Throwback

The Bizz

Movie star, actress, model, and author. The only thing Alicia Silverstone doesn't do is dairy or animals. "I've been a vegan for 11 years," says the author of The Kind Diet: A Simple Guide To Feeling Great, Losing Weight and Saving The Planet.

Candle 79, a delectable vegan/vegetarian establishment founded by Bart Potenza and co-owned by nutritionist, Joy Pierson was home to the down-to-earth activist’s book celebration this week.


(Founder Bart Potenza and co-owner Joy Pierson of Candle 79 and Candle Cafe)

From the moment, co-owner Peirson greeted me when I walked through the front door to the interaction with the sommelier; I knew that there was something different about this plant-based lifestyle. Everyone was happy, energetic, and glowing; a vision not often seen in a city of stress, power, and struggle.

"If you want to feel your best and be free of diets, medicine, and pain or if you’re just wondering how to be kinder to the planet, this book will change your life for the better. That's my promise to you,” Silverstone said as someone handed her a purple-colored martini made from organic concord grapes. After she took a sip of the drink, she handed the glass to me to ensure that I had a taste too.


(Concord Grape Martinis)

I asked her if there were any foods that she missed eating, thinking selfishly of my own desire for medium-rare steak. “If I’m hungry, I may look at a cheese plate but if there’s something else like this there,” she said pointing to the appetizers being passed around, “I wouldn’t want that cheese plate. You get the cheesy creaminess in these dishes and all of the meat dishes just have sauces on them, so there’s really nothing that I’m missing.”

Her point was proven quickly by warm, creamy zucchini-blossoms and ravioli-shaped treats. Interviewing Silverstone was like sitting down to dinner with an old friend.


(Alicia Silverstone and Lori Bizzoco, Entertainment Editor, Pomp & Circumstance devouring vegan ravioli appetizers)

The Kind Diet, a book that she says took her, “one and a half years to write and eight years to dream,” infuses being kind to your body, the environment and animals. She explains how meat, fish, milk, and cheese—the very foods we’ve been taught to regard as the cornerstones of good nutrition—are actually the culprits behind escalating rates of disease and the cause of dire, potentially permanent damage to our ecology. “I want people to think of this as easy and delicious, you can take baby steps to get there. It will make your life better.”


(Alicia Silverstone, author of The Kind Diet at Candle 79 Book Party Celebration in NYC)


(Waterkeeper Alliance book sales table for The Kind Diet)

The vegan way seems to be more than healthy eating-it’s like some secret happy planet. Everyone is so nice. A few people I know could use a book like this.

All proceeds from the sale of the book this evening went to Waterkeeper Alliance, a global advocacy group that helps sustain fishable, swimmable and drinkable waterways worldwide.

Celebrities in attendance included Lake Bell, Giada De Laurentiis, Robin Quivers, Dan Hedaya and Dan Piraro.

- Lori Bizzoco
Photos: Amanda Segur

Who Sung It Better?

When I'm stressed, I tend to listen to a song that takes me back to some memorable happy place. (And I like to listen to it over and over again, sorry roomies and neighbors.) Recently, it's been Neko Case's Hold on, Hold on. That song brings me back to my summer in London: while visiting a friend out in Northampton, that long train ride, the gray clouds and how the sun would shine on these bucolic scenes of sheep grazing pastures covered in wildflowers. How, when I saw her, we screamed so loudly some people stopped and stared. And then the redbull and malibu, hash cigarettes and a cute dog sniffing around our ankles. Sunning ourselves out on her backyard while the song blasted over speakers.
So I've been listening to it (over and over again, like I said) and saw a Marianne Faithfull version of the song, and then I thought about those obnoxious US Weekly spreads, of "who wore it better" and thought we should have a little vote to see who sung this one better.





I don't know... each variation has it's own melancholic perspective... what do you think?

-Kastoory

Bizz Buzz

When Pomp asked me to cover the Americans for the Arts National Arts Awards at Cipriani, I was gushing with nerdy excitement. I'm an avid enthusiast for every form of art New York City has to offer, from graffiti covered gates to the latest MOMA exhibition. Growing up in the Lower East Side, I learned about art from St. Marks performance artists and local murals--not in public school where art class funding gets cut first, if it ever existed in the first place.

Americans for the Arts, one of the premier nonprofit organizations struggling to increase access to art education is a heavy-hitter in the world of political advocacy and fundraising - a losing battle in today’s crisis-frenzied Congress.

As someone forever in love with how the city changes and how we construct our identities, Brooklyn married authors Paul Auster and Siri Hustvedt were enough to make me throw my graduate work to the side and head to the red ropes and bright lights of Cipriani. Toss in Robert Redford, Salman Rushdie, Kitty Hart, Ed Ruscha Kelly Richardson, and special guests Kerry Washington and Nancy Pelosi, documentary filmmaker Ken Burns, and Dennis Hopper, and I have a clearer picture of how fundraising gets done, particularly considering entry to the event requires a contribution ranging from $1,000 to $50,000.


('90s Speed Demon Dennis Hopper makes his appearance)


(Pomp's Ippolita di Paola interviewing Salman Rushdie)

Salman Rushdie, one of the most prominent and politically significant novelists of our time, faced a fatwa (death sentence) from Iran’s orthodox leaders in 1989 for his fourth novel Satanic Verses. This forced him into government protection in Britain. This week he showed up with no guards and stopped to speak with me. I asked him about his opinion of the organization and his role in it. Rushdie smiled in his dark green velvet blazer and said, “I think it’s great. The arts are having a hard time these days and it’s very important to have advocacy organizations like this. I'm happy to be here and be a part of it.” After expressing my admiration for the inspirational courage he expresses in his writing, photographer Amanda and I got back to the rough side of the event—the nasty paparazzi, flocking tourists and whining young elites being dragged to the event by their families.


(The beautiful Kerry Washington arrives!)

Shortly after, the beautiful Kerry Washington, with her mom at her side, stepped out of a black SUV in a stunning dress, greeting the press with grace. “Hello gentleman, and lady,” nodding to Pomp’s photographer. Her assistant, who Washington introduced as “the new Dana”—highlighting the obviously low retention rate of celebrity assistants, rushed them inside.


(The man of the night: Lifetime Achievement Award Honoree Robert Redford arrives at last)

Robert Redford showed up last with his beautiful wife. He was not enthused by the onslaught of journalists, but his presence made the tourists happy. The no-name guests were all epic examples of New York high society with gorgeous designer dresses and personal drivers, but that didn’t stop the other side of NY from making its debut as well. A homeless cart-pusher let high society know what he thought about them as he passed by: “A lot of white people don’t recognize evil as evil.” Maybe if there was more public access to the arts that statement could have led to a critical discussion about the banality of evil with Rushdie.

-Ippolita di Paola
Photos: Amanda Segur
Entertainment Editor: Lori Bizzoco

This Week In Rape - Mandatory Binding Arbitration Edition

I didn't expect Al Franken to do much in the Senate. He's a comedian, right? But he's done something great introducing an amendment to the 2010 Defense Appropriations bill, which seems to be a direct response to the Jamie Leigh Jones case.

In case you haven't heard of it, hers is a case to watch. Long story short: Ms. Jones was working in Iraq as a contractor for Halliburton subsidiary KBR, where her employers refused to house her separately from her male co-workers, in spite of repeated complaints that the men were sexually harassing her. The men drugged her and gang raped her. When she complained, she was held by KBR in a shipping container for over 24 hours without food, water, or a bed, and her employers told her that if she left Iraq for medical treatment, she'd be fired.

But that was only the beginning of her nightmare. After returning stateside, she decided to pursue legal action, and KBR claimed that she couldn't, that her contract stated that all disputes with her employer must be resolved by mandatory binding arbitration.

If you're not familiar with it, imagine that instead of going to court you go see an extralegal judge that is selected and paid for by the opposition. As you can imagine, the judge sides with corporations as often as 95% of the time, according to a study done by consumer watchdog group Public Citizen. And guess what! You've probably got a mandatory binding arbitration clause in some of the contracts in your life. Use a cell phone?

Just the other week Ms. Jones won the right to her day in court.

And now, Al Franken has introduced an amendment stating that no defense contracts can be awarded to companies that "restrict their employees from taking workplace sexual assault, battery and discrimination cases to court."



This is a perfect example of why capitalism is screaming out for regulation to protect the rest of us. They should rename the amendment the "I can't believe we actually have to make a rule for this" amendment.

Let's hope it passes.

The Boy who Harnessed the Wind

I love that title. It makes me think of a fairy tale. The kind where humans turn into animals that belong somewhere other than here, like the sea or sky. Or the kind where a long journey has to be taken because someone is born into the wrong life. It conjures old-timey illustrations of grimacing men in top hats with long faces becoming vapour and terrorizing small villages until a child traps them inside of a butterfly net with magic words given by a self-sacrificing healer. You know... folk tales.
But instead, it's the title of a book co-authored by William Kamkwamba, a boy from an African village who, with little education, and little knowledge of English, looked at books about windmills and built one based on the diagrams -- and then made it conduct electricity. Impressed? So was Jon Stewart during the taping of The Daily Show (which I went to thanks to Martha) and boy it was a real treat. William Kamkwambe was inspiring and down-to-earth. Jon Stewart even re-shot his intro to make it shorter so that there would be more of the interview in the episode. That's when I fell in love with him, not during the beginning when he makes jokes, and talks to the audience, not even when he was visibly cracking up while watching one of his "reporters" skits on bling recession. But when he did extra work to make sure something important had more air time. Something about sitting through 40 mph wind tunnels made getting into the show more magical. Like some epic test passed, a riddle answered correctly to a troll under the bridge who grants us passage to a place we've only dreamed of.



-Kastoory

Bizz Buzz

The moment I heard Hugh Jackman and Daniel Craig would be starring together on Broadway this Fall in “A Steady Rain,” I searched for tickets. It was July, yet all I could find were outrageously expensive seats through a service called “Stub Hub.”

Even as a weekly-going theatre fanatic, I have never before paid $175 for “the cheapest seat” in the rear. I bought a ticket anyway knowing I was going to see People Magazine’s “sexiest man alive,” along side a man who gave me heart palpitations when he flexed his 007 muscles.



“A Steady Rain,” a two-character melodrama, written by Keith Huff, opened at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theater on Sept. 29th and my back-of-the-house ticket was for October 1st. Having counted down the days, I danced to the box office with the printed confirmation number in hand. I proudly presented the window agent my receipt but he shook his head saying there was no ticket. I had him search every database and file. He even called the Stub Hub office. It was now five minutes to curtain and I was on the verge of hysteria, pleading desperately with the agent to just let me into the show. He calmly told me that there were tickets available to purchase in the front center of the orchestra. They were house seats reserved for last minute VIPs. To hell with my budget in this tight economy - I plunked down my credit card and paid all over again, running breathless to my seat as the lights dimmed.

The curtain rose and only a few feet away were two actors who totally commanded the stage. They engaged the audience in a tale of two police partners covering the gritty underbelly of Chicago. They used nothing more than dialogue and body language (sometimes seated, sometimes standing) to create the most vivid, multi-dimensional portraits. Daniel Craig bared no resemblance to his film roles, taking on an almost whimpish, recalcitrant demeanor as “Joey,” while Hugh Jackman was all muscle, sexuality and bravado as “Denny.” They were beat cops with different codes of street justice and honor. The relationship between the partners unfolded as each described their version of an evening that began at Denny’s house with his wife and young kids. On this evening, Denny’s living room becomes the target of a drive-by shooting that physically shatters his home and threatens the life of his youngest son. Well worth the price.

-Rosemary Kalikow
Entertainment Editor: Lori Bizzoco