The Insider: Hi Andrea! Thanks for agreeing to do a text interview with us. Andrea Kwok: My pleasure! The Insider: I’d like to start with a few questions about you and your background. Where are you from originally? Andrea Kwok: I grew up at the Jersey Shore The Insider: And where do you live now? Andrea Kwok: I live in downtown Manhattan The Insider: Where did you go to school? Andrea Kwok: I went to Rutgers for my undergraduate degree, and I went to the University of Delaware for my doctorate in physical therapy The Insider: How long have you been a physical therapist? Andrea Kwok: Six years The Insider: What is the name of your company and your title? Andrea Kwok: My company is Spear Physical and Occupational Therapy. I am the clinical director of the West 67th Street office in Manhattan. The Insider: Please tell me a little bit about the company and what it does. Andrea Kwok: We provide physical and occupational therapy services to the greater Manhattan area, primarily outpatient but we also have telehealth and home care services. We also offer pelvic floor and hand therapy. We are based in New York but are starting to expand to the tri-state area. We recently opened an office in Hoboken, N.J. The Insider: Since we’re a pandemic publication, I’m interested in hearing how your PT practice has been affected by Covid. Andrea Kwok: It has definitely presented new challenges. We were very lucky in that no therapists were asked to furlough at any point. However, early on when little was known, most visits were being conducted via telehealth, which was not widely used in PT prior. Very few patients were coming into the office. As things started to open back up and patients returned to the clinic in person, each office had to figure out how to maintain distancing and cleaning protocols. The Insider: Like the American population at large, many of our readers have unfortunately had Covid by now. Is there anything that physical therapy can offer people who have gone through that? Andrea Kwok: One of the issues we are seeing is PACS, or Post-Acute Covid-19 Syndrome. It is also referred to as “long COVID.” Some people who have recovered from Covid experience lingering respiratory effects or find that they have a very low tolerance for any amount of activity. There is still a lot of research to be done, but one of the interventions currently being recommended for these patients is physical therapy The Insider: That’s really interesting! What kind of techniques would be used? Andrea Kwok: The rehab process would involve a graded exercise program that can only be progressed if certain criteria are met. Because PACS patients do not demonstrate a typical response to exercise, it is important not to encourage maximum effort or progress too quickly, as this would likely exacerbate their symptoms. The Insider: Almost all of the Covid sufferers I’ve interviewed have mentioned fatigue as one of their main symptoms. Is it important for people who still have active Covid to get up and keep moving, or is that impossible? Should people fight the fatigue, or just rest? Andrea Kwok: I have not heard that increased activity levels while fighting the infection correlate with more positive outcomes. So, I would be inclined to believe that rest is the most important The Insider: Do you know whether insurance will pay for post-Covid physical therapy? Andrea Kwok: It should. You would want to be evaluated by a physician first to determine if physical therapy is appropriate The Insider: Are you seeing more professional energy right now about PT for long Covid? Studies, classes, that sort of thing? Andrea Kwok: PACS research is certainly ongoing, and it is still a relatively new condition within the scope of physical therapy. There is definitely a push to educate health care professionals about the condition, especially those involved in the rehab process. Earlier this year, Spear partnered with Mount Sinai to host a live webinar for our therapists in order to provide background information about PACS as well as the current recommended treatment protocol. The Insider: Are PACS patients more likely to be older? Andrea Kwok: No, I believe the demographics are very mixed The Insider: All very interesting! Is there anything else you’d like to mention? Andrea Kwok: I think it is important to note that while physical therapy has helped in some cases, it has not proven to be the definitive solution. Researchers are still trying to determine the underlying cause of the condition, and it is suspected that additional medical intervention may also be necessary for recovery. There are no conclusive studies yet. The symptoms and responses of PACS patients are widely varied, which has made it very difficult to assess. The Insider: Yes, it’s a confusing disease. Thanks so much for helping us understand it better! Andrea Kwok: Of course! Andrea Kwok is the Clinical Director of SPEAR’s West 67th Street location. Andrea earned her Doctorate in Physical Therapy from the University of Delaware. During her time there, she completed a graduate assistantship in the Physical Therapy administrative office and served as class secretary. Prior to her graduate studies, Andrea graduated summa cum laude from Rutgers University with a major in exercise science and a minor in Spanish. Andrea was a founding member of the Rutgers club gymnastics team, where she served as team treasurer. In her professional career, Andrea has experience working with a wide range of orthopedic conditions, inclusive of sports injuries, mechanical pain, neurological pain, and post-operative rehabilitation. She pursues continuing education with a manual focus, intent on refining her ability to address joint, neurodynamic, and soft tissue dysfunction. Andrea is a large proponent of injury prevention and has participated in movement screenings for high school athletes, active adults, and local residents in the community. She is committed to restoring patient strength and function through targeted exercise and movement training.

By Laurence Lerman / New York City In a roadside diner, a young customer, Jack Nicholson, wants a side order of wheat toast to go with his omelette. When the humorless waitress turns down his simple request—“No substitutions,” she grunts—Jack calmly tries to persuade her to accommodate him. “What do you mean, you don’t make side orders of toast?,” he asks. “You make sandwiches, don’t you? You’ve got bread? And a toaster of some kind? It all comes to a boil pretty quickly after that, with Nicholson then ordering a plain omelette and a chicken salad sandwich on wheat toast—no mayonnaise, no butter, not lettuce. “Now all you have to do is hold the chicken, bring me the toast, give me a check for the chicken salad sandwich and you haven’t broken any rules,” he reasons. “You want me to hold the chicken, huh? “I want you to hold it between your knees,” he wise asses, using his forearm to angrily sweep everything off the table onto the waitress’s waiting apron. That scene of anti-establishment alienation is one of the highlights of the moody 1970 drama Five Easy Pieces, co-written and directed by Bob Rafelson. Rafelson died on Saturday, July 24, from lung cancer at his home in Aspen, Colo. He was 89. With such films as the Academy Award-nominated Five Easy Pieces and its 1972 companion piece The King of Marvin Gardens (also starring Nicholson along with Bruce Dern and Ellen Burstyn), Rafelson distinguished himself as one of the leading filmmakers of the New Hollywood movement of the late Sixties and early Seventies. But it wasn’t just his directing that earned him that status. In 1965, New York City-born Rafelson partnered with his friend Bert Schneider to form Raybert, a Los Angeles production house that the two imagined as a training ground for contemporary, up-and-coming directors—filmmakers for the counter-cultural era, as it were. One of Raybert’s first projects was for the small screen, though, inspired by Rafelson’s idea for a TV show about a rock’n’roll group (a pre-Beatles idea, he long claimed). The band he and Schneider created for TV was The Monkees and their eponymous series ran from 1966 to 1968, winning three Emmy Awards along the way. With the addition of a third partner, Steve Blauner, a few years later, the company became known as BBS Productions and soon cranked out a few of the most renowned independent films of the era, including the Dennis Hopper-directed smash Easy Rider (1969), Peter Bogdanovich’s The Last Picture Show (1971), Nicholson’s Drive, He Said (1971) and Rafelson’s own two efforts. BBS produced only eight films over its seven-year run, but it was the company’s very existence that proved to be an influential model for a rising industry of independent producers and production houses. Of its three founders, only Rafelson continued to regularly produce and direct movies in the decades following the shuttering of BBS in 1972. Schneider died in 2011 and Blauner in 2015. Though none of them embodied the rebellious, anti-authoritarian ethos of the BBS era, Rafelson’s directorial efforts, a number of which he-co-wrote, frequently focused on individualistic, combative protagonists. Among them were a scheming Theresa Russell, who married wealthy men before murdering them, and Debra Winger as a Justice Department agent obsessed with bringing her down in the suspenser Black Widow (1987); and embattled African explorers Richard Francis Burton and John Hanning Speke (Patrick Bergin and Iain Glen) in the biographical Mountains of the Moon (1990). One of my favorites is the 1996 crime drama Blood and Wine, which finds philandering wine merchant Jack Nicholson and his sickly, safecracking partner Michael Caine teaming up for an ill-fated jewel heist. Though he wasn’t an actor, Rafelson’s steely blue-eyed visage and grumbly voice made an impression upon me the few times he did pop up on the screen, often uncredited, in a handful of films (his own and others). He made one such appearance in Mike Figgis’s 1995 tragic drama Leaving Las Vegas. It’s during a scene where suicidal alcoholic Nicolas Cage has an ugly exchange of words with his prostitute companion Elisabeth Shue at a mall eatery, prompting him to rise from the table and head for the exit. “Maybe you should wait,” says a man near the cashier, Rafelson, as he blocks Cage’s way. “Why?” “You can tell—she really wants you to,” replies Rafelson with an earnest nod, before he quietly walks off in Cage’s place. Laurence Lerman is a film journalist, former editor of Video Business--Variety's DVD trade publication--and husband to The Insider's own Gwen Cooper. Over the course of his career he has conducted one-on-one interviews with just about every major director working today, including Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, Clint Eastwood, Kathryn Bigelow, Ridley Scott, Walter Hill, Spike Lee, and Werner Herzog, among numerous others. Once James Cameron specifically requested an interview with Laurence by name, which his wife still likes to brag about. Most recently, he is the co-founder and editor-in-chief of the online review site DiscDish.com.

By John Rolfe / Red Hook, N.Y. Sexuality. Is there any subject that makes humans freak out more than this one? Since the dawn of recorded history, the power, behaviors and mechanics of physical attraction and procreation have been viewed as taboo, evil, to be kept under strict wraps and tightly controlled. While the sexual revolution of the 1960s certainly led to more openness and acceptance, we are in the midst of a backlash. The so-called “dirty deed” is still fraught with cultural baggage and potential emotional and physical consequences. In our mainstream forms of news and entertainment (TV shows, movies, video games), explicit acts of harmful violence are more acceptable for viewing than sexual pleasure. Heck, we’re still so hung up on the idea that the human body is shameful that mothers who breastfeed (nature’s way for humans to feed their infants) in public are often harassed, as if what they are doing is somehow harmful to others if seen. Sex education, so necessary for informing responsible behavior, is still a battleground, with conservatives seeking to limit it strongly or keep it out of schools altogether. The emergence of the LGBTQ+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer or questioning) community during the past 50 years has kept the issue boiling, especially in politics. It’s telling that a majority in the House of Representatives feels it’s necessary to pass bills to protect the right of same sex couples to marry. It boggles my mind that these things remain matters of legality and are in possible jeopardy from the Supreme Court and the Republican Party. One particularly contentious argument is that the subjects of sex and gender preference should be left to parents, many of whom are woefully uninformed or too squirrely to discuss them with their kids. I know how that feels. As the father of four, I always dreaded “the talk” and tried my absolute level best to punt it to my wife. Our kids, in turn, were profoundly uncomfortable talking about sexual topics with either of us. Given all this deeply ingrained unease, it’s no wonder that relatively little is known about what makes people tick sexually and why. The study of human sexuality didn’t begin in earnest until 1886, and progress has been slow with prominent researchers such as Bill Masters and Virginia Johnson accused by many of being mere perverts. LGBTQ+ issues in particular are shrouded in thick clouds of ignorance and fear of “the other.” Few things feel more “other” to a majority than a minority of people who are attracted to the same sex and active about it physically, socially and politically. One common, persistent myth is that LGBTQ+ people are recruited and converted from the ranks of heterosexuals. Another is that they are inherently molesters. The right-wing extremist group The Proud Boys recently crashed an event at a library in San Lorenzo, Calif. where men in drag were reading stories to children in an effort to promote acceptance. One of the Proud Boys wore a shirt declaring “Kill Your Local Pedophile.” So-called “drag queens” are unsettling in the way they challenge gender norms, but they are not always gay men or merely seeking recruits. Yet another myth is that the LGBTQ+ ranks are much larger than they actually are. Gallup Polls in 2011, 2013 and 2019 found that a majority of Americans consistently believe that nearly a quarter of the country’s population is gay or lesbian. The actual number is around five percent. Transsexuals make up .6 percent (or 1.6 million). Given those actual percentages, the reaction to and legislative action against same-sex marriage and transgender use of public restrooms and participation in sports has been blown way out of proportion. The threats that so many people perceive in those areas are based far more on assumption than actual evidence. It is feared that allowing LGBTQ+ couples to marry will cause heterosexual unions to dissolve. The overall divorce rate in the U.S. (2.9 per 1,000) has actually been falling since gay marriage was legalized in 2015, though fewer couples are choosing to marry. And there is such a strong, prevalent discomfort with transsexuals, especially with regard to public restrooms, that the expectation of perversion fills the void left by the lack of actual understanding In fact, transsexuals are much more likely to be victims of harassment and sexual assault that commit those crimes. One especially murky subject is transsexuals in high school and college sports. About 10 to 14 percent of the transsexual community’s young population is estimated to be participating. Yet the sample of such athletes is so small that no definitive studies exist on how transition affects performance on the field. Such an athlete will not have an automatic physical advantage if any cisgender female competitors are bigger and stronger, which they easily can be. Nonetheless, some states have scurried to legally prevent crossover athletes from competing against the gender into which they were born. My initial inclination was to believe the solution was to have transgender athletes compete against each other, but their numbers are too small and I can understand their feelings of isolation from the sporting community. The storm of misinformation and misunderstanding has been intensified by often confusing terms such as “cisgender” (a person whose sense of identity and gender corresponds with their birth sex) and “non-binary” (gender identity that doesn’t fall neatly into “man” or “woman”) that have entered the popular vernacular. Many assume they were recently invented by the LGBTQ+ movement, but the Latin prefix “cis” (on this side) has been used with regard to gender for decades. Discussions of “sex” (determined by reproductive function) and “gender” (either sex according to social and cultural rather than biological differences) and how gender can be fluid are met with ridicule by those who fail to understand the actual definitions of those words. To give you an example, on July 13, nationally syndicated columnist Froma Harrop wrote a snarky piece called “‘Women’ shall not be erased” in which she declared, “I'm not going to refer to myself as ‘cisgender,’ a reference to people whose gender identity aligns with the sex they were assigned at birth.” Harrop was refusing to use a scientific term to describe what she actually is, but she sees the word as a mere slogan of the LGBTQ+ movement, which she accuses of bullying others into seeing people its way. I want to be clear than I am not advocating for “anything goes anytime.” I don’t believe that one’s sexuality should be an “in your face” matter and that consideration of others’ feelings and sensibilities with any subject you care to cite is always called for. I simply believe that people should be free to safely live as they are and those who have reached the age of consent, which in states ranges from 16 to 18, should be free to express love or share physical pleasure with whomever they wish in ways that are not meant to be harmful. I plead guilty to not knowing enough about transgenderism–no one knows yet what causes gender dysphoria–to make an informed decision about where I stand on the solutions to hot button issues and the wisdom of giving kids medical treatments that will affect and possibly permanently change their bodies before they can change their minds about the whole thing. Based on the research I’ve done so far, I can see that the decision to transition from one sex/gender to another is a very complicated, nuanced thing that is sure to be ground up in the ham-handed, starkly either-or arenas of culture and politics. Gender identity confusion often starts in childhood, but can be a form of obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) or genuine gender dysphoria (a deep sense of unease and distress when your biological sex does not match your perceived gender identity). Either way, the child and the parents are confronted by serious, life-altering if not life-threatening matters. I understand the concern behind the new Texas state law that enables law enforcement to investigate the parents of transgender kids for potential child abuse, but the specter of prosecution for seeking care is absolutely the wrong way to prevent a potentially irrevocable and highly consequential act. Treatments such as using puberty blockers to delay the onset of sex-specific physical changes (breasts, pubic and facial hair, etc.) can buy time to sort things out, but competent care from physicians and mental health professionals is crucial. As it is, transgender as well as gay and lesbian people are at great risk for depression, substance and abuse and suicide due mainly to society’s hostile attitudes toward them. They are not acknowledged for who they are. They are treated as second-class citizens by those who would deny them the right to form a marriage contract, and they are assaulted by people who believe they are abnormal, dangerous and deranged. Why anyone would actually choose to live with that kind of rejection, discrimination and harassment is beyond me. Yet many people still insist that being gay, lesbian or transgender is a matter of “grooming” and conscious choice. There is a world of difference between being taught to understand and being indoctrinated (taught to uncritically accept a set of beliefs). Homosexuality was considered a mental disorder until 1975. Researchers are still trying to find the specific biological factors that determine the gender with which one identifies and to which one is attracted. While the search for a distinct “gay gene” has come up empty, recent studies strongly suggest that sexual orientation and behavior are determined by levels of exposure to hormones such as testosterone while in the womb. There is reasonable certainty that being gay or lesbian, or wanting to actually be one’s opposite sex, are not simple choices that a person consciously makes with cold calculation. I know I never “decided” to be heterosexual — when I hit puberty I was reflexively attracted to girls — nor have I ever met anyone of any orientation who says they made such a “chicken or beef” choice with any degree of deliberation. I have met more than a few people who are more open to same-sex experience than others, which only bears out what researcher Alfred Kinsey found: There is a spectrum that ranges, on a scale of 1 to 7, from strictly heterosexual to strictly homosexual. Until we know and understand more about the factors that influence human sexuality in all its variety, I’d really prefer to hear a lot more from experts (physiologists, biologists, psychologists and psychiatrists) and a lot less from fear mongering politicians, misinformed media personalities, and self-righteous social warriors. I just wish we all could proceed carefully and compassionately. Live and let live. Do no harm. These are fellow human beings after all. John Rolfe is a former senior editor for Sports Illustrated for Kids, a longtime columnist for the Poughkeepsie Journal/USA Today Network, and author of The Goose in the Bathroom: Stirring Tales of Family Life. His school bus drivin’ blog “Hellions, Mayhem and Brake Failure” is parked on his website Celestialchuckle.com (https://celestialchuckle.com) with the meter running.

By Naomi Serviss / New York City When my Country Mouse girlfriend Dee worries about me living in this–let’s say “challenging”–city, I worry too. I worry she’s been glued to scare radio. Again. Living in Manhattan is loads different than living in a swanky suburb, desert ranch home or Orlando townhouse. All abodes I have known. This girlfriend of nearly 50 years knows there are scads more people here than where she lives in Pennsylvania’s Poconos. She and her husband settled there after their storied teaching careers, when they retired. They have a massive organic garden. Tending it is merely one of the myriad projects that sometimes come to her in dreams. She’s the Energizer Bunny until she collapses in a graceful heap. What does she know from danger, besides bears and killer mushrooms? I kid, I kid! She’s a smart one: a doctor AND a scientist! Who can fix ANYTHING! The “Pokies,” as we affectionately call them, are not even close to suburbia. It’s Country Lite. An adage comes to mind, applying to us both: “It’s a nice place to visit…” Who would choose to live in a city where screaming tabloids produce serial mini-heart attacks, and are owned by an Australian “news” conglomerate? A bottom-feeding empire whose mission and forte are the promotion of sensationalism, I might add. Polluting cyberspace with the latest school shootings, deadly fires, climate horrors, and vicious racism. We know! We know! Knock off scaring readers! An impossibility. That’s another story: The dearth and death of American newspapers. Which covertly brings us back to living in the nitty gritty city of no compare. Any place, as my late father-in-law used to say, “has its good parts (long pause) and its bad parts.” Marv Serviss, who died at age 101, was inscrutably taciturn. Unless recounting his Battle of the Bulge days. Or winding up to pitch a rib-tickler. It always landed. When Marv imparted a morsel of his vast wisdom, everyone listened, like E.F. Hutton. New York feels weirder now than usual. Not weird in a good way, how Portland, Oregon used to be. Neighbors feel it and worry, too. Fellow dog parents gather and group-worry. Some mask. Others don’t. Like everywhere. If I didn’t have the sanctuary of Central Park a half block away, New York would have been in my rear-view years ago. It’s busy and overcrowded and summer’s garbage stench could make you hurl. And apparently has on many occasions, as evidenced by sidewalk clues. Tourists are cramming the sidewalks again, teetering on impossible wedge shoes and falling for the fake Buddha con. That’s when the saffron-gowned guy wanders up and offers a card and “free” bracelet. For five bucks. Dirty dungarees poke out from under the orange robe. Scruffy sneakers complete the scammy “look.” You’re welcome. Tourists don’t seem affected by New York City’s latest rise in Covid (BA.5) cases of the newest variant. New York always been a nutso place to live, but this summer, it seems crazier than usual. Senseless gun violence, anti-Asian attacks and the ubiquitous homeless wandering zombie-like in upscale neighborhoods. I’m sympathetic to the plight of the beggars. Up to a point. I saw a bare-chested homeless guy brushing his teeth while perched cross-legged on a concrete slab in front of an empty store next to a church. I can’t unsee that. Thermometer-busting temperatures are evidenced by rippling heat waves above a newly tarred avenue. Overflowing trash containers add to the humid late July odor. An expected garbage bouquet scents the dusty, noisy air. Don’t get me wrong! I love New York. Central Park! Broadway! Lincoln Center! Restaurant Row! Museums! The other reasons! New York has more than its fair share of good and bad parts. I get it. We’re kind of stuck for awhile. Maybe it’s time to board the Pokie train for a spell. It couldn’t hurt. Naomi Serviss is a New York-based award-winning journalist whose work has been published in The New York Times, Newsday, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Highroads (AAA magazine), in-flight publications, spa and travel magazines and websites, including BroadwayWorld.com

By Jessie Seigel / Washington, D.C. The political scene right now is like one of those horror movies in which, no matter what you do to escape the madman, Jason or Freddy—or in this instance, Donald Trump—he just keeps rising out of his swamp or your nightmares, coming back to plague you again and again and again. That Trump plans to run for president once more in 2024 is no surprise. The speculation is whether he will announce it before the midterm elections or after. Trump is chomping at the bit to announce early. Most important, to Trump’s way of thinking, becoming president will stop the investigations into his many crimes. One source who discussed the matter with Trump this summer told Rolling Stone this month, “He says when he is president again, a new Republican administration will put a stop to the [Justice Department] investigation that he views as the Biden Administration working to hit him with criminal charges –or even put him and his people in prison.” Another source reported that Trump “said something like, ‘[prosecutors] couldn’t get away with this while I was president.’” If Trump gains the presidency in 2024, the Department of Justice (DOJ) policy forbidding prosecution of a sitting president would insulate him from any federal charges for another four years. Double trouble: Trump is facing possible criminal prosecution by Fani T. Willis, the Atlanta area district attorney. and Merrick Garland, the U.S. Attorney General in Washington, D.C. (R) Given the right-wing leanings of the Supreme Court, it might even hold that the presidency protects Trump from all those pesky state criminal investigations and civil lawsuits currently being leveled against him (the Georgia criminal investigation and the civil suit brought by Capitol and Washington D.C. Metropolitan Police officers, to name just two). In addition, based on DOJ guidance to eschew investigation of presidential candidates too near an election, Trump likely thinks that announcing his candidacy this early will insulate him from prosecution now. However, unless Attorney General Merrick Garland is entirely feckless, it’s unlikely that such insulation would kick in two and a half years before the next presidential election. Trump is also calculating that a pre-midterm announcement would discourage primary challenges against him. He told New York Magazine, “I think a lot of people would not even run if I did that…I think that you would actually have a backlash against them if they ran.” Some Trump adherents have been encouraging him to announce before the midterms. But many other Republican politicos are afraid that doing so will make Trump’s malfeasance the midterm issue, rather than the rising price of gas and food. One Republican strategist told the Washington Post, “Of all the selfish things he does every minute of every day, it would probably be the most… Everything we are doing that is not talking about the economy is going to be a disaster.” This fear can only have increased after the final January 6 committee hearing last Thursday (July 21), which thoroughly exposed Trump’s leadership of the January 6 coup attempt and his callous criminal intent. Of course, these Republicans are fine with Trump running—they only want his announcement delayed so that he doesn’t harm their chances of taking over the Senate and the House. However, one would expect that the jeopardy the revelations create for Trump will increase his panic to announce early. Unlike the Republicans, Democrats are rooting for Trump to announce as early as possible. The common wisdom is that Trump would be the perfect foil to turn attention away from the Biden Administration’s perceived failure to adequately react to obstruction in the Senate and the right-wing onslaught from the Supreme Court. Democratic strategist Xochitl Hinojosa told New York Magazine’s Intelligencer column this month, “now you have Roe, and if you also have the threat of Trump becoming president, that becomes a motivating factor not just for the Democratic base to turn out but also for moderate voters who didn’t vote for him in the last election.” Democrats apparently hope that an early Trump candidacy will not only allow Biden to contrast his steady style with Trump’s instability, but will aid down-ballot candidates during the midterm election. Former White House Senior Advisor Cedric Richmond told Politico this month, “It puts in perspective what’s at stake, shows that the Republican Party is still extreme and helps set up the contrast…Democrats need to home in on what they stand for — from their agenda to their values and contrast it with how extreme the other side is and what they want to do.” My advice to the Democrats: be careful what you wish for. Assumptions about the best foe to defeat in an election tend to backfire. Witness the 2016 election. Though Hillary Clinton won the popular vote, she did not win out against Trump’s Putin-aided manipulations. The aftermath of the 2020 election nearly ended in a successful coup. And now the GOP and the Supreme Court are gearing up to allow Republican-controlled state legislatures to substitute their will for that of the voters if elections go against their party. Although this effort is ongoing with or without Trump, with Trump on the presidential ticket, the anti-democratic corruption will likely be more intense. Though millions of people have watched the January 6 committee hearings, there are others who only watch Fox News. Fox did not even carry the last, decisive hearing, but falsely characterized it as absolving Trump. It is an open question whether the voters—the people—will crack wise to their own true interests and vote accordingly. Will they simply react to the moment’s economic and other political pain rather than understand that Republican obstruction is preventing the current administration from easing it? In the midterms, will they have the perception to throw out the Trumpist candidates lock, stock and barrel? I tend toward H.L. Mencken’s statement: “Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public.” But like any good pessimist, I sincerely hope I’m wrong. Political columnist Jessie Seigel had a long career as a government attorney in which she honed her analytic skills. She has also twice received an Artist’s Fellowship from the Washington, D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities for her fiction, and has been a finalist for a number of literary awards. In addition, Seigel is an associate editor at the Potomac Review, a reviewer for The Washington Independent Review of Books, and a dabbler in political cartoons at Daily Kos. Of this balance in her work between the analytic and the imaginative, Seigel jokes, “I guess my right and left brains are well-balanced.” More on and from Seigel can be found at The Adventurous Writer, https://www.jessieseigel.com.

Fred Plotkin, a pleasure activist and passionate Italy and culinary expert, speaks each Friday with leading people in the arts FRED PLOTKIN is one of America’s foremost experts on opera and has distinguished himself in many fields as a writer, speaker, consultant and as a compelling teacher. He is an expert on everything Italian, the person other so-called Italy experts turn to for definitive information.  Fred discovered the concept of "The Renaissance Man" as a small child and has devoted himself to pursuing that ideal as the central role of his life. In a “Public Lives” profile in The New York Times on August 30, 2002, Plotkin was described as "one of those New York word-of-mouth legends, known by the cognoscenti for his renaissance mastery of two seemingly separate disciplines: music and the food of Italy." In the same publication, on May 11, 2006, it was written that "Fred is a New Yorker, but has the soul of an Italian."

By Laurence Lerman / New York City Claes Oldenburg was my first Pop artist. I discovered him on a trip to Philadelphia with my parents as a newly minted teenager back in 1977. We’d headed down to check out the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall and the Franklin Institute and Philly’s famed Nick’s Roast Beef eatery (my dad’s idea). While driving down Market Street between our destinations in Center City, we passed Oldenburg’s “Clothespin,” an unmissable 45-foot steel sculpture of, well, take a guess. It had been installed outside of Philadelphia’s City Hall a year earlier and there it stood for pedestrians, cab drivers, office workers and everyone else to admire—or joke about. We pulled over and parked—yes, we managed to wangle a spot in Center City!—and then got out to look more closely. Clothespin was a giant rendition of a common household object, yeah, but something more. It was a larger-than-life abstraction of that object—unrealistically and imposingly huge, highly stylized in its smooth appearance and deep colors, and subtly romantic in that the two halves of the pin that faced each other sort of resembled a pair of curvy individuals leaning in to give each other a kiss. The impression Clothespin made on me stuck and ignited my decades-long interest in Pop Art, the modern art style most identified with imagery derived from popular and mass culture. My appreciation of the comic book-styled paintings of Pop artist Roy Lichtenstein was not far behind, with works by Andy Warhol and Jasper Johns soon to follow. But Oldenburg and his glorious public art installations featuring large-scale replicas of everyday objects and his large or traditionally-sized “soft sculpture” versions of the same were the first. Oldenburg died on Monday, July 18, at his home and studio in the SoHo section of Manhattan, from complications of a fall and a fractured hip. He was 93. Born in Stockholm to Swedish parents, raised in Chicago (his father was consul general of Sweden to Chicago) and educated in literature and art history at Yale and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Oldenburg moved to New York City in 1956. It was the dawn of what was to be called the Pop Art Movement. Oldenburg produced his first significant works in the late Fifties—sculptures of simply rendered figures, letters and signs inspired by the Lower East Side neighborhood where he lived. Though his methods and materials for creating sculptures would change over the ensuing years, Oldenburg’s subjects remained constant: he regularly depicted everyday objects—clothing, food, appliances, household items. All of them were familiar and recognizable in their basic form; none of them would have been considered “art” at that point. It was these early works, many of them early examples of the soft sculpture (sewed together by Oldenburg’s first wife, artist Patty Mucha) with which he would always be associated, were showed in the Pop Art movement’s much buzzed-about “happenings” of the early Sixties, performance art productions organized by artists and performers and staged in small downtown venues. Oldenburg’s work and approach, back then as it still is now, strongly contrasted the era’s prevailing sensibility that art was supposed to be “profound.” Nonetheless, Oldenburg’s sculptures received substantial exposure and his profile quickly rose. By the mid-Sixties, Oldenburg began increasing the scale of his work,enlarging them to oversized—indeed, colossal—dimensions. By the end of the decade, he began receiving regular commissions to create freestanding public sculptures in this style. These large-scale pieces, always of recognizable objects and crafted in either soft or hard appearances, initially elicited ridicule from the general public. But that was initially. By the early Seventies, Oldenburg’s pieces—large, colorful, startlingly contemporary sculptures of cheeseburgers, typewriters, ice cream cones, telephones, flatware, bowling pins, rubber stamps, lipsticks, pocket knives, slices of pie —came to be embraced and admired by nearly everyone who saw them. Over the years, I was exposed to Oldenburg’s work primarily in New York City museums—the Guggenheim, the Whitney, MoMA—while I saw extensive coverage of his more expansive public oeuvre in books, online and in televised news segments. I regret that I never made it a point to seek out his many public works that are on display in cities here and abroad that I have traveled to—Cleveland, Dallas, Minneapolis, Venice, Paris, Berlin, Tokyo and others. Oldenburg himself was pleased that his reach extended outside of cosmopolitan America’s art institutes. "We like the idea that the sculptures are not all in, say, New York or someplace—that they're scattered around the cities of America and Europe,” he said on NPR’s All Things Considered in 2011. My wife and I plan to travel to Jerusalem sometime next year and I just learned that Oldenburg’s 1992 Apple Core, a ten-feet-tall, enamel-painted aluminum sculpture of you-know-what proudly stands right outside the city’s Israel Museum. I look forward to taking a bite. Laurence Lerman is a film journalist, former editor of Video Business--Variety's DVD trade publication--and husband to The Insider's own Gwen Cooper. Over the course of his career he has conducted one-on-one interviews with just about every major director working today, including Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, Clint Eastwood, Kathryn Bigelow, Ridley Scott, Walter Hill, Spike Lee, and Werner Herzog, among numerous others. Once James Cameron specifically requested an interview with Laurence by name, which his wife still likes to brag about. Most recently, he is the co-founder and editor-in-chief of the online review site DiscDish.com.

By Alan Resnick / Detroit Here’s a riddle for you: what do a car salesman, chiropractor-fire walking instructor, real estate broker, media personality-actor in low-budget horror films, and a pastor have in common? They are competing to be the Republican nominee for governor in my home state of Michigan. Ours is one of 36 gubernatorial seats up for grabs this fall, 20 of which are currently occupied by Republicans and 16 by Democrats. And some of the nation’s candidates range from scary to downright frightening. Take, for example, Dan Cox and Doug Mastriano. Cox, a first-term state legislator, won the July 20th Maryland Republican primary for governor. The Baltimore Sun reports: “Cox attended the then-president’s January 6, 2021, rally in Washington before the riot at the U.S. Capitol. Cox called Vice President Mike Pence “a traitor” for not overturning the results, but Cox said he did not go to the Capitol when the event attendees turned violent.” According to the Washington Post, Cox “vigorously fought against the certification of President Biden’s 2020 victory and Maryland’s coronavirus mitigation measures.” But Cox pales in comparison to Mastriano, a retired Army colonel and two-term state senator. Politico reports that Mastriano “chartered buses to the U.S. Capitol on January 6, where he appears to have been part of a crowd that crossed barricades.” Mastriano opposes any exceptions to an abortion ban. He also believes the state legislature should have the power to appoint presidential electors and to “decertify” election machines. To put a cherry on top of the sundae, Mastriano is reported to have paid Gab, a social media platform frequented by the accused shooter in Pittsburgh’s 2018 Tree of Life Synagogue massacre, for “advertising services” for his campaign. Unsurprisingly, both these chaps have been endorsed by, as MSNBC’s Nicole Wallace likes to put it, the disgraced, twice-impeached former president. I’m not one to brag, but we’ve got some folks in the Great Lakes State that can go toe-to-toe with the likes of Cox and Mastriano. As a starting point, none of our five candidates for the Republican nomination have ever held elected office. Why some voters see a total lack of government experience as a virtue is beyond my comprehension, after living through the terms of our former governor Rick Snyder and a president who hosted a reality television show and who filed bankruptcy multiple times. Kevin Rinke owned three auto dealerships, so I suppose that could be considered good grounding for a career in politics. The first television ad I saw from Rinke had him posing next a zombie, and asking the question: “Why are the only dead people who vote Democrats?” He went on to promise “I'll audit the voter rolls and make sure there's no hint of cheating in Michigan elections. Join me, and let's lay voter fraud to rest.” Of course, every voter fraud claim raised in Michigan over the 2020 election was found to be without merit. And when it was mentioned to him during a television interview that the Detroit Free Press had reported that in every case of dead voter fraud, the defendant was a registered Republican and/or an acknowledged Trump voter, Rinke claimed that his ad was meant to be humorous. Regrettably, the interviewer failed to ask Rinke who would find his commercial amusing. Certainly not the viewers who believe The Big Lie. And certainly not the viewers who know better. Rinke’s latest TV commercial is also a gem. In this ad, he pledges to end the state income tax on individuals and ban students who are biologically male from competing in public school sports for females. Please instant message me if you can explain how these two issues go together. Rinke was also the defendant in two rather unseemly lawsuits from 1992, one involving the use of racial slurs in the workplace and the other involving sexually harassing employees, with the primary allegations coming from his secretary. In an interview with the Associated Press this month, Rinke called the allegations “blatantly false” but did acknowledge making payouts to the former employees, which he said was less costly than going to trial. Court records indicate that Rinke and the employees agreed to have the cases dismissed. Zombies also play a role in the biography of another one of our state’s contenders, Tudor Dixon. Ms. Dixon spent 17 years in the steel industry in assorted sales roles and briefly hosted a show on Real America’s Voice. In case this channel is currently not on your favorites list, some of their programming includes Ted Nugent Spirit Campfire, Securing America, and Law and Border. Ms. Dixon has attempted to differentiate herself from her competitors by focusing on the role parents should play in their children’s education. The Associated Press reports t she has suggested that public schools have become a hotbed of government-sponsored perversion, and has called for school administrators to be prosecuted if they allow children access to sexually explicit books. While she has not formally been endorsed by Trump, her television commercials frequently contain a clip of him describing her as “a very popular, fantastic brilliant, candidate.” But Ms. Dixon has been endorsed by Dick Devos, patriarch of one of Michigan’s most powerful and wealthy Republican families. Mr. Devos’ wife, Betsy, was the Secretary of Education in the previous president’s administration. Given her emphasis on family values, it’s no shock that Ms. Dixon has come under fire for acting in assorted low-budget horror movies little more than a decade ago. Who can forget Buddy BeBop vs. The Living Dead, in which she was eaten alive by zombies? This classic also contains a scene in which a zombie consumes the midsection of a pregnant woman. Another scene depicts a zombie biting off a man’s genitals. Word on the street is that Lin-Manual Miranda is in negotiations to turn this flick into a musical. Garrett Soldano, age 43, describes himself as a “chiropractor, small business owner, author, public speaker, family man, proud Catholic, and former WMU (Western Michigan University) football player.” He modestly omits that he also has been a fire-walking instructor. It’s good to have a Renaissance man in the race. Soldano created the Facebook group Michiganders Against Excessive Quarantine. The Los Angeles Times reported that his site had approximately 380,000 members before Facebook shut it down amid a crackdown on the spread of misinformation and threats. Soldano also gained national notoriety on February 1 when, on the right-wing podcast Face the Facts with April Moss, he argued that rape victims should not have abortions because that “little baby inside them might be the next president.” He’s also attempted to reach out to social conservatives by denigrating transgender rights and declaring that his preferred pronouns are “conservative, patriot.” Prior to jumping into the gubernatorial race, Soldano hawked a supplement, Juice Plus. On July 8, the Los Angeles Times reported that Soldano “falsely claimed that Juice Plus could ‘dominate’ any virus, including COVID-19, and had the added benefit of giving him ‘great bowel movements’.” After receiving a warning from the Federal Trade Commission about making false claims made by those selling the supplement, the multilevel marketing firm that sells the product has disavowed any claims that Juice Plus was an effective COVID-19 treatment. The FTC did not weigh in on bowel movements. Mr. Soldano might want to add “grifter” to his list of preferred pronouns. We Michiganders have the proud distinction of having the first person running for election in a major state or federal race to be charged in connection with the January 6 insurrection. Ryan Kelly, a real estate broker who has made The Big Lie the focus of his campaign, was arrested by the F.B.I. on June 9 and charged with four federal misdemeanor counts–committing violence against a person or property on restricted grounds, damaging federal property, disorderly conduct and entering a restricted building or grounds without permission. Kelly has pleaded not guilty to all charges and, taking a page out of Trump’s playbook, claims that the date of his arrest was politically motivated to hurt his candidacy. An attempt by Progress Michigan, an organization that describes itself as “a media hub for the entire progressive community,” to have him disqualified for running was rejected by the Michigan Court of Appeals on July 21. Kelly’s website states that, if elected, Kelly will declare the pandemic over on his first day in office. Just think of all the wonderful things he can do for our state during the remainder of his first week as governor. He can pronounce Flint’s contaminated water crisis over on Day 2. Crumbling roads and bridges can be declared repaired on Day 3. Kelly can announce that Michigan’s public education system is now best in the nation on Day 4. Detroit’s automobile insurance rates can move from highest to lowest in the nation on Day 5. And regional transportation issues will be alleviated on Day 6. Let’s give him the seventh day to rest. But, Rinke, Dixon, Soldano, and Kelly are mere bleeding hearts and snowflakes when compared to Ralph Rebandt, who recently retired after serving for 35 years at a church in Farmington Hills, the city where I live. When asked by the Detroit Free Press about his top three priorities as governor, Rebandt responded: “First would be bringing God back into culture and bringing back Judeo-Christian principles. My second thing would be bringing back our Judeo-Christian principles, and my third thing would be bringing back our Judeo-Christian principles." Rebandt believes ‘the Bible should be the chief or primary textbook in the school system." He has the most restrictive view on abortion of any candidate in the primary field. Rebandt believes there should be no exceptions for the procedure, and if the mother would certainly die from something like an ectopic pregnancy, doctors should try to save the life both the mother and child. He has pledged not to meet alone with any woman who is not his wife. If elected governor and a woman is selected for a cabinet post, Rebandt has said that he would not meet with her alone either. Mike Pence and mother must be pleased. Rebandt says that it’s not that he doesn't trust himself, but rather out of concern about someone making a false allegation of impropriety. The Detroit Free Press asked him if it would be discriminatory if male cabinet members could get his ear at a private meeting but female members could not. "There's a legitimacy in raising that," Rebandt said, without offering any further elaboration. He’s also indicated that he would use soldiers to stop undocumented immigrants from entering our state: “Many people do not realize that Michigan has been used as a drop off site for those entering illegally from Mexico,” Rebandt said in one section of a position paper. “Therefore, I will place the Michigan National Guard on every major highway entering Michigan, and other locations of interest, to stop the entrance of illegal immigrants to Michigan.” Lastly, Rebandt has been endorsed by the My Pillow Guy, Mike Lindell. I wish I had something snarky or witty to add here, but all I’ve got is “Yikes.” Blessedly, Rebandt has polled at only between 1% and 2% among Republican voters. The remaining four candidates are in a statistical dead heat according to a July 13 – 15 survey. Some 38% of the poll respondents remain undecided. I used to take pride in the notion that, in America, “Anyone can grow up to President.” But the past six years and our upcoming election for governor have got me rethinking that position. Alan Resnick is an industrial psychologist with over 40 years of professional experience. He and his wife are sheltering at home in Farmington Hills, Michigan. He is passing the time by cooking, exercising, catching up on friends’ recommendations of must-see TV and writing.

By Andy Borowitz July 25, 2022 WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—Senator Josh Hawley is “deeply concerned” that his newfound national reputation for cowardice is overshadowing his commitment to end democracy. “People see one video of me fleeing like a terrified bunny, and they think that’s all there is to me,” Hawley told reporters at a press conference. “They’re totally forgetting that I’m also a guy who tried to overturn a free and fair election.” Hawley admitted that, although it is tempting to stereotype him as “a guy who was scared shitless of a mob he had egged on earlier in the day, that’s just one side of me. What about the side of me that wantonly subverts democracy? That should count for something.” “People are focusing on the totally chickenshit Josh Hawley and ignoring the lusting-for-autocracy Josh Hawley,” he complained. Hawley’s press conference was cut short after a reporter asked a question and the senator ran away.

By Bonnie Fishman / San Francisco Bay Area A reunion is “an instance of two or more people coming together again after a period of separation, So says The Oxford English Dictionary. But do we really need an official definition? I just attended my 50th (two years delayed by the pandemic) Oak Park High School Class of ’70 reunion in suburban Detroit on July 9. We’re also all 70! Ask anyone there, clearly we know what reuniting felt like. It was truly a collective feeling of home, warmth, freedom, and of shared childhood experiences. No bull. We all knew where we came from. When I returned home to California, my family asked me what the highlight was. It wasn’t one person or one event, it was that sense of belonging to people from my past, rooted forever in all of our hearts. My reunion weekend began with a check in at a new neighborhood hotel. What?! My goodness, this was the first time in my hometown where I didn’t have a home. A very weird feeling indeed. The days unfolded with gatherings, big and small, at friends’ homes, restaurants, bars, and of course, the big event Saturday night at Glen Oaks Country Club. The smaller groups allowed for real visiting beyond where do you live now, do you still work, where are your children and grandchildren, and–here’s the one you want to ask but don’t– what ailments or conditions are you suffering from? A real can of worms! Besides seeing old friends and acquaintances, I was able to stop in at some of my favorite food haunts. One can’t visit suburban Detroit without a meal at the Jewish delis–Pickles & Rye and The Stage Deli for a corned beef sandwich, cheese blintzes, or potato latkes. I also dropped by Diamond Bakery, a Jewish bakery, to get the best rye bread in the country (sorry California, yours just doesn’t compare!). I brought a loaf back to my husband along with 7-layer cake, which is a riff on a Hungarian Dobos Torte. I spent one afternoon and evening at my good friend Mitch’s house with a group of a dozen or so people. The purpose of this gathering was for band practice. The band, the Saturns, is a group of classmates who nearly 58 years ago played together in an Oak Park basement, just like this one. For the past few reunions, they have been generous to pull some old tunes from the past and entertain the reunion goers. They did not disappoint. I was part of the “groupies” listening in and visiting afterward over a delicious dinner from Mezza, a top-tier Arabic restaurant. We dined on their griilled, de-boned, lemony, garlicky chicken, puffy pita bread baked in a brick oven, baba ganoush and hummus. And let’s not forget the fabulous falafel topped with yogurt sauce. This was not the weekend to be watching one’s weight! I sure didn’t. The reunion party itself was pretty special. It was warm and friendly, truly heartfelt. The country club served the usual buffet with way too many choices, such as entrées like standing rib roast, and more salads and sides than you could count. No one was really there for the food. For me, it’s always about the food, but I didn’t even care that evening what they put in front of me. It was about the visiting and reliving old stories from those tender high school years. Outwardly, classmates seemed at peace with their lives, though one doesn’t know what really goes on behind closed doors. By 70 years old, everyone has had bad things happen in their lives, but none were really being discussed. What I confirmed by being back at home was that I have no regrets about moving to a quieter, more rural, more peaceful life in the San Francisco Bay area. I can easily leave suburbia behind, though it was great connecting with my old hood. One thing I truly won’t miss is the Michigan humidity, which hit me the second I deplaned. California has ya beat. My two-square-mile hometown of Oak Park, Mich. was a magical place to grow up and I feel blessed to have lived there and still be able to connect with fellow classmates. In the spirit of “what’s cooking,” I would be remiss if I didn’t feature one of our old high school cafeteria’s standard hot foods. Johnny Marzetti is an inexpensive casserole of macaroni, ground beef, and cheese created by the Marzetti family, who arrived from Italy in Ohio back in the late 1800s. By the 1920s, the recipe had drifted to Michigan and other Midwestern states. Side note: this is the same Marzetti family who created the line of salad dressings that you can buy at most grocery stores in the Midwest. This dish has been described as American Goulash. I’m bringing “Bonnie’s Johnny Marzetti” into the 21st century with a few tweaks. I’m using fusilli pasta instead of elbows, I’m adding more fresh vegetables, substituting ground turkey for the beef and throwing in fresh chopped herbs for a nice lift. Even though this meal was designed for cafeterias, it’s good enough to serve for company. Feel free to do your own riff on an age-old recipe. I must confess: I never ate from the hot food line in high school. In my senior year, every day, and I mean every day, I had tuna salad on Wonder bread, a pair of Hostess Cupcakes, and chocolate milk. I’d say that’s processed food on steroids! Tell us here at The Insider what you remember eating in your high school cafeteria. If it’s from the 1990s on, I’m betting it wasn’t Johnny Marzetti! Bonnie’s Johnny Marzetti Yield: 8 servings 1/2 lb. fusilli or rotini pasta 2 Tbsp. olive oil 1 medium onion, diced small 1 red, yellow, or green bell pepper, diced small 3 garlic cloves, minced 4 oz. mushrooms, sliced thin 1/2 tsp. crushed red pepper flakes 1/2 tsp. dried thyme 1 lb. ground turkey 2 c. canned crushed tomatoes in puree 3/4 c. pasta water 1 Tbsp. tomato paste 1/2 tsp. salt 1/2 tsp. coarse ground black pepper 1/2 c. chopped fresh herbs: any combination of rosemary, oregano, parsley or thyme 1 c. shredded sharp cheddar or mozzarella cheese 1 c. grated Parmesan, divided Bring a 3 qt. pot of salted water to a boil.  Add the pasta and cook until al dente. Drain well, reserving 3/4 cup pasta water.  Reserve. In a large sauté pan or brazier, cook the onions, pepper, and garlic in the oil over moderate heat until they are translucent.  Add the mushrooms, red pepper flakes and thyme to the pan. Cook another 5 minutes.  Add the ground turkey, breaking up the meat with a spoon. Cook thoroughly. Pour in the canned tomatoes, reserved pasta water, and the tomato paste. Turn heat down to low and continue cooking and stirring for about 15-20 minutes.  Remove pan from burner. Add the pasta and stir to coat with the sauce. Season with salt and pepper. Blend in the cheddar or mozzarella and 1/2 cup of Parmesan. Fold in the fresh herbs. Spray a 2 qt. casserole with pan release.  Fill with pasta mixture.  Sprinkle top with remaining 1/2 cup Parmesan.  Bake in a preheated 400° oven for 20 minutes. Bonnie Fishman attended the Cordon Bleu Cookery School in London. Later, she owned and operated Bonnie’s Patisserie in Southfield, Mich. and Bonnie’s Kitchen and Catering in Bloomfield Hills, Mich. She has taught cooking for over 35 years and created hundreds of recipes. She is now living in Northern California.

By Andy Borowitz July 21, 2022 WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—In an impassioned plea in open court, lawyers for Steve Bannon argued that imprisoning their client would result in cruel and unusual punishment for those incarcerated with him. “The Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution explicitly bans cruel and unusual punishment,” Bannon’s attorney, Harland Dorrinson, declared. “We strongly believe that being locked up in the same facility with Mr. Bannon is precisely what the authors of that amendment had in mind.” Forcing prisoners to be imprisoned with Bannon would violate “not only the Constitution but the Geneva Conventions,” he added. “Speaking from personal experience, I have spent hours in proximity to Mr. Bannon,” the attorney said. “The prospect of spending five or ten years in such a state is too horrible to contemplate.” In a final argument, the attorney noted the behavior of the federal prosecutors, who rested their case against Bannon after calling only two witnesses. “Your Honor, they clearly couldn’t wait to get out of here,” he said. “I beg of you, let us all leave.”

One film journalist’s stream-of-consciousness cinematic journey through the pandemic, Part 93 By Laurence Lerman / New York City I must admit I don’t make it to the beach as much as I used to back when I was a younger man living near the Jersey shore, or earlier, as a boy in Flatbush, Brooklyn, right down the block from Coney Island. But even when the beach was a regular part of my summers as a born-and-raised Northeasterner, I’ve got to admit that as a film guy, I was often just as pumped to check out a beach movie on the tube or in a theater (there’s air conditioning in both!) as I was to haul my cookies to the shore and sweat it out on the sand. Alright, watching what the beach has to offer on the screen doesn’t compare to the genuine article, but the movies sure did give me a lot to choose from. And they still do. While beach movies have long been associated with the post-WWII rise of beach culture and its attendant young people and of course the beach party genre of the 1960s, American motion pictures have been spending time at the beach since the silent era. From the outset, the sun, sand, surf and swimsuits proved to be very pleasant and highly visual subjects, worthy of capturing in the crosshairs of a camera lens. Certainly, there was a lot to look at! Leading silent era Hollywood filmmaker Mack Sennett, who became famous as one of the originators of slapstick comedy routines like pie-throwing, car chases and other exaggerated physical comedy, was one of the first directors to routinely include the beach and swimsuit-clad performers—women, of course—in his work. Beginning in 1915, Sennett assembled a bevy of women in attractive but not-too-provocative bathing costumes to appear in a series of comedy shorts for his Keystone Studios, primarily filmed on the Los Angeles shoreline, as well as for promotional films and events (like beauty contests on Los Angeles’s Venice Beach). The ladies were collectively known as Mack Sennett’s Bathing Beauties and their eponymous boss kept them working regularly for more than a decade, frequently alongside well-known comedy performers like Billy Bevan. Though none of the Beauties were featured or even named, many went on to significant acting careers in the silent film industry, including Mabel Norman and Gloria Swanson (who frequently denied her history with the Beauties after she became a star in her own right). So successful were Sennett’s Bathing Beauties that imitators began popping up in the 1920s, including the Christie Studios’ Bathing Beauties and the Fox Corporation’s Sunshine Girls (which counted Janet Gaynor as an alumna). Beach settings appeared in plenty of films during the early sound era and beyond–the 1949 romantic comedy The Girl from Jones Beach with Virginia Mayo and the 1955 film noir Female on the Beach with Joan Crawford are a couple of the more notable ones. But the idea of beach-set comedy-romances accented with fashionable trends and new music, featuring teenagers or college-aged characters and appealing to that same demographic of young people, didn’t really get rolling until a little later. First came Columbia Pictures’s Gidget (1959), starring Sandra Dee as a high school senior looking for romance among the denizens of L.A.’s surfing community. It became a fast hit—America’s favorite young ingénue hits the beach only to encounter boy trouble!—and inspired a handful of sequels and a TV show. It was followed by MGM’s Where the Boys Are (1960), starring Connie Francis, Dolores Hart, Paula Prentiss and Yvette Mimieux as a quartet of midwestern co-eds who head down to Fort Lauderdale for their spring vacation. This “spring break” turns into a coming-of-age story for the young ladies, all of whom exemplified different points on the compass of the changing morals of America’s college-aged young adults, particularly in regards to romance and sexuality. The film also included an implicit date rate scenario that briefly turned the pleasant tale into a cautionary one. With Gidget and its progeny and Where The Boys Are serving as his inspiration, producer Samuel Arkoff, co-founder of the independent B-movie company American International Pictures (AIP), got the idea to make his own beach film for the burgeoning teen market. “The beach is a wonderful setting for a teenage film,” Arkoff said in his 1992 autobiography. “And it doesn’t hurt to show girls in skimpy bathing suits." The result was 1963’s Beach Party, directed by budget-conscious TV veteran William Asher. It starred teen idol Frankie Avalon and just-out-her-teens Annette Funicello, formerly one of the most popular Mouseketeers on TV’s original Mickey Mouse Club in 1955. They portrayed Frankie and Dolores, a pair of young lovebirds who attempt to enjoy a private romantic getaway in a Southern California beach house, only to encounter a whole slew of friends, surfers and bikers looking to all that SoCal has to offer. The fun came in the form of surfing, dancing, singing and, in the words of a visiting anthropologist, “wild mating habits.” The alchemy achieved in Beach Party by mixing appealing stars, a breezy beach setting, a nubile young ensemble, a pop music score, dancing and, in my opinion, a sexy but lighthearted tone, was incendiary and the film became a sensation. It became AIP’s highest-grossing film to date and launched a new subgenre—the beach party movie. Arkoff quickly jumped on Beach Party’s success and made a sequel. Then another. And still another. Within three years, hit-and-runners AIP cranked out seven beach party movies featuring the same sun-kissed setting and many of the same cast members (led by Frankie and Annette, who starred in the majority of them). Not surprisingly, the films became sillier and, well, worse. But the sequels kept coming while other studios attempted to imitate the AIP beach formula with their own productions. So, while AIP’s Muscle Beach Party (1964) and Beach Blanket Bingo (1965) were good enough, How to Stuff a Wild Bikini (later in 1965) and Ghost in the Invisible Bikini (1966), the studio’s final beach movie, definitely were not. In the Seventies, a handful of L.A.-based beach movies arrived with the kind of sexual permissiveness and nudity that the era’s newly annointed R-rating allowed (and even encouraged!). The Van (1977) and Malibu Beach (1978) were a pair that made some ripples on the low-budget circuit and in the earliest days of premium cable TV. Malibu Beach’s titillatingly low-brow humor featured a scruffy terrier trained by its enthusiastic male owner to snatch the bikini tops off women who were sunbathing. (This was truly the stuff of drive-ins and burgeoning cable channels like the long-gone Wometco and Spotlight!) The NBC Television Network got in on the fun with the 1978 TV flick Zuma Beach, a jiggly little number starring lithesome Suzanne Somers as an addled rock star who hits the titular sandy playground to enjoy some swimming, chicken fights, beach volleyball and chili dog-scarfing. She's abetted by a slew of admiring hormonal high schoolers played by such soon-to-be-stars as P.J. Soles, Tim Hutton, Rosanna Arquette, Steven Keats, Tanya Roberts and Michael Biehn. As for spring break movies, they laid more or less dormant until the Eighties with the arrival of Where The Boys Are ’84, an inevitable remake starring Lisa Hartman, Lorna Luft, Wendy Schaal and Lynn-Holly Johnson as a foursome who make the trek from their snowbound Northeastern college to the sunny climes of Fort Lauderdale to engage in the rites of spring. This wasn’t your parents’ Where The Boy Are—one of the gals reveals the times are a-changin’ when she declares, “All you need is a bikini and a diaphragm—and though the movie was rated a relatively tame PG-13, there was tantalization aplenty with its arousing chit-chat and hordes of shapely young people wearing the stringiest of string bikinis and Speedo swimsuits. (Yes, well-cut young men, too!) Further, the movie didn’t contain a lick of nudity or any sex scenes. This wasn’t the case with the Eighties’ other spring break movies. Quickies like Spring Break (1983) featuring Penthouse Pet of the Year Corinne Alphen and Private Resort (1985) starring up-and-comers Johnny Depp and Rob Morrow were low-budget winners with the college crowd. Others set during the spring getaway season but not in Southern Florida were the Palm Springs-based Fraternity Vacation (1984) featuring Tim Robbins in an early star turn, and Hardbodies (1984), a flagrant 1984 nudie concerning a trio of middle-aged businessmen who rent a beach house on Hermosa Beach and hire a surfer dude to help them meet beach bunnies who are way too young for them. The sex-and-silliness directives of spring break and other beach adventures retreated to TV in the Nineties and the early aughts, with such popular shows as Beverly Hills 90210 and Head of the Class spotlighting beach-based storylines as part of the networks' newly developed “summer mini-seasons.” In the movies, the sandy surfaces provided more of a backdrop for different kinds of studio genre fare. The surfing-infused crime thriller Point Break (1991) with Keanu Reeves and Patrick Swayze stands out among these. So does the South Pacific romantic adventure Six Days, Seven Nights (1998) with Harrison Ford and Anne Heche, and the Jamaica-set rejuvenating romance How Stella Got Her Groove Back (1998) based on Terry McMillan’s 1996 bestseller and starring Angela Basset and Whoopi Goldberg. Clearly, big stars go to the beach, too! The last decade has seen a handful of others, mostly comedies that are definitely a little less leering than the movies of the Seventies and Eighties, while still being fun and playful and, yeah, sexy. The popular Aubrey Plaza and Zach Efron star in a couple of the more watchable entries, beginning with 2016’s Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates, about a pair of dudes who hook up with a pair of party girls to accompany them to their sister’s destination wedding in Hawaii. The same year’s Dirty Grandpa finds Efron’s young lawyer being accompanied by his grandfather on his Florida vacation. The big joke here is that grandpa is played by a frequently shirtless Robert De Niro, who at one point is nearly seduced by Plaza’s beach girl, who enthusiastically orders him to “Tear open my bra like it’s a social security check!” Finally, there’s 2012’s very out-there Spring Breakers, a cult picture written and directed by former enfant terrible Harmony Korine that takes us back to Fort Lauderdale as it follows four college girls who hold up a restaurant to gets the cash to fund their spring break. While partying, drinking and drugging their way across town, they’re arrested, only to be bailed out by a local eccentric named Alien, a multi-hyphenate who makes ends meet by rapping, selling drugs and dealing armaments. And you think these gals ran seriously afoul of the law earlier…? Oh, the spring breakers are portrayed by Ashley Benson, Rachel Korine, Vanessa Hudgens and Selena Gomez, the latter two being popular child stars with multiple Disney credentials who joined the cast as as part of their transition to more "grown-up" roles. Alien, meanwhile, is play by James Franco, an actor who has seen his fair share of controversy over the past several years, capped by accusations and lawsuits involving sexual misconduct. There are a lot of beaches and bathing suits in Spring Breakers—the four leading ladies wear bikinis for more than half the film’s running time—but it’s not really in the name of good clean fun as the ensemble descends into a world of drugs, crime and violence. Anything fresh and innocent and enjoyable that one associates with beach movies is wholly squashed in Spring Breakers. A sign of the times? Maybe. But audiences didn’t love it either and the critics, even less so. Where are Frankie and Annette when you need them? Laurence Lerman is a film journalist, former editor of Video Business--Variety's DVD trade publication--and husband to The Insider's own Gwen Cooper. Over the course of his career he has conducted one-on-one interviews with just about every major director working today, including Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, Clint Eastwood, Kathryn Bigelow, Ridley Scott, Walter Hill, Spike Lee, and Werner Herzog, among numerous others. Once James Cameron specifically requested an interview with Laurence by name, which his wife still likes to brag about. Most recently, he is the co-founder and editor-in-chief of the online review site DiscDish.com.