The
Red Hook StarRevue
AUGUST 2017
SOUTH BROOKLYN’S COMMUNITY NEWSPAPER
FREE
Major Motion Picture opens August 11
Glass Castle author’s time as local community journalist by Sarah Matusek
REPORTERS NOTEBOOK
SHOW ME A HERO by Sarah Matusek
I
’m hungry, but I dutifully wait for lunch. Because lunch today is at Defonte’s!
I spend the morning writing at the Star-Revue’s warehouse office, pretending coffee is enough. The hours slouch by. When I can’t take any more typing, I bolt out the door and head down Van Brunt Street. Armed with a notebook and cash, I try my best to walk—don’t run, Sarah—toward the famed sandwiches. The sun is brutal. Beads of sweat shine from the balding scalps of passing men. I alternate the sides of the street to find moments of shade. My shinlength black capris don’t help; I’d decided against shorts this morning, like I usually do when planning to walk around Red Hook, because the length of my pants determines how many unwelcome shout-outs I get from men. But today’s discomfort makes the walk feel more like a pilgrimage.
Special treat
This is my first-ever trip to Defonte’s Sandwich Shop, the family-run legend that has served up hearty heroes since 1922. I’ve heard its praises sung all over—from New York Times food critic Sam Sifton’s love letter to Defonte’s fried eggplant sandwich, to my editor, claiming that the only reason why the shop survived decades of crimeridden Red Hook was because no one wanted to lose such a great place for lunch. (With no research to confirm, I’ll let this lore linger for now.)
“I’d never been happier in my life. I worked ninety-hour weeks, my telephone rang constantly, I was always hurrying off to interviews and checking the ten-dollar Rolex I’d bought on the street to make sure I wasn’t running late, rushing back to file my copy, and staying up until four a.m. to set type when the typesetter quit. And I was bringing home $125 a week. If the check cleared.”
-- Jeannette Walls in The Glass Castle, remembering her job at The Phoenix newspaper
J
eannette Walls’ best-selling memoir from 2005, The Glass Castle, documents her vibrant, chaotic childhood through pageturning adventures. As her family wanders from Arizona to Appalachia, it’s clear that Walls’ eccentric parents are more concerned with self-fulfillment than child-rearing. With little oversight, Walls and her three siblings are left to their own creative devices and practically raise themselves.
Jeannette E. Walls’ first Phoenix cover story. (courtesy Phoenix Newspaper Archives at Brooklyn College Library)
A film adaptation of The Glass Castle hits theaters August 11 with a starstudded cast: Brie Larson plays Walls, along with Naomi Watts and Woody Harrelson as her parents.
downtown Brooklyn, including Red Hook and Carroll Gardens. She left such an impression that she is still fondly remembered by her former Phoenix colleagues — including the founder of the paper you’re currently reading.
It just so happens that Walls’ first serious writing job began in 1978 in Brooklyn. She was a high school intern, and later reporter, at the Brooklyn Phoenix, a weekly community newspaper that covered
The Star-Revue caught up with a few of Walls’ Phoenix acquaintances who remembered the tall, confident redhead who blazed her way through Brooklyn, on her way to becoming a best selling author, with her memoir
soon to be up on the silver screen.
City-As-School intern
After following her older sister out of West Virginia to New York City, Walls was barely 18 years old when she started at The Phoenix. She was placed at the paper through an alternative public school, City-AsSchool, that offers students education through internships instead of traditional classrooms. “In those years I don’t think we (continued on page 6)
As my 20s march on, I’ve gained a “to hell with it” attitude about food and have become an omnivore foodie. If a fellow diner gapes at a portion and says, “That’s too big,” I’m often the one who takes up her fork and goes, “Challenge accepted.” So I’m ready for my meaty hero. After a sweaty mile, I turn right onto Delavan Street. My eyes settle on De(continued on page 3)
Table of Contents Happenings ............................................2 School News.........................................16 Religious News....................................4,5 Summer in the City ............................11 Formula E ..............................................8 Marlene Pantin ....................................17 Red Hook Star-Revue
www.star-revue.com
Second Sundays page 22
Chef V pages 18-19 August 2017, Page 1