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Jordan Wright
September 22, 2013
Special to Alexandria Times
Given its title one might imagine Arena Stage’s Artistic Director Molly Smith deliberately timed this piece to reflect the beginning of the fall season. But The Velocity of Autumn, a play Smith also directs, is not about the calendar. It is a poignant metaphor on the human condition.
 Estelle Parsons as Alexandra and Stephen Spinella as Chris in The Velocity of Autumn – Photo by Teresa Wood Estelle Parsons plays Alexandra, a crusty old gal living out her days in the Brooklyn brownstone where she raised her three children. She has jerry-rigged her home’s interior with barricades and Molotov cocktails strung together like party lights in order to keep the police, summoned by two of her children, from carting her off to a nursing home. In short she’s preparing to blow herself up and take her Park Slope neighborhood with her.
Once a successful artist Alexandra wants to spend the rest of her life among her books and records in her own home. Her children have other ideas as to where she should live. The two-person play (with phone updates from the panicked siblings), an often-prickly conversation between Christopher and his mother, is weighted with gallows humor. “I will set myself on fire,” she threatens, toying with an old Zippo lighter while grasping a homemade explosive. “Then I’ll bring the marshmallows,” Christopher quips, modeling his mother’s dark sense of humor. I won’t reveal the dramatic early entry of the long absent Christopher, tasked by his overly meddlesome siblings, Michael and Jennifer, to talk their mother down from her end-of-the-world scenario. But I will say it clarifies the autumnal reference.
The story is a tender exercise in patience and reconciliation as Alexandra and her estranged son create new bonds while revealing their darkest fears and reflecting on their lives. Snappy one-liners abound, keeping the dialogue from mawkish sentimentality, “Getting you out of diapers was like the Bataan Death March!” While philosophies on aging keep it real, “Old age is just one big surprise. You never know who you are until you get up!”
 Estelle Parsons as Alexandra in The Velocity of Autumn – Photo by Teresa Wood Parsons, best known for her Academy Award-winning performance in Bonnie and Clyde and as Mother Bev on TV’s sitcom Rosanne, has kept her theatre presence active, not only by directing, but also by taking roles scripted by the American theatre’s most revered playwrights such as Tennessee Williams, Arthur Miller, Samuel Beckett and Edward Albee. Her portrayal of Alexandra, a woman of fierce determination, complexity and above all a wry sense of humor, proves that she is one of America’s most brilliant, and funniest, actors.
Stephen Spinella comes to the role of Christopher with a shelf’s worth of Tony and Drama Desk Awards. His sensitive performance as the wayward son returning to the fold to mitigate disaster and reconnect with his mother, is genuine and deeply affecting.
Playwright Eric Coble’s The Velocity of Autumn, part of a trilogy of “Alexandra” plays, gives us a memorable night of pure, unadulterated theatre that will resonate mightily – – not only with caregivers and the elderly, but for all those seeking grace and meaning in a fast-moving world.
 The Velocity of Autumn at Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater. Illustration by André Carrilho Through October 20th at Arena Stage, 1101 Sixth St., SW, Washington, DC 20024. For tickets and information call 202 484-0247 or visit www.ArenaStage.org.
Cary Pollak for Whisk and Quill
September 20, 2013
Every time we turn around Jose Andres and his ThinkFoodGroup are launching exciting and imaginative projects. From September 22nd to October 5th Zaytinya restaurant will hold its third annual Grape Festival showcasing this versatile fruit in Mediterranean cuisine. Recently the internationally renowned chef and entrepreneur launched a new line of Spanish foods including deluxe olive oil, sherry vinegar, mussels, tuna and more. Look for them at Whole Foods or order on line at www.joseandresfoods.com. More on these gourmet treats in the next “Nibbles and Sips Around Town”.
Fourteen days dedicated to promoting the glories of the grape begin on September 22rd at Zaytinya, when Head Chef Michael Costa will prepare a wine dinner highlighting the wines of northern Greece from famed producer Ktima Pavlidis.
 Order up for Head Chef Michael Costa and his team at Zaytinya Many unique wines and spirits from around the Mediterranean are on the agenda. On September 25th from 5 till 7:00 p.m. complimentary tastings will feature Lebanese wines; Turkish wines will be showcased on the 26th; wines from Greece on October 2nd; and spirits distilled from grapes will be sampled on October 3rd.
On Monday, September 30th the “Zaytinya Road Trips 2013” dinner will be led by ThinkFoodGroup’s Wine Director, Lucas Payá, along with Zaytinya’s Beverage Manager, Daniella Senior, who will share highlights of remarkable wine experiences from their recent travels through Greece.
 Grapes take a star turn in these delicious nibbles We had a chance to savor a few of the innovative dishes that originate from early culinary traditions and that will be on the menu throughout the festival. Mutancene, is a preparation made with lamb shoulder sourced from Virginia’s Border Springs Farm and calls for braising the lamb in honey and grape vinegar with almonds, dried plums and apricots. This truly is a regal recipe, a version of which was served in the 16th century at the court of Ottoman Sultan, Suleiman the Magnificent.
Prawns Arak, another delicious offering, is prepared with head-on shrimp sautéed in arak, roasted grapes, red Fresno chiles and aromatic herbs. Arak is an aniseed-flavored alcoholic spirit popular in the Middle East. Also on the menu is Muscat Grape Granita, an orange flower scented yogurt espuma with candied orange and lemon verbena.
 Hamachi crudo topped with grapes and sea beans “There’s More Than One Way to Skinos a Grape” is a whimsical cocktail created for the festival. Skinos is a liqueur made from the resinous sap produced from the mastic tree and used in cooking. Here it is combined with verjus, the juice of unripe grapes, Dolin Blanc Vermouth, Fee Brothers Old-Fashioned Bitters, a lemon twist and a garnish of a frozen peeled grape. Cleopatra would be most pleased.
Festivities conclude October 5th with a Greek Harvest Patio Party that will include live music, grape stomping, a glass of wine and snacks, all for $10.00 pp. For more information visit http://www.zaytinya.com/index.php/about/calendar/grape-festival-at-zaytinya.
Photo credit – Jordan Wright
Jordan Wright
September 17, 2013
Special to The Alexandria Times
 Roz White as Sadie and Margo Moorer as Nella in Gee’s Bend – Photo credit Chris Banks “I had a vision. Like the story passed down by my grandfather,” says Sadie Pettway, though she wasn’t a Pettway yet, at least not till she met the smooth-talking Macon, a man with dreams as big as hers and a determination to make her his wife. “He’s got big plans for land and babies,” she boasts to her sister Nella. As in most of the scenes Sadie, Nella, their mother Alice, and husband Macon sing their stories – – stories of survival and stories of hope told in authentic gospel music and reflected in their hand-sewn quilts. You’ll hear “How I Got Over”, “Banks of Jordan”, “He’s All I Need” and many more as the music reflects the both the period and the emotion.
 Anthony Manough as Macon and Roz White as Sadie – Photo credit Chris Banks MetroStage’s longtime Music Directors, William Hubbard and William Knowles have added eight traditional gospel songs to the four from the original production of Gee’s Bend to create a powerful, soul-stirring, come-to-Jesus experience that reaches deep into your spirit and claws its way beyond the heavens. But that doesn’t mean there’s no sass. The sisters snipe at each other about men, morals and momma and as Nella tells Sadie, “It don’t matter what a quilt looks like. It’s what you do under it!”
The play slash musical (Artistic Director Carolyn Griffin is still puzzling out how to categorize it) is set in Gee’s Bend, Alabama, a real place separated from the mainland by a rickety unpredictable ferry and a surrounding river. Named for former slave owner, Joseph Gee, it’s situated smack dab in the cradle of Dr. King’s movement – a bus ride from Selma and the historic march that Sadie longs to be a part of. The play spans the years from 1939 to 2002 focusing on the Pettway family, generations of former slaves whose land holdings and civil rights were dearly bought and fought for.
 Margo Moorer (Nella), Roz White (Sadie) and Duyen Washington (Alice) – Photo credit Chris Banks Duyen Washington plays Alice (and later niece, Asia) a wise matriarch who tries to train her daughters to be good housewives and even better quilters. (The play’s many-colored quilts are as authentic as it gets and are from the original production at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival.) Washington crafts a beautiful portrait of a woman with little but her heart to give her girls. Roz White, whose legendary voice has been heard in countless MetroStage productions from Three Sistahs, Cool Papa’s Party, Pearl Bailey…by request to her most recent role as Billie Holiday in Ladies Swing the Blues, gives us the stalwart Sadie, a perfect foil to her devil-may-care sister Nella played by Margo Moorer whose stage credits rival her film credits in such movies as Forrest Gump, Tyler Perry’s House of Payne. The movie The Watsons Go to Birmingham, in which she plays Mrs. Davidson, has its red carpet debut this week in Washington, DC.
 Anthony Manough (Macon), Duyen Washington (Alice), Margo Moorer (Nella), Roz White (Sadie) – Photo credit Chris Banks Anthony Manough crafts a likeable but hard-hearted Macon, an ambitious man, who forgets the grim lessons of his youth as he tries to keep Sadie from her mission to register to vote. Manough, too, has appeared in numerous MetroStage productions (as well as on Broadway in The Lion King and Jesus Christ Superstar), lending his virtuoso voice and musical talents as Charlie Parker in Ladies Swing the Blues.
Percussionist Greg Holloway handily backs up the amazing a capella singers with African-inspired gospel rhythms and cleverly imagined sound effects. Thomas W. Jones II, the writer, director and actor who has received a combined 42 Helen Hayes Award nominations, directs the stellar cast to achieve a richly textured evening of song and soul marked by redemption and transformation.
Highly recommended.
At MetroStage through November 3rd – 1201 North Royal Street, Alexandria, 22314. For tickets and information visit www.metrostage.org.
Jordan Wright
September 15, 2013
Special to The Alexandria Times
When Lillian Hellman wrote The Children’s Hour in 1934, it was a very different time…or was it? Hellman was an original, a maverick whose anti-fascist writings branded her a communist and who was later summoned to the House Un-American Activities Committee to inform on her fellow writers. Her response to HUAC revealed an early feminist who would defend her rights and those of others. In her writings Hellman concerned herself with social issues of the day, in this drama she points the spotlight on intolerance and fear mongering.
 Katelyn Wattendorf (Mary), Ellie Milewski (Evelyn), Cynthia
>Mullins (Peggy) and Jenni Patton (Rosalie)
– photo credit to Michael deBlois In Port City Playhouse’s latest production, a willful girl claims to have seen and/or heard, depending on her revisionist fantasies, a liaison between the two headmistresses at her posh boarding school. The cast includes nine schoolgirls, a daft aunt, a wealthy grandmother and her housemaid, and a doctor, fiancé to one of the two headmistresses. The play is based on factual events that occurred at a girl’s boarding school in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1809.
Mary Tilford is the original “Bad Seed”. “I’m always getting punished for everything,” she whines to her gullible grandmother in hopes of leaving school. As she ratchets up her stories to make her case, “They’ll kill me. They’ve got secrets…funny ones.” the old lady softens, believing her scandalous tale. When she spreads the vicious lies to all the children’s parents, it brings about the destruction of the headmistresses’ reputations and that of their newly established school.
 Carole Steele (Mrs. Tilford) & Katelyn Wattendorf (Mary) – photo credit to Michael deBlois. The story is gripping and, despite some uneven performances, is a fine play that you may remember was turned into a movie in 1961 starring Audrey Hepburn and Shirley MacLaine, with James Garner in the role of the doctor and cousin to Mrs. Tilford.
Katelyn Wattendorf is commanding as the evil-minded and manipulative Mary Tilford, a sociopathic bully who threatens and cajoles in equal measure. Jenni Patton, who plays Mary’s tortured schoolmate, Rosalie Wells, provides the perfect counterbalance with a convincing performance as Mary’s handmaiden. Michelle McBeth playing Karen Wright, headmistress and fiancée to Dr. Cardin, and Chelsey Megli as her cohort Martha Dobie give nuanced performances as the accused women. Carole Steele in the role of the unduly moralistic Amelia Tilford contributes the right measure of grace and iron will to the supercilious nosy parker, while Robin Ann Carter, who was unsteady as the eccentric Mrs. Mortar, played it for laughs in flamboyant Auntie Mame style. Unfortunately the slow pace in the second act threatened to derail the dramatic buildup. Hopefully the kinks will be ironed out by next weekend’s performances.
 Chesley Megli (Martha Dobie) & Michelle McBeth (Karen Wright) – photo credit to Michael deBlois A clever set design by Raedun de Alba serves as both living room and classroom at the school, and later, gussied up with lace and bric-a-brac, as Mrs. Tilford’s drawing room. Scenes with the girls playing at Bonnie and Clyde and reading aloud scenes from Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra lend credence to Hellman’s reimagined setting at a girl’s school in Lancet, Massachusetts in 1934. Costume designs by Kit Sibley and Jean Schlichting echo the prim school uniforms and dowager dresses and lace-up footwear of the day.
At Port City Playhouse at The Lab at Convergence, 1819 North Quaker Lane, Alexandria, VA 22302. Performances are on the following dates – Sept. 13, 14, 20, 21, 24, 27 & 28 at 8:00 p.m. Matinees on Sept. 21 & 28 at 2pm. For tickets and information visit www.portcityplayhouse.org.
Cary Pollak for Whisk and Quill
September 12, 2013
Those of you who have enjoyed summertime performances at the Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts here in the Washington, DC area know that enjoying a picnic on the lawn before the show is part of the fun. At one such outing I was commandeered to provide dessert and was eager to bring something both beautiful as well as delicious. The friends I was joining that evening tend to think that the presentation on the picnic table is almost as important as the one on stage. With that challenge in mind I made a large French tarte with freshly baked crust, pastry cream, summer fruits and a shiny apple glaze. This stunning final act is perfect for dining al fresco or at home at a formal dinner party.
 12 ½ inch tart with strawberries, green grapes, red plums, blueberries and kiwi fruit The origin of the modern fruit tart is less than clear, but it is known that French and Italian Renaissance chefs developed several pastry doughs still popular today. The Propre New Booke of Cokery published in England in 1545 contains a recipe for making “shorte paest for tart” that would look familiar to today’s pastry chefs. Most likely the first fruit tart to gain notoriety as an individually named dessert was created by the Tatin sisters for the restaurant in their hotel in the village of Lamotte-Beuvron, France in the late 1800’s. This upside down apple tart with caramelized fruit concealed beneath a pastry crust, was made famous after the sisters’ demise by the iconic Maxim’s in Paris, where it was called for the first time, “Tarte Tatin.”
Fruit tarts can be made in any home kitchen. It’s easier than expected and well worth the effort. You will need a French tart pan with a removable bottom, a stand mixer and a food processor. The electric appliances are not entirely essential in that these tarts were made for decades before such conveniences were invented. For some cooks there is a tactile satisfaction to cutting cold pieces of butter into flour by hand to create the dough, but the speed of an electric food processor transforms the tart making process from daunting to doable.
French tart pans produce impressive results, but they must be handled with care. Always lift them by the edges. The removable bottom makes it easy to pop off the rim and place the tart on a dish when it is ready to be served. But if you attempt to lift the pan by the bottom at any point before that, the rim can slip off and the tart slide to the floor. At that point you could be muttering curses far stronger than “Sacre bleu!”
 9 ½ inch tart with strawberry, green grapes, red plums, kiwi fruit and blueberries The main types of pastry dough used in French cooking are pâte brisée, pâte sucrée and pâte sablée, all of which consist mostly of butter and flour. The first is a standard pie dough; the second, as the name implies, contains more sugar; and the third is a more coarsely textured dough reminiscent of sand. There are so many variations in the recipes that can be found for each, that the distinctions tend to blur. The following recipe is not definitive and can be tweaked to your liking. It makes enough dough for two 10-inch tart pans.
[color-box]Pâte Sablée
2 ½ cups of all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon of sugar
16 tablespoons of butter, very cold and cut into cubes
1 large egg, stirred slightly to break up the yolk
¼ cup of water
½ teaspoon salt[/color-box]
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Butter the inside of a tart pan and dust it with flour tapping out any loose flour. Place the dry ingredients into a food processor fitted with the chopping blade and pulse briefly to combine. Add butter and pulse for several seconds at a time until the mixture resembles coarse meal. Add liquid ingredients and process until the dough is formed. Divide the dough into two equal parts, wrap each in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 20-30 minutes.
On a floured board roll out one of the dough portions into a disk one inch larger than the 10-inch tart pan. It is best to use a standard French rolling pin, which is a wooden cylinder 19- or 20-inches long and just under two inches in diameter. It gives greater control and a larger working surface than the more familiar type of rolling pin with the two small handles on either end. The dough can then be transferred to the tart pan by placing the rolling pin in the middle of it, folding it over the pin, then raising it up and lowering it into the pan. Lift up the dough that overlaps the pan a little bit at a time so that you can press the dough into the edge between the bottom and the rim, all around the pan. Make sure that the dough is flush against the rim and of uniform thickness all around. Use a sharp paring knife to trim the dough flush with the edges of the pan.
A common instruction at this point is to line the pan with parchment or wax paper weighted down with pie weights or dried beans and bake for about 20 minutes. Remove paper and weights and continue baking for about 10 minutes until the crust is golden brown. A short cut I prefer starts by making sure the crust is well pricked to allow for steam to escape rather than form bubbles during the baking process. Cut strips of foil into two-inch by six-inch sections. Fold them in half lengthwise and bend them into a curved shape. Place them end to end in upside down “V’s” around the perimeter of the crust, so that they form a loose fitting “tent.” This will prevent the edges of the crust from browning more quickly than the bottom. In about 25 minutes the crust should be uniformly golden brown without the need for a second trip to the oven, but be sure to watch the crust, not the clock. You may have to remove the foil for the last few minutes to make sure the fluted edges are done.
The vanilla pastry cream (crème patissière) is a cooked filling that should be solid enough to support a layer of fruit and glaze. As with French pastry dough the recipes vary from cookbook to cookbook. The one below is a more traditional type in that the starch used is flour. Other recipes use a mixture of flour and cornstarch or cornstarch alone.
[color-box]Vanilla Pastry Cream
5 egg yolks
½ cup of sugar
¼ cup of all-purpose flour
1 ½ cups of milk
2 teaspoons of vanilla extract[/color-box]
Using an electric mixer with a whisk attachment, mix the yolks for a few seconds. Add the sugar, then the flour, and beat to a thick paste. Heat the milk in a pot just until it comes to a boil. Continue beating while pouring the milk slowly into the bowl, and add the vanilla. Transfer the mixture back to the pot and simmer for two minutes, stirring constantly, to cook the flour. Cool the pastry cream by placing it in a bowl and covering the surface with wax paper to prevent the formation of a crust. Refrigerate if you wish to speed up cooling.
Fill the pastry crust with an even layer of pastry cream. Now you are ready for the creative part. You could make a tart that features only your favorite fruit, or you could assemble many colorful fresh fruits. The latter could be used to create a random spattering of different fruits, or a number of sections, each devoted to a single fruit. Better still, find the center point of the tart (with a tape measure if necessary) and build from there. Think in terms of concentric circles and contiguous or overlapping fruits. The tart is your canvas and the fruits are your paints.
 12 ½ inch tart with strawberries, red and green grapes, blueberries, black and red plums and kiwi fruit Speaking of painting, the final step is to brush on a glaze. This preserves the color and freshness of the tart and adds a beautiful sheen. Melt down jelly in a pot with a little water. Let it cool until it is no longer hot, but still liquid enough to be applied with a pastry brush. I like to use apple jelly, but you can also use apricot, which is clear enough in color and light enough in flavor to enhance, rather than compete with the fruits.
A gorgeous fruit tart is something you will want to share with your friends. Don’t be alarmed if you feel a tug of hesitation when guests are ready to cut the first slice. Be sure to snap a picture to immortalize your masterpiece. That way you can preserve your tart for posterity…and eat it too.
 French tart pans, 9 ½ inch and 12 ½ inch diameter Photo Credits: Cary Pollak
Jordan Wright
September 9, 2013
Special to The Alexandria Times
What’s The Little Theatre of Alexandria without a Brit Wit comedy in its repertoire? For its 2013 fall season opener it has chosen Caught in the Net, a rollicking romp by the wildly successful British playwright Ray Cooney about a husband’s marital deception. And this one’s a doozy.
 Mike Baker as John Smith, Annie Ermlick as Barbara Smith (Center) and Tricia O’Neill-Politte as Mary Smith – Photo credit Tabitha Rymal – Vaughn John Smith (Mike Baker) has spent his marital life leading two lives with two wives – one in Streatham, the other in Wimbledon. He has a teenage child with each. Gavin Smith (Luke Markham) lives with his mother Barbara (Annie Ermlick), while Vicki Smith (Eliza Lore) resides with her mother Mary (Tricia O’Neill-Politte). John races back and forth between the two families, juggling his affections like a Chinese plate twirler. The trouble begins when the teens find each other on the Internet and uncover an odd coincidence. Each has a father named John Leonard Smith, age 53, taxi driver.
 Luke Markham (Gavin Smith) and Eliza Lore (Vicki Smith – Photo credit Tabitha Rymal – Vaughn The teens become fascinated by their shared knowledge and Vicki invites Gavin to tea at her home. John is appalled, or as he puts it, “horrified, mortified, petrified and crucified,” should they meet. He tells Mary that Gavin must be a sexual pervert and locks Vicki in her room. Thus begins the farcical shenanigans of John’s subterfuge and many disguises, as he tries to keep his family members from running into each other. Little white lies lead to evasions and outright fabrications as John digs his self-imposed grave.
 Mike Baker (John Smith) and Paul Tamney (Stanley Gardner) – Photo credit Tabitha Rymal – Vaughn Mike Baker presents us with a pitch perfect portrait of the harried husband caught a web of lies. In one particularly brilliant scene, faking a wrong number to conceal his identity from one of his wives, he puts on a Chinese accent, rattling off countless dishes at a furious clip to keep Barbara at bay. In another phone call Baker employs a German accent all to the relentless pace of sight gags, pratfalls and a stream of hilarious one-liners. Mary, “He’ll kill himself.” Stanley (Paul Tamney), their longtime boarder and John’s comrade-in-tomfoolery, “That would solve all our problems!”
When Stanley’s doddering, half-blind and senile grandfather, played handily by Richard Fiske, is enlisted in the scheme to keep the beautiful Barbara at bay, he rises to the occasion. “I have a curious urging in my loins,” he exclaims while lusting after her with arms outstretched.
 Luke Markham (Gavin Smith), Annie Ermlick (Barbara Smith), Tricia O’Neill-Politte (Mary Smith) – Photo credit Tabitha Rymal – Vaughn Director Eleanore Tapscott, who recently returned to the DC area from New York where she directed Shakespeare and Moliere for the Westside Repertory Theatre, and her Co-Producer, Alan Wray, steer a terrific cast in this masterful comedy of sex, lies and mistaken identities.
Special mention to Set Designer, Michael deBlois, for the seven-door set lending the production a note of mass hysteria as the characters alternately chase and avoid each other across a central living room.
Through September 28th at The Little Theatre of Alexandria, 600 Wolfe Street. For tickets and information call the box office at 703 683-0496 or visit www.thelittletheatre.com
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