The Rake Magazine

Author: Christy DeSmith

  • An Economic Stimulus of the Mind

    So, am I right on this? The government wants to send me six-hundred
    bucks? Well, that’s the sort of policy I can get behind, friends … But at first, when I
    heard the news, I thought: Now, g’on ahead and feed that to your wee, pup of an investment portfolio. But that sort of defeats the purpose
    of an economic stimulus, right? So then, I realized, it is my duty to
    blow this dough–and guilt free, too!

    Understand me on this: I do not advocate Keynesian economics, especially when it comes to personal spending. Still, sadly,
    I couldn’t resist outlining, in my head, a lefty little plan for how I might help with the economy: clothes, shoes, locally-owned retailers as much as possible, oh, and if I can
    support a local craftsperson or two all the better. The conclusion of this thought process: What’s the harm in procuring the threads I
    want now, and then paying them off later–when I’ve got the coin?

    This has all been a roundabout way of explaining my mindset
    when, last night, I hauled over to La Bodega to enjoy the
    Avoid The Gray fashion show, sponsored by the local boutique Cliché.

    And Avoid The Gray they certainly did! To be quite honest, I
    wasn’t keen on some of the paisley and floral satins that marched down the
    aisle. But I was inspired by a few of the runway looks:

    As always, my sincerest apologies for the lack of photographic prowess. Still, I thought this blue trench was very dramatic and, somehow, romantic. Bravo to the designer … I think it was Belle.
    The chunky scarf is sexy as hell, don’t you think? I’m not sure, but I think this look was from Amanda Christine Designs.
    Meet my favorite model of the night: spunky, sassy, sexy as hell, and–halleluiah–curvy. (Girl crush! Swoon!) Lookit. A little later on, she struck a pose for me, too:
    The above comes from Mafiusi. Don’t know ’em, but I dug the use of Superman-style tights!
    And here are a few of the other looks I enjoyed–all of which are available, for your deficit-spending pleasure, at Cliché as of TODAY:

  • I Wouldn’t Care for This Health Care, No!

    Get with the program, health-care providers of America,
    and get a clue about the prices you ascribe to your services. While you’re at
    it, we wouldn’t mind if you went so far as to tell us the costs upfront. Yes,
    yes; I know the industry if rife with corruption–er, negotiated discounts–and, in fact,
    the prices are subject to much (much!) change. But here’s the thing: Very many
    of your customers are paying out of pocket nowadays.

    For example, me! At this morning’s 8:20 a.m. dental
    appointment (I’d saved enough dough in my HSA), I stumbled into a
    hundred-dollar situation: Apparently, they’ve got these five-year, full-facial
    X-rays for which they insert a progression of plastic doodads and snap a
    dozen-odd pics all around your face.

    "What’s different here?" I asked the hygienist on the fifth or sixth take. I get an
    X-Ray every year or so (I know these run me an extra thirty bucks), but I didn’t
    recall it ever being so elaborate before. It was at this point that,
    finally, I learned I was getting the Cadillac five-year, full-facial X-Ray and,
    even better yet, the hygienist assured me: "The insurance company treats them
    just like panoramic X-rays."

    "I don’t have dental insurance," I uttered icily–or as icy
    as I could be with a damned bite-guard in my mouth. I mean, who has dental
    insurance anymore? That’s, like, so-oo passé.

    I won’t bore you with the details of my temper tantrum, but I
    will say this: I’ve got decent chompers and would’ve passed on the hundred-dollar-plus
    X-Ray had I known about it upfront. This is akin to the time I took my junker Volkswagen
    for an oil change, only to learn, upon picking it up later in the day, that
    they’d replaced the $800 timing belt while they were at it, too. What gives?

  • Apologies, Promises, and News

    Sorry I’ve been slow to update, but I wanted to send alert of this upcoming fashion show LATER THIS WEEK (Thursday) that’s titled,
    appropriately, Avoid The Grey. The show is being produced by Cliché, a fabulous
    Lyn-Lake area boutique. The intent, even more appropriately, is to inject some color
    into our beige-um-gray winter palettes, and also to tease us with the promise
    of adorable spring fashions, which we in Minnesota never quite get to enjoy the
    way inhabitants of other towns do, since our springs are so belated and, uh,
    SHORT.

     

    Featured fashions are mostly local: Kjurek Couture, Amanda
    Christine Designs    , Red Show Clothing Co., Laura Fulk, Belle, and more. I
    promise to post some snaps by Friday afternoon.

     

    Also, note that I’m judging this coolio apparel-design
    contest     from MNfashion, West Photo, and mnartists.org.

  • Doing Lines: When Actors Fail to Recall

    Peer Gynt: It’s a fairly good Guthrie production, in my
    humble view–although it would’ve been smart, even merciful, of the director,
    had he condensed the meandering fourth and fifth acts. But what I’m more
    interested in discussing here is the review penned by Star Tribune critic Rohan
    Preston, in which he derides lead actor Mark Rylance for not knowing his lines.
    Is that fair, do you suppose?

    Preston did something
    similar in November ’06 when reviewing The Rivals at the Jungle Theater. It
    seemed Claudia Wilkens, who played Mrs. Malaprop, hadn’t memorized her lines in
    time for opening night; in fact, she hadn’t yet mastered them when I saw the
    show two or three nights later. From an audience perspective, this proved a
    problem: How to know where the malapropisms stopped and the fumbled
    lines began? But still, I was surprised by the chitchat in the theater
    community following Preston’s critique: Had he
    hit Wilkens below the belt, people wondered. Is it fair to criticize an actor
    for not knowing his or her lines, since a critical review is traditionally more
    concerned with the substance of the play?

    Methinks it’s fair to criticize actors when their flubbed
    lines impede upon the theater-going experience. But then again, I’m an audience-centrist.
    I write from an audience perspective; I write to the audience, as if they might
    one day care to see the show. And misfired lines do a lot to hurt our
    experience. In fact, we feel ripped-off when artists
    aren’t ready to present the work we’ve shelled for! At last night’s showing,
    Rylance was still flubbing a few of his lines, but it wasn’t enough to interfere
    with my experience. As a matter of fact, by then, he had done a fine job
    inhabiting the character. He used a mumbled, sort of messy speech pattern that, I felt,
    brilliantly captured the inner workings of this troubled, cloudy-thinking youth.

  • THEATER: Particularly in the Heartland

    Judging by the size of last night’s audience, there should
    be tickets left to see Particularly in the Heartland. And if you happen to be
    the type who’s a little tired of our pop culture’s present mood (rampant
    cynicism peppered with ironic snark)–in other words, if the Colbert Report
    doesn’t entirely resonate, or if the plights of Britney Spears don’t exactly
    inspire, in you, a sense of schadenfreude–then this show might be something you’d
    care to see.

    It stands in stark contrast to the Walker’s initial installment of the annual Out There series: last week’s performance by Miguel Gutierrez and, ahem, "the Powerful People," which struck
    me as a masturbatory, self-indulgent piece of artless hipster quackery, passed
    off (unsuccessfully) as an exercise in shapes and whimsical personalities
    emerging from pattern. Last night’s show, rather, made me feel good about my
    place in the world. It’s a sprawling, even diffuse, and loosely-connected play. The basic premise is shamelessly ludicrous: A trio of
    evangelical kids, living out in the middle of nowhere, lose their parents to a
    Kansan twister, but believe the folks have been raptured. (One kid claims
    to have seen it happen.) To make a long story short: The ghost of Bobby Kennedy
    shows up, as does a female Wall Street type, and the effect, I suppose, is to
    turn an inner eye at our blue-state prejudices. For example, there are plenty
    of moments when the evangelical kids make ridiculous statements; the
    youngest of the kids, a ten-year-old spitfire named Anna, waxes poetic on her
    science textbook, which gives plenty of ink to creationism–and, as an audience
    member, you’re already rolling your eyes. We’re accustomed to
    encountering the occasional ironic and/or hateful usage of red-state stereotypes.
    (The conditioned response is to write them off, focusing instead on the play’s other virtues.)
    But in this show, predictable leftism is not what unfolds–not in the least.
    Nor are we led to believe the death of Bobby Kennedy was the single event that led
    this country into its present mess; even he is painted as a complicated
    character, with plenty of flaws as well as strengths. The message seems to be
    this: There’s plenty of beauty to be discovered if only we allow ourselves to wander
    outside our black-and-white thinking. Also, people–even (especially?) evangelicals–are
    essentially good.

     

    In one of the show’s most powerful moments, the cast breaks from
    the script and invites the audience to ask questions. What became clear to me
    then was that these performers are so entrenched in, and care so much for, their
    characters that they can even improvise, while staying in character, with
    relative ease-and without hitting false notes. Again, I reflexively thought the
    cast would get about the sport of lampooning fundamentalists. But instead,
    the play’s sincerest moment came to pass: An audience member asked Sarah–the middle
    child, a teenager dabbling in lesbianism–what she plans for her future. The response–to
    be a better person "and hopefully see my parents again"–startled me. And so,
    finally, I abandoned my hardened expectations and began to feel the play for
    what it was. It left me feeling lighter, with a renewed sense of optimism. Go
    see it.

  • Hell Yes, Holly

    Last week, while continuing work on
    the February fashion feature (coming soon), I stumbled upon this fantastic jewelry
    collection at Key North, a new-ish eco-retailer in Northeast Minneapolis.

     

     

     

    The earrings, of course, are my fave – they’re made of something called African turquoise. Each of the above pieces are by Holly J., a Minneapolis-based
    designer.

  • Many Thanks to Moskal

    Thanks to local designer George Moskal for making me feel all
    Lindsay Lohan-like this holiday season. He lent me one of his dresses! I wore it to
    a belated holiday party last Friday night; see the craftily cropped outtake
    below. Because, you see, even with a pretty dress on, I still can’t feel good
    about my big, frizzy mop of hair.

  • The dress is souper!

    Today, I did more sleuthing for the coming February fashion
    feature and uncovered this treasure: Kim Bartmann, owner of Bryant Lake Bowl and Barbette as well as a lover of all
    things vintage, has an original "Souper Dress" on display at her new-ish Red Stag
    Supper Club     (see my mediocre snapshot below). This paper dress, inspired by the
    work of Andy Warhol, was issued by the Campbell’s Soup Company in 1967. Shoppers could
    get one sent directly to them, via US Mail, in exchange for one dollar and two Campbell’s soup labels. Unfortunately,
    however, because the dresses were advertised as disposable (per the trend of the time), most didn’t
    survive until now. This one belonged to – and was lovingly preserved by – Bartmann’s mother. Other Souper dresses
    have recently sold for as much as $5,000.
     
     

  • First Stop: Stephanie’s

    So, yesterday I started working on the February fashion
    feature, for which men and women pick fashions for their sweethearts. (Check the
    crappily laid-out online version from last year.) First stop was Stephanie’s in
    Highland Park
    with WCCO-TV reporter Jason DeRusha, who picked out a darling dress for his
    darlin’ wife. That dress, however, shall remain unseen until the Feb issue hits
    stands. But I can tell you this: As it turns out, DeRusha actually likes
    shopping for his wife, so we had a pretty good time. Here’s a snap of DeRusha and
    shop owner Stephanie Morrissey hangin’ out in the back of the store, near the
    sale section.

     

    "Oh, I know Ted Baker!" said DeRusha upon noticing the label on the beautiful
    steel-gray dress below. "I like his ties." But of course, Stephanie’s doesn’t
    carry the ties. (You’ll need to head to Len Druskin to find those.) However, Stephanie’s is
    the exclusive Twin Cities carrier of Baker’s women’s line. Alert! Occupational
    hazard! Yes, that is my very own bathroom in the background you see there. If
    you have already gleaned this fact, I’ll lay it out for you: I bought the damn thing.

  • Danger, Danger, and Whatnot

    In these cold, bristling days of the early year (when there’s
    no holiday in sight), it’s good to have something to anticipate … And so, in
    defiance of depressing January, this offering: an illustrated list of some, but not all, of the
    designers for this spring’s Voltage local fashion show, courtesy of Nic Marshall Photography.

     

     

     

    Above: That’s Russell Bourrienne, menswear maven (he once told me: "I’m
    known for my pants") and all-around nice guy.

     

     

    Above: That’s hipper-than-thou Annie Larson, whom I find intimidating (the chunky glasses seem to cast a preemptive strike against unwitting folks such as me) … You might recall the line of jumpers she presented at last year’s Voltage under the name Double Dutch.

     

     

    That’s the "architectural" clothing designer Laura Fulk rockin the asymetrical hair up there. Fulk is currently in the throes of designing costumes for God Save Gertrude, a new rock-n-roll play. (Read more about the playwright, Deborah Stein, and her musical tastes here.) I hope to offer a sneak-peek of those costumes right here at Hook & Eye …

     

     

    Above: I don’t know much about Amanda Christine, but she sure looks sweet …

     

     

     

    That’s the inimitable Katherine Gerdes, known far and wide for her formal yet confortable designs, hiding in her hoodie. With any luck, she’ll launch a new line of jersey dresses in conjunction with Voltage ’08.

     

     

    Not to beat a dead horse, but George Moskal (above) is my absolute faves – not the least of my reasons is that he just lent me the dress for which I previously begged. I plan to wear it to a holiday party this Friday. Stay tuned for the full frontal.