocal effects:

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lullaby lilt, rockabilly rave, devil-quaking growl, endearing sneer. Readers in ICON’s circulation area will have two chances this month to hear him conjure everything from a donkey’s view of Christ to an iceberg’s view of the Titanic. He’ll be joined in Sellersville and Huff ’s Church by his longtime partner in criminal entertainment, Sergio Webb, who plays a mean electric guitar and a nasty bullhorn. Olney spoke recently from the Nashville home he shares with his German wife and their two children. The Rhode Island native discussed his mini-empire of mini-albums about religion and film noir, his weekly online show called You

Never Know and a souvenir shop with his gig-tested fedoras, including one worn in a comically retro YouTube video of These Boots Are Made for Walkin’. He came off as a wry, wondering wanderer—a shot of Ray Charles with a jigger of William Faulkner. What’s the first song you couldn’t forget, that floored you? The one I remember really getting to me was There Goes My Baby by the Drifters. The sentiment of the song was

GEOFF GEHMAN

very basic, yet nothing had hit me so hard. It was so dramatic, with the strings and everything. It really raised teenage anxiety to an operatic level. I wasn’t even a teenager at the time, although, of course, I wanted to be one. What’s the best thing to come out of your You Never Know series? Has it changed your interaction with real live listeners? You know, it reinforces a relationship with audiences that existed before the Internet. About 25 years ago I played at the Winnipeg Folk Festival. The people in charge were introducing me around and they showed me the media tent where I would be interviewed. And I thought, well, no one has heard of me, so I don’t have to worry about being interviewed. Sure I wanted to have something enough, I got a message that someone that made sure no one would from a radio station in mistake me for a country South Dakota wanted to talk to me. What’s singer. A fedora seemed to do more, it was a station on an Indian reservathe trick. It was either that or tion. And I remember talking to this woman a beanie. and being humbled by the idea that somebody I had never met, from a place I had never been, would be interested in my songs. So the YouTube show reinforces the humbling feeling that songs can reach around the world. When we first talked, way back in 1997, you mentioned that your song Eye of the Storm had become a sort of security blanket for a Native American in lonely territory in South Dakota. Any more recent examples of your tunes taking unexpected turns? Well, people in England seem to have the strongest feelings about 1917, which is basically about a guy visiting a prostitute in France in World War I. Someone came up to me during a concert and said that’s what basically happened to his grandfather. I’ve had 16-year-old English kids request that song. What struck me is that World War I is still present there the way the Civil War is still present to many Southerners here. It was a pretty stunning example of really jumping over generations if you let yourself go a little bit. Speaking of letting go, how the hell did you come up with that sap in Postcard from Mexico who’s suckered by “the devil’s daughter,” who speaks through a bullhorn like some pulp-novel alter ego? Yes, it’s a guy sort of having a conversation with his deep conscience or his libido or something. At the time I had been watching Body Heat [the steamy,

quadruple-crossing movie] so I must have had in the back of my mind. You know, I wrote that song with John Hadley [his co-author on Ol’ Diz: A Musical Baseball Story, a CD/theatrical score]. I had a lick and John would blurt things out to it and I would answer him. And then I said okay, just for the fun of it I’ll write the beginnings of lines and you write the ends of them— but I’m not going to tell you what I’ve written. That reminds me that you once had an exercise where you came up with funky phrases from mixing and matching scraps of paper with nouns and adjectives. That came about when I was asked by a teacher to talk to her kids about writing. And I panicked because I hadn’t really thought about the assignment. So I had the kids take a piece of paper out of each hat and had them write about “the frigid poster” or something like that. The point I wanted to make to them is that writing is a messy endeavor. Things happen beyond your control, and you have to give up your control. You don’t write things down in your best penmanship, or in a lavender suit. You’re not crazy about writing directly about your life; you prefer straining your thoughts about classic dilemmas and capitalC characters: Stonewall Jackson, Jesse James, Jesus. Do you try on characters and conditions like clothes? I don’t want to write about myself because as soon as you do that, you’re censoring certain things because they’re too embarrassing, or too weird to say in public. Whereas you will say them if you’re writing about someone else. I find out things about myself by trying to avoid myself. I kind of find myself when I lose myself. It’s a sort of cloak of invisibility. Speaking of going over to the other side, why do you recite Coleridge’s Kubla Khan like a rockabilly revival preacher? Originally, I was just trying to remember the poem. And I found out I could remember it better by thinking it was a kind of drug-induced vision. It wasn’t this polished thing; it wasn’t Ode on a Grecian Urn. It was this really strange stuff, blurted out by someone who was really a rocker in his time. When I put it on YouTube, I got comments ranging from “Gee, I had to study this in school and it helped out, so thanks” to “That’s the worst crap I’ve ever heard.” You know, I’m thinking about performing Tennyson’s Ulysses in public—without the full scenery chewing. If I do I can assure you it will involve some alcohol. Why do you and Sergio Webb get along so well, besides a fondness for playing nasty guitar and watching minor-league baseball? Sergio always comes ready to play. I respect his respect

for the job, and the business. When we first started playing together, he was dressed to kill and I realized I had to step it up, fashion-wise. Out in the audience are a lot of people who work really hard in difficult jobs and they come to be entertained. If I don’t take their entertainment seriously, they have a right to be angry. You know, I haven’t seen a minor-league game this season. But I’m working on a fight song for the [Lehigh Valley] IronPigs [the Allentown farm team of the Philadelphia Phillies]. I think I refer to them as “pigs of steel.” I rhyme that with “field.” Once upon a time you said you really like to play for folks who haven’t heard you “so they don’t see the punches coming.” Do you still like performing for David Olney virgins? Yeah, the chance to play for someone the first time is really the core experience. I love watching the reactions of people hearing Jerusalem Tomorrow or John Dillinger for the first time; it’s the best feeling. Especially when you see their eyes change from “This guy looks kind of old to me” to “OK, this is going to be all right.” And then you both buckle up and away you go. What does wearing a fedora do for you? When I first began playing rock and roll in Nashville I wanted to have something that would make sure that no one would mistake me for a country singer. I needed something that would at least tell me that I was preparing to go into the arena. A fedora seemed to do the trick. It was either that or a beanie. So what is the universe saying when your concert- and video-used fedoras are all sold out on your website? I don’t know what that means. A couple of years ago I just spontaneously blurted out on the YouTube show that my hats were for sale. My manager got very angry because I was selling them cheap, for $10 or something. But, hey, people enjoy them. I enjoy them; they have their own history. So I guess what the universe is saying is: “You look so good in that hat, Dave, and I’d like to look good, too.” I may be more definite once the check comes in. ■ David Olney with Sergio Webb, opening for Karla Bonoff, Sept. 20, Sellersville Theater, 24 W. Temple Ave., Sellersville, Pa., www.st94.com, 215-257-5808; David Olney with Sergio Webb, Sept. 21, Landhaven Bed & Breakfast, 1194 Huff ’s Church Rd., Huff ’s Church, Pa., www.landhavenbandb.com, 610-845-3257. His You Never Know show airs Tuesdays at www.davidolney.com.

Geoff Gehman is the author of The Kingdom of the Kid, a memoir of growing up in the middle-class, longlost Hamptons (SUNY Press, 2013). He can be reached at geoffgehman@verizon.net

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feature

R. KURT OSENLUND

Art in the Age of Technological Propulsion Susan Sarandon, Frank Langella, and the Tricky Tech Themes of Robot & Frank Screen icons Susan Sarandon and Frank Langella co-star in the new futuristic dramedy Robot & Frank, which explores individuals’ relationships to technology—specifically those of senior citizens. Along with their budding director, Jake Schreier, the actors sat down

to weigh in on the film’s themes.

FRANK LANGELLA ISN’T ON Twitter. He only just learned how to text, thanks to a tutorial from his daughter. And as for all the Kindles and iPads he’s received as gifts at industry events, he hasn’t gotten around to digging through them yet. “They keep giving me these things,” Langella says, “and my nephew and niece keep saying ‘give them to us!’ And I say ‘No, no! I intend to use them one day!’ I have them all, but I’m resistant only because I really do think that you should do for yourself as much as you can. I think everything today is about supposedly freeing up your time, and to do what, I don’t know.” Langella, 74, has the same self-reliant ideals as his title character in Robot & Frank, a seriocomedy about an aging ex-con (Langella) with mild memory loss, whose son (James Marsden) sets him up with a live-in, care-taking robot in the not-too-distant future. Though ultimately about the ways in which the robot aids Frank in being a better human, the movie raises plenty of talking points about our collective relationship with technology, and, more specifically, the technological interactions of our older generation.

R. Kurt Osenlund is the managing editor of The House Next Door, the official blog of Slant Magazine. He is also the film critic for South Philly Review, and a contributing writer for ICON, Slant, Cineaste, Fandor and The Film Experience. He compiles his work and posts other goodies at his blog, www.yourmoviebuddy.blogspot.com, and can be reached via email at rkurtosenlund@gmail.com. Opposite page: Susan Sarandon.

Langella’s co-star in the film is fellow acting icon Susan Sarandon, who plays Jennifer, a local librarian aided by her own robot shelf-stocker. Regal as ever at 65, Sarandon, who accompanied Langella for Robot & Frank’s New York press tour, shares most of her collaborator’s sentiments about technology’s propulsive, excessive urge to tidy up one’s life, particularly in regard to books. “I don’t like to read e-books,” Sarandon says, her words emphasized as she leans forward at the head of a long wooden table, which she shares with Langella in a Park Avenue hotel suite. “I like real books. I like to touch books, I like pages turned down. I like to get books for my kids that I can re-read—all the Vonnegut, with quotes underlined and stars in the margins. And then I give them to people—I give a lot of books as presents. I don’t even know how you do that [with e-books]. Can you do that in a Kindle? I don’t know.” Of course, the growing accessibility via tablets, e-readers, VOD, and general online access can be a major plus for artists like Langella and Sarandon, whose films, regardless of genre or budget, can be seen by more people in more ways than ever before. Robot & Frank director Jake Schreier, a 31-yearold NYU grad who also appeared for the junket, says he’s pleased with the many options through which his films can be viewed, and stresses his enthusiasm for the recent leaps in home entertainment quality. “I would say I’m actually quite encouraged…that people have better and better home exhibition methods,” Schreier says. “So now, when a movie is screened at someone’s house, it’s in the proper aspect ratio and there’s a chance that it’ll be quite large, compared to the way that movies have been watched in home environments for many years.” In keeping with a generation-gap theme that faithfully

presents itself throughout the day’s discussion, Langella largely disagrees with his director, likening the growing convenience of embracing home viewing to prevalence of technology teaching us to disengage. “I like the fact that I can seat 20 to 25 people in my house,” Langella says. “It’s not sophisticated, it’s just a huge television set. And I like making a lot of food, and a having lot of friends gather and watch a movie. But I wouldn’t like it if it were just there for me so I could just go by myself and not have to elbow with other people. The temptation is there to want to just go and hide and be in my own world, because I really don’t get much pleasure in public movie houses anymore—everybody’s talking too much and texting and the lights of their [devices] are going off. But I think the danger, certainly, is that it gets so convenient that you begin to say, ‘Well, I don’t really have to deal with people.’ All of the ways in which we are supposedly making life better are just alienating us from each other.” Though seeming refreshingly unaffected by most things, Sarandon tends to speak of technology as if she’s casually describing an attacker, its openness to everyone and infiltration of daily life occasionally oppressive and even unnerving. With a crooked smile, she says she had to start “texting in self-defense,” because her children would no longer answer the phone when she called. “I had a really archaic phone that [forced you] to push everything twice,” she says, and [my kids] wouldn’t explain anything to me because they just loved the fact that I didn’t

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interview

Taj Mahal Natural Wonder, Natural Fact

AJ MAHAL IS A man and a monument. For seven decades he’s been building stately pleasure joints of blues: global, tropical, topical. He’s influenced two generations of influential musicians—Bonnie Raitt, Keb’ Mo’, Jack Johnson—with his jaunty, genuine guitar, voice and presence. He’s compelled three generations of listeners to juke on their feet and in their seats with a disarmingly charming philosophy. “I just play to the goddess of music,” he’s said, “and I know she’s dancing.” This natural factness animates Mahal’s 70th-birthday gift: a Columbia/Legacy release of unreleased studio recordings (Hidden Treasures of Taj Mahal 1969-1973; see review in this month’s issue) and a mothballed 1970 concert at Royal Albert Hall in London. The two-CD package is a triple play: a lively revue of his rainbow blues (folk, rock, country, city); a showcase for his exceptional relationship with guitarist Jesse Ed Davis; a reminder why the Rolling Stones picked him for their Rock and Roll Circus, the legendary unaired 1968 TV extravaganza. You haven’t really lived until you’ve heard Mahal turn “Oh Susanna” into a strutting stroll soaked in Otis Redding soul During our interview the former Henry Saint Clair Fredericks Jr. played cultural historian and critic. He offered edgy, eloquent opinions on musical politics and fashions. We began by riffing off one of my favorite Mahal moments, 32

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when he cooled a boiling stage at the Philadelphia Folk Festival with a smashing ensemble of Panama hat, long white shorts and shoes red enough to make the devil blush. You’re obviously a man who wears stylish clothes stylishly. So why doesn’t your website list your favorite clothing stores along with your favorite restaurants, cigars and fishing places? Well, more than likely I’d probably have a line of clothes. I wouldn’t mind creating a situation with shirts and a few other things that have to do with the lifestyle I have when I’m off the road. I think it’s possible to ramp up that tropical/ethnic vibe. What was the first song you couldn’t forget, that absolutely flattened you? As far as music and melody are concerned, it was “Body and Soul” by Coleman Hawkins, around 1947. When it comes to lyrics, it could be “Nature Boy” by Nat King Cole. But, then, so much good music was popping up around that time. I’m remembering all those great Louis Jordan tunes: “Caledonia”; “Choo Choo Ch’Boogie”; “Blue Light Boogie.” “Gee Baby, Ain’t I Good to You?” was a song I

liked fooling around with for a long time. Of course, this all predates rock and roll. Back then, rock ’n’ roll was a distant sound. It sounded like a watered-down version of the great music I was hearing already. You have to understand, as a little kid sound is just coming at you from everywhere. Back then, source radio was really big, so there was room for all sorts of sounds to come in. You’d be going along, saying something to your parents, and they’d say, “Hold on a second—I’m listening to something on the radio,” and you’d perk up your ears. It’s so different today. Nowadays the push is to be inside your mind before you make up your mind [chuckles]. The commercialization of radio in the United States is just terrible. Downbeat No. 1 is “Satisfaction” by the Rolling Stones. Downbeat No. 2 is “I Want to Hold Your Hand” by the Beatles.” Downbeat No. 3 is “Whiter Shade of Pale” by Procol Harum. You have to hand it to them: that kind of mind control is impressive. What did you learn, or what did you remember that you had forgotten, from listening to your newly released “hidden treasures” from the late ’60s to the early ’70s? Only one thing really came up. There’s this tune called “Butter” that took me a minute to remember. Quite frankly,

GEOFF GEHMAN

I wasn’t aware the engineers had recorded that. I guess we just brought in “Butter,” had some fun with it, and went on to finish what we were doing. Most of the time I was really meticulous in the studio. I didn’t make a million takes of everything. My idea was when you came to record, you already knew the song. If you start making three takes of anything, you realize you don’t know the song. Again, I just kept a high level of what I put out. I was making new music instead of just trying to sound like the other guys. In my day the focus in the industry was on the guitar gods and their ability to bore you with 11-minute drivel. Or: “Gee whiz, there’s this kid who’s 12 years old and plays like B.B. King.” Whereas I was off putting my spin on Howlin’ Wolf melodies. I was creating really new stuff that was too far out of the box for folks to see. They said I was ahead of my time. I wasn’t ahead of my time. They just wanted to keep things the way they were, to shut people out from a wide range of sounds. Is there anybody you’re dying to play with? Is there anything you’re dying to do? Well, not at the moment. I really want to continue being in a position to do my things the way I want to do them, without a manager or an agent or a record company telling me what to do. Here’s the thing: Because of the collapse of the music business, getting things out there is really in the hands of the artists. So I’ll probably release projects on my website or other places online. For example, you can put more photographs online than on a video or a CD. And I’m really into pressing high-quality vinyl—the 180-gram version of what your dad bought you when you were ten years old. In a way, it’s a more natural situation than in the old days. In the old days the record company wanted a record a year, sometimes two records a year. That’s not how music flows. You can attach yourself to that kind of flow only if you’re really living the music, if it’s happening 24/7/365. You’ve been credited with globalizing the blues by mixing them with African, Indian and Hawaiian idioms, by turning what you’ve called “the spyglass of anthropology” on music. What sort of niche have you carved for the blues? Well, I haven’t really carved a niche. What I got tired of was ethnomusicologists finding some old black guy from the bayou somewhere and writing a thesis about him that ends up in some dusty bin or cabinet somewhere, and never giving back to the community here in America, where many white people can’t tell one black person from one another. What I’ve been saying is: You have to get out of this paradigm and go to other places in the world where people love the music for the music, not because it’s drilled into their heads, not because they’re given a slice of a certain demographic too far to the left or too far to the right. Go to these summer concerts of indigenous music all over the world, where people sit out on the lawn with their picnics and their coolers and enjoy community culture. Look, I’m the child of an Afro-American mother and an Afro-Caribbean father [Henry Saint Clair Fredericks Sr. was a pianist-composer nicknamed “the genius” by Ella Fitzgerald]. I learned from an early age that there’s global music everywhere, if you just plug into it. I get that spirit naturally, from my ancestors. We, African-based people, were moved from the continent to all parts of the Western world. So it’s not Cleveland playing Miami and that’s the world; it’s England playing Kenya, it’s Sri Lanka playing Australia. What I’m saying is: I’m just hanging with my cousins, so come in and enjoy the music. We’re all related here. I’m just showing you how music can travel over a long period and a long, long space. I’m thrilled that I’m helping a new generation of youngsters get in touch with their grandparents and learn that the music their grandparents loved was pretty doggone hip. ■ Visit www.tajblues.com to learn more about the new two-CD collection The Hidden Treasures of Taj Mahal 1969-1973 (Columbia/Legacy) and his favorite restaurants, cigars and fishing joints. SEPTEMBER 2012

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HOTEL Modern Cuisine h Classic Comfort Corner of Swan & Main Lambertville, NJ 609-397-3552

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dining

ROBERT GORDON

BEAU MONDE VIVE LA BRETAGNE! EVERY visit I make to Beau Monde sparks greater homage to the anonymous inventor(s) of the crêpe. The crêpe creators were humble paysans who inhabited Brittany, the region of France that abuts the southern border of Normandy. Yes, peasant food it was, the crêpe. Until French kings discovered it and the crêpe zoomed up several gastronomical food levels. Many readers may not remember that in the ‘60s/’70s restaurant awakening crêpes were all the rage. They were chichi, and exotic in a dining scene where frozen chicken patties were heated, drenched in Chef Boyardee sauce and passed off as pricy, exquisite specialties. The restaurant revolution wrought by a boatload of French and European kitchen talent changed all that. They introduced more exotic, elaborate dishes and the crêpe relinquished its ubiquity. But, Les temps changent. Les goûts restent (Times change. Good taste remains), and the crêpe remains alive and well in Philadelphia. My favorite Philly place for a crêpe fix remains Beau Monde, which has been satisfying Philly crêpe-cravings since the mid-’80s. I hadn’t been there for a while, but recent visits show Beau Monde’s crêpes are still tops. As is Beau Monde’s à bon marché pricing. Dinners are generally low-priced, or can be if you choose. Several non-crêpe choices are available. Escargot, a perennial favorite, is one of the city’s better versions. Chopped garlic completely pebbles over a moule/escargot pot, where more than a half-dozen immersed escargot soak in garlicky-buttery sauce. French bread toasted with buttered and garlic stands ready to sop the sauce to the last rich drop. Paper-thin crusted Beau Monde Pizza with spinach, tomatoes, Swiss cheese, goat cheese, and roasted leeks is delicious. Grilled Pear Salad includes greens with goat cheese and spiced pecans. Grilled Breast of Duck Salad and Seared Tuna Salad score on the same formula. Soupe à l’oignon (onion soup) has been a Philly dining favorite for well over a decade, consistently scoring a position or high praise on numerous “Best of ” lists. A notable non-crêpe entrée is Steak au Poivre. Beau Monde’s muscular take on the classic is a 10-ounce strip steak oozing melted Gruyère cheese, and sides of grated potatoes, haricots verts, and green peppercorn demiglaze. But for me, Beau Monde’s crêpes are the thing. Entrée crêpes are made with buckwheat; sweet crêpes with wheat. The buckwheat is full-bodied with hefty texture that stands up to any entrée. Thus it adds a sublime texture, for example, to coq au vin. Coq au vin is the timeless French classic that combines chicken stewed with red wine, baby onions, tomatoes, mushrooms, carrots and pancetta. The crêpe that folds around Smoked Trout adds delicious earthy depth to the trout. Braised leeks and crème fraiche lend more succulence. It’s hard not to dive into a dessert crêpe. You can build your own (you can build your own entrée crêpe as well). Try the Grand Marnier crêpe. The dousing of Grand Marnier elevates the taste of any other ingredients you choose. And do order cappuccino, which is frothy and hearty. Authentic Parisian ambiance animates Beau Monde’s lovely French décor. Bona fide also is the crêpe-making process, which you can observe from the sidewalk outside, just as you can in many towns in France. In fact, when I posted photos of Beau Monde on Facebook, some friends from Brittany thought I was in France. They thought the crêpes were mouth-watering. Now they’re threatening to visit me to check them out. Ironic. As proud, loyal residents of Brittany, they’d never go to Paris for what they call “inferior” crêpes. But they would come to Queen Village. Vive Beau Monde! ■ Beau Monde, 6th and Bainbridge Streets, Phila. (215) 482-1999. creperie-beaumonde.com r.gordon33@verizon.net SEPTEMBER 2012

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ROBERT GORDON

Martine’s IF NEW HOPE DIDN’T have a Martine’s, it would have to invent one. Overstatement, I know. Forgive me. It’s an election year. But there is a kernel of truth to it. New HopeLambertville and its surrounding terrain is a pricey citadel of the landed gentry. Yet it has long been a magnet and melting

pot for sundry lifestyles and generations. New Hope-Lambertville’s eclectic blizzard of shops blurs class with crass, but does so with panache and style. The Delaware River is the lifeblood of the twin towns. The river is the inspiration for artists, the thrill for romantics, and the beacon for tourists. And Martine’s offers one of the town’s most romantic river view for diners. And it gives the town another upscale, fine-food restaurant that taps the magnificent river vista. So yes, if there were no Martine’s, New Hope-Lambertville would need to invent one. Martine’s didn’t always enjoy a riverside berth. Martine Landry, owner of the eponymous restaurant used to hang a Martine’s sign on the historic building at the corner of Ferry and Main, only a hop, step and jump away. The original Martine’s has appeal. too. Thick, whitewashed walls charmingly scorn plumb lines. Uneven flooring and beautiful Pennsylvania fieldstone walls frame a homey, historic interior. It’s lovely. But the cramped kitchen and quarters eventually induced Martine to seek a different berth. And there it was, at the other end of her block. The new Martine’s also has historic bona fides as well. Martine modernized the circa 1717 structure graciously blending old with new and adding a deck for stunning alfresco dining. Diners on the deck enjoy the sight of Lam36

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bertville glimmering across the Delaware, while a mesmerizing sound track of river fowl, crickets, and tree frogs plays nonstop. Martine’s is open every day for lunch from 11:30 AM to 4 PM. Yes, 4 PM. No, it’s not a typo. But it can be a lifeline. My hunger alarm tends to go off at nonconventional meal times whenever I crawl around shopping hubs like NH-L. As late as 4 PM, you can order an upscale lunch like filet, trout, or salmon. Sandwiches and salads are also available. In terms of quality, they’re sit-down-and-savor sandwiches and salads, not quick-bite, fill-the-gullet noshes. On the dinner menu, a favorite is Fried Green Tomatoes, prepared in southern tradition. Sliced tomatoes are coated with cornmeal, shallow-fried in bacon fat, and served with grilled shrimp. Bacon strips crisscross the plate while mustard remoulade peppered with mustard seeds sparks and moistens each forkful. Thai mussels zing with an elixir of Asian spices. Earlier in the summer, zucchini blossoms were offered as a special. If you missed them this season, put it on your summer 2013 list. The zucchini blossoms, like Fried Green Tomatoes, are crusted in cornmeal, then stuffed with Italian fontina cheese and deep-fried in a batter that’s almost tempura-like. Deep black garlic purée zigzags the dish. The presentation is terrific, and the taste meets the visual promise. Paté du Maison is a longtime menu item. It’s served in classic French style with grain mustard, chutney, cornichon and toast rounds that all abut a central mound of paté. Salads are colorful. Avocado and cantaloupe slices and sliced radishes peek out of a deep green mountain of romaine lettuce strips, with goat cheese clinging to the sides. Among the entrées, panko-encrusted crabcakes are browned to just-right crunch. The crabcakes come plated on a tumble of halved, bright-red, sweet cherry tomatoes with piquant lime-green wasabi aïoli. Pistachio-crusted Alaskan sockeye salmon is grilled and poised over nutty basmati rice pilaf amidst caramelized pineapples for tropical zest. Fettucini formed a tasty plate tossed with green and black olives, bell peppers and capers in an herb garlic white wine sauce. Martine’s house-made desserts rock. Peach-blueberry cobbler is down-homey with elegance. However, the pièce de résistance is Dulche de Leche Parfait. Swoons of crumbled chocolate cookies, house-made whipped cream, and caramelized bananas blend for killer flavor, while funky candied bacon tosses in salty-sweet crunch. It’s the kind of over-the-top, watch-the-river-flow, ideal meal closer you wish someone would invent. And Martine’s has. ■ Martine’s, 14 E. Ferry Street, New Hope, PA. (215) 8622966. Hours: Lunch Daily 11:30 AM-4 PM; Dinner Daily 5-10 PM martinesriverhouserestaurant.com

Email: r.gordon33@verizon.net

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A Few Good Reads

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WHILE IT IS INDISPUTABLE that it is better to drink wine than to read about it, don’t rule out reading about wine with a glass of it in your hand. This is actually fairly easy if you are using an e-reading device, as you need only one finger to turn pages. Here are some good reads on wine (and food) that I think even non-winos will enjoy. Some are older, but still enjoyable. The Drops of God – Book 3 Tadashi Agi [Vertical 360 2012] The latest English translation of The Drops of God, the wine-focused Japanese manga (comic book) series from Tadashi Agi (the pen name of brother and sister Shin and Yuko Kibayashi) and illustrator Shu Okimoto, continues the story. Launched in Japan in 2004 and first published in English in 2011, this awardwinning wine comic is a hit not only in Asia but even in France. The Vertical website describes the basic plot: “When world-renowned wine critic Kanzaki passes away, his will reveals that his fortune of a wine collection isn't bequeathed as a matter of course to his only son, who in a snub went to work in sales at a beer company. To come into the inheritance, Shizuku [the son] must identify—in competition with a stellar young critic—twelve heaven-sent wines whose impressions the will describes in flowing terms.” These are called the “twelve apostles,” or the “Drops of God.” Books 1 and 2 are necessary to understand the action before jumping into Book 3. The actual panels aren’t Superman—there’s lots of talk and a little action. And there will be many more books, true to comic format, before all twelve wines are discovered. Napa: The Story of an American Eden James Conaway [Houghton Mifflin 2002; first publication 1990] James Conaway aims at the heart of Napa Valley, also known as America’s Eden. He profiles some of the men and families who created today’s wine empires—the Gallos and Mondavis among them. Anyone interested in the U.S. wine industry should read this to understand the motives and driving forces that shaped it. It reads like a novel. Conaway followed this book with his 2003 The Far Side of Eden in which he picks up the narrative as a new crop of wine entrepreneurs arrives and changes the face of the Valley once more. The Accidental Connoisseur: An Irreverent Journey Through the Wine World Lawrence Osborne [Farrar Straus 2005] Lawrence Osborne takes us on a romp through many of the world’s top wine regions, where he considers the many forces that influence the making and selling of wine. He looks at taste, technology, wine critics and market trends. He examines the elusive terroir,

and he spends a few words on the pompousness of many wine critics and reviewers. He is modest and honest about what he doesn’t know. His reports on meetings and talks with the top people in the wine business are fascinating to read. The book is well written, and reads like a vinous travelogue: “After leaving Terni, I drove down the long aristocratic road to the Numana highway, through the sluggish rain, past burned-out silk factories to the riffy-raffy seaside strip of Numana. I was so tipsy that I missed the turnoff for Sirolo and ended up in a strange no-man’sland of Lido di Riscoli.” Yes, Chef: A Memoir Marcus Samuelsson [Random House, 2012] At the age of three, Marcus Samuelsson and his sister were orphaned when their mother died of tuberculosis in their native Ethiopia. They were adopted by a middle-class white family in Göteborg, Sweden. There, his new grandmother, Helga, took him under her wing and into her kitchen, where he learned the basics that helped him become a world-famous chef. Yes, Chef is the story of Samuelsson’s journey Chef/author Marcus Samuelsson. from the Göteborg kitchen, through many years in restaurant kitchens in Europe, to his arrival in New York City and his stellar rise. It documents his capture of a New York Times three-star rating at Aquavit in his mid-twenties and his opening of Red Rooster in Harlem. In Red Rooster, he has created a multi-ethnic eatery where people from all levels of society mingle and dine. The story is emotional and told with passion and honesty. Yes, Chef is captivating and a rewarding read. Tasting Pleasure: Confessions of a Wine Lover Jancis Robinson [Penguin 1999] Jancis Robinson is one of the top writers and critics in today’s wine industry. There are many books about the details of wine—its production and rating—and Robinson has written a few of those. She is the editor of the leading reference, Oxford Companion to Wine, and recipient of dozens of awards. But here she has written about the enjoyment of wine. Tasting Pleasure is her description of the passion for wine that started while she was studying at Oxford University. Though it was written over a dozen years ago, and the wine world has changed in that time, it still feels current. This is Robinson’s travelogue through the top cellars, prestigious vineyards and starred restaurants. Reading both the Osborne book and this gives us different perspectives on the wine world. ■ Patricia Savoie is a wine and culinary travel writer. Email: WordsOnWine@gmail.com

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sally friedman

September Song

IT’S AN ANNUAL PILGRIMAGE, a rite of every fall. And it’s one that I approach with mingled joy and dread. The joy comes from my lifelong love affair with beaches and oceans. The dread comes from the inevitable parting, now that days are shorter and the sweaters have replaced the bathing suits in the bedroom drawer. I’ve always been bad at endings. So I go on this pilgrimage to say goodbye to the beach alone. I go for a few precious hours that seem harder and harder to claim in these days of constant connection with the world, when spontaneity is elusive. Beaches and spontaneity should go together. While I’d like to grab just a towel and dash off, age has brought a certain degree of prudence. These days, my September odyssey means toting along a beach chair, sunscreen, insect repellent and a sensible lunch. Twenty years ago, I wouldn’t have been so prudent.

As I drive along familiar roads with my car windows open and Manilow on the tape player, I think of all the poetry and prose I wish I’d composed about the savage beauty of an ocean, and the spell that a beach at sunset can cast on the most impoverished soul. I choose Long Beach Island for my annual trek out of habit and deep affection. Proximity counts, too. Somehow, driving for more than 60 or 70 minutes to reach the ocean takes away some of the pleasure. Once, the roads to this island were deserted. Now they are not. But there comes a certain stretch, near cranberry bogs, where the road feels deliciously all mine, and it’s in this stretch that I remember other years, other beach odysseys. So much has changed in my life, and in the world—but somehow, this stretch reminds me that time occasionally does stand still. Once on the island, I shed the tensions of the present tense, and surrender to one goal: I must find the perfect beach, one that will allow me to complete the unwinding. It takes on an urgency that is strangely wonderful. On this trip, I don’t end up at the same beach I’ve come to know best. I find another, farther from civilization. I couldn’t tell you why I choose this particular stretch of sand and dunes, except that it’s almost completely deserted. My company is sparse, but some of the natives on LBI know this beach, too, and the few whom I encounter eye me warily. I am the usurper of their long-awaited peace and quiet after the summer invasion, the potential “foreigner” who may leave this special place less wonderful than I found it. I remind myself that if I lived here year-round, I, too, would want the place to myself come fall. If history is prophecy, I will spend one hour of my last day at the beach this year staring at the ocean. I’ll spend another hour reading, one more snoozing, and the last hour walking. I will speak to no one. I will eat ravenously of the lunch I’ve packed, and wish I’d packed more. My cell phone will remain untouched in my beach bag. My deadlines will recede, and I’ll drift into reveries that are comforting, not the sort that will make me clammy with anxiety. It’s bliss. Sheer bliss. And before I leave, I will invariably find some shells to carry back home with me. They will be carefully chosen, as if my very destiny hinged on their shape and form. I’ll scour the beach like a pirate searching for booty because these will be, after all, tangible reminders of a place I love. One shell from last year’s haul sits on my dresser still. It’s pink and fragile, curled around into itself, protected yet somehow vulnerable. Like the beach itself. Yes, it’s a long, long way from May to September. And winter looms large. But for one beach-lover, a solitary farewell to the beach will somehow stand as a reminder that it will all be there next year, waiting for me. And that thought surely makes the waiting more bearable. n

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about life

JAMES P. DELPINO

Finding

“The One” IN A POPULATION IN which half the marriages end in divorce and the average marriage lasts 6.5 years, finding or being the “right one” has become more and more challenging. Many good people have tried and failed to find and develop the relationship they desire, deserve and need. Seventy-percent of those who are divorced remarry within two to five years. These numbers don’t include committed relationships where people live together unmarried. So, even the failure of a marriage or committed relationship does not deter most people from trying their hand at love once again. Humans are social animals and require relationships with others to survive and thrive. Because people seek out relationships time again throughout the course of life it is possible to see patterns of interpersonal relationships. These patterns are often the cause (or at least a major contributing factor) of the failure of relationships. Relational patterns are simply sequences of feelings, thoughts and behaviors repeated with others. When there is a couple, the possibility of creating deep and fulfilling love is possible. Because there are two sets of thoughts, feelings and behaviors commingling, it’s no wonder that most folks find navigating the waters in this most dangerous ocean difficult at best. The individuals who work on themselves, especially with the assistance of mentors and coaches, are the most likely to succeed in most any endeavor. In the area of relationships, seeking to maintain and improve strengths and skills will be a benefit in several ways: you’ll attract more developed individuals; you’ll spare yourself much unnecessary pain, drama and heartache; you’ll learn more about yourself, others and life in general; you’ll become more effective, accurate and efficient with reading and assessing others; and you’ll exude a sense of happiness and confidence, which is attractive to both genders. Equally as important as developing strengths and abilities is working hard on the self to minimize negative and undesirable traits, behaviors, thoughts and feelings. The momentum and power of the healthy aspects of the self are used like a grinding stone to wear down negative tendencies and patterns. In general, the way to minimize or reduce a problem is to face it and modify it a little bit at a time. Small changes make big differences over time. If the problem is behavioral, choose one of the following three instead of the patterned behavior: 1) Do nothing; 2) Do the opposite behavior; 3) Do a reduced and watered down version of the behavior; 4) choose an alternate behavior. If the problem is in the area of thinking, remember that the mind is capable of thinking only one thought at a time. Take advantage of

Jim Delpino is a psychotherapist in private practice for over 30 years. jdelpino@aol.com (215) 364-0139.

this biological fact by substituting more helpful thoughts. Two highly successful ways of doing this are to use a mantra, prayer, phrase or quote and repeat it over and over when negative thinking arises, and prepare a list of positive things about yourself and read it over and over when negative thinking arises. If the problem is with emotions and feelings, first identify the feelings and then search for what triggered those feelings. Awareness is the first step in managing undesirable feelings or emotions. Awareness becomes your ally in spotting and managing triggers in your life. Because humans are so adaptable and programmable, we’re naturally capable of making change by modification and reprogramming. The list of techniques above is by no means exhaustive, however these are good starting places on the road to self-improvement. Having a coach or mentor to help you with these problem areas will greatly enhance your success. Having someone who brings out the best in you will help you to see more clearly into yourself as well as into the mind, behaviors and feelings of others. Changing the focus to the person you seek for a committed relationship offers the opportunity to discover what could really be available in a happy and fulfilling relationship. Finding someone who heightens your joys and decreases your sorrows is indeed the most important quest in life. People who have love tend to live longer, get sick less often and enjoy life more than those who do not have love in their life. So often, though, people rush into love because the desire to have love and closeness is so powerful. This is where the hidden dangers of love reside. When love takes hold it is easy to imagine all sorts of things about the other person. Of course, when these things turn out to be not true at all or only partially true there follows the inevitable disappointment. Haste and emotional blindness rule the day as opposed to taking one’s time and using wisdom to determine the outcome. Being able to distinguish personality from character may be the single most important skill in determining if he or she is the one for you. Personality is much like our muscular system. It is relatively easy to modify or change with continued effort. Character is more like our skeletal system and, of course, is much more difficult to change. Character is often not revealed until months into a relationship. We often fall for and are attracted to the personality. In the end, it is character that maintains the relationship. While personality traits offer color and diversity, character determines if there can be a positive and fulfilling relationship. Lack of integrity—where words and actions do not match-up—is more serious than a lack of sense of humor. It’s like the difference between gold-plated and solid gold—gold-plate erodes over time and reveals an underlying base metal, whereas solid gold is gold forever, through and through. ■

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26 / INTERVIEW / GENE SIMMONS

Do you think that both Paul and you get that work ethic from your parents? Definitely, yes, but it’s certainly cultural. People don’t like to hear this, but immigrant groups that come to America have that ingrained in them. The Asian population for instance: when you go to New York City, you will see 24-hour food markets. Unions can go jump into a lake. Work long hours and overtime. Get out of here. These are family-owned businesses [whose owners] work as long as they have to get the job done, seven days a week. No vacation. They persevere. They succeed. Nobody who lives a paint-by-number, 9-to-5 existence is extraordinary. That makes you just another guy. If you want to succeed, you have to work hard beyond the 9-to-5. Whenever I meet successful people, they’re not people who look at the clock. Warren Buffet, one of the richest men on earth, gets up early every morning and goes to work—six days a week by his account, and still lives in the same house that he bought 35 years ago in Omaha of all places. He can probably afford to buy Omaha. Without sounding too complimentary, one of your songwriting credits on the new album, “The Devil in Me,” is a true centerpiece of Monster. Thanks. I kept thinking about what sort of interesting turnaround I could make on the subject of Beelzebub. I came up with the idea that there is no hell, or outside evil, and that instead we are the devil or, rather, the devil is me. Not some unseen vision down below. I am the demon, very much evil incarnate. I like turning the devil into me. That I might be that guy. It’s an interesting twist on the whole fire and brimstone thing. That said, my favorite song on the new album is Paul’s “Wall of Sound.” It’s got the best melody, really.

I’ve interviewed both you and Paul in the past. The last time I spoke with him, he mentioned taking the reigns of production for that last album Sonic Boom. Obviously, he did the same thing here. Back then he told me that “democracy is overrated, somebody has to take charge.” Are those your sentiments as well? Yes. Democracy is overrated because everybody can’t have an equal say. The idea of democracy is important because everybody should have a voice. But everybody’s vote can’t have the same value. Someone going in to operate on a human being, [there’ll be] ten people in the room—surgeon doesn’t ask the rest of the people in the room should I go in through the stomach. It’s not done by committee, but democracy would require that. The good thing about Paul is that he was able to commit the time and the mental fatigue that it takes to stay in the studio for three months. I didn’t have that. I’m way past that. I don’t have the patience to sit there and slave. The process does involve all of us sitting down and writing the songs and taking a sledgehammer to everybody’s songs—including mine and Paul’s. To his credit and the fact we have a history together, no one person has the answer to all the questions. Paul is steering, in the driver seat, and I’m happy. Who else should do that if not him? OK, me. But he has the patience. Was there a shared dictate between your partner and yourself going forward from the start, that you guys would keep your personal lives out of your lyrics? It wasn’t voiced, not a sit-down discussion. We simply wrote the stuff that we felt comfortable writing. We still do. We were products of the Beatles’ song structure—A B A—versechorus-verse, then the middle eight. Intrinsically that’s what KISS continues to be. We’re not Rush. I couldn’t write those songs if you paid me and I love getting paid. I don’t understand fusion and jazz. I can’t quite grasp it. You don’t know where the chorus is and you certainly don’t walk down the street humming the stuff. You have to be comfortable with what you do. Example is when we first started to put on make-up we were going for a fey look, an androgynous thing. But that doesn’t work if you’re 6’2” and 200 pounds like I was in those days. You can’t come in with a tutu and try to be Lou Reed. It didn’t work. So you went for the fantastical in terms of image and lyric—still do, really, taking Monster into account.

The Simmons family at home: Nick, Sophie, Gene and Shannon Tweed.

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We decided to be who we were. Be true to yourself, to your school if you will. We liked the whole metallic black and silver thing. The studs and armor. It was and is a convincing extension of who we are on the inside. Look, I‘m an action movie guy. I couldn’t wait to see The Dark Knight Rises, The Avengers and Battleship. I like loud bombs, aliens, spaceships. I hate Jennifer Aniston movies—it’s not what I am. I couldn’t be John Meyer if you paid me. It’s too light in the loafers. That’s not to say they’re bad people or that what they do is not good. It is good. It’s just not who I am. I follow Popeye in his philosophy. I yam what I yam. ■

8 / ART / ALEX KANEVSKY

turies past. He has even titled some of his work after the art world’s most famous pictures, such as the The Polish Rider 2 and Nude Descending a Staircase. Rembrandt’s The Polish Rider resides in New York’s Frick Collection. Marcel Duchamp’s Nude Descending a Staircase is in the Philadelphia Museum of Art. (A side note: Kanevsky and Duchamp both studied mathematics as young men.) Kanevsky has an active gallery presence with solo shows at the Rosenfeld Gallery in Philadelphia, the Somerville Manning Gallery in Delaware, as well as galleries in New York, San Francisco, Montreal, and Washington. His museum shows have been somewhat less numerous. He has also participated in the annual US Artist Show in Philadelphia sponsored by the women’s group to benefit The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Kanevsky has been characterized by one critic as “fast, smeared and out of control. However, the artist is also an accomplished photographer and has used some of the discipline of photography in his painted work. In the main, his work has been critically well-received. Undoubtedly, Kanevsky’s audience would grow and he would benefit from a full-blown museum show in which his work would be more accessible and open to greater critical analysis. The show at the Woodmere is a good introduction. ■

Rogers Pizza (detail).

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regional theater Melody Gardot One night only 9/29 @ 8:00PM Local star Melody Gardot captivated audiences with her first two albums Worrisome Heart and My One and Only

EDITED BY DAVID SCHULTZ

with conviction, passion, and wit. This smash hit production (2011) became the best-selling production in Lantern’s history, and returns for a brief run. The Lantern Theater Company, at St. Stephen’s Theater, 10th & Ludlow Streets, Phila. (215) 829-0395. $20-$38. lanterntheater.org

conservatives, blind revolutionaries, closeted gay men, imaginary travel agents. Together, their lives intersect and get blown apart with profound symbolism and brilliant comedy. Directed by Blanka Zizka. The Wilma Theater, 265 South Broad Street, Phila. (215) 546-7824 wilmatheater.org

Arsenic and Old Lace 9/26-10/7 A comedy that kills with kindness. The well-meaning spinsters, Martha and Abby Brewster, befriend old men and attempt to relieve their loneliness by inviting them in for a glass of homemade wine laced with “just a pinch” of cyanide. When their levelheaded nephew discovers what they are up to, and draws their attention to the fact that their antics are not only against the law, but wrong, Martha responds, “Oh piffle!” This hilarious comedy is an American classic. DeSales University, Center Valley Campus, 2755 Station Ave, Center Valley, PA (610) 282-1100

The Edge of Our Bodies 9/6-9/23 Pulitzer Prize finalist Adam Rapp creates a young woman’s intimate journey punctuated by both her need to be heard and an aching desire to disappear. A Philadelphia premiere from the author of Exile’s 2006 hit Red Light Winter, The Edge of Our Bodies was critically acclaimed during the Humana Festival of New American Plays at the Actor’s Theatre of Louisville. This powerful coming-of age story

Cooking with The Calamari Sisters 9/27-1012

Thrill. Her newly released album, The Absence, includes elements reflective of recent world travels from Morocco to Buenos Aires. Famous for her Philly nightclub beginnings, Melody fuses together multicultural influences with a distinct and smoky mix of jazz, blues, rock, and pop. Merriam Theater, Broad Street, Phila. (215) 893-1999

Direct from sold-out engagements across the country, the brassy, sassy Calamari Sisters bring their all singing, all-

New Jerusalem, The Interrogation of Baruch de Spinoza at Talmud Torah Congregation: Amsterdam, July 27, 1656 9/4-9/23 As the Inquisition bears down on them, a small Jewish community flees Portugal to find a tenuous peace in seemingly liberal Amsterdam. But Spinoza, a favorite son of the

dancing, all-cooking hit to Philadelphia for a limited run. The zany Delphine and Carmela Calamari—the wide-waisted darlings of Brooklyn’s cable access TV station, WFAT—are taping the final broadcast of their popular cooking show “Mangia Italiano” while the audience joins in the fun onstage. Conceived and created by Jay Falzone, Dan Lavender and Stephen Smith. Society Hill Playhouse, 507 South Eighth Street, Phila. $45.00 (215) 923-0210. societyhillplayhouse.org Angels in America, Part Two: Perestroika 9/12-10/21

community and the rabbi’s heir apparent, is a revolutionary thinker. When the boldness of his ideas strains the bounds of Amsterdam’s professed tolerance, it leads to a dangerous confrontation between powerful political forces and his own beloved community. Based on true events in the life of one of the greatest philosophers in history, David Ives’ engaging drama challenges traditional political and religious thinking

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From the wreckage of an Angel’s dramatic descent from heaven which concludes Part One: Millennium Approaches, Angels in America forges ahead in Part Two: Perestroika . Everything in our world is changing. The AIDS epidemic is escalating, the ozone layer is under attack, and God has abandoned all of mankind. Amid this chaos, Tony Kushner creates a cosmic-scale portrait of America through now-legendary characters: ancient rabbis, Mormon housewives, neo-

showcases Rapp’s gift for rich language and razor sharp insight into the human condition. Theatre Exile @ Studio X, 1340 South 13th Street, Phila. (215) 218-4022. Tickets start at $20.00. theatreexile.org La Boheme 9/28, 9/30, 10/3, 10/5, 10/7 The timeless story of a shy seamstress and a passionate poet who chance upon each other on a snowy Parisian evening, La Boheme is known for its lush melodies and characters that touch the very heart of our humanity. With sweeping orchestral and choral music, this original production from director Davide Livermore shines a spotlight on the true bohemian influences at the turn of the century by showcasing the intensely moving impressionist art created at the turn of the 20th Century. Soprano Norah Amsellem essays the title role of Mimi. Academy of Vocal Arts alumniturned-international tenor Bryan Hymel makes his company debut as Rodolfo. Music Director Corrado Rovaris conducts Puccini’s captivating score. Performed in Italian. Opera Company of Philadelphia, Academy of Music, Broad & Locust Streets, Phila. (215) 732-8400. ■

footlights

DAVID SCHULTZ

Bring It On THIS SASSY MUSICAL IS paper-thin and trivial, at first glance…. maybe second glance, too. But the musical moves quickly and the athletic performers attack the work with such a fervor that it’s almost impossible not to give in to its modest charms. The heroine at its center is Campbell (Taylor Louderman), a perfect girl with blond hair and brilliant white teeth, who is about to enter her senior year at Truman High. Campbell dreams of nothing but winning the National Cheerleading Championship. Her fervor and resiliency are put to the test when redistricting forces her to transfer to another high school, leaving her squeaky clean, white, upscale school for a much rougher, racially diverse part of town. The thought that this school does not even have a cheerleading squad is enough to put Campbell in a state of apoplexy. She tries in vain—at first—to fit in at Jackson High where she is now in the minority at a school that is ruled by Danielle, an authoritative girl who leads a dance team and rejects Campbell’s dream. Zaftig fellow student Bridget (Ryann Redmond) is also transferred to the scary new school, and works as Campbell and Danielle’s go-between. Skylar (Kate Rockwell), Campbell’s earlier rival, plots to be Truman High’s new cheerleading captain and is secretly happy about the events that have transpired, but sweetly smiling young Eva (Elle McLemore) intends to take full control and get all the glory for herself. The crux of the show turns on how Campbell tries to galvanize her so-not-interested—really not at ALL interested—new fellow students into forming their own snappy cheerleading squad to defeat Eva and her former Truman teammates at the national championships. Will she do it? Can she do it? None of this ridiculous story and its overly convoluted plotlines would matter if not for the insanely talented people in front, on the stage, and the expert craftsmanship behind the scenes. The libretto by Jeff Whitty (Avenue Q), music by Tom Kitt (Next To Normal) and Lin-Manuel Miranda (In The Heights) with Co-Lyricist Amanda Green (The upcoming Hands on a Hardbody) are all working at the top of their game. That they merged their copious talents into a seamless whole is a testament to the magic of theater. Director and choreographer Andy Blankenbuehler is fearless—and a tad insane to boot; he frequently marshals his singers and dancers into dizzy pyramids of cheerleading insanity. The athletic performers seize the moment and without any nets, defy the forces of gravity, as they leap into the air with abandon and sheer joy. The music is an amalgamation of rock, hip-hop, and Broadway ditties. The sheer sense of fun onstage, and the aura of the ridiculous melding into the sublime are the chief assets of this unexpected sleeper hit. Originally a limited run through October, the show has been extended into January 2013. I’d not be surprised if this cheerleading troupe made it into the spring and tried for a Tony. ■ Playing at the St. James Theatre, 246 W. 44th Street. Through January 20th, 2013.

David Schultz is a member of the Outer Critics Circle.

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classical notebook Lights Dim on Broadway for Marvin Hamlisch, A “Complete” Musician

THE MUSIC WORLD WAS deeply shocked recently by the unexpected loss of one of its most talented and “complete” musicians, as I call them, Marvin Hamlisch. Marvin Frederick Hamlisch, born on June 2, 1944, was an iconic American composer, pianist and conductor. He was known as the one of only eleven so-called EGOTs—those who have been awarded an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, as well as a Tony. He was also one of the only two people to have won those four prizes and a Pulitzer Prize. Hamlisch also won two Golden Globes. He was born in Manhattan to Viennese-born Jewish parents, Lilly and Max Hamlisch, who fled Austria just before the beginning of World War II. His father was an accordionist and bandleader. Hamlisch turned out to be a child prodigy, who by age five began mimicking the piano music he heard on the radio. A few months before he turned seven, in 1951, he was accepted into what is now known as the Juilliard School Pre-College Division. Although Liza Minnelli’s debut album included a song he wrote in his teens, Marvin’s first hit did not come until he was 21 years old. This song, “Sunshine, Lollipops, and Rainbows,” co-written with Howard Liebling, was recorded by Lesley Gore and reached number 13 on the Billboard Hot 100. His very first musical job was as a rehearsal pianist for Funny Girl with Barbra Streisand. His first film score was for The Swimmer, after the film’s producer, Sam Spiegel, hired him based on a piano performance he heard at a party. Later, he wrote music for several early Woody Allen films such as Take the Money and Run and Bananas. In addition, Hamlisch co-wrote the song “California Nights” (also with Liebling), which was recorded by Lesley Gore for her 1967 hit album of the same name. The Bob Crewe-produced single peaked at number 16 on the Hot 100 in March 1967. Hamlisch’s first major stage work was in 1972 playing piano for Groucho Marx at Carnegie Hall for An Evening with Groucho. He acted as straight man and accompanist while Marx (at age 81) reminisced about his career in show business. The performances were released as a two-record set, and remain very popular. Hamlisch then composed the score for the 1975 Broadway musical A Chorus Line—for which he won both a Tony Award and a Pulitzer Prize—and They’re Playing Our Song, loosely based on his relationship with Carole Bayer Sager. Among Hamlisch’s better-known works during the 1970s were adaptations of Scott Joplin’s ragtime music for The Sting, including its theme song, “The Entertainer.” It hit #1 on Billboard’s Adult Contemporary chart and #3 on the Hot 100, selling nearly two million copies in the U.S. alone. He had great success with The Way We Were in 1974, winning two of his three 1974 Academy Awards. He co-wrote “Nobody Does It Better” for the 1977 James Bond film The Spy Who Loved Me with his then-girlfriend Carole Bayer Sager, which was later nominated for an Oscar. Hamlisch also wrote the orchestral/disco score for the film, which was re-recorded for the album. He got to work with his favorite singer, Johnny Mathis, in live performance on occasions, and Mathis also recorded many of his classic song compositions in the studio. In the 1980s, he had success with the scores for Ordinary People (1980) and Sophie’s Choice (1982). He also received an Academy-Award nomination in 1986 for the film version of A Chorus Line. His last projects included Three Men and a Baby and what would be his two last film efforts, The Informant! (2009), starring Matt Damon and directed by Steven Soderbergh, and Behind The Candelabra, a movie about the exuberant life of Liberace, starring

Marvin Hamlisch. Photo: Len Prince. 46

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Peter H. Gistelinck is the Executive Director of The Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia. Prior to joining the Orchestra, he was the Director of Sales and Marketing and Co-Artistic Director for the Brussels Philharmonic Orchestra and Flemish Radio Choir in Belgium. Mr. Gistelinck is a member of the Kimmel Center Resident Advisory Committee, The Recording Academy, American Film Institute, Musical Fund Society, Philadelphia Arts and Business Council, International Academy of Jazz and International Society for the Performing Arts.

PETER H. GISTELINCK

Michael Douglas and Matt Damon, to be released in 2013. In addition to his film work, Hamlisch composed the theme songs for Late Night with David Letterman and Good Morning America. At the beginning of the 1980s, his romantic relationship with Bayer Sager ended, but their songwriting relationship continued. The 1983 musical Jean Seberg, on the tragic life of the actress, failed in its London production at the UK’s National Theatre and never played in the U.S. In 1986, Smile was a mixed success and had a short run on Broadway. The musical version of Neil Simon’s The Goodbye Girl (1993) closed after only 188 performances, although Marvin received a Drama Desk nomination for Outstanding Music. Shortly before his death, Hamlisch scored the musical version of The Nutty Professor, based on the 1963 Jerry Lewis film and directed (as was the film) by Lewis himself. The show premiered on July 24, 2012, at the Tennessee Performing Arts Center in Nashville, and is aiming for a Broadway run. Hamlisch was also the Music Director and arranger of Barbra Streisand’s 1994 concert tour of the U.S. and England, as well as the television special, Barbra Streisand: The Concert, for which he received two of his Emmys. He also conducted several tours of Linda Ronstadt during this period, most notably on her successful 1996 Dedicated to the One I Love tour of arenas and stadiums. n the classical music side Hamlisch was a great talent, too. The Dallas Symphony Orchestra commissioned and performed his classical symphonic suite titled Anatomy of Peace (a Symphonic Suite in one Movement for Full Orchestra/Chorus/Child Vocal Soloist) on November 19, 1991. It was also performed at Carnegie Hall in 1993 and in Paris in 1994 to commemorate D-Day. The work was recorded by the Dallas Symphony Orchestra in 1992. Anatomy of Peace was a book by Emery Reves which expressed the world-federalist sentiments shared by Albert Einstein and many others in the late 1940s, in the period immediately following World War II, a subject that was understandably very sensitive to Hamlisch. I clearly recall being so impressed by this specific work, that when I wanted to commission him for a similar work for The Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, he politely declined responding, “Peter, it’s really a lot of work and at the end of the day these new classical works mostly end up in the library, not being played anymore. I’d rather continue to write songs, musicals and film-scores.” Hamlisch held the position of Principal Pops Conductor for the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, the San Diego Symphony, the Seattle Symphony, the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, The National Symphony Orchestra Pops, and The Pasadena Symphony and Pops. He was also to be announced as the new Music Director of the Philly Pops for the 20132014 season onward, in the week of August 13, only one week after his passing. In addition to have been awarded an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, a Tony and the Pulitzer Prize, he received ten Golden Globe Award nominations, winning twice for Best Original

Marvin Hamlisch and Barbra Streisand at the Cedars-Sinai Board of Governors Gala at The Beverly Hilton Hotel in 2011. (AP Photo.)

Song, with “Life Is What You Make It” in 1972 and “The Way We Were” in 1974. He also received six Emmy Award nominations, winning four times, twice for music direction of Barbra Streisand specials, in 1995 and 2001. He shared the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1976 with Michael Bennett, James Kirkwood, Nicholas Dante, and Edward Kleban for his musical contribution to the original Broadway production of A Chorus Line. Hamlisch received the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia Lifetime Achievement Award in 2008 and a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2009 at the World Soundtrack Awards in Ghent, Belgium. He was also inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame in 2008. In 2008, he appeared as a judge in the Canadian reality series Triple Sensation which aired on the CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation). The show was aimed to provide a training bursary to a talented youth who could be a leader in song, dance and acting. In May 1989, Hamlisch married Terre Blair, a Columbus, Ohio, native and weather/news anchor from the ABC affiliate

WTVN-Channel 6 in that city. Marvin Hamlisch died suddenly after a short illness on August 6, 2012, in Los Angeles, California at the age of 68. The Associated Press described him as having written “some of the best-loved and most enduring songs and scores in movie history.” Streisand released a statement praising Hamlisch, stating that it was “his brilliantly quick mind, his generosity and delicious sense of humor that made him a delight to be around.” Aretha Franklin called him “classic and one of a kind” and one of the “all-time great” arrangers and producers. The head of the Pasadena Symphony and Pops commented that Hamlisch had “left a very specific…original mark on American music and added to the great American songbook with works he himself composed.” No one can argue with that. At 8:00 p.m. on August 8, the marquee lights of the 40 Broadway theaters were dimmed for one minute in tribute to Hamlisch, a posthumous honor traditionally accorded to those considered who have made significant contributions to the theater arts. Rest in Peace, Marvin. n SEPTEMBER 2012

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singer /songwriter Lyle Lovett ★★★1/2 Release Me Curb Records/Lost Highway

Omar & The Howlers ★★★ I’m Gone Big Guitar Music

Release Me marks the end of Lyle Lovett’s association with Curb Records that began with the release of his self-titled debut album in 1986. The four-time Grammy Award winner plays down his own songwriting and has assembled an album that reflects his musical roots. Lovett employs an eclectic approach on Release Me. Songs by German theologian Martin Luther (“Keep Us Steadfast”) and Chuck Berry (a slowed-down version of “Brown-Eyed Handsome Man”) co-exist nicely.

I’m Gone, the new CD by Omar & The Howlers, could just as easily have been called I’m Still Here. Bandleader Omar Kent Dykes marks 50 years of making music with a collection of a dozen songs that acknowledge his roots and influences. The Mississippi native draws inspiration from blues, country, rockabilly and rock. “Drunkard’s Paradise” has echoes of late ‘50s Johnny Cash with its loping rhythm and its tale of personal setbacks. “Wild and Free” utilizes

Omar Kent Dykes. Photo credit: Mark Pucci Media

a modified Bo Diddley beat for its underpinning rhythm. Dykes offers a pair of back-to-back instrumentals to showcase his backing band. The languid “Lone Star Blues” captures the feel of a bar at closing time. “Omar’s Boogie” is the the flip side with his guitar delivering a getup-and-go feeling. The title track is slice of generic rockabilly with its reliance on recycled riffs. Dykes fares better with a growling version of John Lee Hooker’s “I’m Mad Again.” The performance matches the attitude of the title. Los Lobos ★★★★ Kiko Live Shout! Factory Lyle Lovett.

The lively horn-powered arrangement for Jesse Winchester’s “Isn’t That So” recalls Lovett’s work with his Large Band. He teams up with k.d. lang for a straightforward duet on the title track that also was Engelbert Humperdinck’s biggest U.S. single. Lovett and Kat Edmonson generate some sparks on Frank Loeseer’s “Baby, It’s Cold Outside.” On his own material, Lovett tries a different take with “Night’s Lullaby,” a song written for an updated production of Shakespeare’s “Much Ado About Nothing” that serves as a foreshadowing of things to come. For Lovett, the future is unwritten, but “Release Me” is an entertaining recapitulation of where he’s been.

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With its strong songwriting, top-flight musicianship and creative use of the recording studio, Kiko represented a creative breakthrough for Los Lobos. Twenty years after its original release, Kiko Live finds the band revisiting the album with a live CD and DVD. The CD features Los Lobos performing the 16-song Kiko album at a 2006 concert in San Diego. It captures the richness of the band’s music, from the Mexican-flavored “Saint Behind the Glass” to the dreaminess of “Kiko and the Lavender Moon” and the bluesy jazz of “That Train Don’t Stop Here.” This is a re-imagining and not just a re-creation of the original material, as heard on the extended horn-fueled waltz “Rio de Tenampa.” The DVD features the concert plus the three-song encore, which includes a majestic acoustic version of “La Bamba,” the band’s No. 1 hit single from 1987, performed with traditional Mexican instruments. Interspersed throughout the video are interviews with band members discussing the creation of Kiko. Shout! Factory has also reissued the original Kiko album with two demos and a trio of live performances from 1992 radio show. It’s a first class treatment for one of the best albums of the 1990s.

TOM WILK Ratings: ★=skip it; ★★=mediocre; ★★★=good; ★★★★=excellent; ★★★★★=classic

the Constitution. With Election Special, Cooder continues in the footsteps of Woody Guthrie in taking a stand with his music. Caroline Herring ★★★1/2 Camilla Signature Sounds Drawing inspiration from American history to the fiction of Eudora Welty, Caroline Herring delivers a set of compelling songs on Camilla, her sixth studio album. Her songs deal with loss, faith and resiliency. A native of Mississippi, Herring has a knack for bringing the past to live and draws on her Southern roots. The title track, named for a town in Georgia, recounts the true story of a pregnant woman who suffered a miscarriage during a clash with police in the early 1960s. “White Dress” is based on a story of an African-African woman and her harrowing experience as a Freedom Rider in 1961. Musically, Herring utilities a spare folk/country sounds that is a good fit for her voice, which recalls Joan Baez in its clarity and purity. “Traveling Shoes,” based on a short story by Welty, is done without instrumentation and shows the power of Herring’s voice with addiLos Lobos. Photo credit: Drew Reynolds

Ry Cooder ★★★1/2 Election Special Nonesuch/Perro Verde Records Like Howard Beale, the newscaster played by Peter Finch in the 1976 film Network, Ry Cooder is mad as hell and isn’t going to take it anymore. Instead of taking to the airwaves, Cooder has released Election Special, a politically-charged album geared to this year’s presidential vote that touches on race relations, the economy and foreign affairs. “Mutt Romney Blues” uses the Republican presidential candidate’s treatment of his dog as a metaphor for what he will do to the nation if elected. “Brother is Gone” is his withering indictment of the Koch Brothers and big money and its influence on the political campaign. The Occupy Wall Street movement inspired “Wall Street Part of Town.” Cooder’s mandolin playing offers a hint of optimism and recalls a ‘60s-era protest song. “The 90 and the 9” serves as his take on economic inequality. “Cold Cold Feeling” is a pensive blues regarding Barack Obama, but could apply to the solitary feeling experienced by any leader in the White House. “Take Your Hands Off It” is a warnRy Cooder. Photo credit: Joachim Cooder. ing not to tamper with

Caroline Herring.

tional vocals by Mary Chapin Carpenter and Aoife O’Donovan. “Joy Never Ends (Auld Lang Syne)” ends the album on an upbeat note. The song was inspired by Herring’s trip to Texas for a family wedding. Set to a lilting melody, it’s a reminder of the importance of tradition and perseverance. ■ SEPTEMBER 2012

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keresman on disc Hot Club of Detroit ★★★★ Junction Mack Avenue

No guitarist looms over the world of music quite like Django Reinhardt (19101953). He’s influenced six-stringers as diverse as Glen Campbell, Tony Iommi (of Black Sabbath), Stevie Ray Vaughan, and Wes Montgomery. His style—a commingling of his Roma/Gypsy roots and pre-big band-era jazz—continues to inspire tribute bands. One such is the Hot Club of Detroit, but unlike some, this outfit uses the Django band/model as a point of departure, putting their own spin/slant on things and taking

it into the future (as opposed to a cozy, idealized past). Hot Club use two guitars and bass (sans drums) but dispense with the violin in favor of reeds and accordion, and this time out even include a vocalist on some tunes. The results are bracing if atypical— they incorporate “free/out” jazz influences, as on the appropriately titled “Chutzpah,” mixing sultry Gallic lyricism, whiffs of klezmer (an early Jewish “fusion” style—look it up), and some joy-filled, non-ponderous skronk and squeal, all the while swinging like mad and elegance to spare. “Midnight in Detroit” will take you to the back-in-time Paris to which Woody Allen took us in that dandy movie of his. On three songs, Cyrille Aimée sings with a lilt that evokes the early days of Billie Holiday. Purists will no doubt balk—that’s what they do. But anyone who can groove to Django, Dan Hicks, and David Murray in the same evening will find lots to investigate here. mackavenue.com / hotclubofdetroit.com Delta Moon ★★★ Black Cat Oil Red Parlor Once keys-player for rockers The Brains (originators of Cyndi Lauper’s “Money Changes

Delta Moon.

Everything”), Tom Gray came by the blues naturally—he grew up in Ohio. While still tinkling the ivories, Gray focuses more on the guitar these days—with Mark Johnson, Delta Moon is from whence springs sizzling six-string wails (with a heavy bottleneck slide orientation). Unlike Mahal, Delta Moon isn’t as tradition-oriented, but Black Cat Oil (the Moon’s seventh) is still a fun listen. They’ve got a swampy Southern style evocative of Little Feat (circa their first four albums), Tony Joe White, and Dr. John—or, imagine if ZZ Top were raised in sultry N’awlins ambiance instead of Texan hell-yeah rowdiness. deltamoon.com / redparlor.com Taj Mahal Hidden Treasures of Taj Mahal 1969-1973 ★★★★ Columbia/Legacy The blues, in case you’ve not noticed, is forever—it’s one of the cornerstones of American music. Taj Mahal (born Henry St. Clair Fredericks, Harlem 1942) was something of an anomaly during the blues boom of the middle/late 1960s—while the rockin’ electric blues of Muddy Waters and B.B. King (and their white acolytes) was all the rage, Mahal went the

Hot Club of Detroit.

shemp@hotmail.com

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MARK KERESMAN Ratings: ★=skip it; ★★=mediocre; ★★★=good; ★★★★=excellent; ★★★★★=classic

other way, reaching back to rural, pre-electric styles of the ‘20s and ‘30s for inspiration. But he wasn’t all “purist” about it—he had an electric band that could burn and turned the Carole King-co-writ “Take A Giant Step” into a signature tune. Hidden Treasures is just that, a double-disc set of previously unreleased tunes from his tenure with Columbia Records, one live (London 1970) and one studio. You get the driving strut of “Big Fat,” featuring some searing electric guitar from the late Jesse Ed Davis and wailing harmonica from Mahal, and the lopsided funk of “Tomorrow May Not Be Your Day.” Before he got to explore the connections between assorted folks and blues forms, Mahal linked Sleepy John Estes and Junior Wells, his raspy soulful voice as real as the grit on your windowsill. Life and/or overly polished modern blues got you down? This be the cure. legacyrecordings.com / tajblues.com [See interview with Taj Mahal on page 32 of this issue.] Annbjorg Lien ★★★1/2 Khoom Loy Compass A fiddle is a violin is a fiddle, right? Yes, but not when it’s the Norwegian variant, the hardanger fiddle. It’s shorter than “ours” with a flatter bridge and fingerboard, its unusual sound by way of being played two strings at a time. Norway’s Ms. Lien comes from both classical and trad folk backgrounds, but concentrates on a cosmopolitan concoction of folk strains from ‘round the globe. “Natten” juxtaposes pensive, cyclic Irish and Norwegian

melodies with percolating African-influenced percussion. “Til” shows that the anchoring “drones” of India and Scotland are actually copasetic, and the gorgeously lush evokes a dreamland match-up of Enya and the Chieftains on an Emerald Isle in the Sky. “Needle’s Eye” has a cool, John Barry-meets-Steely Dan swagger to it, even! Lien’s warble recalls that of Enya’s but more earthy/folk-y, less new age-y. Purists can go fish—them that like to hear the commonality of assorted “ethnicities” (Scandinavian, Celtic, Asian, etc.) served up with amicability, poise, and personality can dig in. compassrecords.com Gentle Giant Three Friends ★★★ Octopus ★★★★ Alucard Hands up, all those recalling the halcyon daze of progressive rock, circa 1969-1976…during that period, bands such as Yes, King Crimson, and Jethro Tull overtly conjoined rock with elements of classical music (and jazz, occasionally) and actually filled theaters and arenas doing it. Of course, some of the better “prog” bands never got to be very well-known (at least in America): Camel, Caravan, and Gentle Giant. The latter were a bunch of UK multi-instrumentalist fellows with an approach that possessed the dynamic complexity of the big names but also the refinement of medieval music. Now their catalog is being reissued in snazzy digitally remastered (by the band) editions with bonus tracks. Three Friends (from 1972) is a concept set about [see title] from school days to adulthood. High points include the lilting vocals and shimmering, jazz-hinted vibraphone and keyboards of “Schooldays” and the richly Mozart-ian elegance segueing into thorny, pugnacious hard rock of “Peel the Paint.” (The latter anticipated some of Frank Zappa’s post-’77 work.) However, like some of their peers, the

Gentle Giant

Annbjorg Lien.

Giant get heavy-handed at times...one person’s bluster can be another’s fireworks. 1973’s Octopus just may’ve been GG’s masterwork. Classical (Renaissance, baroque, symphonic, and even whiffs of then-non-trendy Glass/Reich minimalism) and jazz elements are more thoroughly integrated into the songs; there are some handsome vocal harmonies, and while the arrangements are dazzlingly sumptuous they are more subtle, less bombastic, and laced with (unlike some of their peers) whimsical humor…and note the fervent, slowburning bluesy guitar solo of “River”! Whether you want to relive those thrilling past times or simply savor adventurous, genre-defying rockin’ sounds regardless of era, sup at this trough. gentlegiantmusic.com ■ SEPTEMBER 2012

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nick’s picks Neil Cowley Trio ★★★★ The Face Of Mount Molehill Naim Jazz Classically trained British pianist Neil Cowley rooted himself in pop and funk early in his musical career, playing and performing with bands like Zero 7 and Brand New Heavies as

with synthesizers in the ‘80s (Current Events, Getting There) and recording albums in he ‘90s with organist Dan Wall (While We’re Young) and violinist Mark Feldman (Open Land) that created arresting group dynamics and musical textures, yet never blurred the guitarist’s tonal purity. His discography includes nearly 30 releases as a leader in addition to his work in the group Gateway and countless collaborations with ECM artists including Charles Lloyd, Jack DeJohnette, Marc Copland and many others. Abercrombie gets back to basics on his heartfelt and buoyant quartet recording, Within A Song, paying tribute to his early influences by covering iconic tunes by Miles Davis, Ornette Coleman and John Coltrane. The music that spoke so clearly to Abercrombie in the ‘60s is presented thoughtfully here, with good feeling and a touch of wistful nostalgia. It’s brought to fruition by the leader, saxophonist Joe Lovano, bass player Drew Gress and the remarkably evocative Joey Baron on drums. With toned down tempos and gripping sonics, Abercrombie often defers the lead voice to Lovano—the sweet tart notes jump from his horn rat-a-tat style on the bravura mash-up, “Within A Song”/”Without a Song”—while he toys with phrasing and subtle comps in the background. But when Abercrombie’s on deck, it’s the masterful and tuneful fretwork that energizes the recording. “Flamenco Sketches” radiates from Abercrombie’s new read on the melody and the tune unfolds dreamily, its form laced with stunning interplay. The quartet is in especially great form on Coleman’s “Blues Connotation,” which has a freer vibe, with unscripted solos that come together organically. Abercrombie takes the profound melody of Coltrane’s “Wise One” and seamlessly blends reverence for the source material with his effusive, joyful solo. The album is rounded out with the cool blue swing of Bill Evans’ “Interplay” and “Sometime Ago,” a sweet natured standard that connected the guitarist to the Art Farmer-Jim Hall Quartet and here it’s played by Abercrombie and crew with fond affection. (9 tracks; 61:15 minutes) Matthew Silberman ★★★★ Questionable Creatures DeSoto Sound Factory

Neil Cowley Trio.

There’s a euphoric groove that snakes its way through tenor saxophonist Matthew Silberman’s debut, Questionable Creatures, and when it seizes your attention on tracks like “Ghost

well as forming his own acclaimed group, Fragile State, which trafficked in electronic and chill-out lounge music. He continues to ride a heady wave of personal success in England and Europe, notably playing with Adele on her chart-busting album 21. The Neil Cowley jazz trio was formed in 2006, with music dubbed “jazz for Radiohead fans” (Radio Silence and Displaced were two albums that deservedly made waves.) Prepping for a breakout stateside, you can nearly taste the trio’s exuberance on The Face Of Mount Molehill, their fourth and very fine recording. The Face Of Mount Molehill is straight-up contemporary jazz with a bang-bang edge— vaguely improvisational and tethered to pop, R&B and an occasional drift into something approaching smooth jazz. Cowley, bassist Rex Horan and drummer Evan Jenkins populate the studio-derived tunes with many buzz-happy moments and surreal bits of creativity (the sampled child’s laugh as textural component on “Mini Ha Ha” and fizzy synths on the title track) that provide ear candy pleasure. Stronger tracks like “Fable” and “Rooster Was A Witness” are tight and memorable. Nicely, these sticky jazz tunes carry a lot of heart within their tight 3minute plus playtime. Stunningly recorded by the audiophile-friendly Naim Records, The Face Of Mount Molehill is a 45-minute blast, mixing percussive jazz riffs with British-styled pop grooves and played for big fun. The tunes should sound even better live when the Trio performs at the Iridium in NYC on October 11. (12 tracks; 45:44 minutes) John Abercrombie ★★★★1/2 Within A Song ECM Beginning in 1974 with his first solo recording for ECM (Timeless), guitarist John Abercrombie has embraced various ways to augment the sound of his instrument, experimenting

Nick Bewsey has been writing about jazz for ICON since 2004. A member of The Jazz Journalists Association, he blogs about jazz and entertainment at www.jazzinspace.blogspot.com. Twitter: @countingbeats 52

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Matthew Silberman. Photo: Jonathon Kambouris.

Of The Prairie” and “The Battle At Dawn,” you’ll recognize a band in perfect sync. The other six tunes, all of them original and involving, take full advantage of the leader’s concept that marries jazz with power chords and tonal rawness. To make this happen, Silberman’s tight-

NICK BEWSEY Ratings: ★=skip it; ★★=mediocre; ★★★=good; ★★★★=excellent; ★★★★★=classic

knit, piano-less ensemble features two guitarists (Ryan Ferreira and Greg Ruggiero) along with bassist Chris Tordini and drummer Tommy Crane, a configuration that infuses the music with emotional texture and a genuine sense of adventure. The saxophonist plays with a thick, lush tone, Coltrane-like at times, but driven here by big beats and electrified rhythms. Ferreira weaves a hypnotic solo on “Mrs. Heimoff,” a fractious waltz with twisted riffs and surging sonics. Both guitarists alternate solos on “The Process,” a moody tune that flows with Silberman’s distinctive phrasing, and jointly dial up fuzz tones and psychedelic bliss on the closing track, “The Pharaoh’s Tomb.” Transplanted from Santa Monica, CA to Brooklyn, Silberman digests the contrast between east and west coast living to inspire his compositions and inform his group’s sound. And his artistic vision doesn’t limit itself to music. The album’s graphics display a colorful surrealist landscape and his interactive website is smartly designed to connect with fans in the same way that pop, rap and hip-hop artists do—the music video for “Ghost Of The Prairie” is a first-class production rich in atmosphere and dark conspiracies. It’s an interesting brand launch and provides the perfect assist to make Questionable Creatures one of this year’s better progressive jazz recordings. (8 tracks; 56:23 minutes) The Eric Mintel Quartet ★★★1/2 Just Around The Corner www.ericmintelquartet.com If you’re a jazz fan who visits or lives in Bucks County, PA, you’ve probably heard of pianist Eric Mintel. A naturally gifted musician who learned to play Brubeck’s “Take Five” during his earliest piano lessons, he formed his quartet in 1993 and has accumulated a host of accolades

Pete Smyser ★★★★ The Jerome Kern Concert www.smyser.com With deserved endorsements from guitarists Bucky Pizzarelli and Howard Alden, 7-string guitarist Pete Smyser is releasing his first live recording, The Jerome Kern Concert, which documents a wonderful performance at Moravian College in Bethlehem, PA from January 2011. The crisp sound and superior acoustics promote a relaxed, yet sophisticated vibe as Smyser interprets Kern’s well-known melodies like “Look For The Silver Lining,” “Pick Yourself Up” and Smoke Gets In Your Eyes.” The musical bond that Smyser has with pianist Tom Lawton, bassist Madison Rast and drummer Dan Monaghan is tight and tuneful. Lawton is a particularly ace accompanist, filling his solos with colorful hues, and he comps in the classic tradition. Smyser is a mainstay on the Philadelphia scene and his website lists the many opportunities to catch him in the act. For a regional player who’s released six previous albums, Smyser has the chops and rhythmic flair to delight fans of classic jazz standards, delivered in a style reminiscent of Herb Ellis and Barney Kessel, and to his credit, played with a verve all his own. He performs regularly at The Café in Bethlehem, PA with upcoming dates noted on his website. (11 tracks; 57:02 minutes) Abiah ★★★1/2 Life As A Ballad Madoh Music After a bumpy start to his pop career, mostly involving the cumbersome process of making music in a major label sausage factory, the singer/songwriter Abiah (formerly Jeremiah Abiah) has crafted a sophomore album of emotive ballads, an audacious idea for a relative newcomer. But with delicacy and warmth, Abiah makes it work. To cement his vision, Abiah adds pianist Robert Glasper, guitarist Marvin Sewell (Cassandra Wilson) and the accomplished drummer Ulysses Owens, Jr. who co-produces as well. Having jazz musicians on board adds class to the project, but Abiah’s voice and music is the star. The singer toggles tone and tempo for “Doves,” a ravishing version of Prince’s “When Doves Cry” that’s sure to get some

Eric Mintel Quartet at the Musikfest Café in Bethlehem, PA.

since then—everything from performing at the White House to being a featured guest in 2005 on Marian McPartland’s Piano Jazz on NPR. Just Around The Corner is Mintel’s tenth CD and the most fully realized effort from this impressive artist. Apart from the percolating “That Happy Feeling,” Mintel avoids overt Brubeck licks to play looser, more contemporary compositions that would be right at home on some of pianist David Benoit’s mainstream jazz recordings. The spirited title track kicks things off but deeper in you’ll dig the catchy “Just Happened,” a 7+ minute workout flavored with a satisfying bass n’ drum groove. Other notable highlights include “Heart Of The Holidays,” sweetened for a December playlist but it stands on its own fresh originality. The interplay between Mintel and his band flows freely and the tunes, including the sumptuous ballad “As The Sun Rises,” exude melodic charm. Major credit goes to Nelson Hill on alto and soprano saxophone, electric bassist Jack Hegyi and drummer Dave Mohn, along with Jim McGee who recorded the band in real time (no in-studio fiddling or aural trickery) with immersive old-school analog sound. Mintel’s website has an up-to-date calendar so you can hear this fine band throughout the region. (10 tracks; 65:41 minutes)

Abiah. Photo: Francis Augustine.

attention partly for its familiarity, but mostly it should be measured for Abiah’s capacity to reset this classic in a novel and surefire way. The emotional drive of a song like “September” better exemplifies the strength of this artist. With a rounded-edged voice that suggests a more vulnerable Seal, Abiah’s experience singing back-up for George Michael and Yolanda Adams signifies a willingness to lay his emotions out there. “Foolish Heart” is among the first three tracks, any of which would be strong singles and worthy of airplay. Concise and happily free of filler, Life As A Ballad makes room for one up-tempo track, “Next Time Around,” a song with a carefree gait that trades break up misery for the discovery of self-worth and forgiveness. The final allusion one might associate with Abiah would be vocalist Lizz Wright since they both share honesty in the stories they tell, their musical palette and in the beautiful words they sing. (9 tracks; 37:37 minutes) ■ SEPTEMBER 2012

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jazz library

BOB PERKINS

THE POPULARITY OF MODERN jazz reached its zenith in the 1950s and 1960s. There was an unbroken triumvirate in place at the time, with the major record companies sending their artists on tour following the release of newlyrecorded albums. The artists were then interviewed on radio stations which catered to jazz music. And, of course, the radio hosts would ask the artists the leading question, “Where are you appearing?” During this period, Philadelphia was fertile jazz turf, boasting jazz musicians aplenty. There were a couple of jazzplaying radio stations, and there were clubs and record stores galore. Shirley Scott was a young Philly musician of the 1950s. She began piano and trumpet lessons at and early age, but later switched to piano exclusively. Touring musicians would

Shirley Scott

drop by the family home in North Philly to visit, jam, and even coach Shirley a little. During an interview with me some years ago, Shirley spoke of pianist Red Garland often stopping by to give her a pointer or two. Garland lived in Philadelphia on a couple of occasions and was house pianist at the city’s famed Down Beat Club. He went on to hold the piano chair in one of Miles Davis’s fabled groups. Shirley played piano in number of small groups as a teenager. This was a time when Philly was teaming with emerging jazz talent like John Coltrane, Benny Golson, Bobby Timmons and “Philly” Joe Jones, to name a few. While still in high school, she heard a local organist named Jackie Davis, and was fascinated by the sound he

coaxed from the instrument. She soon began studying the behemoth known as the Hammond B-3 organ. Dates at the small but revered club known as Spider Kelly’s followed. Toward the middle 1950s, she caught the ear of visiting tenor-man Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis who was looking to form a new group, featuring an organ. He approached Shirley, who remembered the occasion: “Eddie was in Philadelphia with his drummer Charlie Rice, and somehow he’d heard about me and I got the job. He was the greatest teacher I ever had. He put me in the forefront and allowed me to grow.” Over the next five years, Shirley and Davis recorded more than a dozen albums. The Davis quartet was also the opening act at Count Basie’s club in Harlem and maintained a long run there. When not at Basie’s, there were plenty other clubs and theaters to work, like New York’s Apollo, the Howard in Washington, D.C., and the Uptown in Philly. Shirley was gaining fame, and was sought out by a number of saxophonists prior to meeting and marrying saxophonist Stanley Turrentine in 1960. They traveled the road and recorded together for ten years before dissolving their marital and musical union. Stanley could fuse jazz, soul and blues, and add in a touch of gospel. The mixture was always rollicking and swinging; his sound was unique and totally his own. Shirley would match him stride-for-stride on the organ. Her touch was light, airy and bouncy—but always sure! She was not only a fine accompanist, but an equally fine and inventive solist. Her organ artistry earned her the sobriquet, “The Queen of the Organ.” She wore the crown well. She was the first female to conquer the big B-3 organ at a time when Philadelphia became known as “The Organ Capitol of the World.” Shirley took some time off from traveling during the 1970s. The popularity of the organ was waning, and Shirley was staying close to home to care of her ailing mother. She attended Cheyney University in the ‘80s, received her bachelor’s degree and became a music educator at the university. In the early 1990s, Shirley turned her attention again to the piano and resumed recording. This was also about the time she and her trio assisted in getting Philly’s newly-opened Ortlieb’s Jazz Haus up and running. The trio remained at the club for an extended period, insuring its success. Shirley was a few credits away from a master’s degree when she began taking a nationally-advertised diet preparation which damaged her heart. She filed suite and was awarded millions of dollars, but never regained her health. A few years later, in 2002, at age 67, she passed away. Following her death, a compilation of her work, Queen of the Organ: Shirley Scott, was released by Prestige. She listened to my jazz program regularly, and offered compliments. She once autographed one of her albums for me, writing, “Bob, as long as you do what you do, I can do what I do.” Shirley gave her own meaning to the phrase, “Great Scott!” ■

Bob Perkins is a writer and host of an all-jazz radio program that airs on WRTI-FM 90.1 Mon.–Thurs. night from 6 to 9pm and Sunday, 11–3pm. 54

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HARPER’S M

FINDINGS By Rafil Kroll-Zaidi

A compendium of research facts

STUDIES SUGGESTED THAT THE elderly overestimate their driving abilities, possess a distinctive smell whose disagreeable properties do not originate in the underarms, and sometimes die of loneliness. Following research that found people underestimate the length of their fingers when their hands are hidden, a volunteer amputee was found to underestimate the length of her hidden phantom fingers. The children of older fathers may live longer and have longer telomeres, children exposed to open cooking fires exhibit impaired social and block-building skills, and sleepier professional athletes are less likely to stay with the teams that draft them. Some adults with sleep problems may simply be afraid of the dark. 40,800,000,000 pounds of total adult human biomass is due to excessive fatness. Hereditary inequality arose by 5,000 b.c. High social status accelerates the healing of male baboons’ wounds. Nations with a more prevalent belief in Heaven have higher crime rates, and those with a more prevalent belief in Hell have lower rates. Archaeologists in Bulgaria were increasingly confident that they had found part of the head of John the Baptist. In Israel, the bushytailed jird was seen spitting out sweet mignonette seeds. Neuroscientists blocked the pathological rage of mice. The Very Large Telescope produced new images of the War and Peace Nebula. ARKANSAN GOOSE 50 CENT survived being shot seven times. The male clubwinged manakin (Machaeropterus deliciosus), who sings by knocking together his heavy wing bones more than one hundred times per second, was found to possess unusually robust wing bones. Peacocks were suspected of communicating via the infrasonic rumblings of their trains, and of issuing copulatory hoots even when alone, in hopes of enticing females. Inbreeding threatened the meerkats of the Kalahari. Genetic testing confirmed that the sequestration of Dogon wives in menstruation huts helps Dogon husbands ensure paternity. The transmission of HIV to infants via breastfeeding was, in light of evidence of the intrinsic antiviral properties of breast milk, now more plausibly blamed on cracked nipples. Surgeons at France’s Poissy–Saint-Germain-enLaye hospital reported success in building new clitorises for victims of clitoridectomy. A dolphin in the Ionian Sea freed its genitals from an octopus. Scotland was increasingly sown with rape. MARINE BIOLOGISTS, BY FAILING to clean their submersible, accidentally introduced Californian mollusks to the deep seas off Washington, and possibly also introduced copepods who prey on mollusk gonads. “It’s really embarrassing,” said a team member. “But it didn’t seem like a clear and present danger.” Researchers turned a snail into a 7-milliwatt battery that can be recharged by feeding the snail or by allowing it thirty minutes’ rest. Fathead minnows exposed to low levels of SSRI antidepressants become somewhat autistic. Dolphins downwind of power plants are more mercurial. The dolphins of Cardigan Bay had learned to anticipate discharges of whelk waste from a seafood factory. Young scallops were unusually numerous in the Mid-Atlantic. Brittle stars locomote bilaterally. Hundreds of starving crown-of-thorns starfish killed themselves in Japan. The Dumfries and Galloway Constabulary concluded that a koi theft in the village of Heck had been committed by an otter, and archaeologists announced the discovery of Scotland’s first cursing stone. Nine turtle couples were found to have been fossilized 47 million years ago while having sex.

day trip

DAN HUGOS

Stars of Fusion Come Together in Rare Opera House Concert Fans of fusion jazz understandably get excited about the thought of three of the greats performing together: guitarist Larry Coryell, bassist Victor Bailey, and drummer Lenny White. Collectively, they are a merging of some of the most incendiary talents on the music scene, capable of virtually anything. The Mauch Chunk Opera House in Jim Thorpe brings them together for an exclusive performance on Saturday, September 8. Formerly the founder of The Eleventh House, Larry Coryell deserves a special place in music history. He brought a hard-edged, cutting tone, phrasing and note-bending that owed as much to blues, rock and even country as it did to earlier, smoother bop influences. Yet as a true eclectic, armed with a brilliant technique, he is comfortable in almost every style, covering almost every base from the most decibel-heavy, distortionladen electric work to the most delicate, soothing, intricate lines on acoustic guitar. When the jazz supergroup Weather Report replaced Jaco Pastorius with Victor Bailey, the new bassist bore a heavy burden on his then 16-year-old shoulders. But from this point onwards, Bailey’s name was known worldwide. This was doubtless helped by not restricting himself to playing strictly in jazz fusion bands. To this day, Bailey performs with artists from the worlds of jazz, R&B, hip-hop and pop, such as Chick Corea, Branford Marsalis, Grover Washington Jr. , Sean “Puffy” Combs, Mary J. Blige and Madonna. Lenny White is still best Larry Coryell (guitar), Victor Bailey (bass) and Lenny White (drums). known for being part of Chick Corea’s Return To Forever in the 1970s. White was self-taught on drums and he largely started his career on top, playing regularly with Jackie McLean and recording Bitches Brew with Miles Davis in 1969. White was soon working with some of the who’s who of jazz, including Freddie Hubbard, Joe Henderson, Woody Shaw, Gato Barbieri, Gil Evans, Stanley Clarke and Stan Getz. As a member of Return To Forever during 1973-76, White gained a strong reputation as one of the top fusion drummers, but he was always versatile enough to play in many settings. Coryell, Bailey, and White’s most recent release was Electric, in which the performances take front and center. The mix of jazz, funk, and rock tunes is infectious, especially when played with such incendiary inspiration. The combination of such highly-regarded talents that produced Electric, come together once again for a rare and anticipated performance at the Opera House. ■ Select seats and order tickets at MauchChunkOperaHouse.com or call 570-325-0249 for more information. Artist biographies excerpted from Allmusic.com

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The Los Angeles Times Sunday Crossword Puzzle GOING DAFFY By Marti Duguay-Carpenter Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis

1 5 11 14 19 20 21 22 23 26 27 28 30 31 32 35 38 39 40 41 44 47 50 51 52 54 55 59 60 62 63 65 66 67 68 70 71 74 75 77 78 81 82 83 84 85 87 88 89 90 91 97 100 101 102

ACROSS Bon mot Supplies with gear Spa sounds Class without struggle Ticklish Muppet Gopher’s route Fire The sun, for one Quite somber Independence Day? Garden hose gasket Was perfectly tailored Senators’ holdings Cornerstone word Held title to Expandable waistline, say? Golf gimme Corner Bart Simpson’s grampa Common blood type, briefly Set up for a fall Cape Cod feature Dietary supp. watchdog Car registration datum “Return of the Jedi” dancer Like always Sooner than, to a bard Ghost from outer space? Lean Fence-sit Conserve, in a way Short hops They’re often full of hot air Stick (on) Bubbly mixer Diminished Soda bottle size Chat with colleagues Award coveted on “Mad Men” Big bag of wind? Penn of “Harold & Kumar” films Yellowstone feature Deal Polynesian pendant Country W. of Somalia Posh Rubbernecked Break __: take the lead RNC’s group Navy mascot Else Jet bridge? Part of an act “Say it isn’t so!” They may be tall Tick off

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106 108 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 24 25 29 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 53 55 56

Light bulb units The truth about Zeus, Apollo, etc.? “Un Ballo in Maschera” aria Capable, facetiously Incapably Had too much Scout’s mission Uneffusive Blood pressure elevator Cold War news service DOWN Comedian Foxworthy Cliff-dwelling race in a 2002 film Blue stuff Storied surprise winner Patriot Allen Bartlett specialty In need of nourishment, most likely “Picnic” playwright A pop ’70s radical gp. with a seven-headed cobra symbol “__ From the Bridge”: Miller Try to whack Rocker Patty married to John McEnroe It may be inflated Equally unlikely Undercover op “Live at the Acropolis” musician Incandescent bulb gas Word with mining or steel Cognac bottle letters Inconsequential Test for M.A. hopefuls “Totally awesome!” Help with a heist Brings to heel Needing assembly Texas Hold’em player’s confidence? Counterfeiter-catching agt. Like most mailed letters Agitates On the calmer side Pretense Pay to play Ebenezer’s epithet Parisian pals? Parking lot misfortune Does sum work Tweezers holders Together, to Toscanini Rage

57 58 61 63 64 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 75 76 79 80 82 85 86 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96

Trip odometer button Rogers rival Some singers Shocked Egyptian royal cross One of five in a kids’ rhyme Tannish gray Snow shoveling aftermath, maybe Bad thing on a record Austrian city with a torte named after it This puzzle’s honoree, for one Jack of “The Great Dictator” Hard worker Cambridge sch. Exam for future docs Poke Hit the ball hard Ore-Ida item Army sack? Bowl cheer Capri attraction Deep cut Most fit to serve Leafy alcove ORD, on an airline ticket Bit of high jinks Handles Mayan calendar symbol, e.g. Trivial

97 98 99 102 103 104 105

Vibrating night sound Biceps exercises Ed Asner septet Get an __ effort 1871 Cairo premiere Sandal revelations Cuts off

107 Icarus’s undoing 109 Tape player spec. 110 “Just kidding!”

Answer in next month’s issue.

Answer to August’s puzzle, DOUBLE OVERTIME

HARPER’S M

INDEX Facts compiled by the editors of Harper’s Magazine

Percentage increase in average annual federal spending during the Obama Administration : 2.4 Rank of that rate of increase among the lowest under any president since Truman : 1 Cost of staging the 2012 London Olympic Games as estimated by the British government in 2003 : $3,700,000,000 Cost as currently estimated by the British government : $14,600,000,000 As estimated by an independent study : $37,000,000,000 Date after which Olympic athletes will be banned from promoting any brand, product, or service on Twitter : 7/15/2012 Estimated number of “brand police” tasked with covering over logos and monitoring social media during the games : 250 Chance that an American between the ages of 18 and 34 thinks Facebook is “likely to fade away” : 1 in 2 Percentage change over the past fifty years in the number of hours U.S. college students spend working : +44 In the number of hours they spend studying : –59 Percentage of top 40 songs from the 1960s that were written in a major key : 85 From the 2000s that were : 43 Portion of all Americans with hepatitis C who were born between 1945 and 1965 : 2/3 Factor by which the number of American babies born addicted to opiates has increased since 2000 : 3 Projected gross revenue of the U.S. fertility industry in 2013 : $4,260,000,000 Rank of the United States among the world’s largest exporters of human sperm : 1 Tons of Greek-style yogurt spilled on a New York State highway after a truck crash in May : 18 Number of hours worked annually by the average Greek worker : 2,032 Rank of this number among the highest in the Eurozone : 1 Number of bullets fired at human targets by German police in 2011 : 36 Rank of rhinoplasty among the most common cosmetic surgical procedures performed on British men : 1 Rank of breast reduction : 2 Estimated percentage of jokes made by female managers that get laughs, according to a British study : 20 By male managers : 90 Portion of French president François Hollande’s new cabinet members who are women : 1/2 Portion of U.S. cabinet members : 1/4 Of Japanese cabinet members : 1/17 Number of days a juvenile penguin eluded Japanese authorities after escaping from an aquarium in March : 82 Percentage of Russians who say having a strong leader is more important than having democracy : 57 Minimum number of U.S. states whose constitutions forbid atheists from holding public office : 6 Percentage of Americans who believe that anti-American speech should be protected by the Constitution : 45 Number of people stopped and frisked by the NYPD last year for “furtive movements” : 351,739 For wearing “clothes commonly used in a crime” : 31,555 Number of accidental 911 calls made in New York City last year by cell phones in pockets or purses : 3,910,373 Number of reopened U.S. felony investigations that have resulted in exoneration since 1989 : 901 Average number of years each exonerated felon spent in prison : 11 Amount that Pakistan fined each of Osama bin Laden’s widows for their illegal stay in the country : $110 Percentage of U.S. veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan seeking disability benefits : 45 Number of private U.S. citizens killed in terrorist attacks in 2010 : 15 Number killed by falling televisions : 16

Index Sources 1,2 Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (Washington); 3,4 National Audit Office (London); 5 Sky News (London); 6 International Olympic Committee (Lausanne, Switzerland); 7 Olympic Delivery Authority (London); 8 Associated Press (Washington); 9,10 Philip Babcock, University of California, San Diego; 11,12 Glenn Schellenberg, University of Toronto; 13 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Atlanta); 14 Stephen Patrick, University of Michigan (Ann Arbor); 15 Marketdata Enterprises (Tampa, Fla.); 16 California Cryobank (Los Angeles); 17 Chobani (Norwich, N.Y.); 18,19 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (Washington)/Harper’s research; 20 Conference of Ministers of Interior States (Schwerin, Germany); 21,22 British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons (London); 23,24 Judith Baxter, Aston University (Aston, England); 25–27 Harper’s research; 28 Tokyo Sea Life Park; 29 Pew Research Center Global Attitudes Project (Washington); 30 Harper’s research; 31 Ipsos Public Affairs (Washington); 32,33 New York Civil Liberties Union (N.Y.C.); 34 Winbourne Consulting (Arlington, Va.); 35,36 Sam Gross, University of Michigan Law School (Ann Arbor); 37 Embassy of Pakistan (Washington); 38 U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs; 39 National Counterterrorism Center (McLean, Va.); 40 Consumer Product Safety Commission (Bethesda, Md.). SEPTEMBER 2012

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31 / INTERVIEW / ART IN THE AGE OF TECHNOLOGICAL PROPULSION

know how. I had to learn like a monkey. For the first week, it was just, like, complete cartoon words and symbols, and they would laugh their asses off.” Just weeks ago, Sarandon personally verified her Twitter account, following two years of two separate users posing as her on the site (“I’m sure they were better at it than me,” she quips). She updates occasionally about film projects and philanthropy (she’s long been associated with a boatload of charities, including Habitat for Humanity and The Trevor Project), but she keeps off the web when it comes to Sarandon news. “I don’t want to know what people are saying on blogs,” she says. “I don’t want to see chatter about me. It just completely terrifies me. When people say mean things about me who don’t even know me, I’d rather not know about it. I’m not that thick-skinned. I just don’t read anything. I don’t go online or Google myself or any of that. I’d rather just stay in my own little reality.” With Langella’s fears of convenience-driven alienation, and Schreier’s endorsement of firstrate home theaters, the notion of little personal realities in the age of full-speed-ahead technology is another theme that hovers over the afternoon. In Robot & Frank, the pivotal, housemaid-like device bridges the gap between lonesome techie dependence and vital world connection, as the robot becomes Frank’s only friend, yet reintroduces him to a reality he cantankerously shunned. Inspired by true events now unfolding in Japan, where robot caretakers are being developed to aid a growing abundance of senior citizens, Robot & Frank presents everyone with what many will see as an ethical question: Would you want your parents’ goldenyears reality to involve the care of a robot? And furthermore, would you want a robot taking care of you? “I think a lot of older people are using their TVs as robots,” Sarandon says. “They’re [TVs are] on all day keeping them company and the people aren’t even doing the dishes. They have a relationship with their TVs. I would get [a robot] for my mom. She’s 89 and Frank Langella. lives in one of those assisted communities. She’s not with a caretaker all the time, but she’s had a few medical issues, so she’s a little precarious. Someone comes in every morning for a few hours and makes sure things are okay. If she had a robot, it could get things done for her, but she might be freaked out by it. Maybe by the time I need a robot I won’t be freaked out by it. Certainly, my kids wouldn’t think anything of having the robot as a nanny. I think if I had a robot who could do the dishes and cook gourmet meals and clean my toilets, that would be fabulous. I don’t see anything wrong with that.” Langella, of course, disagrees. “I think we’re going in the wrong direction,” the actor says. “The more you give us socalled help in every form, not just robotic help, but chemical help and pills and things to open the door for us, the less helpful it is. Everything tells us that we’re too busy to help ourselves, and the more that this is happening, the more human beings are going backward, not forward. You take away all the essentials of life from people, the necessities of life, and pretty soon you get robotic people. People will become robotic. It would be especially interesting to see what would happen if no one were able to communicate in any way but one-on-one. Certainly, there’d be more babies born. Parents and children would talk more to each other. Old people would talk to young people. It would probably be like it was when I grew up in the 1940s: you sat around the table, and hated it, but something was right about that in terms of communication.” “I’m not of the mind that things are worse now,” Schreier retorts. “I mean, they’re different, but I always feel like there’s a way to look at it where there’s something that makes up for what gets lost.” “But you weren’t there then,” Langella says. n 58

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calendar CALL TO ARTISTS Accepting applications for Arts Festival Reading, GoggleWorks Center for the Arts, 201 Washington St., Reading, PA. Quality craftsmanship in traditional and contemporary styles. Accepting artists until full, space limited. For application, artsfestivalreading.org or call 610-374-4600, ext.104 ART EXHIBITS THRU 9/7 The Baum School of Art Faculty Exhibition. The Baum School of Art, 510 Linden St., Allentown, PA 18101. baumschool.org THRU 9/9 Interlude, paintings by Melissa M. Bryant. Twenty-Two Gallery, 236 So. 22nd St., Phila. 215-772-1911. twentytwogallery.com THRU 9/30 Alex Kanevsky: Artist, Curator, Juror. Woodmere Art Museum, 9201 Germantown Avenue, Phila. (215) 2470476. woodmereartmuseum.org THRU 9/30 Elise Dodeles: Fearless. Fighters’ portraits using inspiration from photos of San Francisco area boxers from the Olympic Club taken 1910-1930. The Quiet Life Gallery, 17 So. Main St., Lambertville. 609-397-0880. quietlifegallery.com THRU 9/30 Summers Passing, SFA Gallery, 10 Bridge St., Suite 7, Frenchtown, NJ. 908-268-1700. sfagallery.com THRU 10/1 Artwork by Si Lewen. Meet Si Lewen 10/13, 2-4pm. Kardon Gallery, 139 South Main Street, Doylestown, PA (a branch of the Si Lewen Museum, Bethlehem, PA.) Wed.-Sat. 10-6, Sun. 12-6, and by appt. 215-489-4287. kardongallery.com THRU 10/1 Netherfield Fine Art features works by fine artist Jessie Krause. 11 East Bridge St., New Hope, PA. 215-8624500. Netherfieldfineart.com THRU 10/14 I Look, I Listen: Works on Paper by Marlene Miller. Michener Art Museum, 138 S. Pine St., Doylestown, PA 215-340-9800. michenerartmuseum.org THRU 10/18 California Impressionism: Masters of Light. Arthur Ross Gallery, University of Pennsylvania, 220 S. 34th St., Phila., PA. upenn.edu/ARG

9/1-9/30 Jane Gilday Show, New Works. Metropolitan Fine Art, Rte. 202 So. & 263 (opp. Penn’s Purchase), Lahaska, PA. 267-544-0882. themetfa.com 9/2-10/28 Kim Keever. Lafayette College, Williams Center Gallery, Easton, PA. Photographs of landscapes assembled inside a water-filled tank. 610330-5361. http://galleries.lafayette.edu.

9/26-10/7 Arsenic and Old Lace. Act 1 Performing Arts, DeSales University, Labuda Center, Main Stage, 2755 Station Ave., Center Valley, PA. 610-282-3192. desales.edu/act1 9/29 Louie Anderson, 7pm. State Theatre, 453 Northampton St., Easton, PA. 610252-3132, 1-800-999-STATE. statetheatre.org

9/6-11/4 Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, by Brian Lav. Red Filter Fine Art Photography Gallery. Reception Sat., 9/8, 35. 74 Bridge Street, Lambertville, NJ 08530. 347-244-9758. redfiltergallery.com. Thur.-Sun. 12-5.

9/29-10/3 44 Plays for 44 Presidents. Muhlenberg College, Theatre & Dance. 2400 Chew St., Allentown, PA. 484-664-3333. muhlenberg.edu/theatre

9/8-9/29 Hidden Places. Oils by J. Stacy Rogers. Opening reception, Sat., 9/8, 5-8pm & Sun., 9/9, 12-4 pm. Travis Gallery, 6089 Lower York Rd. (Rt. 202), New Hope, PA, 18938. Wed.-Sat. 10-5. 215-794-3903. travisgallery.com

Saturday nights: Sette Luna Restaurant, 219 Ferry St., Easton, PA. 610253-8888. setteluna.com

9/8-10/7 Dot Bunn; Solo. Featuring all new work. Opening reception Sat., 9/8, 58pm. Patricia Hutton Galleries. 47 West State St., Doylestown, PA. 215348-1728. PatriciaHuttonGalleries.com 9/12-10/19 Max Ginsburg, The Social Realist Master. Artist demonstration: Painting a Portrait from Life, 3-6pm. No charge, RSVP by 9/10. Opening reception 6-8pm. The Baum School of Art, 510 Linden St., Allentown, PA. 610-433-0032, www.baumschool.org 9/14-10/7 Forsaken Waters. Photographs by Derek Jecxz. Reception 9/14, 6-9. Twenty-Two Gallery, 236 So. 22nd St., Phila. PA 215-772-1911. twenty-twogallery.com 10/13 & 10/14 Sweet Edge Sculpture Tour. Six of New Hope area’s finest contemporary sculptors open their studios to the public. George Anthonisen, Constance Bassett, David Cann, Raymond Mathis, John McDevitt, Steven Snyder, 267-337-1818, sweetedgesculpture.com.

THEATER 9/7-10/7 Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike. Starring David Hyde Pierce and Sigourney Weaver. McCarter Theater, 91 University Place, Princeton, NJ. 609258-2787. mccarter.org.

DINNER & MUSIC

Thursday nights: John Beacher’s Community Stage, 8-12pm, Community Stage sign ups, 9pm: Solo act, 8-9pm. Karla’s, 5 W. Mechanic St., New Hope. 215-862-2612. karlasnewhope.com

9/29 Ballet Folklorico De Mexico. Zoellner Arts Center, Lehigh University, 420 E. Packer Ave., Bethlehem, PA. 610-7582787. zoellnerartscenter.org 9/29 The Four Seasons by Vivaldi and works by Wagner, DeFalla, 7:30 p.m. Pennsylvania Sinfonia Orchestra, First Presbyterian Church, 3231 W. Tilghman St., Allentown, PA. Tickets- $15$30 in advance/at door. 610 434-7811. PASinfonia.org 9/30 & 10-/1 Haydn, Symphony No. 96 in D major and Beethoven, Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 61. Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, Perelman Theater, Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, Broad St., Phila. cop.org

Some organizations perform in various locations. If no address is listed, check the website for location of performance.

10/20 GALA! Save the date. An evening with Katharine McPhee. Zoellner Arts Center, Lehigh University. 610-7582787. gala2012@lehigh.edu

9/8 Rock of Ages. Zoellner Arts Center, Lehigh University, 420 E. Packer Ave., Bethlehem, PA. 610-758-2787. zoellnerartscenter.org

ARTSQUEST CENTER AT STEELSTACKS (Musikfest Café) 101 Founders Way, Bethlehem, PA 610-332-1300. artsquest.org

9/14 Escher String Quartet with Benjamin Hochman, piano: 8pm. Foy Concert Hall, Moravian College, W. Church & Main St., Historic Bethlehem, PA. Tickets available at door or at www.lvartsboxoffice.org. Chamber Music Society of Bethlehem. cmsob.org 9/15 Cyrille Aimee & Diego Figueiredo, Zoellner Arts Center. Lehigh University, 420 E. Packer Ave., Bethlehem, PA. 610-758-2787. zoellnerartscenter.org 9/16 The Duke Street Brass Quintet, 4p.m. $10 suggested donation. Arts at St. John’s. St. John’s Lutheran Church, 37 So. Fifth St., Allentown, PA. 610-4351641. stjohnsallentown.org

9/15: 9/22: 9/27:

9/29: 10/5: 10/6: 10/12: 10/13: 10/14:

10/19:

10/20 10/19 Concertante, Chamber Music Society of Bethlehem, 8pm. Foy Concert Hall, Moravian College, W. Church & Main St., Historic Bethlehem, PA. Tickets available at door or at www.lvartsboxoffice.org. Chamber Music Society of Bethlehem. cmsob.org

MUSIC

9/9 Arias for Animals. Christina Lamberti & friends, 4p.m, $25, $20 suggested donation. Arts at St. John’s. St. John’s Lutheran Church, 37 So. Fifth St., Allentown, PA. 610-435-1641. stjohnsallentown.org

9/2: 9/8:

9/6: 9/7 9/8 9/12: 9/18: 9/20:

9/23: 9/28: 9/29 10/3: 10/6 10/10: 10/14: 10/18: 10/31:

Artist Fund Benefit Concert A Salute to the Rolling Stones Sister Hazel Hannibal Burress Ramin Karimloo - Songs of the Human Heart Kathy Mattea The Robert Cray Band and Kenny Wayne Shepherd (Levitt Pavilion Benefit Concert) John Waite / John Parr / Tommy Tutone Patton Oswalt Al Jarreau Leftover Salmon Garfunkel and Oates Jars of Clay Los Lonely Boys The Smithereens Keb’ Mo’

10/21 10/26 10/27

The Allentown Band CBW - Larry Coryell, Victor Bailey and Lenny White Real Diamond - The Tribute to Neil Diamond Enter the Haggis The Fishtank Ensemble (Gypsy Jazz, Siberian anthems, Flamenco) The John Denver Tribute Pianist Dr. George Fiore The Battlefield Band Donna The Buffalo Ryan Shupe and the Rubberband Manhattan Lyric Opera Rodgers to Romberg to Webber An Evening with Jonathan Edwards and Michael Martin Murphey Simon and Garfunkel Retrospective Swearingen & Kelli The Badlees Badge: The Eric Clapton Retrospective

READINGS 9/15, 6 p.m. Poets Ross Gay & Chris Mattingly. Ross Gay’s books include the poetry collections Against Which (CavanKerry Press, 2006) and Bringing the Shovel Down (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2011). Chris Mattingly is the author of the chapbooks Ad Hoc (selected by Ross Gay) and A Light for Your Beacon (both from Q Avenue Press). Panoply Books, 46 N. Union St., Lambertville NJ (609) 397-1145. panoplybooks.com EVENTS 9/22 Mixology Social, 2-4 p.m. The Art of Mixing Drinks. Chaddsford Winery, Peddler’s Village, shop #20, Street Rd., Lahaska, PA. R.S.V.P. required, $20 per person. 215-794-9655. 10/6 5th Annual Pottery Festival, 9-4pm. Stahl’s Pottery Preservation Society, 6826 Corning Rd., Zionsville, PA. 610-965-5019. stahlspottery.org. 10/22 Autumn Alive, 10am-4pm, Downtown Quakertown, PA. Kid’s rides, street performers, cupcake wars, pet parade, scarecrow contest, petting zoo, live music, arts & crafts vendors, food. Raindate 10/27, 10-4. 215-536-2273. quakertownalive.com

MAUCH CHUNK OPERA HOUSE One of America’s oldest vaudeville theaters, built in 1881. 14 West Broadway, Jim Thorpe, PA 570-325-0249. mauchchunkoperahouse.com SEPTEMBER 2012

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