PRESORTED STANDARD PERMIT #3036 WHITE PLAINS NY
Vol. VI, No. XLI
Westchester’s Most Influential Weekly
So Many Films... So Little Time! The Second Annual YoFi Film Fest Lights Up The Yonkers Waterfront • Oct 17, 18 & 19. See page 19
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THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
Lightning Protection!
Editorial This week we mark the fourth anniversary of the death of Pace College student, D. J. Henry. It is still difficult to understand what caused the police to draw their weapons on what was clearly just a group of college kids trying to have fun. They were perhaps a little loud, maybe even rowdy, but theses were clearly good kids who were just hanging out
on a Saturday night, not a mob bent on destruction. There was no need for armed force here to disperse them. Our hearts go out to the Henry family as they continue to fight for justice in the wrongful death of their son. In the course of the day, the police in each of our communities are called upon to be many things to many people. Law enforcement officers keep our streets safe, assist the ill and the injured until EMS arrives, respond to domestic disputes,
ASSOCIATED
crime scenes and sometimes, crimes in progress. It is a challenging, difficult and in some communities, a very dangerous and often thankless job. However, the use of lethal force is calculated to have fatal consequences and should never have been used to deal with young adults on that night in Town of Mt. Pleasant four years ago. Crowd control of a group of college kids should be well within the skill set of any police officer anywhere in America.
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LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Dear Editor:
“The Roosevelt” TV presentation by Ken Burns, as a historical documentary becomes questionable because of these factual omissions. First Omission – Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) failed and prohibited the disclosure of an imminent attack on Pearl Harbor to the Naval Base Commander Admiral Kimmel and General Short that prevented any defense. We are now told that FDR believed America could not go to War
without cataclysmic disaster which would have shortened the War. Second Omission – FDR executive order interned 13,000 Italians to prison of war camps throughout the county. Third Omission – FDR, Patrician views are reflected when he ordered the Justice Department classification of all Italian Americans or American Citizens of Italian Heritage as Enemy Aliens. This wartime program had the FBI squads of agents to conduct illegal night raids on their apartments, arrests, detention and
kidnappings of the 4 million plus families from 1941 to 1944, which happened in the7th Ward [Italian Section] of the City of Yonkers. It was a massive Federal Occupation by the F.B.I. and others. There were no publications of this act of terror and fear, because that person would be charged with sedition that might affect war morale and jailed, now described as “The Secret War”. Fourth Omission – Theodore Roosevelt’s famous outcry, “It was a great Patriotic Act” when 12 Italian Stevedores
were jailed and hanged by a mob in New Orleans after being found not guilty on Trial for murder against a Sheriff. This affirmed this Patrician Racial beliefs and prejudice or bias toward some Americans. Fifth Omission – Theodore Roosevelt tyrannical occupation of the Philippines with suppression and aggression of the native people who suggest independence with severe loss of lives. These many omissions were permitted with the so called principle of “artistic privilege by a TV Director and
commendable but they are in conflict with the definition of History which is “A chronological record of significant events usually including an explanation of their causes”. Webster New Collegiate Dictionary. The omissions are the holes that exist in legacies. Was it History, Was it Ken Burns “His Story”. A Witness to History, John N. Romano, WWII witness
Mission Statement
Table of Contents Editorial...................................................................................................2 Letters to the Editor.........................................................................2 Government/Community Section....................................................4 Society.................................................................................................4 Spirituality..........................................................................................5 Community.......................................................................................6 Government......................................................................................7 Religion...............................................................................................8 Technology Creative Disruption.................................................10 Education.........................................................................................11 Arts/Enertainment..............................................................................12 Literature..........................................................................................12 Opera................................................................................................12 Eye on Theatre.................................................................................13 Calendar...........................................................................................16 Cultural Perspectives.....................................................................17 Yonkers Fil Festival.........................................................................19 Legal Notices........................................................................................16
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Send publicity 3 weeks in advance of your event. Ads due Tuesdays, one week prior to publication date. Letters to the Editor & Press Releases can only be submitted via Email: WestGuardEditor@aol.com westguardpressreleases@aol.com westguardadvertising@aol.com Office Hours: 11A-5P M-F 914.216.1674 Cell • 914.576.1481 Office Read us online at: www.WestchesterGuardian.com
The Westchester Guardian is a weekly newspaper devoted to the unbiased reporting of events and developments that are newsworthy and significant to readers living in, and/or employed in, Westchester County. The Guardian will strive to report fairly, and objectively, reliable information without favor or compromise. Our first duty will be to the PEOPLE’S RIGHT TO KNOW, by the exposure of truth, without fear or hesitation, no matter where the pursuit may lead, in the finest tradition of FREEDOM OF THE PRESS. The Guardian will cover news and events relevant to residents and businesses all over Westchester County. As a weekly, rather than focusing on the immediacy of delivery more associated with daily journals, we will instead seek to provide the broader, more comprehensive, chronological step-by-step accounting of events, enlightened with analysis, where appropriate.
From amongst journalism’s classic key-words: who, what, when, where, why, and how, the why and how will drive our pursuit. We will use our more abundant time, and our resources, to get past the initial ‘spin’ and ‘damage control’ often characteristic of immediate news releases, to reach the very heart of the matter: the truth. We will take our readers to a point of understanding and insight which cannot be obtained elsewhere. To succeed, we must recognize from the outset that bigger is not necessarily better. And, furthermore, we will acknowledge that we cannot be all things to all readers. We must carefully balance the presentation of relevant, hard-hitting, Westchester news and commentary, with features and columns useful in daily living and employment in, and around, the county. We must stay trim and flexible if we are to succeed.
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
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THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
Government/CommunitySection Cuomo vs. Astorino: It’s a Snooze Campaign By NANCY KING With less than a month until Election Day, the New York State Governor’s race has become so boring that it’s barely worth mentioning. One would think that with such a short period of time left in this campaign, that things would really be heating up but instead, this campaign has even the most seasoned political analysts yawning. Even their commercials are boring. The Cuomo campaign has dragged out longtime Westchester Republican Larry Rockefeller to explain in thirty seconds why he, as a
life-long Republican will be voting for Democrat Governor Andrew Cuomo. Astorino this week released an ad on the internet that depicts his three school age children laughing at a television set while allegedly watching what is supposed to be a negative ad about their dad. If you don’t have access to a computer or the internet, then you won’t be able to watch the cash strapped County Executive’s commercial. Using minor children in a political ad campaign is probably supposed to present an air of innocence and purity about a candidate’s intentions but it is also kind of creepy. Press conferences this week have also morphed into the realm of just
shrugging one’s shoulders. On Monday, the Governor treated media and local officials to a ferry ride on the Hudson to welcome the Left Coast Lifter, one of the largest floating cranes in the world, to our little corner of the Hudson. The crane is here after having traveled 6 thousand miles and through the Panama Canal to build the new Hudson River Bridge and to help tear down the old one. The Governor excitedly told all in attendance that not only were we getting a new bridge but at the discounted rate of 4 billion dollars in construction fees. When the Governor was asked how much the toll would cost on this discounted bridge, all that was to
be heard was the gentle lapping of those Hudson River waves. Astorino’s big press conference of the week occurred on Wednesday when it was announced by his office that there may be a patient at Phelps Memorial Hospital in Sleepy Hollow who might have contracted Ebola. He traveled to West Africa and now was displaying flu like symptoms. Of course we all received this press release within moments of the Ebola patient who was being treated in Dallas had died. By the time the press conference had ended, Dr. Sherita Amler cautioned everyone that this was a low level risk. By 5:00 PM the individual in question had been cleared of the virus and all in attendance were left shaking our collective heads as to whether we were really at risk or was this just a
free media moment for the Republican candidate. The week in this sleepy campaign still has both sides still bickering about debates. The governor has agreed to a televised debate to be aired in the Buffalo region and the Astorino campaign has opted out of a scheduled radio debate. Perhaps the County Executive himself is coming to realize that this race for governor has become a non-race and that the voters just don’t really care. In the meantime, with just a few short weeks left in this race, there isn’t too much left to say about this race; it’s boring. Perhaps in a month both of these guys can get back to doing the jobs that the poor voters elected them to do.
SOCIETY
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The Tragic Death of DJ Henry Four Years Later By NANCY KING October 17th marks the four year anniversary of the murder of Pace University student Danroy DJ Henry. Henry died of gunshot wounds after former Pleasantville Police Officer Aaron Hess catapulted himself onto Henry’s car and shot him through the windshield at point blank range. In the four years since this killing, of a young black man by a white police officer there have been numerous other deaths of black men and women at the hands of white police officers. Kenneth Chamberlain Sr. here in White Plains, Travon Martin in Florida, Michael Brown in Ferguson Missouri, and Charles Gardner in Staten Island. These deaths have been high profile murders but what are we doing to stop it? Nothing. In the Henry case, Westchester County District Attorney Janet DiFiore seated a Grand Jury and without much surprise, cleared all police officers of any wrong doing in this case. There is an old saying that a DA can indict a ham sandwich if they wish to do so but it was clear that Ms. DiFiore chose not to indict any of the police officers involved and threw the old ham sandwich theory right out of the window. Since then, the Henry family has filed a Federal wrongful death suit for the murder of their oldest child.
After months and months of painful depositions, that case is slowly making its way through the Federal justice system. The twists and turns of those involved in the case have also taken on a strange life of their own. Since October 17th 2010, the Town of Mt. Pleasant, where the killing occurred has undergone a series of changes. Finnegan’s Bar and Grill, the establishment where all those students were partying on that night has gone out
of business. Supervisor Joan Maybury has abruptly resigned as of last week and the Police Chief Lou Alagno has retired. The only officer to tell the truth in a deposition, Ronald Beckley never returned to work, takin an early retirement after testifying that he was the one who shot Officer Hess, injuring him in the leg; not DJ Henry’s car which is what Hess testified to as to what happened. One officer told the truth, is ostracized from the law enforcement community and never returns to work. A life ruined for telling the truth. The most bizarre twist to this whole story goes to then Lt. and later Chief Brian Fanelli. Fanelli, who had been the commanding officer that night, is often thought to have concocted the whole Hess being hit by a car to protect that officer. Soon after the shooting, Beckley confided in Fanelli and told him that he had discharged his gun, had shot Hess and believed Hess to be the aggressor in this instance. Fanelli wove such an intricate story that a jury surmised that young Henry was indeed a threat to the police. However earlier in 2014 it was revealed that Fanelli himself turned out to be a threat to the community. He was indicted on Federal charges that alleged he was downloading and disseminating child pornography. Fanelli, plead not guilty and claims he only had the porn on his computer for research. At this time, Fanelli has lost his job with the
police department and is currently under house arrest until his trial gets underway. As for Dan and Angella Henry, they are watching their wrongful death suit take that long and winding road through the judicial system. Their grief however has been channeled into the DJ Dream fund, a non-profit that supports healthy programs for children. With 5K, 10K and bicycle races, Dan and Angella Henry have sent children to sports camps, purchased back to school supplies and have sponsored dozens of educational programs. With broken hearts, they have turned their grief into a positive force for change while they wait for justice. However, the question still remains as to why police departments around the country have declared a war on men of color. Most of the time the reasoning behind these murders is that those murdered were a threat to the officers. The real reason is that a clause in the Patriotic Act authorizes police departments to use deadly force when there is a perceived threat. This allows our national police departments to shoot first and worry about it later. It happened to DJ, it has happened to Trayvon, Michael, Ken, and Eric and without change, murders by the hands of the very men and women who are hired to protect us, will continue. Dan and Angella Henry, through their philanthropy, and their faith in the justice system are making sure that their son’s death though tragic will not have been in vain.
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
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SOCIETY/SPIRITUALITY LETTER TO THE EDITOR
In Memoriam: Father Benedict J. Groeschel, C.F.R. Fr. Benedict RIP
Fr. Benedict J. Groeschel, C.F.R., died Saturday, October 4th, on the same day as St. Francis of Assisi, after praying a rosary. He was a renowned retreat director, author, lecturer, teacher, counselor and guide to many, perhaps the most well known priest in the United States. It was my privilege to call him co-founder of Good Counsel helping homeless mothers and babies, my spiritual director and friend. Fr. Benedict and I met during the winter of 1980 while I was at a mission helping homeless and runaway kids in Times Square. He came during the most difficult day I was there, gave a homily filled with practical as well as spiritual insights which began a long personal collaboration in helping the poor and helping those who help others. Considering the plight of homeless mothers and babies, whom I saw coming off the streets into this mid-town Manhattan shelter, I asked Fr. Benedict, “Why didn’t someone do something to help homeless mothers go back to school, find a job (and as he would often say) ‘take that next good
step in life.’ “ His final response was that he would help me if I wanted to start a home for mothers and babies. Good Counsel homes is operating nearly 30 years now helping mothers return to school and find jobs. Fr. Benedict helped me every step of the way, was the founding chairman of the Board, was a personal and professional guide as we worked with difficult situations and he was a major reason Good Counsel was able to open our Daystar
home for special needs mothers who are not only homeless, but have a mental health diagnosis and/or an addiction. For a while I worked with him at the home he began for young men, St. Francis Home in Brooklyn. I’ve seen him calm the anger and rage of young men. He was sympathetic and inspiring to them as well as to Good Counsel’s young women. While traveling with him on pilgrimages in Italy, France, Ireland and England, he was often met by people who were familiar with his writing, his tapes or appearances on EWTN, the international television network. He always was himself, kind, friendly, helpful. Many times I’d meet with him late at night because he was counseling priests up until midnight. He’d often sleep only four hours a night. When he once complained to Mother Teresa of Calcutta, whom he was appointed as liaison by the then Cardinal of New York, Terrance Cooke, that he was always tired. He related that Mother asked him, “How long do you sleep?” He responded, “Four hours.”
Editor’s Note:
On August 27, 2012 Father came under fire, for suggesting that “youngsters ages 14-16-18 seduce priests;” a statement that he retracted on Aug. 30th, stating that “he had not intended to blame the victim.” This was a sad episode in a life dedicated to public ministry, which benefitted countless thousands. Those close to Dr. Groeschel suggested that this statement was very out-of character; perhaps a
She replied, “That’s the problem.” “What?” he asked. “You sleep too much.” Fr. Benedict enjoyed that kind of humor. Fr. Benedict often said he was looking forward to going to “Purgatory, because it was like Jersey City” where he grew up. Many people believe Fr. Benedict to be a saint. While he was not perfect, his preaching and work with the poor touched millions of lives. When he was going to speak to priests on a retreat in Florida on January 11, 2004, he was hit by a car and nearly died. Thousands of people wrote how he had personally changed their lives. Many
combination of aging, injuries incurred following motor vehicle trauma several years earlier and Fr. Groeschle’s work with impaired priests conspired to create his lack of judgment in this instance. Sexual abuse is an evil that that savages the souls of those that are victimized and cannot be tolerated or covered up. Legal minors cannot give consent; blaming victims is not acceptable. Report all instances of sexual abuse to the authorities at once. were converted or strengthened in their faith. Some remained in their faith but listened to him because of his incredible spiritual insights and practical wisdom. He will not be forgotten and of his 40 plus books all still in print, I believe many will be read for centuries to come. May Fr. Benedict rest in Your Peace oh Lord. Peace, christopher bell + https://www.facebook.com/opensi www.goodcounselhomes.org www.postabortionhelp.org
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THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
COMMUNITY
Fidelis Care to Open Yonkers Community Office Non-profit health plan invites public to join celebration YONKERS, NY – (October 7, 2014) - Fidelis Care, a Statewide health plan with more than 1.1 million members, invites the public to celebrate the grand opening of its Yonkers Community Office. Conveniently located at 419B South Broadway, Yonkers, NY 10705, the Community Office was established to make free and low-cost health insurance coverage easily accessible to neighbors in Yonkers. With open enrollment for Medicare Advantage underway and open enrollment for New York State of Health: The Official Health Plan Marketplace beginning on November 15, this Community Office will be a resource for neighbors to learn about all Fidelis Care products and receive assistance with enrollment.
It will also serve the needs of current Fidelis Care members. Following a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Wednesday, October 22, neighbors of all ages are invited to the grand opening celebration at the Yonkers Community Office from 1:30 to 5:30 PM. There will be music, refreshments, giveaways, and face painting for children. Fidelis Care representatives will be available to answer questions about health insurance and help eligible residents apply for enrollment. The grand opening celebration continues at the Yonkers Community Office on Thursday, October 23 from 9 AM to 5:30 PM, with Information Day about the Affordable Care Act. Residents can meet with a Fidelis Care representative to learn about health insurance options
for the entire family. On Friday October 24 from 9 AM to 5:30 PM, the public is invited to Fidelis Care in Your Community Day, featuring entertainment and giveaways. Fidelis Care’s Yonkers Community Office is open Monday through Saturday, from 10 AM – 6:30 PM. For more information, call (914) 233-5222. About Fidelis Care: As the New York State Catholic Health Plan, Fidelis Care offers quality, affordable coverage for children and adults of all ages and at all stages of life, including products available through NY State of Health: The Official Health Plan Marketplace. With more than 1.1 million members Statewide, Fidelis Care was founded on the belief that all New
Yorkers should have access to affordable, quality health insurance. For more information, call Fidelis Care at 1-888FIDELIS (1-888-343-3547) or visit
fideliscare.org. Follow us on Twitter at @fideliscare and on Facebook at facebook.com/ fideliscare.
COMMUNITY
Evening of Honor At a fundraiser at Westchester Broadway Theatre in Elmsford to benefit the Hudson Valley Honor Flight,WBT donated a portion of all ticket sales for the opening night of SOUTH PACIFIC. The $10,000. total donated was to sponsor the October 18th inaugural flight from Westchester, with the second flight following in April of 2015. WBT owners Bob Funking and Bill Stutler received a proclamation of merit
from County Executive Rob Astorino for their efforts on behalf of the veterans. The October 18th Flight was a mission accomplished! CDR Bob Foster of VFW Post 228 said, “Transporting 186 people across the country and well over 200 throughout a city, half with physical handicaps, is an engineering marvel at best and we did it. What a team we have! As always, I was touched to the deepest part of my heart
WBT Presents 10,000. check to Honor Flights. L-R CDR Bob Foster, VFW Post 2285; Fred Abatangelo, Hudson Valley Honor Flight; Bob Funking, Owner; Vito Pinto, WC Veterans Agency; Morgan Rappe, Edgemont HS Senior Veterans Club; Frank Kimler, Hudson Valley Honor Flight Executive Board; Bill Skennion, Hudson Valley Honor Flight; Bill Stutler, Owner
L-R CDR Bob Foster, VFW Post 2285; Bob Funking, Owner; Bill Stutler, Owner; Fred Abatangelo, Hudson Valley Honor Flight; Vito Pinto, WC Veterans Agency; Bill Skennion, Hudson Valley Honor Flight; Frank Kimler, Hudson Valley Honor Flight Executive Board
by each veteran I spoke to and laughed with throughout the day. Also laughing with you all about some of the funny stuff that happened along the way was priceless.” Hudson Valley Honor Flight is a nonprofit created solely to honor America’s veterans for all their sacrifices. We transport our heroes to Washington, D.C. to visit and reflect at their memorials at no cost to the
veterans. Honor Flight Network recognizes American veterans for their sacrifices and achievements by flying them to Washington, D.C. to see their memorials at no cost. Top priority is given to World War II and terminally ill veterans from all wars. In the future, Honor Flight Network will be expanded to include Korean War and Vietnam War veterans. In order for Honor
Flight Network to achieve this goal, guardians fly with the veterans on every flight providing assistance and helping veterans have a safe, memorable and rewarding experience. For what our veterans have sacrificed and have given to us, we consider what we do a small token of appreciation!
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
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GOVERNMENT
November’s Elections Won’t Resolve Much of Anything Oct 1 2014: Unless the recent election talk of bipartisanship and finding common ground becomes a reality, dysfunction and lack of productivity in Congress is likely to continue. Members of Congress are home now, campaigning for the upcoming elections. Their messages are all over the map, and for a good reason: they have very little to brag about. The Congress that just recessed until after the elections makes the 80th — the one that Harry Truman blasted as “do-nothing” — look like a paragon of productivity. This year’s members did manage to avoid a shutdown, but that’s about all. Congressional leaders spent the better part of the year avoiding tough votes. They didn’t pass an annual budget. They made no pretense of weighing U.S. policy against ISIS or, really, any other foreign or defense policy issue. They didn’t tackle immigration reform, climate change, tax reform, the minimum wage, or domestic surveillance. They passed fewer bills than any other Congress in 60 years. In the 3 ½ months between the beginning of August and mid-November, they’ll have been in session all of 10 days. Small wonder that voters are in a sour mood when it comes to Washington. They want to see our elected leaders tackling issues that confront the country. They want less partisanship. They don’t understand government’s frequent failures, and crave more competence. On every front, the people they’ve elected have disappointed them. This may be why there is no dominant theme in this year’s elections: voters seem more focused on a variety of issues than on one dominant issue. Apathy is high and we are headed for low voter turnout, even by the standards of mid-term elections. Voter outrage at Congress is not translating into a message of rejecting incumbents. This has made the tone of the election rather interesting. Candidates appear to have picked up on voters’ dislike of mean-spirited campaigning, and for the most part are showing restraint. The deeply partisan politics we saw in 2010 and 2012 has abated. Where a couple of years ago there was heated talk of storming the gates in Washington
and potentially shutting the government down, that kind of campaigning is just a memory this year. Candidates may not be embracing Washington, but they’re not attacking it as they once did. There’s even talk of bipartisanship and building bridges, sentiments that were nearly invisible in recent years. Given President Obama’s lack of popularity, there’s a general sense among members of the political class that Republicans have an edge in the election and may well take over the Senate. A battle to control the Senate can have significant consequences, yet it’s unlikely that much will change on Capitol Hill in the near term. Mid-term elections are usually about the President, and Republicans are largely content in this election to attack him, while Democrats are content talking about anything but the President. Even if the Senate majority changes hands, it will do so only narrowly. Given that a party needs 60 votes there to accomplish much of anything, whoever controls the Senate will be able to maneuver only on the margins; resolving tough issues head-on will be difficult, maybe impossible. Unless the recent election talk of bipartisanship and finding common ground becomes a reality, in other words, the dysfunction and lack of productivity that have become defining characteristics of Congress in recent years are likely to continue. This is ironic, because large amounts of money are being poured into the fall elections, especially in races for the Senate. You’d almost think transformational policies were at stake. In truth, though, these elections are more of a run-up to the presidential race in 2016.
And even then, the attention on the Senate is probably misplaced. Polls are showing that a number of gubernatorial seats are likely to switch hands in both directions, and if anything this year’s 36 gubernatorial contests will have more of an impact on politics two years from now than what happens in the Senate. In short, whatever happens on Election Day this year, it’s unlikely that much will change in its wake. This may hardly be the most important election of our lifetimes, but the business that Congress left unfinished is still waiting. The nation needs an elected leadership capable of rolling up its sleeves and meeting our challenges head-on right now, not a few years hence. Lee Hamilton is Director of the Center on Congress at Indiana University. He was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives for 34 years. For information about our educational resources and programs, explore our website at www.centeroncongress.org. Go to Facebook to share your thoughts about Congress, civic education, and the citizen’s role in representative democracy. “Like” us on Facebook at “Center on Congress at Indiana University.”
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THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
RELIGION
The Perversity of Righteousness—A 180-Degree Moral Shift By Luke Hamilton It is downright difficult to shock or awe anyone anymore. The convergence of instant-media platforms and invisible data networks, which connect these platforms to millions of eyeballs, means that anything which happens in the world is eligible for prime time. Like most situations involving groups of anonymous strangers interacting with each other, the trash floats to the top. Our palates have grown jaded and calloused, taught to seek the thrill which lies just beyond the boundary of social approbation. The slope becomes more slippery the further we slide down the hill, increasing the pace and inertia of our demise. Once-forbidden debauchery now sells clothing lines, attracts prime-time viewers, garners political support, spawns lucrative charities, and dominates headline, byline, and through-line of our news cycle. Shocking is mundane and the outrageous is normal. There is however one way guaranteed to get the panties of the masses in a collective bundle: mention Christ, the Bible, God, or His people; elaborate on His plan of salvation for a sinful and fallen mankind; affirm the exclusivity of the Christian message in the words of Christ Himself, (“Enter by the narrow gate, for wide is the gate and broad is the way which leads to destruction,” Matt 7:13). Should you communicate this simple message to the right audience you will soon find yourself, like Abraham Van Helsing, holding aloft a torch in a dank and dusty crypt, surrounded a horde of snarling individuals, intent on your demise. Because righteousness is the new depravity. Purity has become debauched. Proof of this exists all around us. Public schools in Chicago announced last year that they are mandating the teaching of Sex Ed—for Kindergarteners. This material is to include homosexual relationships.
Apparently, 5-year olds need to know about sodomy. Parents in Freemont, California recently forced the removal of a Sex Ed curriculum that sought to teach 9th graders about bondage and sex toys. The maddening thing is that instead of being treated like the perverse ideas they are, these initiatives (and others like them) clearly have the support of their school district administrators or they would never have gotten off the ground in the first place. The sexualization of children is now an educational goal. The flipside of this coin are the stories of children being suspended from school for saying “God bless you” to a classmate. Little ones being told they are forbidden from reading their Bibles during elective reading periods. A young girl being sent to change out of her “Virginity Rocks!” t-shirt because it’s too sexual. These stories have happened and will continue to happen as the moral poles of our society continue their 180-degree shift. Outside of the school room, those who stand for righteousness are attacked even more viciously. Phil Robertson, the patriarch of the Duck Dynasty clan, was suspended from his television show for stating his religious belief regarding human sexuality in a magazine interview. Tim Tebow, after openly speaking about the faith which drives him and his commitment to remain sexually-pure before marriage, finds himself blacklisted in the NFL. This was clearly not a “football decision” since the Jets kept Mark Sanchez on the roster. Chick-fil-A was roundly derided when its founder declared his honest support for traditional marriage. Hobby Lobby has been the target of ridicule and derision ever since it sued the Obama Administration in order to avoid being forced to subsidize abortifacient birth control for its employees. The list grows longer daily, of individuals and companies who are ostracized for their attempts to manifest a God-honoring position in their lives and businesses.
The light borne by groups and individuals who seek the righteousness of God is a powerful stimulant. The light illuminates the darkness and makes those who lurk there painfully aware of their iniquity. Consequentially, the source is attacked, in an attempt to shutter the light and plunge back into the unmolested darkness. Some of those who have carried light into the darkness go astray because they mistakenly believe that the light they bear is the light of their own righteousness. It is not. It is the light of Christ. The best we can hope to become is a faithful mirror. Just as the moon has no
effulgence of its own but reflects the light of the sun, believers have no intrinsic righteousness of our own but reflect the righteousness of the Son. Make no mistake, carrying His light into the darkness isn’t a quest undertaken only by the brave or the adventurous. It is a command for every believer to fulfill in his lifetime. The bare minimum of our commission is to be prepared, as the Apostle Peter commands, to give a reason for the hope within us to whomever asks. Sadly, we no longer have to venture far to fulfill this mission, as the darkness envelops us
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where we stand. Simply standing for His truth in today’s world is enough to attract the enemies of righteousness and beckon to those who have gone astray in the moral twilight in which we are mired. How does this duty to bear God’s light into the world square with the modern world’s assessment of objective truth as offensive? It doesn’t. After all, truth is offensive to who have a stake in a lie. The question to consider is, do we believe the Gospel to be the truth? If we do not, then why claim to believe it? If we do, then what shame can be had in bringing it to others? These thoughts and questions are asked honestly and with abundant introspection. Standing for God’s righteousness is not something which comes easily to anyone, even though there are those who seem naturally suited to it. If it was easily done, we wouldn’t have to fight toothand-nail to try to protect righteousness from being replaced by sacrilegious debauchery. Yet fight we must. “If sinners be damned, at least let them leap to Hell over our dead bodies. And if they perish, let them perish with our arms about their knees, imploring them to stay. If Hell must be filled, let it be filled in the teeth of our exertions, and let not one go unwarned and un-prayed for.” – C.H. Spurgeon Luke Hamilton is classically-trained, Shakespearean actor from Eugene, Oregon who happens to be a liberty-loving, rightwing, Christian constitutionalist. When not penning columns for ClashDaily. com, Hamilton spends his time astride the Illinois-Wisconsin border, leading bands of liberty-starved citizens from the progressive gulags of Illinois to [relative] freedom. Hamilton is the creative mind/voice behind Pillar & Cloud Productions, a budding production company which resides at www. PillarCloudProductions.com. He owes all to his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, whose strength is perfected in his weakness.
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
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set forth into motion, a Republic with a Bill of Rights, which protected specific human activity. Men have explored and harnessed the power of the natural world to enhance and advance the human condition. But today it seems as if we are a society are fueled by consumerism and banality. Gone is the wonder. We are force-fed a culture of materialism and vice-chasing. Politics is the art of human manipulation and I am equally as terrified as I am fascinated with the concepts of power, influence and public deception. It’s always good to look at the human element behind any historical context. Take a glimpse at the past because it casts a glow on the present, which will shine a light on the future. I notice that though I try to see the world with amazing clarity, there is so much information and so many moving parts and
variables, that it creates a cloud of distortion. We now have to rely on the accuracy of those who have recorded history and we have to filter through the intentions of those who continually rewrite history. By ignoring politics we inadvertently invite a conjuring of human despotism. When good people turn a blind eye to the madness of others we cannot avoid history from repeating itself… and monsters are reborn. We must remember that before Adolf Hitler, there was a Genghis Khan, and before him, a Nero. Before the Roman Empire, there was a Roman Republic. Monsters among men are not new to history. This is why we must pay attention to the patterns of the past and the trends of our history - or else we are doomed to repeat them. This is why, I now admit to myself, I am into politics. Follow on Twitter @kurtcolucci
GOVERNMENT/COMMENTARY
Are You “Into Politics?” By KURT COLUCCI I think most readers of this newspaper are politically conscious and at the least socially aware. These are two characteristics that I assign to myself, if not out of necessity, at least for humor. Friends, family and co-workers frequently come to me for advice on politics or social commentary in an attempt to make sense out of current events. They say
things like “well, you are into politics”. This is usually the point where I take a step back and withdraw into a moment of selfreflection, draw a deep breath and attempt to trick myself into believing that I’m not “into politics.” I am, however, fascinated by complex human relationships and amazed by how current events are carved out from the past and how they will affect our future. I’m focused on, and interested in, the management of human action and human ability. There is no escaping politics in our modern day. Politics has become the art of human manipulation, a sort of a modern-day black magic where competing groups work diligently to trick people into believing that the illusion of choice is real. Our present and our future are both grossly affected by politics and legislation. Whether we pay attention to “politics” or not, we all feel its effects eventually. I, like many readers of this newspaper, am fascinated with the history of our species
and the evolution of human relationships. Human relations have always been very a unique, confusing and fascinating study to me. This leads me to the central question of this writing: what is the origin of government and the resulting political structure? Our species has evolved from small groups of hunter-gatherers who banded together for the sake of securing their own survival. They applied their human energy in a collective effort to fight off predators in an attempt to survive the terrifying elements of the natural world.
Our attempt to organize society precedes anatomically modern human beings. Throughout history, some peoples have had, and Asian nomads still have, portable living structures; this is an amazing concept. This was an invention borne out of necessity because early humans were nomads and hunter-gatherers. It was necessary for humans to organize and compromise, to achieve a new type of social structure, in order to coordinate human action for the sake of survival. Did they call this primitive organization government? Who knows? The bottom line is simple. People have worked together for the sake of surviving the harsh natural world, which is as beautiful as it is unforgiving. There is an elusive nature to the concept or study of man’s quest to harness the power of the collective, in order to serve the needs of society as a whole. In our modern day it may seem counter-productive, but at one point in our existence it was
a harsh necessity. Here’s the quick breakdown of events: Long ago, when people were huntergatherers fighting the elements of the natural world and the predators within it, including other human beings, people had to organize because they were stronger as a group, than they were as individuals. Eventually our ancestors learned to cultivate the land and with the advent of agriculture and irrigation systems, were able to plant their feet in one static geographic area. This ultimately gave rise to cities and markets, which allowed for production and safe and consistent trade. A greater civility evolved from this as standardization of weights and measures allowed for efficient trade. Roads for easy travel emerged. As cities grew bigger people began to identify with a specific geographic area, creating boundaries around lands that were governed in a certain manner. At times there were conflicts between these governed territories. Looking back through history we can see that the organization of human energy created something that could be to be manipulated. Diverse communication systems, which started as cave drawings and ultimately evolved into the complex satellite data transmissions that we see today, allowed for the forging of mass consent. This is what I consider to be the beginning of political evolution. Those of us who pay attention to human interaction are labeled “political” as if this label is some sort of badge of dishonor, almost a societal Scarlet letter around our necks. Far too often we hear people say “I don’t get into politics.” My question to this is usually “why? Why wouldn’t you want to learn your past to understand your present condition and more accurately predict your future? The fact that anyone would willfully ignore their current human condition and all the influencing factors that affect their future amazes me. I fall victim to the belief that politics is nothing more than the collective administration of human energy. This includes laws for societal organization and the enforcement of these laws. But politics is a lot more than just public administration-after all that is the role of government. And there can be no government without politics. There is always an underlying philosophy to how a society is governed. Whether it’s the ideology of self-government or centralized control by a state. The founders of the American Republic tried to find a balance between a central authority and individual autonomous states, able to make their own decisions locally through a Democratic process; the rule of law being the highest ideal. That is why the founders
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THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
Creative Disruption
It’s Not All Bad, Is It? – No, but … by John F. McMullen A resounding NO to whether it is all bad– but, unfortunately, you’d never know from today’s news. We read or, more likely, see on television, usually only of the beheadings, Ebola crisis, murders, racial unrest, cop shootings, high profile rapes. car-jackings, etc. It is the awful incidents that get our attention while good news goes under our radar. Harvard professor, Steven Pinker, an experimental psychologist, cognitive scientist, linguist, and popular science author, writes in the Preface to his 2012 book, “The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined,” “Believe it or not – and I know that most people do not – violence has declined over long stretches of time, and today we may be living in the most peaceful era in our species’ existence. The decline, to be sure, has not been smooth; it has not brought violence down to zero; and it is not guaranteed to continue. But it is an unmistakable development, visible on scales from millennia to years, from the waging of wars to the spanking of children.” Granted, Pinker wrote this before the outrageous brutality of ISIS and the bombing, rocket launches, and drone strikes by the US and its partners and these actions may have affected (or not)
his designation of this as “the most peaceful era in our species’ existence” but the study is voluminous, impressive, encompasses from prehistory to the 21st Century and is well worthy of our attention. Professor Hans Rosling is, with Raymond Kurzweil, in all probability, the individual whose TED Talks are watched annually by the most viewers in the world. TED (“Technology, Entertainment, and Design”) talks (www.ted.com), started in 1984 with regular conferences beginning in 1990 throughout the world. The presenters have included Bono, Bill Clinton, Joan Goodall, Bill Gates, Malcolm Gladwell, Richard Dawkins, Google founders Larry Page & Sergey Brin, Kurzweil, and Rosling – each presenter is allowed 18 minutes to present her / his / their case. Since June 2006, the talks have been available for free watching on-line and, as of April 2014, there were 1,700 talks available on-line (on November 13, 2012, the number of viewings passed the one billion mark). Rosling is a Swedish medical doctor, academic, statistician, Professor of International Health at Karolinska Institute and co-founder & chairman of the Gapminder Foundation (www. gapminder.org/). The foundation has developed powerful graphic presentation tools to display statistics in a non-dry,
interesting manner (the main tool is available for free use at the web site). Using this Gapminder tool, Rosling gave a fifty-nine minute presentation on the BBC, “DON’T PANIC — The Facts About Population: The world might not be as bad as you might believe!” on November 7, 2013 (www.gapminder.org/videos/dontpanic-the-facts-about-population/#. VDXU3ZUtDX4” in which he showed that the world can support the projected world population growth. In September 2010, Rosling had given a TED Talk, “The good news of the decade?” (www.ted.com/talks/hans_ rosling_the_good_news_of_the_decade/ transcript), in which he reviewed the progress made throughout the world in response to the United Nations’ “Millennium Development Goals.” There were specific goals laid out in eight areas: “End Poverty,” “Gender,” “Maternal Health,” “Child Health,” “Environment,” “Control of Infection,” “Education,” and “Global Links Between Nations.” Rosling said “I like these development goals, and that is because each and every one is measured” and took the audience though a detailed statistical analysis which showed that the 2000-2009 decade demonstrated real progress in all of these areas (it must be pointed out that these figures were compiled before the Ebola outbreak and we now see
problems in the worldwide attempt to control infections). Bringing the analysis closer to home, we only have to look at President Obama’s October 2nd talk on US economic progress at Northwestern University in Chicago (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/03/ us/politics/in-illinois-speech-obamatrumpets-economic-successes.html -- the video of the speech is at this site as well as the New York Times reporting on the talk). In the talk, the president said “What I want people to know is that there are some really good things happening in America,” ticking off progress in energy self-sufficiency, manufacturing numbers, health care costs and other areas. Some of the points that he made: •B usinesses have added more than 10 million jobs in the last 54 months, the largest job growth in our history. • The deficit has gone from 9.8% to near 3% in the president’s time in office. • The policies of the administration slowed the growth in health care costs while “helping more Americans gain quality affordable health coverage. We’ve reduced the uninsured rate among adults by 26%, bringing health coverage to more than 10.3 million people.” • “Our High School Graduation Rate is the highest it’s ever been.” • “Unprecedented investments have been made in clean energy” with Wind Power Tripling and Solar Power Increasing Tenfold.
Republicans and Democrats to the left of President Obama will certainly question these figures and will attempt to debunk them, maintaining that other policies would have produced even greater improvement. The fact remains, however, that these figures look pretty good – and, if they could have been better, that’s great too. So we have three looks at different aspects of the world’s current position and that of the United States and they all indicate that things are far from as bad as they seem from our watching of the nightly news. There are, however, underlying challenges that we must face as we go forward – and these are the ones that this column has focused on since its beginnings, 130 columns ago. Technological innovation had led to the creation of a substantial number of high-paying quality jobs while eliminating many more across the board (from high paid executives at Kodak to bank tellers, checkout clerks, factory workers as well as middle managers across all industries). Since these workers are scattered all over and not-concentrated in any particular Congressional District, this aspect of economic change has not received the attention it so richly deserves (there is now a National Science Foundation project charged with investigating the impact of technological change). Additionally, since many of the displaced are either too old,
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THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
Page 11
administrative functions could be spread across the large firm. Now, the feeling that is coming into vogue is that smaller entities focused more narrowly will be more profitable and, in addition to HP (and EMC, already under pressure from investors to split), there are calls for DuPont and Pepsi to also separate functions into different companies. The surprising fact (at least to me) is that the HP split will result in the laying off of 50,000 people (HP’s figure; industry analysts estimate 55,000). To keep this number in perspective, Google’s total number of employees
is about 49,000 – so HP is laying off more people than Google employs! The message, then, really is that the picture is more complex than it may seem. The good news is that things aren’t anywhere nearly as bad as the television presents but buried under that statement is the fact that we have a lot of work to do in both understanding the new complex problems brought on by technological innovation and then dealing with them.
changers normally happen under our personal radar until we find that the world as we knew it is no more.
that even the best states have only a tiny fraction of their students equipped for the rigors of the industry. The highest-performing state, Maryland, saw just over 1% of the class of 2013 pass the AP Computer Science exam (defined as receiving a score of 3 or higher on the 5 point scale). North Carolina, which falls in the middle of the pack, saw fewer than 3 in 1000 students pass. Louisiana, the lowest-performing state that still had a passing student, saw just 4 students in 10,000 pass the exam. Two states- Wyoming and Mississippi saw zero students pass. A look at the performance of traditionally underrepresented groups in computer science is even more sobering: as Education Week affirms, in some states, “no female, AfricanAmerican, or Hispanic students took the Advanced Placement exam in computer science.15 Improving access to and success in AP computer Science courses is critical to preparing students for the jobs of today and tomorrow. An online petition started by the non-profit Code.org encouraged citizens to sign “if you think every student in every school should have the opportunity to learn computer science.” As of early 2014, more than 1million people had signed, while more than 20 million people worldwide completed the program’s Hour of Code. During Computer Science Education Week in December 2013, Code.org announced a partnership with Chicago Public Schools (CPS) to make computer science a core subject (as opposed to merely an elective) in CPS schools.16 In Wisconsin, Governor Scott Walker signed a bill that would increase the number of credits in math and science a high school student needed to graduate, while permitting computer science classes to count for the math requirement.17 Alabama followed suit, meaning 16 states total allow computer science courses to satisfy high school math requirements.18 Such trends are encouraging developments and show the steps
thoughtful state leaders can take.The business community would do well to use their voices to advocate for continuing this push. To read the complete report, visit: www.
Creative Disruption
It’s Not All Bad, Is It? – No, but … Continued from page 10
too uneducated for the new higher level jobs being created, or, unfortunately, too unintelligent for the new tasks, many do not show up in unemployment figures as they either give up altogether or take much lower paying jobs (often creating mortgage problems or limiting their children’s opportunities). There are also changes caused by our new mobile social media technology which some observers see as very negative.
This series has dwelled on these issues previously and will return to them next week. Finally, there is the “out-of-nowhere” push for major companies to split their firms to allow unconfused focus on specific activities – Question: “Is Hewlett-Packard a services company or a manufacturer of desktop systems?” Answer: “The question will soon be moot as HP is split in two companies.” Consolidations used to be pushed with the idea that a large company would have a savings in personnel as
Creative Disruption is a continuing series examining the impact of constantly accelerating technology on the world around us. These
Comments on this column to johnmac13@ gmail.com John F. McMullen is a writer, poet, college professor and radio host. Links to other writings, Podcasts, & Radio Broadcasts at www. johnmac13.com, his books are available on Amazon, and he blogs at http://open.salon.com/ blog/johnmac13. © 2014 John F. McMullen
EDUCATION
Leaders and Laggards
The US Chamber of Commerce Foundation Report 2014 This week, we excerpt page 36 of the U. S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation Report: Leaders and Laggards 2014, which examines the effectiveness of schools, nationally to prepare students for high-tech jobs in computer programming:
Similarly, in a 2012 survey of students and employers, the National Association of Colleges and Employers found that 52% of the 196 major companies it surveyed were hiring in the field of computer science. 12 The BLS found similar high pay and high
Schools Failing to Prepare Students in Computer Science
growth rates for computer and information systems managers (18% growth predicted by 2020 and an average salary of $115,780 per year),13 computer programmers (12% growth and $71,380 per year), computer systems analysts (22% growth and $77,740 per year),14 and database administrators (31% growth and $73,490 per year).14 In other words, in a wide array of computer science- related professions, anticipated growth in jobs and salaries suggests a burgeoning and lucrative field – not to mention a necessary one in a 21st century economy. Unfortunately, a look at passage rates on the Advanced Placement Computer Science exam – one measure of student preparedness for these fields in high school- demonstrates
Large technology firms like Google, Microsoft, Apple, Facebook, and Twitter have spurred significant growth in the American Economy. These companies hire large numbers of employees who are trained in computer science, pay them well, and position them to create new and innovative products that make all of our lives better. These major players are not alone. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) predicts a 30% increase in demand for software developers by 2020 (a growth rate they call “much faster than average” for the labor market as a whole). Estimated average pay for software developers was $90,530 per year in 2010.11
Sleep-Away Camp
uschamber.com. This article is printed with written permission from The U. S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation, 1615 H Street, NW Washington, DC 20062-2000
Page 12
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
Arts/EntertainmentSection LITERATURE
The Song of Rest By Najah Muhammad Ryan Sitting at an angle on the window ledge, she was overtaken by the sound of rain tiptoeing on the terrace. It was tapping in harmony with the time on the ticking clock, parallel to where she was sitting. The young women gazed longingly at the half moon, as its dim light barely seemed to touch the right side of her face, neck, and the top of her shoulder. Illuminating
in the near distance were a few candles, just bright enough that one could faintly notice the deep blue color of the hallway walls. Blue like the sea-- for in that moment it was a dark and rich passage. The clouds grew heavy and so did her thoughts; so did her eyes. Each blink became one step closer to eternal rest. They were slow and sumptuous, keeping the beat bass of the sounds around her
like the West African Doundounba; drumming, drumming. She began to hear the echo of her soul; a somewhat ritualistic groove. Each sound began interweaving; pounding open and shut like hand on drum. The rain sounded like a brekete, the clock a kenkeni, her heart a dun dun, and the sound of the tussling trees became shekeres. Each sound played out the pulse of her thoughts, her breath and her heart; an equally taunting yet soothing melody. From her peripheral vision she saw the muffled reflections of the glinting
candles dancing around her, similar to how the Iroquois and Chippewa dance the circle of fire. In her final moments she was alone, but not completely forsaken, for she had the rain, the clock, the candles, the trees, her heart, the moon, and the night. Together they were the most beautiful lullaby; the gentlest guide. Surely the women drifted away at the final shut of her eyes; and let go into the sound of peace, the song of rest. ©Najah Muhammad Ryan 2014
OPERA
Taconic Opera Commences 17th Season With Verdi’s Falstaff Yorktown, NY: Taconic Opera opens its 17th Season with Giuseppe Verdi’s final opera, Falstaff, based on Shakespeare’s hilarious comedy, The Merry Wives of Windsor. After an illustrious career in dramatic opera and being considered its undisputed king in his day, the composer actually came out of retirement in order to add a comedic gem to his crown. Unlike his earlier “bel canto” operas, Falstaff is a “verismo” opera in which the orchestra becomes as vital
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and important as the singers. For audiences and singers, Falstaff is considered a comedic masterpiece. The company is bringing back Jorge Ocasio in the title role. Ocasio has been the funny-man (buffo) in the company’s recent productions of Italian Girl in Algiers, Daughter of the Regiment and Don Pasquale, and has induced audience reactions from genuinely amused chuckling to outright explosions of laughter. He is a comedic master who is thoroughly engaging during every moment on stage. The rest of the cast match him in both singing and acting ability and create an unbeatable ensemble. Performances will be held at the Yorktown Stage, 1974 Commerce St., Yorktown Heights, NY on Saturday, October 18 at 8:00 pm and Sunday, October 19 at 2:00 pm. A wide range of ticket prices are available and significant reductions are offered for seniors. To encourage youth attendance, student prices are only $15 regardless of seating selection. For more information or to purchase tickets, visit the company website at www.taconicopera. org or call the toll-free number: (855) 88-OPERA (855-886-7372).
Opera For Children
Over the past 16 Seasons, Taconic Opera has reached out to as many as 6000 school children a year in their
schools. In addition, since the year 2000, over 10,000 children have attended our mainstage operas (the same one’s that our adults attend) at special Thursday morning performances set aside especially for schools. During these performance, The cast, orchestra, technical help all get off of work and donate their time so that children can be exposed to this art form. Dan Montez, General Director of Taconic Opera, founded the company in Westchester in 1997 so that he could have a career in Opera, without traveling all over the world. Mr. Montez is a professional tenor and he has sung principal roles in over 50 productions on stages that include Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall and the San Francisco Opera. Additionally, Mr. Montez has also performed in numerous oratorios and recitals throughout the United States. Mr. Montez is also an accomplished stage director, composer of two oratorios: Enoch and Jonah, and author. Some of his recent books include: Don’t Believe It: How to follow your dreams in spite of those who say you can’t; Singing For Your Supper: What they don’t teach you in school about an opera career; and Singing in Your Sleep: The personality you will need to have a career in Opera.
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
Page 13
EYE ON THEATRE
Flummoxed Playwright, Autistic Youth By JOHN SIMON It’s Only a Play
A persistent rumor has it that the uncouth drama critic in Terrence McNally’s “It’s Only a Play” is based on me. First seen Off Broadway in 1986, the comedy is now on Broadway, brilliantly directed by Jack O’Brien on Scott Pask’s opulent set.
Playright Terrence McNally
We are in the bedroom of Julia Budden (based on Irene Selznick—all the characters are caricatures of real people), which serves as cloakroom for the offstage opening-night party for the latest play by Pater Askin (i.e., McNally), a prospective flop. The legendary guests are named by Gus, the young coatroom attendant with grand ambitions, as he brings in their expensive, often eccentric, garments soon to be a monumental pile. McNally has effectively updated the play with contemporary figures and references. Thus Gus’s remark, “I am pretty sure I saw Rosie O’Donnell talking to the Pope.” On comes James Wicker, a ham actor friend of the playwright’s, now uncast because of an ongoing role on a seemingly everlasting TV series. He being able to do the lead so much better or, failing that, casting Harvey Fierstein (whom he cleverly impersonates) or at least Nathan Lane (who he is, playing Wicker). The text is not short on sexual and homosexual jokes, and even his being repeatedly misaddressed as Wacker takes on lewd implications of wanker. A
Continued on page 14
Nathan Lane and Rupert Grint in “It’s Only A Play”
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Page 14
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
EYE ON THEATRE
Flummoxed Playwright, Autistic Youth Continued from page 13
major butt of jokes is the theater critic Ira Drew, some of whose murderous putdowns we hear, though I must protest that I do not write plays and peddle them under a pseudonym. The boudoir harbors the telephone, on which countless supposedly private calls are made to newspapers, agents and friends with typically catty wit. “It’s Only a Play,” however, is funny even if you don’t know on whom everyone is based. Even I am not sure who is the model for the stage and screen diva,
foulmouthed Virginia Noyes (think noise!), just released from jail and wearing a court-assigned ankle bracelet that sounds off most inappropriately. (Tallulah Bankhead perhaps?). Also present is the director of the evening’s fiasco, a famous but pottymouthed British import soon to be knighted, outlandishly clad and behaved. And there is the befuddled author, Askin, unable to overcome his begetting a turkey, and in a state of perpetual, melancholy daze. As Wicker-Wacker, Nathan Lane
is majestically grandiose, his every expression and gesture—even his silences—unremittingly uproarious. As the injured, suffering playwright, Matthew Broderick is almost as funny. As Virginia Noyes, baritone-voiced Stockard Channing, makes bitchy pomposity uncommonly endearing. With her tricky voice, Megan Mullally flutters imperiously as a skittish grande dame; as a snarky directorial wunderkind, Britisher Rupert Grint is all pretentious precocity; as Gus, Micah Stock is exemplarily besotted. F. Murray Abraham makes a diabolic drama critic much grander than I could ever dream to be. Admiring mention must be made of
Ann Roth’s unfailingly droll costumes, Lady Gaga’s being a comedic knockout. Altogether, McNally has written a joyously absurd farce, with characters both appalling and appealing, as only a play by a master can make them.
The Curious Adventure of the Dog in the Night-time
I may be more old guard than avantgarde, but I find “The Curious Adventure of the Dog in the Night-time” a little too determined, not to say hell-bent, to amaze and shock. Innovation is all very well, but less so when it proves obsessive and distracting.
Rupert Grint, Megan Mullally, Matthew Broderick, Nathan Lane and Stockard Channing in “It’s Only A Play”
With its Conan Doyle-inspired title, this is the story of Christopher Boone, a small-town autistic fifteen-year-old, mathematically savant but humanly idiot. His beloved dog, Wellington, has been murdered—a garden fork protruding from his corpse—and the boy is determined to track down the killer. He proceeds to “detectivize” with seemingly impeccable logic, but his autism forbids his being touched, entering other people’s dwellings, and not fearing innocuous bystanders as threatening strangers. He likes being alone in tight places, and would enjoy being an astronaut on a spacecraft with
Continued on page 15
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
Page 15
EYE ON THEATRE
Flummoxed Playwright, Autistic Youth Continued from page 14
preferably no one else on it. But he must find the dog killer first. There is his annoying father, Ed, who keeps telling him to keep his nose out of other people’s business, and his pathetic mother, Judy, in hospital for a minor ailment, but there killed by a stroke. Or so his father tells him. In fact, she was having an affair with a married neighbor, and is now living with him in London. Although scared of trains, Christopher takes one to London. He finds his mother, eventually getting her to return to their burg, where he will also be in time for an advanced math test enabling him to get to university and a career beyond. His one good angel is Siobhan, the special education teacher who got him to keep a helpful diary, from which he and she take turns
reading aloud. All this, which sometimes makes fun of being a play, is adapted from a novel by Mark Haddon, told in the first person, and probably more easily digested. Adapted somewhat chaotically for the stage by Simon Stephens, it indulges in every conceivable fantastic device. Thus the three permanent walls constitute a grid of squares, some of which are pigeonholes from which all sorts of things emerge, to combine with prodigious projections and yield the wildest agglomeration. The floor, a similar grid, allows Christopher to draw on it in chalk, run a toy train over it, and al race across it in reversible patterns. This only begins to convey the oddest assortment of cluttering phenomena, notably a bunch of cubes that minor characters keep breathlessly rearranging in variously suggestive configurations, when they are not lofting
the boy skyward and toying with him, or just sitting ominously around the edges of the set. The dialogue is suitably fanciful, as for example Christopher’s “I see everything. Most other people are lazy. They do what is called glancing, which is the same word for bumping off something and carrying on in almost the same direction. And the information in their head is really simple.” The actors are to be congratulated, not least for their good British accents. At this, the highly talented recent Juilliard graduate, a most convincing Christopher, is particularly adept. Expertly directed by Marianne Elliott, the entire cast is impeccable, with Enid Graham ( Judy), Ian Barford (Ed), and Francesca Faridany (Siobhan) particularly outstanding. Fine décor and costumes by Bunny Christie, adventurous lighting by Paule Constable, thrilling video by Finn Ross, choreography by . . . but enough of listing the many
collaborators. See it by all means if you relish the bizarre. Otherwise you might just let dead, like sleeping dogs, lie. John Simon has written for over 50 years on theatre, film, literature, music and fine arts for the Hudson Review, New Leader, New Criterion, National Review, New York Magazine, Opera News, Weekly Standard, Broadway.com and Bloomberg News. He reviews books for the New York Times Book Review and Washington Post. To learn more, visit the www.JohnSimonUncensored.com website.
It’s Only A Play
Gerald Schoenfeld Theater 236 West 45th St., New York, NY 10036 Photos: Joan Marcus
The Curious Incident of the Dog in Night-Time Ethel Barrymore Theater 243 W 47th St, New York, NY 10036 Photos: Joan Marcus
Page 16
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
CALENDAR
News and Notes from Northern Westchester By Mark Jeffers
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My wife and I are trying to get in shape for all the wonderful charity walks and runs in the area. The problem is while she is running up hills; I am tiring just lacing up my sneakers! Not to worry though I did manage enough energy to write this week’s “out of shape, but working on it” edition of “News & Notes.” Speaking of walks…the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s Light The Night Westchester Walk will be held on November 1st at Rye Playland. The society funds treatments that are saving the lives of patients today. LLS is making cures happen by providing patient support services, advocacy for lifesaving treatments and the most promising cancer research anywhere. Over at Lasdon Park in Katonah they are having a Terrarium Making Demonstration on Sunday, November 9th, at 2pm, join the horticulturist and learn how to make your own garden in a globe. The 13th Annual St. Patrick’s Golf Outing will be held on Monday, October 20th at the Salem Golf Club, remember keep your left arm straight and head down, that’s what my buddy Brian always tells me when trying to golf. How about some sipping and reading…The Friends of Mahopac Public Library are holding their fourth annual wine tasting on October 16th at Sterling Cellars in Mahopac. Do you have plans on Saturdays in November…you may want to “moo-ve” on this and plan to stop by the Hilltop Hanover Farm in Yorktown Heights and join farm
performances being held at The Katonah Village Library on Friday, November 21st and Saturday, November 22nd, all times are at 8pm. The cast includes Holland Renton of Larchmont, Cyrus Newitt of Bedford Hills and Julie Thaxter-Gourlay of Westport, Conn. The play will be directed by Sam Morell of Armonk. It’s time again for the Fall Foliage Festival presented by the Town of Mt. Pleasant Recreation & Parks Department, it will be held at Broadway Field in Hawthorne on Saturday, October 18th. You know time is flying by when I mention that the Katonah Museum of Art is opening its museum shop for the holidays; the shop is open Tuesday through Sunday until January 4th. The gang over at Muscoot Farm in Somers is presenting a Blacksmithing
Mark Jeffers resides in Bedford Hills, New York, with his wife Sarah, and three daughters, Kate, Amanda, and Claire.
CALENDAR Saturday November 1
MONDAYS - 8:30 AM
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educational director Carol Lake to visit with the cows, and learn about the farm and educational center from an insider’s perspective. The Lions Club of Bedford Hills is very excited to celebrate its 75th year as a vital part of the Bedford Hills and Northern Westchester community on October 18th at 7pm at the Holiday Inn in Mount Kisco. Congratulations and well wishes go out to Bedford’s Hollywood star couple Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds as they are expecting their first child. The Small Town Theatre Company will produce a staged reading of the Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award Best Play “Proof ” at both The Hergenhan Center in Armonk and Katonah Village Library in Katonah. The performances will take place on Friday, November 14th and Saturday, November 15th in Armonk with additional
Workshop, Saturdays in November 1 & 15, 9am to 2pm. Adults 18 and older can learn the basic skills of blacksmithing with craftsman Bill Fitzgerald. Happy Birthday…we hope that everyone will stop in to Charles Department Store in Katonah and help them celebrate 90 years in the business. Like their parents and grandparents before them, Dave and Jim Raneri take pride in serving their customers. The store has a little bit of everything and what they don’t have, they will order for you. Last year my wife was on the hunt for a particular cookie cutter and they had it for her within a week. We are heading out this weekend to pick apples, they are so many great northern Westchester orchards to choose from, and don’t forget to fire down some hot cider… see you next week.
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Pakola R & D, LLC. Articles of Org. filed NY Sec of State (SSNY) 5/23/2014 Office in Westchester Co. SSNY design. Agent of LLC upon whom process may be served. SSNY shall mail copy of process to the LLC 15 Lewis Rd, Irvington, NY 10533. Purpose: Any legal activity
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THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
CULTURAL PERSPECTIVES
Arab Inspirations By Sherif Awad The history between Italy and Egypt goes back to the love story between Cleopatra and Julius Caesar until, centuries later, many Italians came and lived in Cairo and Alexandria, becoming Egyptian residents in a cosmopolitan and contemporary society of the past two centuries. If history books and some historical films spoke about the Arab heritage in Andalucía, fewer reflected the Arab presence in Sicily. Yet, on the other side of the Mediterranean, the travelling Arab cinema and literature has influenced the Sicilian born Aldo Nicosia who now teaches Arabic language and Modern Arabic Literature at the Italian university of Bari. Dr. Nicosia, who also speaks a fluent Arabic with Egyptian slang, has first published in the year 2007 Il Cinema Arabo (The Arab Cinema), a book discussing Arab cinema after writing many articles
about Tunisian poetry, literature, dialectology, cinema, censorship and socio-political issues in the Arab societies. With the same publishing house Carocci, Nicosia recently issued a new book called Il romanzo arabo al cinema (The Arab Novel in Cinema) where he discusses and compares the original text and film adaptation of four novels. A Q&A with the author: SA: First, let us know about Arab heritage in Sicily now and in the past AN: When we speak about Arab heritage in Sicily, first we should have in mind a banal but basic geographic datum: Sicily lies in the heart of the Mediterranean sea, so we share with Arab world same weather, same light of air, same colors, same vegetation, same tastes and ingredients used in cuisine, same behaviors and attitudes in life. Yet many Sicilians ignore or decided to ignore these “facts of similarity”…Why? Maybe because the sea seems to everyone a border bigger than lands and mountains in dividing people.
Moreover, Italian people have an innate trend to be colonized by other nations or cultures, exactly like Arab people. So we forgot where we are found, our neighbors and looked towards northern Europeans models and styles, trying to imitate them in all aspects of life (except food, maybe, at least so far, and democratic values). Many Sicilians ignore the huge effects of Arab conquest of Sicily and the flourishing conditions of the island during the Normand period. Yet, if you consider the Sicilian dialect and the agriculture terminology or surnames or names of places, you feel surrounded by Arab names adapted to rules of Italian phonetics or corrupted by time. To consider the Arab roots of Sicilian civilization are fashionable only when we talk in conferences, as if we talk about something past, gone with the wind. But when Sicilians criticize Arab societies, they just criticize their own ills, such as the lack of personal responsibility, the lack of sense of nation, of public interest, the individualism or the tribalism of social behaviors.” SA: “Why did you develop an interest to study and teach Arabic literature in Italy?” AN: “Many Arab friends have asked me the same question. No one asks you why to choose to study English or French or German, considering that we southern Italians share fewer things with northern Europe (apart from an imagined history or war events) than with Mediterranean people. As I told you before, we turned our back to south and looked towards north, attracted by what is considered on the top. Moreover we see that in every map north is found on the top and south on the bottom, except in al-Idrisi medieval maps. So even Arab friends are surprised from the fact that some persons from Europe could be interested in Arabic history, language, and so on. For me it was more natural and spontaneous to get interested in what my Arab neighbors do, think and live their lives. Even religion differences seem to me a superstructure and not a basic divide as weather conditions, temperatures and common struggles to survive during long centuries with same objective difficulties. Moreover we are an island, so Sicilians were separated by the heart of Europe by sea and long land distances.” SA: “What can you tell us about your students? Why Italian young men and women prefer to study Arabic?” AN: “Since 2003 I had taught Arabic, I mean a language that scholars call Modern Standard Arabic (MSA), just a convention to define a product that is not good to have full communication in the Arab world. Personally I prefer to teach living Arabic languages, the so-called and
Continued on page 18
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THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
CULTURAL PERSPECTIVES
Arab Inspirations Continued from page 17
despised “dialects” (and Arab cinema helps me a lot to achieve that goal). Till 2012, I taught in the university of Catania, so almost all students were Sicilians, except for some of Arab origins, mostly from Tunisia and Morocco. After the events of 9/11, we noticed an increase in Arabic courses enrollment all throughout Italy. Of course Sicilians students who studied history well or were just looking at their facial features in a mirror, decided to study Arabic language and Arab-Islamic civilization, the language of their ancestors. Some choose those subjects out of exoticism, or a kind of fashion. MSA is
tough even for mother tongue Arabs, so you can imagine what means for Italians, so some of them, after a few months, give up, but that is a very normal reaction. Some students choose Arabic, dreaming a well-paid job in Dubai. There are girls who have met boyfriends from Maghreb areas, so they are eager to discover their background cultures. Some boys feed forbidden dreams with eye-winking women, covered by veils, or belly dancers: maybe they don t dare to admit that!” SA: How do you use Arab film in your lectures at the university to teach the Arab language? AN: “I use to project many Arab films (subtitled in English or French or Italian) in my courses of Arabic Modern Literature, representing many different
Author Aldo Nicosia
countries, periods and issues. I find that students need this kind of material to feel themselves more involved in the treated subjects than having to do so with sometimes boring papers and written stuff. The problem is that some students need to be encouraged to visit Arab countries. So cinema could be a visual door to the Arab world for them, or maybe a way to kick their bottoms out of classroom chairs for a full immersion in the Arab culture! Many films I chose were adaptations of wellknown Arabic novels, so I guess it was interesting for students to compare their own film that they had built while reading the novel, and its filmic translations on the big screen.“ SA: In your first book The Arab Cinema, which films you have chosen to discuss? What issues you noticed being depicted in Arab cinema? Il cinema arabo, published in 2007, was the first attempt (as far I know in Italian language) to use cinema as a mirror in which you can see a reflection of all the social, political, cultural history of the Arab world, since the 1967 Naksa till nowadays. In the case of Egypt, the analysis covered a deeper period, since the thirties of the 20th century. I discussed issues such as cultural identity, Arabness, religion, the place of the individual, effect of wars on societies, Palestine, emancipation of woman, censorship, fundamentalism, and many other –isms. It was not easy to squeeze and connect in 128 pages all the events and stories and to select them and eliminate important titles, since I hadn’t in my mind to write a directory of Arab films.” SA: “Now to your new book The Arab Novel in Cinema: What was your criteria in selecting the four novels amongst hundreds of other novels in
Arab literature?” AN: “As I state in the back cover page, I chose Miramar, al-Kitkat and The Yacoubian Building, to cover different phases in the history of Egypt, and to represent different microcosms of it. The source novels are very famous and enjoyed approval and praise from both critic and public. Their adaptations stirred several issues and showed how censorship or autocensorship works in the mind of a director, as intellectual and citizen. The fourth was the 1973 Syrian film Al-makhdu’un (The Duped) by Egyptian director Tewfik Saleh. It was inspired by a Palestinian novel, Men under the Sun, was a personal acknowledgement to the revolutionary force of Ghassan Kanafani’s fiction and Tawfiq Saleh’s art of direction. I consider that, among the four films analyzed, being the best example of adaptation and respect of the spirit of the novelist. I can say that, in some respects, it adds to the novel
source new meanings and shows Arabs the huge culpabilities of authorities in the 1948 nakba. That’s why that film was not broadcast in any Arab country.” SA: “What were the main differences between original text and film adaptation as you compare it in your new book?” AN: “Among the Egyptian films, we can appreciate a certain degree of humor in the first part of the film Miramar, not present at all in the melancholic atmosphere of Mahfouz’s novel. In Yacoubian Building, director Marwan Hamed can be praised for the boldness in visualizing many taboos of Arab societies, such as homosexuality, even if its treatment sounds more stereotyped than in Alaa al-Aswani’s novel. By directing al-Kitkat, Daoud Abdel Sayed created a successful and original piece of art, showing great independence from Ibrahim Aslan’s novel Malek al-Hazin (The Heron). Art is free to express and recreate new atmospheres and concepts, even not connected to the literary source, and in that case no one can use the common cliché that adapted films betray novels.” Born in Cairo, Egypt, Sherif Awad is a film / video critic and curator. He is the film editor of Egypt Today Magazine (www. EgyptToday.com), and the artistic director for both the Alexandria Film Festival, in Egypt, and the Arab Rotterdam Festival, in The Netherlands. He also contributes to Variety, in the United States, and is the film critic of Variety Arabia (http://varietyarabia. com/), in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the Al-Masry Al-Youm Website (http:// www.almasryalyoum.com/en/node/198132) and The Westchester Guardian (www. WestchesterGuardian.com).
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THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
Page 19
Brewing Company, X2O, Slovenia Vodka, Zuppa Restaurant and Lounge, Dolphin Restaurant and Lounge, 66 Main Street, Hudson Park, Anna Artuso’s Pastry Shop, The Yonkers’ Downtown BID, Blue Door
Gallery and Numeric Pictures. Visit the Website: http://yofifest.wix. com to see the screening schedule.
YONKERS FILM FESTIVAL
So Many Films! So Little Time! The Yonkers Film Festival Returns This Weekend
From 6PM Friday, October 17th to Sunday, October 19th, the Yonkers Waterfront will be transformed into a film-lovers fantasy world. More than 75 films will be screened throughout the three-day event, which takes place at the Riverfront Library in Yonkers, across the street from the train station. Ticket holders will be able to chose among features, shorts, documentaries, animation and student work. The festival opens with a Red Carpet Reception on Friday Evening, catered by Chef Peter Kelly and X2O, accompanied by beverages from Slovenia Vodka, Wine in Due Time and Yonkers Brewing Company. The Opening Night Feature is IFC Film’s “God’s Pocket,” which was primarily shot in Yonkers starring the late Philip Seymour Hoffman and also John Turturro. Members of the production team will be on hand for a short Q & A after the film. On Saturday night, the festival will screen Drafthouse films’ “THE DOG,” the real story of the bank robber in Dog Day Afternoon. Attendees will have the opportunity to see many more features, shorts, documentaries, animation and even a midnight movie, throughout the weekend. Saturday and Sunday start with free programs for kids in the morning: G-rated Kid family friendly film selections from KidsFilmFest and fun, educational, film related workshops hosted by the Jacob Burns Film Center. Kids Film Fest
selections will be screened on Saturday 10/18 & Sunday 10/19 at 10:00AM in the 1st floor Auditorium Theater and include short animation, live action and documentary film. The films will repeat throughout the morning. Starting at noon, there are more films, as well as “mini film school” lectures and workshops, including screenwriting (taught by UCLA’s co-chairman of their screenwriting department Hal Ackerman, author of the book “Write Screenplays That Sell”), the animation process (with some of the Blue Sky Studios animation team who made Ice Age, Rio and Epic), How To Break Into The Business, a social media marketing workshop and the famous NY Loves Film Road Show, where attendees have the chance to meet the team from the New York State Governor’s Office for Motion Picture and Television Development during a roundtable discussion of all things productive re: producing in New York State – tax credits, location scouting, finding stages and crew, and more. Whether you’re a first time filmmaker wondering where to start or a veteran producer looking to catch up on the latest, this informal face-to-face Q&A is an invaluable opportunity to Meet Team NY and hear firsthand about all the great things New York State has to offer. And of course, each night will once again end with After-Parties at a nearby restaurant or lounge, offering festival goers a chance to mingle and network with fellow filmmakers and film fans. Yonkers is quickly becoming “Hollywood on the Hudson, thanks to Dave Steck and Patty Schumann,” noted Mayor Mike Spano, who is “proud that the film festival will return to Yonkers for a second year.” YoFi Fest is presented in part through the generous support of The City of Yonkers, The Yonkers Film Office, Westchester County Tourism & Film, AT&T, ASR Group/Domino Sugar, Sound Associates, Generation Yonkers, Empire City Casino, Cross County Shopping Center, Yonkers Tennis Center,
Yonkers Contracting Company, The Jacob Burns Film Center, Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, KidsFilmFest, Metro-North Railroad, McLean Avenue Merchants Association, Wine In Due Time, Yonkers
Page 20
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, OCTOBER 16, 2014
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