Chef Mario Batali talks with us about his shoes, his White House dinner, and his newest cookbook ... Chicano art champion Cheech Marin on his newest traveling exhibit: Papel Chicano Dos ... We'll talk with the last surviving proposed cabinet member of the most unlikely Presidential candidate: Dizzy Gillespie ... And meet the creators of Toothpix, who took the underutilized video feature on Yelp! and have been making 12-second restaurant review masterpieces.
What do you get when you mix Hollywood vets, Yelp, and food? Internet treasure in 12-second bites
Here’s how it usually happens. It’s 7p.m. and you and your partner are hungry, verging on hangry. So after you argue about what kind of food you want to eat, you begin to wade through all the crap on Yelp. But among all the reviews by frustrated screenwriters are a few reviews that don’t suck.
They’re 12-18 second videos, with Hollywood-quality production values — which is not surprising because one of the producers is a Hollywood director, having fun and exploring food in L.A.
The Yelp videos are called Toothpix, and in them, Director Dave Green and actor Joe Cobden are taking Yelp's rarely used video feature and giving hungry diners another way to explore the restaurant. Joe explains, "we wanted to make fun of people who took Yelp too seriously by taking it way more seriously than anyone. And that meticulous work- it's the first thing people talk about, the production value."
Dave Green directed the second Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie, and the kids movie "Earth to Echo." Joe Cobden is an actor who says he's "done a lot of pretty embarrassing television." Probably Joe's biggest credit was a recurring role on "Fargo."
When we met them at Mariscos Jalisco, the popular food truck in Boyle Heights, they told us the idea for their first Toothpix review came from the socioeconomic battle currently underway in that neighborhood.
Toothpix review: Mariscos Jalisco
Joe says, "For Mariscos, we know that Boyle Heights is being -- I’m sorry but -- ruthlessly gentrified, and we thought it’d be funny to have this white guy come down and get on camera with Frank, who owns this business, to speak in Spanish and our guys in the background is trying to be this authentic foodie. So we wanted to make fun of that arrogance. "
12-seconds seems like a blip to explain a restaurant, even in metaphor. Director Dave Green says they're still experimenting with the time restraint, "We're still figuring that out. I mean sometimes we feel limited by the 12 seconds and sometimes we feel that the 12 seconds is the best rule we have."
Take their Trois Familia restaurant review. Joe says it was spawned from the sensationalizing of fusion cooking. "So it was just like this guy writing home about how incredible (it is), but it's just to make fun of it. It has nothing to do with the restaurant or the experience. It's just a restaurant. They make good food, but it's just a restaurant. And we also kind of wanted to parody this foodie culture and restaurant culture because it's ready for it. There's a lot of restaurants in LA and some of them have to go to pretty great lengths to be novel and a lot of the time that's pretty funny."
Joe, the actor in the reviews, was born in Canada and started living here about 15 years ago. Dave is a native Angeleno. Dave says making these videos keeps him trying new places to eat.
"I think when I was growing up," he says. "My family would go to the same restaurants every week. You know, it was like Islands or Acapulco. And then it's been fun as you grow up and get exposed to different things, see that mold crack. Now my parents when we go out to eat on the weekends are like 'Great, where are we going? We want to try somewhere new and see a new part of the city!'"
Joe adds, "If you can be a tourist in your own town- then you're laughing. If you can stay that curious and excited about your home. Especially in a city like this one- then there's no end to the pleasure you can get from it."
Both Dave and Joe are active in the film industry, but making time for Toothpix together is a source of play, rather than pressure. Joe explains, "Our pressure is only to account to each other. Its just us trying to have a good time, come together, break bread while we make these videos and you know like, send a love letter to the city... And hide treasure on the internet!"
Chicano art champion Cheech Marin and the sublime pleasures of works on paper
"What I like about paper is that it's multi-facted in its absorption qualities. Watercolor absorbs differently on paper than printing does, or writing or drawing or acrylic. Especially watercolor. You can just hope. And I think the people that are most surprised are the artists themselves."
-- Cheech Marin on works on paper
This segment is really the latest installment of "Cheech Marin Saves Chicano Art." No, seriously.
Decades ago, the Anglo art world, on the whole, didn’t know or respect Chicano art. As Marin says, it said, "Chicano art isn't art. Chicanos don't make art, they make agitprop folk art, you know, blah blah blah." So he started collecting Chicano art, then sharing his collection in exhibits around the country, and "each succeeding show debunked that notion."
Now, Cheech says, LACMA director Michael Govan has asked him to help put together the Chicano collection for the museum, "and it's a big deal because LACMA is an encyclopedic museum; there's only five in the United States, and what it represents is the final imprimatur of the establishment."
Part of his work is raising money, and it's not easy. "Chicano philanthropy pretty much does not exist," he says, possibly throwing a bomb to shake loose some money. "I think the prevailing attitude is, 'Why do I have to contribute to museums? I already pay my taxes!' Well, so does everybody else."
Wait, I say, I can understand why working class people would say that. But millionaires and billionaires? "Yeah," he says. So what's up, I ask. "I don't know." Maybe because Chicanos have always been "pushed in the shadows," so there isn't the tradition of philanthropy. "The people who build museums by and large get to determine what goes in them. We just have to use that same approach."
Meantime, Cheech continues to tour his collection. The latest exhibit, now at the Museum of Contemporary Art in San Diego, and soon to come to Riverside Art Museum, is "Papel Chicano Dos," spotlighting works on paper by young Chicano artists.
There’s a book by the same name that accompanies the exhibit, and in the audio, you can hear Cheech telling us about some of the artists he picked for the exhibit, like Carlos Almaraz, Carlos Donjuan, Sonya Fe, and Sonia Romero.
Remember when Dizzy Gillespie ran for president?
It's election season. A deep schism in the Republican Party has led to the nomination of one of the most galvanizing presidential candidates in American history. Democrats, on the other hand, have rallied behind a beltway insider with plenty of White House experience.
One candidate, however, has given disillusioned Americans hope for the future. We're not talking about Bernie, and we're not talking about Gary Johnson or Jill Stein, either. We're not even talking about this year's election.
It's 1964: Lyndon Johnson, Barry Goldwater and probably the hippest presidential candidate ever: jazz musician Dizzy Gillespie. And it all started here in Los Angeles.
With his trumpet bell pointed sky high and his cheeks inflated to the size of softballs, trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie was one of the most recognizable jazz musicians of the 20th century. Aside from his importance as one of the prime architects of bebop, Gillespie was a style icon and a consummate showman.
At the age of 47, he added an unexpected title to his resume: presidential candidate. Offering himself up as a swinging alternative to Johnson and Goldwater, Gillespie spent most of 1964 campaigning from the bandstand. He even wrote a theme song for the campaign:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6pVG95yHhsc
Gillespie hosted a midday press conference two months before the election at Shelly’s Manne Hole, the Hollywood nightclub run by jazz drummer Shelly Manne on Cahuenga Boulevard. In front of a bank of microphones and reporters from Jet, Billboard and DownBeat, Gillespie outlined his platform under the shabby glow of the world-famous jazz room, along with naming his cabinet appointees.
Ramona Crowell, the campaign's self-described "mover and shaker," was there. Crowell is the last surviving member of Gillespie’s proposed cabinet. She's 89 today. But she was more than a cabinet member. She was his campaign manager. She was also pretty realistic about his chances.
"I think he would’ve tried real hard to be business-like," she said. "But he was anything but. You could tell from his nickname what he was like."
Crowell, along with Jean Gleason, the wife of Rolling Stone magazine co-founder Ralph Gleason, organized the campaign with a bit of merchandising genius: sweatshirts.
"I decided we should make Dizzy Gillespie sweatshirts, because I had seen a Beethoven sweatshirt," she said. "Dizzy was agreeable to it, and we did."
Though Gillespie never made it on the ballot, his tongue-in-cheek campaign struck a chord. Sales of campaign buttons and sweatshirts were donated to the Congress for Racial Equality and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.
A lot of Gillespie’s platform focused on civil rights concerns: he promised to deport George Wallace, the segregationist governor of Alabama, to Vietnam.
The cabinet appointments were the best part by far, though. Here's a bit of his campaign speech:
When I am elected president of the United States, my first executive order will be to change the name of the White House to the Blues House. The title of ‘secretary’ will be replaced by the more appropriately dignified ‘minister.’ Miles Davis has offered to serve as minister of the Treasury, but I’ve persuaded him to head the CIA instead.
Although Bo Diddley applied first, I told him my choice is the great Duke Ellington for minister of State. He’s a natural and can con anybody. Louis Armstrong is set for minister of Agriculture. He knows all about raising those crops.
Behind every cabinet appointment was a more-or-less inside joke about the jazz legends Gillespie called peers. I don't know if we need to ask, but why Louis Armstrong for agriculture?
"The agriculture thing was because he grew dope," said Crowell, laughing. "I guess it was really good dope."
For minister of Peace? Charles Mingus.
“He was anything but a candidate for that," said Crowell. "He had a terrible temper. He was very overt in his dislike of anybody. And crabby!"
Again, candidate Gillespie:
And, after considering the qualifications and potential of a great many candidates, I have decided that the rabbi of modern jazz… the maharajah of contemporary music… one of the most creative and gifted and avant-garde young men I know – Thelonious Sphere Monk – will be booked for a four-year tour as roving ambassador plenipotentiary.
"He was not outgoing or friendly or anything like that," Crowell, whose title alternated between vice president and press secretary, said. "He wasn’t anybody’s choice for ambassador!”
In the end, Gillespie never held office, of course. His lighthearted campaign did help raise awareness of civil rights issues. Gillespie died in 1993, exactly two weeks before a saxophone-playing southerner took over the Oval Office.
Gillespie did get his chance to hang at the White House, though. In the summer of 1978, Gillespie was invited by then-president Jimmy Carter to participate in the White House Jazz Festival. The two duetted on an appropriate tune:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORhqJZfxxcI
'Loving' inspires a DIY Film Festival of miscegenation films and shows you need to see
You don't need to wait for the local art house to put on a themed film festival. Tim Cogshell, film critic for KPCC's Filmweek and Alt Film Guide, and who blogs at CinemaInMind, is producing a series of DIY Film Festivals for Off-Ramp listeners to throw in the comfort of their own homes.
This DIY film festival is about miscegenation. Don’t know or remember what it means? Good.
Miscegenation is sex or marriage between people of different races — usually whites and blacks. It was illegal in much of the U.S. until the 60s, and was also either taboo or forbidden in cinema. This DIY festival, including a documentary, a short silent film, and even a few TV episodes, is inspired by Jeff Nichols' new film "Loving," which is about the 1967 miscegenation case that changed the law and the movies.
"Loving," the new film by Jeff Nichols
1. "The Loving Story" 2011
"Loving" was inspired by the HBO documentary, "The Loving Story," which is the first film of our festival. Mildred and Richard Loving were an interracial couple who married in 1958, despite Virginia's anti-miscegenation laws.
As good as the new narrative film is, the 2011 doc is better.
The Hays Code, the rules the movies were governed by, stated explicitly: "Miscegenation (sex-relationships between the white and black races) is forbidden." When the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Lovings, the 1930 Hays Code was replaced by the Classification and Rating System Administration. But before that, miscegenation was still fodder for Hollywood.
2. "What Happened in the Tunnel" (1903)
The earliest film to take on miscegenation may have been Edwin S. Porter's very short 1903 film "What Happened in the Tunnel." It was considered funny in 1903, but the film probably contributed to the earliest rules on the miscegenation.
3. "Imitation of Life" (1934)
In the first "Imitation of Life," Fredi Washington plays Louise Beavers’ fair-skinned daughter who rejects her black heritage — and her mother — in favor of passing into the white world and landing a white husband. It barely made it past the censors, but today it’s in the National Film Registry, and Time called it one of "The 25 Most Important Films on Race.”
You might also want to check out Douglas Sirk’s 1959 "Imitation of Life," which is still popular among African American women of a certain age.
4. "Pinky" (1949)
In "Pinky," Jeanne Crain is a young woman who slips into passing as white almost by accident when she goes away to nursing school. She feels guilty, but yet so aware of what being white could mean to her life. Pinky doesn’t hate being black, she just wants what life being white could offer ... including the white man who wants to marry her.
5. "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?" (1967)
Next on our list, Stanley Kramer’s "Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner" from 1967, in which a white girl falls in love with a black man, played by Sidney Poitier, and when the families meet for dinner, they hash it out earnestly. This film took a beating from the left and the right from the day it was released, as we saw in "The Butler," when David Oyelowo's young Black Panther disparages Sidney Poitier. It's problematic for any number of reasons, but I defend its intention — fervently. Before the change in the movie code or the Loving decision, "Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner" faced down the nations’ bigots.
6. "Movin' with Nancy" (1967)
After the Loving case, the notion of miscegenation in film and television evolved. Soon we saw the first kiss on American prime time network TV when Kirk and Uhura kissed in a 1968 episode of "Star Trek." The suits from the network resisted the interracial kiss — but the tepid peck made it to air and is said to be the first such kiss on network TV.
Or maybe it wasn’t:
Nancy and Sammy kiss at the very end of this skit
The December 1967 episode of "Movin' with Nancy" features a kiss between Nancy Sinatra and Sammy Davis, Jr. more than a year before that "Star Trek" episode. The easy, friendly kiss comes at the very end of the photo session scene. A few years later, in February of 1972, Sammy would go on plant the kiss that sealed the deal for anti-miscegenation attitudes in America once and for all.
When Sammy kisses Archie Bunker, it was effectively the first kiss between a Protestant-white-male-bigot and a black-male-converted-Jew on American television.
It was on the cheek, and in many ways is reminiscent of that original kiss in Edwin S. Porter’s short silent film. Only this time it’s not racist and is actually funny. It left the nation a little stunned and ended the issue of miscegenation in American media — forever — although the state of Alabama would not repeal its miscegenation laws until the year 2000.
Song of the Week: "Kokopelli" by Mild High Club
This week's Off-Ramp song of the week comes from
, a Los Angeles band fronted by singer/songwriter Alexander Brettin. "Kokopelli" comes off the bands newest album, Skiptracing, which is out now. Check out the video below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBiHYxZArgY
Mild High Club is signed to one of the most important independent labels in Los Angeles: Stones Throw Records, which is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year. You can catch Mild High Club live along with other acts like Common, Dam Funk, and J Rocc at the first ever Stones Throw Superfest.
The show takes place on Saturday, November 5 at Sycamore Grove Park in Highland Park. The event is totally free, check the full lineup on Stones Throw's website and RSVP for the festival here.
In Yorba Linda, the race for water district board is getting ugly
It's not often that a local utilities board election sets off angry confrontations between neighbors, candidates' faces plastered on Old West-style "wanted" posters and even a current board member hung in effigy.
But races for four seats on the Yorba Linda Water District's board of directors have defied stereotypes of sleepy local elections, stirring up intense outrage and anger – and opening a broader debate about California's water future.
The air in Yorba Linda, the suburban Orange County city known mostly as the birthplace of Richard Nixon, has gotten tense.
Just ask Brooke Jones, who is running for one of the seats on the water district board.
Jones is part of a faction of Yorba Linda residents trying to unseat the current water board over what it considers exorbitant rates and government waste. Just the other day, his daughter ran into Bob Kiley, one of the sitting board members, on a walk in their neighborhood.
"And he was walking his dog," Jones said. "And she said 'oh yeah, my dad's running. We're trying to get some ethics on the board!'"
Kiley is part of the board's old guard, which has been dogged by a decision last year to more than double water fees. His seat is one of two up for recall. Another two are up for re-election, so with a five-seat board, the water district could see an almost complete turnover after Election Day.
"None of [the challengers] are politicians," said Jones. "None of us would be here if we weren't angry with the existing water board. We're trying to correct a bad situation."
The outrage in Yorba Linda starts – as you probably guessed – with the drought.
Last year, the state gave every water district in California orders to conserve. In Yorba Linda's case, it had to reduce water usage by 36 percent, a target residents exceeded.
That's great for conservation – but bad for the water district, which relied on revenue from selling water to cover its expenses and plan for the future. The more people saved, the district said, the less money there was for maintenance and overhead.
So in September of last year, the district's board decided to raise its monthly service charge by $25 – more than doubling previous rates. In an unanimous vote, the five board members raised the fee from $16 to $41, and started collecting penalty fees from customers who went over their water budgets.
Suddenly, the board's normally sedate meetings became anything but.
Meetings were packed, Yorba Linda's City Council held hearings and AM talk show hosts John Kobylt and Ken Chiampou held a rally outside the district's headquarters. Protestors hung a board member in effigy.
After the outrage — and the state’s easing of water restrictions — the board rolled back rates to $32 a month, but it was too late. Opponents of the hike had organized.
This past summer, a group called the Yorba Linda Taxpayers Association tried to put the new rate to a referendum. When the district refused, it took the case to local courts, which ruled in favor of the water district. The judge said raising the rates was within the water board’s purview and noted they were responding to an urgent situation: the prolonged drought.
Instead of appealing, the Yorba Linda Taxpayers Association organized a recall and endorsed candidates for each of the four contested seats. They've all pledged to roll back the rate hikes.
Drive around Yorba Linda and you'll see the signs: literally, hundreds of signs on street corners. Messages like "End Water Rate Tyranny," the word "Recall" crossed out with a red slash, an Old West style "wanted" posters with black and white photos of current board members.
Al Nederhood is one of the candidates.
"If the board had responded in an intelligent and appropriate way a year ago, with a rate increase that was probably half – 40 to 50 percent – of what they actually did," he said. "[Then] most of this problem would have gone away at that point."
Nederhood says, simply, the board overestimated its needs – that the district ended up with an extra $8 million on hand from a combination of penalties and new rates. Instead of refunding the money back to the ratepayers, the district pocketed it.
A spokesperson for the district denied the claim.
The case of Yorba Linda is unique in some ways: the amount the board raised monthly fees was huge, for example. But it's not the only water district to rely heavily on sales for its financial well being.
And if we've learned anything from the drought, it's a vexing contradiction: the more water we save, the more we might have to pay for it.
"You know, people don't really understand how they get their water," said Kelly Salt, a lawyer and an expert on utility rates in California. "They turn on the tap and it magically appears."
Salt said that lots of water districts in California are watching Yorba Linda closely – the results from the recall election could affect how other boards set their rates in the future.
"I think for a lot of agencies, it's been a very difficult time," said Salt. "They have so many of their costs, which are fixed. At the same time, they're encouraging their customers to conserve or use water efficiently."
Gary Melton's one of the board members who voted for the rate hike. His seat is under threat of recall.
He's been on the board for six years, but sometimes he wonders why he ran in the first place. Routine trips to the grocery store have turned into awkward encounters with angry neighbors. Organizers of the recall also launched a boycott of his restaurant, Joaquin's Mexican Bar and Grill.
He admitted that the district could've done a better job involving the community in the decision, but he said what the board did was absolutely necessary.
The board looked at every alternative, he said: tiered rates, budgeting based on house size, but all of it would take too long. If the district failed to raise rates, he said, infrastructure would crumble, the district's bond rating would go down. Yorba Linda Water District, he said, was facing insolvency.
"You've got to have something for earthquakes, or water main breaks, or pump stations or all the things that are required to keep the district safe," he said. "There's a lot more to it."
So what now?
There's no polling in an election this small — Melton and his fellow board members have no idea what their fate will be after November 8.
The Yorba Linda Water District's decision to raise rates sparked outrage in a community with no shortage of engaged, active citizens — even board members say they could've been done better. Now, they have to see it through to Election Day.
If you'll forgive a water analogy: Yorba Linda turned on a faucet they can't turn off.
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