twi-ny recommended events

CYRANO

Peter Dinklage struts his stuff in wife’s musical adaptation of Cyrano story (photo by Monique Carboni)

The New Group at the Daryl Roth Theatre
103 East 15th St. between Irving Pl. & Park Ave.
Tuesday – Sunday through December 22, $107-$252
thenewgroup.org

You don’t need me to tell you that Peter Dinklage is an extraordinary actor. You can see for yourself in the New Group’s world premiere production of Cyrano, Erica Schmidt’s musical retelling of Edmond Rostand’s 1897 novel Cyrano de Bergerac, which opened last night at the Daryl Roth Theatre. Dinklage, who soared above his castmates in winning four Emmys as the wise, debauched Tyrion Lannister on Game of Thrones, commands the stage from the very start of the play; his eyes and body are so emotive, you cannot take your eyes off him. As opposed to many other stars who have portrayed Cyrano onstage and onscreen — Ralph Richardson, Derek Jacobi, Richard Chamberlain, Christopher Plummer, Gérard Depardieu, Steve Martin, and Kevin Kline among them — Dinklage does not wear a prosthetic nose; he is just himself, as he is. When Cyrano says early on, “I am living proof that God has a sick sense of humor,” it takes on additional meaning, given Dinklage’s achondroplasia. When he’s not onstage, you search for him, whether it’s when you hear his voice booming from the side of the audience or as he waits in the wings, watching the action in character, partially hidden by hanging ropes. Alas, if only the rest of the show were up to the same standards.

Cyrano is a brave, feared member of a company of guards; he is a man of both the pen and the sword, as expert with a blade as he is with a pencil. He is madly, desperately in love; the object of his affection is his childhood friend Roxanne (Hamilton’s Jasmine Cephas Jones), but the object of her affection is the novice guard Christian (Blake Jenner), a handsome man with not much upstairs. “I’m so stupid. It’s shameful,” he acknowledges. Roxanne is also desired by the wealthy and powerful Duke De Guiche (Ritchie Coster), who is charge of the company; he is determined to have Roxanne as his wife. Roxanne is love-starved as well: She sings, “I’d give anything for someone to say / That they can’t live without me and they’ll be there forever / I’d give anything for someone to say to me / That no matter how bad it gets they won’t turn away from me.” She falls for Christian at first sight, but he’s such a dull, dense beauty that he has no idea how to woo her, so Cyrano, who cannot bear to see Roxanne disappointed, starts ghostwriting love letters for Christian and feeding him romantic lines to say to her. It all comes to a head when Cyrano, Christian, and De Guiche are in a fierce battle on the front lines of the war.

Christian (Blake Jenner) makes his case to Roxanne (Jasmine Cephas Jones) with Cyrano’s (Peter Dinklage) help in new musical (photo by Monique Carboni)

Adapted and directed by Schmidt (All the Fine Boys), who is married to Dinklage, Cyrano is all about the poetry and power of words. Cyrano lives to write letters. When his friend Ragueneau (Nehal Joshi), a pastry chef, is being threatened by one hundred men coming to kill him, Ragueneau explains it’s because of a political poem he wrote. When De Guiche is intrigued by Cyrano’s nose but can’t bring himself to be direct about it, Cyrano says, “You seem at a loss for words and, good sir, you are staring.” But Cyrano doesn’t believe his way with words or a sword (oddly, the two words are anagrams of each other) will capture his true love’s heart. Dinklage (The Station Agent, A Month in the Country) sings in his affecting, compelling low register, “Roxanne, what am I supposed to say? / Words are only glass on a string. / The more I arrange them and line up and change them / The more they mean the same thing.” When he makes the deal with Christian, he says, “I am a poet. My words are wasted now — they need to be — to be spoken aloud. I will make you eloquent and you, you will make me handsome.” The battle scene is particularly poetic, beautifully directed by Schmidt and choreographed by Jeff and Rick Kuperman, with snow falling down as the men and women soldiers say farewell to loved ones, perhaps for the last time.

Christian (Blake Jenner) and Cyrano (Peter Dinklage) face off in New Group world premiere (photo by Monique Carboni)

The supporting cast is solid, led by Josh A. Dawson as Cyrano’s trusted right-hand man, Le Bret; Nehal Joshi as pastry chef and political poet Ragueneau; Grace McLean as Roxanne’s constant chaperone, Marie; Scott Stangland as the actor Montgomery and the cadet Carbon; Christopher Gurr as theater owner Jodelet and the priest; and Hillary Fisher as Orange Girl. Christine Jones and Amy Rubin’s narrow set features a long horizontal wall with sections that open up to reveal a room of chefs baking, a door, and a balcony where Roxanne calls out to Christian, who is coached by Cyrano in his replies. Words cover the wall like it’s a large blackboard; among the only legible phrases is the heartbreaking “And she loved me back,” which also pops up in one of the songs. The music, by twin brothers Bryce and Aaron Dessner of the National, and the lyrics, by the National lead singer Matt Berninger and his wife, Carin Besser (who cowrites lyrics for the band), are not as inventive as one might expect from a group with members who specialize in nontraditional melodies and experimentation, whether on an album, in an art installation, or even for an avant-garde opera.

For the show, which was workshopped in 2018 by Goodspeed Musicals in Connecticut, to really grab your heart and soul, the audience has to fall in love with Roxanne in order to understand why the Duke, Christian, and Cyrano do. But that never happens. As played by Cephas Jones, there’s nothing that sets Roxanne apart; she seems to be a nice young woman but not a heartthrob that makes men desire her on sight. And by the treacly ending, you’ll be wondering why the brilliant Cyrano ever wanted her in the first place. However, Dinklage’s gripping, poignant performance rises above everything else, making Cyrano well worth seeing despite its flaws.

DOC NYC 2019: SCHOOL OF SEDUCTION / ELLIOTT ERWITT — SILENCE SOUNDS GOOD / FOR SAMA

School of Seduction: 3 Stories from Russia follows three women learning how to snare a man

SCHOOL OF SEDUCTION: 3 STORIES FROM RUSSIA (Alina Rudnitskaya, 2019)
IFC Center
323 Sixth Ave. at West Third St.
Saturday, November 9, 9:15
Festival runs November 6-15
www.docnyc.net

In 2009, Russian filmmaker Alina Rudnitskaya made the short film Bitch Academy, about a school where a man taught women of all ages how to attract potential husbands the old-fashioned way, by flaunting their sexuality and playing dumb. She has now expanded that into the full-length feature documentary School of Seduction: 3 Stories from Russia, making its North American debut at IFC Center as part of the DOC NYC festival. Rudnitskaya follows three women over seven years as they take the workshop run by Vladimir Rakovsky and then apply what they’ve learned to their life, with varying degrees of success. Rakovsky, a former 911 hotline worker who is not exactly a smooth-talking Romeo or Don Juan — he actually talks and acts like someone you might avoid on the subway — teaches the women how to bend over, how to wiggle their butts, and how to jump in a man’s arms and turn him on. “What did you think it was about? The psychological aspects of gender politics in modern society?” he says, defending his techniques, which are questionable at best in the twenty-first century (or any time, really). But there is a severe shortage of available men in Russia, so he convinces the eager women that they need to play this game in order to snag a wealthy suitor, that they are not able to survive in this world on their own.

“What a nightmare!” Lida Lodigenskaya declares about Rakovsky’s ideals. Lida lives with her mother and is in love with a married father of two. She is combative and determined, sure that he will eventually leave his wife; surprisingly, he allows himself to be filmed with Lida despite his personal situation. Vika Sitnik is in a lackluster marriage and is in the process of opening a lingerie store in a mall. She suffers from anxiety, sharing her fears with a psychologist. Her mother does not understand her crisis, stuck in the old ways. “I feel bad inside,” Vika says as she reaches a turning point in her life. Diana Belova is a single mother whose parents threw her out of the house so she lives with her grandmother. She makes the most out of the workshop, creating a fake, fanciful existence built on attractiveness and elegance. “I believe in fairy tales,” she says as she meets a series of men, not searching for true love but for someone who will be able to give her the upper-crust life she feels she deserves. “I need to be the best,” she explains.

Rudnitskaya is not making fun of any of these people but rather focusing on the difficulty women are having finding the right person to share their life. They have been reduced to becoming kewpie dolls to catch and keep a man, which is both sad and heartbreaking to watch. The film is screening on November 9 at 9:15, with executive producers Sigrid Jonsson Dyekjær, Eva Mulvad, and Rose Grönkjær in attendance to talk about the film.

ELLIOTT ERWITT — SILENCE SOUNDS GOOD (Adriana Lopez Sanfeliu, 2019)
IFC Center
323 Sixth Ave. at West Third St.
Sunday, November 10, 4:30
www.docnyc.net

“I hate to give explanations,” photographer Elliott Erwitt says in Adriana Lopez Sanfeliu’s lighthearted Elliott Erwitt — Silence Sounds Good, having its North American premiere November 10 at IFC Center as part of the DOC NYC festival. Sanfeliu, a protégé of Erwitt’s, follows her mentor around the world for two years as he goes through his vast archives; exercises in his Manhattan apartment overlooking the park; returns to Cuba for a new book and exhibition and meets former ballerina and choreographer Alicia Alonso, who passed away last month at the age of ninety-eight; snaps pictures on the street at the spur of the moment; and shows some of his iconic images, including photos of presidents and popes, a series on dogs (especially one that steals his heart in Cuba), a photo of segregated drinking fountains in North Carolina, and others that reveal his innate sense of composition. But he doesn’t have a lot to say about them; “I’m not very good about talking about pictures,” he notes at an illustrated lecture.

Now eighty-nine, Erwitt, who was born in France, moved to Italy when he was three, then came to the United States when he was ten, has a dry, self-effacing sense of humor, although he has a tremendous amount of fun taking unusual self-portraits. Sanfeliu often lets her camera linger on him as he sits quietly, with nothing more to say, preferring to let his work speak for itself. “Photography is about having a point of view, nothing else,” he says. “With calm, but also with passion. But without making too much noise about it. It’s the photo which must make noise.” When he does pontificate, he has a tendency to come up with some doozies. “I don’t think anything is serious,” he says. “Nothing is serious, and everything is serious. . . . Well, it’s one of those conundrums. You might say that I’m serious about not being serious.” Erwitt will be at the DOC NYC screening to perhaps talk about it — he does appreciate his silence — along with Sanfeliu, producer François Bertrand, editor Scott Stevenson, and writer Mark Monroe. Preceding it is Tasha Van Zandt’s fourteen-minute short One Thousand Stories: The Making of a Mural, about JR’s video mural project, The Chronicles of San Francisco.

Waad al-Kateab documents daily life under constant bombardment in Aleppo in For Sama

FOR SAMA (Waad al-Kateab & Edward Watts, 2019)
Cinepolis Chelsea
260 West 23rd St.
Sunday, November 10, 11:00 am
Monday, November 11, 1:25
www.docnyc.net
www.forsamafilm.com

“You’re the most beautiful thing in our life, but what a life I’ve brought you into. You didn’t choose this. Will you ever forgive me?” Waad al-Kateab asks in the extraordinary documentary For Sama. In 2012 during the Arab Spring, Waad, a marketing student at Aleppo University, joined the protests against the regime of President Bashar al-Assad. She started taking photos and cell-phone video, then got a film camera as she became a citizen journalist, documenting the escalating conflict, trying to find moments of joy amid the brutal, senseless murders of innocent men, women, and children. She met and fell in love with heroic doctor Hamza al-Kateab, who was determined to keep his hospital running as the bombings got closer. Waad and Hamza got married, and on January 1, 2016, she gave birth to a healthy girl, Sama.

The film, directed by Waad (who also served as cinematographer and producer) and Edward Watts (Escape from ISIS), is a poignant, unflinching confession from mother to daughter, explaining in graphic detail what the families of Aleppo are going through as Russian and Syrian forces and Islamic extremists maintain a constant attack. “We never thought the world would let this happen,” Waad explains as the body count rises — which she intimately shows, not shying away from shots of bloodied victims being brought into the hospital, a pile of dead children, or a desperate attempt to save the life of a mother and a newborn after an emergency caesarean. “I keep filming. It gives me a reason to be here. It makes the nightmares feel worthwhile,” Waad says.

She captures bombings as they happen, films families huddled inside their homes while machine guns can be heard outside, talks to a child who says he wants to be an architect when he grows up so he can rebuild Aleppo. Because she is a woman, Waad gains access to other women that would not be available to a male filmmaker as they share their stories of love and despair. Waad and Hamza plant a lovely garden to bring color to the dank, brown and gray city. A snowfall covers the turmoil in a beautiful sheet of white. The pitter-patter of rain offers a brief respite. But everything eventually gets destroyed as Waad and Hamza struggle with the choice of leaving with Sama or staying to continue their critical roles in the rebellion, she depicting the personal, heart-wrenching images of war — in 2016, her Inside Aleppo reports aired on British television — he tending to the ever-increasing wounded. “The happiness you brought was laced with fear,” Waad tells Sama in voiceover narration. “Our new life with you felt so fragile, as the freedom we felt in Aleppo.” Winner of the Prix L’Œil d’Or for Best Documentary at Cannes among other awards, For Sama is screening at Cinepolis Chelsea on November 10 and 11 as part of the DOC NYC festival, with director Waad al-Kateab, codirector Edward Watts, and subject Dr. Hamza al-Kateab expected to attend to discuss the film.

DR. RIDE’S AMERICAN BEACH HOUSE

Meg (Marga Gomez), Matilda (Erin Markey), and Harriet (Kristen Sieh) hang out on a roof in Liza Birkenmeier’s Dr. Ride’s American Beach House (photo by Ben Arons Photography)

Ars Nova at Greenwich House
27 Barrow St. at Seventh Ave. South
Monday – Saturday through November 23, $35-$65
arsnovanyc.com

Liza Birkenmeier’s Dr. Ride’s American Beach House lands at a rather fortuitous moment in time. On October 18, astronauts Christina Koch and Jessica Meir completed the first all-woman spacewalk in history. The play, which opened tonight at Ars Nova at Greenwich House, takes place on June 17, 1983, the night before astronaut and physicist Dr. Sally Ride becomes the first American woman in space, aboard the Challenger shuttle. Dr. Ride was not initially part of the narrative; Birkenmeier originally intended to make a grand epic disproving the scientific method but instead concentrated on one scene, set on June 17, 1983, and only discovered later, after the work was already under way, that it had the connection to Dr. Ride, altering the plot significantly.

Best friends Matilda (Erin Markey) and Harriet (Kristen Sieh) are drinking, smoking, and gossiping on the roof of Harriet’s apartment building in St. Louis, supposedly a meeting of the Two Serious Ladies Book Club, which has nothing to do with literature but is just an excuse for the two of them to hang out. Matilda, who occasionally breaks into song, is married to Arthur and has two children, while Harriet, who writes poetry, is living with her boyfriend, Luke. Their main rule is to never discuss men while on the roof, but they can’t help themselves, especially since Harriet has an incredible story to tell about a one-night stand she just had with a biker, something she has never done before. “I don’t want to break the rule, but let’s talk about this through my perspective,” Harriet explains. “He is an object and I am the subject. He is the, the, commodity and I’m the . . .” It might not pass the Bechdel test, but it still keeps the women in charge.

Norma (Susan Blommaert) finds something to complain about to Harriet (Kristen Sieh) in Ars Nova premiere (photo by Ben Arons Photography)

They are soon joined on the roof — superbly designed with a cool slant and little in the way of safety by Kimie Nishikawa — by Matilda’s friend Meg (Marga Gomez), a butch, stout lesbian in boots, a baseball cap, and a Motörhead T-shirt. “Do you have a husband?” an oblivious Harriet asks Meg, who replies definitively, “Of course not.” Meg is bold and direct, open and honest. “Do you hate men?” Harriet asks, referring to a comment Meg makes regarding her job as a nurse. “No no, I don’t hate men; they only make me homicidal. I’ll be fine,” Meg answers. Meanwhile, hovering about is the persnickety Norma (Susan Blommaert), who is making sure that the building is run as efficiently as possible. As the long countdown begins for Dr. Ride’s journey into space — she is spending the night in NASA’s historic Florida beach house, where the astronauts have a barbecue before blasting off the planet — the four women continue to chatter away as Meg suspects that Harriet and Matilda don’t even realize that they are in love with each other.

Smartly directed by Katie Brook (How to Get into Buildings, She Is King) with a keen sense of humor and suggestive sexuality, Dr. Ride’s American Beach House incorporates the scientific method through exploration, observation, and testing. The all-woman cast and crew have a firm grasp of the material, which subtly takes on gender roles, societal expectations, sex, love, and power. It’s no coincidence that the two main characters are named after heroic female figures from children’s literature, Harriet the Spy and Roald Dahl’s magical Matilda. The two women are obviously in love with each other — Matilda calls Harriet “cupcake” and “pookie” — but are unable to understand what that even means, as they are stuck in traditional modes of thought involving the battle of the sexes, despite all that’s happening around them. Harriet uses binoculars while up on the roof — evoking Dr. Ride out in space, using a telescope — but while she peers longingly at a fashionable kitchen across the way, Meg sees a hapless man trying to kill a bug in his bedroom, criticizing his lack of skills in bed. In a reverse Samson and Delilah, Harriet decides to give up her firm control over the biker after he shaves off his facial hair; as opposed to him losing strength, she loses interest.

Besties Harriet (Kristen Sieh) and Matilda (Erin Markey) are rooting for Dr. Sally Ride in Liza Birkenmeier’s new play (photo by Ben Arons Photography)

Despite how funny the ninety-minute play is — and it’s very funny — a bittersweet edge hangs in the air. Dr. Ride died of pancreatic cancer in 2012 at the age of sixty-one, and her relationship first with Molly Tyson in the early 1980s and then with her longtime partner, Tam O’Shaugnessy, only came to light after her death, in her obituary; she was unable to come out during her lifetime. And less than three years after her trip into space, the very same Challenger space shuttle she flew in broke apart in the air, killing all seven people on board, including thirty-seven-year-old high school teacher Christa McAuliffe. But Birkenmeier’s (littleghost, The Way Out West) poetic yet realistic dialogue — the actors frequently hesitate, repeat words, and speak in incomplete sentences — and the engaging performances by Gomez (Latin Standards, Pound), Sieh (RoosevElvis, The Band’s Visit), and Markey (Singlet, A Ride on the Irish Cream) make this more than just another theatrical ride through the contemporary female psyche, in space and on a St. Louis rooftop.

DOC NYC OPENING NIGHT — ONCE WERE BROTHERS: ROBBIE ROBERTSON & THE BAND

Documentary explores the history and legacy of the Band from a singular point of view

ONCE WERE BROTHERS: ROBBIE ROBERTSON & THE BAND (Daniel Roher, 2019)
SVA Theatre
333 West 23rd St. between Eighth & Ninth Aves.
Wednesday, November 6, 7:00 & 7:30
Festival runs November 6-15
212-924-7771
www.docnyc.net
www.ifccenter.com

The tenth annual DOC NYC festival, which has grown dramatically since its humble beginnings, consisting now of more than three hundred screenings and special events over ten days at three venues, kicks off in a big way on November 6 with Daniel Roher’s Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson & the Band, an intimate, if completely one-sided, look inside one of the greatest, most influential music groups in North American history. The film was inspired by Band cofounder Robbie Robertson’s 2016 memoir, Testimony, offering his take on the Band’s ups and downs, famous battles, and ultimate breakup. “I don’t know of any other group of musicians with a story equivalent to the story of the Band, and it was a beautiful thing. It was so beautiful it went up in flames,” Robertson, sitting in a chair in a vast, empty room, guitars hanging on the wall far behind him, says. The setup puts the focus on Robertson’s individuality, his alone-ness, in what others trumpet as a collection of extraordinary musicians. “There is no band that emphasizes coming together and becoming greater than the sum of their parts, than the Band. Simply their name: The Band. That was it,” fan Bruce Springsteen says. “I was in great awe of their brotherhood. It was the soul of the Band,” notes Eric Clapton, who says he wanted to join the group made up of singer-songwriter and guitarist Robertson, singer and bassist Rick Danko, singer and keyboardist Richard Manuel, singer and drummer Levon Helm, and keyboardist and accordionist Garth Hudson.

When Robertson, who was born in Toronto in 1943, talks about his childhood — his mother was born on the Six Nations of the Grand River Indian reserve, which had a profound effect on him musically, and his biological father was a Jewish gangster, although he was raised by an abusive stepfather — the film is revelatory, with archival photographs and live footage of Robertson’s early bands and his time with Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks. Robertson shares mesmerizing anecdotes about going electric with Bob Dylan, recording the Basement Tapes in a house called Big Pink, and discussing his craft. “I don’t have much of a process of like I’m thinking about this, and now I’m going to write a song and it’s gonna be about that,” he explains. “A lot of times, the creative process is trying to catch yourself off guard. And you sit down and you’ve got a blank canvas and you don’t know what you’re gonna do and you just see what happens.”

Hawkins speaks glowingly of his protégé Robertson, who wrote his first songs for Hawkins when he was only fifteen. Roher also talks to executive producer Martin Scorsese, Rolling Stone founder Jann Wenner, record producer John Simon, road manager Jonathan Taplin, equipment manager Bill Scheele, photographer John Scheele, Asylum Records creator David Geffen, and musicians Dylan, Taj Mahal, Peter Gabriel, Van Morrison, and Jimmy Vivino, who all rave about Robertson and the Band. “They were totally in love with their music, and they were in love with each other,” photographer Elliott Landy says. “I never saw any jealousy, I never saw any arguments, I never saw them disagree. They were always supporting each other. They were five brothers, very clearly five brothers who loved each other, and I never saw anything but that.”

Of course, Roher cannot talk to Manuel, Danko, and Helm, who are all dead, and Hudson did not participate in the documentary. Robertson and his wife, Dominique, paint a harrowing picture of the Band’s severe strife as drugs and alcohol tear them apart. There’s really no one, aside from a brief point made by guitarist Larry Campbell, to offer an opposing view to Robertson’s tale, which puts him on a golden throne despite some very public disagreements, particularly with Helm over songwriting credit and royalties. Robertson speaks enthusiastically and intelligently throughout the film, but it’s clear from the get-go that these are his carefully constructed, perhaps selective memories about what happened. But Roher doesn’t disguise that conceit; the film is named after one of Robertson’s solo songs, and the second half of the title is, after all, Robbie Robertson & the Band, as if Robertson is separate from the rest.

One of the main surprises is Robertson’s claim that the Last Waltz concert at Winterland in 1976 was not meant as a farewell but just a pause; Roher and Robertson fail to point out that the group continued to tour and record without Robertson. On his sixth solo album, Sinematic, which was released in September, Robertson has a song about the Band, the aforementioned “Once Were Brothers,” that can be heard at the start of the film. “Oh, once were brothers / Brothers no more / We lost a connection / After the war / There’ll be no revival / There’ll be no one cold / Once were brothers / Brothers no more,” Robertson sings. “When that curtain comes down / We’ll let go of the past / Tomorrow’s another day / Some things weren’t meant to last.” It’s a sad testament to a storied legacy. Packed with amazing photos and live clips that make it a must-see for fans of the group, Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson & the Band is screening at 7:00 and 7:30 on November 6 at the SVA Theatre, with Roher and Robertson on hand to discuss the work.

TWI-NY TALK — RICK CRANDALL & JOE COSGRIFF: THE DOG WHO TOOK ME UP A MOUNTAIN

Rick Crandall lifts Emme at a 14er summit (photo courtesy Rick Crandall)

IN THE AUTHOR’S CORNER
The AKC Museum of the Dog
101 Park Ave. between Fortieth & Forty-First Sts.
Friday, November 8, free with RSVP, 2:00
museumofthedog.org
rickcrandallbooks.com

In 2001, Rick Crandall was looking for something different. The New York-born Michigan grad had experienced tremendous success in early tech, cofounding the computer timeshare business Comshare. “But after our talented team defied long odds to keep the company relevant, innovative, and (mostly) profitable for over twenty-five years, I found myself in my mid fifties and burned out mentally, physically, and spiritually,” he explains in The Dog Who Took Me Up a Mountain: How Emme the Australian Terrier Changed My Life When I Needed It Most (HCI, September 2019, $15.95), which he cowrote with Joseph Cosgriff. He went through “the emotional lows and anxieties that were the fallout of a sad and difficult divorce” but found love with Pamela Levy after moving to Colorado. They were married and the next year added to their family on April 5, 2001, by getting a tiny Australian terrier they named Emme. “There were pastrami sandwiches at Katz’s Deli that were larger and weighed more than this puppy,” he writes.

Crandall, once named one of the Five Leading Pioneers of the Computer Industry, started going on hikes with the dog, and together they were soon climbing Colorado’s fourteeners, peaks of at least fourteen thousand feet in altitude. He blogged about their adventures and was then teamed with Hasbrouck Heights native, raconteur, and sports and jazz aficionado Cosgriff, a former star athlete dedicated to the New York Rangers and Boston Red Sox and who wrote the song “I Like Jersey Best” for his close pal John Pizzarelli. Cosgriff, a friend of mine, had previously collaborated with Pizzarelli on the latter’s memoir World on a String and with publishing scion Richard Press on Rebel without a Suit: The Not-So-Casual Road to Casual Friday. In his book, Crandall, now seventy-six, tells his compelling, irresistible story in such chapters as “Pint-Sized Pup, Giant Personality”; “Take Me Higher”; and “Everybody’s Got a Mountain to Climb.” On November 8, he and Cosgriff will be at the American Kennel Club Museum of the Dog on Park Ave. to talk more about The Dog Who Took Me Up a Mountain in an Author’s Corner event, followed the next afternoon by a talk and signing at Bookends Bookstore in Ridgewood, New Jersey. Below is an edited, combined transcript of separate interviews I conducted with them.

twi-ny: Rick, what was your single favorite moment with Emme? When did you realize she was special?

rick crandall: It was when I first realized how strong was her will to push forward and upward on a hike or climb regardless of the challenges. She had a drive to get to the highest place wherever we ventured. On a hike near Aspen, we were on a trail that had high grass on both sides; we saw two massive bulls headbutting right across our trail. I was debating whether to turn around or fight through sidetracking in the bush.

Then I noticed Emme continuing a steady march right towards the bulls. She let out a single low-pitched “rrrruff,” and both bulls turned their head to see what the noise was. Emme stared them down as she continued straight towards them without a single hesitation. Astonishingly, the bulls each backed up about ten feet like two semi-trucks in reverse. Emme proceeded to march right through that temporary truce as if saying, “Make way, I’m coming through, and I’m bringing my human with me.”

I saw no option but to follow her, nervously. She got through and so did I right behind her. Soon after we passed, the bulls went right back to headbutting across the path — I have the photo. It was then I saw how unstoppable was her spirit, which served us so well afterwards going for the high peaks. She was undeterred by high wind, hail, boulders, or slippery rocks and it motivated me to adopt the same will, which then transformed into a passion.

twi-ny: What do you think it was about her that made her such an extraordinary outdoor companion?

rc: Two things: First is that she never backed down, never quit; second is that she watched out for me. For example, the mountains get increasingly rocky as you go higher, and after the freeze/thaw of winter, many rockslides often make some rocks unstable underfoot. She was always ahead of me, and when she got on a rock that teetered she would stop and teeter while turning her head to me as if to say, “Dad, this one moves, don’t come here.”

Also, when climbing I was always with friends who were younger and faster than me. When they would get far enough above me to be out of sight, she would climb up quickly, spot them, and then come back down just far enough so I could see her like a sentinel and I would know where they went. She was a connector and she knew it.

twi-ny: As a child, you had Jiggs, a Boston terrier, which was a great experience, and much later you had Simba, Pamela’s cat, which didn’t go so well, and more recently Tucker, who ended up getting along famously with Emme. Have any other animals prior to or after Emme played an important part in your life?

rc: Emme just passed a few years ago at age fifteen. Pamela and I have been looking for the next Emme. Pamela has been breeding some of Emme’s descendants and we currently have a young Aussie similarly named Ella, who is behaving like she may be my next climbing buddy. She is irrepressible with an alpha personality, just like Emme. Even fresh out of the womb, while the smallest in the litter, she climbed on top of the other pups and right out of the whelping box. Now we see her seeking the highest point around, just like Emme. She is fearless and adventurous. That would be so cool, because while I have finished climbing all fifty-eight fourteeners in the Rockies, I have a lot of great thirteeners to enjoy and would love to have a dog buddy with me.

twi-ny: Joe, have you had any pets that had an impact on your life? Do you consider yourself a dog or cat person?

joseph cosgriff: Working backwards, I’m definitely a dog person, especially after bonding with Emme through Rick’s stories. Also from reading the works of Alexandra Horowitz, most notably Being a Dog. I missed the four years of our family’s dog experiment while in college and away playing baseball, although I seem to recall that the dog (or a hungry sibling) ate one of my baseball gloves.

Rick Crandall and Joseph Cosgriff talk about The Dog Who Took Me Up a Mountain: How Emme the Australian Terrier Changed My Life When I Needed It Most at a special event (photo courtesy Rick Crandall)

twi-ny: Rick, in addition to Ella, what’s your pet situation now?

rc: Currently we have six Aussies, some of which are there to carry on Emme’s line with more litters, and one, Ralfie, is a record-setting show dog in the breed. Pamela has been having about one litter every eighteen to twenty-four months. She loves everything dog and the Australian terrier meets all her checkboxes.

twi-ny: As a native New Yorker, what do you miss most about the city?

rc: NYC has the most intense and densely located feast of stimuli for anyone searching for a new passion in life. Colorado has mountains that became such an important real part of my life, but the mountains in my story in the book also serve as a metaphor for any passion that can raise the quality of life for any New Yorker, especially with so many choices.

twi-ny: What do you miss the least?

rc: Everything worth climbing has an elevator!

twi-ny: Joe, have you had any experience climbing mountains or going on long hikes?

jc: Rick has promised to take me up into the mountains, so I’m hoping to mix some hiking and jazz in Aspen this summer.

twi-ny: Have you climbed any metaphorical mountains in your life?

jc: Sure, we all have mountains to climb every day. The lesson of Rick and Emme is that allowing one’s senses to enjoy every aspect of a hike is as important as reaching the summit.

twi-ny: Have you ever been to Colorado and, if so, how did you like it?

jc: I have been to Colorado for business a few times, which included “team building” via white water rafting and a few novice hikes with office colleagues. I look forward to a summer trip that lets me explore firsthand several of the climbs we wrote about.

twi-ny: Rick, what was the best part of collaborating with Joe?

rc: The best part is that we quickly developed a relationship due to the intense interaction that only longtime friends get to know about each other. The older I get, the more I cherish a friendship like that.

twi-ny: What was the most challenging part?

rc: The most challenging part wasn’t very challenging. Joe is passionate and highly knowledgeable about MLB — baseball — and he is prone to introduce baseball quotes here and there. He would throw some in and I would go, Huh? But we had no trouble getting to a balance closer to my world — i.e., more mountain and dog quotes. 😊

twi-ny: Joe, what was the best part of collaborating with Rick?

jc: The best part was that Rick came to the book armed with a central, overarching theme — the importance of finding a passion for the final third of one’s life. But those words would have fallen flat like bromides without the stories that put the reader on the mountain trails with Rick and Emme.

Cover Final - Soft Cover
twi-ny: What was the most challenging?

jc: As you’d expect from someone who has been a business founder, a management consultant, and a chairman of the board of several corporations, Rick has strong opinions. No surprises there.

twi-ny: You’ve also collaborated with John Pizzarelli and Richard Press. How did those collaborations compare with the one with Rick?

jc: Those collaborations were different in that I had known both men for a while, and the published book was at least our third or fourth project together. In the case of Pizzarelli, we had known one another for over thirty years and had already cowritten songs and worked out material for Red Sox luncheons both in New York and in Boston.

The highest compliment I would hear about the Pizzarelli and Press books was “Why did they need you?” I know both voices well and tried to tell those stories using each one’s style. Not being as familiar with Rick’s voice, I worked extra hard to describe the world as he does and not as, say, Jean Shepherd would have.

twi-ny: Rick, you climbed all fifty-eight fourteeners in the Rockies with Emme, beginning when you were sixty-four, and thirteeners might be in your immediate future with Ella. Do you have any other grand adventures coming up, with or without an animal companion?

rc: Yes, this is an often-asked question, especially by people trying to figure out how to discover what their next passion should be and from where that idea might come. Mine came from the unlikely source of following my irrepressible dog who had already discovered her passion.

Now, even though she is gone from this earth, the impact on my life continues as I work to get the inspirational message underlying this book in front of as many eyeballs and hearts as I can.

Increasingly I am hearing that my talks at author events, like the one coming up at the Museum of the Dog on November 8, is inspiring to others. That is as much a gift to me and I am all over it, treating this book as my next adventure. I do still climb and I will continue until I can’t, but I don’t have a goal to reach a number; rather, I want to smell the different roses all the way up to each summit.

twi-ny: Joe, next up for you are a music documentary and a children’s book. Anything you can talk about yet?

jc: Yes, I am working on a music documentary that will likely air on public television in early 2021. The director is Jim Burns, who also directed the terrific PBS pledge-week doc a few years ago about the great songwriter and WWII test pilot Jimmy Van Heusen [Swingin’ with Frank & Bing]. My next book will be about the 1904 baseball season and the first pennant race ever between the New York and Boston teams that became the Yankees and the Red Sox. And the children’s book Pizzarelli and I are planning is built around a song near and dear to our hearts — “I Like Jersey Best.” It will be a trip to the Jersey Shore and other Garden State landmarks as seen through the wondering eyes of two eight-year-olds.

twi-ny: Rick, how did the Museum of the Dog event come about?

rc: They schedule a monthly series called the Author’s Corner. When Joe heard that after thirty-two years the AKC had moved the museum back to New York City, he brought a copy of the book over. They called the next day, excited to have us. I am also doing an article for the AKC community, which is impressively large.

twi-ny: How would you say your book is different from the many other dog-related books out there?

rc: On the surface it is an easy flowing mix of humor, adventure, and uncanny stories about an improbably older guy following his small dog up the highest mountains in the continental US in pursuit of their new passion in life. Underlying is the joy and inspiration that takes the reader away from all the negatives bombarding us daily and gives us something important to think about.

twi-ny: Speaking of being bombarded, while you’re in New York, what else do you plan to do for fun?

rc: Hunt around for a jazz club; too many are shutting down, but still some of the best jazz in the country is right here in the city.

LITTLE STEVEN & THE DISCIPLES OF SOUL / PETER WOLF & THE MIDNIGHT TRAVELERS

Little Steven & the Disciples of Soul will play the Beacon on November 6 (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

Beacon Theatre
2124 Broadway between West 74th & 75th Sts.
Wednesday, November 6, $45 – $125, 7:30
www.msg.com www.littlesteven.com

“Somebody open up the door / Well yeah, I’m back to rock some more / If you’re a little on the shy side / Don’t worry, girl, I’ve got the cure,” Stevie Van Zandt sings on “Communion,” the opening song on his first album of original material in twenty years, Summer of Sorcery. Made with the Disciples of Soul, the record is another electrifying collection of heavy groovin’ rock, pop, R&B, Latin, funk, and soul. Little Steven and the Disciples of Soul were in the midst of a North American jaunt supporting the disc when he had to cut the tour abruptly short on doctor’s orders. “I thought I could shake this sinusitis, but it doesn’t seem to be going away,” he announced in a statement. “I’ve never canceled shows before. I feel terrible about this, but my doctors are telling me there’s just no way to continue right now. I really hope we can make up these dates someday somehow.” Fans in New York, where Stevie lives, and Massachusetts, Bronx-born opener Peter Wolf’s longtime home, have caught a break, however, as Little Steven preserved two dates, November 2 at the Chevalier Theatre in Medford and November 6 at the Beacon; the latter is being recorded for DVD release.

Summer of Sorcery has a cinematic scope with a determinedly summer feel. “Please let this be the first summer of the rest of my life,” he pleads on “Love Again.” On the well-titled “Soul Power Twist,” he sings, “It’s an endless summer night / Liberation’s in the air / I wanna say I love you to everybody everywhere / I see the whole gang they’re all here tonight / They’re making a scene because the time is right.” The girl-group-influenced “A World of Our Own” sounds like it takes place on a street corner on a steamy August day. And the propulsive “Vortex” could be the theme song for a gritty summer action thriller. Van Zandt might be turning sixty-nine later this month, but he’s inextricable from the youthful energy of rock and roll. “Hey, old man, get out of my way / I got no interest in anything you gotta say,” he declares on “Superfly Terraplane.” Little Steven’s live performances features songs from most of his solo albums, from 1982’s Men without Women and 1987’s Freedom — No Compromise to 1989’s Revolution and 2017’s comeback, Soulfire, as well as unexpected covers, including one from his boss of his main gig. Wolf, who has made numerous guest appearances with the E Street Band over the decades, opens things up with the Midnight Travelers, whose latest album is 2016’s A Cure for Loneliness. November 6 should indeed provide a cure with summer long over and the darkness of fall settling in.

LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS

Seymour Krelborn (Jonathan Groff) suddenly discovers the bloody secret of Audrey Two in Little Shop of Horrors (photo © Emilio Madrid-Kuser)

Westside Theatre
407 West 43rd St. between Ninth & Tenth Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through January 19, $69-$179
littleshopnyc.com

Little Shop of Horrors is back where it belongs, off Broadway, in Michael Mayer’s exhilarating adaptation continuing at the Westside Theatre through January 19. The 1982 satire of “science fiction, ‘B’ movies, musical comedy itself, and even the Faust legend,” as noted by book writer, lyricist, and original director Howard Ashman, debuted in 1982 at the WPA Theatre and soon moved to the Orpheum in the East Village, where it ran for more than five years. A smash hit that became one of the most-produced shows around the country, it was based on Roger Corman’s 1960 black-and-white comedy about a milquetoast floral assistant on Skid Row who is raising a rather odd plant. It was turned into a successful film by Frank Oz in 1986 and made it to Broadway — something Ashman, who died of AIDS complications in 1991 at the age of forty, was against — in 2003. But Mayer returns it to its roots (I know that phrase is part of the ad campaign, but it’s a darn good one), playing to sold-out houses in the Westside Theatre’s 270-seat upstairs space even though the star-studded musical easily could have done big business on the Great White Way.

Jonathan Groff is sweetly endearing as Seymour Krelborn, a schlemiel working in a failing flower shop on Skid Row owned by the gruff Mr. Mushnik (Tom Alan Robbins), who has raised the orphan Seymour since he was a child, although not with much love. Seymour pines for his coworker, Audrey (Tammy Blanchard), a squeaky redheaded bombshell who has an abusive boyfriend, black-leather-jacketed sadistic dentist Orin Scrivello (Christian Borle). The trio of Ronnette (Ari Groover), Crystal (Salome Smith), and Chiffon (Joy Woods) — yes, they are named for three popular 1960s girl groups, and they sing in that style — serve as a kind of Greek chorus, participating in some of the action as they hang out on a pair of grimy stoops. Mushnik is about to shut down the shop when a strange, unidentifiable plant that Seymour is nursing, which he calls Audrey Two (or Twoey), quickly becomes a local sensation; the store starts doing extremely well, and Seymour and Audrey’s drab existence is reinvigorated. The only problem is that Audrey Two, which is growing at an absurd rate, needs special food to survive: human blood. “Feed me,” Audrey Two, voiced by Kingsley Leggs, demands, not sounding at all like a destitute denizen of Skid Row.

Orin Scrivello, DDS (Christian Borle) thinks he has Seymour (Jonathan Groff) just where he wants him in Michael Mayer adaptation (photo © Emilio Madrid-Kuser)

A riotous take on movies about monsters, aliens, and serial killers in addition to romantic comedies, Little Shop of Horrors is also a trenchant look at class and capitalism in post-depression America. The play is set on Skid Row, where bums sprawl out next to garbage cans and kids never finish school. When Mushnik asks the three girls how they intend to better themselves, they sing about their lack of hope: “You go downtown / Where the folks are broke / You go downtown / Where your life’s a joke / You go downtown / When you buy your token, you go — / Home to Skid Row . . . / Where the cabs don’t stop . . . / Where the food is slop . . . / Where the hop-heads flop in the snow!” It’s a far cry from the downtown lovingly portrayed by Petula Clark in 1965 (“The lights are much brighter there / You can forget all your troubles, forget all your cares . . . / Downtown, everything’s waiting for you.”)

Audrey desperately wants a traditional suburban life where she’s not poor and beaten down, physically and psychologically. “A matchbox of our own / A fence of real chain link / A grill out on the patio / Disposal in the sink,” she sings. “I’m his December bride / He’s father, he knows best / Our kids play Howdy Doody / As the sun sets in the West / A picture out of Better Homes / and Gardens magazine / Far from Skid Row / I dream we’ll go / Somewhere that’s . . . / Green.” It’s no coincidence that Audrey Two is green, offering them all a way out, although not the one they pray for.

Two-time Tony nominee and Obie winner Groff (Spring Awakening, Hamilton) and Emmy winner and two-time Tony nominee Blanchard (Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows, Gypsy) are adorable in roles originated onstage by Lee Wilkoff and Ellen Greene and onscreen by Rick Moranis and Greene. (The always terrific Gideon Glick will step in as Seymour from November 5 to 17.) It might not appear that Seymour and Audrey belong together at first, but then comes the beloved “Suddenly Seymour” and their love blossoms. Two-time Tony winner Borle (Peter and the Starcatcher, Something Rotten!) plays Orin and a bunch of other smaller roles with ketchup, mustard, and relish, devouring them with a sly wit, including several in just a few minutes, featuring hysterical, super-fast costume changes (the duds are by Tom Broecker) as Seymour and Audrey Two go viral the old-fashioned way, eons before social media and the 24/7 news cycle.

Tony winner Mayer (Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Spring Awakening) maintains a sweet intimacy, even as Audrey Two threatens to overtake Julian Crouch’s period set and the small theater itself. Ellenore Scott adds fun choreography harking back to 1960s pop; the puppet design is by Nicholas Mahon based on Martin P. Robinson’s original. The score, performed by an offstage four-piece band led by conductor and keyboardist Will Van Dyke, is chock full of nuggets, from the impossibly catchy title song and previously mentioned tunes to “Dentist” and “Da-Doo,” many of which will have you singing and dancing down the street afterward, which doesn’t happen often nowadays. “There will be a temptation to play it for camp and low-comedy,” Ashman, who also collaborated with Menken on Kurt Vonnegut’s God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater and the Disney animated films The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast, explains in his author’s note in the script, adding, “When Little Shop of Horrors is at its most honest, it is also at its funniest and most enjoyable.” It’s hard to get rid of all the camp, but this Shop is nothing if not honest, funny, and most enjoyable.