In the latest New Yorker, staff writer George Packer asks why the huge profits made in Silicon Valley’s tech world have grown as big as the massive gap between America’s rich and poor. He uses a wider lens his new book, The Unwinding: An Inner History of the New America, taking on the last 35 years of U.S. history in a nation that’s in steady economic decline. Hear Packer read on Monday, June 3, at Book Passage. 51 Tamal Vista Blvd., Corte Madera. 7pm. 415.927.0960.
Matt Costa is everything you’d expect from an artist on Brushfire Records, the label run by ambassador of chill Jack Johnson. His catchy, toned-down songs provide the perfect background for an afternoon of wine tasting and sunbathing in the Napa Valley. This weekend, Costa plays the opening concert of the Long Meadow Ranch Summer series, with upcoming performances by Nicki Bluhm and the Gramblers, Langhorne Slim, Mother Hips and Sean Hayes. See him on Sunday, June 2, at Long Meadow Ranch. 738 Main St., St. Helena. 2pm. $30. 707.963.4555.
Cheryl Strayed’s fame is well deserved; she happened to write Wild, a memoir about her cathartic, months-long solo hike along the Pacific Crest Trail, and one of the best-selling books of 2012. She’s also the force behind the fabulous Dear Sugar columns over at The Rumpus. See the Oprah Book Club alumni for a writing workshop, craft talk and reading on Saturday, June 1, at the Petaluma Sheraton. 745 Baywood Drive, Petaluma. 9am-5pm. $197-$245, includes lunch and workshop materials. www.cherylstrayedevent.com.
Along with Kendrick Lamar, 26-year-old Big K.R.I.T. is one of the freshest voices in the game right now. Hailing from Mississippi, the young rapper draws on old-school rap and touches of funk for the bedrock of his latest album Live from the Underground, out on Def Jam Recordings. Big K.R.I.T’s West Coast Tour hits town on Thursday, May 30, at the Phoenix Theater. 201 Washington St., Petaluma. 8pm. $22. 707.762.3565.
There’s nothing like spending a warm summer night boot-stepping by the gazebo in the main square, friends and neighbors all around, music in the air. Cloverdale’s Friday Night Live concert series makes this sweet fantasy into reality every Friday Night, starting May 31 with a performance by Roy Rogers and the Delta Rhythm Kings. Get there early to load up on snacks at the Cloverdale Farmers Market when Friday Night Live kicks off on Friday, May 31, at the Cloverdale Downtown Plaza. N. Cloverdale Blvd. 7pm. Free. 707.894.4410.
Healthcare, and everything associated with it, is arguably one of the more important issues facing the American people today. It is a social and an economic issue—the fewer people who have coverage the more the cost to the “system” as a whole. Whether you are in support of so-called “Obamacare,” or want things to change in a different way, it’s pretty clear there are many flaws in the current system.
And constantly, every day, it seems, there is a law that changes or hospital consolidation which changes the way healthcare is delivered.
The North Bay Business Journal recently published a story on Covered California, the “state’s online health exchange established under the Affordable Care Act,” written by Dan Verel, health care reporter at the Business Journal.
Verel’s story includes information about the local impact of this rollout of the Affordable Care Act. The Press Democrat also published a story by Judy Lin of the Associated Press which didn’t include any localized information or analysis on the topic.
Also in healthcare news, and related to the Affordable Care Act, last month Alexander Valley Regional Medical Center applied to become a federally qualified health center, which, according to a Business Journal story, “if approved, would allow Sonoma County’s only certified rural health clinic to receive significantly better reimbursement rates and more operating revenue.”
Also of note, Verihealth, Petaluma-based ambulance company, was recently acquired by Falck, a global ambulance company based in Denmark. Falk USA CEO Boo Heffner was quoted as saying of Verihealth: “We view them as a springboard, if you will, into larger markets in Northern California.”
It’s also yet another sign of the consolidation taking place in the health care sector, spurred largely by the Affordable Care Act and the economic realities that are impacting companies — from physician groups to blood banks to ambulance companies — large and small, wrote Verel./blockquote>
To me, these stories reek of relevancy to the local community. The Associated Press wire service is certainly a fine place to pick up news, but with something as big as a roll-out of healthcare reform, it seems logical and apt to get a local angle on the story. The Business Journal’s audience is comprised mostly of business leaders. I am sure the rest of the community would benefit from broader coverage by the other guys in town.
Turns out all those people who put money into pork futures were right, after all. Today it was announced that Chinese company Shuanghui will buy Smithfield, one of America’s largest pork producers, for $34 per share, about 30 percent above its closing share price yesterday. Reports on the value of the deal vary; some report it as $4.7 billion, some say it’s $7.1 billion. Either way, this is the largest takeover of an American company by a Chinese company.
There are concerns on this deal, naturally. Shuanghui was embroiled in a tainted meat scandal two years ago in China, but the companies say this deal will primarily focus on exporting American pork to China. Shuangui says it also hopes to learn more about the United States food safety processes. China is the world’s biggest pork market.
So, it seems the only thing we don’t get from China these days is pork, retaining it as a part of our American heritage. And now they’re taking our pork. It’s easy to say this is a win for the overall health of Americans, a blow to the “obesity epidemic,” as it were. But bacon isn’t to blame, it’s the maple coating on the bacon, the chocolate bar in which the bacon is mixed, the 1,400-calorie burger on which it sits that is the real culprit. Only time will tell how this deal plays out.
Smithfield says it’s keeping its operations in the U.S., which is good for its 46,000 employees. The headquarters will remain in Virginia and no facilities will close, says Smithfield. For now, at least, it’s only the profits that will be leaving.
With such robust wit, speed and delight, Frances Ha doesn’t have to be likened to Annie Hall.
True, like Allen, director Noah Baumbach looks back at the French New Wave, and shoots the film in radiant black-and-white. And it’s true that Greta Gerwig’s Frances is, like Diane Keaton’s Annie, one of those people born without that little switch on the throat that stops us from saying everything we think.
At age 27, Frances’ shield is her dependably plain ex-college pal Sophia (Mickey Sumner), a lean, sharp-featured woman with a pair of spectacles so severe that their frames seem to glow in the dark. She and Frances are pledged to being “undatable.” But Sophia moves up, settling in with a boyfriend she supposedly doesn’t like much (it turns out that he makes serious money). Frances, meanwhile, gets edged out from her Manhattan dance troupe and starts taking the path of least resistance to one after another of several shared apartments.
The film’s not fluffy. It notes the weight of rent on prevaricating artists with no visible means of support, and there’s constant class-card playing.
The movie is a love letter to Gerwig, long associated with the mumblecore film movement. She’s now been kicked upstairs to work with a director who knows what she’s capable of. Frances Ha loves Gerwig in motion, when she dances awkwardly, leaps down a street on her way to work or rides a bike bundled up in a December day in the suburbs. Gerwig is so good that she brings out the poignancy in a whirlwind, sleep-deprivation-blighted, credit-card-financed trip to Paris, foolishly taken on the spur of the moment just so Frances can be equal to the fancy people she meets at a party.
Frances Ha makes a star out of Gerwig, and she’s the kind of star we need: a goofy one we can feel tender about but never underestimate. The film goes happy in the end, and maybe you don’t buy it, but what Frances Ha says is true: people of an unusual type need to create an unusual kind of art to express themselves.
‘Frances Ha’ screens through May 30 at the Smith Rafael Center (1118 Fourth St., San Rafael; 415.454.1222) and opens May 31 at Summerfield Cinemas (551 Summerfield Road, Santa Rosa; 707.522.0719.)
Stylistically, Anderson Valley wines seem much closer to Oregon than, say, the Russian River Valley. The drive there certainly makes it feel that way. The road climbs, twists and dives, then repeats.
The virtue of this long, winding road is that there isn’t likely any driver in front or behind you for a long time. Until there is, and you know that you are not in Oregon. Fortunately, there are plenty of opportunities to pull out—unfortunately, just not enough for impatient drivers.
Anyhow, on to a friendly little Pinot Noir tasting put on by Anderson Valley Winegrowers. The 16th such festival, it’s hosted by Goldeneye Winery in a big tent in the middle of their manicured vineyards. By the warm greetings and banter, it’s clear that many of the attendees are in the business in one way or another, too. With over 2,200 acres of vineyard—compare to over 9,000 in Dry Creek Valley—the Anderson Valley wine scene is like a backyard party.
Angel Camp Vineyards’ winemaker knows something about driving Highway 128. During harvest, he commutes daily from Napa Valley—once a week during slow months. The couple who run Frati Horn (“wine glass” in Boontling) truck their grapes all the way down to Inspiration Vineyards’ warehouse joint in Santa Rosa to make their 2011 Pinot Noir—a cool, juicy rhubarb-flavored refreshment.
Joe Webb, the young general manager at Londer, explains that he does the footwork for a host of satellite clients—four or so who are pouring Londer Vineyard designates at the event. Gadgetry helps him out; he shoots a photo, uploads his stats and lines up some pick dates. His 2009 Swan Clone Pinot Noir has a nose like a wild raspberry dreaming it’s cotton candy.
Sonoma’s Williams Selyem has its Ferrington Vineyard, Napa’s Saintsbury has its Cerise—a bit fatter than many others here, and more like the most recent lineup of their Carneros that I tasted—with a hint of Christmas candle spice. As with every wine festival, the longest lines are for wineries approved by Wine Spectator. Black Kite Cellars fills that role up here, and, yes, the 2010 Kite’s Rest Vineyard Pinot Noir ($45) is not particularly disappointing.
These nice people and their good Pinot Noir have put me in such a fine mood that, even though I’ve assiduously spit out every taste, as I amble back up the hill, munching on a plate of local smoked salmon, a Goldeneye terrace lounger turns to her partner and remarks, “People get so hammered at these events.”
Goldeneye Winery, 9200 Hwy. 128, Philo. Anderson Valley Winegrowers, 707.895.WINE.
Few American stage musicals are as well known and beloved as Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Sound of Music. So it’s funny that so few of its fans have ever actually seen the show onstage.
Compared to the 1964 film starring Julie Andrews—one of the best film adaptations ever made of any play—few stage versions stand a chance at delivering a matching emotional impact. But every once in a while, a theatrical production manages to bring something to The Sound of Music that no other production, including the film, quite manages to achieve.
In the case of the Mountain Play, what director Jay Manley brings to The Sound of Music is sheer, dazzling, unlimited size. Expanding to fill the massive stage area of the 3,000-seat amphitheater, set designer Ken Rowland has erected a gorgeous, sprawling Nonnberg Abbey for the stirring chorus of opening Hallellujahs, sung by a crack team of 24 Benedictine nuns and monks.
When we first see Maria, played well by Heather Buck (seen at Spreckels in last year’s Camelot), she is stationed at the center of the amphitheater, belting the soaring title song from a large boulder beside a wind-twisted tree. A few moments later, when she’s assigned to the household of Captain von Trapp (Ryan Drummond) and his seven children, the Abbey splits into two, each piece pivoting around to create the family’s mountainside mansion. And when the Nazis take over Austria, the sight of massive swastikas fluttering over the stage is impressively jarring and effective.
Even the musical score has expanded, and now features all the songs from the original stage production, including some cut from the film, along with two songs written specifically for the movie.
With this Sound of Music, Manley and his cast and crew certainly deliver the spectacle while managing to stay true to the intimacy of the story, the simple tale of people in love, struggling to do the right thing in difficult times.
Rating (out of 5): ★★★★
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