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Contents 26

OCTOBER ~ 2011

interviews Susan Orlean I 26 The author of The Orchid Thief talks about her obsession with Rin Tin Tin

Low Cut Connie I 28 They see themselves as the Rocky Balboa of bands and they’re waiting for their title shot.

Bad Movie: A Matador’s Mistress I 22 Film

Roundup I 24 Thunder Soul 50/50 Sholem Aleichem Bellflower

Food & Wine

Susan Orlean

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An Amusement Park for the Senses I 30 How the Asian pear came to America.

Fright Nights I 32 Gear up for Halloween with a choice selection of superior horror movies.

day/weekend trip I 59 the last word I 60 Etcetera Harper’s INDEX I 45 L.A. Times Sunday Crossword I 44

Ooka I 37

Harper’s FINDINGS I 59

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Essay A Spoonful of Oatmeal I 40

Dave Barry A Fun-Free Halloween I 42

About Life Dealing With Anger I 47

departments

Music

Politics & Opinion

Classical Notebook I 50

Maria Callas

Historic Met Opera Recordings

Eugene Robinson I 5 E.J. Dionne Jr. I 5 Lexicrockery I 53

George Benson

The Hudson Valley I 36 Union Trust I 38

FEATUREs

Tim Mayer

Jazz Library: Lionel Hampton I 48

Ruth Rodale Spira and Joel Spira, founder of Lutron and Subarashi Kudamono orchards.

Keresman on Disc I 52 Low-Cut Connie

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Art

Travis & Fripp

Anchor Holding I 7 Exhibitions I 8 Pastors & Patriots I 9 Fertile Ground I 10

Mickey Newbury

Mia Doi Todd

Kali Z. Fasteau

Alessi’s Ark

Stage

Singer / Songwriter I 54

Aspects of Love I 12

Lindsey Buckingham

Regional Theater I 14

Guy Clark

Ry Cooder

Film Reel

Nosferatu 4

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Jackie DeShannon

News I 16 The Tourist The Conspirator The Tree of Life Armadillo

Tom Hambridge

Nick’s Picks I 56

Sam Yahel

The Jimmy Amadie Trio

Cinematters: Contagion I 18

Deep Blue Organ Trio

Keresman on Film: Straw Dogs I 20

Shirley Crabbe

ON THE COVER: John Fulton Folinsbee (18921972), Bowman’s Hil (detail)l, 1936-37, oil on canvas, James A. Michener Art Museum. Gift of Marguerite and Gerry Lenfest. Copyright 2007 John F. Folinsbee Art Trust. Page 10

opinion

Obama’s tax plan is common sense, not class warfare Obama and the art of rational choices eugene robinson

E.J. DIONNE JR.

“Class warfare!” scream the Republicans, in a voice usually reserved for phrases such as “Run for your lives!”

Spare us the histrionics. The GOP and its upper-crust patrons have been waging an undeclared but devastating war against middle-class, working-class and poor Americans for decades. Now they scream bloody murder at the notion that long-suffering victims might finally hit back.

President Obama’s proposal to boost taxes for the wealthy by $1.5 trillion over the next decade is a good first step toward reforming a system in which billionaire hedgefund executives are taxed at a lower rate than are their chauffeurs and private chefs.

Republicans whine that, since they oppose raising taxes on the rich—and control the House of Representatives, which can block such legislation—Obama’s proposal should be seen as political, not substantive. This is just a campaign initiative, they say, not a “serious” plan to address the nation’s financial and economic woes.

But that’s pure solipsism: Whatever does not fit the GOP’s worldview is, by definition, illegitimate. By this standard, Obama could propose only measures that are in the Republican Party’s platform—which obviously would defeat the purpose of being elected president as a progressive Democrat in the first place.

If you keep trying something and it doesn’t work and you are a rational person, you change course. President Obama is a rational person. His rip-roaring budget speech was a rational response to the failures of the past eight months. Republicans accused him of “class warfare” because he said the rich should pay more in taxes. When Republicans start saying “class warfare,” it almost always means that a Democrat is doing something right.

Obama’s aides insist that the president had little choice until now but to try to conciliate with the Republicans because they held in their hands the power to cause enormous damage. Obama made the budget deal early this year, they say, because he thought it would be bad for the economy to start off the new Congress with a government shutdown. And he had to make a debt-ceiling deal because the country couldn’t afford default. Now, they say, he has the freedom to bargain hard, and that’s what he doing.

There is something to this, although it doesn’t take into account other moments when the president engaged in a strategy of making preemptive concessions, giving away stuff before he even negotiated. (I’d argue that this tendency goes all the way back to the stimulus package.) But for now, it’s simply a relief for many—especially for the people who support the president—to see him coming out tough and casting himself

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icon 5 / opinion / the art of rational choices

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

Outside of the Republican echo chamber, polls consistently show the American people consider unemployment to be the nation’s most urgent problem, not deficits and debt. Obama was on target with the American Jobs Act he proposed this month; the only question was what took him so long.

Americans do have long-term concerns about debt, however, and by large margins they see an obvious solution: a balanced combination of spending cuts and tax increases. In other words, they want precisely the kind of approach that House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) rejected during the debt-ceiling fight—and that he vows to reject again.

Why did Republicans begin squawking about class warfare even before Obama had a chance to announce his proposals? Because by calling on the rich to pay “their fair share” of taxes, the president has hit upon a clear and simple way to illustrate how unequal and unfair our society has become.

Since the beginning of the Reagan years, the share of total income captured by the top one percent of earners has doubled while the share taken by the bottom 80 percent has fallen. The rich are getting richer at the expense not only of the poor but of the middle class as well.

Studies demonstrating this trend tend to be dry and, let’s face it, sleep-inducing. But the perverse disparity in tax rates between the super-rich and the rest of us is enough to grab anyone’s attention.

The very wealthy earn much of their income through dividends and capital gains, which are taxed at 15 percent. This low rate would apply specifically to a wildly successful hedge-fund manager who made, say, $50 million last year. By contrast, an insurance company executive who made $500,000—just one percent of what the hedge-fund manager took home—would pay a top marginal income tax rate of 35 percent. Even a teacher who made just $50,000—0.1 percent of the hedge-fund haul—would pay a top marginal rate of 25 percent.

Obama proposes tax legislation that would erase this disparity.

He also vows that, unless Congress enacts comprehensive—and fair—tax reform, he will allow the Bush tax cuts for households earning more than $250,000 a year to expire at the end of 2012.

The overall plan that Obama announced Monday would cut deficits by about $4 trillion over the next ten years—without gutting programs that bolster the middle class and aid the poor. New tax revenue and money saved from ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan make up most of the total.

Obama’s proposed savings in Medicare and Medicaid are modest and tailored so that their impact is progressive. The president correctly decided that ensuring Social Security’s long-term solvency should proceed on a separate track. All this should be heartening to those who really want to preserve these vital programs.

The headline from Obama’s plan, though, is the call for wealthy Americans to pay taxes like everybody else. If Republicans believe the current system is fine, Obama said, “they should be called out. They should have to defend that unfairness. They ought to have to answer for it.”

We’ve already heard their answer.

And we’ve heard Obama’s retort: “This is not class warfare. It’s math.” n 6

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as someone with a set of principles. And it was a political imperative, too. His image as a strong leader was faltering, and he was starting to lose support within his own party. He can’t win in 2012 (or govern very effectively before the election) if he looks weak and if his own party is tepid about him. On Monday, he began to solve both problems.

And as Ezra Klein and Greg Sargent point out, Obama may get more done by starting from a position of strength—by stating flatly and clearly what he’s seeking—instead of beginning with concessions and then having to concede even more. In the recent past, he allowed Republicans to control the terms of the debate. This time, he’s trying to set them. That’s usually a better way to get something closer to what you actually want.

The Republican cries about “class warfare” reflect their awareness that if Obama can get them into an argument over why they don’t want to raise taxes on the wealthy, the GOP starts out behind.

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Obama will get grief in some quarters over two decisions for which I think he deserves credit. The first was his giving up, for now at least, on the idea of raising the age at which Americans are eligible for Medicare to 67 from 65. The original rationale was that Americans in the age category who could not get private coverage would pick it up through the Affordable Care Act and its subsidies.

Put aside that (1.) it’s very hard for anyone to get affordable health insurance coverage once they pass 55 or 60, and (2.) we shouldn’t be doing anything that risks increasing the number of uninsured. The fact is, we don’t even know yet if the Affordable Care Act will survive long enough to take effect in 2014. We don’t know what the courts will do. And we don’t know if the president will be reelected. A Republican president with a Republican Congress will certainly try to repeal the law.

If the new health system takes effect, and if it can be strengthened with time, it may well make sense to move the younger and more affluent among the elderly to the new plan.

(And who knows? Someday we may have a comprehensive national insurance plan.) In the meantime, let’s keep people in that category covered by keeping them in Medicare. There will be plenty of time to revisit the issue of health-care costs. It’s an issue we’ll be revisiting for years, maybe decades, anyway.

Obama is also getting hit for using the end of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq to count up $1.1 trillion in savings. You can argue about how the math works, but I like the fact that this makes clear that there are big costs to continuing our interventions. It challenges those who say we should draw down our troops more slowly to come up with ways of paying for the wars. We should have passed a temporary war tax long ago. Obama is once again making clear that the days of putting wars on a credit card are over. n

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Fine Arts Editors Edward Higgins

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

Mark Keresman Bob Perkins Tom Wilk Theater Critic David Schultz Food Editor Wine Editor

Robert Gordon Patricia Savoie

A.D. Amorosi Contributing Writers Robert Beck Jack Byer Ralph Collier Peter Croatto James P. Delpino Sally Friedman Geoff Gehman George Oxford Miller Thom Nickels R. Kurt Osenlund

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 2011 by Prime Time Publishing Co., Inc.

a thousand words

story and painting by robert beck

Anchor Holding

1938 Sept.19. Monday. Flat calm. Raining. Bar. 30. Warm. Thick fog, but luminous as though the sun were not far behind it. Four slender cormorants are sitting in a row and preening themselves on a mooring buoy within fifty feet of the boat.

My thoughts have been with William Lathrop all day, from when I first stepped outside and was struck by the dense stillness. There was no breeze, no gentle rustling of leaves overhead, and no birds or squirrels in sight. It doesn’t surprise me that animals know when a big storm is coming. You can hear a lot when it’s quiet.

3:20 P.M. It has been a day of mixed sun and fog, quite warm. Light S.E. wind. So much sun this A.M. that I shook out my main sail, which was very wet.

I keep a copy of these last four pages of Lathrop’s sailing log on my desk where it can catch my eye, and I read it often. It chronicles the last days of his trip off the eastern shore of Long Island, in a sailboat Robert Beck maintains a gallery and academy in Lambertville, NJ. robert@robertbeck.net

named Widge that he built in his yard just down the road from where I live.

Sept. 20. Tuesday. Slight S.E. wind.

Broken sky with some misty sunlight. Bar. 29–95 and falling. It has been a day of beautiful but disquieting skies. At the edge of dark tonight Anderson got a radio report of a hurricane coming up the coast and already north of Hatteras with easterly gales! It was decided that the best place for me was in the lee of Indian Hill on the east side of the Pond, and that I must get there at once before night set in. I cut my mooring line with the hatchet, got up sail and away in the teeth of a dangerous looking squall coming from the S.E. which broke and drench me just as I was trying to anchor and get down sail. So here I am and feeling decidedly uneasy. It will be an anxious night.

Hurricane Irene made contact with the East Coast today—a rendezvous breathlessly heralded by television nonstop—and it will hit the mid-Atlantic region in a matter of hours. I’m not on a 20-ft. sailboat like Lathrop was, but Irene is a dangerous storm that will do a lot of damage. I am feeling decidedly uneasy myself.

Sept. 21. Wednesday. Wind almost due South bringing with it much mist and fog. Bar. 29-65. The night was windy and rough. But not too bad, and tho I did not take off my clothes I got a good bit of sleep. I am anchored directly in front of the Wazey place about 80 yds. from the end of their dock. Indian Hill looms directly behind. I can see cows grazing. Evidently they are unaware of radio alarms. Perhaps they are right and there is nothing to be alarmed about. I am already beginning to feel a bit irritable about the ten feet I cut off the end of my best hawser.

I have gathered everything from outside that could be taken-up by the wind, but my big concern is the very tall trees that surround my house, and the wet, soft ground. High winds could continue for 20 hours or so. Trees are going to come down, we will lose power, and roads will be impassable. There are questions many of us who live in the woods or near creeks and the river ask ourselves: do I stay to monitor damage; am I taking too big a risk?

10:15 A.M. Bar. 29-6. Blowing hard from S.S.E. But sun is shining brightly and I have my just washed dun-

garees drying in the rigging. I have the big anchor down with a long scope and it seems to hold perfectly.

Part of my attraction to Lathrop’s account is that I know what he didn’t. His handwriting deteriorates in the last two entries, I assume from the rough seas, the final one written heavily and probably with great effort. William Langson Lathrop’s log survived the hurricane, as did Widge, but his body washed up on shore a month later.

1 P.M. Bar. 29-36. Anchor still holds tho wind is ferocious. The two big trawlers have just come in to hug the eastern hills for shelter. Others are here or coming.

The log is a reminder of the spirit and vitality of the 79-year-old Lathrop, a man who left a big mark on the art world and without whom the history of painting in Bucks County would have taken a different direction. It also reminds me that regardless of thoughtful preparations there is often a point—not always visible—that once passed steals your ability to shape the future, leaving you without alternative, a passenger on the deaf and indifferent winds of fate.

2:30 Bar. 29!!

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exhibitions

Pumpkin, Squash, Iris, oil, 5 x 6

Elizabeth Across from Byram, 30 x 24, oil on linen

Entering Point Pleasant Travis Gallery Route 202, New Hope, PA

215-794-3903 travisgallery.com Wed-Sat, 10-5; Sunday 10/2, 12-4

October 1-29 / Gallery talk, 10/15, 1-3

Opening reception 10/1, 5-8 Daniel Anthonisen carries the tradition of Pennsylvania landscape painters, yet his vision is unique.

In large and small paintings, the effects of light, his unique perspective and his sensitivity to his surroundings are startling. Looking at an Anthonisen painting translates into instantaneous emotional involvement.

Anthonisen’s work is powerful, intimate and emotional. His focus is not limited to the river but to objects and places discovered near the river as well as people he meets who are enjoying or live near the river. “Painting for me is life as meditation,” says Anthonisen. “To be present and to inquire what I perceive as important; to ask why I gravitate to the subjects I paint, and why or how this is meaningful in my life. In this way, intuition can flow and this energy is channeled into creating something that can be of value for others.

Anthonisen’s work is in the permanent collections of Payne Gallery at Moravian College (2010) and the James A. Michener Art Museum, Doylestown, PA (2000). His work has been exhibited in New York City at the Salmagundi Club; the Antique Boat Museum, Clayton, New York; Albany Institute of History & Art, Albany; in Vermont at Lake Champlain Maritime Museum, Vergennes; in New Jersey at William Paterson University, Wayne; in Pennsylvania at the James A Michener Museum, Doylestown; Muhlenberg College, Allentown; Payne Gallery at Moravian College, Bethlehem.

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Landscapes: Italy, France & Maine

Carter Leidy Twenty Two Gallery

236 So. 22nd Street, Phila.

215-772-1911

twenty-twogallery.com

October 14-November, 6, 2011

Opening Reception10/14, 6-9 The artist’s principal influence in his paintings come from allowing himself to be completely taken over by music from the late/early 19th and 20th century composers while he paints. Each of the influential pieces of music are noted on the verso of each of his paintings. Mostly a landscape painter, his work covers topics that he loves from places that he loves, Vermont and the Maine coast with a few pieces from his recent travels to Venice, Verona & Croatia. He will be showing work from around the edges of the weather or time of day when things are most exciting to him due to the potential menacing violence which accompanies storms or the incredible colors at sunrise or sunset which appear to him similar to the energy released at any birth/death struggle.

Also, a choice of a few of his beautiful still life nature mort paintings will be included in this show, as well.

View from Camada Cliffs, ME, 8 x 12, oil

Balance

Serenity in Surrealism

Designs for Tranquility

41 Bridge St, Frenchtown, NJ

908-996-9990 designsfortranquility.com Through December 31, 2011 Artist’s Reception 10/15, 6-9 Serenity in Surrealism showcases the original oil paintings by internationally known artist, Evgeni Gordiets. Evgeni is applauded for creating a profound sense of calm with his dreamlike imagination, use of color, and a painting technique that brings amazing lighting effects and depth perception. Each painting exudes tranquility as it expresses the artist’s love for an idyllic balance between the beauty of nature and the human form.

Evgeni Gordiets, born in Kiev, Ukraine, was trained in the art institutes of the former Soviet Union. Evgeni was scouted as a child prodigy at the age of five. Gordiets was honored with numerous awards and grants ranging from First Prize in the United Nations exhibitions to a Top Artist Achievement Award of the Ukraine. His paintings are shown in many European, Russian, and Ukrainian museums.

Private and public collections throughout the U.S., Europe, Russia, Canada, Japan and Hong Kong also hold Evgeni’s work. His blend of surrealism and impressionism has brought Evgeni much deserved recognition since he arrived in America in 1991.

Garden with Yellow Flowers

art

Pastors & Patriots

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Medicine bottles from Halle, c. 1750. Courtesy of the Francke Foundations

Communion service of Augustus Lutheran Church, c. 1730–50

Portrait of Frederick Augustus Muhlenberg (1750–1801), attributed to Jacob Eichholtz (1776–1842), Lancaster, c. 1815.

ya aN Ny N y measure the muhlenberg family of Pennsylvania belongs to the highest rank of american dynasties well a ahead of the mid-20th century kennedys, the wannabes Bushes or any of the wealthy robber barons of this or older ages. here are generals, scientists, politicians, college professors and presidents, governors, pastors, ambassadors, doctors, numerous Congressmen, founders of hospitals and churches—and heading it all was henry melchior muhlenberg.

In 1942, at the bicentennial of his arrival in amer a ica, President franklin Delano roosevelt (no slouch himself in the prominent family game) proclaimed, “Clergymen, soldiers, scholars, and statesmen, the muhlenbergs have represented the best in our national life since the earliest days of the republic.” evidence for that high esteem is the exhibition now at the Berman museum of a art at ursinus College, Pastors and Patriots: The Muhlenberg Family of Pennsylvania which in simplicity and elegance documents the beginnings of the family. the show, comprised of paintings, documents, needle work, artifacts, pistols, flagons and snuff boxes, runs through December 20. at a opposite ends are a delicate teapot and cup and a quart-sized beer mug with engraved glass and a silver cover. henry melchior muhlenberg, the patriarch, was born in 1711 in einbeck. he attended the university if Goettingen and the franke Institute in halle. he was ordained in 1739 and three years later accepted a call from three communities in america—New a hanover, trappe, and Philadelphia—that needed clergy. he would serve for 45 years. Over the years the churches flourished as did the family. there were 11 children, seven of whom reached adulthood. three of his sons were also pastors and several of his daughters married pastors. the exhibition covers the children, grandchildren and several great grandchildren. Peter, the oldest son, would become known as the “fighting parson” in the american a revolution. the story goes that he was preaching to his congregation in v virginia on the theme of there is a time for everything. a allegedly, he said, “there is a time for all things—a time to preach and a time to fight, and now is the time to fight!” where w upon he threw off his ministerial robes revealing a military uniform beneath. he began to recruit

eD hIggINs

then and there. he would become a general in the revolutionary army. a One of the most intriguing artifacts in the show are two pistols that were stolen from Peter during the 1777 Battle of Germantown. he redeemed them, with a $20 “reward.” frederick, also a minister, became the first speaker of the house of representatives. the politics were taken so seriously that when frederick broke a tie vote on a treaty that many thought favored england, his own brother-in-law stabbed him. he was a perfect geographic balance point for the v virginian George washington w and v vice President John a adams from massachusetts. there is a portrait of him in the show, a copy of a work done by adrian lamb that is exceptionally fine. he survived but was not reelected. he became a state official in the state capital, lancaster. henry Jr., also a minister, was a botanist of international fame. he was the pastor of trinity lutheran in lancaster, the first president of franklin College, later to become franklin and marshall. he identified some 1,100 plants within three miles of lancaster. a specialist in grasses, he had some 320 types in his garden.

Other muhlenbergs have included the president of muhlenberg College (named after henry sr.), founder of st. luke’s hospital in New york, y numerous Congressmen, pastor of Christ Church in New y york, professors at Columbia university and the university of Pennsylvania, ambassador to a austria, and governor of Pennsylvania. the family of henry’s wife, the w weiser family, is also well known in Pennsylvania history. a anna maria w weiser, was the daughter of Conrad weiser, famous as a negotiator of Indian treaties. w he was a supportive father-in-law and provided the funds for the young couple’s house. the augustus a lutheran Church in trappe is the oldest lutheran church in the county and has been named a national historic landmark. It and the historical society of trappe (the patriarch’s house), the speaker’s house and trappe Borough have combined for this exhibition, the first such show of its kind. the show was curated by lisa minardi, an assistant curator at winterthur w and an ursinus graduate. a an illustrated catalogue published in collaboration with the Pennsylvania German society accompanies the exhibition.

By the end of the revolution henry m. muhlenberg retired after the strain of responsibilities became too much. his wife, injured in a horrible accident, could no longer assist him. he died in 1787 and anna a marie followed him in 1802. n

edward higgins is a member of the a association Internationale Des Critiques d’art. a OCtOber 2011

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art Fertile Ground Certain places are like magnets with an especially powerful attraction for creative and performing artists. It’s as though something in the air in these settings draws people favored with exceptional talent.

Whatever activates this phenomenon, it’s almost impossible to explain it in concrete terms. But, even though you can’t hold it in your hands or analyze it in a scientific laboratory, it’s very real.

Bucks County, in eastern Pennsylvania, is a good example of this condition. For many years, right up to the present day, considerable numbers of painters, sculptors, writers, musicians and theater people have chosen to live and work in the area.

Maybe, in this case, two facts may be of assistance in understanding why. First, there is the sheer unspoiled, natural beauty of the region.

Second, the long history of a Quaker tradition, with its emphasis on peace and the maintenance of an atmosphere with broad acceptance for people of vastly varied religious beliefs, personal backgrounds and habits of life, may lend further insight into the situation.

In any event, regardless of the reasons, the plain fact is that a number of remarkably gifted individuals have made Bucks County their own. This truth comes forcefully into focus in a fascinating exhibition set to open on October 22, 2011 at the James A. Michener Art Museum on South Pine Street in Doylestown. Titled The Painterly Voice, Bucks County’s Fertile Ground, the show, organized by Chief Curator, Brian Peterson, is scheduled to remain in place until April 1, 2012.

The Michener Museum has a delightfully unique character. Whether you stroll its interior spaces or sit down and rest, the overall setting is perfect for enjoying in-depth contact with art on both an intellectual and emotional level. Few other institutions of its kind and size provide an equally rewarding opportunity for recharging your interior batteries with such an abundance of aesthetic electricity.

The installation featuring the Bucks County painters offers an outstanding display of artworks primarily drawn from the 19th and 20th centuries. They include pieces from the Museum’s own holdings as well as choice examples on loan from various distinguished private collections.

Typical among these selections are items by Edward Hicks, the naïve painter of Biblical themes and such respected artists identified with the impressionist approach of the New Hope colony as William Lathrop,

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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.

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burt wasserman

This page: John Fulton Folinsbee (1892-1972), Bowmanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Hill, 1936-37, oil on canvas, James A. Michener Art Museum. Gift of Marguerite and Gerry Lenfest.

Copyright 2007 John F. Folinsbee Art Trust.

Opposite page top: Edward Redfield (1869-1965), The Burning of Center Bridge, 1923, oil on canvas, James A. Michener Art Museum. Acquired with funds secured by State Senator Joe Conti, and gifts from Joseph and Anne Gardocki and the Laurent Redfield family.

Opposite page bottom: George Sotter (1879-1953), Silent Night, ca. 1932, oil on canvas. Collection of Louis E. and Carol A. Della Penna. oc t o b e r 2 0 1 1

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footlights

david schultz

Aspects of Love If you are in the mood for a swooning, soaring, and overly melodramatic musical, look no further. Aspects of Love, written by Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber, will fill that need and then some.

Aspects, currently at Philadelphia’s Walnut Street Theatre through October 23, premiered in London in 1989, and opened on Broadway in 1990, where it proved to be a modest success. This was an unusual project for Webber, since it was more of a chamber piece than a big set-driven work with bombast (Cats, Evita, Phantom) that he was both loved and reviled for. I managed to see the original work twenty-one years ago on Broadway and was charmed by its swirling melodies and atmospheric set design. The current rendition still has its charms, but on a more modest scale. With limited resources, the Walnut Street Theatre does conjure up a bit of the magic of the original piece. I found it (then) to be a sophisticated tale of decadent Europeans in a triangle of love. As I’ve gotten older it seems a bit less scintillating and naughty.

Maybe time will do that to you.

This is the kind of show that you can back off from and sneer at…. or relax and escape into its convoluted entanglements. I chose the latter and enjoyed the work for many reasons. The work spans twenty years and connects six people and three generations.

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The setting is France and Italy in the ‘40s. Lead Alex Dillingham (Charles Hagerty), a mere seventeen, falls for an older actress, Rose Vibert (Jennifer Hope Wills), and the pair starts an impetuous love affair. Alex takes her to his uncle’s chateau for a weekend of lovemaking and two lovebirds sing, swoon, and make love, completely overwhelmed with each other. Enter Alex’s uncle George (Paul Schoeffler), who, too, finds Rose to be an unearthly vision—who happens to resemble his dead wife, natch. All is cinched and the dramatic wheels set in motion when Rose appears one night in George’s dead wife’s dress. Subtle this show is not.

What follows is an erotic roundelay of romantic entanglements, with even a bit of girl-on-girl action.

George’s off-and-on lover, Giulietta Trapani (Danielle G. Herbert), seems to have the most authentic take on European sensual ennui. You have to hand it to those decadent Euro folk. Nothing really surprises in the telling of the tale, but it is still an enjoyable hothouse of passion and desire.

The accents sort of come and go, as well, but no matter. The full commitment of the actors, sometimes too serious for me—the production could have used much more levity—still manages to work.

Webber supplies perhaps three or four melodies

which he constantly comes back to time and again. The music has an overwrought passion to it. Sadly, the lyrics (Don Black and Charles Hart) stumble and are leaden, with many overstated verses. I could frequently jump ahead of the lyrics and guess what was coming next.

Even with all that said, I still found the damn thing charming. Much of the credit has to go to the leads, and their well-enunciated diction. I could hear every word without straining. The three performers also convince that “love changes everything.” The overblown infatuations, the teary-eyed farewells, and open-armed greetings work within this production.

Scenic designer John Farrell creates a dreamy visual landscape with yards of white scrim that open and close with cinematic flair, and various locales are projected onto the scrim to give a momentary glance into the views at hand.

If you accept that this is just a sumptuous bon-bon, an almost operatic telling of romance in all its many guises, you will have a grand time. n Walnut Street Theatre, 825 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 215-574-3550 walnutstreettheatre.org David Schultz is a member of the Outer Critics Circle.

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regional theater

EDITED BY DAVID SCHULTZ

Our Class 10/12-11/13

Dead Man’s Cell Phone through 10/23

the time and place: Poland, 1925. Polish classmates—5 Catholic, 5 Jewish—grow up, and their lives take dramatically unexpected turns as their country is torn apart by invading armies. friend betrays friend and violence quickly escalates, reaching a crescendo that will forever haunt the survivors.

Based on true events in the Polish town of Jedwabne and inspired in part by Jan Gross’s controversial book Neighbors, Our Class bravely explores a subject still debated today. w written by tadeusz slobodzianek. wilma w theater, 265 south Broad street, Phila.

(215) 546-7824. wilmatheater.org

a deliciously provocative and deeply moving expose on our society’s tech obsession. follow Jean as she embarks on an extraordinary odyssey for purpose and companionship, among a myriad of mysterious phone calls and tantalizing rendezvous. w will she have the courage to truly connect? Or will her tech-based journey yield further isolation? w written by sarah ruhl.

Directed by Jill harrison. simpatico theatre Project @ walnut w street theatre Independence studio on 3, 825 walnut w street, 3rd floor, Phila. $10-$20. simpaticotheatre.org

The Great American Trailer Park Musical 10/14-10/23 this new musical has a wild range of themes; agoraphobia, adultery, spray cheese, road kill, pregnancy, kleptomania, flan, and disco. there is a new tenant in town, and she’s wreaking havoc in florida’s most exclusive trailer park; Pippi the stripper comes between the Dr. Philloving Jennie and her tollbooth collector husband. silly and inane this ‘trailer park’ has ridiculous moments that segue into odd musical numbers.

Pennsylvania Playhouse, IIIick’s mill road, Bethlehem P Pa. (610) 865-6665. $19-$22. paplayhouse.org Mistakes Were Made 10/6-10/30 felix a artifex has two problems: his mouth and his conscience. In a last valiant effort to dig himself out of a self-made rut, this Broadway producer runs head first into the most amazing play the world will ever see, has the perfect star just a phone call away, and may even reconcile with his estranged wife to boot. In this hilarious and heartfelt comedy of redemption, we see a man on the verge of everything—and witness the wicked and wild things he’ll do to get it. starring scott Greer. writ w ten by Craig w wright. 1812 Productions @ Plays and Players theatre, 1714 Delancey street, Phila. $20-$36.

(215) 592-9560. 1812productions. org 14

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New Jerusalem, The Interrogation of Baruch de Spinoza at Talmud Torah Congregation: Amsterdam, July 27, 1656 10/6-10/30 a the Inquisition bears down, a small Jewish commuas nity flees Portugal to find a tenuous peace in seemingly liberal a amsterdam. But spinoza, a favorite son of the community and rabbi’s heir apparent, is an outspoken iconoclast. w when the boldness of his ideas strains the bounds of a 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, this recent off-Broadway hit by playwright David Ives challenges habitual political and religious thinking with conviction, passion, and wit. lantern theater Company, at st. stephen’s theater, 10th & ludlow streets, Phila. (215) 8290395. lanterntheater.org Little Women:The Musical 10/7-10/23 tony-nominated musical adaptation of louisa may a alcott’s classic novel about the lives of the march sisters—meg, Jo, Beth, a amy and their beloved marmee—as the family experiences love, loss, and struggle during the a american Civil war. w Little Women is a perfectly lovely musical that is old-fashioned and appropriate for all ages. Civic theatre of a allentown, 514/527 North 19th street, a allentown. (610) 432-8943. $20-$31. civictheatre.com Into The Dark 10/13-10/23 a the dry, crumbling leaves of autumn leaves fall and the shadows lengthen, touchas stone theatre presents an eerie evening of experimental theater. a chilling cast of characters, suspenseful stories, and haunting vignettes explore the depths of terror that lurk within the human soul. Perfect fodder for the halloween season. touchstone theatre, 321 e. fourth street, Bethlehem. (610) 867-1689. $15-$25. touchstone.org n

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reel news The Tourist (2010) HHH Cast: Johnny Depp, Angelina Jolie Genre: Thriller Rated PG-13 for violence and brief strong language.

Running time 104 minutes.

Awards: Nominated Golden Globes–Best Actress, Best Actor, Best Musical/Comedy Being picked up by the most beautiful woman in the world may be every man’s dream, but for Frank (Depp), a sad-sack math teacher from Wisconsin, an interlude in

Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp.

Venice with mysterious Elise (Jolie) soon becomes a screaming nightmare. Naturally, Elise isn’t whom she seems to be. By the time stumblebum Frank realizes he’s just a pawn in a deadly game to catch a thief, he’s hopelessly in love, which requires a major suspension of belief to accept at this point in the story. The viewers’ expectations sputter when the chemistry between the super-hot femme fatale and hapless tourist couldn’t melt an ice cube. The plot ploy is a necessary but disappointing misdirection that almost sabotages the film. Depp’s comic one liners keep the chase scenes interesting as the plot sweeps him along to a Hitchcock ending.

The Conspirator (2011) HHHH Cast: James McAvoy, Robin Wright, Kevin Kline Genre: Historical Drama Director: Robert Redford Rated PG-13 for some violent content.

Running time 121 minutes.

Like a time capsule, this powerful story takes us back to the turbulent aftermath of President Lincoln’s assassination. The conspirators, including Mary Surratt (Wright), the owner of the boarding house where her son, John Wilkes Booth, and others hatched their heinous plot, are arrested… but not brought to justice. Think what would have happened if Bin Laden were arrested immediately after 9/11 and you get the poisonous atmosphere of that chaotic period. As the mirror image of post 9/11 Washington, the names have been changed to protect the guilty. Secretary of War Edwin Stanton (Kline), the behind-the-scenes power in Washington, demands instant revenge, not justice. Union war hero and attorney Frederick Aiken (McAvoy) fights for due process but Stanton isn’t about to let constitutional guarantees get in his way. The film doesn’t 16

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REVIEWS OF recently released dvdS by george oxford miller Ratings: H=skip it; HH=mediocre; HHH=good; HHHH=excellent; HHHHH=classic

resolve Surratt’s innocence/guilt or make her a hero/anti-hero. She’s sympathetic because she’s railroaded to the gallows while Aiken inspires with his fearless integrity that defies the distorted will of the nation. This well-balanced film engages our emotions while making us think about greater issues, a neat trick seldom seen in Hollywood.

The Tree of Life (201) HHH Cast: Brad Pitt, Jessica Chastain, Sean Penn, Hunter McCracken Genre: Drama Rated PG-13 for thematic material.

Running time 138 minutes.

Awards: Cannes Palme d’Or As a slice of life in the 1950s, this epic moves deeply through the lives of a middleAmerican, small-town family. If you grew up in the ‘50s, the hometown scenes will resonate like lightning in the night. The O’Briens with Dad (Pitt) and Mom (Chastain) and their three boys live in Bible-thumpin’ Waco, Texas, coincidently where writer/director Terrence Malick grew up. Though this existential epic conjures creation from Big Bang to Afterlife, one thing is clear, at least to the church-going O’Brien family: Waco ain’t no Garden of Eden. For son Jack (McCracken/Penn), coming of age is more falling from Grace than discovering Paradise. After all, why should Jack be good when God allows so much evil in the world? Every shot is a metaphor, every action a transcendental question about the Meaning of Life. Through it all, Jack discovers that life’s greatest gift isn’t a blissful childhood, perfect parents, or Sean Penn. financial success as an adult. Life is a journey and every failure and success, love and betrayal, tragedy and occasional moments of happiness make us who we are. The ageless challenge is always “What am I going to do with the rest of my life?”

DOCUMENTARY OF THE MONTH Armadillo (2011) HHHH Genre: Documentary Director: Janus Metz No MPAA rating but real war action.

Running time 100 minutes.

Awards: Cannes, Critics Grand Prize; European Films, Best Documentary Danish with English subtitles.

War in a distant country may seem abstract, even if you’re a taxpayer funding the half-billion dollar/month bill while the economy circles the rim of the toilet. But “War is Hell” is no longer a cliché when you’re the one dodging bullets. Danish director Janus Metz embeds his cameras with a Danish unit stationed at Forward Operating Base Armadillo in Afghanistan. He trudges the grassy lanes with the unit through mud-hut villages where farmers and Taliban fighters are one and the same. The rollercoaster of boredom at the base and dodging death from hidden assailants provides the ultimate adrenaline kick for soldiers who are confused about why they’re there in the first place. This is raw documentation with no defined story arch, no heroes, no judgments, just a slice of pure terror on the level of personal survival. n

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cinematters

pete croatto

Chin Han (left) and Marion Cotillard

D

Contagion

Director Steven Soderbergh has always displayed a coolness that borders on emotional disconnect.

You don’t see teary speeches or hug-filled reunions.

His box office triumphs (Erin Brockovich, the Ocean’s trilogy) feature characters who can’t afford to let their guard down. King of the Hill might be the most intense coming-of-age story I’ve ever seen. Traffic could have made a billion dollars and sold a zillion t-shirts if he chose to glamorize drug dealing with violence and big personalities.

Soderbergh didn’t. All he got was an Academy Award for best director.

His refusal to talk down to his audience while skipping through genres, even if it costs him, is why I am an admirer. But it makes Soderbergh an odd choice to direct Contagion, the star-studded virus-runs-amok drama. A good poker face is not scary. The film never grabs you by the shoulders and gives you an oldfashioned fright. You can watch it with your eyes wide open—unless you find stellar ensemble work and directorial polish bone chilling.

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The origins of the viral horror are benign. Executive Beth Emhoff (Gwyneth Paltrow), coughing and pale, prepares to board her flight home after a business trip to Hong Kong. The same conditions plague a fashion model in London, a Tokyo businessman, and, logically, a Hong Kong waiter. Everyone looks like they have the flu.

Emhoff returns home to Minneapolis, where a few days later she collapses on the kitchen floor, frothing at the mouth and lapsing into seizures. The hospital’s doctor can’t explain her death, but the coroner’s reaction during the autopsy says it all: “Call everyone.”

Soon, a no-nonsense investigator (Kate Winslet) from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention travels to Minnesota. A World Health Organization official (Marion Cotillard) heads to the Hong Kong casino where Emhoff gambled and dined. As the ladies follow leads, attempts to vaccinate the virus prove exceedingly difficult. It’s a model of biological perfection, fitting into cells “like a key into a lock.” People keep dying, so much so that body bags run out.

In the ensuing weeks, things fall apart. Homeland

Security becomes interested. A popular, truth-telling blogger (Jude Law) gets his priorities mixed up. Beth’s widowed husband (Matt Damon) becomes really overprotective of his only daughter. Throughout, Soderbergh handles the material with his usual quiet confidence.

The proof is in the cinematography: Winslet opens her hotel window to see a caravan of military vehicles driving down an empty street on a miserable gray morning. The beleaguered CDC deputy director (Laurence Fishburne) sits in a cafeteria, surrounded by empty chairs, overwhelmed by a problem he can’t solve.

Soderbergh’s approach only takes him so far. His quiet confidence turns into politeness. Grave red lettering pops up to remind us of the number of days that have passed in this misery. Everyone is clearly working against the clock, but the tension never explodes. The movie proceeds as one long anticlimax. Major plot developments get treated with little fuss as Soderbergh and writer Scott Z. Burns make their points about leadership (the military calls the shots; the president is nowhere to be found), bureaucratic red tape, and the common good of people. These messages are fine, but they’re placed too high on the priority list. The movie is about an unstoppable virus killing millions of helpless people.

Shouldn’t we feel a little bit scared? Is it weird not to feel any connection to characters? (Burns and Soderbergh address this shortcoming by having Damon turn into a less hirsute version of Viggo Mortensen’s character from The Road, a distracting move in an otherwise journalisticstyle narrative.) Why does the movie feel respectful and orderly, like something The Learning Channel would produce?

An argument could be made that this kind of restraint is appropriate for a movie released two days before the 10th anniversary of the September 11th terrorist attacks. I don’t buy that. The Dark Knight perfectly captured the random terror that comes when a psychopath gains power over a major city. V for Vendetta, released in the middle of George W. Bush’s second term, explored the horror of an overprotective government. And there was The Road, Team America World Police, and more.

One of the great artistic triumphs post-September 11th is that filmmakers have used the fear of a world run amok in a creative, non-exploitive way. Movies have helped us explore the uncertainty of that day and ever after. By holding back his own emotions, whatever they might be, Soderbergh has offered a somewhat entertaining, well-acted cop out. [PG-13] n

A senior critic at Filmcritic.com from 2002-07, Pete Croatto’s reviews, essays, and articles have appeared in Publishers Weekly, The Star-Ledger, Mad Magazine, and Deadspin.com. He writes about movies and other nonsense at http://whatpeteswatching.blogspot.com.

Read Pete’s musings at whatpeteswatching.blogspot.com or follow him on Twitter, PeteCroatto.

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keresman on film Unless you’ve been living in Vatican City or on Sesame Street, you’ve noticed humanity has a love/hate affair with violence. It can be fun and funny, righteous and wrongful, depending on who’s dishing it out and who’s on the receiving end. Of course, many people that HAVE been on the receiving end can—if they live to tell the tale, naturally—relate just how mean, ugly, and frequently scarring it can be. Merely one of the reasons that Apocalypse Now, Reservoir Dogs, and Saving Private Ryan are clas-

mark keresman

of the aspects that made the original so controversial was [spoiler alert] the rape scene. Aside from its graphic nature, Ms. George’s character is seen as somewhat, as least in part, “welcoming” her violation, presumably because her violators are more “manly” than her “meek” husband.

There are many similarities between the two films, but the new version stars James Marsden (the X-Men movies, 27 Dresses) and Kate Bosworth (Blue Crush, Superman Returns) as the couple—but this time they’re a Hollywood

Straw Dogs

Alexander Skarsgard

sics is the severe and horrifically accurate way violence in portrayed. We’d be hypocrites if we didn’t admit we get a vicarious and/or cathartic thrill when Bad People get “justice” handed to them via a one-way ticket to the Afterlife.

(I recall seeing Thelma & Louise in the theater and noticing some female audience members visibly and audibly thrilling to Susan Sarandon shooting the would-be rapist of her friend, played by Geena Davis.)

Straw Dogs explores that ambivalence regarding violence. It’s a remake of the 1971 film of the same name directed by action-film legend Sam Peckinpah (perhaps best known for the cinematic ballet-of-bullets The Wild Bunch). In the then-controversial original (so much so it was BANNED in the UK for well over a decade), Dustin Hoffman and Susan George play a couple that relocate from America to the wife’s British Cornwall countryside hometown, where they are victimized by the locals. One 20

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screenwriter and actress respectively. The couple relocates to the deep South hometown of her family country house. Alexander Skarsgard (True Blood’s darkly charming vampire big-cheese) and James Woods (oh, TONS of movies) are their chief tormentors—the former is Kate B’s high school sweetheart and the town’s hero quarterback, the latter is the former high school hero football coach, now the town’s dysfunctional, raving-mean drunk.

Imagine, dear Reader: Marsden is the bookish-looking David, a composed, urbane Californian intellectual that listens to old-school classical music (like, Beethoven, baby!) when he writes; slim-sexy Bosworth is Amy, a small-town cheerleader that escaped the town’s gravitational pull and she Made Good. Skarsgard is Charlie—he effortlessly mixes laid-back Southern charm with big-fish-in-a-smallpond menace and entitlement. Charlie heads the roughhewn construction crew renovating the couple’s country

home. Woods, one of my favorite actors, is ex-Coach Tom—he overacts a bit, stopping just short of frothing at the mouth. I half expected him to take a bite out of a car or a fireplug, chew up the metal and spit out bullets. Anyway, Charlie and his crew consider David an uppity wimp/ sissy city-slicker; David tries to be tolerant but considers Charlie & company as rather “basic,” macho, beer-swilling Lynyrd Skynyrd-blasting rednecks. These characters are to an extent stereotypes but if you’ve lived in big cities and small towns (I, uh, have), these stereotypes exist—perhaps not as simply drawn as here, but they’re out there: The Bubbas and the Roger Wallet III types. If you’ve seen many movies or lived in both small and large burgs, you KNOW a “clash” is an eventuality.

Little by little, violence (cat-lovers beware) and indignities are heaped on the couple—he, like many of us, wants to avoid confrontation and fanning the flames of a bad situation. She wants him to seemingly “man up” and “do something.” (What, she never makes clear.) Of course, things come to a head, a point-of-noreturn for nearly every character. Themes of this Straw Dogs: Do women want the stable, dependable nice guy or do they have the not-so-subconscious desire for an exciting-though-dysfunctional bad boy? In order to be a “man,” is being baptized or swathed in violence a necessity? If one must resort to violence, is it “wrong” to take pleasure or feel exhilaration in it? [spoiler ahead] If a character is raped, why wouldn’t she tell her husband and/or the local agents of law enforcement? In 1971, there was sickening “stigma” that dogged a woman that had been raped—surely, Our Enlightened Society has “grown beyond” that, right? I’d hope so, but on the other hand, I don’t believe the town would turn on its popular, church-going “good ol’ boys” in favor of the high-falutin’ Hollywood writer and his frequently scantily-clad, no-brawearing wife…and I think the rape victim knew that, too.

I’m not going to compare versions of Straw Dogs.

The themes, then as now, are common to our time. I believe that life does give us opportunities to settle things peaceably—sometimes. I recall after the 9/11 attacks many pacifists and humanists urged against violent response by our government—not to turn the other cheek, but not resort to war, urging redress by legal and diplomatic channels. That’s a noble notion, but have you ever tried to “negotiate” with a fanatic, a bully, or a psychopath? Straw Dogs makes us look at those uncomfortable, often sickening sides of life, and it does so in a manner that’s entertaining. n

Mark Keresman is a bon vivant misanthrope-abouttown who has contributed to SF Weekly, East Bay Express, Pittsburgh City Paper, Paste, Jazz Review, downBeat, Manhattan Resident and the men’s room wall in the Squirill Hill Cafe.

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bad movie

mark keresman

A Matador’s Mistress

A

All the world loves a lover, especially if that lover is Manolete (1917-1947), the renowned bullfighter, played here by Adrian Brody. The lover that loves Manolete is Lupe Sino, a beautiful Communist actress portrayed by Penelope Cruz, who is not now a Communist or ever been to parties hosted by (known) Communists.

(I have it on good authority that Cruz once Frenchkissed a Libertarian…we were all young once.)

Bullfighting is exciting, except if you’re a bull or a gored matador. If you are concerned about the likelihood of bulls being harmed in A Matador’s Mistress (known as The Passion Within in the UK and Blood and Passion in Canada), relax—no bull is killed onscreen (but s/he is jabbed with those colorful “stingers”). The human characters, however, are somewhat bull and the film, despite the presence of two Oscar winners and the direction/screenplay by Menno Meyjes (The Color Purple, The Siege, Lionheart), is a danger to bipeds (specifically, humans) because it might bore them to death.

A biography is supposed to be engaging, being about

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a real person that was worth making a movie about.

(Would I pay to see a movie based on my life? I’d bloody well not.) This movie presents Manolete as a guy that majored in Marlon Brando Mumbling in acting school.

His manager is right out of central casting—chubby, balding, a cigarette always dangling from his mouth, wears a wide-brimmed hat, gruff yet oddly lovable—and he tells Manolete to stay away from Lupe because “she is a whore.” Yup, she’s bad news all right, and she’ll interfere with your training, champ! (In the Three Stooges short Punch Drunks, manager Moe tells boxer Curly.

“Fightin’ and dames don’t mix.”) If this movie were made in the USA in the 1940s this role would’ve been played by William Demarest; in the ‘60s, by Jesse White, more recently, by John Goodman or Pat Hingle…but I digress. The movie doesn’t show what inspired Manolete to become a bullfighter—he goes from coming from seemingly-nowheresville (walking down a dusty road carrying a suitcase) to becoming a famous bullfighter, but one never sees his rise to being Spain’s national hero,

Mickey Mantle and Ty Cobb rolled into one. Isn’t he ever afraid of getting bull-dozed? If he is, how does he deal with that fear?

What of the other half of this dynamically dreary duo?

Penelope Cruz is SO lovely, but the dialogue she’s forced to utter is caca de vaca. She coos into Manny’s ear at the beach, “I belong to you because I don’t belong to you.”

She also knows how to buck-up a guy’s confidence: “You are the most beautiful ugly man I’ve ever seen.”

We see them “hot for” each other but we never see why she’s captured Manny’s heart apart from her sensuous physicality—in fact, she doesn’t seem to be a very nice person.

A Matador’s Mistress has beautiful cinematography...but the pacing—oy. It’s slow, very slow. Brody does resemble Manolete and Cruz is a true siren, but something’s…missing. Unlike the best film biographies (Bugsy, Beau James, Milk, Serpico), it seems like there are chunks missing, crucial details that make you feel for the characters, whether you like them or not. n

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film roundup Thunder Soul (Dir: Mark Landsman). In the 1970s, the Kashmere Stage Band was a phenomenon. Based in Houston’s all-black Kashmere High School, the band annihilated its stodgy competitors with funky, pounding arrangements and nifty choreography.

After dominating nationally with their groundbreaking content, the kids toured the world and even found listeners decades later, thanks to a popular retrospective album. Landsman’s documentary covers band members from KSB’s heyday—many of whom have not played their instruments since graduation day—reuniting to play a 2008 concert for their beloved leader and teacher, Conrad “Prof” Johnson.

Undeniably upbeat and heartfelt film that shows the impact a good teacher can have on students, especially those who need a father figure. The music, of course, is fantastic. Only glaring flaw: With one or two exceptions, we don’t know the members of the band and how their lives fared after their high school glory days. Jamie Foxx served as executive producer. [PG] HHH1/2 50/50 (Dir: Jonathan Levine). Starring: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Seth Rogen, Anna Kendrick, Bryce Dallas Howard, Anjelica Huston, Philip Baker Hall. Adam (GordonLevitt), a seemingly healthy 27-year-old, is diagnosed with a nasty form of cancer that comes with a grim outlook: he only has a fifty percent chance of surviving. As the disease begins its onslaught and Adam undergoes treatment, his coarse best friend-wingman (Rogen, who also produced) stands by his side and a cute, practically novice therapist (Kendrick) navigates Adam through the rough patch. Like Judd Apatow’s emerg-

ing catalogue of bromedies (Knocked Up, Funny People), Levine’s effort embraces aspects of testosterone-driven comedy and legitimate, man-friendly drama, though not consistently; 50/50 never completely satisfies as a hearty comedy or as a raw character 24

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Pete Croatto Ratings: H=skip it; HH=mediocre; HHH=good; HHHH=excellent; HHHHH=classic

study. Still, it’s a solid, entertaining look at young adulthood interrupted that features good performances from everyone, especially Huston as Adam’s overprotective mom, and Kendrick (Up in the Air) as the young professional with strong feelings for her new client. The movie’s writer, Will Reiser, is a cancer survivor. [R] HHH Sholem Aleichem: Laughing in the Darkness (Dir: Joseph Dorman). Aleichem (1859-1916) is probably best known as the creator of Tevye, the lead character in the beloved musical, Fiddler on the Roof. In reality, Aleichem’s stories about the Jewish milkman were less than cheerful. They reflected the changing status of Eastern European Jews who, at the end of the twentieth century, were struggling to find their way amidst pogroms and opportunities in the secular world. One interview subject in this illuminating, intelligent documentary puts it best: Aleichem taught Jews how to live in the modern world. Dorman effectively puts Aleichem’s cultural significance into perspective. By writing his stories in Yiddish, Aleichem helped turn it into a credible language; his funeral was so massive that it introduced the Jews as an influential demographic in New York City politics. But what’s more impressive—and touching—is how the director reveals Aleichem as a writer of the people. The author truly struggled (and coped) like his beloved characters. Other plusses: Terrific interviewees and Peter Riegert and Rachel Dratch offering sublime readings of Aleichem’s work. [NR] HHHH Bellflower (Dir: Evan Glodell). Starring: Evan Glodell, Jessie Wiseman, Tyler Dawson, Rebekah Brandes, Vincent Grashaw. Highly stylized, borderline incomprehensible drama follows Wisconsin natives and friends, Woodrow (Glodell) and Aiden (Dawson), who aspire to construct a flamethrower à la what they saw as kids in Mad Max. Everything changes when Woodrow falls hard for the wrong woman (Wiseman). That romance, of course, ends badly, causing the poor guy to succumb to a deadening pattern of alcohol and self-pity.

Soon, a flamethrower isn’t enough and Aiden and Woodrow’s goofy intentions darken. Starts off as a quirky take on the Go West Young Man tale, with two nimrods trying to make it in the seedy, unglamorous side of Hollywood. But the plot takes a hard left into kinetic, jealousy-tinged nihilistic nonsense that abandons the characters and exhausts the audience’s patience. There’s a story in Bellflower. It’s too bad that debut director-writer-editor-producer Glodell abandons it for sound, fury, and apocalyptic dream sequences. If Glodell relies on substance more than style, his future work will be worth watching.

This one is not. [R] HH n

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interview The

Pete Croatto

woman rabbit hole who

reached into the

and pulled out

Rin Tin Tin

Susan Orlean is busy today. She’s settling into a new home. Her pets are giving her trouble. A deadline is looming. Yes, she’s still up for the interview, which amidst the swirl of domestic- and work-related chaos, she nails.

This snapshot of Orlean’s afternoon encapsulates her strength as a writer—she’s remarkably focused. Her latest book Rin Tin Tin: The Life and the Legend (now available for sale everywhere) covers the rise of dogs as pets, dog training, the beginnings of the film and television industry, and the lives of the dog (or, more accurately, dogs) and his enamored guardians: trainer Lee Duncan and TV producer Bert Leonard.

Every diversion fits into this memorable portrait of the canine icon, and Orlean’s orderliness does not lead to stodgy prose. The author of The Orchid Thief and New Yorker staff writer clearly relishes finding every angle to a story, even the ones that affect her personally.

It’s why I’ll read anything she writes. Regardless of how arcane the subject is, she makes it sparkle via wit and investigation.

In this mid-September interview, Orlean, 55, talks about juggling all those subjects, what led her to write about Rin Tin Tin, and if an animal will ever again reach such a level of celebrity.

Pete Croatto: The last time we talked you displayed quite a passion for bookstores misplacing you and other authors’ books. With that said, where is Rin Tin Tin going to end up being placed?

Susan Orlean: Well, I already see it listed under pet care, which I guess is not surprising, and biography, which is not incorrect. I think it’s going to end up in a couple of different places, and I suppose better that it end up in many rather than none. It’s tricky. It’s a biography of a sort. It’s an animal book of a sort. And it’s kind of a cultural observation of a sort, so I don’t blame bookstores for finding it a little hard to figure out.

PC: The book covers a lot of ground. How did you manage to tie all those subjects together without getting overwhelmed or cluttering the narrative?

SO: Well, you’re assuming I didn’t get overwhelmed.

I did. The book took me a long time [nearly ten years].

First of all, it was a huge undertaking that was far bigger than I expected. I felt strongly that it made sense only if I told it in a really thorough way. What I think was the 26

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only thing I could do in terms of keeping the narrative intact was to try to convey to the reader the story of my discovery of what I was learning. Essentially that I started a subject expecting it to be kind of compact—not simple, but just manageable—and it grew and grew and that I wanted them to come along on that same exploration with me.

PC: It’s funny you mention wanting to take readers along with you, because in Rin Tin Tin, like your other work, you write regularly in the first person. How did you come to write in that style, and did anyone encourage you not to at any point?

SO: To answer your first question, I began writing in the first person—or at least not pretending that I wasn’t in the story as the reporter—at a point where the only way to make sense of the narrative meant acknowledging my presence, basically. And it was really liberating. And I didn’t feel that it meant that I was suddenly the subject of the story, but rather that it made it so much easier to move the reader around in time and space. I’m just sort of saying, “I’m here. I’m the person observing this.”

It’s actually much more natural. It’s the way you’d tell a story over dinner. We’re not inhibited in telling a story at dinner to friends: “And then I asked” or “Then I went to figure out X.” So, to me, it’s actually far more authentic.

And it’s the way you tell stories, so it never felt phony to me.

I’ve always written for places that, fortunately, don’t have strict rules about how you write. You write to achieve the best effect. I don’t think the stories become narcissistic exercises, so no one ever said to me, “I don’t

see what the point is of having you in here. Get out.” It’s not been a problem in that way.

PC: The one reason I ask is that I’ve read a lot of books steeped in reporting where authors include themselves in the narrative, and it becomes a distraction. How do you keep yourself from being the elephant in the room? When do you know not to include yourself in the narrative?

SO: Well, it’s kind of hard to answer that. It’s surely intuitive. I really do think it’s strictly a kind of measure in your own gut of whether you’re interfering or helping.

It should always feel that you’re advancing the story by being in there. Huge, huge long stretches of my writing I’m not the least bit present. To be honest with you, I feel I always write in a way that my voice is very subjective. Even if I don’t say “I, I, I,” I think there’s always a sense that this is a story being told by an actual person, and I happen to be the actual person. Occasionally, I’m going to refer to something specific. Not everyone is going to like that. There are some people who get very irritated by the writer being present at all. That’s fine. It’s a matter of taste, but I feel strongly that I follow my instincts and hope that they keep it authentic and readable.

The bottom line is that I feel that my goal is to be the most interesting storyteller in the world, and whatever I need to do to make that happen is what I try to do.

PC: Without giving away too much, Rin Tin Tin had a special significance to you from an early age. What made you decide to write this book now?

SO: Very specifically because I had come across Rin Tin Tin’s name in the course of working on another story. I hadn’t actively thought about Rin Tin Tin in decades. I came across his name and had a reaction that was so strong that I really kind of sat up straight. It’s rare that you have a reaction to a memory that’s so strong.

It just led me almost instantly to think, “This is a book; I want to write a book.” Because I so quickly learned so many things about Rin Tin Tin that were so fascinating and rocked me out of what I had thought was the case of his life. It made me think, “Oh my gosh here’s something that I thought I knew, and in fact I don’t know it all—and there’s this amazing story to be told.”

PC: You could also say that sense of discovery runs through the book.

SO: Yeah, very much. This is so much a case of falling into the rabbit hole and thinking, “Wow, this is an

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interview Low-Cut Connie

They see themselves as the Rocky Balboa of bands and they’re waiting for their title shot

NPR’s Fresh Air loves him. Rolling Stone magazine digs him the most. Yet, beyond a few gigs around town and a few events at Old Swede’s Church (they have a piano along with that biblical ambiance), Adam Weiner remains a secret for that which he holds dear and performs zealously—the holy rolling powers of old time gospel, soul, Tin Pan Alley standards and rockabilly.

Weiner—a filmmaker, playwright, singer and composer—has two projects which he holds dear: the dire doo-wopping Ladyfingers where Weiner hiccupps his

and Elvis on LPs such as Open Your Robe and My Prom that are pockmarked by the most ominous piano sounds to grace vinyl. Then there is Low Cut Connie, Weiner’s new band with Birmingham England’s Dan Finnermore.

While Ladyfinger specializes in what he calls kept-man anthems (“What Size Shoe”) and dangerous romancers (“Wonderful Boy”), Low Cut Connie takes on drunken sensuality (“Cat N The Cream”) and primal sexuality (“Johnny Cool Man” with lyrics like “I wanna see you naked baby—from the front and from the back”).

L-R: Dan Finnermore, Russell Saliba, Adam Weiner, Neil Duncan.

way through an array of spooky rockabilly-based songs that summon the ghosts of Gene Pitney, Carl Perkins

If A.D. Amorosi isn’t found writing features for ICON, the Philadelphia Inquirer, acting as a columnist for Philadelphia City Paper (amongst other writings appearing on NBC-TV’s The 10! Show, and editing at Blurt magazine), he’s probably running his greyhound or trying on snug fitting suits.

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Though cut from the same cloth as Ladyfingers, Low Cut Connie spits on then burns that same cloth wholesale with pure sex and raw swamp-slimy rock ‘n’ roll. “No BS, here. It’s Stones/Jerry Lee/Cramps and people will boogie and pee themselves when they hear it,” says Weiner regarding Get Out the Lotion, Low Cut Connie’s debut album.

An eccentric crooner with greasy high hair and the occasional pencil-thin mustache, Weiner is an engag-

ing gent on the verge of mega-success whateverthatmaymean where Low Cut Connnie is concerned. Before they leave town for their longest world tour yet, they’ll make a Philly pit stop at Little Bar at Eight & Fitzwater on October 28 for a sort of pre-Halloween ritual sacrifice and rip-roaring live bash A.D. Amorosi: Where in NJ are you from and how did you get out?

Adam Weiner: Cherry Hill. Y’know, where the rabbi killed his wife. I went up the turnpike to New York City for a while, and from there lived in Memphis, Austin, Philly, and Montreal. As I describe in our song “Big Thighs, NJ,” Jersey is like that hairy mole on my face that I just can’t bring myself to cut off. I embrace it. It is a real part of me, but I dare say I hope it doesn’t turn malignant.

A.D.: Are you too young to have had much of an AM radio youth?

AW: I grew up with the Philly FM stations, Oldies 98.1, Temple 90.1. Recently, I started listening to Cruisin’ 92.1 in Vineland and it’s quickly become my favorite.

I love the weekend show where the two retired south Jersey cops read the police blotter and talk about how society has gone to pot.

A.D.: When was the first time that you heard real rockabilly, and not just Elvis and Jerry Lee Lewis? I’m not doubting or denying their talents and their credentials and certainly adore their achievements. But there’re thicker swamps to stew in.

AW: Well, obviously Jerry Lee’s stuff changed my life.

Actually Dan—the Brit in Low Cut Connie—and I just got to meet the Killer a couple of months ago in Nashville which was a dream come true. I cried like a little girl. I lived in Memphis in 2001 and got into all the old rockabilly. Ray Harris, Sonny Burgess, Jimmy Wages...I got to see Hasil Adkins before he died and I felt like he was the essence of the “ugly America” that I love so much.

A.D.: Do you have a background at all in any sort of indie rock or tamer-than-the-hard stuff music than you do now?

AW: I did the piano man thing in gay bars in Manhattan for about five or six years. I played everything from Hank Williams to Judy Garland to various show tuney cruisers. They were my biggest fans for a long time. I would go out on the road with my rockabilly schtick and get heckled off the stage, and then come back to the queenie bars and get loved up for playing Elvis ballads in French, and boogie-woogie Cole Porter schtick. I once accepted $100 to play the Pocahontas theme song.

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Please don’t tell the guys in my band.

A.D.: Before we get to the rough stuff, you have a poignancy, a soul for ballads, too.

Do you have a rich teaching background in music training? It doesn’t sound casual.

AW: Yeah, I did like ten years of piano lessons, and little bit of singing, but the real education came from those bar gigs, playing for tips and touring all over the country alone. Getting spat on and ridiculed and occasionally adored in various dives and learning how to work a room and deliver a song—that was the best education a man can have.

A.D.: Are you putting Ladyfingers aside for the moment? I know that Low Cut Connie is really taking off.

AW: No way. It’s part of Low Cut Connie. We do plenty of Ladyfingers stuff and I’m still that guy...I just happen to be playing with three absolute bad asses who give those songs a shock treatment and a butt wax.

A.D.: The persona that you are for Low Cut Connie—there’s something very theatrical about it. Were there/are there models? I’m not saying that they aren’t you…just that they seem like a hyper version of you.

AW: I got my idols. Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, Little Richard, Iggy Pop, Tom Waits, Howlin’ Wolf, Prince. These guys know how to keep your attention. I like to tell people that I’m a combo of both Jerry Lee Lewis and Jerry Lewis the comedian, you know?

Both of them are all-timers for me.

A.D.: Is it fair to say that a big difference between Ladyfingers and LCC is the combination of its members?

AW: Low Cut Connie is the pure ballsy schmoozy boogied-up kick ass band that I always wanted to be in. Ladyfingers, even in its humor has an air of sadness about it.

Low Cut Connie is pure joy. There’s a chemistry between us that is beyond words... when we get onstage we don’t know what’s gonna happen...but we know we’re gonna mess it up real good.

A.D.: Where and how did you meet these guys—the Brit in particular—and how did it work out that you’d team on whose songs?

AW: Dan is my soul brother from another mother...we met at the Lakeside Lounge in Manhattan. He invited me to come to Birmingham UK to do a show with his band.

After the show he and I got stuck in a freight elevator for three hours with all our gear and two duffel bags full of booze. By the time the B’ham Fire Brigade cut the door out, we were brothers for life. Fast forward like four years, we were on tour together in Portugal and we decided to start a new band and get a big party going. We decided we’d pick his best songs and my best songs and make a supergroup record. Neil—our guitarist/drummer/producer—invited us to Gainesville to record and we all got on like a goddamn house on fire.

A.D.: You made LCC’s debut at Old Swedes’s Church on New Year’s Eve. How did that gig define where LCC would go?

AW: We had about 200 drunken Philly fools jumping up and down and fondling each other to our music. There were old people and little kids running around. It was a beautiful ridiculous Philly night. We decided that’s the vibe we want to create everywhere we go.

A.D.: How did that tiny Rolling Stone review change the game?

AW: Big time! After the [Robert] Christgau review, Rolling Stone, and the recent Fresh Air review...we’re suddenly feeling that maybe we could have a chance to do this for real,to get people down in the dirt with us all over the country.

A.D.: What’s next after this gig at Little Bar? AW: More more more. Dan’s moving over here after Christmas, and next year we’re going to work this country over and get people out of their chairs. We’re going to tour, record, and put all our chips on the table. We may go broke, but at least we will have given it a shot. As ridiculous and cheesy as it is to say, we see ourselves as the Rocky Balboa band. We’re the little guys, unsigned, not necessarily the most gorgeous or manicured, but we’re punching hard at the carcass of the music industry, and we’re looking for our title shot. n oc t o b e r 2 0 1 1

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Geoff Gehman

dimmers, automated shades and lighting-control systems for the Statue of Liberty and the Bank of China.

Sacks and Harter are on a mission to position Subarashii pears as the gourmet gift that keeps on giving.

Subarashii fruits are sold in first-class grocery stores, placed in crystal bowls at boutique hotels, paired at tastings with pear wines hinting of butterscotch and starfruit. The company’s website sells five patented varieties grown only by Subarashii and offers recipes for everything from a pear martini to dried-pear mac ‘n’ cheese. It’s all part of a plan to popularize Asian pears as an amusement park for the senses.

Asian pears have a juicy pedigree. They were born on misty slopes in western China around 330 B.C., which makes them the oldest cultivated fruit. Transplanted and genetically twisted in Japan and Korea, they became crunchier, rounder, closer to a soft apple. They came to America during the mid-19th century, grown from seed

by Chinese laborers hired by West Coast gold diggers.

These days they flourish in California, Oregon and other

Birds are spooked by an air-raid siren of recorded bird noises, a sort of solar-powered scarecrow.

An amusement park for the senses

“I think it tastes like a cantaloupe. It’s kind of cantaloupy.”

“Oh, I’m not sure about that. To me, it’s more like kiwi with a touch of honey—a honeyed kiwi.”

“Seems like a wine tasting, doesn’t it?”

Holly Harter and Tom Sacks, it must be noted, aren’t noting wine notes. Standing in an orchard, they’re comparing the wine-like range of flavors of an Asian pear, which is livelier, juicier, crispier and rounder than its European peers. The Yoinashi they’re debating is one of ten varieties of Asian pear grown and sold by their employer, Subarashii Kudamono, which is Japanese for “Wonderful Fruit.” Based in Coopersburg, Pa., the company is owned by Lutron Electronics, a leading maker of

orchardopolises.

The idea for Subarashii germinated during a 1973 business trip to Japan by Joel Spira, the Lutron co-founder and director of research who invented the solid-state electronic dimmer. The Brooklyn-raised physicist received a gift of Asian pears and was pleasantly surprised by their robust, subtle taste. He was impressed, too, by their status as a symbol of beauty and longevity. Nobility appealed to an artistic scientist who for six decades has used electronic devices to change light and mood, to nurture nature and human nature.

Unable to find Asian pears near his Coopersburg home, Spira decided to grow them at his home. His project partner was his wife, Ruth Rodale Spira, a Lutron co-founder who in the late 1950s helped him test the solid-state dimmer in a bedroom of their New York apartment. Ruth Spira not only has a B.S. in botany, she has a long personal history with botany. Her father, the late J.I. Rodale, was an organic-gardening guru who founded

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Geoff Gehman is a former arts writer for The Morning Call in Allentown, Pa. He is the author of three books, including The Kingdom of the Kid, a memoir of growing up in the middle-class, long-lost Hamptons. He can be reached at geoffgehman@verizon.net.

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Fright Nights

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Gear up for Halloween with a choice selection of superior horror movies.

I have a lot of tradition films—movies I love to revisit annually. Most of them, naturally, are tied to holidays. For Christmas, I don’t think it will ever be anything other than National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, which for years my family and I watched on a damaged VHS tape complete with Sears and Pennsylvania Lottery commercials circa 1992. For Thanksgiving, I’ve continually made it a point to play Peter Hedges’s Pieces of April while toiling away in the kitchen, no matter how many other folks in the house have complained that they’d “rather be watching the parade.” For Halloween, I have a couple of go-to favorites, including Roman Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby and none other than Halloween, the immortal progenitor of the slasher genre.

Alien (1979)

The Alien franchise really has the bases covered.

James Cameron’s Aliens is, for my money, one of the best action movies ever made, and Ridley Scott’s original, Alien, is surely among the greatest of all horror films.

Introducing the masses to the brilliant, curvilinear artistry of Swiss designer H.R. Giger, and serving as an indispensable godparent of the Final Girl phenomenon, this lonely, perfectly-mounted tale of space terror is owed many a debt in terms of influence. Like its successor, it’s a masterpiece of atmosphere, a claustrophobic, ever-tightening beauty of dark hallways and air shafts that act as the arteries of what often feels more organism than film. As each crew member of the Nostromo ship is picked off, the knot in your gut intensifies (and that whole chestbursting scene certainly doesn’t help matters).

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Halloween is the best movie holiday because there isn’t another so firmly and unmistakably tethered to a whole type of movie. Horror films are as integral to October as summer tentpole films are to July; however, July doesn’t boast one day on which its movies can be celebrated. Horror interest spikes as All Hallows’ Eve draws close, with bump-in-the-night junkies programming their best spooky and shadowy marathons.

For those still looking for a lineup, the following group of ten may serve you well. Since a few are genuinely disturbing, I don’t know if I’d recommend adding them to your own list of tradition films, but they’re all guaranteed to deliver the goods, by which I mean goosebumps.

Antichrist (2009) Both booed and marveled upon at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival, Lars von Trier’s Antichrist is a polarizing bit of author therapy—a provocateur’s response to his own crippling depression, manifested as a thriller-cum-couplescounseling-psychodrama. Naysayers dismiss the movie— about a couple, He (Willem Dafoe) and She (Charlotte Gainsbourg) mourning the death of their toddler son—as a pretentious pile of artsy indulgence but, through these eyes, it’s a work of staggering genius, its unlikely beauty surpassed by its devastating implications. Setting the film in a grave and desolate woods he calls Eden, von Trier deals in fundamentally obvious themes of nature and religion, but the true chill of Antichrist lies in the research of Gainsbourg’s character, who before getting pregnant initiated a scholarly study of witchcraft and gynecide.

What that means for what takes place in the film proper is profoundly unsettling, and I couldn’t shake its impact for weeks. That’s more than I can say for most movies.

Audition (1999)

Speaking of violence and women, this painstaking cult favorite from Japanese filmmaker Takashi Miike has come to be thought of as a cautionary tale for single men on the prowl. God forbid the girl a bachelor takes home turns out to be anything like Asami (Eihi Shiina), the meek-turned-malicious naif a lonely widower (Ryo Ishibashi) attracts after staging a phony film audition.

Unlike American hack Eli Roth, whose similarly-structured Hostel is essentially an inept fanboy homage, Miike presents an engaging mystery before diving into the shock and gore of his much-discussed climax (which, admittedly, is relatively tame 12 years later). Like many titles in this list, Audition blurs the line between reality and nightmare. At the very least, it’ll change the way you look at metal wire.

r. kurt osenlund

The Descent (2005) Preying on our morally ambiguous drives to kill or be killed, and our instincts to recoil at tight, confining spaces, Neil Marshall’s The Descent, like Alien, works to turn your screening room into a constricting prison. The film would likely be stellar even without the jolting, secondact introduction of subterranean monsters, who start feeding on a pack of girls who go spelunking in an uncharted cave system, and may or may not represent the girls’ emerging and unforgiving animalistic impulses. The lighting design is beautifully realized, mixing glowsticks, flares, and rare peeks of sunlight with the directional glow of miner’s helmets. We only see what these poor, poor ladies see, making whatever lurks just of screen all the more terrifying.

Let the Right One In (2008)

Dawn of the Dead (2004)

These days, director Zack Snyder is best known for using green screens to bring to life his masturbatory geek fantasies, but his best film remains his debut, a hip, polished and almost relentlessly intense remake of George A. Romero’s mall-set survival story about zombies run amok. Showcasing a cleaner assemblage of Snyder’s technical and stylistic gifts, and featuring a cast of actors who give real, commendable performances (indie princess Sarah Polley is the affecting standout), Dawn of the Dead is far better than a mainstream splatter picture needs to be. Its extended opening, which establishes an environment of fear and frenzy and slowly reveals just how far the zombie sickness has spread (read: it’s everywhere), ranks high among the most gripping introductions of the 2000s.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978)

A sci-fi epidemic movie akin to Dawn of the Dead, the 1978 remake of the 1956 film Invasion of the Body Snatchers keenly taps into our innate fears of world domination and loss of identity while shrewdly satirizing the paranoia and selfishness often associated with the 1970s. Director Philip Kaufman guides a talented cast that includes Donald Sutherland, Brooke Adams, Leonard Nimoy and Veronica Cartwright. By the end of the movie, which sees the human race get rapidly replaced by a race of alien doppelgängers, the actors’ faces are embedded in your memory, none more than Sutherland’s, which appears, mouth agape, in a haunting beast of a final shot.

Already remade for American audiences, the minimalistic Swedish stunner Let the Right One In set the bar high for future vampire films when it debuted three years ago, depicting the surprising love story between a bullied boy (Kåre Hedebrant) and a young girl (Lina Leandersson) who just happens to be a centuries-old vampire. Artful and even poignant, Let the Right One In thrives thanks to an unhurried pace and an incredible collection of wholly arresting images. You might get more bloody bang for your buck in the latest Final Destination installment, but surely you won’t find sights so unforgettable as a vampire’s victim bursting into flames without warning, or the bullied boy’s tormenters getting their grisly comeuppance in a silent scene of extraordinary compositional savvy.

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A graduate of Temple University’s Film and Media Arts program, R. Kurt Osenlund has been obsessed with cinema and pop culture for as long as he can remember. In addition to ICON, he writes for several weekly newspapers, and regularly updates his blog, www.yourmoviebuddy.blogspot.com. rkurtosenlund@gmail.com oc t o b e r 2 0 1 1

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10 / art / fertile ground

Edward Redfield, Daniel Garber, Fern Coppedge, John Folinsbee, Charles Rosen and George Sotter. In addition, from some of the modernists who lived in the area, there are paintings by Elsie Driggs, Lee Gatch and Lloyd Ney. One of the most memorable pictures in the exhibition is Edward Redfield’s “Burning of Center Bridge.”

Based on a fire caused by lightning striking a wooden bridge over the Delaware River in the middle of the night back in 1923, the painting was done in two versions on the two days afterward. Redfield kept the one now on view in the Museum. It was eventually acquired for the permanent collection in 1998, a hundred years after the artist had settled permanently in the area.

“A Wooded Watershed” is a large scale oil painting on a semi-circle shaped canvas by Daniel Garber. Commissioned as a mural for the State Pavilion at the Philadelphia Sesquicentennial Exposition of 1926, the picture offers a view of a sylvan paradise in which you can almost feel the winds rustling through the trees of a peaceful out-of-doors location.

“Bowman’s Hill” is a view of a little mountain and the surrounding countryside south of New Hope, painted by John Fulton Folinsbee in the 1930s. It’s as though a moment in time has been magically captured and preserved in paint forever after.

Moving through the galleries, you realize that, at its

Nosferatu (1922)

You haven’t seen the face of horror until you’ve seen Max Schreck as Count Orlok, the nightmarish improvement on Count Dracula who lurks in the wings in this unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker’s classic bloodsucking saga. Directed by the great F.W. Murnau, this seminal German Expressionist film can still rattle nerves nearly a century after its production, depicting Schreck as that albino, bat-like, beclawed demon who’s become an eerie icon in popular culture. Depending on which version you come across, you may or may not see the film in multi-colored hues denoting varying times of day. In any case, the stark shadowplay and on-location settings will lend themselves greatly to the experience, which should certainly be had by any true horror fan.

Charles Rosen (1878-1950), Opalescent Morning, ca. 1909, oil on canvas, H. 32 x W. 40 inches, James A. Michener Art Museum. Gift of Marguerite and Gerry Lenfest.

Repulsion (1965) Before there was Black Swan, there was Polanski’s Repulsion, a stirring, black-and-white psychosexual thriller about an unassuming virgin whose repressed past and nightmares of the flesh return to her in the form of vivid hallucinations. As the deeply damaged central character, Catherine Deneuve—in a star-making role—finds the right note of vacant, switched-off madness, her nods, coos and petrified stares perpetuating the film’s mystery.

A Rosemary’s Baby precursor, Repulsion showcases Polanski’s aptitude for staging action in ominous residential spaces, and becomes all the more disorienting when it takes the twisted POV of the lead. One need only glance over the other titles in this list to see the scope of Repulsion’s influence—it played a key part in fusing horror with feminine sexuality.

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The Ring (2002)

Purists probably swear by Hideo Nakata’s 1998 Japanese original, Ringu, but Gore Verbinski’s remake, The Ring, is a startlingly handsome and graceful Westernization which, for this viewer, proved literally hair-raising.

The film may well toss sense and logic right out the window, but hell if young Samara’s (Daveigh Chase) indelible emergence from a leaky television isn’t one pin-you-to-your-seat moment, the tip-top among many fine, frightening scenes. Latter-day scream queen Naomi Watts was revealed to mass audiences through this bluefiltered beauty, which tells the story of a girl, a well, and a video tape that kills you a week after you watch it. So much for feeling relief when the credits roll. n

best, art appreciation is not prescribed. Brilliantly talented painters, like composers of significant serious music, don’t dictate what their audience should think and feel.

Instead, they offer a distinctive complex of aesthetically ordered elements to which visitors may react. The potential outcome is subjective, open-ended and liberating in ways that transcend simplistic description. The colors and textures of the artist’s language of vision serve as keys opening insights that are deeply revealing and singularly moving.

As original artworks, each combination of design factors interpret the mood and atmosphere of a setting experienced by a painter with the special features that mark it apart from everywhere else in the world. The fact that each of these images is distinctly individual helps define why they touch spectators in ways that are inevitably separate and entirely personal. n

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SWAN

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patricia savoie

The Hudson Valley

Modern Cuisine h Classic Comfort

food & wine

Corner of Swan & Main Lambertville, NJ 609-397-3552

History in the glass

A trip up the Hudson Valley, along the banks of the Hudson River, can be awe-inspiring. The Hudson is actually an estuary, where fresh water mixes with ocean salt water and the direction of river flow is influenced by tides. It was called by the Native peoples who inhabited its banks “the river that flows both ways.”

The Hudson River also has been called “America’s Rhine” for its beauty and majesty. And as the grape and wine industry has grown, it’s an apt nickname based on the many wineries that now populate its banks. This is America’s oldest grape growing and wine making region. The French Hugenots planted vines in the New Paltz area in 1677—100 years before vines were planted in California—on the banks and hillsides of the Hudson. The River has always played an important role: it keeps the climate temperate, with warm air being pulled north from downstate.

The first commercial winery in the Valley, in Washingtonville, was Jacques Brothers Winery, established in 1837 to produce Altar wines. In 1885 it was renamed Brotherhood, which today is the oldest continuously-operating winery in the U.S. The oldest continuously-operating vineyard in the U.S. is part of Benmarl Winery nearby.

The Hudson River Region American Viticultural Area (AVA) was established in 1982. It covers 224,000 acres. Today there are 28 wineries, most small and family-owned. An interesting mix of grapes is planted, from French hybrids (Baco Noir, Cayuga, Chambourcin, Chancellor, Chelois, De Chaunac, Frontenac, Marechal Foch, Seyval Blanc, Traminette, Vidal Blanc) to the European vitis vinifera (Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay, Gewirztraminer, Lemberger, Merlot, Pinot Noir, Riesling).

The Valley is a great place for a day trip or a weekend. There are three Wine Trails in the region. The largest, the Shawangunk Wine Trail, is located between the mountains of the same name and the Hudson River. The Trail is 85 miles north of New York City and is composed of eleven family-owned wineries. There also is the Duchess Wine Trail, which has only two wineries at present, and the Hudson-Berkshire Beverage Trail, which runs 44 miles from just south of Albany to the town of Hudson. In addition, several excellent dairies produce fine cheeses, and fruit is abundant.

I spent a day in the Hudson Valley recently with several winemakers and owners tasting some of their wines:

Patricia Savoie is a wine and culinary travel writer.

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Benmarl Winey: Matt Spaccarelli’s family bought the winery in 2006 from the Miller family, who own Chaddsford Winery in PA. They are making an interesting Traminette, with nice fruit, citrus and floral notes. I loved the 2008 Merlot with its cherry, red berry and vanilla notes. The 2009 Baco Noir had a full, spicy nose and black cherry and pepper notes.

[Marlboro. www.benmarl.com] Brookview Station Winery: This winery is making mainly fruit wines and dessert wines and a nice black currant Cassis. It is owned by Susan Goold Miller and her husband Edward and is on the site of the Goold family orchards. [Castelton. www.brookviewstationwinery.com] Brotherhood Winery: Winemaster Cesar Baeza is an owner of Brotherhood along with some relatively new Chilean partners. My favorite of the wines he was showing for our visit was the 2008 Pinot Noir, which is Burgundian in style. It had a lovely fruit nose, and some red plum and cherry notes. It was light, dry and smooth. [Washingtonville. www.brotherhood-winery. com] Cereghino Smith Winery; Owned by Paula Cereghino and Fred Smith, this small winery produces a number of Italian varietals. They were pouring their 2010 Chardonnay, which was spicy and fruity with its touch of Viognier, and the 2009 Cabernet Franc, very dry with sour cherry notes. [Bloomington. www.cereghinosmith.com] Clinton Vineyards specializes in growing Seyval Blanc. Owner Phyllis Feder is making sparkling wines by the traditional method – a Jubilee which showed a bready nose, a Seyval Naturel with no sugar added, and a Peach Gala with peach flavor. They also produce a wonderful Cassis from black currants and several fruit dessert wines. [Clinton Corners. www. clintonvineyards.com] Hudson-Chatham Winery: Carlo and Dominique DeVito acted on their love of wine several years ago – moving from New Jersey, buying an old farm and planting vines. Their winery specializes in small handmade batches. They are doing great things with the Baco Noir grape. The Reserve 2010 is light and spicy, while the Old Vines 2010 is dense and complex, with dried black cherry notes. They also make “Empire,” which blends three wines made from Baco Noir from the Hudson Valley, Merlot from Long Island and Cabernet Franc from the Finger Lakes. Their 2009 Estate Seyval Blanc is dry with apple pie notes. [Ghent. www.hudson-chathamwinery.com]

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Ooka

Ooka, 110 Veteran’s Lane, Doylestown, PA 215-348-8185 ookasushi.com

food & wine

Once again, we’re off to Ooka. We discovered Ooka several years ago. It’s hard to believe, but when Ooka debuted, sushi was exotic around these parts. I stumbled across a 1998 Ooka restaurant review stashed away with some old reviews I myself had written (including one on Ooka). The piece, written by another reviewer, was glowing. However, the first several paragraphs were devoted to explaining terms like sushi, sashimi, and tempura—familiar lexicon nowadays. The remainder of the review focused on the wild popularity of this exotic newcomer. The popularity has not declined.

The initial buzz Ooka created in May of ‘97 buzzes still. Given its location in a nondescript, isolated shopping center behind the carwash on Veteran’s Lane, Ooka must be doing something right. After all, there’s no paucity of choices for dining in the heart of Doylestown.

Ooka scores the dining trifecta: good food, service, and atmosphere. It’s hard to beat in terms of cheery service. Everyone is accommodating and helpful—a characteristic that ratchets up in importance for diners who don’t know their yakitori from their negimaki. The ubiquitous staff performs without obtrusiveness. The décor is sleek, contemporary and comfortable with the affable staff adding the all-important human dimension to these attributes.

You’ll find a variety of expertly rendered, clever rolls on the extensive menu.

What’s most consistent in the appeal of Ooka’s sushi is texture, beginning with the quality of the rice. The rice is always moist and unclumped. The vinegars and sweeteners used in the sushi preparation heighten the taste, and provide a tasty canvas for the fish or vegetable cargo they wrap. Ingredients are always fresh. Fish is always odorless. And, with few exceptions, artistic and appetizing presentations deliver on their visual promise.

There are some memorable creations among the long list of Signature Rolls.

Lobster Tempura Roll shows up as a pair of long, segmented cylinders encircling smoked salmon under a carpet of green avocado. Purple Roll gathers eel tempura, cucumber and crabstick and tops it all with grilled Japanese eggplant. Lobster Dynamite Roll is Maine lobster with avocado and mango topped with spicy tuna.

There’s a dizzying number of individual items on the menu with a few prix fixe, multi-course choices. In the menu’s Hibachi section (the highest priced menu section) you’ll find the Ooka Deluxe. This selection offers a choice of filet mignon and lobster tail ($31.95); Lobster Tail, shrimp, and scallops ($32.95); NY Strip Steak, chicken, and shrimp ($29.95); or Filet, shrimp and scallops ($31.95).

Ooka’s greatest attraction for me is the small plate selection. Hot and cold appetizers are presented with a sort of endearing artistic humility consistent with the general Ooka vibe. The $6 Shumai appetizer (steamed shrimp dumplings) brings several tender dumplings served atop a large exotic green leaf with house-made soy teriyaki sauce. At $6, Harumaki (spring rolls) that harbor fried crabstick is flavorful. Crisp Soft Shell Crab is a definite pleaser. No matter the season, whenever soft shells appear on the menu, the Ooka chefs manage to capture the crab at the peak point in its molt when the crunch of the shell is delicate and insinuates some sort of primal gusto that makes this dish a perennial favorite.

Dinner entrées, ranging from $13 (Vegetable Tempura) to $29 (Seafood To-Ban which is Lobster Tail, Shrimp, Scallops, Spinach in lemon-garlic sauce), offer several Asian standards, some of which have been fused comfortably into American contemporary compatibility. Thus, wasabi and basil-perfumed edamame breathe Asian tradition into Pan-Roasted Chilean Sea Bass, while corn kernels and caramelized pumpkin give it New-World boost. It’s a destination-worthy dish, as is Roasted Long Island Duck Breast at an astoundingly low $20. Succulent duck is perfectly crisped,

and caramelized Asian pear, taro potato clad in light tempura, and Japanese eggplant lift the dish to exceptional.

I’ve only touched on the menu highlights. There are pages more to explore and savor. I know I’ll find something else new or different my next visit, which, as history shows, will be coming sometime soon. n

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robert gordon

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Union Trust

“Is this really Philly?” my Big Apple friend asked, gawking skyward toward Union Trust Steakhouse’s magnificent ceiling. The Phillies aren’t the only ones that are facelifting Philly. Our dining scene has upped its game, too, in terms of opulent venues. A generation or two ago, a place like Union Trust Steakhouse might have seemed too splendiferous, too sumptuous for the Quaker City. To enjoy dining digs with Union Trust’s brand of elegance, Philadelphians would head to the Big Apple, complaining, “Why can’t Philly have restaurants like that?” That’s changing. Even my NYC friend conceded that Union Trust Steakhouse “is dropdead gorgeous.”

Union Trust is a hotbed for celebrity spotting. A litany of Phillies names identify personal wine lockers that line the entrance. En route to your table, you’ll see names like: “LA”(translation: “Larry Andersen”), “Jen & Chase Utley,” “Cole Hamels.” Sure, leave it to SoCal guys like Utley and Hamels to find our town’s coolest spots. Union Trust has caught Hollywood’s eye as well.

A soon-to-be-released Jack Nicholson movie used Union Trust for some of its scenes. Limitless, starring Philly native Bradley Cooper, also features it.

The structure itself was originally designed by world-class Philadelphia architect and French immigrant Paul-Philippe Cret, whose global portfolio includes the University of Texas Tower at Austin—the infamous perch for deranged ‘60s gunman Charles Whitman. The Rodin Museum, the Valley Forge National Memorial Arch, and Ben Franklin Bridge are some other works of Cret.

DAS Architects transformed the original space into the current restaurant, handsomely balancing the contemporary with the baroque. The room features chic, contemporary appointments like rich maroon padded tabletops and banquettes, gracefully curving padded dining chairs and mammoth banks of lights arranged in columns suspended overhead.

The task of designing the Union Trust menu is Executive Chef Quincy Logan’s, whose fare certainly measures up to the high bar set by the décor and atmosphere. Union Trust is arguably one of the vanguard in a new generation of steakhouses. Fish entrées are as good as the impeccably rendered steakhouse fare. Sides are good and the signature cocktails are a delight. To be sure, you pay a commensurate tariff, but considering the excellence in food, décor and ambiance, prices are 38

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fair. And you can add an attentive, professional waitstaff to those other attributes. The servers are unstuffy and down-to-earth. Thus, the overall dining experience incorporates the kind of elements once found only in Manhattan.

The front and back of the house work in notable harmony, thanks to Quincy Logan, a personal, amicable Jersey guy. He crossed the Delaware over a decade ago to pursue his craft at Philadelphia’s Capital Grille. Seven years later, he helped open Union Trust and after a few months was tapped to head the kitchen. From Chef Logan on down, you’d be hard-pressed to find a place with more team spirit between the cooks and the servers.

Crispy Calamari underscores a major strength of the menu: Only the finest, freshest ingredients are used.

Sometimes in chophouses, the searing (so to speak) focus on the meats tends to reduce the ingredients in side dishes to afterthoughts. Un-breaded calamari ($13) is fresh and tender and peppadew relish infuses justright piquancy. Peppadews are a good choice. They’re designer vegetables—a cross between a sweet pepper and a chili that was developed and patented in South Africa (note to purists: they are not genetically modified).

Bigeye Tuna Tartare ($16) is jewel-red minced tuna that glimmers in a huge recessed rectangular dish.

Togarashi oil, a Japanese seven-ingredient spice, spiked with sultry Thai sriracha paste, enlivens the fish, along with a tumble of ridged, spicy house-made waffle chips.

A fistful of toasted pistachios lace a Tasting of Beets ($11) on which goat cheese clusters atop sliced red and golden beets served with a tangle of mixed greens and wedges of fresh tomatoes. Maine Lobster Bisque comes chockfull of lobster sweetened with a delicate crème fraiche cap. Other Appetizers include Kobe Short Rib, Scallops & Bacon, Kobe Steak Sashimi—to name but a few.

The Raw Bar is another attraction, especially for oyster connoisseurs. Union Trust offers some of the city’s best slurping. Choices include east-coast oysters like Blue Point, Island Creek, “Choppers” Wellfleet, Rome Point, Malpeque, Cape May Salt, and Chesapeake Bay Wild along with west-coast species like Kumamoto, Kusshi, Shigoku, Pacific Rim and Effingham. For groups who are dining together, there’s a Grand Tower of oysters for $65 and an Ultimate Tower for $95.

Not surprisingly, steak choices are first-rate. In the “Heritage Black Angus” menu section, all the selections are raised on the Herr Angus Farm in Lancaster.

Choices range from an 8-oz. Filet Mignon ($36) through Cowboy Ribeye, Bone-In Filet Mignon, to Ribeye Filet Mignon ($44). Among the choices in the “Prime, DryAged for 28 Days” section, you’ll find NY Strip ($45), Porterhouse, Ribeye, and the decadent 28-oz. Tomahawk Ribeye ($60). All these steaks come from Creekstone Farm in Kansas.

Steak lovers might want to choose something from the “House Specialties” menu section. Filet King Oscar is filet mignon resting on four asparagus stalks slathered with béarnaise sauce and capped with king crab.

Entrées in this section like Shiitake Rubbed Cowboy Ribeye ($48) or Ancho-Rubbed Strip Steak ($39) are paired with special sides chosen by the chef.

And speaking of side dishes, Smoky Collard Greens ($8) is one of the city’s finest sides. The funky acerbic complexity of collards (an underutilized green that’s enjoying a resurgence) is tamed with copious chunks of turkey bacon. Sautéed Spinach is a tasty side dish, too.

Loaded Hash Browns that glisten golden-brown amidst fried onions and curled scallions are also a good bet.

Union Trust dishes out some of the most generous servings I’ve seen at chophouses. Notwithstanding that, you should consider saving room for dessert.

The house-made gelatos are sublime. The Creamsickle Cheesecake, with blood orange gelato and caramel satisfies your guilty pleasure, but the S’Mores—peanutbutter gelato mounded on graham cracker-pretzel crust and capped with marshmallow meringue—is the bomb.

Suffice it to say, this breath-taking eatery is best experienced first-hand. With its magnificent vaulted, sculpted ceilings, ubiquitous marble accents, and colossal arched walls, dining at UnionTrust Steakhouse is like dining in the Musée d’Orsay. That’s not in New York either. n Union Trust Steakhouse, 717 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19106 (215) 925-6000 uniontruststeakhouse.com

Email r.gordon33@verizon.net and visit his website at robertgordononline.com.

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essay

sally friedman

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he was a magnificent cook, a woman who could turn an ordinary pot roast into something so remarkable that you wanted to weep in gratitude. Food lives in memory: Mom’s Jewish Apple Cake, her ginger cookies, even her scrambled eggs, all occupy permanent memory cells. So it was always somewhat intimidating to cook for this woman who could turn out fantastic family dinner in a daunting high-rise apartment space. But when my late mother was in her 96th year, and forced to hang up her apron as illness invaded her tiny body, I was determined to keep her well fed. After all, that was her act of grace to me during my first years of life. It seemed eminently right that I could do the same for her last.

Initially, it was simple: my sweet mother was so grateful for the help that she eagerly accepted the most modest of offerings. Meatloaf and mashed potatoes—true comfort foods—were favorites.

Ditto for baked chicken with a hint of lemon and the simplest brown rice.

But as her illness progressed, and chemo drugs altered not just her sunny perspective, but her taste buds as well. Suddenly, this sweet little lady who smiled at a plate of gelatin was finicky, Fussy. Even a bit quarrelsome.

I learned that one of the great challenges of our role reversal—this ultimate, painful one—was keeping perspective. Instead of feeling bruised and rejected when Mom turned away from my most valiant culinary efforts, I tried to imagine her failing appetite, her weariness, her pervasive sadness. Not so easy. The emotions don’t go to college.

“Too spicy,” Mom would lament when I offered a mild vegetable soup I’d labored over for hours and carried to her apartment in multiple jars. And I would sulk like a spoiled child.

My broiled salmon was rejected. “Overcooked” was the verdict. In desperation, I tried take-out food at some of her city’s most fabled restaurants. Not surprisingly what I got was “Too fancy!”

Patience was wearing thin through those long days and nights as Mom slowly was forced to relinquish her beloved independence along with her strength.

And then the “Eureka!” moment came.

I would set up an arrangement that allowed the former empress of the kitchen to be close by the kitchen—close enough to tutor me on the fine points of her own natural talents with food.

It involved trial and error until we figured out precisely how to cushion the right chair, fashion a footrest, and still give Mom a bird’s-eye-view of her kingdom: the apartment kitchen.

And so it began: Several times a week, I would arrive at Mom’s apartment door with her specified list of ingredients. She would carefully examine and judge the quality of the chicken thighs, the freshness of the spices, the purity of the olive oil.

And then the commander-in-chief of chefdom would direct the preparation of the upcoming lunch or dinner. Step-by-step, she would guide me through the products and processes she knew without even glancing at a recipe. It was all right there, in her brain, her heart and her fingertips.

While Mom had tried for years to lure me into the kitchen for this transmission of knowledge, I’d somehow always resisted. No need to consult Dr. Freud; cooking was her thing, so I didn’t enter that arena. Until now…

As the days and weeks slipped by, we both knew that our time together was now heartbreakingly finite. So our culinary sessions took on a new urgency. We wanted this to go on forever. And we both understood that it could not, and would not.

As my mother grew weaker, our lessons grew shorter. Propping her up close to the kitchen became more daunting. Our last culinary session was somehow so fitting: Mom taught me how to make perfect, creamy oatmeal, the very food she had fed me as a baby.

I had a tough time meeting her oatmeal standard, but I finally got it. Without words, we congratulated one another on our giant leap.

Her very last meal was a spoonful of oatmeal warmed with milk. I’d done it right. It was the last time I saw her smile. Mom died a few days later. But her mission had been accomplished. She had passed on a gift more precious than rubies. n

a spoonful of oatmeal

Mary Cassatt (1844–1926) Young Mother Sewing, 1900.

Oil on canvas; 36 3/8 x 29. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, H. O. Havemeyer Collection, Bequest of Mrs. H. O. Havemeyer, 1929. ©Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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Sally Friedman has been “living out loud” for over three decades. In addition to ICON, she contributes to the New York Times, Philadelphia Inquirer, AARP Magazine and other national and regional publications. She is the mother of three fierce daughters, grandmother of seven exceptional grandchildren and the wife of retired New Jersey Superior Court Judge Victor Friedman. Email: PINEGANDER@aol.com.

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dave barry How to have a fun-free Halloween Gather ‘round, boys and girls, because today Uncle Dave is going to tell you how to have some real “oldfashioned” Halloween fun!

Start by gathering these materials: a commercial air compressor, an acetylene torch, a marine flare gun and 200 pounds of boiled pig brains. Next, select a neighbor who ... Whoops! Scratch that, boys and girls! Uncle Dave did not realize that your parents were also reading this column. Ha ha! Hi there, Mom and Dad! Uncle Dave was just having a flashback to the Halloweens of his boyhood, an innocent time when parents were far more relaxed and clueless about what their kids were up to.

“You kids have fun, and be home by Thanksgiving!” our parents would call to us on Halloween night, as we staggered out the front door, weighed down by hundreds of pounds of concealed vandalism supplies, including enough raw eggs to feed Somalia for decades. By morning, thanks to our efforts, the entire neighborhood would be covered with a layer of congealed shaving cream and toilet paper that, around certain unpopular neighbors’ homes, was hundreds of feet thick. This is how the Appalachian Mountains were formed.

Yes, boys and girls, Uncle Dave and his chums sure had a lot of fun on Halloween! And when Uncle Dave says “a lot of fun,” he means, “a very unsafe time.” Because it turns out that we were violating many Halloween safety rules. In those days, we did not know about the importance of Halloween safety, because the Internet did not exist, at least not the way it is today.

Back then, the entire Internet consisted of two slow, boxcar-sized UNIVAC computers about 50 feet apart, connected by a wire. It would take one of these computers an entire day to send an email to the other one, which would immediately delete it, because it was a Viagra ad.

Thanks to technological progress, we have access to much more information today, so we understand how hideously dangerous pretty much everything is, especially Halloween. Uncle Dave looked up “Halloween Safety” on the Internet, and he found a website established by the National Safety Council, at http://www.crimemuseum.org/documents/Halloween%20 Safety%20Tips On this site, you parents will find numerous tips to ensure that your children have a safe Halloween. For your convenience, Uncle Dave has boiled these tips down to five: 1. Never allow your children outside on Halloween night.

2. Or in the daytime, either.

3. Your children should spend Halloween locked inside a windowless room, sedated and wrapped from head to toe in reflective tape.

4. If, God forbid, some neighbor, somehow, manages to actually give one of your children a treat, you must immediately snatch it away and destroy it with a flamethrower.

5. Never use a flamethrower while sleeping.

Uncle Dave’s point is that Halloween is not the carefree holiday that it once was. These days, nobody goes outside on Halloween night except teenagers, which Uncle Dave—believe it or not!—used to be one of, although he now finds them terrifying. But does that mean that youngsters can no longer have fun on Halloween? Yes! No, wait, Uncle Dave means: No! There are plenty of Halloween activities that are both fun AND safe. For example, there is: CARVING THE PUMPKIN. This is a Halloween tradition that began in the British Isles, where one magical night several centuries ago, a group of people decided to put a lit candle inside a hollowed-out pumpkin, to symbolize the fact that they had been hitting the sauce pretty hard.

Today, pumpkin-carving is an activity that the whole family can enjoy, except for Dad, who gets stuck with the job of actually carving the pumpkin, which means he has to stick his hand inside and grasp the pumpkin slime, knowing that at any moment he might encounter the North American Gourd-Dwelling Scorpion, whose toxic sting claims more American lives each year than cellular phones and asteroids combined.

In closing, the best way to avoid this danger, advises the American Pumpkin Growers Council, is to make sure you buy a pumpkin “that costs a lot of money.” n

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ADVERTISEMENT

Have Yourself a Merry Little “Lehigh Valley Christmas”

By Kate Scuffle, Selkie Theatre

Over the past 15 years, A Lehigh Valley Christmas in Concert has become a beloved holiday tradition, kicking off the Christmas season with a joyous, jamming concert featuring legendary Valley musicians as well as exciting new artists. If you’ve somehow managed to miss it—this is the year to join in the party!

A Lehigh Valley Christmas began in 1996, when organizers Miriam Huertas and Mike Krisukas of Zen For Primates gathered Valley musicians together over Thanksgiving weekend for a Christmas concert showcasing blues, rock, gospel and folk artists playing their favorite holiday tunes at the J.I. Rodale Theatre. It was an unforgettable, sold-out evening, a musical holiday reunion for musicians and audience alike. That night, the tradition was born.

Over the years, the Concert just got bigger and better, known for stellar performances, one-of-a-kind collaborations onstage, and the rousing, beautiful All-Star Finale. While audiences were treated to wonderfully fresh takes on holiday classics, the event also became an instant favorite with musicians for the warm backstage camaraderie and onstage magic.

“This concert is a homecoming for me,” says Dave Fry, folk legend and founder of Godfrey Daniels, “This is a chance to reconnect with my fellow hard-traveling Lehigh Valley musicians and play for a sophisticated listening audience in a very classy place. It doesn’t get any better than this.”

In 2007, A Lehigh Valley Christmas in Concert had simply grown too big to be managed alone, and that year became the Year Without A Christmas for concert goers and musicians. But like any good Christmas story, there is a happy ending. Due to huge popular demand, the Greater Lehigh Valley Chamber of Commerce partnered and A Lehigh Valley Christmas happily returned in 2008.

So if you haven’t already made it your own holiday tradition, don’t miss the magic of the 15th A Lehigh Valley Christmas in Concert as musicians take to the stage at the elegantly historic Allentown Symphony Hall on Thanksgiving Sunday. The Lehigh Valley’s best performers and musicians are looking forward to welcoming you to the family with joy, laughter, story and song!

Happy 15th birthday—A Lehigh Valley Christmas in Concert!!!

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The Los Angeles Times Sunday Crossword Puzzle Give it some gas

By Gareth Bain Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis

Across

1 Sassy 5 Judge’s decrees 10 Vena __ 14 Iranian faith 19 “In the Valley of __”: 2007 film 20 Lots of lots 21 Fictional coward 22 Oboists’ section 23 *Dishonest kegler?

25 Chief Norse god 26 Park place 27 Move sneakily 28 Mystic’s deck 30 108-Down on a screen 32 Style with layers 33 *Inane Laconian serf?

35 Org. with a WasteWise program 38 “__ Touch This”: MC Hammer hit 40 Job listing initials 41 They’re hard to read 43 Rolls gas 46 Grooves in boards 48 Key letters 49 *Where to see historic tickers?

52 Pride youngster 54 Overzealous bather?

55 Other, to Ortega 56 “__ porridge in the pot ...”

57 2000s drama set in Newport Beach 59 U.K. decorations 60 Foreign correspondent?

62 Lab specimen 64 Question of time 66 Many Soc. Sec. recipients 67 *Treat one’s stye?

71 Six-time Olympic swimming gold medalist Van Dyken 74 Two twos, say 75 ___ mail 76 Terhune’s Lad, e.g.

78 Renaissance family name 81 Day break?

84 Slight incision 86 Scintilla 87 Stinks 89 Sound during a drive?

90 *Fights during breathing exercises?

92 Bounces back 94 Animal on Wyoming’s flag 96 Range in Utah 97 Non-roaring big cat 99 Onetime Beatle Sutcliffe 100 Alt. announcers 44

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02 China’s Mao __-tung 1 103 *Broadway tykes?

106 Series ender 110 Govt. securities 112 30th anniversary gift 113 Like some dress patterns 115 Not from here 117 High-tech tablet 119 *Throw tennis star Sharapova?

121 Asian menu promise 122 Golden State sch.

123 “Macbeth” (1948) director Welles 124 Auctioneer’s word 125 74-Across numbers 126 Mint leaver, often 127 “¿Cómo __?”

128 “__ the night ...”

Down

1 Organic fuel 2 New York Bay’s __ Island 3 __ Waldo Emerson 4 Eighth of 24 5 Freshwater fish 6 Frau’s “I” 7 Iraklion native 8 It incited a 1773 party 9 Stars of old Rome 10 Stopped bleeding 11 Help 12 Express 13 Invalidates 14 Part of a support system?

15 Dynamic opening?

16 *Where you might hear “Oy vey!

I need a drink!”?

17 Big stink 18 Six-Day War victor: Abbr.

24 Food made from cultures 29 Witching hr. follower 31 Gibraltar landmark 33 Assessor’s decision 34 Homemade tipple 36 Superman look-alike, evidently 37 Jacks and jennies 39 Kvetch 42 Golf green border 43 Prokofiev’s wolf catcher 44 Pulls down 45 Ruse 46 90 degrees 47 Mystery novelist Grafton 49 Brewery flavoring 50 Accessory often worn diagonally 51 Salinger heroine 53 Pitch : baseball :: __ : cricket

57 Quisling’s crime 58 Lighthearted genre about womanhood 61 Litigator’s org.

63 __ Arbor, Michigan 65 Tokyo, once 68 In good condition 69 Hip-hop’s __ Yang Twins 70 “A Dissertation Upon Roast Pig” essayist 71 Hello or good-bye 72 Teeny parasites 73 Votes for 74 Sri Lankan export 77 Bullets may be seen on one 78 Posture-perfect 79 Vier + zwei 80 *When mildly amusing sitcoms air?

82 Lump 83 Lifting apparatus 85 Bikini sizes 88 Microwave choices 90 With 107-Down, words to a goner 91 Canonized Archbishop of Canterbury 93 Humorist Mort 95 Mike Brady, to Carol’s girls 98 Light element, and a hint to how the answers to starred clues have been inflated

00 Pie-making aids 1 101 “Finally!”

104 Pound-watching org.

105 Reno-__ Intl. Airport 107 See 90-Down 108 It shows the way 109 With 118-Down, 2000s boxing champ

113 Low wetlands 14 Boys 1 115 “Wait, there’s more ...”

116 Singer Reed 118 See 109-Down 120 U.S. govt. broadcaster Answer in next month’s issue.

11 Tops Answer to September’s puzzle, SECRET STASH 1

HARPER’S m

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Facts compiled by the editors of Harper’s Magazine

Average lag, in months, between economic recovery and employment recovery after the nine previous recessions: 10 Projected lag, in months, after this recession: 60 Percentage of the $46 billion allocated by TARP to help homeowners refinance that has been used for that purpose: 4.3 Percentage of Americans who say they have a “great deal” of confidence in the nation’s banks: 23 In Congress: 12 Number of the 612 races in California’s last four statewide elections in which the incumbent’s party won: 605 Amount paid at a Texas auction for the vanity license plate “freedom”: $2,500 For “america”: $3,000 For “ferrari”: $15,000 Percentage of mortgage-interest-deduction recipients who say they “have not used a government social program”: 60 Of federal student-loan recipients: 53 Of food stamp recipients: 25 Percentage of Americans who say their household couldn’t come up with $2,000 in thirty days: 47 Years it will take lenders in New York State, working at their current rate, to foreclose on all houses currently in default: 61 Percentage change in the likelihood that a U.S. college-educated couple will divorce if housing prices fall by 10 percent: +29 Percentage by which a woman who lost her virginity before the age of 16 is more likely to get divorced later in life: 80 Chance that a child born to a mother with a college degree will be born out of wedlock: 1 in 17 That a child born to a mother without a college degree will: 1 in 2 Percentage by which Americans prefer having boys to girls: 40 Number of U.S. counties in which life expectancy for women is lower than or the same as it was in 1997: 860 Percentage of Americans who believe pornography is “morally wrong”: 66 Percentage who believe the death penalty is: 28 Percentage of gays in the military who are “out” to at least some of their unit, according to the advocacy group OutServe: 78 Number of members in Iran’s “moral police force,” which is charged with enforcing national dress codes: 70,000 Number of health-care workers arrested in Bahrain for tending to the wounds of antigovernment protesters: 48 Chance that a Pakistani approves of the U.S. raid on Osama bin Laden: 1 in 10 Number of suspected leakers of classified information who have been prosecuted since Obama took office: 5 Number who were prosecuted under the Nixon Administration: 2 Date on which the federal government declassified the Pentagon Papers: 06/13/2011 Date on which rinderpest became the second disease officially eradicated from the earth: 6/28/2011 Price for which the head of St. Vitalis of Assisi, the patron saint of genital disease, was sold at auction in May: $5,000 Value of public-health benefits for every dollar spent on pollution control, according to the EPA: $30 Percentage by which the risk of type 2 diabetes increases for every two hours a day that a person watches television: 20 Estimated percentage change in the abuse of antianxiety drugs in the United States since 9/11: +176 Number of the 48 wrestlers who participated in 1991’s WrestleMania who are now dead: 13 Hours more media consumed each day by the average minority youth than by the average white youth: 4.5 Percentage of U.S. video-game players who are over the age of 50: 29 Last day on which ancient Greek was taught at Michigan State University: 4/29/2011 Date on which Greek “rush week” begins for the Michigan State Spartans: 9/11/2011 Index Sources 1,2 McKinsey Global Institute (N.Y.C.); 3 U.S. Department of the Treasury; 4,5 Gallup (N.Y.C.); 6 Public Policy Institute of California (San Francisco); 7–9 My Plates (Nacogdoches, Tex.); 10–12 Suzanne Mettler, Cornell University (Ithaca, N.Y.); 13 National Bureau of Economic Research (Cambridge, Mass.); 14 LPS Applied Analytics (Jacksonville, Fla.); 15 Martin Farnham, University of Victoria (Victoria, British Columbia); 16 Anthony Paik, University of Iowa (Iowa City); 17,18 National Marriage Project, University of Virginia (Charlottesville); 19 Gallup (N.Y.C.); 20 Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (Seattle); 21,22 Gallup (N.Y.C.); 23 Sue Fulton, OutServe; 24 International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran (N.Y.C.); 25 Physicians for Human Rights (Cambridge, Mass.); 26 Pew Global Attitudes Project (Washington); 27,28 U.S. Department of Justice/Government Accountability Project (Washington); 29 National Declassification Center (College Park, Md.); 30 Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Washington); 31 Damien Matthews, Matthews Auction Rooms (Oldcastle, Ireland); 32 Environmental Protection Agency (N.Y.C.); 33 Anders Grøntved, Harvard School of Public Health (Boston); 34 Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (Rockville, Md.); 35 Harper’s research; 36 Victoria Rideout (San Francisco); 37 Entertainment Software Association (Washington); 38 John Rauk, Michigan State University (East Lansing); 39 Department of Student Life, Michigan State University (East Lansing).

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30 / feature / AN amusement park for the senses

Emmaus-based Rodale Press, publisher of Prevention and other healthy magazines. As a youngster she worked on a family farm that tested organic-gardening recipes for Organic Gardening.

The Spiras started small, growing Asian pears from seed in their backyard. They consulted Western and Eastern experts, including an American pomologist. They planted thousands of fruit trees on hundreds of acres on two former farms in Weisenberg Township, a center for corn, soybeans and Christmas trees northwest of Allentown. Lutron employees helped them develop new varieties by rating taste, color and shape. Polling staffers was natural for the Spiras, whose Oriental style of leadership ranges from encouraging a sense of shared ownership to carefully choosing paint colors for conference rooms and stairwells.

In early September, a few days into harvest season, I visited the Subarashii orchard in Kempton, Pa., once the site of a Kobe breeding farm where wealthy Texas beef buyers appeared in Cadillacs decorated with cattle horns.

My guides were Holly Harter, Subarashii’s director of marketing, and Tom Sacks, the general manager. Like most Subarashii/Lutron employees, they have many roles. Harter supervises public relations, publications and promotions. Sacks plants, sprays, picks and drives a fruit truck to the Hunts Point market in the Bronx. Once the operations manager of Lutron’s global distribution center, he is relatively new to Asian pears but a veteran of where the pears are grown. The Weisenberg Township native grew up nine miles away from the Kempton orchard; as a youngster he baled hay and picked potatoes on Subarashii’s property in Germansville Sacks started the tour by driving a Chevy Suburban to a hill above a slaloming, banking, quilted valley. We tasted the tan, conical Hosui, a commercial variety as popular in Japan as Red Delicious apples are in the U.S., and the round JunoSan, a unique variety that resembles a reddish-brown softball. Thanks to Hurricane Irene the ground was littered with pears; turning the turf into a gourd patch.

Down the hill, near the orchard’s midpoint, Sacks parked by another Subarashii special. Shaped like a bulbous cone, the SuSan could be confused with a European pear. No Bartlett, however, is as sweet; no Anjou is as potent. To Harter, the SuSan tastes like sugared grapefruit; Sacks detects a dose of port wine.

“People either love it or they don’t like it,” said Sacks of the SuSan, which is named for one of the Spiras’s three daughters. “For many Asians, it’s too sweet. I think most people don’t like it because they don’t understand it.”

It didn’t take long to understand that growing gourmet Asian pears in Pennsylvania is a delicate operation. In the early spring Subarashii employees place a waxy, multi-layered bag around the round, semi-sweet AsaJu, another patented variety, to preserve its tawny yellow color, crisp skin and light sheen. From early September to mid-October the AsaJu and its cousins are hand picked only when they’re ripe. European pears, by comparison, typically ripen off the tree.

Coddling continues in the packing house at the Kempton orchard, which is nicknamed Nashimon, or “Pear Home.” Pears are sorted by hand and wrapped in tissue paper. The AsaJu gets an elastic sock, a fancier fashion for a franchise player. The fruits are then placed in foam trays in corrugated containers vented to promote aeration and freshness.

Growing gourmet Asian pears in Pennsylvania is also a brutal business. Copper is sprayed to fight stinkbugs and fireblight. Deer are chased by resident dogs. Birds are spooked by an air-raid siren of recorded bird noises, a sort of solar-powered scarecrow.

Subarashii transforms victims into heroes. Damaged fruits become dried pears, an apricot/starfruit-like Rieslingstyle table wine, a brandy called Eau de Vie, or “Water of Life.” Some even become decorations. According to Harter, heavy rains in 2009 produced five-pound boulders that doubled as substitute gourds in Thanksgiving centerpieces.

Some consumers insist that Asian pears are only good as Thanksgiving centerpieces. Sacks estimates that only two percent of Americans have actually tried what he grows. Fruit purists swear that a pear should not be as round as an apple, or have speckled skin, or be as sweet as tutti-frutti bubblegum.

Sacks and Harter use tastings to convert the skeptical. The Asian pear’s relatively thick peel, they point out, makes it juicier than its European peers. The SuSan’s sharp sweetness can be tempered by a tangy cheese; Sacks recommends a smoked Gouda. A round, sandy-skinned pear makes an unusual gift; a pear with hints of coconut or cashew makes a great conversation piece.

Subarashii’s campaign has become a crusade since 2005, the year Joel Spira decided the company should be a profitable business. Since then Subarashii has introduced dried pears and a butterscotchy dessert wine. Unions have been made with the Berks County School District and Fair Food Philadelphia, a non-profit that specializes in locally grown products. Pears have been given to spectators at a minor-league baseball game; marathon runners have been told that pears are healthier than energy bars. The Subarashii website has become a virtual cookbook for Asian pear slaw, Asian pear chili and cucumber bacon mousse paired with Asian pear wine. Subarashii Kudamono pears are available at Wegman’s supermarkets; pears and pear byproducts (dried pears, pear spread) are available at www.wonderfulfruit.com.

Subarashii’s recipe for growth includes popularizing the Asian pear as an executive gift and positioning it with artisanal apples, boutique wines and other distinctive gourmet goods. “The goal is to give it more shelf space without making it a commodity, to make it the sort of unique gift you want to get and give,” said Sacks. “I’d like to see that happen before I turn room temperature.” n Geoff Gehman is a former arts writer for The Morning Call in Allentown, Pa. He is the author of three books, including The Kingdom of the Kid, a memoir of growing up in the middle-class, long-lost Hamptons.

He can be reached at geoffgehman@verizon.net.

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about life

james p. delpino

Dealing with Anger Constructively Almost everyone agrees that fighting is not a good thing for couples, friends, parents or kids. While some fighting is to be expected, too much or too severe fighting can become highly problematic. Fighting does have a way of bringing out the worst in most of us, as well as the person(s) with whom we are fighting.

Plain and simple: words hurt. Words can hurt so deeply that some of those hurts take years or even a lifetime to get over and heal. Some ill-spoken words can cause emotional injuries that never heal even over the course of an entire lifetime. When we speak hurtful words, especially in anger, we can change the course of a relationship.

In the worst case scenario we can damage a relationship to the point that it is beyond repair. I’ve spent a career observing how words can damage and haunt people more deeply than most of us would ever suspect. A teacher who calls a child stupid may condemn that child to a perception that he or she is in fact stupid when he or she is clearly not. A parent who tells a child they were a mistake and were “never wanted” can make a heart bleed for a lifetime. Spouses who tell each other they’re not loveable can ruin years of a loving relationship. When injurious words are repeated a cycle of verbal abuse which is unstoppable can become the norm. Yes, words hurt, and keeping this realization in the forefront of our minds makes use of an awareness that can help each one of us to be less hurtful when we speak.

If we must speak tough or harsh truths it is best, in general, that we separate the person from the behavior or speech. Saying, for example, “I don’t like what you said or did” is much better than saying “I don’t like you.” The first example puts the focus on speech or behavior. The second example is an attack on the self of the person. Striving to not injure the self of the other keeps disagreements from becoming fights that hurt.

An even better approach is to say, “ I love you and I’m not ok with how you just spoke to me.” This last formulation can take communication to a whole new level for folks who are on the verge of being contentious with each other. It is also a helpful way to

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Jim Delpino is a psychotherapist in private practice for over 30 years. Email jdelpino@aol.com (215) 364-0139. oc t o b e r 2 0 1 1

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Whoopee!

Winner of the

ICON

jazz library LionelHampton

monthly drawing for

DINNER FOR TWO: Ned Hanover You can win, too.

Here’s how: Send an email with the subject line

bob perkins

The venerable old Earle Theater at 11th and Market Streets in Philadelphia, played host to many of the top entertainers in the world. The greatest big bands, small bands, singers dancers and comedians played the Earle. These were the days of the “packaged tours,” in

vibraphone what Armstrong was to the trumpet, and Coleman Hawkins was to the tenor sax—an innovator.

He was born in Louisville, Kentucky in 1909. While still very young, his mother moved her son to Birmingham, Alabama to live with her parents who later moved

Glorious Food

Then write your full name and send to trina@icondv.com.

Whoopee!

Winner of the

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DINNER FOR TWO: wes sturgis You can win, too.

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Glorious Food

Then write your full name and send to trina@icondv.com.

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Lionel Hampton, France, 1964. Photo: Roberto Polillo.

which a band, featured singer, a dancer or dance-team, and a comedian were on the bill. In its heyday, it was a common sight to ride or walk past the theater and see a line of patrons extending from 11th Street, down the block to 10th, waiting for the doors to open.

One of the major attractions of this bygone day, was Lionel Hampton and his orchestra. When Hampton and his band came to town, the Earle was sure to be sold out for his one- or two-week engagement. The band used to rock the house with signature tunes like “Flyin’ Home,” and “Hey! Ba-Ba-Ba-Re-Bop.” Folks would be bouncing and swaying in their seats to the Hampton beat.

Lionel Hampton enjoyed a storied career as an entertainer: he was to the

to Chicago. The grandparents saw to Hampton’s education via a private school where he learned to play drums. Before long he was playing in a number of bands. Along the way he taught himself to play piano—two-finger-style—but could hold his own in any ensemble.

One of Hampton’s first major gigs was with Les Hite’s band, which led to his move to Los Angeles, where he met Louis Armstrong who had a date to play with Hite’s band, at which Hampton accompanied Armstrong on a set of bells. Armstrong later took over Hite’s band, and at an Armstrong band recording session, a set to vibes happened to be present. Armstrong asked Hampton if he could play them, and if so, to record a number with him. Hampton reminded Armstrong: “I’ve

been playing bells behind you, and [the vibraphone] has the same keyboard, only bigger.” So without further ado, the song, “Memories of You” was recorded—and a legendary vibraphone artist was born.

During the time Armstrong fronted Hite’s band, Hampton met future wife Gladys Riddle, a great businesswoman who ultimately managed his career.

Hampton left Hite’s band and formed his own unit which toured the west Coast.

Benny Goodman heard Hampton play, and invited him to join his combo, which he did, and thus began the four-year run of a foursome that not only produced great jazz, but broke down longstanding racial barriers. This was 1936 and some separationist diehards were opposed to two African-Americans and two Caucasians making music on the same stage.

But jazz greats, Goodman on clarinet, Hampton on vibes, Teddy Wilson at the piano and Gene Krupa on drums, were too good and too popular to stop. This, of course, is the group that produced the historic concert at Carnegie Hall in 1938.

Hampton left Goodman’s group under friendly circumstances in1940 and started his own big band. He maintained large and small groups over the next 50 years, employing talent the caliber of Dexter Gordon, Art Farmer, Quincy Jones, Clifford Brown, Jimmy Scott, Joe Williams, Betty Carter, Dinah Washington, Charlie Mingus, Wes Montgomery, and a host of other household names in jazz. .

“Hamp,” as he was sometimes known, was not short on awards, having received a handful of honorary doctorates, along with numerous other musical and humanitarian citations. Shortly after his passing, one of his vibraphones was placed in the National Museum of American History.

Lionel Leo Hampton died on August 31, 2002. He was 94.

Hamp - The Legendary Decca Recordings of Lionel Hampton, which include a killer rendition of “Stardust” (at 15:13 minutes!), is a doozy. n

Bob Perkins is a writer and host of an all-jazz radio program on WRTI-FM 90.1 Monday-Thursday night from 6 to 9 and Sunday, 11:00am-3pm.

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classical notebook Maria Callas HHHHH The Callas Effect EMI Classics Widely regarded as the greatest opera singer and performer of all time, Maria Callas is the original diva, the ultimate opera icon. Her life story, voice and performances intrigued, thrilled and inspired audiences during her life-

moist personal recordings, a new documentary DVD featuring fresh insight from those closest to her, and a lavishly illustrated 124-page hardcover book with an essay illuminating and honoring the essence of Maria Callas, the woman and the myth.

Callas devotees will find new material and food for thought in this release. Those less familiar with her personal and musical allure will find an attractive and

Maria Callas

time and continues to do so today. Thirty-four years after her death, Maria Callas is not only the world’s bestselling soprano but also a bestselling artist of all time.

Diva, artist, style icon. Who was the real Maria? The Callas Effect is a deluxe presentation bringing together three CDs (in the Experience Edition) of her finest, 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.

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compelling introduction. The CD contains exquisitely interpreted arias from nearly 30 operas, including such favorites as “O mio babbino caro,” “Vissi d’arte” and “Casta diva.”

The newly-produced DVD documentary/memoir features performance footage, recordings and still photos combined with powerful first-hand accounts of Maria Callas’s genius from witnesses in all walks of life. Opera singers, stage directors, actors, actresses, backstage theater crews, recording staff, impresarios and opera fans who queued for days to buy tickets to her performances all describe how Maria Callas exerted a unique and extraordinary effect on them. Among the interviewees are singers Mirella Freni, Joyce DiDonato and John Dobson, former General Administrator of the Royal Opera House John Tooley, stage director John Copley, Callas biographer Tony Locranto, critic and broadcaster John Amis and Maria Callas herself, in conversation with Lord Hare-

wood.

The glossy, hardcover book contains a new article

by Ira Siff, translated into German, French, Spanish and Italian. Siff suggests that Maria Callas, without doubt the most influential opera singer of the 20th century, had such a far-reaching impact on opera that her influence is still gaining momentum today. Her timeless, universal appeal captures the imagination, not only of opera lovers but of people who have never set foot in an opera house.

Maria Callas was a “bundle of contradictions—artistically radical, socially conservative, fiercely independent, and obsessed with appearances.” In other words, she was human, real flesh and blood, as were her gripping interpretations of the operatic roles she portrayed with intense characterization and maturity of emotional expression.

Siff chronicles Callas’s life story as the daughter of poor Greek immigrants to America, her studies in Greece with Elvira de Hidalgo, who trained what she described as the “tempestuous, extravagant cascades of sound, as yet uncontrolled, but full of drama and emotion.” We learn about her debuts, the launch of her international career and her championing by Tullio Serafin, the variety of roles she took on, both heavy and bel canto. She learned new roles in record time, grasped new languages, complete with their inflections and subtleties. We follow her trajectory to legend status, learn how she revolutionized performances with vocal virtuosity and dramatic impact, how she shaped her talent and transformed her physique, losing 70 pounds and inspiring Luchino Visconti and Franco Zeffirelli to mount new productions for her. Callas became a style icon, fell in love with Aristotle Onassis and lost him to Jackie Kennedy. She died, aged 53, of a fatal heart attack in 1977.

Her career was short but, as Tito Gobbi’s daughter, in the DVD documentary, quotes her father as saying, “Maria is immortal.” And she is. This set is a historical treasure and definitely a must for every Opera fan and beyond.

Metropolitan Opera Historic Radio Broadcast Recordings HHHH

The Met: Live in HD Sony Masterworks Sony Masterworks, in partnership with the Metropolitan Opera, presents the first in a line of CD and DVD releases drawn from both the storied Met broadcast archive and the acclaimed series The Met: Live in HD. For now there are four multi-disc sets that represent the first official release on CD of historic Saturday afternoon radio broadcasts from 1947 to 1962, with complete live opera performances freshly remastered from the original sources. All-star vocal greats like Licia Albanese, Carlo Bergonzi, Jussi Bjorling, Franco Corelli, Giuseppe di Stefano, Lily Pons, Leontyne Price, and Bidu Sayao at

peter H. Gistelinck Ratings: H=skip it; HH=mediocre; HHH=good; HHHH=excellent; HHHHH=classic

the height of their careers. Included in the release are also four DVDs capturing some of the most acclaimed and requested recent productions from the awardwinning, groundbreaking series: Puccini’s Madama Butterfly, John Adams’s Doctor Atomic, Verdi’s Simon Boccanegra, and Richard Strauss’s Salome, each featuring some of today’s top opera talents, including Plácido Domingo, Karita Mattila, Patricia Racette, and Gerald Finley.

“Opera lovers should be very pleased to have these historic gems available, as well as some of our most recent high definition transmissions,” said Peter Gelb, the Met’s General Manager. “We are committed to serving our public with the greatest possible range of operatic artistry.”

Bogdan Roscic, President of Sony Music Classical said: “The Met broadcast archive is one of the ultimate treasure troves of recorded music. We’re happy to be able to make some of its most legendary tapes available for the first time in the way they should be presented.

Today, the Met’s work of course gets preserved in a much different way, and so we also look forward to releasing some of the most spectacular recent productions in glorious HD video.”

ROSSINI: IL BARBIERE DI SIVIGLIA, December 16, 1950 (two CDs). This live broadcast from the Met of the Rossini favorite features the legendary Lily Pons in the role of Rosina, with the sterling young tenor Giuseppe di Stefano as Count Almaviva, a role he never recorded commercially, and baritone Giuseppe Valdengo, well known for his recordings with Toscanini, as Figaro. Alberto Erede conducts the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and Chorus, with the cast also including Salvatore Baccaloni as Don Bartolo and Jerome Hines as Don Basilio.

PUCCINI: LA BOHEME, February 15, 1958 (two CDs). This classic performance of one of the repertory’s most popular operas stars the passionate singing of two paragons of Italian style, soprano Licia Albanese as the doomed seamstress Mimi and tenor Carlo Bergonzi as the poet Rodolfo. The conductor is Thomas Schippers, with the cast also including Mario Sereni as Marcello and Laurel Hurley as Musetta.

GOUNOD: ROMEO ET JULIETTE, February 1, 1947 (two CDs). The star-crossed lovers in this version of Shakespeare’s tale are the celebrated Swedish tenor Jussi Bjorling and the sweet-voiced Brazilian soprano Bidu Sayao, both in roles they never recorded commercially.

Emil Cooper conducts, with the cast also including John Brownlee as Mercutio and Nicola Moscona as Frere Laurent.

PUCCINI: TOSCA, April 7, 1962 (two CDs). Live from the Met, Leontyne Price sings Puccini’s tragic title heroine – in the prime of her career, opposite the thrilling tenor of Franco Corelli as Cavaradossi. Baritone Cornell

MacNeil sings the evil Scarpia, one of his most famed portrayals. Kurt Adler conducts the Met Orchestra and Chorus.

“THE MET: LIVE IN HD” on DVD: Hugely popular worldwide, “The Met Live in HD” series—which has won both Peabody and Emmy awards for excellence— captures recent productions from the Metropolitan Opera with the highest possible production values, including high-definition visuals, innovative camera work and surround sound. Four of the most requested recent productions debut on DVD, featuring some of today’s top singers, conductors and directors. The DVD packages also include bonus features on the operas and their productions.

color and surging emotion of Verdi’s score.

RICHARD STRAUSS: SALOME (October 11, 2008).

Met audiences have gone wild over the sizzling Salome of Karita Mattila, who is indisputably one of the greatest exponents of the role in our time. The Finnish soprano embodies Oscar Wilde’s petulant, willful, lust-driven heroine. With Strauss’s harmonically lush music magnifying the degenerate atmosphere and building erotic

PUCCINI: MADAMA BUTTERFLY (March 7, 2009).

This stunning production by the late Anthony Minghella of Puccini’s perennial crowd-pleaser opened the Met’s 2006-07 season, launching Peter Gelb’s first season as general manager. This 2009 revival was seen by hundreds of thousands of people around the world. Soprano Patricia Racette stars as Cio-Cio San, the innocent, trusting young geisha of the title; she falls disastrously in love with American Navy lieutenant B.F. Pinkerton, played by tenor Marcello Giordani, only to be abandoned by him.

Dwayne Croft plays Sharpless, the sympathetic American consul who does all he can but is unable to avert tragedy. Patrick Summers conducts.

JOHN ADAMS: DOCTOR ATOMIC (November 8, 2008). John Adams, perhaps today’s pre-eminent American composer, teamed with librettist Peter Sellars to create a gripping, mesmerizing work that depicts a pivotal moment in human history—the invention of the atomic bomb. This very 21st-century opera presents the human face of technological change, as scientists, politicians and military men wrestle with the implications of their work.

The DVD captures the potent stage production by Penny Woolcock, as well as the Met conducting debut of Alan Gilbert, music director of the New York Philharmonic.

Baritone Gerald Finley gives a haunting, star-making performance in the title role of J. Robert Oppenheimer.

VERDI: SIMON BOCCANEGRA (February 6, 2010).

When this sumptuous production by Giancarlo Del Monaco opened in 1995, iconic tenor Plácido Domingo gave a riveting performance as the romantic lead tenor, Gabriele Adorno. In the 2010 revival, Domingo made history by taking on the baritone title role, a feat no other singer in Met history has done. The great Spanish tenor’s Boccanegra is seconded by a strong cast that includes Adrianne Pieczonka as the doge’s long-lost daughter Amelia, Marcello Giordani as Gabriele Adorno, and James Morris as Jacopo Fiesco. Met music director James Levine conducts the company’s great orchestra, bringing out all the

Karita Mattila in the Met’s production of Salome in 2008.

tension, this is an opera that generates as much of an impact today as it did at its 1905 premiere. Mattila caused a sensation when she sang Salome at the Met for the first time in 2004, and this DVD captures her reprise of this stunning interpretation. Patrick Summers conducts a performance by the Met Opera Orchestra that is both gloriously intense and ravishingly subtle.

These historic performances originally broadcast via the Metropolitan Opera’s Saturday afternoon radio series have never before been available internationally in authorized versions from original sources. Now, the first commercial releases of this material are presented, newly remastered from the original sources and with the imprimatur of the Met. A must for every opera lover. For more information on the Metropolitan Opera and the series, visit www.metopera.org. n

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keresman on disc travis & fripp HHH1/2 Live at Coventry Cathedral Panegyric

mia Doi todd (whose mom is the usa’s first female asianasian-a sian-a american merican judge) encompasses the best of assorted cultures—North & south a america, Japan, India (but isn’t an “eat Pray love” dilettante)—and has a gentle humanist mindset (without being a mush-head). But that means nada without talent and she has that to spare—she wields

theo travis is a saxophonist/flutist, a major presence on the uk jazz scene; guitarist robert fripp is founder of k king Crimson, one of the longest-lasting progressive rock ensembles in history—he’s also collaborated with David Bowie, Brian eno, and Daryl hall (yes, the very same, of hall & Oates). together, they weave dense and billowing yet approachable and absorbing tapestries of sound.

It differs from the fripp & eno works in that fripp’s guitar is noticeably more forceful, intertwining/interacting with travis’s breathy, velvety soprano sax and flute. melody is de-emphasized in favor of ambiance, perfect for reading, meditation, and staring at the rain. Nice. juno.co.uk/labels/Panegyric mickey Newbury HHHH1/2 An American Trilogy Drag City while the name might not ring (m)any w bells, the songs of mickey Newbury (19402002) are part of the rich, rumpled fabric of american music, sung by kenny rogers in a his first edition days (the psychedelic hit “Just Dropped In”), ray Charles, and elvis Presley (among maN maNy Ny others). a along with k k kris kristofferson and w willie Nelson, Newbury was among the songsters that revolutionized country music as much as the Beatles did rock & roll. most of Newbury’s albums have been out of print nearly forever, so American Trilogy is an event. this four-disc set restores Looks Like Rain (1969), Heaven Help the Child (’71), and ‘Frisco Mabel Joy (’73), adding a “bonus” platter of previously unreleased songs. vocally, he suggests michael Nesmith, leonard Cohen, and (a touch of) stephen stills and his tunes commingle the poetic complexity of Cohen and Nick Drake with Mickey Newbury the introspective candor of Gordon lightfoot. many songs have ornate, almost baroque orchestration that’ll warm the heart’s cockles of any fan of Belle & sebastian, lee hazlewood, and Burt Bacharach. No home—that esteems remarkable songwriting, that is—should be without this. dragcity.com mia Doi todd HHHH Cosmic Ocean Ship City Zen Normally I’ve severe reactions (similar to many folks’ to monosodium glutamate, Paulie shore, la lohan, Jackass) to aN aNy Ny ything thing with the word “cosmic” in its title, but I can’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. the singular style of singer/songwriter shemp@hotmail.com

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Mia Doi Todd

a sonorous, velvety, melodious voice that evokes Joni mitchell and Nina simone (without sounding like either). there’s sultry bossa nova, psychedelic guitar, a andean percussion, Chilean poetry, and muted passion—todd sings with experience yet manages to retain a sense of wonder (think certain eras of van v morrison and George harrison), her music embracing serenity and loveliness in a world that’s anything but. y yeah, I’m a cynical bastard but I feel ms. todd is 100 percent sincere and her Ship is a wonderful, Bs-free balm, which the Collective we w sO need these days. miadoitodd.com kali Z. fasteau HHH1/2 An Alternate Universe flying Note formerly known as Zussan kali fasteau, ms. kali Z. fasteau is a globally-travelled multi-instrumentalist that’s played with avant-garde jazz royalty— royalty—a archie archie shepp, sun ra, w william Parker—and established herself as wizard-queen of the sphere where jazz, world music (especially that of India and turkey), and free improvisation groove as equals. An Alternate Universe features kZ k f on soprano sax, cello, and electric piano; w. Parker, bass, and drummer Cindy Blackman (who last year tied the knot with rock/fusion star Carlos santana). It’s hard to tell “composition” and “improvisation” apart, and that’s a good thing. Performances (trio, occasionally duo) herein are expansive, diffuse, and occasionally rough-hewn, but there’s a spiritual warmth and exuberance that’s downright compelling. w while it doesn’t reach the dizzying heights of her previous platters (such as People of the Ninth, ‘06’s collaboration

lexicrockery

by Robert Gordon mark keresman Ratings: H=skip it; HH=mediocre; HHH=good; HHHH=excellent; HHHHH=classic

with saxophonist Kidd Jordan), An Alternate Universe is recommended to those for whom the cosmic tones of Paul Winter, Art Ensemble of Chicago, and Don Cherry (especially his combo Codona) are food & drink. kalimuze.com Alessi’s Ark HHH1/2 Time Travel Bella Union/Yep Roc Well, youthful angst is going to be with us, like, forever, so we may as well make the best of it. (Besides, in the last century an ItalianAmerican kid named Frankie sang all-starry-eyed and look how swell he ended up.) Alessi’s Ark is the nom de musique of Alessi Laurent-Marke, a young Brit lass, and Time Travel is her second full-length. It’s a comforting slice of winsome folk-pop—her eyes are wide open and her

Despic-cabal: describing the despicable actions of the uninformed rightwing cabal whose fanaticism caused the US credit rating to be lowered.

New Book Releases: The Flawed-Acidity of Nope,

by John Boehner The Blair Switch Project, or “The Americanization of Tony,

by Tony Blair To Whine Own Self Be True,

by Dick Cheney Fracktion: the miniscule fraction of the price for environmental damages caused by fracking that the frackers themselves, Big Oil, will pay.

Dickenscion: scions of the Dickensian London elite, like Eric Cantor, Ron Paul, and the Tea Party, who strive to embed the values(?) of characters like Ebenezer Scrooge (“Are there no poor houses?”) into 21st century American society.

Fumblamentalists: religious fanatics who fumble Christianity’s fundamental dogma of “Love thy neighbor as thyself” on every political issue.

Tormential Rain: torrential rain that causes nonstop torment to homeowners worried about flooding in the basement and other damage.

Commonstealth: PA Governor Corbett’s stealthy removal of PA as a plaintiff in five environmental suits to encourage polluters to prosper at the expense of the commonhealth.

Recantor: someone who repudiates, withdraws, or revokes an ill-advised stance or statement—named after Eric Cantor, who can “cant,” and “can’t,” but never recant.

Alessi Laurent-Marke heart is on her sleeve, just the way Carly Simon always heard it should be. Laurent-Marke’s voice is wise-in-time winsome with touches of jazz-y phrasing (a la Rickie Lee Jones and Beth Orton in their respective early days). Her way with a melody recalls of George Harrison’s best early ‘70s stuff, along with the aforementioned Carly S. Unlike some young songsters (she’s nearly 21), Alessi has a sense of history—note her insidiously bouncy yet bleak take on Lesley Gore’s girl-group-era denial classic “Maybe I Know.” Time Travel is a bittersweet sonic Snuggie from a performer with potential. bellaunion.com / yeproc.com n

Taxidermy (redefinition): now refers to Grover Norquist’s process of stuffing witless Congressional carcasses with inflexible dogma, thus rendering the stuffees appropriate as wall hangings but not as public servants.

Firewater: redefinition: no longer refers to alcohol, but rather to H2O which, via the completely safe process of fracking, can now be lit off as it flows out of the tap.

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47 / about life / dealing with anger constructively

disarm anger that has been escalating.

Anger is not a primary emotion. Anger is a reaction, a secondary or defensive response to an attack, real or perceived. Behind anger we will always find sadness or fear or a combination of both. When someone is angry it is often helpful to validate that the person is feeling anger. Sometimes, having feelings validated is a quick and powerful method to deescalate anger. Another helpful thing to say when anger appears is, “ I see (or hear) that you’re actually very sad (or hurt or afraid) right now.” This redefines the problem as sadness or fear or both sadness and fear.

When we’re unable to stop our anger we all have choices as to how we express it.

We can say to our partner, “ I need to vent.” Venting is much better than attacking.

When it’s someone else becoming angry we can say something like, “ Do you need (or want) to vent?” And it’s better to say, “ It feels like...” than to say “ It is like....” Keeping the venting in the area of feelings is better than confusing feelings with facts, because, well, feelings are not facts—they’re feelings. When someone vents (as opposed to attacking) it’s helpful to validate the feelings that are being vented as true for that person.

We try too often to change feelings or correct them before they’re vented and validated. This approach most often yields more anger and provokes anger in the other(s) as well. It also tends to make people believe they’re not being heard and understood.

In addition, they feel judged. Taking the time to listen and validate can make a huge difference in how the interaction will go.

The simplest and most direct way to conquer fighting and injuring another person is to simply not fight. If we can control the expression of our own anger we can discover important things about ourselves. When we don’t express anger we can feel a heightened kind of psycho-physical tension. When the pressure is not released externally, this tension can propel us deeper into ourselves to seek and find the roots of what underlies anger. We know those roots are sadness or fear, or sadness and fear.

Processing and discussing these basic emotions will be a much better path than engaging in a cycle which can lead to verbal abuse. n

singer /songwriter Lindsey Buckingham Seeds We Sow Mind Kit HHH1/2

Working in Fleetwood Mac requires a degree of compromise for Lindsey Buckingham. As a solo artist, he gets the chance to go his own way and takes the opportunity for musical experimentation.

Seeds We Sow, his sixth solo studio album in 30 years, showcases his skills as a guitarist, from the intricate acoustic work of the title to the energized electric rave-up of “That’s The Way Love Goes.”

Buckingham mostly employs a one-man band approach for the album, layering guitars and other instruments atop each other on “Rock Away Blind” and the pulsating “One Take.” “End of Time” and “She Smiled Sweetly” wrap up the album on a feeling of emotional release. The former is a reflection on mortality with Buckingham’s tenor projecting a note of vulnerability over chiming guitars. The latter is an an intimate reading of a mid-‘60s Rolling Stones ballad, featuring just his voice and acoustic guitar.

Guy Clark Songs and Stories Dualtone HHH1/2

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36 / first sip / the hudson valley

Millbrook Vineyards and Winery: Owned by John and Kathe Dyson. Winemaker John Graziano makes a crisp, clean Tocai Fruiliano. His 2009 Pinot Noir was Burgundian in style – medium-bodied with spice, cherry and cranberry notes. The Cabernet Franc was actually a meritage blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Franc and Merlot that showed red and black raspberry, spice and plum. [Millbrook. www.millbrookwine. com] Oak Summit Vineyard: John Bruno, formerly owner of Bruno’s Pen and Pencil restaurant in NYC, and wife Nancy are making fine Pinot Noir from six acres—perhaps one of the nicest from the Valley or state, and winner of awards nationwide. The 2009 is full of raspberries and red cherries with a sniff of cocoa and smoke. [Millbrook. www.oaksummitvineyard.com] Stoutridge Winery: This is a gravity flow facility making all natural, unprocessed wines. Owner Steve Osborn makes a number of Euro-focused wines including Pinot Blanc, Vidal Blanc, Muscat and Riesling varieties, and Northern Italian style reds. He poured a very nice Merlot. [Marlboro. www.stoutridge.com] Tousey Winery: One of the newer wineries here. Owners Ben and Kimberly Peacock are making an elegant Pinot Noir, with black cherry and red berry highlights.

Their Cassis is made with honey (from their hives) rather than sugar. [Germantown. www.touseywinery.com] Whitecliff Vineyard: Michael and Yancey Migliore are owners of this 70-acre property. They poured a very nice Gamay Noir (The same grape of Beaujolais fame) with fine strawberry notes. The Riesling showed apple and mint notes. Their white blend, Awosting, is made of Seyval and Vignonoles and is fresh and fruity. The 2010 Cabernet Franc, made with grapes from Long Island, had notes of leather and rose petals. [Gardiner. www.whitecliffwine.com] n 54

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Guy Clark tries something different on Songs and Stories, his first live album since 1997’s Keepers. Clark provides background and observations on the songs, adding a new dimension to his work. With a captivating voice to draw the listener in, Clark is an adept a storyteller as he is a songwriter.

Songs and Stories offers a retrospective of his career from “L.A. Freeway” from his 1975 debut Old No. 1 to “Maybe I Can Paint Over That” from 2010’s Someday the Song Writes You. Working with a four-piece acoustic band, Clark celebrates the simple pleasures of life in “Homegrown Tomatoes” and “Stuff That Works,” and offers a moving elegy to his father on “The Randall Knife.” He also continues his tradition of featuring songs on his albums by Townes Van Zandt, who died in 1997, with a heartfelt version of “If I Needed You.” Clark also shares the spotlight with bandmates Shawn Camp and Verlon Thompson. Camp’s “Sis Draper” is a testament to the power of music while Thompson’s “Joe Walker’s Mare” is a character sketch of a horse and owner that receives a powerful performance.

Ry Cooder Pull Up Some Dust and Sit Down Nonesuch HHHH

Pull Up Some Dust and Sit Down serves as Ry Cooder’s musical state of the nation. “No Banker Left Behind,” the album’s folk-based opening track, is powered by tomwilk@rocketmail.com

tom wilk Ratings: H=skip it; HH=mediocre; HHH=good; HHHH=excellent; HHHHH=classic

Cooder’s banjo and sets the tone with a skeptical look at the the bailout of the nation’s financial institutions.

Cooder’s songwriting approach recalls a 21st century Woody Guthrie in its creativity and storytelling, and he utilizes elements of country, blues, rock and Mexican music as background.

“El Corrido de Jesse James” envisions the outlaw and the Almighty meeting in heaven for a discussion of

understated desperation.

“Put a Little Love in Your Heart” and “What The World Needs Now is Love” are secular sermons on the power of love whose message remains timeless. The latter, written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, shows the undiminished power of DeShannon’s voice as she is accompanied by just an acoustic guitar. “Don’t Doubt Yourself Babe” is a song of empowerment that dates from the mid-1960s, while “Will You Stay in My Life,” a newer song, shows her romantic side and ends the album on an upbeat note.

Tom Hambridge Boom!

Superstar Records HHH

As a producer and songwriter, Tom Hambridge has played a behind-the-scenes role for such artists as George Thorogood and Buddy Guy. He produced the latter’s Living Proof, winner of the 2010 Grammy for Best Contemporary Blues Album. Hambridge, a singer

remedying economic inequality. “Quick Sand,” first released as an online single last year, is Cooder’s take on through the eyes of those moving north.

Cooder remains a top-flight guitarist and his playing is first-rate on the bluesy “John Lee Hooker for President” and “If There’s a God.” He captures a mournful eloquence on “No Hard Feelings,” the closing song which looks at missed opportunities in America.

Jackie DeShannon When You Walk in the Room Rock Beat Records HHH1/2

Jackie DeShannon’s career dates to the late 1950s and has had her songs recorded by a variety of artists, including the Byrds, the Searchers and Kim Carnes. On When You Walk in the Room, DeShannon revisits some of her best-known songs from the past half-century.

She opts for stripped-down arrangements, and the less-is-more approach works well on the title track as her sense of yearning comes to the forefront. “Needles and Pins” is slowed-down folk-rock and gives the song a feeling of

and drummer, moves into the performing spotlight again with the release of Boom!, his fifth solo CD. The album’s mix of blues, rock and country is as straightforward as the CD’s title.

“I Keep Things” kicks of the album with a song about the emotions and memories that our possessions contains. “Upside of Loneliness is a tongue-in-cheek reflection on the benefits of a romantic breakup. On “I’ve Got Your Country Right Here,” a country hit that Hambridge co-wrote for Gretchen Wilson, he celebrates his musical influences (Waylon Jennings, Charlie Daniels, the Allman Brothers Band). Occasionally, Hambridge’s songs have a generic feel, such as “Never Gonna Change,” but he also crafts songs that rise above the norm with “Things I Miss the Most,” a celebration of family and the home life. n

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nick’s picks Sam Yahel HHHH1/2 From Sun To Sun Origin Records

Sam Yahel’s reputation is anchored by his skill as an organist for groups led by Joshua Redman and trumpeter Ryan Kisor as well as recorded gigs with Norah Jones, Lizz Wright and Peter Cincotti, and his Hammond B-3 licks thrill with their edginess and soulful swagger. Though you get a taste of Yahel’s signature sound on the title track, Yahel applies his gifts primarily as a pianist on From Sun To Sun, which puts him in a trio setting with bassist Matt Penman and drummer Jochen Ruekert on a

Sam Yahel

mostly original program save for three melodious covers (“A Beautiful Friendship,” Cole Porter’s “So In Love” and “Taking A Chance On Love.”) The surrounding tracks are sublime, rife with opportunities for this crew to bob and weave with an authority that feels exactly right. Yahel is an expressionistic pianist who reminds one of a sunnier, unencumbered Keith Jarrett. Taking in the colorful atmospherics of “Toy Balloon” and inspirational interplay on “One False Move” along with the breezy “By Hook Or By Crook” is to listen to jazz in its most energetic, satisfying form. From Sun To Sun is a whirl of inventiveness, mixing modern jazz, ballads and personal anthems (“Blink And Move On”) into a shimmering, uplifting whole. (13 tracks; 68:46 minutes)

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 56 n

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The Jimmy Amadie Trio HHHH Something Special TPR

Recorded without rehearsal and essentially in one long take (no do-overs!), Something Special is a classy recording that’s juiced by Philadelphia’s own Jimmy Amadie, a masterful old-school pianist who swings brightly on a clutch of standards that sound renewed thanks to his skillful trio. Life hasn’t been easy for Amadie— physical issues conspire against him continuously and it’s a wonder that he plays with such a sunny disposition. That’s the definition of a consummate professional, I suppose, because Amadie brings it home on tracks like the spirited “All The Things You Are,” Dizzy Gillespie’s “Con Alma,” a rollicking Autumn Leaves” and “Fly Me To The Moon.”

Amadie’s got ace rhythmic Jimmy Amadie support in longtime bassist Tony Marino and drummer Bill Goodwin who, together, dovetail beautifully with Amadie throughout, particularly on the leader’s own “Blue For Sweet Lizzy,” a winner that lopes through the head then blooms in Technicolor, bouncing over a tight groove. Another original, “Happy Man’s Bossa Nova” is a persuasive Brazilian number with a cheerful melody and nice changes throughout. Amadie’s a remarkable pianist, one of the best, and you can tell he’s filled with the joy of jazz by listening to him play. Another first-class recording for Amadie, Something Special is heartfelt music that makes you feel good. (In support of this album, Amadie will be performing at the Philadelphia Museum of Art on October 14th which will be his first public performance since 1967.) (10 tracks; 61:16 minutes)

Deep Blue Organ Trio HHHH Wonderful!

Origin Records

You can’t argue with a concept that puts the music of Stevie Wonder front and center; you could only find fault if your personal favorite isn’t a part of the Wonderful! playlist. Formed in Chicago in 2000, The Deep Blue Organ Trio is Bobby Broom on guitar (a longtime sideman for Sonny Rollins,) Greg Rockingham on drums and Chris Forman on the Hammond B3. Forman, blind since birth, supplies the soul power on a kick-ass recording that pulls its selections from Wonder’s earlier records. “Tell Me Something Good” (the hit Wonder wrote for Rufus and Chaka Khan) sets a celebratory tone, a “grease and grits” approach that organist Charles Earland favored, especially covering pop tunes as he often did. Connecting the dots, drummer Rockingham played with Earland for years; here he keeps the groove sustained on “Golden Lady”

nick bewsey Ratings: H=skip it; HH=mediocre; HHH=good; HHHH=excellent; HHHHH=classic

and “Jesus Children Of America” and provides the percussive fills around Forman’s slamming solos. So infectious are these tracks that the recording has a natural thrust—one great tune ends and you’re anticipating the next hit. “My Cherie Amour” gets a moody treatment, slowed way down and sounding as if it’s played at a downstairs bar through a haze of smoke at 3 am. Dig that “Ribbon In The Sky” coda, too.

Broom is in sterling form here, as good as he was on his recent Monk tribute record, and he plays with a Wes Montgomerylike facility and grace. The undoubted highlight here is a bump and grind riff on “You Haven’t Done Nothin’, with enough vamps and struts to carry on twice its length. (9 tracks; 62:19 minutes)

Shirley Crabbe HHH1/2 Home Maisong Music

Sometimes jazz is about small moves and simple melodies. From this template springs the debut of Shirley Crabbe who sings jazz and pop standards with a natural effervescence and infectious brightness. Her voice has a natural clarity, one akin to Dianne Reeves, but with a softer and at times, tentative edge. On Home she surrounds herself with loyal support that clearly adores her—pianists Jim West and Donald Vega, bassist John Burr, drummer Alvester Garnett and an equally talented horn section. Mentored by the inimitable Etta Jones, Crabbe is a latecomer to the scene but sounds no less seasoned by experience and musicality. The ultimate success of her debut stands on three numbers, Leonard Bernstein’s “Lucky To Be Me” and Oscar Brown’s “Strong Man,” where Crabbe’s lustrous voice hosts saxophonist Houston Person whose velvety solos lend the album its classic feel. Then Shirley Crabbe there’s the exotic arrangement of Carole King’s “So Far Away” that Crabbe sings with soulful aplomb, investing the lyric with a mournful and deeply knowing emotion-

ality. (9 tracks; 44:20 minutes) Tim Mayer HHHH Resilience JLP Records

It defies belief that Resilience is a debut recording from the young tenor saxophonist, Tim Mayer, chiefly because he sounds so old—as in experienced, polished and professional. Cohesively constructed, the album suggests that Mayer has a crush on cool school sounds originally swung by guys like Zoot Sims and Frank Wess. This is exuberant stuff that’s given the full workout by its cast of players like pianist George Cables, bassist Dezron Douglas and drummer Willie Jones III—all of them top notch talent. Also remarkable is Mayer’s guest list that includes trumpeters Claudio Roditi, Greg Gisbert and Dominick Farinacci, trombonist Michael Dease, guitarist Mark Whitfield and Don Braden on flute. Slavish to the groove, Mayer leads his all-stars through vintage jazz hits by Kenny Dorham, Lee Morgan, Fats Navarro (a juicy “Dance Of The Infidels”) and Thelonious Monk’s “Work,” where he cleverly echoes the great Charlie Rouse. Fresher still are hard-line showstoppers like Dease’s sublimely swinging “For Miles” where Mayer spins out notes with a delirious glee and Cable’s own “Klimo,” a bossa inflected bop tune that’s animated by its darting melodic lines and fusion of horns. Mayer’s effortless proficiency extends to ballads (the solid “I Guess I’ll Hang My Tears Out To Dry”) and his own rapid fire “Who Knew” that pairs the saxophonist with guitarist Whitfield, hammering their notes home in perfect unison. Resilience is a breathlessly exciting, straight-ahead recording. (10 tracks; 60:51 minutes)

George Benson HHH1/2 Guitar Man Concord Jazz

Few jazz artists have gone as far as George Benson in terms of crossover appeal and recognition. From his earliest straight-ahead recordings, Benson has a canny ability to plug into the pop-jazz zeitgeist like few jazzmen.

Guitar Man aims to connect Benson with his Breezin’ roots and he reigns supreme on his instrument—unadorned versions of “Tenderly,” “Don’t Know Why” and meaty, string-laden renditions of “I Wanna Hold George Benson Your Hand” and “My Cherie Amour” are terrific.

On-board veterans like pianist Joe Sample, drummer Harvey Mason and super hot bassist Ben Williams get to shine on bite size cuts like “Naima,” “Tequila” and “Paper Moon” but there’s no mistaking that Benson is calling the shots and making all the right moves. (George Benson will be performing at the Keswick Theater in Glenside, PA on October 23. Showtime is oc t o b e r 2 0 1 1

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incredible story and it just keeps getting more and more interesting. I can’t walk away.”

PC: One striking aspect of the book was how much the general public loved Rin Tin Tin. Are we ever going to see an animal with such a devoted following or has the novelty of TV and films—two media he was around for in their early days—worn off?

SO: I think that the innocence that is required to look at an animal as so powerful and so symbolic, I don’t know that we’re that culture anymore. I don’t know if we look at animals with the same kind of belief the way we used to. Animals have been heroic and moved in and out of roles many times as far as being looked at almost as more powerful than people. I’m not sure that we will have that connection. Also, at the time Rin Tin Tin became such a phenomenon, the number of channels, so to speak, of entertainment was so limited. You had three networks. It was just a very different world. We still have stars that take on enormous significance, but I think the impact is kind of different these days.

PC: I would agree with that. Also, you mention in the book dogs only become a regular part of domestic life until the 1940s or 50s. Rin Tin Tin premiering onscreen in the late 1920s was a big deal.

SO: We’re a far more sophisticated culture now. It’s harder to surprise people. It’s harder to get a reaction of such amazement because we’ve seen it all.

PC: Yeah, we have. We’ve seen Keyboard Cat. SO: Because of the rise of things like YouTube and reality TV, we just don’t look at entertainers as having a kind of god-like quality. That’s something we just don’t see anymore. It used to be that you knew nothing about Hollywood stars and you simply admired them from afar, and that simply does not happen anymore.

PC: Bert Leonard, the producer of the first Rin Tin Tin television show, was devoted to the dog until his death. You learned of Leonard’s loyalty via a storage locker full of old documents, the key for which you received from his daughter Gina. How do you get subjects to give you that kind of trust?

SO: The one thing a writer needs to be is genuine and I think that many people are really eager to have their stories told and in the case of Bert…I think his family loved the idea of his being remembered when he had kind of disappeared. And so, while she had no idea if there was anything in there, I think also her feeling was it’s great that you’re interested in him; if you want to take a look, go ahead. But I was certainly fortunate that I had her trust. I think that’s the sort of result of being honest and saying, “I really want to know his story and I really care about telling his story.”

PC: Your best-known books have dealt with subjects—orchids and Saturday nights—that are not on the tips of everyone’s tongues. Many people don’t know who Rin Tin Tin is. These aren’t what publishers would consider sexy topics.

SO: I am a victim of my own curiosity. The only ideas that really get me excited are the ones that really get me excited. I have a sort of temperamental inability to focus group my ideas. I tend to get interested in a subject and really want to learn about it. My natural next reaction is, “Oh, I just learned something really interesting. I want to tell people about it.” The fact that I do that via a keyboard and a published book is really almost incidental.

Learning a story and telling a story is what really interests me…It’s just sheer impulse and, frankly, a certain 58

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instinct of, I know this is a good story. I know people won’t think that they want to know this, but boy, it’s so cool they’re going to be really glad that I told them.

PC: If you write a book because it’s a popular topic and you don’t care about it, then that lack of interest may show.

SO: I’m just not interested in that. If something is already popular, why would I want to write a book about it? I don’t pick subjects just to be contrarian and purposefully offbeat. I like to write about what interests me.

The kind of commitment I have to it and my enthusiasm is what usually draws people in and later they may think, “Wow, now I’m interested in that.” I’m so often curious about the things that I don’t know anything about and

Nicolas Cage plays both Charlie and Donald Kaufman in Adaptation (2002).

that strike me in a surprising way. It’s hard to be surprised if it’s something that’s already really familiar.

PC: There’s one quote from the book that stuck with me: “A singular passion helps you slice through the mess of the world, but I had also come to believe that cutting such a narrow path plays tricks with proportion and balance and pushes everything to the edge.” That’s written about people who were passionate about Rin Tin Tin. But, for you, does that apply to writing?

SO: Absolutely—I think the focus and, frankly, obsession required to write something is just as consuming as any passion, and sometimes plays the same tricks on your ability to be balanced and have perspective. Unfortunately, that’s also the only way to get it done.

PC: Over the last couple of years, you’ve hit the social network with abandon. Your Twitter account is a blast. You’re easily reachable on Facebook. Is that part of a writer’s job now or was it a curiosity that blossomed?

SO: Aha! It’s a bit of both. I first signed up for social media at the urging of my assistant; she insisted that it was a new job requirement for a writer. Then I discovered that I enjoyed it, much to my surprise. I think there are still many writers who don’t engage in social media and still sell lots of books and do a great job. I just think it’s a good opportunity to talk to your readers, to have fun, and to add another dimension to your experience as a storyteller.

PC: You’re in California now. Has moving west changed your perspective as a writer?

SO: I’m sure it will—place has such a profound effect on all of us. But we’ve only been here two weeks. So far, I’m still jet-lagged. n

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By Rafil Kroll-Zaidi

A compendium of research facts Scientists rediscovered Borneo’s rainbow toads and discovered seven new species of Philippine forest mice, a new genus of blind Bulgarian beetles, four new species of jewel beetles, and six new species of New World micromoths. A great Mormon butterfly born in London’s Natural History Museum was observed to be male on its left side and female on its right. Cod mislabeling in Ireland and casual prostitution in Wales were rampant. A Cumbrian owl left a powder-down imprint of its entire body on a window. British scientists concluded that seventeen skeletons found recently in a well in Norwich were Jewish, and in the Orkney Islands, more than a thousand human bones were unearthed in the Tomb of the Otters. Middle-aged Chinese men are culturally disposed toward binge drinking, and Chinese adolescents who exercise frequently, eat their vegetables, and avoid sweets are likelier than those who do not to be fat. Boys in Taiwan are likelier than girls to vomit in order to lose weight. High levels of menthol-cigarette advertising were noted near California high schools whose students are predominantly African-American. African Americans’ eyes contain more oxygen than the eyes of whites.

The existence of the Lunch Effect in Spain was established, doctors pinpointed the origins of Barrett’s Esophagus, and U.S. Department of Energy researchers broke Kasha’s Rule. Anti-π activists celebrated Tau Day. “People find themselves almost violently angry at π,” explained theoretical physicist Michael Hartl. “They feel like they’ve been lied to their whole lives.” A lack of variation among verbs and nouns in finance reporting was found to precede market bubbles. Economic recession had caused European birthrates to stagnate. Dominant female mongooses expend substantial energy bullying younger females not to breed, and alpha-male bluestreak cleaner wrasse fish punish females who eat the rich mucus of the wrasses’ client fish (and thereby threaten to scare off those clients) as well as females who eat too many client parasites (and thereby threaten to transform themselves into male wrasses) commensurately with the degree of the females’ offense. Among Uganda’s Budongo chimpanzees, primatologists observed routine postcoital penis-cleaning. Sleeping babies register the crying of others.

German police were disappointed in the performance of Sherlock Holmes, a cadaver vulture, who confuses animal and human remains and prefers walking to flying; junior cadaver vultures Miss Marple and Columbo, said the birds’ trainer, “can’t do anything besides fight with each other.” Finches in whose brains a Japanese ornithologist destroyed the anterior nidopallium lost the ability to recognize ungrammatical birdsong. The hole-punching of clouds by planes was found to increase snow near airports. Ovulation improves straight women’s gaydar. Male black widows tend to avoid females who have been starved by scientists and prefer instead to mate with well-fed females, who are less likely to eat them and whose satiety the males can smell, through their feet, in the silk of the females’ webs. Palpimanus gibbulus spider-eating spiders will succeed in devouring Cyrba algerina spider-eating spiders 90 percent of the time; the other 10 percent of the time P. gibbulus will itself be eaten. Ladybugs occasionally recover their own will after parasitic wasp larva zombification, and Puerto Rican anoles can unlearn. Researchers at the University of Twente found that the Wave of Death exhibited by rat brains one minute after decapitation does not, as previously assumed, indicate brain death. Scientists observed the double beating of a tarantula’s heart. n

day/weekend trip

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Foodies flock to a new dining mecca Jim Thorpe, already known as one of the most scenic and historic small towns in America, is quickly becoming known as a small and diverse dining Mecca. In the past five years, four interesting new restaurants have sprouted up throughout town, much to the delight of foodies everywhere.

The newest of the crop is the Broadway Grille & Pub, situated in the landmark Inn at Jim Thorpe. Its authentic old world atmosphere has been infused with a hip, downtown ambiance, and it’s quickly becoming the town’s newest hot spot. The kitchen features a wide array of reasonably priced menus that offer new twists on old standards, as well as delicious entrees, salads and sandwiches influenced by flavors from South American and Pan Asian cuisine. Steaks, chops and seafood are chargrilled on the restaurant’s new hickory wood grill. On Friday and Saturday nights, the Grille offers a special late night menu till midnight. It also offers the biggest breakfast menu in town, including everything from fluffy buttermilk pancakes to spicy huevos rancheros, plus a huge lunch menu featuring entrees, salads, daily specials and delicious desserts. An extensive drink list features wines from around the world, plus a huge selection of beer, specialty cocktails and martinis. 24 Broadway, Jim Thorpe broadwaygrillepub.com. 570-732-4343.

Further up Broadway, the stately Albright Mansion recently hired a new Cordon Bleu-trained chef to oversee its evening fare, which includes everything from steak with gorgonzola and prosciutto di Parma to grilled escolar with pineapple coulis and macadamia romesco. The Albright Mansion also serves breakfast, lunch and a full English tea—including homemade scones—in its elegant Victorian parlors. 66 Broadway AlbrightMansion.com 570-3254440 At the end of West Broadway, Flow, Jim Thorpe’s farm-to-table restaurant, is situated inside a historic wire factory with an underground stream that’s visible from the dining room. Part of the Carbon County Cultural Project, Flow’s patrons can enjoy their food and drinks inside while gazing at original artwork or outside on a plant-filled patio.

The seasonally-changing menu features highlights such as duck with apricot mustard, chicken with a sweet onion risotto, a daily “starving artist’s special” and delicious homemade soups. Sunday’s tapas night, occasionally with flamenco dancing, is proving to be a big hit. 268 West Broadway thecccp.org 570-325-8200 Tucked away on historic Race Street, Moya has quickly become a destination restaurant with its lively, colorful atmosphere—complete with vivid abstract paintings created by the owner—and exquisite, eclectic food. Its delicious menu features local seasonal ingredients, with favorites such as sesame-encrusted yellowfin tuna, homemade gnocchi in a creamy tomato crab sauce and yummy appetizers such as their famous avocado salad, polenta, and goat cheese with asparagus. If there’s room for dessert, patrons can enjoy their homemade tiramisu, dream bombas with peanut butter ice cream or a dreamy limoncello parfait. 24 Race Street. JimThorpeMoya.com 570-325-8530 n oc t o b e r 2 0 1 1

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aint peels from the high vaulted ceilings in the oval-shaped rooms at the east and west ends of the Woodland Mansion, but this 18th century house still stands as a glorious reminder of Philadelphia’s social heyday.

The Woodland Mansion was built in 1787 in the Federal style on 250 acres of land purchased in 1734 by Andrew Hamilton, a friend of Thomas Jefferson. The house was built with a carriage house, stable and garden landscape, inspiring Jefferson to write, “The Woodlands is the

the Benjamin Franklin Bridge and the 1913 renovation of Rittenhouse Square.

Amid the towering monuments honoring the nowforgotten barons of big industry and business, Paul Cret’s and Thomas Eakins’s shockingly simple grave markers seem tragically understated. Had Eakins and Cret been native Parisians, their tombs would have towered over the ostentatious monuments of the business moguls.

Instead, grazing amid the tombs one can find small herds of deer, all regular residents of the cemetery who never seem to wander outside the boundaries drawn by the

only rival which I have known in America to what may be seen in England.” Further additions to the mansion were added by Hamilton’s grandson, William Hamilton (17491813).

Once the scene of lavish 18th-century events, the Woodlands decline began in the 1840s, when the property ceased to be a social “cocktail Mecca” for local and national dignitaries. After William Hamilton’s death, the Mansion and grounds were sold off by heirs. In 1840, the estate became the property of the Woodlands Cemetery Company.

Most of what Jefferson saw in the 18th century can still be seen today, especially in secret passageways and labyrinths that cover the basement area. The cemetery is similarly impressive, where you can walk among the graves and tombs of prominent 18th and19th century Philadelphians. Buried here are Thomas Eakins, Rembrandt Peale, members of the Drexel and Biddle families, Dr. Samuel Gross and architect Paul N. Cret, designer of

40th and Woodland trolley stop, but who spend their entire lives nibbling grave grass.

The handsome gateway to Woodlands Cemetery was designed by Paul Cret, as was the University Avenue Bridge which is visible from the Woodlands mansion.

The Woodlands Mansion inspired the creation of Woodland Terrace, the finest example of Italianate villa architecture in the city. Designed in 1861 by Philadelphia carpenter-turned-architect Samuel Sloan, Woodland Terrace is a grouping of 22 houses built shortly after the western expansion of the city’s trolley railway system.

The Italianate style, which evolved from the Gothic Revival period, was predicated on the typical rural Italian villa, which included four-panel doors, square cupolas or towers and colored or etched glass. In its English and American form, the Italianate style allowed for extensive elaborations, and was America’s most popular form of architecture around the time of the Civil War. Shortly after Sloan designed the houses in 1861, fashions and styles

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changed and the architect’s career fell apart.

But West Philadelphia in 1861 was a magnet for speculative builders, whose aim was to construct houses for the affluent middle class trying to escape the congestion of Center City. Sloan, who had established himself in the city as a designer of hospitals, asylums and schools, had already designed an Italianate villa for Andrew M. Eastwick on the site of Bartram’s Gardens when he took on the Woodland project.

Paul Cret’s house is prominently displayed among the other houses in Woodland Terrace. Cret moved to 516 Woodland Terrace in 1913 and remained there until his death in 1945. And, as architects are wont to do, Cret sought to improve or redesign parts of the house, although only a portion of these plans was ever executed.

In fact, the most picturesque of Cret’s additions was eliminated from the house when the house was purchased by its present owner, Dr. David Musto, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania.

Dr. Musto, who bought the Cret house in 2004, says that, while researching the house on the Internet, he discovered Cret’s original house redesign plan. Included in the plan was a copy of the facial mask sculpture Cret designed for the Rittenhouse Square fountain. Cret had originally put a copy of the mask on the wall above the first floor fireplace. This gargoyle-devil face, which gushes water into the Rittenhouse Square fountain during the warm weather months, obviously frightened a superstitious former tenant, who had it removed or destroyed.

Dr. Musto says a large mirror had been placed where the mask had been. “We moved the mirror to another room and our architect located people to actually re-create from the Cret drawings what had been there,” he said. A new Paul Cret mask now embellishes the fireplace.

Dr. Musto also re-created Cret’s plan for French wallpaper, but had to sidestep Cret’s unexecuted plan for a front porch. “Today, Woodland Terrace has a moratorium on anything that’s visible from the street, so on the back of the second floor, we put a deck using the original design that Cret had come up with for the front of the house,” he said.

Italianate house villas are characterized by roundheaded windows, elaborate frames, bay windows, porches or verandas. Decorative elements in cast iron and metal also typically decorate an Italianate house. Most of the Woodland Terrance houses are wood frame buildings covered with tan-colored stucco although the end houses were special creations made of stone and supplemented with a columned porch and a tower. Cret’s house was not an end home, so it had a simpler design.

Dr. Musto says he has worked for a year and a half on the restoration, and that it has been an “agonizing amount of work.” Several radical innovations were instituted, such as the addition of a colonnade where there had been a staircase. The house also came with a shed

thOm NICkels

attached. In Cret’s old study, Dr. musto installed a murphy bed for guests (where Cret once had a bookcase) as well as writing and coloring book tables with crayons for his children.

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30 minutes into the opening reception for a whopping $1250]. Instead, they went for the jugular.

“I mean,” says Cordora, his voice moving up a notch, “Do all gays hate other gays? everybody in the city loves me, all the girls, all the straight guys think I’m cool, it’s only the homos who I got ‘shitty’ from!”

O-CalleD “aPPrOBat OB ION art” Is not OBat supposed to be original but a rehash and a manipulation of old images. If you’re looking for something new with this kind of art you’re likely to go away disappointed or grind your teeth before writing a negative review. former tv host Burch Cordora’s second solo exhibit, The Absolution Lab, which just finished a successful run at ven and v vaida Gallery in Old City, garnered mostly positive press for its appropriated celebrity images—or

snarky comments aside, opening night for The Absolution Lab was standing room only with sales receipts breaking all ven and vaida v first friday records with art sales coming in at upwards of $1,600.00 this year Cordora plans to find another ten or 12 straight guys to pose for another Straight and Butch calendar, as well as get his “madonna sex book” published.

“I really need to get this book done,” he says. “It will be the end-all of this project.” like approbation art, the book will follow the madonna template with a little text, but 90 percent of it will be photographs of 30 or so different guys.

Butch Cordora’s riff on the famous Lennon/Ono photograph, which was in the show at Ven and Vaida in Old City.

prints in large format canvasses—of amy a w winehouse, David Beckham, Paris hilton, and others. a as with any creative undertaking, some slings and arrows must fall. for Cordora, the big arrow was a review in City Paper that he calls “snarky.”

“I though the slant was going to be more of an educational, pop culture, or an lGBt slant, but the review was more like an art critic’s review. the kind of stuff that I do you either hate or love, you get it or you don’t get it, but clearly CP’s interviewer was no fan of warhol. w I couldn’t believe that CP didn’t have at least one nice to say; like the amy a winehouse image was nice [it sold w

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he QuestION, “where where were w you during the earthquake?” has been making the rounds a lot lately. this is the sort of question that’s interesting for about fifteen minutes. how many times can you hear different versions of “I saw the floor roll,” or “the pictures on the wall of my house rattled like drums?” right after a august’s quake I was curious to see how the mainstream media was handling this. television reporters were having a heyday interviewing office workers on the streets of Center City. they were also steadfast in their belief that 2 p.m., tuesday, a august 23, would burn a hole in the public’s mind every bit as deep as 9/11 or the John f. kennedy assassination in 1963. a prediction like this of course assumes that an east coast earthquake

like the one we experienced will not return for several decades. I’d say that was a pretty optimistic hypothesis given current earth and global warming changes. I wish it weren’t so, but environmental-related events will take center stage in the coming years.

One man who was interviewed took his fifteen minutes of tv fame to talk about his fiancé, not only saying her name and town of origin but also managing to plug the family business and then tying the whole thing together by saying, “I hope they are all okay. I really hope my fiancé is okay.” One almost got the feeling that he was hoping the reporter would respond with a, “Okay, I’ll see if station management can put you in touch with her.” while I understand the fear that many felt as the w quake shook offices in a number of Center City skyscrapers (we may be years away from 9/11, but in the collective mind there’s still a special fear associated with skyscraper emergencies), I hate it when reporters seem to go on protracted hunts for tragedies that will improve ratings. the rolodex, repeat-question, “what what was your expew rience of the earthquake?” seems to beg for grisly new details. Consider this: what’s an earthquake if half the people you talk didn’t even know there was an earthquake? “I was asleep when it happened,” a friend of mine said blithely. a another friend, who was taking a late shower at the time, said he felt nothing but the well modulated mix of warm and cold water over his shoulders when the 5.8 wannabe mega quake shook the computer terminals in many Center City office buildings. a clerk in a Center City rite a aid not far from City hall told me he “felt nothing” but knew something was up when hordes of office workers began crowding the store entrance on Broad street. for years I’ve been reading how animals can be good indicators of coming earthquakes. a neighbor’s cats, all three of them in fact, behaved strangely seconds before the quake, running around her house and racing up stairways, whereas my all-too-tranquil tuxedo cat gave me no clues if indeed she felt any precursor vibes at all. Not that watching my cat behave strangely would have made any difference, mind you. had she ran in circles or flung herself against a wall I would have taken that as one of those periodic cat spasms that seem to come from nowhere. a and like most people, once I felt the floor “roll” I would not have associated that with an earthquake but most likely with a loose floor joist.

In Pennsylvania, we’re not supposed to have earthquakes. Not only that, but in Philadelphia, which has its

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share of crime and economic problems, we’ve always been pretty lucky when it comes to any natural disasters. We may get soaking rains, blizzards or insufferable humidity, but for the most part these things pass without collapsing our homes, destroying our

People on Market Street in Philadelphia just after the earthquake.

office buildings or otherwise wreaking havoc downtown. So yes, it’s good to be a Philadelphian when it comes to natural disasters—so far.

What shocked most people about the quake wasn’t what they felt move under their feet but the fact that this assumption that we were somehow in a safe zone or exempt from the horrendous calamities that happen elsewhere in the world, was finally put to rest. This is scary stuff, Virginia.

Most natural disasters can be predicted. Hurricane Irene, for instance, had been on tracking radar screens for a while. Snow storms also are seen in advance, as are tornados (if only in terms of minutes, but even one minute can save a life). Earthquakes give no warning. They are like traffic accidents and heart attacks. They just happen.

And they happen on beautiful blue sky, humidity-free days, when all seems well with the world

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ore than twenty years ago when you went to buy a ticket at Philadelphia’s old Greyhound bus terminal at 1711 Market Street, you got to interact with live human beings. Not only that, but travelers had a lot more “fun” while waiting for a bus. The plastic seats had bolted- on TV sets and were spaced far enough apart so that you were not on top of fellow passengers. In an adjoining room was a Roy Rogers restaurant where you could get a tolerable fast food meal. When it came time to board your bus, you took an escalator down to the departure level.

Years before this, in the 1950s, both Greyhound and Trailways buses employed on-board stewardesses. Dressed in uniforms with hats and gloves, the stewardesses served coffee and Danish on morning road trips to New York City and back. The ‘50s, 60s, and 70s, of course, were peak years when it came to bus travel. Greyhound had its 1956 double-decker Scenicruiser, the 1955 Courier and the classic 1948 Silverside. Bus terminals, such as Washington D.C.’s super station on New York Avenue, built on the ground floor of a skyscraper, were noted for their various architectural amenities.

Philly’s old Greyhound terminal was a kitschy paradise. There was a small arcade

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with pinball machines, an instamatic 50 cent photo booth, and an Ellsworth Kelly anodized aluminum 12 foot high and 64 foot long prize-winning “Sculpture for a Long Wall” (1957) on one of the station walls. There were also coin-operated luggage lockers where layover travelers could stash suitcases before setting out to explore the city.

When Philadelphia’s Greyhound bus station moved to 1001 Filbert Street, the fast food restaurant morphed into a glorified food stand where travelers could watch hot dogs and soft pretzels bake to death in plastic neon heaters. Vending machines were installed in place of the treasured foot lockers, while the restrooms had most of their private stalls removed, a redesign that made for a lot of wasted space unless your idea of a bathroom is a smelly lecture hall.

While I rarely travel by bus, I recently traveled by Greyhound to Scranton. My last Greyhound venture was in the 1980s, when it was possible to converse with a ticket agent.

Did I say ticket agent? Aside from the very humane NJT booth (where there’s a live person), Greyhound travelers are forced to purchase tickets from machines. A machine attendant barks orders while overseeing other tasks: “Push the red button. Go back.

Where do you want to go?” Dealing with so many people, the stressed attendant—who is outfitted in a yellow police-style vest—is obviously overworked.

The attendant on duty the day I bought my ticket, though polite, was beside herself.

“Where you’d say you were going?” she shouted into my left ear. I don’t know about you, but when somebody barks in my ear I tend to react like someone escaping gusts of wind. It didn’t help that the terminal was packed with end-of-summer passengers, with everybody trying to figure out where they were supposed to go.

After the machine produced a round trip ticket, I noticed that the price was unusually high. Miraculously, I tracked down the still vexed yellow vest attendant: “Can you tell me why this is? This isn’t the price quoted me when I called Greyhound last week.”

“You got a March Trailways for your return trip, that’s not Greyhound,” she said.

“You mean the machine gave me Greyhound on the way up and Trailways on the way back—without letting me know? Did I miss the fine print?”

“It’s the departure time you selected,” she said, “when there are no Greyhound buses available, it switches you automatically.”

“And raises the price, without offering you an option?”

“You can exchange it,” she said.

But I had had enough of lines and kept the ticket, thinking I’d just watch the machine with a wary eye the next time I traveled Greyhound.

Fortunately, the bus ride to Scranton was enjoyable. The driver, who was an older man, didn’t speed on the passing lane. Younger drivers, such as the 24-year-old driver who recently lost control of his Greyhound bus on the Pennsylvania turnpike while traveling in the passing lane (the front end of this kid’s bus struck the concrete barrier and eventually flipped on its side, injuring 14 people), tend to like speed. The older driver also had the good taste to wish the passengers good morning and then map out the route to Scranton. As a traveler, one feels comfortable hearing such things, but that was not the case on the return trip.

The return trip reminded me of traveling on a crowded Septa bus—or a crowded cattle car in India. The driver said nothing about the route or how many station stops the bus would make on the way to Philadelphia. He did manage to address chronic cell phone users. “Use your cell phones for emergencies only,” he advised, “Be respectful of other passengers.” Few listened to the driver, of course.

As an added bonus, it was a Friday, the worst possible day for travel; everybody and their grandmother was high tailing it to Philly.

The biggest shock came twenty minutes after the bus pulled out of Wilkes-Barre, when the odor of second hand smoke coming from the back of the bus. “Oh no,” I thought, “Who would dare do this in 2011?”

Bold as brass, the smokers lit up repeatedly until smoke filled the entire cabin, the driver as oblivious to the smell as the passengers. The only thing missing was the voice of Twilight Zone’s Rod Serling announcing that this was a road trip into the past.

It was also hardly coincidental that the smokers waited until the driver had pulled onto the turnpike before lighting up. On the turnpike, the driver’s attention would be focused on traffic.

When we arrived in Philly, the yellow vested attendants weren’t smoking but they

going out calendar ART EXHIBITS THRU 10/9 Infrastructure. Paintings by Edward Marston.

Twenty-Two Gallery, 236 S. 22nd St., Phila.

215-772-1911 twentytwogallery.com THRU 10/15 Atul Bhalla: Water Works. Lafayette College, Tues.-Fri. 1-5, Sat. 12-5 and by appt.

Lafayette College, Grossman Gallery, 243 No. Third St., Easton, PA. 610-330-5361 http://galleries.lafayette.edu THRU 10/16 Transmutation and Metamorphosis: The Collages of Ann Irwin. In Ann Irwin’s universe, the unexpected becomes commonplace and the commonplace is never exactly what you expect. Houses sprout heads and rays of fire. Hills bristle with stick figures. Trees grow ribs and skulls. These transformations can be both ominous and optimistic, witty and wise; they arose from a life committed to creativity and represented a daily triumph over adversity. Michener Art Museum, 128 S. Pine Street, Doylestown, PA 215-340-9800. michenermuseum.org THRU 10/21 The Baum Legacy: artists of the Lehigh Valley area 1926-1975. Exhibition and sale, The David E. Rodale Gallery, The Baum School of Art, 510 West Linden St., Allentown, PA. 610-433-0032. baumschool.org THRU 10/22 Forms/Gods: Carolyn Hesse and Eric Tonzola. Soft Machine Gallery, 725 No. 15th St., Allentown, PA. 484-838-4252. softmachinegallery.com THRU 10/23 Jennifer Hudson, Baptism. Open afternoons, Thurs.-Sun. Michael Benari’s “Kind of Blue” continues in Upstairs Gallery II Red Filter Fine Art Photography Gallery, 74 Bridge St., Lambertville, NJ. 347-244-9758. redfiltergallery.com THRU 11/20 Daniel Watts: From Stillness. The Quiet Life Gallery, 17 So. Main St., Lambertville, NJ. Wed.-Sun. quietlifegallery, 609-397-0880 THRU 12/31 Quilt Art. James A. Michener Art Museum, 138 S. Pine St., Doylestown. 215-340-9800. michenerartmuseum.org THRU 12/31 Serenity in Surrealism, internationally known artist, Evgeni Gordiets. Artist’s reception, Sat., Oct. 15, 6-9pm. Designs for Tranquility, 41 Bridge St., Frenchtown, NJ. 908-996-9990. designsfortranquility.com THRU 1/29/12 Masterpieces by Andrew Wyeth from the Collections. Brandywine River Museum, Rte. 1, Chadds Ford. 610-388-2700. brandywinemuseum.org 10/1-10/29 Daniel Anthonisen: Entering Point Pleasant. Reception, 10/1, 5-8pm, 10/2, 12-4pm, Gallery Talk, 10/15, 1-3pm. Travis Gallery, 6089 Lower York Rd. (Rt. 202), New Hope, PA. 215-794-3903. travisgallery.com 10/2-11/19 111th Anniversary Exhibition of Works on Paper. Opening reception 10/2, 2-4.

Philadelphia Watercolor Society. Community Arts Center, 414 Plush Mill Rd., Wallingford. pwcsociety.org

10/9-10/30 Philadelphia Heartbeat. Paintings of familiar and seldom-seen Philadelphia by Bucks County artist and writer, Robert Beck.

Opening reception 10/9, 12-5. Rosenfeld Gallery, 113 Arch St., Phila. 215-922-1376. robertbeck.net

10/12-23 Shooting Stars, by Molly Newman. Act 1 Performing Arts, DeSales University, Labuda Center for the Performing Arts, Schubert Theatre, 2755 Station Ave., Center Valley, PA. 610-282-3192 or visit desales.edu/act1

11/19 Two Giants: Mozart & Beethoven. Pennsylvania Sinfonia Orchestra, Allan Birney, Music Director. Symphony Hall, 23 N. 6th St., Allentown, PA. Tickets: 610-434-7811, LVArtsBoxOffice.org, PASinfonia.org

10/9-11/20 A Different View 2: Invitational Exhibition of 12 Abstract Artists. Coryell Gallery, 8 Coryell St, Lambertville, NJ 609-397-0804. coryellgallery.com

10/13-23 Into the Dark, created and performed by the Touchstone Ensemble. Touchstone Theatre, 321 E. 4th St., Bethlehem. 610-8671689. touchstone.org

11/27 A Lehigh Valley Christmas, In Concert.

Allentown symphony Hall, 23 N. 6th St., Allentown, PA. 610-432-6715. allentownsymphony.org/LVxmas.aspx

10/14-11/6 Landscapes: Carter Leidy. Reception 10/14, 6-9. 236 So. 22nd St, Phila. 215-772-1911. twenty-twogallery.com

10/20 In the Heights, 7:30 pm. State Theatre, State Theatre, 453 Northampton St., Easton, PA. 610-252-3132. statetheatre.org

10/15 Preview Party: Shared Treasure: The Legacy of Samuel H. Kress. 6-8 p.m.

FREE museum members; $15 non-members.

Join us as we welcome the return of the Kress Collection to our gallery walls with our “Shared Treasure” preview party. Great food, drink, live music and socializing will all contribute to an evening of fun as we celebrate the museum’s re-opening and the unveiling of our new special exhibition. Please R.S.V.P. by October 13: 610-432-4333, ext.

129 or events@allentownartmuseum.org.

10/28-11/6 Stephen Sondheim’s Merrily We Roll Along, Muhlenberg College, 2400 Chew St, Allentown. muhlenberg.edu/theatre 484664-3333

DINNER & MUSIC Tuesdays: Music & poetry, dance performances, storytellers & buffet. $30 includes tax and gratuity. Hamilton’s Grill Room, 8 Coryell Street, Lambertville, NJ 609-3974343. hamiltonsgrillroom.com

10/22 & 10/23 Sweet Edge Sculpture Tour. Studio tours of Nakashima, McDevitt, Snyder, Cann, Mathis, Bassett, Pettegrow. sweetedgesculpture. com

Saturday nights: Sette Luna Restaurant, 219 Ferry St., Easton, PA. 610-253-8888. setteluna.com

10/22-4/1/2012 The Painterly Voice. Michener Art Museum, 138 S. Pine St, Doylestown, PA. 215-3409800. michenerartmuseum.org

10/22 Tony Bennett Gala. Sat., October 22, 2011.

Zoellner Arts Center, Lehigh University, 420 E. Packer Ave., Bethlehem, PA. For details call 610-758-6172.

11/5-12/10 Chuck Zovko, New Works. Meet the artist, 11/27, 1-4. The Snow Goose Gallery, 470 Main St., Bethlehem, PA. 610-974-9099. thesnowgoosegallery.com

CALL TO ARTISTS Seeking talented artisans, crafters, specialty food/baked goods vendors to participate in this traditional Christmas Market in THE Christmas City USA, Bethlehem, PA. Christmas City Village, Weihnachtsmarkt. Authentic German Christmas Market in bustling historic downtown. Outdoor, 8’x8’ wooden stalls w/electricity. Nov. 25,26,27 & Dec. 2,3,4 & 9,10,11 & 16,17,18 & 22,23,24. Times: Fri & Sat 11am-8pm, Sun 11am-5pm. For info: christmascityvillage.com. For prospectus either download from the website or send SASE to: Downtown Bethlehem Association, 804 Wood St. Bethlehem, PA 18018.

THEATER THRU 10/9 You Never Can Tell, by George Bernard Shaw. Act 1 Performing Arts, DeSales University, 2755 Station Ave., Center Valley, PA. 610-282-3192. desales.edu/act1 10/2 The Flying Karamazov Brothers, 3pm.

Family friendly and imaginative performers!

Baker Hall, Zoellner Arts Center, Lehigh University, 8 p.m. 420 East Packer Ave. Bethlehem, PA 610-758-2787.

10/7 The Midtown Men, 4 Stars from the original cast of Jersey Boys! 8pm, State Theatre, 453 Northampton St., Easton, PA. www. statetheatre.org, 1-800-999-STATE.

GALAS

10/15 2011 Gala Concert, violin virtuoso, Hilary Hahn. The Bach Choir of Bethlehem, 8pm. Central Moravian Church, Historic Bethlehem, PA. Tickets: Bach.org, 1-888743-3100, ext. 15

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

THRU 10/27 Noon-Ten Concerts, Tuesdays in October, 12:10pm. Arts at St. John’s, St. John’s Evangelical Lutheran Church, 37 So. Fifth St., Allentown. stjohnsallentown.org, 610435-1641 10/11 Esperanza Spalding, 2011 Grammy Winner Best New Artist, Chamber Music Society.

Zoellner Arts Center, Lehigh University, Bethlehem. 610-758-2787. zoellnerartscenter.org 10/21 Carducci String Quartet. Chamber Music Society of Bethlehem, Empie Theatre, Baker Center for the Arts, Muhlenberg College, 2400 Chew St., Allentown, PA. Tickets available at the door or lvartsboxoffice.org.

10/30 The Philadelphia Brass Quintet with Organ, Timpani, 4pm. Arts at St. John’s, St. John’s Evangelical Lutheran Church, 37 So. Fifth St., Allentown, PA. 610-435-1641. stjohnsallentown.org 11/11 Pacifica Quartet, 8pm. Chamber Music Society of Bethlehem, Faith United Church, 5992 Rt. 378, Center Valley, PA. Tickets: lvartsboxoffice.org. www.cmsob.org

ARTSQUEST CENTER AT STEELSTACKS (Musicfest Café) 101 Founders Way, Bethlehem, PA 610332-1300. artsquest.org 10/7: Al Stewart 10/8: Here Come the Mummies 10/9: The Smithereens 10/12: Lorna Luff 10/13: Karla Bonoff 10/16: Carl Palmer of Emerson, Lake & Palmer 10/19: Hot Chelle Rae 10/22: Chuck Negron of Three Dog Night 10/23: Lehigh Valley Music Awards Beatles Showcase 10/25: Southern Gentlemen Tour: Ed Roland of Collective Soul & Kevin Griffin of Better Than Ezra 10/28: Hoots & Hellmouth and Holy Ghost Tent Revival 10/29: Julie Fowlis 10/30: Sonny Landreth

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 10/8: Eddie Bruce – Bruce on Bennett Tribute to Tony Bennett 10/14: Blues Caravan 10/15: Battlefield Band 10/16: Quartet for the End of Time Performed by the Lyra Ensemble 10/21: The Badlees 10/22: Badge: The Eric Clapton Tribute 10/29: Hamell on Trial 11/4: Girlyman 11/5: John Lennon Imagined 11/12: John Denver Tribute 11/18: Cheryl Wheeler 11/19: Girls Night Out Comedy 12/2: Gandalf Murphy & The Slambovian Circus Christmas Show 12/3: The Peek-A-Boo Revue Holiday Spectacular 12/10: Craig Thatcher and Friends Rockin’ Christmas Show

EVENTS THRU 10/30 Scarecrow Competition & Display, Peddler’s Village, rte 202 & 263, Lahaska, PA. Peddlersvillage.com, 215-794-4000 THRU 10/30 Bethlehem Harvest Festival, Just Desserts, Fall Fashion Event, Doggie Day and Halloween 5k & Parade. For more information visit downtownbethlehemassociation.com. bethlehempa.org

THRU 10/31 Art of Urban Environments Festival, Easton, PA. An arts celebration for all! Tour the outdoor exhibits created exclusively for the festival that seek to shine a fresh light on urban space and the beauty of the city’s environs. http://sites.lafayette.edu/urbanartsfest THRU 10/31 Pumpking Festival, galleries and shops having special events & sales, restaurants premiering their Fall menus. For full schedule of events, go to frenchtownnj.org, click under events to see the October in Frenchtown calendar.

10/8 Halloween Postcard Making Event, Modern Love, 12-4pm, 23 Race St., Frenchtown, NJ. 908-996-3387. shopmodernlove.com 10/22 Pink is Pretty and Pertinent, Breast Cancer Awareness Month Fundraiser, Designs for Tranquility, 41 Bridge St., Frenchtown, NJ. 908-996-9990. designsfortranquility.com 10/22 Quakertown Autumn Alive, 10am-4pm.

Fun for the entire family, scarecrow contest, on stage talent show, pet parade contest, horse-drawn carriages, food.www.quakertownalive.com 10/22 Grapes ‘N Hops, Beer and Wine Festival, Quakertown Alive! Quakertown Historical Train Station, downtown Quakertown, 2-6pm. Live entertainment featuring The Daisy Jug Band, wine for sale by local wineries, and more. www.quakertownalive.com 11/3-6 Invision Photo Festival, Banana Factory, 25 W. Third St., and SteelStacks Campus, 101 Founders Way, Bethlehem, PA. Fantastic exhibitions, parties, presentations, workshops, and portfolio reviews. artsquest.org/invision 11/5 Cocktails & Collecting, 6-9pm, Allentown Art Museum of the Lehigh Valley, 31 N. 5th St., Allentown, PA. The evening will feature works of art from over 20 fine and decorative art galleries and artists from New York, Philadelphia and the Lehigh Valley. Museum curators will be on hand to provide information on how to select a piece of art and start an art collection. The culinary portion of the evening will feature hors-d’oeuvres and a complimentary bar will be offered. Early–bird tickets (purchased on or before October 28) are $100 p/person; after October 28 tickets are $125 p/person. 610-432-4333. allentownartmuseum.org 11/12 & 13 17th Annual Hidden Treasures Studio Tour in the Lehigh Valley, 10-5pm. Tour the studios of talented artists that work in pottery, wood, glass, knitting and weaving, porcelain, silk, jewelry and other forms of media. hiddentreasurestour.com

CLASSES THRU 11/19 10-week children / teen art classes, The Baum School of Art, 510 W. Linden St., Allentown, PA. 610-433-0032. baumschool.org THRU 12/19 15-week adult art classes, The Baum School of Art, 510 W. Linden St., Allentown, PA. 610 433 0032, www. baumschool.org oc t o b e r 2 0 1 1

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