The Rake Magazine

Category: Blog Post

  • Off to Mexico

    Sick of winter much? Can you bear another cold day of having
    to bulk up? Me either! That’s why I’m checking out for Mexico, yo. Feast
    your eyes on this: the adorable, but nonetheless scanty, romper I procured for
    the occasion (as modeled by the much thinner-than-me office floor).

     

    The romper is by Michele Henry, originator of House of Henry
    line (check the website if you care to see the above on an actual person). Here’s another of her warm-weather rompers, which is made from the same stretch
    cotton and modeled by a lovely size-eight dress form.

     

    I’ll mark my return in early March with coverage of three
    local fashion shows:

    MARCH 8: A TWOFER
    Methinks it’s marginally interesting that the all-new
    Envision fashion show, which promises to parade looks from the Cliché and Local
    Motion boutiques across the IDS Center’s fiftieth floor, is going head to head
    with the stalwart DIVA MN show. Among the DIVA designers, by the
    way, will be Ms. Henry, mastermind of the rompers above.

    MARCH 9: BREAK-THE-BANK BEAUTIES
    The brand-new "Runway Luxury" show will feature unattainable
    clothes by Monique Lhuillier (whose only local connection, really, is that she
    keeps an Edina
    boutique) and Joynoëlle (a certified Twin Citian) at the soon-to-open Ivy boutique
    hotel.

    In the meanwhile, stay reasonably warm, will you?

  • Across the Globe — on land and in water

    In case you haven’t noticed, we’ve had a few great guest bloggers lately in our Just Passing Through blog. Steve Hendrickson — an actor in Ten Thousand Things‘ latest play, Eurydice — will be finishing his week-and-a-half stint with with an opening night post tomorrow. And before that, local playwright Aditi Kapil shared her behind-the-scenes experience with two current productions — one of which starts today! According to Kapil, Beneath the Surface is a circus about water; but I’ll write more about it later, after the evening performances begin. (Today’s is a daytime performance.)

    THEATER & PERFORMANCE
    The Syringa Tree

    In the meantime, go check out The Jungle Theater’s latest production: The Syringa Tree, by Pamela Gien. Sarah Agnew takes on 24 different roles in this one-woman show about an interracial family — or rather, two families (one black, one white) struggling for a point of convergence — in 1960s South Africa. The tale begins through the eyes of six-year-old Elizabeth Grace as she attempts to understand her chaotic surroundings, and continues to unfurl the world of Africa through multiple characters who cut across gender, age, race, tribe, and faith.

    7:30 p.m., The Jungle Theater, 2951 Lyndale Ave S. Minneapolis, 612-822-7063; $26.

    BOOKS & AUTHORS
    One Day, One Venue, Two Great Authors

    Today might be the perfect day to hang out by the University. Cut out of work early, avoid traffic, and get yourself settled into a nice, cheap parking spot somewhere between the bookstore and The Loring Pasta Bar, so you can stop in for some artichoke ramekin or a spicy tuna roll between presentations. Mmmm.

    At 4 p.m., join author and former Associated Press reporter Giovanna Dell’Orto for a discussion of her book, The Hidden Power of the American Dream. I don’t know how hidden it is, frankly, but I’m guessing Dell’Orto has much more to offer beyond the usual American Dream rhetoric. Exploring the different events that have shaped how Europeans — and the rest of the world — view Americans, she sets out to prove that the future of our country lies in a global belief of the American Dream. Makes sense to me.

    This, of course, is followed by the artichoke ramekin at the Loring. Or perhaps you prefer a burger and a malt at Annie’s Parlour.

    After a bite to eat, head back to the bookstore to meet open-water swimmer and best-selling author Lynne Cox. Best known for her first novel, Swimming to Antarctica, Cox will be discussing her latest work, Grayson, another beautiful and personal tale, this time about a baby whale. At the age of 17, Cox was training for another long-distance swim (if you read her previous book, you already know about how she crossed the English Channel — twice!), when she discovered a baby gray whale following her. Here’s the catch: if she were to return to shore, the baby whale would follow her to its death; but if she were to swim out to sea, she would be putting her own life at risk. Find out how Cox reunited the baby whale with its mother and likely saved its life. Is there anything this woman can’t do?!

    7 p.m., University of Minnesota Bookstore, Coffman Memorial Union, 300 Washington Ave. S.E., Minneapolis; 612-626-0559; free.

  • Letters From Eurydice IV

    The differences between the first dress and second dress are three:

    1. It’s our second dress rehearsal.
    2. We have moved from our cramped basement rehearsal space at the Quaker Meeting House to the spacious, bright, airy, and day-lit upstairs meeting room.
    3. We have a small audience of Michelle Hensley (again) and Michelle Woster (TTT Managing Director) — who has brought along four women friends. Also present are the meeting house caretaker and his daughter, who looks to be about four years old. Apart from the two Michelles, none of these people are theatre professionals, and, most importantly, nobody is carrying pens and legal pads. They’re just here to see the play.

    Larissa — who throughout the entire rehearsal period has been struggling valiantly against a nasty, persistent racking cough that has limited her to 2-3 hours of sleep a night — looks rested and, surprisingly, cheerful. She makes no attempt to take me aside and explain, eyes averted, that she has conferred with Michelle and Peter and that all agree a huge mistake has been made, and that one of the other Steves of the Minneapolis acting community — Yoakam, Pelinski, D’Ambrose, Lewis, or Sweere (fabulous actors all, btw) — will be going on with script in hand and perhaps it would be best if I gave back all my salary, packed my things quietly, and left by the back door.

    Instead, Larissa spends the first two hours giving notes and going over particular scenes, tightening, adjusting, finessing with a sense of confidence and surety. The comments she has from Peter and Michelle all appear to be smart, observant, constructive, and effective.

    Our audience arrives at 12:45, and at 1 p.m. we’re off. Sonja and Marc (Eurydice and Orpheus) start the play and instantly the energy of the room changes to something we’ve never felt before. The change is the rapt attention of our tiny audience. They are riveted, engaged, enthralled. They laugh! Omigod, the play is funny! After three and a half weeks of rehearsal, we had kind of forgotten that. But even better, the laughter is coming from recognition and identification. They cry! The end of Eurydice carries a bittersweet melancholic mixture of empathy and loss that seems almost unbearable to witness. The play ends, and we stand to face the friends of Woster. Their mouths are creased with wide smiles and their eyes damp from tears. Yin and yang — marvelous!

    Larissa and Michelle look relaxed and elated. Larissa has notes for us; there are always notes, but they’re the notes a cast gets when the director feels the play is on the right track — more than that — that the play has tuned itself to the right pitch and is working, is playing the way it’s meant to. Glitches are addressed, minor issues are discussed and solved, but the air is vibrating with the sense that the audience was compelled, moved, and we’re onto something special here. Tomorrow we give the play it’s first real audience: the VOA Women’s Correctional Facility in Roseville. Ready or not, rehearsals are over.

    Next: Opening Day

  • You're Invited: Dinner and Jazz at T's Place

    Please join us for dinner and jazz on Wednesday, February 27 at T’s Place, 2713 E. Lake St. Minneapolis.

    We stopped in the other night at T’s Place, the Ethiopian-Malaysian fusion restaurant a couple of doors down from the Town Talk Diner, to check out Yohannes Tona and his band. I’d read a piece in the Twin Cities Daily Planet by Dwight Hobbes that described Ethiopian-born Tona as "the baddest bass guitar player in the Twin Cities."

    As luck would have it, Tona was off gigging in Las Vegas, but we weren’t disappointed: his replacement was an amazing Cameroonian guitar player named Kenn Wanaku, who led Tona’s regulars in a couple of high energy sets that ranged from reggae and merengue to Congolese soukous and West African hilife, with a little Paul Simon and Bob Marley thrown in as well.

    The only sour note was that the place was nearly empty. So Carol and I decided, we have to get a bunch of friends – and Breaking Bread Readers – together and come back and make an evening of it: Tona and his band play (almost) every Wednesday night. So we are scheduling our little get-together for a week from today – Wednesday, February 27.

    Carol and I will plan to arrive by 8 p.m., and the music starts at 9:00.

    T’s Place offers a unique menu – a combination of traditional Ethiopian dishes, served on a tray covered with injera (a pancake-like flat bread), and some Malaysian-Ethiopian dishes that chef T Belachew invented when he was a chef-partner with Kin Lee at Singapore!. For menu details, check the website. Prices for food and drinks – they have a full bar – are very reasonable, and there is no cover charge for the music.

    We’re asking everybody to order – and pay – for themselves, though you are very welcome to follow the Ethiopian custom of eating from a shared tray.(With your fingers, if you really want to be authentic.)

    Please email me at iggers@rakemag.com, if you plan to attend. Or just show up.

  • Dunking the Fishtank

    Fishtank: n. a diffuse, silent comedy ostensibly done in the
    spirit of Buster Keaton and Jacques Tati. I couldn’t help but make comparisons
    to Play Time, my favorite Tati flick (I just re-watched the restaurant scene
    last week). This was Tati’s all-out screed on modernist architecture, if you’ll
    recall. In my mind, the physical acting is less funny than the extremist
    perspectives of the filmmaker. Tati goes to great, comic lengths (and toes the
    line of tedium) to illustrate his disdain for contemporary architecture and its
    sullying effect on the Parisian streetscape. Now, to make my point here: I’m
    not the sort of theatergoer who demands a message, or even a point, from the shows
    I see. Nor do I require a cohesive narrative arc (although I do happen to
    believe that story is inherent to the best art). However, this show is
    something else–lacking in both perspective and narrative.

    The basic premise: examining the little obstacles and comedies
    in our mundane, everyday existences. But there were only two instances in which I,
    as an audience member, recognized something in the situations: one performer (Nathan
    Keepers) encountered a few problems when passing through an airport metal detector,
    which was played to great comic effect and ended up being the show’s highlight;
    another performer (Dominique Serrand) got stuck on the phone in voice mail hell.
    Man, I’ve been there. But other than that, the situations were too obscured to breed
    familiarity–or, for that matter, any emotional investment in these characters.
    And it’s pretty, damn boring to watch a show that’s inhabited by people you
    could give a rat’s ass about.

    It’s got to be said: Jeune Lune has a history of omitting the
    playwright from its creative process. In fact, I believe their adaptations of
    operas and classic texts have succeeded because of the built-in storylines.
    Plus, the company demonstrates reverence for their preferred dead
    scribes (Shakespeare, Molière). But their "ensemble-created" work, in my
    opinion, has often been diffuse, disjointed, lacking in any sort of thread, too pleased with itself, and therefore emotionally
    isolating (bear in mind here: I wasn’t around for the benchmarking Yang Zen
    Froggs    ).

    I "get" the clown thing. But the key to succeeding, as a
    clown, has always been to cultivate an alliance between audience and performer.
    In other words: The two of us ought to be in on this joke together. For
    whatever reason, I wasn’t invited to attend this joke. In fact, by the end of
    the night, the only thing that was clear to me about these characters was this:
    They’re awfully enamored of their own cuteness.

    So, the gloves are off. But before I dispense with my final criticism,
    I suppose I ought to make the disclosure I always make when writing about Jeune
    Lune: I used to work there, in administration. I have no lingering
    hostilities. I liked the job. Many of my most memorable theater-going
    experiences were at Jeune Lune. I want to see this company succeed. But of
    course, I was sad to see some of my favorite people (to say nothing of their
    artistries) leave the company, in 2006.

    My final point on Fishtank: Jennifer Baldwin Peden’s
    character–the sole woman (it felt somewhat like watching the Smurfs)–speaks baby-talk. Also, she seemed to be costumed as a Japanese schoolgirl. So,
    obviously, there’s a huge difference between finding one’s inner idiot/clown and
    infantilizing the sole female character. For many women, I’m afraid, there’s
    nothing funny about watching a grown woman behave and be treated as a precious, little six-year-old.

  • Letters from Eurydice III

    First dress rehearsal:

    As I mentioned earlier, TTT makes camp in all manner of places not designed for theatrical performance and uses whatever light is present in the room. Occasionally we perform someplace that has natural light from windows, but it’s mostly artificial lighting and mostly fluorescent. That means that, unlike sitting in a darkened theatre, our audiences see Eurydice in full light. They can see the actors of course, but they can also see each other, which is sometimes unnerving. But more importantly, we the actors can see the audience. This often requires a radical adjustment for actors used to performing in the comforting, cloak of darkness — did for me at least. With the audience sitting so close and in full view, it’s practically impossible to not include them as participating members of the experience. This always works well with Shakespeare, where soliloquies and asides are meant to be shared directly with an audience. But as we rehearsed Eurydice, we found the solution to a problem often lay in finding a way to open the scene to the audience. (For more perspective on this subject read about my moment of TTT epiphany as described by American Theatre Magazine.)

    Eurydice had two dress rehearsals, and the first one was especially unnerving, at least for me. Remember that when we’re rehearsing there is no audience except for Larissa, our director, and any actors who aren’t in the scene, who perhaps decide to sit and watch instead of going to the bathroom or finding a quiet nook to run their lines. So, up until dress rehearsals, the actors are imagining the audience: speaking to and looking at empty chairs.

    For our first dress rehearsal, along with Larissa we had two other audience members: Michelle Hensley, the TTT artistic director, and Peter Rothstein, the brilliant artistic director of Theatre Latté Da and director of TTT’s upcoming spring production of Once On This Island. Larissa, Peter, and Michelle settle themselves among the seats, giving the actors at least three living breathing faces to react with. Except that Larissa, Peter and Michelle aren’t actually there as audience members, they’re on hand to help Larissa get some perspective on the play- they’re there as consultants. Sympathetic, encouraging consultants to be sure, but for an actor, anytime somebody sits down to watch you act with a pen and legal pad on their lap they are no longer your friend. They are a critic.

    In Eurydice my first appearance is a monologue (I don’t want to give away any more of the play than I have to so I won’t say what the monologue is about). I have worked with Peter Rothstein once in several new script workshops and have found him a wonderful director: affable, encouraging, intuitive and imaginative. Moreover, he has never seen any of the previous rehearsals for Eurydice. So for my first connection with the I audience, I choose Peter. I look at him in the eye, begin to speak, and before I’m halfway through the sentence, his head is down and he is writing furiously on his pad. I keep going, but my inner actor, the little dickie bird who sits on my shoulder any time I’m performing, immediately goes into a paranoid panic: what’s he writing down, and why is he writing so fast, and is it about me? Why isn’t he paying attention? It’s because I’m terrible! He hates me! And he’s writing down that he hates me and why he hates me! Mayday! Mayday! I turn away from Peter and look at Michelle, and omigod she’s writing too! Sheets and sheets about how I totally suck! Where’s Larissa? Oh, there she is, journaling away eight to the bar on the pluperfect putrescence of my so-called performance. I haven’t spoken five sentences and I know, I know, I’m a complete failure.

    What were Peter, Michelle and Larissa writing? I don’t really know. It may be that they were commenting about how awful I was. But just as likely they were making notes about sight lines, blocking or how much they were enjoying what they were seeing. This kind of note-taking happens in practically every dress rehearsal of every play ever produced. The difference is that in most theatres, the note-takers are sitting in the dark. The actors can’t see them scribbling madly and, in those cases, ignorance is our friend. At the end of the first dress rehearsal, Peter and Michelle smile at us (me) encouragingly, but I know they hated it (me). Then they dash off. They will call Larissa that evening to offer their thoughts and the first thing they will say to her is Steve Hendrickson has got to go.

    Next: Second dress rehearsal.

  • Happy President's Day

    LECTURE
    Jen Bekman

    American Photo‘s 2007 Innovator of the Year and famed New
    York gallery owner Jen Bekman packs up some photos and her affable
    lecturing style to pay the Minnesota Center for Photography a
    visit. The acclaimed artist, who makes frequent public appearances at
    portfolio reviews and seminars, charmingly refers to herself in the
    third person so as not to seem swell-headed when asked to rattle off
    her accomplishments. But, really, there’s quite a bit to be proud of:
    her Jen Bekman gallery sheds light on budding artists and affords them
    the inventive group shows they deserve. Hey, Hot Shot!, Bekman’s
    quarterly photography competition, follows suit, calling for a handful
    of talented young shutterbugs to line the walls. In the online realm,
    her Personism blog covers a healthy mix of fabulous design and
    noteworthy current events; and the Bekman-founded 20×200 site offers
    hard-to-find prints on the cheap. Those feats alone should fuel a
    couple questions. —Haily Joy Gostas

    7 p.m., Minnesota Center for Photography, 165 13th Ave. NE, Minneapolis, 612-824-5500.

    ART
    Cold Blooded, Warm Hearted

    First Amendment Arts, the Northeast Minneapolis basement space
    devoted to eye-popping prints and guerilla graphic design, has just the
    remedy for that notorious Hallmark holiday (hint: for many of us, it
    came and went with chocolate wrappers in its wake) with Cold Blooded, Warm Hearted. This
    group exhibition of prints brings together five established, eclectic
    artists (Christa Dalien, Bill Fick, Mark Hosford, Michael Krueger, and
    Jenny Schmid, each from a different place around the country) with some
    key concepts in common-past and present politics, personal and physical
    landscape, and cultural critique among them. Oh, a great sense of humor
    to boot, hence the title: one part cold-blooded irony; one part
    warm-hearted embrace of their bold subject matter; all parts
    fascinating. —Haily Joy Gostas

    1-5 p.m., First Amendment Arts, 1101 Stinson Blvd., Basement Rooms A & B, Minneapolis, 612-379-4151.

    THEATER & PERFORMANCE
    Joseph Scrimshaw’s Adventures In Mating,

    Taking to the Bryant-Lake Bowl stage tonight (and running every Monday until someone makes ‘em stop), Adventures In Mating
    sees its triumphant return to the Twin Cities with new scenes, new
    choices, and a new leading lady (that’d be Mo Perry, most recently seen
    in the Minneapolis Theater Garage’s production of Looking For Normal). Of
    course, Joseph Scrimshaw’s now-international hit wouldn’t entail the
    same madcap rom-com hijinks without plenty of audience interaction, so
    feel free to abuse your role as the swift hand of destiny in this
    couple’s hit-or-miss first date. Red or white wine? Soup or salad? Kiss
    or slap? It’ll rarely be the same show twice-kind of like Choose Your Own Adventure, but for the blackest of hearts. —Haily Joy Gostas

    8 p.m., Bryant-Lake Bowl, 810 W. Lake St., Minneapolis; 612-825-8949; $12.

    Also tonight:

    The Randy Weston African Rhythms Trio will perform at the Dakota. And Michael Oren, author of Power, Faith, and Fantasy, will discuss his book at Lyndale Congregational United Church of Christ (7:30 p.m.)

  • Day Off/On

    Today is one of those odd holidays. Some people have the day off, others must work. Restaurants are clearly open, but school is closed. There’s no real celebration or gift-giving or feast involved, but because it’s an election year, maybe we should spend some time thinking about President’s Day.

    Or maybe we should buy a German sausage rug.

    Or we could check out what Andrea Strong has to say about the New York food scene on her new blog.

    We’d be remiss if we didn’t take a moment to explore our feelings about cilantro.

    It’s important to weigh in on dark vs. milk, no?

    Then we’ll have to make lunch for the crazies.

    Plan your Spring Break.

    Get whisk wise.

    And finally, really get into the nitty gritty of presidentialism.

    Maybe you can top the day off by attempting Martha Washington’s cake recipe from Mount Vernon.

     

  • No More 2 a.m. Runs for Calamata Olives and Camembert

    I hear other teenagers hang out on street corners and in pool halls. My son and his friends? Throughout all four years of high school, at every time of the day and night, they could be found clustered in the same place: the St. Louis Park Byerly’s.

    Until now.

    Tonight (February 18) at midnight, all Byerly’s and Lunds stores will close their doors, not to re-open until 6 a.m. tomorrow. And this is the way it will be from here on in. It’s the end of an era: Byerly’s has operated 24 hours a day since 1971 and Lunds since the early ’90s. My son and his crew — many of them Orthodox Jews who rely on the kosher deli for a late-night, after-party nosh — are devastated.

    You may be, too, the next time you get a craving for baguette, fig spread, and cave-aged cheese after the jazz clubs close. Because from now on, Cub, Rainbow, and Perkins will be your only options.

    "This is mostly an effort to focus our resources on those hours when most of our customers are in the stores," said Aaron Sorenson, a spokesperson for Byerly’s and Lunds. "By closing overnight, we can take some of our staff and move them to peak hours. We expect aisles will be cleaner during the day and there will be more people there to increase levels of service."

    When pressed, however, Sorenson admitted there was another reason for the change in hours: A rash of recent late-night robberies have made store management fear for the security of its staff members.

    "We realized our overnight team members were vulnerable," Sorenson said. "There was only a skeleton crew and people knew it. So they were more likely to take advantage and put our people — and our customers — at risk." (Note: Sorenson asked me to be careful with this information, which is why I waited until the new hours went into effect to post — so as not to publicize the problem and invite more walk-in thefts.)

    From now on, Byerly’s and Lunds will operate more like other high-end grocery stores, locking their doors to stock and clean at night, then opening with sparkling, full shelves the following day.

    As for my son and his friends, I do worry. . . .Frankly, the deli and luncheon counter WAS a nice place for them to congregate: Wholesome, close to home, and full of exactly the sort of quality food I advise them to eat. Now, when I want to find my 17-year-old, I’ll have to start calling people’s houses instead of simply driving over to Byerly’s. Next thing I know, he and the boys will be reduced hanging out at Walgreen’s. . . .or Holiday.

    And who, I ask, will bring them kosher club wraps and cream sodas there?

  • Ancient Aborigines and $6 Australian Wine

    Here it is, practically the eve of the Oscars, and I’ve yet to see two of the five movies nominated for best picture. I didn’t care for No Country; I liked but did not absolutely love Juno. So far, my money’s on There Will Be Blood, which was not only a magnificent film but the richest evocation of loneliness and megalomania I’ve watched since Citizen Kane.

    Saturday night, we decided to see Michael Clayton. My husband, myself, and about 200 other middle-aged, middle-income, mid-level professionals. John and I got to the theater in plenty of time but there was a line, literally, around the block. Round white faces and L.L. Bean-clad bodies for as far as the eye could see. Damn, it’s humbling to be confronted with your own incredibly predictable, privileged, demographically determined life. . . .

    By the time we’d stood waiting for ten minutes and hemmed and hawed and finally departed because we didn’t want to be stuck inside some crowded auditorium with all those other lemmings, it was too late to catch any other show. So we dashed to Hollywood Video and picked up a film sure to make us different from all of THEM: A Cannes winner from last year called Ten Canoes.

    Then we stopped at Hennepin-Lake Liquors for a bottle of wine.

    Now let me remind you that Henn-Lake DOES NOT TAKE CREDIT CARDS. I do this, of course, because we didn’t remember ourselves, and John and I ended up digging through pockets and purse to come up with the price of an Australian Pinot Noir from Lindemans Wine that was bottled — get this — in 2007.

    This made the pinot roughly the same age as the orange juice in our refrigerator. And it cost only a tad more at $5.95. But the Lindemans came highly recommended by the girl behind the counter, who was at least 21 years and 2 months old. Also, luckily, we had just enough pennies and dimes between us to take it home — which we did, along with our DVD.

    It turned out to be a very odd but charming little film. The first full-length feature ever made in native aboriginal language, Ten Canoes is more fable than drama. It begins with a voiceover narrator, then reverts to a tribe in which an elder is telling a story to his younger brother, then reverts a second time to an ancient camp in which men’s instinctual jealousies cause a series of dire things.

    This is what I call a "recessive" narrative — one that goes back in time then flashes back yet again, so like concentric ripples in a pond, you can never quite remember where you started. It is, in fact, a structure I advise my undergraduate writing students to avoid. It’s nearly always confusing. (Last year’s Sweetland suffered from the same problem.) I can think of only two films that used this paradigm well: Sophie’s Choice, in which the adult Stingo recalls his young adult years in Brooklyn then yields to Sophie’s memories of the war; and The Princess Bride, which broke all the rules anyway and still managed to do everything well.

    Ten Canoes is not quite so successful. At least one of the stories — the "middle" one, if you’re looking at them chronologically — eventually fizzles out and gets lost. But the cast is extraordinary, actors who do as much with facial expression as they do with words. And it was wonderful simply to be some place else for 90 minutes: In this case, the swampy northern tip of Australia camped by the side of a river with men (mostly) who think nothing of walking around with only a braided string tied around their waists and routinely have three wives at a time.

    In the end, the central story — the one that takes place in ancient days — is tight and satisfying, its life lessons relevant even today. And it is comforting to me, somehow, to know that men take the same scatalogical glee in their own body emissions and sexual habits whether they’re carrying cell phones or spears. (See the extended flatulence scene, which is oh, so effective, by the way, when done nude.)

    And about that wine, you’re wondering?

    It was. . . .fine. Strawberry, cherry, and raspberry, like liquid candy with a tiny bit of oak (a very tiny bit) and a hefty kick (13.5% alcohol). This is the Tom Collins of wine — appealing, apparently, to those drinkers who are stranded in the decade or two between Juicy Juice and Chatauneuf-de-Pape. Even for we grown-ups, sitting curled up in a big chair and watching a magic realism tale about dignified warriors who giggle as they fart, it was pretty damn good. Especially for six dollars and change.