The Villager • March 10, 2016

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The Paper of Record for Greenwich Village, East Village, Lower East Side, Soho, Union Square, Chinatown and Noho, Since 1933

March 10, 2016 • $1.00 Volume 86 • Number 10

Curtain comes down on 2nd Ave. standby the Stage Restaurant BY TINA BENITEZ-EVES

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ima bean soup and challah bread “was the jam,” said Jonathan Jones, a former East Villager, remembering the Stage Restaurant, which officially closed for good earlier this month. A longtime tenant of 128 Second Ave. — Stage’s home

for more than three decades — Jones was a regular customer of the Polish eatery for more than a decade, and even had a signature dish made specially for him by Stage proprietor Roman Diakun. Over the years, locals and visitors alike indulged in Stage’s pierogies — potato, STAGE continued on p. 4

Purple, pedicabs, a push for recycling: A look back at New York’s ‘Eco ’80s’ BY BILL WEINBERG

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eceived in the mail this week, from the wilds of New Hampshire — a historical and cultural offering from a member of the East Village diaspora, dispersed from its urban homeland by the forces of gentrification. To wit, Carl Hultberg, my E. Fourth St.

neighbor and buddy of many years, now a cabin-hermit in the Great North Woods. The five-volume set of monographs is collectively entitled “Garden of Eden: The Eco Eighties in New York City,” and mostly consists of Carl’s photography from the era, with a big emphasis on ECO ’80S continued on p. 24

PHOTO BY MILO HESS

Hillary Clinton speaking at the Javits Center last Wednesday, the day after her Super Tuesday victories.

Lookin’ for love on the Hillary trail BY SARAH FERGUSON

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aybe the flickering image of an Amex gold card projected onto the Jacob Javits Center’s glass walls should have warned me that even when Hillary tries to go populist, she does so with a certain corporate veneer. Billed as an “organizing event” in the wake of her Super Tuesday wins, Clinton’s appearance at Manhattan’s West Side convention center last Wednesday was

a victory lap for the home team — a chance to feel the love from labor groups who have endorsed her — such as the carpenters’ and teachers’ unions — as well as dueling allies like Governor Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio (who was booed briefly for his reticence to endorse Clinton early on.) For me, going to see Clinton was an effort at reconciliation. Having already been unfriended on Facebook by some women for expressing my profound disappointment with Clinton’s 2002

Iraq War vote, I nevertheless put on my best pantsuit and prepared to hear in person why she’s the best and most sensible choice to lead the Democrats in 2016. But I could not get in. At 5:45 p.m., just before Clinton took the stage, the Secret Service shut the doors, leaving a hundred or so of us stranded in the lobby behind the elaborate security check. Even when I tried to ply my media credentials, I was rebuffed. CLINTON continued on p. 6

St. Pat’s Parade lets L.G.B.T. group march.....page 3 Silver Spurs slashing victim back at work......page 8 Steve McCurry sees India..............page 21

www.TheVillager.com

ACKERS ARE BACK: The third installation of the Acker Awards, recognizing avant-garde artists and luminaries who have defied convention, is set for Thurs., March 17, at HOWL! Happening gallery, 6 E. First St., from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. Free and open to the public, it’s presented by Clayton Patterson and emceed by Phoebe Legere, who was an Acker winner last year, and co-sponsored by The Villager and Overthrow boxing. This year, for the first time, there will also be a full slate of posthumous honorees, from Taylor Mead and Tuli Kupferberg to Grady Alexis, John Evans, Vali Myers, Hanz Penza and many more. L.E.S. documentarian Patterson co-created the Acker Awards with writer Alan Kaufman. We attended last year’s event, at Lorcan Otway’s Theatre 80 on St. Mark’s Place, and it was great. “It’s at the HOWL! space this year, which is perfect,” Patterson said. “There’s a lot of overlap there.” As for how the idea of adding the posthumous Ackers came up, Patterson said, “Zito and I were sitting around and talking about the Ackers. I’m not sure who mentioned the posthumous — but he said, ‘I’ll paint them.’ ” The Acker Awards are named after novelist Kathy Acker, who in her life and work exemplified the risk-taking and uncompromising dedication that identifies the true avant-garde artist. Each recipient will receive a commemorative box that contains original artworks and mementos created by some of the 40 winners. A big shout-out to Michael Shirey, The Villager’s art director, who is putting together the event’s 46-page program booklet, a real collector’s item. On a personal note, Patterson and his wife, Elsa Rensaa, of course, still have not moved to Austria, as he had said he was planning to do a few years ago. Patterson will be going to Austria briefly this week for a few days, but it’s just one of his regular trips there,

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March 10, 2016

This year’s Acker Awards will also include posthumous honorees — seen painted on discarded coffee cups by Zito, above — including the likes of Holly Woodlawn, Flo Kennedy, Bimbo Rivas, Joey Ramone, Allen Ginsberg, Rockets Red Glare and The Pope of Pot.

where he is involved in a tattoo convention and wild sideshow event, among other projects. In addition to everything involved in pulling up stakes on the Lower East Side and making such a big move, Rensaa’s health is also an issue. “You know, there’s a lot going on,” Patterson said.

SHEER ‘GENIUS’: Speaking of HOWL! Happening gallery, Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth of the Tom Tom Club were there Saturday night for the opening of the Arturo Vega “Insults” show. Their much-sampled early ’80s smash hit “Genius of Love” can be heard covered by Tinashe in Target’s current TV ad campaign. HEY! HO! RAMONES SHOW! Also at the Vega show, PUNK magazine’s John Holmstrom told us he’s busy working on a map that will note everywhere the Ramones played in the New York area, which will be for sale at the upcoming Ramones show at the Queens Museum, pegged to the 40th anniversary of the band’s classic self-titled first album. The exhibit, “Hey! Ho! Let’s Go: Ramones and the Birth of Punk,” debuts April 10 at the Queens Museum and will then move to Los Angeles for a second opening Sept. 16 at the GRAMMY Museum. “The Ramones represent a resistance to the status quo and so many of the artists who they influ-

enced — and who they were influenced by — embody that same ideal,” said Laura Raicovich, the Queens Museum’s president and C.E.O. “As an institution, we are thrilled to explore the nexus of art and the Ramones, from their roots in Queens to the international diaspora of punk.” Added U2’s Bono, “The Ramones were the best band ever, because they actually invented something. They talked like they walked like they sounded onstage. Everything added up. Watching them live and hearing Joey sing, I realized that there was nothing else that mattered to him…and pretty soon nothing else mattered to me.” The exhibit will be organized under themes — places, events, songs and artists — and include materials by the likes of Arturo Vega, who, along with the Ramones, designed the band’s famous logo; Sergio Aragones, the Mad magazine cartoonist; Holmstrom; Shepard Fairey, and Yoshitomo Nara, who, for this exhibit, has created a large-scale version of one of his paintings of his recurring character Ramona, whom he named in homage to the Ramones. Also included are contributions from the personal collections of Mickey Leigh, Joey Ramone’s brother and the Ramones’ original stage manager; and Linda Ramone, Johnny Ramone’s wife; plus works from well-known local rock photographers Roberta Bayley, who shot the first Ramones album cover, Bob Gruen and Godlis, along with Danny Fields, the Ramones’ first manager, Monte A. Melnick, the Ramones’ tour manager, and others intimately involved with the group throughout their career. Additional artifacts will also include personal memorabilia, such as clothing and instruments. And don’t forget Holmstrom’s map!

JACO AND THE JOCKS: Since this week’s column is all about the arts and music, here’s a tidbit from Carl Hultberg, whose collection of writings about Downtown’s “Eco ’80s” Bill Weinberg reports on in this week’s Villager. Hultberg, a core member of the former Village Green recycling operation at W. Fourth St. and Sixth Ave., said Jaco Pastorius, the talented but troubled bass virtuoso, used to hang out around the center. “I never really knew who he was,” Hultberg told us. “He seemed so strung out most of the time, so I probably didn’t care. We had a lot of characters down there back then. It was 1987. He used to borrow our broom to clean up the basketball courts. He’d break up the local games with his clowning and I’d wonder why they let him do that. One day he asked me if I knew who he was. I said, No, who was he? He said he was Jaco f---ing Pastorius, and I just said, ‘Sure, and I’m Louis Armstrong.’ I used to call him Havlicek because he was the only white guy over there, mostly,” he said, referring to the Celtics ’60s great. “One day I saw him out in the park with a Fender jazz bass and a little Pignose battery-powered amp. He was playing Jimi Hendrix’s ‘Third Stone From the Sun’ in harmonics. I said, Wow, he really is Jaco Pastorius. A few weeks later, he was dead.” CORRECTIONS: Last week’s Villager article “City goes for the fences to increase parks access” stated that the Jane St. Garden will be getting a new gate, but in fact it will be getting whole new fence, which, presumably, also includes a new gate. Also, the article incorrectly stated that the new park at the St. Vincent’s Triangle is privately owned but maintained by the city’s Parks Department. Indeed, Rudin Management’s original intention was to create a “publicly accessible” open space on private land. However, as a result of the insistence of Community Board 2, the land was instead turned over to the Parks Department and is now under that agency’s jurisdiction. However, the park is maintained by the new Rudin condominium across the street under an agreement with the Parks Department. TheVillager.com

Green with pride: St. Pat’s will let gays march BY DUNCAN OSBORNE

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he organizers of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade that takes Fifth Ave. every year will admit an Irish L.G.B.T. group for the first time since the exclusion of L.G.B.T. people from that parade launched protests and a boycott by elected officials 25 years ago. “The New York City St. Patrick’s Day Parade board of directors says to all, céad míle fáilte — a 100,000 welcomes,” said Frank McGreal, a parade board member, using a Gaelic phrase. The welcome came at a Thurs., March 3, event held at the Irish Consulate on Park Ave. that was emceed by Mayor Bill de Blasio and Barbara Jones, the Irish consul general to New York. The invitation to march that was extended to the Lavender & Green Alliance was announced in February, but what appeared to be a negotiation on the mechanics of the group’s participation was only recently finalized. All L.G.B.T. groups that wish to participate will march behind the Lavender & Green Alliance banner and the group will step onto Fifth Ave. at 3:10 p.m. from W. 48th St. The March 3 announcement was a teary affair at times, as politicians and activists who have battled to get into the parade recalled earlier struggles and savored obtaining the goal that they sought for so long. “Go raibh míle maith agat,” said Brendan Fay, who represented the Alliance, in Gaelic. “That means a thousand thanks to you… . As the Irish L.G.B.T. community, we extend a very special thank you to Dr. John Leahy, the St. Patrick’s Parade board and committee, [and] thank you Frank McGreal for your words. We thank you for your hospitable decision, which reflects the feelings and sentiments of so many Irish and Irish Americans. Your historic gesture of welcome, like a miracle of hospitality, undoes the anguish and pain of

PHOTO BY DUNCAN OSBORNE

Announcing the news at the Irish Consulate on Park Ave., Mayor Bill de Blasio was joined by Barbara Jones, the Irish consul general to New York, to the right of the mayor, and activist Brendan Fay, far right.

exclusion and discrimination. ” In 1991, Mayor David Dinkins invited the Irish Lesbian and Gay Organization to march with him, though without its banner, after the group was banned by parade organizers. The mayor’s move infuriated John Cardinal O’Connor, then the head of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York and a leading anti-L.G.B.T. voice. The crowd vilified Dinkins and the marchers, leading one mayoral aide that year to call the march “two miles of hate.” Dinkins compared it to the treatment given to civil rights marchers in Southern cities in the 1960s. L.G.B.T. groups were banned that year, and the annual protests over the ban have meant that every parade since then has been marked by controversy. Many elected officials, including de Blasio, chose to boycott the parade. On March 3, de Blasio said he would march this year. OUT@NBCUniversal, an L.G.B.T. employee group at NBCUniversal, a Comcast unit, applied to march in 2014, but was denied. The group marched in 2015, and it was uneventful. Activists who had long called for opening up the parade, however, noted that the NBC group represent-

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ed the event’s media sponsor and not the Irish-American community. The focus at the March 3 press conference was pressing the point that the conflict is over, though McGreal would not say if an L.G.B.T. group will be permitted to participate in future parades. “This March 17, we will all march together,” de Blasio said. “It’s something we can now put behind us because unity has been achieved.” Missing from the event was anyone representing the archdiocese,

which has the ability to at least make the Alliance’s participation controversial. Timothy Dolan, the current cardinal, has adopted a conciliatory tone toward the L.G.B.T. community, though that tone has not translated into changes in policy. “I also have to say I had a wonderful phone call with Cardinal Dolan, who was in his home state of Missouri,” de Blasio said. “We talked about what this moment meant. I told him from the bottom of my heart how appreciative I had been for the tone he set in the city, for the welcome and openness that he has created to say to everyone, ‘We can find a way forward.’ ” Emmaia Gelman, a member of Irish Queers, which has been leading the protests and the boycott of the parade in recent years, including last year when OUT@NBCUniversal marched, said that she would be marching this year. “The demand to end the exclusion from the St. Patrick’s Day Parade has always been for Irish lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender marchers to participate in the parade behind their own banner,” she said. “We’re really pleased that’s going to happen. It’s been a long 25 years… . It’s really a great thing that it’s over.”

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March 10, 2016

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Curtain comes down on Stage Restaurant Named best weekly newspaper in New York State in 2001, 2004 and 2005 by New York Press Association Editorials, First Place, 2014 News Story, First Place, 2014 Overall Design Excellence, First Place, 2013 Best Column, First Place, 2012 Photographic Excellence, First Place, 2011 Spot News Coverage, First Place, 2010 Coverage of Environment, First Place, 2009

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March 10, 2016

STAGE continued from p. 1

cheese, beef, sauerkraut or mushroom, boiled or deep fried — made-to-order potato pancakes and red or white borscht and other soups, as well as sausage-and-tomato sandwiches, omelets, meatloaf, stuffed cabbage and beets, plus French toast or grilled cheese on challah bread, cheese and blueberry blintzes and an array of other specialty Eastern European and American dishes dreamed up by Diakun since his opening the Stage back in 1980. On March 2, generations of Stage patrons learned that the restaurant, which has been closed for nearly a year following a lengthy legal battle with landlord Icon Realty Management, would never open again. “It is with bittersweet emotions that we at Stage Restaurant are announcing that we are closing our doors permanently after 35 amazing years,” Diakun said. “The events of the year have been overwhelmingly devastating on us, and we have decided to close the Stage’s door.” “It’s terrible,” said John Serdula, a longtime tenant who heads the building’s tenants association. “It was a focal point for the community of the East Village. Everybody went there. All the people from Cooper Union — artists ate there all the time. Every time I say I live next door to ‘Stomp,’ people will say, ‘Oh, you live near Stage?’ It has such a huge following.” Diakun, who also lives upstairs from Stage at 128 Second Ave., addressed the ongoing legal dispute with Icon, which started days after the Second Ave. gas explosion on March 26, 2015, which leveled three buildings, 119, 121 and 123 Second Ave. Four days after the catastrophe, the restaurant was shut down, following a Con Edison investigation that revealed alleged gas siphoning in the building’s basement. This resulted in a gas shutoff — resulting in no heat or hot water for the building’s tenants for months — and the Department of Buildings issuing a stop-work order against Stage on any work in the basement. Icon issued Stage an eviction notice on April 13, and the restaurant sued the landlord to stop the process. Diakun has been fairly quiet, rarely speaking to the press since Stage’s closing last spring. In his Facebook post last week, he wrote, “Over the past year, we have resolved our dispute with the landlord. Stage Restaurant never engaged in any wrongdoing; however, after our prolonged closure and because of the cost to make the repairs and expenses of reopening, we are sad to say that the Stage cannot reopen.” Nearly one year later, Diakun is tired, and the legal battles and the loss of money have taken a toll, according to Serdula, who ran into the Stage owner shortly

Roman Diakun in the front window of his Stage Restaurant on Second Ave. He recently announced he won’t be reopening.

after he had officially handed the restaurant’s keys over to Icon. Serdula said Diakun told him he had two more years on the lease but decided to close. “I could tell that he’s depressed,” said Serdula, who also leads Icon Coalition, a group of tenants dealing with ongoing issues with the Iandlord. “It’s been one year since he’s been put under pressure by Icon and he couldn’t make any money during it.” Serdula added that Icon did not allow Diakun to go into the basement to have his gas lines fixed, so that he could reopen his business, and was also trying to raise the restaurateur’s rent, plus is now allegedly harassing the longtime tenant, alleging that a downstairs neighbor is complaining of noise in his apartment. “He’s furious,” Serdula said. “He should have fought more to keep the restaurant. I could understand it. You win this battle, then there’s another battle — and another and another. It’s too exhausting.” Chris Coffey, an Icon representative, told The Villager that there were no rent increases for the Stage restaurant and that things ended amicably in court with Diakun. “The lease was expired, but they were welcome to stay there,” said Coffey, adding that Icon hopes to get a suitable tenant that has the character of the East Village. “Icon wishes them the best…whatever they decide to do. They were welcome to come back, but made the decision not to reopen.” Landlord issues aside, patrons will always remember what Stage was all about, whether borscht or an American cheese grilled on some challah with butter. For Serdula, it was all about Stage’s chicken soup. “When you’re sick and don’t feel like

making anything and just want soup, you just had to go downstairs and say, ‘Can I have some soup?’ ” he said. “The pierogies were great, too. All the food was good. The challah bread was fantastic.” Serdula and Jones remembered Diakun’s good nature and how he looked out for the building’s older tenants by bringing them food every day at no charge. “He never announced it,” Serdula said. “He just did it, no charge. It’s a really nice thing to do.” Now, Stage sits vacant in the ground floor of No. 128. The restaurant gate is up, though, and passersby can look in at the kitchen, the line of red stools and the formica-topped counter, with napkins, salt and pepper and other condiments still in place, as if Stage will open any day now. There are even a few specials still listed in the window. “Thank you all for your support, your signatures, your donations, and especially your kind words,” Diakun added in his Facebook goodbye. “We could not have realized our passion and love for nourishing and providing a place of comfort and gathering to the community without you all. Your loyalty, support, kindness and love have been a true blessing, and something we will never forget.” Jones, who moved to Virginia last fall following a lengthy court battle with Icon, still will always remember that one special dish at Stage. “Roman used to make me an eggand-cheese on challah with potatoes and grits inside,” said Jones, who added that Diakun’s portions and prices were a steal. “This was a special he came up with for me. I have been dreaming about missing this egg-and-cheese special. I sure would have loved to have one this morning.” TheVillager.com

TheVillager.com

March 10, 2016

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Lookin’ for love on the Hillary campaign trail CLINTON continued from p. 1

“We’re at capacity, ma’am,” one of the Secret Service guys in black polo shirts responded. “The event is closed,” he said — even though reports and photos of the event show that while the curtained-off stage area where Clinton spoke was full, the hall itself was half-empty and could have easily accommodated several hundred more people. “This would have never happened at a Bernie rally. They just pushed me over the other side,” ranted a disgruntled man who had waited for more than an hour to get in, before stalking off. “This isn’t us,” a Clinton campaign staffer told the remaining supporters milling in the unheated hall. “We are trying to do something on our end. I’ll let you know if anything changes.” For a moment, the voice of Hillary greeting the crowd amid strains of Katy Perry flashed on one of the TV monitors. But it was CNN and they quickly cut away. (Note to the Clinton campaign: Why not live cast the event on the monitors throughout the Javits Center?) Contrast this to the reported 10,000 people who filled a stadium at Michigan State University to hear Bernie Sanders speak last Wednesday, and you begin to grasp why Clinton is not running away with this thing — yet. Sure, the New York event was just a campaign stop, and there are bound to be constraints when you consider the logistics of protecting a former first lady, New York senator and secretary of state who has aroused both enormous respect and venomous contempt in her many years on the public stage. Experience has its downsides. But the control freakism of the Secret Service was also reminiscent of Clinton’s early refusals to do prime-time interviews and address issues back in 2015, when she first announced, not to mention the recent flap over appearing at a Fox News town hall. And now there is e-mail-gate… I mean, why did she hide a server in her bathroom? Even stalwart allies like The New York Times have begun to look pointedly at her role as secretary of state in pressing for the U.S. bombing intervention in Libya that led to the overthrow of longtime dictator Muammar Gaddafi. Instead of promoting democracy there, thus far this assertion of American “smart power” has resulted in Libya devolving into a failed state and ISIS haven, swimming in arms looted from Gaddafi’s vast weapons arsenals. As the Times wrote last Sunday: “Now Libya, with a population small-

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March 10, 2016

PHOTOS BY MILO HESS

The New York Democratic establishment embraced Hillary Clinton last Wednesday, including from left, Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito, Governor Andrew Cuomo, with his girlfriend Sandra Lee, and City Comptroller Scott Stringer. Mayor Bill de Blasio was also on hand to show his support.

er than that of Tennessee, poses an outsize security threat to the region and beyond, calling into question whether the intervention prevented a humanitarian catastrophe or merely helped create one of a different kind.” Unable to catch Hillary speak live, I contented myself with talking to her supporters about why they believe it is now Hillary’s time. Carmen Cametta Young, a retired healthcare worker from Queens, said she was for Hillary, “mostly because of Bill.” “I’m voting for her because I know Bill Clinton will help her run the country. We’re getting two for one, and she would be the first woman president. Give her a chance,” urged Young, speaking with a Jamaican lilt. “I think it’s the best option we have,” added her friend Lourdes Moretta, a member of the healthcare workers’ union 1199 SEIU. “I don’t think Sanders is going to win, and we have to press for a woman. I want a woman president, and I don’t want to see Donald Trump be president.” Asked what she thought of Sanders, Moretta said he was “too much to the left” to win. “He has good ideas, but in this country, people are not ready for it,” said Moretta, who is from the Dominican Republic. (As an example, she pointed to Sanders’s call for free college tuition: “You should pay something,” said Moretta, who put three daughters through college with hard work and scholarships.) There were also lots of union mem-

Actor and Village resident John Leguizamo was the event’s host.

bers, who had been given comp time to attend, as evidenced from the many mass-produced signs, including one from the Laborers International Union of North America PAC that read: “LiUNA for Hillary, Pipelines = Good Jobs.” (The abundance of people waving this slogan at Hillary made me wonder about the depth of her professed opposition to the Keystone XL pipeline. Clinton had initially supported this controversial project when she was secretary of state, and still has close ties to pipeline builder TransCanada. Paul Elliot, the national deputy director for Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign, is now TransCanada’s top lobbyist.) And let’s not forget Clinton’s flakking for natural gas fracking abroad while she was secretary of state. Still, the appeal of having a woman actually ascending to the U.S. presidency is both tantalizing and real. Liz Bernstein, a 62-year-old acupuncturist

from Brooklyn, was ecstatic after posing for a selfie with Clinton and shaking her hand. Bernstein, who had arrived at 2:45 p.m. to claim a front-row seat, said she loved how Hillary spoke of the need to bring America together, to “build bridges instead of walls,” and bring more “love and kindness” into the public dialogue — a new line for Hillary, one that Bernstein said made the crowd go “ballistic.” In addition to core Democrats, Bernstein believes Clinton can draw moderate “rational” conservatives who are freaked out by the Trump Show and Ted Cruz’s extremism. And she’s more than fed up with what she called the “outright projection and sexism” coming from some in the Sanderista camp. “Bernie’s speaking to an idealism that’s not rooted in what people’s lives look like,” said Bernstein, who hails from Washington State (aka Berner country). “He’s a lone wolf. He’s a professional criticizer. He doesn’t have the resources to tap into the people who understand the intricacies of political process,” she added, citing Clinton’s ability to marshal the support of union leaders. But if Clinton really wants to shatter America’s biggest glass ceiling, she’d better do more to provide access. How do you lead a movement for change when you’re running as Democratic royalty — a former first lady turned senator turned secretary of state who comes to the platform with plenty of experience yet still acts like she has a bunch of stuff to hide? TheVillager.com

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March 10, 2016

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Hit-and-run driver slams into man on Christopher St.

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distraught woman comforted a friend as he was being attended by Fire Department personnel, left, after he was hit by a car in front of 131 Christopher St. around 9:15 p.m. on Fri., March 4. According to police, the victim, a 40-year-old Jersey City man, had been on the sidewalk when a black Mercedes-Benz going westbound on Christopher St. mounted the pave-

ment at the location and hit him. A police spokesperson said, after being struck, the man “landed on a fire hydrant.” According to witnesses, the driver did not stop and was last seen turning northbound onto Greenwich St. The injured man was removed to Bellevue Hospital in an unknown condition, but was expected to live, according to police.

‘I’m feeling good’: Diner slash victim back at work BY TEQUILA MINSKY

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PHOTO BY C4P

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wo weeks after Bobby Barbot was sliced with a box cutter, he’s back on the job at Silver Spurs, looking amazingly good for the ordeal he’s been through. It was on a Wednesday evening around 8 p.m., two weeks ago when 16-year-old Dominicio Howington was making the rounds in Silver Spurs, asking for donations and for people to sign a basketball petition. The waitress that evening sought the help of Barbot, 25, who works as a busboy, to ask the youth to leave. Words were slung back and forth between the two young men, and they moved out onto the sidewalk. Howington took a swing at Barbot and Barbot punched back and connected. At this point, Howington pulled the box cutter from his pocket. According to Barbot, there was a little more pushing around, with the waitress trying to separate the two. It was only after the waitress saw the blood and told Barbot, and he put his hand to his face, that he realized that he had been slashed. The ambulance came pretty quickly, and took him to Bellevue’s emergency room, where he received 135 stitches to close the gash, which went all the way through his cheek. Many of the stitches were made on the inside of his mouth. As Barbot tells it, almost a week later, he got a private message on Facebook from a person using a fictitious name and requesting anonymity. The tipster sent him a photograph, asking: “Is this the person who did it?” When Barbot affirmed that it was, the tipster sent the alleged slasher’s name, address, phone number and where to find him. Barbot passed this information on to the police. Howington was picked up by cops in the Lillian Wald Houses, where he lives on the Lower East Side. Barbot

PHOTO BY TEQUILA MINSKY

Bobby Barbot had to get 135 stitches to close the long gash on his cheek.

subsequently ID’ed him in a lineup at the West Village’s Sixth Precinct. Although Howington is 16, he’s being held as an adult on $50,000 bail. “I’m feeling good,” Barbot said Wednesday afternoon. “I’m happy to be out and not just laying around the house. My face is still a little tight.” One of the biggest impacts of this ordeal for Barbot is that he had to stop his gym membership due to financial constraints. In addition, he’ll have to postpone his next competition until he’s completely healed. Barbot competes as an amateur in Mixed Martial Arts, which includes boxing, wrestling and jujitsu. His record is four wins and two losses. His next tournament was to be in Buffalo in two months, but he said he won’t be able to compete in that one. Local activist Sylvia Rackow reported that 52 people contributed to a fund she collected for Barbot, raising a total of $1,325. Most of them, like her, were residents of 505 LaGuardia Place — a handyman from the building also contributed — but others were from Washington Square Village and 88 Bleecker St. “I think the Scoopy’s Notebook article in The Villager last week really helped to stimulate people to donate,” Rackow said. TheVillager.com

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Kushner E. 4th tenants without gas five months BY JOAQUIN COTLER

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hurs., March 3, marked another hearing in ongoing litigation between young real estate mogul Jared Kushner and the tenants at 118 E. Fourth St. Residents of the East Village walk-up building claim that the landlord has continued to deny them livable conditions, and have demanded the immediate restoration of essential services, including gas, heat and plumbing. The renovations of the tenement’s apartments and the subsequent unsafe living conditions has been an issue for tenants since 2012. The most recent case involves residents’ claims that a gas outage throughout the building has deprived them of cooking gas since October 2015. But the problems have been going on longer than that, they say. Back in 2013, Kushner spent upward of $200 million to buy more than 25 East Village properties. Among them was 118 E. Fourth St., which he purchased from notorious developer Ben Shaoul as part of a $49 million deal that included six other buildings. The buildings are currently operated by Westminster Management,

a subsidiary of Kushner Companies. For a year and a half, Westminster has failed to address numerous claims tenants have made about the conditions at No. 118, tenants charge. “My bathroom ceiling has collapsed five times due to a leak in my neighbor’s sink that they just wouldn’t fix,” said Jennifer Hengen, a tenant in the building for more than 20 years. “They’ll just patch the pipe or hole, not tackle the root of the problem. Rusty water dripped from two holes in my ceiling for a year and a half before management called the plumber. Is this harassment or neglect?” David DuPuis, an upstairs neighbor of hers, has lived in the building since 1983. He said that, in addition to the leak, which stemmed from his plumbing, a fire also started in Hengen’s ceiling due to faulty wiring, and the damage has only recently been addressed. “They installed new wiring last week, and rebuilt some of the walls that were destroyed while they were searching for the cause,” DuPuis said. “It took over a year and a half, and a lawsuit, and six months of no gas, for them to actually fix things in the last two weeks.” He claimed that the firefighters

who came to address the blaze and the electricians who rewired the ceiling advised residents to move out because the place was in such bad shape. DuPuis, an active member of the building’s tenants association, said that solidarity was the only way to force results in this case. “We set up a private Google group back in 2012, so when Shaoul was tearing down the building we could post updates,” he said. “We would keep an eye on people’s apartments when they weren’t home. Management would always be coming and showing apartments and forget to lock the door on their way out.” The Cooper Square Committee and MFY Legal Services are supporting the tenants’ fight against their high-profile landlord, who also publishes the New York Observer and is Donald Trump’s son-in-law. Tenants said that after Kushner bought the E. Fourth St. building three years ago, Westminster kept it in pretty good shape for six months while showing the place to investors. After fixing — at least cosmetically — some of the serious issues depicted in the tenant association’s blog, “Occupy E. 4th St.,” management removed public garbage containers, which resulted in piles of trash in the

courtyard, leading to a rat infestation lasting almost a year. According to Brandon Kielbasa from the Cooper Square Committee, the total number of unaddressed violations in the building is currently 35, with eight outstanding class C, or immediately hazardous, violations. Attempts have been made to hold the landlord in contempt of court, but because he is not listed by name as the building’s owner, Kushner’s lawyers have insisted that his name be stricken from the case. Kielbasa believes it’s an attempt by the landlord to distance himself from the issues at No. 118. “Removing him from the case protects him from the possibility of being held in contempt of court,” the activist said. “But the other reps listed on the Department of Housing Preservation and Development’s records for the building could still face that.” Court was adjourned last Thursday with the contempt motion left to be argued later. In a last-minute protest, Kushner’s lawyers stated that they had confused this case with another one against him for not providing heat at 118 E. Fourth St. In the end, all parties ultimately agreed to reconvene March 22.

Right now, the New York City Council has the opportunity to support a commonsense affordable housing plan that will help more aging adults live independently in their homes in the city they love. Taking action on Mayor de Blasio’s Affordable Housing plan will create 200,000 affordable housing units over the next 10 years for low- and moderate-income residents, including seniors and people of all ages. Today, there are 200,000 seniors on waiting lists for affordable housing in our city. This sensible plan will help right this wrong and give all New Yorkers struggling to make ends meet a chance to live and thrive in the city we all call home.

Pass the Mayor’s affordable housing plan.

New Yorkers need affordable housing now.

To see how our members are getting involved, go to aarp.org/nyc facebook.com/AARPNY @AARPNY aarp.org/nyc Paid for by AARP

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TheVillager.com

March 10, 2016

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Westbeth and how the West was won — and lost BY ALBERT AMATEAU

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effrey Trask, professor of American cultural and intellectual history, found the perfect place to present his lecture on “The Social Geography of Village Housing in the Sixties.” The March 3 lecture in the community room of the Westbeth Artists Residence focused on Westbeth, which opened in 1970 as the first large-scale conversion of industrial space to residential use. Trask, who teaches at Georgia State University in Atlanta, recalled that his research in 2010 took him to the elaborate and beautiful library of the New-York Historical Society, with its strict rules. “Then I came to Westbeth and asked to see whatever records they had,” Trask said. “I was taken to the basement and given a key to a room stacked to the ceiling with boxes of documents.” The remark was greeted with knowing laughter from longtime residents of the 13-building complex. Trask’s talk, co-sponsored by the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation, Westbeth Artists Residents Council and Village Alliance business improvement district, covered the conception and development of Westbeth and the political context of the era. It was hoped that the conversion of the Bell Laboratories complex between West and Washington Sts. from Bethune to Bank Sts. would serve as a model for living and work space for low-to-moderate-income artists. That didn’t happen. Instead, Westbeth actually ironically became a model for luxury residential conversion of abandoned industrial buildings. Beginning in the 1960s, the idea of “the bulldozer approach” to urban renewal was falling out of favor, Trask noted. Jane Jacobs published “The Death and Life of Great American Cities” in 1961. Robert Moses’ plan for the Lower Manhattan Expressway, which would have cut across Soho and Little Italy, was dropped in 1962. The Committee to Save the West Village mounted an aggressive, media-savvy campaign that forced the city in 1962 to drop a plan to demolish and rebuild 14 blocks in the West Village. “Committee members at one point went to a City Hall hearing in a tour bus designed by Salvador Dali,” Trask said. The preservation movement gained momentum in the 1960s. Activists lobbied to prevent demolition of the Jefferson Market Courthouse at W. 10th St. The long-vacant building reopened as a library in 1967. It was in the 1960s that artists began using Soho warehouse lofts illegally as combined liv-

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March 10, 2016

PHOTO BY BOB ESTEREMERA, COURTESY OF G.V.S.H.P.

The Westbeth interior courtyard, showing the balconies designed by Richard Meier as part of the 1967-70 conversion.

Professor Jeffrey Trask giving his presentation last week on Westbeth and the history of residential conversions in the West Village.

ing and work spaces, many of which became legal in 1971. City planners and urban critics viewed the dilapidated Hudson River piers, empty factories, the little-used elevated railroad (the High Line) and the elevated Miller Highway, which was demolished and replaced in the 1980s, as a desolate area, but still had a hope for future transformation. The Westbeth vision was developed by J.M. Kaplan, founder of the J.M. Kaplan Fund, and Roger L. Stevens, a theatrical producer and the first president of the National Endowment for the Arts. Privately developed with federal help, the project was supposed to be-

come self-sufficient after a while. An alternative to public housing, which had begun to be discredited, the project was intended as an arts incubator; artists were supposed to live and work there for five years, then move on, making room for a new group of artists. In 1966, Bell Labs had left the Village, its home since 1898, and moved to New Jersey. Kaplan, who had made his fortune marketing Welch’s grape juice, which he later sold to the grape growers’ cooperative, was able to buy the vacant one-block complex in 1967 for $750,000 from AT&T, Trask noted. Among the project’s prominent supporters was Henry Geldzahler,

curator of American art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and later commissioner of the city’s Department of Cultural Affairs in the Koch administration. Kaplan and Stevens, along with Kaplan’s daughter, Joan Davidson, lobbied hard at City Hall to rezone the West Village to accommodate the project. They named it after two of its boundaries, West and Bethune Sts. Stevens, who had considerable clout with the Johnson administration in Washington, was able to secure favorable loans from federal agencies. Resident artists had to have moderate incomes in order for Westbeth to qualify for federal loans. Kaplan and Stevens hired Richard Meier as the architect to convert the complex into residential and studio space. They also hired Dixon Bain as project manager. Bain, who had previously worked for AT&T, knew the complex and, working with Meier, helped keep everything on track during the 1967-71 construction period. Meier won an AIA (American Institute of Architects) award for the project in 1971. Although treasured by its residents and widely admired as a “noble experiment,” Westbeth never fulfilled its original promise, Trask said. By the time the project was complete, rent for loft space in the city had risen beyond the means of most artists, so residents did not move out of Westbeth after five years as originally planned. Trask concluded that Westbeth was a social success but did not succeed financially. The audience last week, made up of Village neighbors and Westbeth residents, responded to the lecture with enthusiasm. George Cominskie, president of the Westbeth Artists Residents Council, later recalled the precarious finances of the complex. “We almost were bankrupt twice,” he recalled. Cominskie also noted the dangerous environment of the West Village in 1990. “We formed a neighbor patrol group, working with the Guardian Angels,” Cominskie said, referring to the uniformed volunteer anticrime group. “So many of our tenants were being mugged at night that we gave each one a whistle and told them to blow it whenever they felt threatened. Everyone in the neighborhood knew the sound and called the police when they heard it.” The crime threat has receded, Cominskie said. “Our main issue now is affordability,” he added. Westbeth, with 384 units, a residents’ art gallery and a theater connected to The New School, has about 1,200 residents. Rents average more than $750 per month. TheVillager.com

This is about park and public process, not me TALKING POINT BY TOM FOX

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was saddened by Diana Taylor’s vituperative and fallacious attack (“Fox has his facts all wrong on Pier 57 project,” talking point, March 3). My Pier 57 op-ed (“Pier 57 project kept changing, without new bids,” talking point, Feb. 25) must have been right on the mark. Questioning the Hudson River Park Trust regarding Pier 57 in no way enhances my reputation as a park advocate. That’s a result of 40 years working to create community gardens and parks, including the Hudson River Park, Brooklyn Bridge Park, Brooklyn/Queens Greenway and a host of “park” projects that I’ve had the privilege to play a leadership role in. I would much prefer to cheer on the Trust’s current efforts, but unfortunately, they make that quite difficult. I’ve been advocating for this park since first suggesting it in testimony

to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers regarding the environmental impact statement for Westway in 1985. I continued to advocate for the park, formally, until resigning from the board of Friends of Hudson River Park in 2011. My concern then was that, in restructuring Friends, Ms. Taylor would turn an effective watchdog into a lapdog — which is exactly what happened. Apparently, the failure to include a marina in the Pier 57 project rendering presented by RXR at the Jan. 20 public meeting should not cause anyone to question whether a marina will be part of the project. Instead, citizens should read the details of a draft lease to find out if a marina would be added — somewhere in the Hudson River at some later date. The rendering, which didn’t include a marina for the first time in eight years, was just eyewash to garner public approval. As far as understanding the difficulty of planning and implementing complicated projects, let’s compare our respective track records working on Manhattan’s West Side. Since Ms. Taylor joined the Trust’s board in 1999, the Trust has had two failed R.F.P.’s (requests for proposals from

developers) for Pier 40, one failed R.F.P. for Pier 57, and just spent eight years trying to get their second one right for Pier 57 by changing developers, land uses and lease terms. I led a successful multiyear effort to reach consensus on the concept and financial plan for the park (which still guides the Trust 20 years later) and secure the initial $200 million city and state commitment for the park’s planning and construction. Working with the New York State Department of Transportation, we cleared tow pounds, bus garages and sanitation facilities from the dilapidated 1.2-million-square-foot Chelsea Piers, issued an R.F.P. and monitored the construction of this three-pier complex, which was completed in just three years. Then there’s the eight years spent working with state D.O.T. on the design and construction of the West Side Highway. Spurred on by Ms. Taylor’s pithy denunciation of both my expertise and intentions, I’m now sending a formal letter to state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli to request a clarification of public procurement laws. The Trust says they can delay a project for eight years, change project

developers, change allowable land uses, and increase a lease term by 50 years — all without releasing a new R.F.P. for the modified project. I disagree. If the state comptroller says the Trust is right, I will apologize publically to Ms. Taylor. I’ve always been big enough to admit when I’m wrong, unlike many others I have dealt with in public life. The tools that protect the public interest are the requirement for public participation, environmental review, public bidding and, as a last resort, the courts. Those tools were used to defeat Westway and create the Hudson River Park. For me, this is déjà vu all over again. Fox was a citizen appointee to the West Side Task Force in 1986, and the West Side Waterfront Panel from 1988-’90; the first president of the Hudson River Park Conservancy (which completed the Hudson River Park’s concept and financial plan) from 1992-’95; a member of the Hudson River Park Alliance (which supported the Hudson River Park’s founding legislation) from 1996-’98; and a founding board member of Friends of Hudson River Park. He is also a plaintiff in a current lawsuit against the Pier 55 project.

Cut! Arch movie paintjob The Church of the Ascension preceded park renovation

Fifth Avenue at Tenth Street • www.ascensionnyc.org • 212-254-8620

FLASHBACK BY YANNIC RACK

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careless film crew incurred the wrath of Villagers 36 years ago this month, when it vandalized the famous Washington Square Arch during a shoot for a Marilyn Monroe TV movie. As The Villager’s March 27, 1980, issue reported, the team left the arch’s base coated in silver paint after using it as a backdrop for the flick — raising outrage just two months before the park was scheduled to get an overhaul. “ ‘I can’t believe it,’ said an exasperated Evelyn Patterson, the executive assistant to the president of New York University who is spearheading the formation of The Friends of Washington Square Park,” read the article. The landmarked 19th-century arch was apparently supposed to be cleaned of unseemly graffiti that May, an operation that had been planned for years. “ ‘And these people just come in and paint it. It’s incredible,’ ” Patterson complained to The Villager. The reporter credited the vandalTheVillager.com

ism to a city agency misunderstanding, writing that the Mayor’s Office of Motion Pictures and Television claimed the Parks Department had O.K.’d the painting — which was promptly denied by Parks. Nevertheless, city officials found common ground in condemning the coloring, notably deviating from usual government PR speak. “ ‘It is ridiculous and unheard of,’ ” the article quoted the Parks Department’s maintenance director as saying of the film crew’s doing. He told The Villager that the company should forever be banned from New York City locations. “ ‘They are a bunch of idiots and this is a lawless and stupid act,’ ” he said. The Villager did not have a good photo of the defaced arch back then, so this week asked Jonathan Kuhn, Parks’ head of arts and antiquities. “I’m afraid we do not appear to have historic photos of this sordid incident,” Kuhn reported. “Thankfully, in the 2003-04 conservation of the arch, we removed the many layers of graffiti and paint-overs accumulated over several decades, the oldest of which dated to the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962.”

March 20 Palm Sunday 9 a.m. Said Eucharist 11 a.m. Blessing of the Palms & Procession A reading of the Passion According to St. Luke Festal Eucharist w/ Choir 7:00 p.m. Meditation & Sacrament March 24 Maundy Thursday - 7 p.m. Holy Eucharist with Full Choir With Washing of Feet, Stripping of Altar, Setting of the Altar of Repose and Watch with the Blessed Sacrament March 25 Good Friday - Noon The Passion and Death of Our Lord Jesus Christ, with Choir With Veneration of the Cross, And Communion from the Reserve Sacrament

Please join us for Services in Holy Week. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday In Holy Week—Holy Eucharist 6 p.m. at Side Altar Liturgy of the Word Saturday, March 26, 10 a.m. The Great Vigil of Easter Saturday, March 26, 8 p.m. With Full Choir With Lighting of the New Fire, The Paschal Candle, And Renewal of Baptismal Vows Easter Sunday Day of Resurrection 9 a.m. Said Eucharist of Easter 11 a.m. Festal Eucharist with full Choir 7:00 p.m. Meditation & Sacrament

Parish Office at 12 W. 11 St. • Office Hours: Mondays-Fridays, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

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March 10, 2016

13

POLICE BLOTTER Village ‘valet’ bust

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A 2009 BMW stolen from a garage at 425 W. 59th St. was later spotted in the Village. Video surveillance captured a man entering the garage and vehicle at 4 a.m. Wed., March 2. Garage employees leave keys on the dashboard so cars can be easily moved. Police said they saw the car on Washington and Perry Sts. and arrested the suspect at the scene. The vehicle’s owner said there was new damage on the right side and driver’s-side bumper. Michael Smith, 37, was arrested for felony grand larceny.

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An officer said he noticed a Nissan fail to signal while changing lanes when driving on Houston St. around 1:20 a.m. on Thurs., March 3. The officer also observed the vehicle’s headlights and taillights were not on. After stopping the car, the officer saw a joint on the center console. After searching the vehicle, he also found 11 forged credit cards. Police arrested Bryan S. Jean, 23, for felony criminal possession of a forged instrument.

The pain at Jane Police said that around 4 a.m. March 5, a man was talking with friends in front of the Jane Hotel, at 113 Jane St., when another man punched him in the face. The victim experienced minor bruising and refused medical attention. Philippe Rascol, 22, was arrested for misdemeanor assault.

Supreme slash suspect Police are seeking the public’s help

A suspect in the Supreme slashing, according to police.

in identifying a man involved in a slashing at Supreme in Soho on Thurs., Feb. 18, at 2 p.m. Police said a man, 21, was leaving the clothing store, at 274 Lafayette St., when two men approached him and began arguing with him. One cut the victim on the right side of his face with an unknown object, and the two suspects then fled. The victim was removed to Downtown Hospital, treated and released. Anyone with information is asked to call the Police Department’s Crime Stoppers Hotline, at 800-577-TIPS. Tips can also be submitted on the Crime Stoppers Web site, www.nypdcrimestoppers.com, or by texting to 274637 (CRIMES) and entering TIP577.

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March 10, 2016

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TheVillager.com

Mayor’s false dichotomy on affordable housing TALKING POINT BY ANDREW BERMAN

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ayor de Blasio’s twin rezoning proposals to reshape development in our city go before the City Council for a final vote toward the end of this month. The plans purport that letting developers build taller buildings will result in their including more affordable units — while vastly increasing the number of new market-rate housing units we build — yet will make our city and our neighborhoods more affordable. But the facts just don’t bear this out. The mayor’s Mandatory Inclusionary Housing proposal would require 25 to 30 percent of new residential developments in certain areas to be affordable. But there’s a catch: The requirement would only be applied when the city changes zoning rules to vastly increase the amount of new market-rate housing that could also be built. Thus, affordable housing would only be provided if a great deal more market-rate housing is also built than would otherwise be allowed.

Sound familiar? This is the formula used 10 years ago in Manhattan’s West Chelsea/Hudson Yards neighborhoods and in Brooklyn’s Williamsburg/Greenpoint. Back then, zoning rules affecting those areas were changed to increase significantly the allowable amount of residential development, with strong incentives for making a fraction of the housing affordable. The result? Quite a bit of affordable housing was built in both areas — more than in any other part of the city, or about 25 percent of new units on the West Side and 16 percent in Williamsburg/Greenpoint. But there was also a virtual tsunami of new market-rate housing that utterly transformed those neighborhoods, physically and socioeconomically. These formerly diverse areas became among our city’s least affordable and most rapidly gentrifying neighborhoods, defined by walls of glassy high-rises that resemble Hong Kong or Miami more than New York. This is the model the mayor is seeking to apply across the city. But there’s a less-discussed, more pernicious flip side to linking these affordable housing requirements exclusively to massive upzonings: Neighborhoods unwilling to accept vastly increased amounts of mar-

ket-rate housing get no affordable housing. Case in point: The de Blasio administration has consistently rejected a rezoning proposal for the University Place/Broadway corridor in Greenwich Village with an affordable housing component, because we were unwilling to accept a vast increase in the allowable amount of market-rate housing along with it. The mayor’s other rezoning proposal, Zoning for Quality and Affordability, would lift height caps by more than 30 percent in certain parts of the city when new developments include 20 percent affordable housing. Some might find this a worthwhile tradeoff, if it results in more affordable housing. The problem is, it won’t. This part of the mayor’s plan would apply to areas called Inclusionary Zones, which currently have strong incentives for including affordable units in new developments. According to the city’s own study, in 95 percent of the cases, developers are already doing this. But the city claims existing height limits prevent a higher rate of inclusion — that the caps don’t leave room to “fit” the affordable units, so developers leave them out. Here again, studies say something different. The affordable housing program’s complicated bureaucracy and requirements, its comparatively gener-

ous tax breaks for building market-rate rather than affordable housing, and the relative inexperience of smaller builders seem to be the main reasons some developments don’t include the affordable units. Unfortunately, the mayor’s rezoning plan would do nothing to address these factors, which actually do inhibit the inclusion of affordable housing in new developments. The mayor’s rezoning proposals create a false dichotomy, claiming if we just allowed more and larger developments, we’d have a more affordable city. At best, evidence indicates the height-lifting approach of Z.Q.A. would result in no net increase in affordable housing. At worst, experience shows M.I.H.’s vast increases in market-rate housing would likely accelerate gentrification and inflate rents and housing prices. Either way, these plans would undeniably make for more-crowded, less-livable communities, with services and infrastructure stretched ever thinner. Worse, such approaches divert us from implementing real solutions to New York’s affordability problems. Our neighborhoods, and our city, deserve better. Berman is executive director, Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation

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March 10, 2016

15

Pedaling a new way of biking in the ‘Eco ’80s’

George Bliss’s Anything Goes bicycle pedicabs in Washington Square in 1987. Bliss pioneered pedicabs in New York City.

PHOTO BY CARL HULTBERG

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Fence plan makes no sense To The Editor: Re “City goes for the fences to increase parks access” (news article, March 3): Trying to fix a problem that doesn’t exist could create new problems. Fences around gardens, like the Jefferson Market Garden, prevent rowdy tourists from vandalizing the park. Fences, like the one around Passannante Ball Field, at Houston St.

EVAN FORSCH

and Sixth Ave., keep balls and other sports equipment from rolling into traffic and serve as a bit of a barrier in a high-traffic site. Isn’t the Mercer St. playground slated to be demolished with the N.Y.U. 2031 expansion plan and replaced by a “Tricycle Garden”? Why spend more taxpayer dollars on a park that the court has already determined isn’t a park, and may not exist once construction begins? Stacy Walsh Rosenstock

To catch a Katz’s ticket thief To The Editor: Re “ ‘Where’s your ticket?’ A prison of pastrami” (notebook, by Beth Kaiserman, March 3): I once sussed out a ticket thief next to me on the Katz’s sandwich line. I had my ticket on the tray while waiting for my sample pastrami. Then it was gone. After persistence and confrontation, I got the lowlife to return mine. I don’t think that thief went into Katz’s looking to steal a ticket; he saw, what for him, was an opportunity at my literal expense. To save face, or avoid prosecution, he pretended it was an accident. If you are willing to steal, then lying to others and yourself is easy. He probably justified it as “finders keepers, losers weepers.” I’ve seen this on the M14D when I found, to later return, a lost wallet. A viper on the bus, who I beat to the wallet, was amazed that I would do that. He would have kept it, he said, and then recited the offensive limerick. Jared Goldstein a.k.a. Jared the NYC Tour Guide E-mail letters, not longer than 250 words in length, to news@thevillager.com or fax to 212-229-2790 or mail to The Villager, Letters to the Editor, 1 Metrotech North, 10th floor, Brooklyn, NY, NY 11201. Please include phone number for confirmation purposes. The Villager reserves the right to edit letters for space, grammar, clarity and libel. Anonymous letters will not be published.

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March 10, 2016

TheVillager.com

Who is this f----n’ guy? Trump from Soho to Uh-oh! TALKING POINT BY LINCOLN ANDERSON

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met Donald Trump once. It was at the ribbon-cutting for his new Trump Soho condo-hotel at Spring and Varick Sts. in April 2010. Back then, I don’t think anybody had any inkling that he would one day be running for president. The Soho Alliance and Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation had vigorously fought the construction of the 46-story behemoth — the Soho Alliance even sued in court — but The Donald prevailed. What was most memorable to me about meeting Trump was his sort of goofy, breezy behavior when I was interviewing him. It was definitely a unique experience. He cut the ribbon, along with his children, Ivanka, Eric and Don, Jr., the hotel’s development partners, Julius Schwarz of Bayrock and Alex Sapir, and Robert Lieber, the deputy mayor for Economic Development. Trump’s kids were going to have a role in managing the place. Trump then asked if there were any questions from the media, and seeing none, with a “Let’s get to work!” he started to walk off. I stepped up to him, though, before he left the room. First, he basically mocked my approach, saying, “Oooh!” and making a silly face. O.K., whatever, I didn’t see any other reporters deigning to interview him. Trump looked eager to talk to a reporter, though. When I told him that I worked for The Villager, he promptly said, in seriousness, “That’s a good paper.” The Trump seal of approval, for what it’s worth. We had reported on the fierce neighborhood opposition to the project, along with the discovery of ancient graves on the construction site that belonged to congregants of an early abolitionist church that once stood there. And there also had been a catastrophic construction accident that killed one worker when a collapse occurred near the top of the tower. My first question was how would the restrictive declaration covering condo owners’ use of their units be enforced? Stays at the hotel are limited to no more than 29 days in a row within a 36-day period, and 120 days total per year. Opponents suspected the building was a “Trojan horse” for residential use, since the area had a manufacturing zoning that allowed hotels but not residential use, which had led the City Council to put the restrictive declaration in place. No problem, Trump stated, confidently: The length of stays would be monitored by “computer,” and it was, of course, a great system. What about the fact that the building was so tall it could be seen sticking up like a middle finger from all over Downtown? “That’s a good thing,” Trump stated bluntly. Chiming in, Ivanka said it meant people inside the building would have excellent views when looking out. Ivanka seemed nice, but, umm, she totally missed the point — probably intentionally — by spinning that one the other way. What of all the community opposition from Soho residents? “They’re all our friends now,” Trump brashly assured. “Everybody likes our building.” Suddenly, a pack of photographers — many of them, doubtless, paparazzi — moved in and, sensing a money shot of the whole Trump clan standing together, started barking at me to back up. “Your notebook’s going to be in the photo!” one of TheVillager.com

VILLAGER FILE PHOTO

Donald Trump and his daughter, Ivanka, at the ribbon-cutting of the Trump Soho condo-hotel in April 2010.

them yelled. “Get your notebook out of the frame!” The camera-friendly Trump and Ivanka instinctively turned toward the photographers. “Who is this f----n’ guy?” Trump joked, waving me off with mock annoyance as the camera flashes exploded in a blinding blaze of white. The photographers satiated, I then asked the mogul about a report that only one-third of the building’s 391 units were in contract to be sold. That question, though, he didn’t want to answer. “O.K., I’ll see you later,” he said, then walked out of

‘It’s too much bad talking. No manners, no respect — nothing.’ Azad

the room. One photog asked me, “What did he say to you?” It wasn’t a big deal, I said. I assumed it was just Trump being Trump. But I realize now it was sort of par for the course with his M.O. of “insulting his way to the presidency.” I didn’t take it personally, and perhaps, in his own way, he was sort of trying to be funny. But I have interviewed a lot of people, and, honestly, no one has ever acted quite like that. Most people don’t needle you the minute they meet you and then end an interview by saying, “Who is this f----n’ guy?” and wave you off with feigned annoyance. Again, I think he was just sort of breezily making a joke of it all. But is it presidential behavior?

I bumped into Trump again in the lobby and again asked him about the building’s gargantuan size. “We had a zoning that allowed us to build this tall, and we took advantage of that,” he asserted. “I think it’s going to be a landmark in New York.” He assured that the place would “do records, in terms of volume and food.” He then walked out toward his waiting black car in front, but first kneeled down in the entryway to pose for a photo with some little kids who were checking into the hotel with their parents. “See!” Trump called back to me over his shoulder while still on his knee. “This is business!” My mom worked in the Garment District for decades, and I told her about my encounter with Trump. “He sounds like a typical salesman,” she shrugged. I work with a lot of salespeople. They basically put food on my plate. Trump, though, is in a league of his own. As for the Trump Soho hotel and its “great” computer system, Andrew Berman, executive director of G.V.S.H.P, this week told me, “As far as we know, for years after it was built, the Trump Soho never conducted or provided to the city the required audits to prove they were abiding by the law regarding terms of stay and residential use. However, just to make sure responsibility is placed where it belongs, neither the city, nor former Council Speaker Christine Quinn and former Borough President Scott Stringer, who helped craft the agreement, ever asked to see a single audit, and the city never penalized the Trump Soho for not doing so. “As you know, however, the Trump Soho was a giant financial failure, and according to press reports, they were changing from a condo-hotel operation — which obviously lends itself to abuse of the restriction against residential uses — to a traditional pay-pernight transient hotel, which the zoning allows; so the possibility of zoning violations, as well as the applicability of the original agreement requiring audits, may TRUMP continued on p. 31 March 10, 2016

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March 10, 2016

TheVillager.com

Water damage can’t dampen Drama Book Shop’s prospects After burst pipe, Broadway star helps turn the tide BY COLIN MIXSON

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here are few achievements more admirable than nearing the century mark. The Drama Book Shop, a niche bookstore that’s served theater artists and enthusiasts since 1917, has persevered through one and a half world wars, a Great Depression, one disastrous experiment in prohibition, 17 US Presidents, a near catastrophic fire, and — most ruinous of all — the introduction of cinema with sound, followed decades later by the rise of an online book vendor with ambitions to deliver their product by drone. Now, in the final stretch before its grand centennial anniversary, the venerable Drama Book Shop has run into a stretch of bad luck that nearly drowned its ambition of surviving to its 100th year — but thanks to the enduring love amongst New Yorkers for theater and the performing arts, and the unsolicited promotion of one wildly successful playwright, this independent book dealer will survive the digital age and beyond, according to the store’s owner. “I still don’t know how to react to the way people have come in and helped us,” said owner Rozanne Seelen. “The response has been phenomenal.” The Drama Book Shop, located at 250 W. 40th St. (btw. Seventh & Eighth Aves.) was recently flooded by several thousand gallons of city water after a pipe broke on the cold night of Sun., Feb. 14, turning the pulpy contents of its acting, history, and design sections into so many theater-themed popsicles by the time employees came to open the door the next morning. The near ruinous turn of events has left the store bereft of some of its most popular titles. The loss of its acting TheVillager.com

PHOTOS BY YANNIC RACK

Allen Hubby and Rozanne Seelen anticipate searching for a new location when the lease is up on their W. 40th St. location, but are confident the Drama Book Shop will celebrate more milestones beyond its 2017 centennial.

All is forgiven: Customers didn’t seem to mind the disclaimer on this sign, posted to acknowledge the bare shelves that were cleared after several thousand gallons of water flooded the store on the night of Feb. 14.

material, which accompanies many budding thespians through their tour of Juilliard and the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, was an especially hard blow, according to store’s manager and heir apparent. “Rebuilding the acting section is particularly hard,” said Allen Hubby, Seelen’s nephew. “It’s one of our most popular sections. Students need textbooks, and students come here for books and we’re forced to say, ‘Sorry, they drowned.’ ” So it came as both a blessing, and served as yet another testament to the store’s importance to the theater community, when Lin-Manuel Miranda came to Drama Book Shop’s aid. The creator of “In The Heights,” whose Grammy award-winning musical “Hamilton” is currently Broadway’s most coveted ticket, “saved us,” said Seelen. “I really think he did. He will never have to pay for a book again as long as I live. Any book he wants is free forever.” Having heard of the water damage, Miranda took to Twitter. With a few well-placed hashtags — and in under 140 characters — his words of praise gave the store a much needed boost in sales, helping it produce at least some of the capital needed to finance replacement copies of its waterlogged tomes. “We must have gotten 600 orders saying, ‘Lin sent me,’ ” Hubby explained. “We didn’t even ask him, he just did it out of the goodness of his sweet heart.” Miranda’s association with the Drama Book Shop is based on more than just a great retail experience. Its three floors on W. 40th St. once served as his base of operations. “The @dramabookshop is not only DRAMA continued on p. 20 March 10, 2016

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Long shelf life likely for Drama Book Shop DRAMA continued from p. 19

the best place to get theater-related ANYTHING, I wrote most of In The Heights there. Pls support. #BuyABook,” Miranda tweeted on Thurs., Feb. 18. Other tweets from that day indicate a bright future in marketing, should he choose a new career path. In addition to praising the Shakespeare section’s comfy chairs, he replied to a Twitter follower’s inquiry about whether the upcoming Miranda-penned “Hamilton: The Revolution” would be available for purchase at the Drama Book Shop. “It will be. And I’ll go sign it there,” Mirada vowed, “But they need your help now so I can go sign it there in April.” Other tweets found Miranda naming his most recent purchases (“When I was last there I got a Noel Coward bio, a King Lear DVD starring Brian Blessed, and the Heathers piano/ vo”), and invoking a character from “It’s a Wonderful Life,” who rescues George Bailey from impending bankruptcy and scandal (“If you’re not in NY, you can also purchase items via the site below. BE SAM WAINWRIGHT. HEE HAW”). This latest episode in the long life of Manhattan’s only remaining performing arts bookstore is merely a brief act in an epic play and, when the curtain first rose on the Drama Book Shop in 1917, it revealed a much different set and cast than what you’ll find today. As it was, the Drama Book Shop began less as a bookstore, and more as a bookshelf, located in the Manhattan offices of the Drama League of New York. Back before video (and, later, the Internet) would come to reign as the supreme source of pulp violence, pornography and off-color humor, theater was the ultimate wellspring of all things unwholesome, and the Drama League helped ardent fans of proper drama sift through the many lewd productions that proliferated during the early 20th century, according to Hubby. “Around the turn of the century, theater had gotten a bad name, because a lot of it was quite tawdry,” he said. “So, this group of people who loved theater formed branches all over the country. The idea was they would recommend plays that were worthy of theater, which basically meant theater that didn’t have sex or violence.” Meanwhile, the bookshelf (or card table, depending on who’s telling the story) was managed by one Marge Seligman — and, over time, her mea-

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March 10, 2016

PHOTOS BY YANNIC RACK

From online orders to brick and mortar foot traffic, response to the recent water damage “has been phenomenal,” says Rozanne Seelen.

Although structurally intact, the ceiling sustained significant water damage.

ger collection of dramas and musicals ballooned, eventually becoming more popular and than the haughty Drama League that birthed it, according to Hubby. So, Seligman took her catalogue of plays and established the Drama Book Shop on E. 45th St. in 1923, in what was then Manhattan’s Publishing District. From there, the store moved a few times, each time heading further west, until eventually finding its way to W. 52nd St. (btw. Fifth & Sixth Aves.) in 1958, when a group of disparate thespians and theater enthusiasts bought the store. Among them was Arthur Seelen, a former actor, whose enthusiasm for theater craft and the people who love it remains a fond recollection of the shop’s more venerable patrons, even after his death in 2000, according to his widow, Rozanne. “He loved the young people who came into the store, and he loved the books,” she said. “Even all these years later, people come and say how much they miss him. It’s a great credit to him.” Seleen, his partners, and, later, his wife, cultivated a staff similarly devoted to the performing arts, whose knowledge of the craft and their faithfulness to the store is as much a key to the shop’s success as its doting clien-

tele, according to Hubby. “We have an incredibly knowledgeable staff,” he said. “People who come to work here stay for years and years, and they don’t want to leave, even though we pay them next to nothing. We have the best staff in the world.” In fact, the Drama Book Shop has produced at least one stellar addition to the theater world. Playwright Douglas Carter Beane, whose work on “As Bees in Honey Drown,” “The Little Dog Laughed,” “Xanadu” and “The Nance” have made him a (literal) marquee name, worked at the store as a bag checker in the ’80s. But, while the store and its staff are sought-after for their prodigious knowledge of theater, that doesn’t always equate to sales — even if they’re able to help the customer pick out the perfect play, according to Hubby. “It is frustrating when someone says, ‘Thank you so much for your help, I’m going to go to Amazon and order that book,’ ” he explained. And, despite its enormous collection of plays and written material concerning performing arts, many of which is out of print and nearly impossible to come by, the Drama Book Shop is a destination for more than just its wares. In addition to its basement the-

ater, where the store’s resident children’s theater company, The Striking Viking Story Pirates, rehearse and perform, the Drama Book Shop has played host to several high-profile, if impromptu revivals. At one point, cast members from the original production of “A Chorus Line,” invaded the store and collectively belted out tunes from the show. That off-the-books revival was followed up by an unofficial production of “Hair,” when cast members of the show’s original and follow-up productions met up at the shop and gaily broke out in song, according to Hubby. “We’ve had some revivals,” he recounted. The Drama Book Shop has outlived at least five other theater-themed bookshops in the city, and is now one of three remaining niche performing arts bookstores in the western hemisphere, with one in Los Angeles and another in London still chugging along, according to Hubby. But, as the store’s centennial anniversary approaches, several other threats loom over the bookshop’s future. Even after this reporter began work on the article you’re now reading, a second incident subjected the business’s basement offices to more water damage, on Sun., Feb. 28. Fortunately, this one was less catastrophic, and did more to encourage an early spring-cleaning than anything else, according to Seelen. “It’s making us clean up the office,” she said. More ominous, however, is the approaching end date on the business’s current lease, which will almost certainly force Drama Book Shop into yet another period of flux in the face of what’s expected to be an enormous rent hike, Hubby said. “Our lease is up dangerously soon,” he said. “We have a very good relationship with our landlord, but we’ll have to move when our lease is up. It will probably triple.” Whatever happens, chances are good that, somewhere in the city, there will be a cozy chair where somebody, from some part of the world, will be devouring a stack of plays curated by the Drama Book Shop. “It is not without its challenges. Every day is an adventure,” said Hubby. “Our customers are very resourceful. If they need a monologue, they’ll find us.” The Drama Book Shop is located at 250 W. 40th St. (btw. Seventh & Eighth Aves.). Hours: 10 a.m.–7 p.m. Mon., Tues., Wed., Fri. & Sat. (open until 8 p.m. on Thurs.). Sun., 12–6 p.m. Call 212-944-0595 or visit dramabookshop.com. TheVillager.com

Steve McCurry sees India, in spectacular color Rubin Museum’s retrospective is an epic eye-opener BY NORMAN BORDEN

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es, “Steve McCurry: India” is a spectacular exhibition — but then again, Steve McCurry is a spectacular photographer. Best known for his iconic “Afghan Girl” image, which appeared on the cover of June 1985’s National Geographic, McCurry’s first exhibition at the Rubin Museum of Art (RMA) is an eye-opening retrospective of work from his more than 80 visits to the Indian subcontinent during the period of 1982–2014. The show, which includes other iconic images as well as photographs never seen before by the public, coincides with the publication of McCurry’s new book, “India.” It’s also the museum’s first partnership with the International Center of Photography. McCurry says that the publication of “Afghan Girl” changed his life — but in my opinion, some of the photographs in this show are just as memorable, including some from two of his previous books, “Monsoon” and “India by Rail.” When McCurry visited India for the first time in 1978, he had only planned to stay about six weeks, but ended up wandering around the subcontinent for two years. He said he had no comprehension of India “until I stepped off the plane. I wasn’t prepared for the feeling of magnificence that it evoked. It felt both chaotic and connected.” McCurry has kept returning over the years to a country that retains the capacity to “delight, charm and horrify” him. Many of the 37 photographs on view at the RMA show why. His memorable images of crowded, chaotic cities, primitive rural areas, ancient prayer ceremonies and huge religious festivals, and intimate portraits of ordinary people looking directly at his camera, capture India’s unique charms and beauty as well as its economic and cultural extremes that both fascinate and infuriate. Explaining why he’s attracted to India, he says, “There is such an extreme range of class: rich and poor, old and new, sacred and secular…There are Hindus and Muslims, Sikhs and Jains, Christians and Buddhists all living amongst one another.” Before his first trip to India, McCurry had always used black and white film. Realizing his India pictures should be in color, he brought along 300 rolls of Kodachrome. “Color is integral to the story of the TheVillager.com

PHOTO © STEVE MCCURRY

“Rabari Tribal Elder, Rajasthan, 2010.”

Buddhist monasteries, the Hindu temples, and the Festival of Holi,” says McCurry, who seems both pleased with and committed to his transition to color. “That’s the world we live in… color makes the picture more important,” he notes. In 2010, Eastman Kodak recognized his superb use of color by asking him to shoot the very last roll (36 exposures) of Kodachrome they would ever manufacture. He chose to shoot about 24 images in India; the spectacular 40 x 60 inch print “Rabari Tribal Elder, Rajasthan, 2010,” with its subject’s intense stare and McCurry’s supersaturated color, is a testament to both the photographer’s talent and the film. The importance of color in India is also beautifully illustrated by “Boy in Mid-flight, Jodhpur, Rajasthan, 2007,” one of my favorites in the show. McCurry explains: “I’d been in Jodhpur many times, and I know the back streets well. There were always cows, people on bicycles, and workers in that narrow alley. I took a number of pictures, but I’m glad I waited for the moment the boy practically flew through the passageway.” In my view, I thought capturing the boy in mid-air at the end of the alley was fantastic, but framing it with the deep blue back

wall, red painted hands and orange wall makes it a masterpiece. The picture’s impact is magnified by the large format print –– 40 x 60 inches. This image supports the artist’s belief that a still photograph “is something which you can always go back to. You can put it on your wall and look at it again and again because it is that frozen moment. I think it tends to burn into your psyche. It becomes ingrained in your mind. A powerful picture becomes iconic of a place or a time or a situation.” Well, this is certainly one of them.

In 1983, McCurry returned to India to photograph a series for National Geographic about the monsoon, a season of heavy rainstorms that is synonymous with life, passion, and celebration. On view is “Dust Storm, Rajasthan, 1983,” an iconic image that also graces the cover of “India.” The picture has a mystical quality; the trees and cloud of dust contrast with the bright red saris the women are using to shield themselves from the dust clouds and wind. McCurry says, INDIA continued on p. 22

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Wednesday through Saturday at 8:00 PM Sundays at 3:00 PM

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The Indian subcontinent, supersaturated by McCurry

PHOTO © STEVE MCCURRY

“Boy in Mid-flight, Jodhpur, Rajasthan, 2007.”

INDIA continued from p. 21

“I stopped and tried to make pictures, but they didn’t even notice me, they sang and prayed. Life and death seemed to hang in precarious balance.” While shooting the “Monsoon” series, the photographer saw a tailor walking down the street carrying his sewing machine on his shoulder with water up to his neck. The machine was ruined — but when “Tailor Carries His Sewing Machine through Monsoon Waters, Porbandar, Gujarat, 1983” appeared on the cover of National Geographic, the manufacturer sent the tailor a new machine. In his decades-long search for “unguarded moments, the essential soul peeking out, experience etched on a person’s face,” McCurry has given us an incomparable look at the India that is on the cusp between modernity and ancient tradition: the well-dressed customer waiting for his shoes at the cobbler’s shop; a mother and child at a car window; a father and daughter on Dal Lake; a man covered with green powder carried by a crowd during the Holi Festival; huge crowds gathering for the Kimbh Mela Festival; Buddhist monks debating. Steve McCurry has seen it all. Now, through his eyes, you can too.

PHOTO © STEVE MCCURRY

“Tailor Carries His Sewing Machine through Monsoon Waters, Porbandar, Gujarat, 1983.”

“Steve McCurry: India” is on view through Mon., Apr. 4, at the Rubin Museum of Art (150 W. 17th St., btw. Sixth & Seventh Aves.). Viewable with admission to the museum, Mon. 11 a.m.–5 p.m., Wed. 11 a.m.–9 p.m., Thurs. 11 a.m.–5 p.m., Fri. 10 a.m.–10 p.m., Sat. & Sun. 11 a.m.–6 p.m. Admission is $15, $10 for seniors/students, and free for children under 12 (or after 6 p.m. on Fri.). Visit rubinmuseum.org or call 212-620-5000 for more info. For artist info, visit stevemccurry.com. PHOTO © STEVE MCCURRY

“Dust Storm, Rajasthan, 1983.”

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Just Do Art BY SCOTT STIFFLER

“THE MOSQUITO” AT DIXON PLACE

A familiar face on the nighttime tube (“China Beach,” “Law & Order”) and, more recently, as a cultural commentator on “CBS News Sunday Morning,” Nancy Giles excels at dishing out droll observations whose spice and bite don’t come with the unpleasant aftertaste left by cynicism. The woman knows how to pick her battles, and how to shape her material — qualities that come in handy when Giles is booking talent for “The Mosquito,” a monthly showcase at Dixon Place that conjures visions of an insect whose bite has lasting consequences, while making a cheeky reference to “The Moth,” that 800-pound gorilla of the storytelling circuit. Variety is what sets Giles’ showcase apart, with the host performing alongside a rotating cast of regulars (Pat Candaras, Cynthia Kaplan, Peri Gaffney, Kathryn Rossetter, Sheila Head, Susan Burns, Sue Giles, Nancy Shayne) offering monologues, stand-up, and music. Free. Mon., Mar. 14, 7:30 p.m. in the cozy front lounge space at Dixon Place (161A Chrystie St., btw. Rivington & Delancey Sts.). Visit dixonplace.org or call 212-219-0736. Giles on Twitter: @nancygilesnyc.

AMORE OPERA PRESENTS DONIZETTI’S “POLIUTO” AND “THE ELIXIR OF LOVE”

Amore Opera continues its seventh season of presenting classic and overlooked operas, at prices well within the grasp of youth and senior members of the community. Directed by Nathan Hull and performed by multiple casts, this double bill of works by Gaetano Donizetti marks the first time “Poliuto” has been presented — in a full production, with full staging — in the United States, since 1859. The two-act tragic tale, based on Pierre Corneille’s 17th century play “Polyeucte,” dramatizes the life of Christian martyr Saint Polyeuctus. “The Elixir of Love,” aka Donizetti’s “L’Elisir d’Amore,” is based on the French comedy “Le Philtre” by Eugène Scribe, in which a con man convinces a poor peasant that the beautiful but indifferent object of his affection will come around, thanks to a magic potion (available for purchase, of course). Both productions, sung in Italian with English subtitles, have Italian conductor Daniele Tirilli holding the baton. In May, Amore Opera presents Verdi’s “Rigoletto,” as well a version of Gilbert TheVillager.com

PHOTO COURTESY DIXON PLACE

L–R: Cynthia Kaplan, Pat Candaras and Kathryn Rossetter are frequent guests of host Nancy Giles, at “The Mosquito” — a free monthly variety show at Dixon Place.

and Sullivan’s operetta “Iolanthe,” cast entirely with children. Fri., Mar. 11 through Sun., Mar. 20, at The Sheen Center (18 Bleecker St., at Elizabeth St.). For the schedule of performances and tickets ($45 general, $35 for seniors, students, children), visit sheencenter.org or call 212-925-2812. Artist info at amoreopera.org.

FAUX-REAL THEATRE’S “THE BACCHAE”

Greek theatre performed with “immersive abandon that closely approximates how these plays were first experienced” is the specialty of New York’s avant-garde Faux-Real Theatre — whose interpretation of Euripides’ 5th century tragedy casts its Greek chorus as a girl group, Dionysus as a “gender-bending and mercurial party god,” and its communal party as an uninhibited realm where nobody bats an eyelash at the sight of a titillating costume malfunction or a drunken goat dance. Through Sun., Mar. 20: Thurs., Fri., Sat. at 7:30 p.m., Sun. at 2 p.m., at La MaMa (First Floor Theatre; 74A E. Fourth St., btw. Bowery & Second Ave.). For tickets ($18 general, $13 for students/seniors), visit lamama.org or call 646-430-5374. Artist info at fauxreal.org.

PHOTO BY NATHAN HULL

The Roman general Severo (Robert Garner) attempts to woo Paolina (Sara Beth Pearson), in Amore Opera’s production of “Poliuto” — through Mar. 20 at The Sheen Center.

PHOTO BY MICHAEL STEVER

Immersive and uninhibited: Faux-Real Theatre’s “The Bacchae” gives La MaMa some serious Greek, through Mar. 20. March 10, 2016

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Purple, pedicabs and a push for recycling: ECO ’80S continued from p. 1

the Village and Lower East Side. It is published under the imprint of Ragtime Society Press. (An aside: Carl is the grandson of Rudi Blesh, the famous jazz critic and promoter, and among his other projects was the Rudi Blesh Ragtime Society music appreciation club. His cavernous antebellum apartment that he inherited from Rudi was packed almost to capacity with vinyl — an international collection spanning ragtime, jazz, blues, rock and way beyond.) The ’80s are remembered more for Reagan reaction and Koch conservatism than radical ecological politics. But they were a time when, below the surface, the consciousness shift that began with the counterculture upheaval of the ’60s and continued through the environmental movement of the ’70s was ripening, getting serious about manifesting its vision in concrete alternatives. Carl’s special project in those years was the Village Green Recycling Team, one of the first efforts at a recycling program in the city. He was also involved in the New York Greens, a nascent attempt at a Green Party in the city. This effort ultimately came to little, but it did bring together various activist and ecological projects from around the metro area, immersing Carl in an alternative culture that would prove an incubator for ideas later adopted by the mainstream. The first volume is devoted to the New York Greens and related activist efforts; the next two to the late Adam Purple’s Garden of Eden and community gardens; the fourth to experiments in bicycle and human-powered vehicle (H.P.V.) design; the last to urban cycling and recycling. Shots of the celebratory All-Species Parade, with art-activists dressed up in homespun costumes to impersonate their favorite endangered animals, contrast those of scruffy volunteers pushing handcarts piled high with newspapers. The Village Green Recycling Team and sibling Lower East Side Ecology Center, by their very existence, put pressure on the city to launch an official recycling program. Environmental groups were lobbying the City Council to pass a bill mandating such a program, after much resistance from the Sanitation Department. The enviros could point to these grassroots initiatives as evidence that recycling could work in the megalopolis; the bill was finally passed in 1989. Among the images reproduced in “Garden of Eden” are Villager articles on these efforts from back in the day. (The L.E.S. Ecology Center continues to serve as a compost drop-off

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PHOTOS BY CARL HULTBERG

Adam Purple with some seedlings in his Garden of Eden in 1985.

The entrance to the Garden of Eden.

site today; hopefully, the bureaucracy will again follow the grassroots pioneers and instate a mandatory citywide composting program in the coming years.)

Although I couldn’t find a photo of it in his monographs, Carl’s apartment for years sported a sign in the window reading: “COOPER UNION, HOW COULD YOU DO THIS TO

OUR NEIGHBORHOOD?” Another, actually illuminated from behind, read, “LIFESTYLES OF THE SICK AND SHAMELESS.” This was a reference to the Bowery Bar (today the B-Bar), which opened on the block, an early toehold of gentrification, in a reconverted gas station that had been long abandoned. The Cooper Union industrial-arts college owned the site, and Carl’s friend (and sometime housemate) George Bliss sought to establish an H.P.V. workshop there. Instead, Cooper Union turned the property over to developer Eric Goode, who transformed it into the B-Bar. In its heyday, when it drew the glitterati (it has since become déclassé), the signage right next door registered silent protest with those waiting on line to get in. Bliss opened his workshop elsewhere, producing and marketing pedicabs and the big truck-trikes used by the V.G.R.T. This workshop, known as The Hub, bounced around to a few locations — most recently in the West Village, where he sold and rented alternative-model bicycles. It finally closed its doors in 2014 — according to George, forced out of business by the advent of Citi Bikes. Also documented is the struggle of bicycle messengers to keep Fifth, Park and Madison Aves. open to bikes after the Koch administration issued an order banning them from those Midtown thoroughfares during working hours in 1988. This was the first time the messengers really got organized, in what Carl calls “a spontaneous American labor movement.” They repeatedly rode en masse in defiance of authorities, and ultimately prevailed in getting the ban overturned. These actions presaged the Critical Mass bike rides that took off in the ’90s, cyclists making the point with their bodies to demand their right to the road. Again, this demand would later be taken up by the bureaucracy under Mayor Bloomberg, and dedicated bike lanes began appearing on many Manhattan streets — with stretches of Broadway now closed to cars entirely. Then there’s Adam Purple. The two volumes devoted to him contain shots of his garden before, during and after its destruction in January 1986. (Particularly poignant images show Adam’s cat, forlorn in the post-destruction rubble.) The destruction of Adam’s garden both set a dangerous precedent that gardens could be destroyed by city government fiat and galvanized a movement to defend them — ultimately resulting in the deals that saved hundreds of gardens around the city in the early years of ECO ’80S continued on p. 25 TheVillager.com

A look back at New York City’s ‘Eco ’80s’

Steve Athineos leading an action by bicycle messengers in 1987 in what, according to Carl Hultberg, was the city’s first Critical Mass rally. Athineos, who ran a messenger company on E. Third St., organized the messengers so that they wouldn’t get banned from Fifth, Madison and Park Aves. He died this year.

Christina Datz hauling paper for the Apartment House Recycling Program of the Environmental Action Coalition. ECO ’80S continued from p. 24

the Bloomberg administration. Of course, it’s a bitter irony that gardens, bike lanes and pedestrian malls are today seen by many as TheVillager.com

greasing the way for further gentrification (in the case of the pedestrian malls, actual privatization of public space). As the bureaucracy embraces alternative models, it has the effect of destroying those very grassroots ini-

Carl Hultberg, one of the core members of the Village Green recycling team and the author of a new collection of books on the “Eco ’80s.”

tiatives that broke ground for them and made them possible. The most blatant example is Citi Bike, a program that bears the name and logo of a financial behemoth — representing corporate recuperation of progres-

sive, even radical ideas. Carl’s “Garden of Eden” commits to our collective memory those radical origins — and the lesson that all progress, ultimately, comes from below. March 10, 2016

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To Advertise Call: 646-452-2490 LegalAds@TheVillager.com Deadline – 12 noon Wednesday

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PHOTO BY LINCOLN ANDERSON

A “crystallized” book by Alexis Arnold at Art on Paper. In its second edition, the Art on Paper fair returned to the Lower East Side’s Pier 36 at Montgomery St. last week. Normally, the pier is home to Basketball City, but for the four-day fair, from Thursday to Sunday, it was buzzing with gallerists and art lovers, more than 20,000 of them over the event’s duration. The fair featured the best in paper-based art — works on, about and from paper — from 65 top galleries from Downtown Manhattan to around the world. Among local artists featured were the late Larry Rivers and graffiti great LA II.

Telecom connects on 3’s, ending S.P. Bears’ season SPORTS BY RICHARD KUSHNER

I

n an incredibly exciting game, on Wed., March 2, the Seward Park Campus boys basketball team beat John Adams, 54-51. The Grand St. Bears were down by 3 at the end of the first quarter, up by 5 at the half, down by 5 at the end of the third quarter, which was stretched to 10 in the final quarter, and then down by 3 with 46 seconds left. Seward Park made two defensive stops and scored twice, and was up by 1 with 14 seconds left, and then held on for the win. It was inner-city hoops at its finest. There were college coaches at the game. It was just too much fun. But then on Sat., March 6, the Bears faced off with High School of Telecommunication Arts & Technology at the Cardozo High School gym in Queens. It was a close game, but the season has come to an end as Seward Park lost. Many times basketball games are won on the foul line. In a close game, it is the team that makes more free throws that is usually victorious. Although Seward Park’s foul shooting was fairly good, Telecom’s was superior. They only missed one free throw down the stretch whereas Seward missed seven. That made the difference as Telecom

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March 10, 2016

pulled out the victory, 65-59. Both teams played a very slow, grind-it-out game. Seward was close throughout, and though down by 8 at the half, they never gave up. They even went ahead 51-50 at one point, but Telecom was resilient and their press baffled the Bears at times. Also, Telecom’s 3-point shooting was superb. And their constantly shifting defenses kept the Bears off balance, resulting in turnovers and poorly chosen shots. For Seward Park, the seniors carried the team. Xavier Jennings had 9 points, Drew Billingsley had 17, and D’Andre McLamb had 24. Once again McLamb had the crowd on its feet with three sensational dunks. Billingsley’s 3-pointers kept the team in the game and Jennings’s drives to the basket were sensational at times. However, poor shot selection, leading to a poor shooting percentage, was the culprit. The Bears had an outstanding season — going 12-1 in conference play and then getting all the way to the final eight in their PSAL A Division playoffs. We wish them well and hope to continue to watch the seniors when they go away to college. You can play basketball as long as you wish to competitively, not only in college, but in men’s leagues all over the country. So, although this high school and championship tournament season has come to an end, there will be a lot more basketball for these young men in the future. TheVillager.com

Trump from Soho to Uh-oh! TRUMP continued from p. 17

no longer apply.” Asked his thoughts on Trump aspiring to be president, Berman replied, in part, “The Trump Soho was clearly a scam from the beginning… . I don’t think that anyone involved with this project is qualified to serve as dogcatcher, much less any higher office.” After the San Bernardino shooting in December, when Trump called for a ban on Muslim immigration, I asked some local Muslim merchants around where I live for their thoughts about him. Hassan, from Bangladesh, the night man at a deli on my corner, said clearly Trump is a rich guy who has always been catered to and just takes whatever he wants. “He wants a woman, he just picks them,” he said, plucking the air with his fingers. “That is a big chair — for the whole world,” he said of the responsibility of being U.S. president. Clearly, he was implying that a guy like Trump should not be sitting in that seat. Subbir, another Bengali who is the morning cashier at a smaller deli next to Hassan’s, said of Trump, “He may win the Republican [primary]...but the American people… .” He didn’t finish the sentence, but I think most people could fill in that pause: “...are not really crazy enough to elect this guy.” “Every religion has good and bad,” he added. Azad, a younger guy who works at the second deli at night, recently told me he actually follows Trump’s page on Facebook, just to keep up with whatever whacky thing he is saying now. On his smartphone, he showed me one of Trump’s videos in which he calls the Mexican border “Swiss cheese” and talks about all the executive orders he would pass, if elected. “It’s too much bad talking,” he said of Trump. “If he be the president, you should be more...,” he searched for the word, “you can’t talk like that: ‘Kill that people. Kill this people.’ It is American president. It is a big thing. He’s talking like homeless people. You should talk more carefully. If you be the president, you can’t talk like other people — you have to be more…” “Responsible,” I said, helping him out. “Yes,” he said. “No manners, no respect — nothing,” he said of Trump. “You can’t talk hard all the time. Sometimes, talk hard — sometimes, talk soft.” Similarly, a barber from Uzbekistan down the street, said of Trump, “You have to be tough as president, but you also have to be nice. You represent the country.” These guys are all recent immigrants. Their English-speaking ability isn’t perfect, but their comments are sane, sensiTheVillager.com

ble. This is what much of the world must think when they hear Trump bluster — a guy who is combative and reckless and simply not fit to be the leader of one of the planet’s most important countries. I was sitting next to a French law professor recently on an Airporter bus to J.F.K., and asked him what he thought of Trump. “Amusant,” he said, as in “entertaining, funny, amusing.” Sure, Trump is a reality TV star, you can’t help but watch him. It’s funny for now, but if he were to be elected president? He didn’t know what to say about that. The far right in France — and, in fact, all Europe — is about 25 percent now, he noted. The day after Trump racked up still more primary wins on Super Tuesday, I got a call from a very concerned Frances Tallmer, the widow of the great writer Jerry Tallmer, who penned so many incisive talking points for us over the years on politics and all manner of issues. “I’m scared, scared of Trump,” Frances told me. “Jerry would be having a bloody fit right now, and would be writing his hands and his fingers off. He’s dangerous, he’s dangerous,” she said of Trump. “If he wins, we’d be having war and be in big trouble in this country. He won’t stop. He’s a dictator. Honey, he’s a fascist, and he’s dangerous. Jerry and I are still connected — he’s telling me.” I recently was catching up with Trigger, who runs the Continental cheap shots bar on Third Ave. There are some things he likes about Trump, he admitted, as he looked at me from beneath the brim of his Vietnamese rice paddy hat. But there are other things that really bother him, such as the candidate’s insensitive comments about people’s appearances, like when he dissed Carly Fiorina. I know, I told him, what kind of leader treats people like that? I mean — what? — would a Trump cabinet resemble something out of “The Stepford Wives”? On top of everything else, the guy just sounds so superficial. Trigger also recalled he was once out at a fashion event and Trump was there with his current wife, Melania. Trump basically plopped himself down at the foot of the catwalk to better ogle the models, and just ignored his wife, according to Trigger, who said he found it disgusting. Meanwhile, the Daily News frontpage images of Trump as a clown and so forth remind me of MAD magazine. Yes, it is a mad political moment. … Indeed, Trump, as everyone knows by now, is riding a wave of anti-establishment anger. I understand it — and I also feel it. After Hillary Clinton rolled up some big wins on Super Tuesday, I recently made my first-ever political contribution — to Bernie Sanders. Hey, better keep an eye on those superdelegates!

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GREENS ARE GOOD FOR YOU.

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