twi-ny talks

TWI-NY TALK & GIVEAWAY: DANIELLE MONARO & SELF WORKOUT IN THE PARK

SELF magazine’s Workout in the Park returns to Rumsey Playfield on Saturday — and twi-ny has free tickets to give away!

SELF WORKOUT IN THE PARK
Central Park, Rumsey Playfield
Enter at 72nd St. & Fifth Ave.
Saturday, May 7, $20, 11:00 am – 3:00 pm (registration begins at 9:00 am)
www.selfworkoutinthepark.com

New Yorkers of all sizes and abilities will be getting long and strong with seventeen different classes at Rumsey Playfield in Central Park this Saturday during SELF magazine’s annual Workout in the Park. SELF tapped innovative fitness specialist Crunch to present everything from Masala Bhangra’s Bollywood-flavored moves to Retro-Robics (anyone remember the eighties? Jane Fonda?) and the classic Beach Body burn to brand-new workouts such as LaBlast, cardio fat-burning ballroom moves inspired by Dancing with the Stars; a special Glee class where you’ll learn songs and dances from the show; KAMA Strength, inspired by the Kama Sutra (which muscles will you be using for that class?); and Reebok Toning Zone, a total-body regimen that exploits the training advantages of Reebok EasyTone sneakers. Participants will also get style, beauty, and nutrition consultations, plus a goodie bag with exclusive freebies from sponsors PopChips, Garnier, and more. The special guest emcee for the four-hour event is Z100’s Danielle Monaro, the self-described “tough chick from the Bronx” who brings the Sleaze to Elvis Duran and the Morning Show every day at 6:30, 7:30, and 8:30. In between exercising and gossiping, Danielle talked to twi-ny about getting pumped up.

Danielle Monaro, who brings the Sleaze to Z100’s morning show, will aim to please as host of the annual SELF Workout in the Park on Saturday

twi-ny: When we New Yorkers get outside, we’re crazy for parks. What’s your favorite park? What’s your favorite indoor way to keep fit?

Danielle Monaro: I love Overpeck Park in Teaneck, New Jersey. It’s great for rollerblading! When I work out inside I got to Tiger Schulmann’s mixed martial arts classes.

twi-ny: As a Z100 personality, you’re around some pretty hot music all day long. At Workout in the Park, SELF is featuring workouts inspired by Glee and Dancing with the Stars. What’s your favorite workout song or type of music to exercise to?

Danielle Monaro: Right now I work out to the Jessie J CD (Who You Are)! I also love Adam Lambert, Jesse McCartney, Pink, and Craig David. They all get me pumped.

twi-ny: New Yorkers are known for being a bit obsessive about fitness. We’ve seen a guy swing a golf club on Madison Avenue and people X-country skiing down Park Ave. during a blizzard. What’s the wackiest workout you’ve ever tried?

Danielle Monaro: I have tried many workouts, but to be honest they are pretty normal! Lollllllll

TWI-NY GIVEAWAY PACKAGE: Tickets are $20 and must be purchased in advance, but twi-ny has a pair to give away right now for free, along with a water bottle and an iRenew bracelet. Just send your name and daytime phone number to contest@twi-ny.com by Thursday, May 5, at 12 noon to be eligible. All entrants must be twenty-one years of age or older; one winner will be selected at random.

TWI-NY TALK: ANNE BOGART

UNDER CONSTRUCTION will hold its New York premiere April 21 - May 7 at Dance Theater Workshop (photo by Michael Brosilow)

UNDER CONSTRUCTION
Dance Theater Workshop
219 West 19th St.
April 21 – May 7, $20-$35, 7:30
212-924-0077
www.dancetheaterworkshop.org
www.siti.org

Founded in 1992 by Anne Bogart and Tadashi Suzuki, Manhattan-based SITI Company specializes in presenting original multidisciplinary works that examine the nature of theater itself as well as unique interpretations of plays and text by such writers as August Strindberg, Virginia Woolf, Noël Coward, and William Shakespeare. In 2001, artistic director Bogart and playwright Charles L. Mee began a four-part road trip through the concept of the United States with bobrauschenbergamerica, followed in 2006 by Hotel Cassiopeia, set in the boxlike world of Joseph Cornell. The third part of the American Museum Cycle, Under Construction, which melds the down-home charm of Norman Rockwell with the visual flair of contemporary installation artist Jason Rhoades, holds its New York premiere April 21 – May 7 at Dance Theater Workshop as part of DTW’s Guest Artist Series. The always engaging Bogart and Mee will participate in preshow Lobby Talks April 25-27 and May 2 at 6:30, but you can get some of the inside scoop from her now in the below twi-ny talk.

twi-ny: You recently wrote on your blog that SITI “offers a gym for the soul.” How would you say Under Construction fits that description?

Anne Bogart: Because the play has no obvious narrative structure, Under Construction asks the viewer to put together the pieces. But when you do put the pieces together, using your associative and imaginative toolbox, the journey will be a buoyant and adventurous one.

Artistic director Anne Bogart and SITI Company are on a mission to redefine and revitalize contemporary theater (photo by Michael Brosilow)

twi-ny: Under Construction is the third part of the American Museum Cycle, in which the work of American artists influences the productions directly and/or indirectly, including Robert Rauschenberg in bobrauschenbergamerica, Joseph Cornell in Hotel Cassiopeia, Norman Rockwell and Jason Rhoades in Under Construction, and James Castle in the upcoming Soot and Spit. How do you and Chuck decide which artists to build your stories around? Were there any artists you wanted to use that just didn’t work out?

Anne Bogart: It was Chuck Mee who suggested Robert Rauschenberg, Joseph Cornell, and James Castle. But for many years both Chuck and I had secretly harbored a fascination for Norman Rockwell. This mutual interest led toward Under Construction. But, in typical Chuck fashion, it was he who had the brilliant idea to juxtapose Norman Rockwell and his vision of America with the wild and woolly world of installation-artist Jason Rhoades. I once suggested to Chuck the idea of doing a play based upon Andy Warhol, but Chuck did not take the bait. The subject matter must be of interest to both of us. But in general, it is Chuck Mee who takes the lead in the choice of subject and the format of the play.

twi-ny: SITI’s stated mission is “to redefine and revitalize contemporary theater in the United States through an emphasis on international cultural exchange and collaboration.” How would you say the company is doing as it looks toward its twentieth anniversary next year? Do you think contemporary theater in general still needs to be redefined and revitalized?

Anne Bogart: Theater is the art form that perhaps, more than any other, needs to be redefined and revitalized on a regular basis. New forms and audience/actor relationships are in a constant state of flux. What was revolutionary fifteen years ago now feels antiquated. As for how SITI Company is doing, as we move into our nineteenth year of existence, we are reevaluating our processes and our methods of existence and looking with fresh eyes at our mission statement. Here is the new one that we just composed:

“SITI Company was built on the bedrock of ensemble and we believe that through the practice of collaboration, a group of artists could make a life together and have a significant impact upon both contemporary theater and the world at large. Through our performances, educational programs and collaborations with other artists and thinkers, SITI Company will continue to challenge the status quo, to train to achieve artistic excellence in every aspect of our work, and to offer new ways of seeing and of being as both artists and as global citizens. SITI Company is committed to providing a gymnasium-for-the-soul where the interaction of art, artists, audiences, and ideas inspire the possibility for change, optimism, and hope. We are hopeful for the future and look forward to the adventures that lie ahead.”

TWI-NY TALK: BEN KATCHOR

Since 1988, Brooklyn-born artist Ben Katchor has been exploring urban decay and disappearing aspects of culture and society in such comic strips as Hotel & Farm, The Jew of New York, and Julius Knipl, Real Estate Photographer as well as in such musical theater pieces as The Rosenbach Company and The Slug Bearers of Kayrol Island, or, The Friends of Dr. Rushower. He focuses on old-fashioned characters who wander through cities mumbling and grumbling about the way things were, seeking out blue-plate specials and marveling at old signage from a bygone era. Katchor has just released his latest book, The Cardboard Valise (Pantheon, March 2011, $25.95), a collection of “picture-stories” published in Metropolis magazine that detail eccentric xenophile Emile Delilah’s surreal existence, including his journey to the Tensint Islands, an exotic land known for its rest-room ruins and boardwalk ice-cream licker. The book comes with fold-out carrying flaps, mimicking Emile’s valise, which is filled with an array of things, as is Katchor’s book. On April 2 at 2:00, Katchor will present A Checkroom Romance at the New School Presents Noir festival; the free musical production features text and images by Katchor and music by Mark Mulcahy. On April 9, Katchor will be signing copies of his books at the Pantheon booth at the MoCCA Festival of Comic Art at the 69th Regiment Armory at Lexington Ave. and 26th St. Katchor recently discussed travel and the future of the book in our latest twi-ny talk.

Ben Katchor’s latest collection is another genius examination of eccentricity in a surreal, old-fashioned world (photo by Jeff Goodman)

twi-ny: Your previous book, The Beauty Supply District, came out more than ten years ago. Why such a long wait?

Ben Katchor: I got involved in working on music-theater productions over the past ten years. In collaboration with composer Mark Mulcahy, we produced four shows: The Slugbearers of Kayrol Island, The Rosenbach Company, A Checkroom Romance, Memorial City, and, premiering in October 2011, Up from the Stacks. All along, I continued my weekly and monthly picture-stories but didn’t feel the need to compile them into a book — until now.

twi-ny: In The Cardboard Valise, Emile Delilah packs a heavy suitcase and heads to the Tensint Islands. You’ve also taken readers on a journey to Kayrol Island. When you go on vacation, do you prefer bustling cities, dusty towns, or exotic islands? Are there certain items that you always pack that you don’t necessarily really need, as Emile does?

BK: I like cities and the countryside of Europe. I tend to bring along piles of research material that I rarely get to use.

twi-ny: One of the major themes of your work has always involved disappearing parts of culture — outdated factories, old-fashioned signage, and people lamenting the way daily life is changing, missing how things were. With the growing success of electronic books, there are some sounding the death knell for the physical book itself. What are your thoughts on ebooks, specifically as it relates to the kind of picture-stories that you tell? Are you afraid the physical book might be a disappearing part of American culture?

BK: The repurposing of physical books for electronic distribution is an awkward and limited activity, mainly for archival purposes. The possibilities of electronic storytelling go far beyond the confines of the printed book and I look forward to seeing what develops. Physical books will be around for a long time — I see them used as window and door props, and as structures to support laptop computers. I’m used to looking at picture-stories on large high-resolution screens; modern printed books seem to me like an unfortunate reduction of the information in the original digital file. The publishing industry began to dematerialize books with the introduction of the disposable paperback — the ebook is the logical expression of this impulse.

TWI-NY TALK: KIDS OF 88

Kids of 88 will be playing their sweaty, sexy electro-pop at Piano’s on March 28 (photo by Kyle Dean Reinford)

Piano’s
158 Ludlow St.
Monday, March 28, $8-$10, 9:00
212-505-3733
www.myspace.com/kidsof88
www.pianosnyc.com

Best buds Jordan Arts and Sam McCarthy have been making music together since they were twelve years old, banging pots and pans and listening to Hendrix. The Auckland duo known as Kids of 88 — vocalist McCarthy and programmer and keyboardist Arts were both born in 1988 — burst onto the scene a few years back with the sexy, steamy electro-pop hits “My House” and “Just a Little Bit” and have gone on to make remixes for Cobra Starship and Ke$ha, even going out on the road with the latter on a recent brief European tour. On such big-sounding dance-club songs as “Downtown,” “Sugarpills,” and “Just a Little Bit,” they sing about slutty sex, getting unprofessional, and, well, just having a damn good time. Upon returning from their highly praised shows at SXSW, Arts and McCarthy, who will be playing Piano’s at 9:00 on March 28 on a bill with Cassette Kids, K. Flay, Bo Bruce, and the Lopez, answered questions about Austin, their friendship, and ’80s theme songs.

twi-ny: You’ve just finished several gigs at SXSW, where the raves keep pouring in. What was the overall experience like? Did you get to see other bands play as well, or were you too busy with your own shows and press?

Sam McCarthy: The overall SXSW experience was festively turbulent. We had been tipped off about how crazy things can potentially become, so we were well prepared when it came to maneuvering our way about the town, meaning we could focus on what we were there to do and have an amazing time doing it! Unfortunately we only managed to capture a few other bands. Surfer Blood on the Tuesday night was great, If only we could have caught the amazing Gayngs, then we would have been set for life.

Jordan Arts: South by South Swag was what Theophilus London called it when he took the stage for the MTV Garage showcase, which we were also playing at. To be on the bill with the likes of him and Friendly Fires and Matt & Kim was awesome, so that was a highlight for me. It was a bit of a whirlwind experience but I’d do it again in a heartbeat.

twi-ny: The two of you have been making music together now for more than half your lives. Do you ever get sick of seeing each other, or are you more like kindred spirits, meant to be together?

JA: I think kindred spirits is a nice way to look at it. We are more often than not on the same wavelength, which doesn’t always happen with everybody. To be experiencing parts of the world we’d never had imagined we would be in together can only mean that we’ll be reminiscing about the past when we’re sixty years old!

SM: We have moments where we can clash, but they are always positive disagreements, whether that results in an idea that neither of us would have conjured up or it keeps the other on their toes; however, most of the time it’s a happy band-ship. We’re both Aquarian, so even if we wanted to tiff it’d be forced.

twi-ny: On your website, you describe your music as “a cross between a late ’80s police drama intro theme and a sophisticated super hussy.” What is your favorite late ’80s police drama intro theme, and who is your favorite sophisticated super hussy?

SM: Beverly Hills Cop is up there. I also think a disco rework of the America’s Most Wanted song could be pretty epic. Top bird? Daryl Hannah in a pant suit is a sight for sore eyes; I could have easily bitten off a bit of Sharon Stone in her heyday also.

JA: Although bending the rules a bit, my favorite theme would probably be the Beverly Hills Cop intro or maybe the amazing Knight Rider theme. As hussies go, I think Lisa [Kelly LeBrock] from Weird Science takes the cake. She’s oh so sexy, but the fact that she can do out-of-this-world things makes her very sophisticated!

TWI-NY TALK: ANA BOLLOCKS

Ana Bollocks (r.) shows her stuff for the Queens of Pain, who open Gotham Girls Roller Derby season Saturday night against the Bronx Gridlock

Gotham Girls Roller Derby
City College of New York / Nat Holman Gymnasium
138th St. & Convent Ave.
Opening night: Saturday, March 26, $19.99 – $35, 6:30
888-830-2253
www.gothamgirlsrollerderby.com

Get ready for a slobber-knocker of a good time this Saturday night as the Gotham Girls Roller Derby season gets under way at CCNY’s Nat Holman Gymnasium, with two-time defending champion the Bronx Gridlock battling it out with 2010 runner-up the Queens of Pain. That will be followed on April 16 when the Brooklyn Bombshells take on the Manhattan Mayhem at LIU’s Schwartz Athletic Center. Since its inaugural 2004 season, the nonprofit, all-female GGRD has been doing it their own way, with such players as Bitch Cassidy, Evilicious, Miss American Thighs, Sexy Slaydie, Tip-Her Gore, Angela Slamsbury, and Anais Ninja skating around the track, blocking, pivoting, and jamming toward victory. The league also features the All-Stars, the Wall St. Traitors, and the all-rookie Meatpacking District, who skate against other teams in the Women’s Flat Track Derby Association. A member of the All-Stars and the Queens of Pain, blocker and pivoter Ana Bollocks recently discussed the fast-growing sport with twi-ny.

twi-ny: What would people coming to their first GGRD match be most surprised about regarding the makeup of the audience?

Ana Bollocks: I think people assume that we have either a hipster audience or a goon audience, and it’s not the case — it’s a good cross-section of regular folks of all ages, including a decent contingent of parents with kids. Our audience is loud — REALLY loud — and enthusiastic but generally positive and well-behaved. I grew up playing soccer and I heard more referee-baiting and shit-talking from roughly two dozen parents on the sidelines than I do from a thousand people at a derby game. It’s a pretty great atmosphere.

Ana Bollocks seeks the crown in upcoming GGRD season (photo by Matthew Pozorski)

twi-ny: How did you first get involved in roller derby? You’re regarded as one of the leading blockers on the circuit, paving the way for the jammer to score points. What are the different skills needed for each position?

Ana Bollocks: Well, I started in early 2005, when GGRD was just starting its first full season and we were one of about a dozen leagues in existence. So all I had to do was make my attendance numbers for three months and I was in. Nowadays there’s something like 700 leagues and 28,000 skaters worldwide, so it’s a lot more competitive. We had about a hundred people try out in November and we ultimately accepted eleven new skaters into Gotham, many of whom had skated in other leagues before moving here.

I don’t know that the different positions require different skills so much as jammers need those skills dialed up to eleven. Whatever position you play, you need stability, sprint speed, endurance, and speed control. For me, jamming is fun at practice, but I’m a better blocker than jammer so I’d rather be blocking when it counts.

twi-ny: You’ve been described as a “bad ass” with the “heart of a champion.” When you’re not racing around the track, you work in data management and developing accuracy systems and standards as a woman named Kristin Carney. Do you bring those qualities to your everyday life?

Ana Bollocks: Hmmm, “heart of a champion?” I don’t know if my bosses think of me as a one-legged puppy who can make it on her own, but I *do* have a review coming up. . . . I’ll let you know! Seriously, the one thing that I think applies to both work and derby is have a plan and keep it simple. If you make things too convoluted, everything goes to hell.

twi-ny: Films such as Kansas City Bomber and Whip It have depicted roller derby to be a vicious, no-holds-barred sport filled with extreme characters and aggressive violence. Is there any truth in any of that?

Ana Bollocks: Well, there’s controlled violence on the track, obviously. Body-checking is legal (and fun!). But you can’t, say, clothesline or punch opposing skaters or anything. Derby blocking is mostly parallel to hockey blocking in terms of what’s legal and illegal. You can hit an opposing skater hard, but you can’t grab her, hit her in the head, etc. But nobody watched Slap Shot for its meticulous depiction of clean hockey play, right? Over-the-top fouling is a superior dramatic device. But it an actual game it’ll just get you sent to the penalty box.

TWI-NY TALK: JENNIFER EGAN

National Book Critics Circle Award winner Jennifer Egan will be celebrating the release of the paperback edition of A VISIT FROM THE GOON SQUAD with a series of very different events in New York City in the coming weeks (photo by Pieter M. Van Hattem/Vistalux)

It’s almost impossible to overstate just how accomplished a writer Jennifer Egan is. Born in Chicago, raised in San Francisco, and based in Brooklyn, Egan has penned the short story collection Emerald City (1993) and the novels The Invisible Circus (1995), Look at Me (2001), The Keep (2006), and A Visit from the Goon Squad (2010) in addition to numerous articles and cover stories for the New York Times Magazine and other publications. Her fiction writing and journalism have garnered a host of honors, the latest being the prestigious National Book Critics Circle Award, which she won March 10 for A Visit from the Goon Squad, out in paperback today (Anchor, $14.95). Goon Squad is a swirling delight of a novel, jumping through time and space from chapter to chapter, each narrated by a different character and built around two engaging protagonists, kleptomaniac Sasha and record producer Bennie Salazar. Organized like an interconnected collection of short stories that can stand on their own, Goon Squad is a literary tour de force, a thrilling symphony that leaves readers breathless with anticipation at the conclusion of each chapter. Just before winning the NBCC Award, Egan talked to twi-ny about obsession, affection, obscurity, and chemistry.

twi-ny: Considering the daring experimental structure of Goon Squad and the tendency for works in progress to periodically threaten to fall completely to pieces, what helped you stay with this project through the years, especially during times when you may have been doubting it?

Jennifer Egan: The primary thing that held me steady as I worked on Goon Squad was an ongoing curiosity about—you might even say obsession with—the characters. They were in my head pretty much all the time. Also, since one of my goals was to make every chapter completely self-sufficient, I had a sort of built-in Plan B: If the whole construction didn’t combust in the way I was hoping it would, at least I’d have a solid story collection to fall back on. That was my hope, and although my goal was definitely higher than that, it was consoling to think that I would end up with some kind of book either way.


twi-ny: The novel is told from multiple POVs, with multiple narrators. Which one did you find most challenging to write from, and which was easiest? Which was your favorite, or did you have one?

Jennifer Egan: The character that came to me most easily was probably Bennie. I’m not sure why that is, but I had a special affection for him, and I also kind of identified with him—though I’m happy to say that we’re not alike! The most difficult character was probably Lou, because he has a lot of bad qualities, and there was a danger of his seeming like a monster, rather than a human. Personally, I feel a lot of sympathy for Lou—I see him as a tragic figure—but not all readers share that view, so it may be that I didn’t completely succeed at humanizing him.

twi-ny: You’re nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award in the Fiction category with Jonathan Franzen, David Grossman, Hans Keilson, and Paul Murray, none of whom were finalists for the National Book Award. (You were previously a National Book Award finalist for Look at Me.) How do you feel about book awards in general, and how they relate to your career specifically?

Jennifer Egan: Being a finalist for the National Book Award saved Look at Me from complete obscurity (it came out the week of 9/11, when most fiction disappeared without a trace), so I know how helpful those little medallions can be! I’ve also been a judge of the National Book Awards (2009), and I think that probably cured me of any sense that awards are personal. It’s all chemistry; how a particular group of people’s tastes interact, individually and together, with a gigantic body of work published in one year. Judges are judged themselves on their choices, and I think they generally agonize in their effort to do a responsible job. When I think about last year’s National Book Awards, my first thought is not that I wasn’t a finalist but that they did us all a huge service by honoring someone of enormous talent—Jaimy Gordon [Lord of Misrule]—who was not widely known. I envied them for having pulled that off.

Jennifer Egan will be at BookCourt on Monday, March 28, at 7:00 (free), for a discussion and signing; at Symphony Space on Wednesday, March 30, at 7:30 ($15-$25) for a Thalia Book Club event with Siri Hustvedt and Margot Livesey revisiting Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina; at BAM on Thursday, March 31, at 6:30 ($50) for an Eat, Drink & Be Literary dinner moderated by Deborah Treisman; at the April 14 Westchester Libraries Author Luncheon at Abigail Kirsch’s Tappan Hill at 12 noon ($75-$1,250) with David Shenk and Diane Mott Davidson; and at the New York Public Library also on April 14 at 7:00 ($25) for the Live from the NYPL program “Jennifer Egan in Conversation with Laura Miller.”

TWI-NY TALK: RICHARD THOMPSON

Richard Thompson will reach into his bottomless bowl of tricks tonight at Zankel Hall (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

WFUV LIVE AT ZANKEL HALL
Zankel Hall, Carnegie Hall
Fifty-seventh St. at Seventh Ave.
Saturday, March 19, $42-$48, 10:00
Series concludes April 8
www.carnegiehall.org
www.wfuv.org/event/zankel
www.richardthompson-music.com

Over the last decade, masterful British musician Richard Thompson has played all over New York City, from the cozy confines of Joe’s Pub and City Winery to the pouring rain of Prospect Park, from the Town Hall and Irving Plaza to the shores of the Hudson and East Rivers. Tonight, one of folk rock’s greatest singer-songwriters and guitarists heads uptown to play a solo set as part of the annual WFUV Live at Zankel Hall series. “I’ve never been to Carnegie Hall, and certainly not played it, but it does have an international reputation, and I’m thinking some of that cachet should rub off on the lesser Zankel,” Thompson told twi-ny. “It seems an exciting prospect, and I really look forward to it.” The series, curated by longtime radio host and WFUV music director Rita Houston, began with the Indigo Girls on October 23, followed by Martin Sexton’s Solo Holiday Show on December 11; it concludes April 8 with Edie Brickell and her new band, the Gaddabouts. Thompson, a founding member of Fairport Convention and half of the seminal Richard & Linda Thompson duo, is touring behind his latest album, Dream Attic (August 2010, Shout Factory), primarily playing in the Richard Thompson Electric Trio, with bassist Taras Prodaniuk and drummer Michael Jerome. But he’ll be going it alone tonight. “I’ve played very little solo in the last six months, so I don’t have a ‘plan’ at this point, but I hope the set will be a reflection of the last forty-five years — selections from the decades, and a few newer things,” he explained. Thompson has quite an old kit bag of songs to choose from; he’s released more than fifty albums, including 1000 Years of Popular Music, which takes listeners on a stirring journey through the centuries, not just the decades. The first two hundred ticket holders to show up tonight will get a free drink as part of Late Nights at Zankel Hall, with doors opening at 9:00.