(1) Pasta. It is important to keep learning throughout your life. And sometimes your learning provides you with immediate benefits.
We are lucky to live near a first quality fish store, The Fishery, and probably buy fish there at least once a week. The store has always also had two aisles of groceries, mainly things that you might serve with fish – sauces, grains, spices, various ethnic specialties, and so forth, along with high quality chocolates, a refrigerated section containing milk and other drinks, and a freezer devoted to high quality ice cream. Recently, it has added some fresh produce. And it has always had a large selection of pastas, mainly from Italy, several different brands.
Yesterday, I went to pick up some salmon for dinner, and decided that baked salmon and vegetables we already had at home would be good with some pasta, prepared simply with oil and garlic, and sprinkled with Parmesan cheese. We have pasta at home, but I decided that this would be an opportunity to try one of the pastas they had at The Fishery, and I chose, for no particular reason, spaghetti with the brand name Gragnano. It was maybe the best pasta I had ever tasted (and I have tasted a lot of pasta).
I looked it up. Gemini (I know I rely on Gemini a lot, but….) says: “Gragnano pasta is widely considered the best dried pasta in the world because of its unique geography, traditional craftsmanship, and strict production methods protected by European law.” It goes on to talk about the microclimate at the town of Gragnano, between the Gulf of Naples and Monti Lattari, the low calcareous spring water (I have no idea what that means, but calcareous is another example of a New Word for the blog) found there, the use of “bronze dies”, rather than Teflon molds (“this leaves a rough, porous, floury surface that helps sauces drip and bind to the noodles….”), and slow drying (most pastas apparently are dried at high heat in a matter of minutes, while Gragnano pasta is dried at low temperatures over many hours or days, which “preserves the integrity of the wheat proteins and starches……, resulting in a lower glycemic index”). And when you buy Gragnano pasta, you know what you are getting because it has a registered geographic indication (IGP) from the European Union, which sets high standards and precise characteristics.
As I often say…..who knew? But let’s add this to Dimitri Greek Olive Oil, Liberty Orchards Turkish Delight, and Fig Balsamic Vinegar from the Peppercorn Market in Bedford PA as must-haves for your kitchen.
(2) Frida Kahlo. Last night, we went to see the one woman show “Frida” at the Shakespeare Theatre. The one act piece, written and performed by the talented Vanessa Severo, was rated excellent by the six friends we joined for the show, but for me (I don’t want to speak for Edie), it didn’t do the trick. Not to say that the show is not good, it is (unlike the one we recently saw about Marc Chagall at Theater J, which I did not think was well put together) quite good. But it is also lacking as a bio-play (if that is a word) about Kahlo.
I will try to explain: Vanessa Severo starts the play with an informal talk to the audience explaining that she discovered Frida Kahlo years ago and was really taken by her because she identified with her. The self identification seemed to be the way Kahlo viewed her relationship to the world at large, but it also had to do with physical disabilities that each had. Kahlo had polio at age 6, which left one leg longer than the other (and, believe it or not, also left one leg shorter than the other…but that’s a different story), and Severo was born with a malformed left hand. They both worked to overcome these difficulties, although Kahlo’s was compounded when she was a victim of a horrific bus accident at age 18 which required years of confined recovery and a lifetime of painful episodes and necessary surgeries.
With this in the background, and with very clever props which enabled Severo to play not only Kahlo, but others, including her husband, artist Diego Rivera, and with Severo offering wall-breaking asides now and then to the audience as Severo, not as Kahlo, I wondered whether this show was to explain Frida Kahlo, or was to explain Vanessa Severo. Several times, Severo says that in many respects, they were the same person. And, even the title of the play, “Frida…A Self Portrait” by Vanessa Severo, reeks of ambiguity, does it not?
In the play, Kahlo comes across as a very angry woman, trying to hold in her anger, but unable to do so consistently. She is 47 years old, about to commit suicide (did she, or did she not, is still an open question, I believe), and is recounting her life, speaking to an architectural journalist, who is visiting her, to write an article about her house. And she berates him, as she tells him the story of her life, which sounds like a life filled with physical tragedy (it certainly was), and a one sided relationship with Rivera, who cheated on her (even with her younger sister), much to her never ending shock.
Well, some of this is just wrong, I think. Yes, Kahlo had serious pain and physical problems, but by and large she led quite a full and complete life. If you watch her in old videos, her walking seems good, her mood seems fine, and she clearly was able to travel and see the world. As to Diego Rivera’s infidelities, they were obviously there for everyone to see. But guess what? They were matched by bisexual Kahlo’s infidelities, both with men and women, and these too were available for the world to see, including (some confirmed, some rumored with a high degree of confidence) with sculptor Isamu Noguchi, department store owner Edgar Kaufmann, Jr., art dealer Julian Levy, artist Georgia O’Keeffe, photographer Tina Moditti, and actresses Paulette Goddard and Josephine Baker, and, yes – believe it or not – with Leon Trotsky. None of this was in the show.
Kahlo also was a devout Communist, starting out as a firm Trotsky-ite, and winding up anti-Trotsky, pro Stalin. This was as central to her life as was her art, and the same is true of Rivera. In fact, the very house in which Kahlo is being interviewed by the journalist in the play is the house in which Leon Trotsky and his wife lived for, I think almost two years, when they wound up in exile in Mexico (and this is when she had the affair with Trotsky). And, after she broke with Trotksy and backed the Stalinist USSR, and Trotsky was stabbed by an ice pick and killed, Kahlo was arrested by the Mexican authorities and held for a few days, being suspected of being involved in the conspiracy that led to his murder.
None of this was in Severo’s play. Perhaps because Severo did not identify with these aspects of Kahlo’s life and, ahem, perhaps because this play was more about Severo than Kahlo.
On the other hand, Severo should be praised for writing this work, and then for performing it. While I can understand writing it and understand performing it, it is harder to me to understand the ego (maybe) or the insecurity (maybe) or both that would lead her to take on the two roles. Again, I go back to my theory. Having written this play after she had spent so much time identifying with Kahlo, how could she let anyone else play the part? If she did, this would be a play about Kahlo, and not what I think it really was, a play about Severo.
At any rate, it was a nice night out on the town, and included pizza at the Matchbox next door to the Shakespeare Theatre to start. Should you go to Matchbox? Well, the pizza is acceptable (not great, but acceptable) and it is the perfect place to go for dinner with someone with whom you have no interest in speaking. The music is so loud that talk is just not possible.
Still no word from Alaska or Mississippi. But Mr. Eisenkot has been tasked with forming a government in Israel. Will he succeed? (My guess? Yes.)
