Jun 22
Becca MartinUncategorized
June 22, 2011
Our first day in New Orleans (May 28) started just about five — maybe closer to four — hours after the day we drove down ended. My best friend Pam and I agree that you can sleep when you’re dead, but you can only eat breakfast at Croissant d’Or when you’re in New Orleans.
My sweetheart, on his first visit to my favorite city, got off to a rocky start. It was probably nine or 10 blocks from the hotel to the patisserie on Ursulines, and he kept asking — already soaked by the worse-than-Kansas humidity — if we were sure we knew where we were going.
That was pretty much his New Orleans experience — getting dragged hither and yon by two crazy women with a long list of favorite places we just had to see. He’d probably tell you (off the record) that it wasn’t quite how he expected his honeymoon to go.
But New Orleans won his heart, just as I knew it would. As I told him on the night of our arrival, while we were wandering lost in a not-very-upscale neighborhood, hating the city of my dreams might not be a deal breaker — but it sure would require some renegotiation!
Anyway, this year, instead of reiterating what I adore about NOLA, we’re going to see some of it from Larry’s point of view. These are the things he enjoyed most.
• The World War II Museum.
I’d told him repeatedly how impressed I was with this museum’s chronicle of the War to End All Wars. He didn’t expect to be dazzled by “Beyond All Boundaries,” the multi-sensory film shown in the still-new theater across the street, and he certainly didn’t expect to see his late father in a mural. We’re still working on getting a copy of the photo, but it made for a very emotional visit.
• Food. And more food. And more food.
I’m happy to say he enjoyed every place I love — Coop’s, the French Market Restaurant & Bar, Ralph & Kacoo’s, Pat O’Brien’s — but we also tried something new (on the recommendation of the hairdresser who gave me back my short hair).
Louisiana Bistro, a tiny dining room on Dauphine Street, offers something called “Feed Me,” and it’s a culinary delight. All you choose is the number of courses you want to eat — and alert the chef to any food allergies or fears. The rest is a delightful surprise.
We had three courses, starting with crawfish beignets. Next came alligator soup, a dark brown roux with a slow-rolling heat. The final course was buffalo ribs with mashed sweet potatoes — and of course, we had to try the bread pudding. (It’s Pam’s ambition — with my help — to taste every bread pudding in the French Quarter and rate them all. We take notes.)
Around us, we saw other tables getting completely different meals. It was just plain fun to leave ourselves in someone else’s hands.
• Everything Audubon.
We did the zoo — and stopped to see my favorite white gators and furry little nutria — after enjoying a streetcar ride out to La Madeleine for lunch. We did the aquarium, a perfect escape from the heat, marveling once again on its revitalization after the destruction of Hurricane Katrina. And we did the insectarium, where the butterflies were out in full force, dancing to their own silent music. While he enjoyed it all, I think Larry’s favorite thing was tasting bug snacks at the snack bar. Huh.
• The street performers.
The French Quarter is always full of mimes and musicians, making a living in their own little corners of the world. Some of them, like the one pictured here, are just amazing. We also enjoyed the art exhibited around Jackson Square and in the galleries — although Pam’s and my passion for Pete the Cat is still a mystery to him.
• And we both enjoyed an unscheduled stop at Vicksburg on the way home. I’d been driving past one of the Civil War’s best-known battle sites for years and had never been able to visit. I believe Pam was bored out of her mind. We came home and bought Ken Burns’ Civil War series!
After this year’s introduction, I can envision the next New Orleans vacation happening at my sweetheart’s pace — which would mean spending less time racing from place to place, trying to see it all, and more time sitting in sidewalk cafes, sipping coffee with chicory and watching the world go by. I think my feet and I can live with that!
This French Quarter street performer was motionless for who knows how long, in spite of the heat and passers-by sticking their faces in his.
Although I've visited the Audubon InsectariumAlthough I've visited the Audubon Insectarium many times, the butterflies were busier and more beautiful than ever before.
The Audubon Aquarium of the Americas was not only beautiful but cool!
One of my favorite things about walking in the Quarter is the beautiful ironwork.
May 20
Becca MartinUncategorized
There is a joy in new theater that is unique. You get to meet completely new characters in completely unpredictable situations. You get to see old friends playing those new roles. You get to see playwrights that are as proud as new papas and as nervous as first dates.
“Disfarmer” by Werner Trieschmann and “The Spiritualist” by Bob Ford debuted last night at the Arkansas New Play Fest at Nadine Baum Studios. That the plays went on at all was a tribute to the determination and resilience of a grieving theater community. That audiences laughed and listened was a tribute to the playwrights, directors and actors who brought the scripts to life without sets, costumes, music or lights.
“Disfarmer,” which has been on the New Play Fest stage before, is billed as the story of a reclusive photographer working in Heber Springs in the early part of the 20th century. In 2005, art dealers discovered his work, and in Trieschmann’s play, dispatched Vance (Drew Johnson) to buy as many photos as possible.
The play, in fact, is really about a Heber Springs “nobody” named Carlee, wonderfully played by Vickie Hilliard, and how she saw the Disfarmer photos as a way she could be important, sort of her 10 minutes of fame.
John T. Smith played an enigmatic Disfarmer, Bob Hart was hilarious in every role he took on, and Shannon Webber showed her talent by easily flipping from role to role.
Kudos to director Kate Frank for making us forget that it was a staged reading. Didn’t notice. Didn’t care.
Not having the accoutrements of a full production had more of an impact on Ford’s “The Spiritualist” because it’s a play that revolves around music. I spent a lot of time wishing for a piano — but by the same token, the duet by Amy Herzberg and Maury Reed was amazing!
The brand new script is about an Englishwoman in the 1970s who claimed she channeled the great composers — Liszt, Beethoven, Bach. An American newspaperman wants to prove she’s crazy or lying and challenges her to channel Buddy Holly — thus the duet between Herzberg as Rose and Reed as Holly.
It’s a fascinating story, based as “Disfarmer” is on real life. It’s harder to relate to, however. Everyone has had a portrait made. Not everyone speaks to spirits — or is intimately familiar with the great composers! (Playwright Bob Ford is; he has a master’s degree in music from Yale.) I might wish for more of a primer!
That said, what would I change about the evening? Not a thing, except to wish the well-filled house was sold out!
That’s a subtle way of suggesting you get out tonight, even if it is raining, and see Alan Berks’ “They Want” and John Walch’s “In the Book Of.” The first show starts at 6:30 p.m., and tickets are $7. It’s like seeing a baby born — without the wailing!
Apr 25
Becca MartinUncategorized
Here’s how good University Theatre’s “Othello” is: The play is nearly three hours long — and you’ll be sorry when it’s over.
Don’t worry about Shakespeare’s English; the actors get it, so you will too.
Don’t worry about the modern — well, not really modern, more 1930s science fiction — costumes designed by Latricia Reichman. They’re interesting but not distracting.
Don’t worry about the staging, which at times seems more “Tempest” than tragedy. It’s beautiful, and it symbolizes goodness and light turning to sorrow and darkness.
Instead, focus on the acting, which is some of the best you’ll see anywhere, anytime.
Justin Cunningham, a senior drama major from Atkins, is heartbreaking as Othello. He’s (in this version) young, successful and madly in love with Desdemona (Molly Carroll). But, as director Michael Landman says, something makes him vulnerable to the suggestion that his wife is unfaithful. Maybe it’s being a Moor — black — in Venice. Maybe it’s because Desdemona is beautiful and the daughter of a senator, while he is merely a soldier. Maybe he simply has demons of his own.
But it takes virtually nothing for Iago — once his friend and perhaps more — to plant the seeds of doubt. And that doubt grows into tormented insanity that destroys everything he loves.
Ah, Iago.
Fayetteville’s own Jim Goza was last seen as the wide-eyed innocent in “Every Christmas Story Ever Told (And Then Some)” at TheatreSquared. There is no innocence in his Iago — only pain and fury and hatred, coupled with the talent of lying with a sincere smile on his face. The character is not unlike Kathryn in “Cruel Intentions.” You know Iago is evil, but it’s easy to cheer him on.
Innocent bystanders are, of course, caught up and suffer in Iago’s web of lies: Desdemona, who is truly sweet and faithful; Roderigo (Asa Tims), one of her suitors who becomes Iago’s pawn; Cassio (Justin Walker), who is promoted over Iago by Othello and thus sets the whole plot in motion; and Emilia (Rachel Culp), who is Iago’s wife but also Desdemona’s servant and confidante and pays the price for both. There isn’t a weak link in the chain, but special kudos to Culp, who brings Iago to justice with power and fury of her own.
There just aren’t enough compliments to heap on Goza and Cunningham — pages and pages of lines, duplicitous interaction that must be perfectly nuanced and a violent end that leaves them both out of breath. (They’ve been practicing stage combat all semester.) And that’s not to mention Goza’s magic — but you have to see that for yourself.
“It’s not a play about bad people,” director Michael Landman says. “It’s a play about trust and betrayal, about passionate love and being willing to be vulnerable in relationships.”
“This play is heart-wrenching and truly beautiful to look at,” Cunningham adds.
“If we do our job right as actors, directors and designers, every person in the audience should have a cathartic moment at the end,” Goza concludes. “Everyone in our audience has been hurt” just as Iago was.
FAQ
‘Othello’
WHEN — 8 p.m. Wednesday-Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday
WHERE — University Theatre in the Fine Arts Building on the University of Arkansas campus in Fayetteville
COST — $7-$16
INFO — 575-3946
Apr 22
Becca MartinUncategorized
In Neil LaBute’s “In the Company of Men,” two men plot to break the heart of a female coworker. In his “The Shape of Things,” an artist uses professed love to completely change a man (and break his heart). And in “Fat Pig,” a man hides the woman he loves from his friends because she isn’t thin (and breaks her heart).
Most people haven’t experienced those particular situations, although heartbreak is certainly universal. But each and every playgoer can see him- or herself in one of the characters in LaBute’s “Reasons to Be Pretty,” on stage right now at TheatreSquared under the direction of Shana Gold, who also directed “Underneath the Lintel.”
Steph (portrayed by New York actress Christin Sawyer Davis) has had her feelings irreparably hurt by her boyfriend’s chance remark. He’s called her face “regular.” Not pretty. Not beautiful. Not even cute. “Regular.” It might seem like nothing, but she can’t get over it. And she can’t stay with him after hearing it.
Greg (another New York actor, Dusty Brown) is mystified by Steph’s behavior. He thinks he’s the innocent everyman — until he finally realizes he’s not.
And then there’s Carly and Kent. Carly (Rebecca Rivas, a graduate student at the University of Arkansas) is Steph’s best friend, the one who repeated Greg’s remark. She’s beautiful — and stereotypically not real bright. Kent (Kris Pruett, most recently seen as Mutt in “Sundown Town”) is Greg’s best friend, but he’s also every cliche of the boorish, two-timing, foul-mouthed male. It’s impossible to imagine why a beautiful woman would want him — but Carly does — or why the innocent everyman would be his friend.
Admit it: You’ve been one of these people. Or you know one of these people intimately.
And that’s the “squirm” factor in this play, which has been called a kinder, gentler Neil LaBute. In “In the Company of Men” and “The Shape of Things,” the moral of the story — when it is finally revealed — smacks you in the face like a wet mackerel, and you’re left with your mouth hanging open. “Reasons to Be Pretty” sneaks up on you. And by the time the final confrontations happen, you’re busy assessing that last failed relationship, the friendship that’s just too one-sided, the pretty girl you underestimated — and the plain girl who really did grow up to be beautiful, much to her own surprise.
All of the actors were absolutely grounded in their characters’ shoes, making that connection with a particular one easy. I, of course, was drawn to Steph, especially at the end, when she realizes that the decisions have all been made, and the only thing left to do is go where they lead her. I sympathized with Greg, I pitied Carly, and Kris Pruett is just as powerful as Kent as he was as Mutt — and, for me, just as easy to hate.
The script has some marvelous one-liners, things you wish you’d said or could remember for the next bad boyfriend experience. The language is … very “modern” — the characters swear with as little thought as they breathe — and whether because of that or in spite of it, it lacks the poetry of some of LaBute’s earlier works. It seems like there isn’t a single complete sentence in the entire play. I think it’s a sign of the times and perhaps symbolic of how confused these characters are. It bothered me.
The set changes, however, were delightful — easily and quickly done and amazingly clever. Kudos to set designer Nick Francone!
“It is simultaneously dark comedy and gut-wrenching drama,” says T2 artistic director Bob Ford. “These characters are fiery, vulnerable, acerbic, clumsy… They’re painfully in love and trying to make it work. The reality of ‘Reasons’ is exactly why it resonates.”
What he said.
‘Reasons to Be Pretty’
TheatreSquared
Nadine Baum Studios in Fayetteville
WHEN — 7:30 p.m. April 22; 2 & 7:30 p.m. April 23; 2 p.m. April 24; and again
Kris Pruett (from left), Rebecca Rivas, Cristin Sawyer Davis and Dusty Brown star in T2's "Reasons to Be Pretty."
April 28-May 1
COST — $22-$24
BONUS — 30 tickets for each show are available at $10 for playgoers under 30 years old
INFO — 571-2728
Apr 20
Becca MartinUncategorized
Arkansan Charlaine Harris is the author of the extremely popular Sookie Stackhouse vampire novels. “Dead Reckoning” comes out May 3.
Anne Rice. Laurell K. Hamilton. Charlaine Harris.
Three authors have shaped the current genre of vampire fiction, and arguably none more than Harris, who lives in Arkansas.
In October 2008, she became the only author to have an entire series on The New York Times bestseller list simultaneously.
Last year, “Dead in the Family” sold 200,000 copies in its first week on sale and debuted in the No. 1 spot on both The New York Times and USA Today bestseller lists.
There are more than 20 million copies of her 10-book series in print.
And the HBO series “True Blood,” based on the adventures of telepath Sookie Stackhouse, has won an Emmy, a Golden Globe and a People’s Choice Award.
On May 3, Sookie returns in “Dead Reckoning.” The vampires are still fighting among themselves. The were-creatures are dealing with the aftermath of “coming out.” The fairies are drawn to their kinswoman like moths. And it’s a human who really, really wants Sookie dead.
After a late-night spent with a preview copy, What’s Up! asked Harris five questions:
Q. I’m curious about how “Dead Reckoning” reflects your life. I wonder if there are people you love reflected in Sookie, in her grandmother, in Bill, in Dermot, in Sam?
A. Certainly there are aspects of people I love (and some people I really dislike) in the characters as I’ve created them. Writers are observers, and we’re all affected by what we observe. I’m glad to say that “Dead Reckoning” doesn’t reflect my actual life at all!
Q. How do you begin to write a fight scene like the one at the Fangtasia? Do you diagram? Do you have consultants who are trained in fighting?
A. I wouldn’t hesitate to consult a fighter if I needed to, but up until now my imagination has done the job. My former karate instructor gave me a helpful observation: Real fights are usually very short in actual clock time, though they may seem to last forever to the participants. So when I’m writing a fight scene, I have to hold a lot of action in my head at once, and it has to be decisive and drastic.
Q. Why Elvis?
A. It occurred to me that that would explain all the sightings. I decided to go with the idea.
Q. Is there literature from your childhood reflected in your books? Did you love to read about fairies and elves and demons? How did vampires come into your world?
A. Of course, my childhood reading has affected everything I’ve written. I was an early Poe fan, and I loved “Jane Eyre” and all the Jane Austen books. I read a lot of my brother’s action books, too, and the usual Nancy Drew and Trixie Belden books. I’ve always been a voracious reader. I didn’t really think about vampires a lot, since they weren’t such a popular fictional topic then.
Q. Do you have hopes for Sookie to find happiness? Is there a happy ending in your head that she just has to get to? Or is the character shaping her own destiny, so to speak?
A. I have known the way the books will end for quite some time. The clues to it do lie in Sookie’s character. I’m very fond of her, since I’ve lived with her for so long, and I hope readers will be satisfied by what becomes of her.
Apr 19
Becca MartinUncategorized
Sesquicentennial remembers bloody, bitter battle between brothers
“No event has been as overly romanticized and glamorized as the Civil War,” says historian Tom DeBlack, a professor at Arkansas Tech University in Russellville. “It wasn’t glamorous. It wasn’t chivalrous.”
It was, he says, more “Cold Mountain” than “Gone With the Wind.”
For the next four years, Arkansans from the Ozarks to the Delta will be looking back at the war that pitted neighbor against neighbor and brother against brother. The Arkansas Civil War Sesquicentennial commemoration officially begins with an event April 30 in Little Rock.
“Every place in the state was affected somehow during the Civil War,” says Mark Christ, community outreach director for the Arkansas Historic Preservation Program. “A lot of our primary focus is encouraging local communities to tell their stories.”
There were more than 750 engagements “of one kind or another” in Arkansas, DeBlack says, not just major battles like Fayetteville, Prairie Grove and Pea Ridge but skirmishes and guerrilla attacks.
The war west of the Mississippi is largely ignored by historians, DeBlack adds, but “it was every bit as impactful in the lives of Arkansans as the war in Virginia was to Virginians.”
When the war started, he says, Arkansas was 16th among the Union’s 33 states in wealth per capita.
“After the war, it never approached that rank again,” he says.
The war disrupted “the very nature of Arkansas society,” shutting down the functions of government and institutions like churches.
“As the armies passed through, they left utter desolation, destruction,” he says. “The law enforcement and court systems broke down, and there was anarchy in some parts of Arkansas.
“It was just a different type of war west of the Mississippi.”
And it was perhaps a more bitter war in Northwest Arkansas than anywhere else in the state, DeBlack adds.
“It truly was a war of neighbor against neighbor and brother against brother,” he says. “The bitterness lingered long after the war was over.”
So why raise the ghosts of the past?
“(Noted historian) Shelby Foote argued that the Civil War is what made America America,” DeBlack says.
Civil War Events
Mark 150 Years
Fort Smith
Sesquicentennial Kickoff
This event falls on the day that Companies D and E of the First Cavalry under Union Capt. Samuel Sturgis were led to safety by Delaware Indian scout Black Beaver after they abandoned Fort Smith in 1861. On the same day, Arkansas State Troops took control of the unoccupied fort.
Park staff and volunteers will present historical vignettes about the evacuation and occupation. Special guest Kerry Holton, a direct descendent of Black Beaver and current president of the Delaware Nation, will portray Black Beaver. The highlights of the day will be Holton leading a column of Union cavalry re-enactors out of the fort at 10 a.m., 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. Other programs will include an encampment of Confederate soldiers and artillery demonstrations.
WHEN — 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday (April 23)
WHERE — Fort Smith National Historic Site
COST — Free
INFO — 783-3961
Little Rock
Official Sesquicentennial Kickoff
The official kickoff for the state commemoration of Arkansas’ Civil War Sesquicentennial is April 30 at the Old State House Museum and will include a re-enactment of the final secession vote, flag presentations to local militia companies, re-enactors camped on the lawn and viewing of a new Arkansas Educational Television Network program on remembering the Civil War in Arkansas.
The first of the museum’s five Civil War exhibits, “An Enduring Union,” also opens to the public that day. This exhibit will convey why Arkansas commemorates its Civil War veterans and will feature artifacts documenting the post-war Confederate and Union veteran reunions in the state. Artifacts include reunion-related photographs, medals, memorabilia and uniforms.
WHEN — 9 a.m.-5 p.m. April 30
WHERE — Old State House Museum in Little Rock
COST — Free
INFO — 501-324-9685
Eureka Springs
Civil War in the Ozarks: Facts and Fascination
This one-day Chautauqua-style event details the history of the Civil War on the battlefields and the home front and explores how and why this era continues to be of such interest today. The day will include lectures, dramatic performances, walks, readings and panel discussions.
WHEN — 9 a.m.-6:30 p.m. May 12
WHERE — Basin Park Hotel in Eureka Springs
COST — $15
INFO — 244-5074 or eurekaspringsdowntown.com
Additional Events
“Blue and Gray: Documenting Civil War Arkansas, 1861-1865” — An exhibit highlighting rare Civil War artifacts and documents collected by the state archives during the past century, through April, Arkansas History Commission in Little Rock. 501-682-6900.
“Revolution and Rebellion: Words, Wars & Figures” — An exhibit of scale miniatures of Civil War personalities and artifacts from the Arkansas History Commission, through April, William J. Clinton Presidential Center in Little Rock. 501-374-4242.
“An Enduring Union” — An exhibit focusing on why Arkansas commemorates its Civil War veterans and featuring artifacts documenting the post-war reunions of Union and Confederate veterans in the state, opens April 29l at the Old State House Museum in Little Rock. 501-324-9685.
“Reel to Real: Gone with the Wind and the Civil War in Arkansas” — An exhibit contrasting items from the movie “Gone with the Wind” with the actual experiences of war-time people in Arkansas, opens April 30 at the Historic Arkansas Museum in Little Rock. 501-324-9351.
Web Watch
• For more information on the Arkansas Civil War Sesquicentennial, visit www.arkansascivilwar150.com.
• For more about the national commemoration, visit www.civilwar.org/150th-anniversary.
The Fort Smith National Historic Site will kick off its celebration of the Civil War Sesquicentennial on April 23.
Apr 01
Becca MartinUncategorized
One of the most interesting interviews I’ve done this year!
Oral historian Stephen Sloan will remember “The Stories of Hurricane Katrina” when he visits the University of Arkansas in Fort Smith next week.
By Becca Bacon Martin
bmartin@nwaonline.com
When Hurricane Katrina hit Hattiesburg, Miss., Stephen Sloan became a historian trapped in the middle of a major historical event.
For him, living history meant no electricity, trees falling on the house he shared with his wife and children and getting to know the neighbors as they used his propane grill to cook food that would otherwise have spoiled.
But Katrina wasn’t just Sloan’s story. It devastated 11 communities along the Mississippi coastline, and all of its survivors had tales to tell. As a collector of oral histories at the Center for Oral History and Cultural Heritage at the University of Southern Mississippi, Sloan felt compelled to listen. Now director of the Institute for Oral History at Baylor University, he still feels compelled to share what he heard, and he will do so as a visiting scholar next week at the University of Arkansas in Fort Smith.
Sloan’s public lecture, “The Stories of Hurricane Katrina,” is set for 11 a.m. Wednesday in the Gardner Building lecture hall on campus. It will also include memories of Hurricane Camille, which damaged the Gulf Coast in 1969.
“People wanted to tell their stories,” Sloan says. “It’s one way to cope, to normalize a completely abnormal situation. But anyone who had been on the coast for any length of time wanted to first tell me a story about Hurricane Camille. That was a way to remind themselves of what they had endured in the past — and a way to begin to understand their Katrina experience.”
Sloan, from northeastern Texas, had no way to know what to expect when Katrina roared on to the Gulf Coast on Aug. 29, 2005. He and his family just went to the leeward side of the house, he says, and were eating cereal (because his wife knew the milk would be the first to go bad without refrigeration) when a huge pine tree fell across the roof. The top broke off and swung through a window next to the family.
Sloan’s children were 7 and 4, and both have very vivid memories of that morning, he says.
“We were without power for six days,” he goes on. “It’s funny how you continue to switch the lights on as you go from room to room!”
But Sloan knew immediately how lucky his family was. His wife was able to get the children to their grandparents’ home and stock up on “water, peanut butter and batteries.” His father, who was involved in a Texas Baptist association that provided disaster relief, came to Hattiesburg and helped provide several thousand meals a day to those in need. Their home was close to a hospital, so restoring power to the neighborhood was a priority for the electric company. And Sloan was able to pursue the stories that weren’t being told by mainstream media.
“We were doing interviews on slabs, in hospitals, in temporary shelters, at Red Cross centers,” he says. He was surprised to see that wherever survivors gathered, new communities were formed.
“That’s one of the things I really wanted to document. I’m fascinated by the way the things we think of as ‘history’ play out on the individual and family level.”
Some of the stories were tragic, some funny, some both. By way of example, Sloan remembers a man who had been paid to guard an office complex. As the water rose and he and a companion climbed up on filing cabinets, he felt sure his death was imminent. He wanted to use his companion’s cellphone, but the other man said no, explaining he was short on minutes. That man died. The first man survived, clinging to a tree, without his clothes or even his dentures.
“He said at that point he was negotiating with God, ‘please don’t let me die in this tree naked and toothless,’” Sloan says. “Then he said he realized that was how he’d come into this world.”
Sloan says he was amazed at what people told him, “but we all have a desire to be known. The best favor you can do for someone is to let them tell you their story.”
And so it became a struggle to choose which stories to preserve.
“I had to choose not to do thousands,” he says. “Those were difficult choices.”
In the end, Sloan says, the “worst and best parts of us are revealed by events like this. We think we know the story of Katrina, but it was a different story for everybody.”
FAQ
‘The Stories of Hurricane Katrina’
With Historian Stephen Sloan
WHEN — 11 a.m. Wednesday
WHERE — Gardner Building lecture hall at the University of Arkansas in Fort Smith
COST — Free
INFO — 788-7570 or e-mail mmcoy@uafortsmith.edu
Mar 24
Becca MartinUncategorized
Stetson china was produced in Lincoln, Ill., from the 1940s into the 1960s. It looks like Blue Ridge china, which creates the challenge for collectors. (Photo by Becca Martin)
I couldn’t help but like antiques, I guess.
I grew up in the same beautiful turn-of-the-century home that housed my Aunt Grace’s antique shop. She was willing, delighted even, to answer my questions about doll heads, silver dollars and Depression glass. When she had a yard sale to clear out inexpensive items, I was in charge of the cash box, tallying up each ticket on a cumbersome manual adding machine. And when I was very, very good, I got to play with her collection of miniatures, a cabinet that included dozens of things from a cast-iron stove — a salesman’s sample that was perfectly sized for a child — to “penny dolls” that were no bigger than my child-sized thumb.
Most of her antiques were auctioned off when my aunt passed away, so I didn’t get to expand on any of her collections. Instead, I stole an idea from my best friend.
Pam collects Stetson china because her great-grandmother, Catherine Plunket, was an artist at the Illinois plant where it was produced and painted by hand. That’s the family connection.
The challenge is that the Stetson China Co., founded in 1946 in Lincoln, Ill., hired artists who had worked for the much better known Southern Potteries company in Tennessee. So Southern Potteries’ Blue Ridge china patterns are, obviously, similar — and neither company marked all of its pieces.
I started with just a piece or two of Stetson, a dogwood pattern chosen because I love dogwood. I mean, how much room could a few dessert plates and a teacup or two take up?
Then I found my first sugar bowl, distinctive because of the flower-shaped handle on the lid. It too was dogwood — but the next one wasn’t. Neither was the one after that. Then I bought a platter … and a stack of plates … and a creamer (or two) and a serving bowl (or six).
Now Stetson china fills most of one kitchen cabinet and the wooden display rack where I show off the serving bowls. Sugar bowls and creamers fill a shelf of my grandmother’s secretary. Platters are hung on the wall above my dressing table.
The joy is in the discovery: Picking up a pattern I don’t recognize and finding out it really is Stetson. Flea marketing with Pam and being the first to see a piece of Stetson down the aisle. Finding another sugar bowl (my favorite thing). Or discovering something neither one of us has seen before.
A couple of weekends ago, I found a bowl with a sort of quilted band around the edge, something new to Pam. And then the day got even better. Tucked up in the corner of a flea market shelf, I saw a teapot, attached to its trivet with yellowed adhesive tape. I didn’t recognize the flower pattern, but I knew that flower-shaped handle on the lid! It’s Stetson because it’s marked. It’s rare because Pam didn’t even know the company had made teapots. And it expands the quest, because the company might have made salt and pepper shakers, too!
Stetson has no real monetary value. I just bought a dessert plate at a thrift store for a dollar. The value is in the collection, the connection and the quest.
Feb 16
Becca MartinUncategorized
Anti-Cooking Crusader Drawn Over to the Domestic Side
I scared myself at Wal-Mart the other night. Instead of buying makeup or a pair of shoes, I chose a Pyrex measuring cup as my reward for surviving the monthly grocery run.
Then I went home and perused cookbooks for a recipe for pork loin.
Good grief! What’s happened to me? I’m turning into … Abby Burnett!
Abby, longtime Morning News food columnist and a dear friend, is a kindred spirit, someone from whom I was obviously separated at birth. We share many of the same quirks, foibles, paranoias, passions…
Except when it comes to food. We both love to eat it, but that is where we’ve always parted company. She loves to cook it, read about cooking it, think about cooking it, talk about cooking it, collect things that have to do with cooking it. I’ve always wanted it to appear magically on my plate — and when I’m finished with it, I want the plate to hop up on its own little legs and go jump in the dishwasher. I’ve always believed the kitchen was for providing ice, not entertainment. You think men and women have trouble communicating!
Abby: “I get to interview Paul Prudhomme. You know, the Cajun chef. I actually get to taste his cooking! Isn’t that incredible?!”
Becca: “Is this like having John Cena over for dinner?”
Abby, after long pause: “No, I think it’s like having John Cena practice wrestling moves with you in your yard.”
Becca: “Oh, cool!”
Or…
Abby: “It was wonderful. I cooked, we ate, we talked about the food — you know, the different spices in it, the subtle tastes, the texture… It was just so nice to have someone to do that with. Oh, I know you don’t get it.”
Becca: “Sure I do. My sweetie laughed out loud at ‘Fraggle Rock.’”
But, oh, heaven help me when Abby gets together with another cook — my mother-in-law, for instance. Then the conversation inevitably turns to the merits of various spring-form pans, the secrets of perfect stuffed mushrooms or whether to use a water bath for baking dessert, and soon I find myself sitting in the corner, rocking autistically and wondering if the NCAA will ever change the possession rule on defensive tie-ups.
When I was Lifestyles editor, recipes were my greatest challenge. A typo like 4 tablespoons of salt didn’t faze me. What did I know? Someone once asked me how I could do that job if I couldn’t cook. And although the smart-aleck answer about covering gay issues without being a lesbian shut her up, it did give me pause. Perhaps I had taken a wrong turn on the road to womanhood…
My mother was always a terrific cook — nothing fancy, just what she calls “food food,” roast pork, mashed potatoes, cherry cobbler. It’s not that I couldn’t have learned.
I just had no interest. Cooking was for women who intended to stay at home and also learn to sew. I was going to be a great actress — or at least a great drama teacher — and would live on caffeine and coffee cake, thank you very much.
When that plan fell through, I married Dan. He wooed me with crepes and London broil, and it was love at first bite. I almost never cooked — and when I did, he wasn’t very impressed. This is the first time in my whole life I’ve had my own kitchen — a place where I can experiment, make a mess and clean it up myself, all without anyone helping me do it. Sure, I have a tiny stove, an even tinier microwave and about 3 square feet of countertop, but it’s mine, all mine. And I have someone wonderful to cook for — someone who is impressed when I get the chili right!
So imagine Abby’s surprise when I called her to report I’d successfully made up a recipe for that pork loin. She couldn’t have been any more shocked than I was — but the old adage is true. When it’s just you against Betty Crocker, in the squared circle of the kitchen, eventually Betty will win.
Feb 14
Becca MartinUncategorized
“Sundown Town” hurts.
Sometimes, it’s so eloquent and beautiful, it’s painful.
Sometimes, it’s so brutal and ugly, it’s painful.
One thing is certain: Even at 2.5 hours, TheatreSquared’s new play by Kevin Cohea is never boring.
Although it started life as a bluegrass musical, “Sundown Town” grew up to be something completely different. It’s still got the music, but now the songs wrap around the story of Moses, a drifter who wanders into a 1918 Arkansas town where African-Americans aren’t welcome — especially after dark but really, not at all.
It’s a little overwhelming to try to “review” something like this play. It’s amazing that a drama like this was born in Fayetteville, Ark., written by a local playwright, workshopped by a local company, produced on a local stage. It probably won’t ever be “Rent” — because 20somethings aren’t likely to attach themselves to it in droves — but it should surely be staged at every regional theater in the South. It’s not overly ambitious to imagine it off-Broadway. It could be a film, the next “O Brother, Where Art Thou?”
How do you “review” that?!
So let me simply tell you what I liked — but let me start with what I didn’t, because the list is SO MUCH shorter.
I would take out two songs — don’t really care which two. The play is just a little bit long for a drama — not because people aren’t enthralled but because you can feel the time pass during a drama whereas you might not during “Mamma Mia.”
Choose to use all the props or no props, please. It’s distracting to watch the actors pantomime the fiddle and the dishes when they have the pocket knife and the Bible.
I understand what the light change, the music and the slow motion are meant to convey when violence erupts. But it would be a lot more powerful — a lot more brutal, but a lot more powerful — to do the necessary fight choreography and stage it in real time. When Loretta slaps Annie, it should be shocking and (that word again) hurtful. When Mutt kills Scratch, it should be the ugliest, most awful thing ever. And — my personal opinion, as all this is — we need to see what happens to Moses. The words don’t pull any punches; the action shouldn’t either.
What do I love? Everything else!
The script is powerful and evocative. I’d like to say I always knew Kevin Cohea had it in him — and I did. And still, I believe this is the tip of his iceberg as a playwright.
The cast — as I said Friday night — is only as good as its weakest link, which makes it perfect:
I’ve watched Bill Rogers on stage for years — and wouldn’t have known he was Scratch! Wow. Just wow.
I remember Halley Mayo as a sweet-faced child actress at Arts Center of the Ozarks and Arts Live Theatre, and I thought she made Annie sympathetic and naive and rebellious and sweet and hopeful — just like Annie needed to be.
I don’t think the show could have opened with a stronger voice than David Wright’s as the preacher we trust to watch out for his flock — but this time, he can’t.
Quinn Gasaway tore my heart out as Joshua, making him real and poignant but not a caricature of a disabled boy.
Bruch Reed also evoked all sorts of emotions as Dub — his love for his daughter, his distance from his wife, his respect for Moses, even after what happened at the church.
Valarie Andrews broke my heart as Loretta, all of whose passion has turned in the wrong directions.
John T. Smith’s Bill Cheatham is slimy — not evil, but too much of a coward to be good.
Playing Mutt puts Kris Pruett in danger of getting slapped on the street. Nasty, stupid, hateful and so believable is the character that the actor needs to issue a disclaimer: I am not he.
And Alex West… I thought when I saw Alex West as Moses in rehearsal that he was too quiet, too low-key to hold the show together. I was wrong. During the performance, what I saw as too quiet thrums with veiled power. Moses’ still waters run deep.
The set is wonderful and versatile.
And the music by 3 Penny Acre is what sets “Sundown Town” apart. I heard a theatergoer say the songs don’t forward the action well enough. It’s true they’re not lyrics that are part of the story; again, I’ll use “Rent” as a contrast. But they suit the story perfectly. And the live band keeps the show in motion.
I thought when I saw Bob Ford’s “My Father’s War,” I had been as privileged as a theatergoer in Fayetteville could be.
Now I am twice blessed.
Halley Mayo is Annie and Alex West is Moses in the TheatreSquared production of Kevin Cohea's "Sundown Town."
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