Howie Day plays from both his new album and his repertoire of old favorites at the Southern on Saturday. Photo: Publicity photo
It may have been over 10 years since Howie Day crooned the earworm lyrics “even the best fall down sometimes” over the soaring melody of his acoustic guitar in his platinum single “Collide,” but his star hasn’t fallen yet. The Maine native’s heartfelt songs have gained a devoted audience with four studio albums and strong, energetic live shows. Behind his warm, tenor vocals and radio-friendly pop hits, you’ll find the talents of a lifelong multi-instrumentalist — Day has been a pianist since the tender age of 5 and picked up guitar a few years later.
Saturday 8/1. $17-20, 7pm. The Southern Cafe and Music Hall, 103 S. First St. 977-5590.
Lawrence Gaughan ran for Congress as a Democrat and is running for the Board of Supervisors as an independent. He says the dozens of calls he made to his ex-wife’s mother were “during a difficult time.”
Submitted photo
When Lawrence Gaughan announced in April his latest bid for office—he ran for the 5th District congressional seat last year and this year is running for the Albemarle Board of Supervisors—he made his announcement at the Bamboo House way up U.S. 29 practically in Greene County, and noted in a press release that the restaurant previously belonged to his high school sweetheart’s family.
That did not sit well with the Porritt family, who used to own what was then the Piney River Restaurant. Sisters Nancy Porritt Johnson, who briefly was married to Gaughan, and Debra Porritt Wood are adamant that their family in no way endorses Gaughan, especially after he repeatedly called their 77-year-old mother by phone in 2012 and left 23 profanity-laden messages on her answering machine, with the term “bitch whore” being among the less offensive of his choice of words.
Johnson and Gaughan, both 48, were part of Albemarle High’s class of 1985, took a government class together, and dated once, they both say. They reconnected on Facebook in 2010 and in June 2011, Johnson flew to Los Angeles, where Gaughan lived and worked as an actor.
After about a week, they eloped, says Johnson, and they lived together for less than a month when Johnson left and returned to Charlotte, North Carolina, where she now lives. Both agree the marriage was a mistake, both say they filed for divorce, both blame the other’s flaws for the failure of the union, as is not uncommon in bitter divorces.
What is uncommon are the multiple phone calls Gaughan made to Johnson’s mother, Gerri Porritt, who lived in York, South Carolina, and who had met him once briefly. “Lawrence harassed our mother for weeks with phone calls at all times of the day and frequently throughout the night,” writes Wood in an e-mail. “Mom asked him to leave her alone many times, that she was just an old woman with nothing to do with the situation, and had to resort to taking her phone off the hook for much of the time.”
Wood provides a copy of a police report her mother filed September 12, 2012 in York about harassing, obscene phone calls from Gaughan, after Los Angeles police told Porritt she needed to make a complaint there. When the calls continued in October, Wood says she advised her mother to let them go to her answering machine and go into another room so she wouldn’t have to hear them.
A tech-savvy friend recorded 23 messages from the answering machine in an MP3 format, says Wood, who provided the recording to C-VILLE, and ultimately she changed her mother’s phone number to an unlisted one. Gerri Porritt died a year later in December 2013.
Johnson describes the “helpless rage” she felt at seeing how enormously upset her mother was with the continued phone calls, and she includes an e-mail she sent Gaughan’s father October 16, 2012, asking for his help in stopping the distressing calls.
Johnson, who has a doctorate in special education and who works for the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school system, says she received harassing phone calls, as well, but she blocked them and changed her number.
She says she really hadn’t thought about that period in her life until she recently learned Gaughan was running for office—and she encountered him again at the Albemarle High 30th reunion July 17, where Gaughan called police and said Johnson’s fiancé, Steven Viebrock, was threatening him.
Gaughan confirms his 911 call from Adventure Farm Winery and he claims Viebrock “was in my face and threatened to beat me up.” Viebrock says he called Gaughan a “pussy,” but denies threatening him.
Johnson and Viebrock were detained about 30 minutes as they left the winery, and Johnson says, “We asked why he was able to file a false accusation against us when I’d tried unsuccessfully to get him to stop harassing me and my mother.” No charges were filed against Viebrock, and Gaughan obtained an emergency protective order.
“What’s her motivation to bring this to your attention?” Gaughan asks a reporter.
Actually, it was Earl Smith, who is running for supervisor in the Scottsville District and who collected signatures on a petition to remove sexual-battering former supe Chris Dumler from office, who contacted C-VILLE.
He was a friend of Johnson’s from AHS, knew of her brief marriage to Gaughan, and says he’d received a message from Gaughan on Facebook about Johnson that was “incredibly vile” several years ago, and then forgot about it.
It was just recently, he says, that he realized that candidate-for-the-Rivanna-District Gaughan was the same guy who’d been married to his friend Johnson and with whom he’d had a Facebook exchange that Smith claims got him “blocked and deleted.”
Says Smith, “It has nothing to do with politics. Once I learned who this was, I felt morally I had to say something. I don’t want this to happen to anyone else.” He cites his own correspondence with Gaughan and what Gaughan said to Johnson’s mother. “He goes to people’s houses and says, I’m going to represent you. It doesn’t sit well with me. I was part of his attack, and I had nothing to do with him.”
Gaughan says he doesn’t remember messaging Smith.
As for the calls to Porritt, he says, “I don’t know what to say. It was a very tragic time, very challenging for me. I felt my whole life was being undermined. It was a tremendous injustice that [Johnson] would do the things she’s done.”
But what about the repeated, offensive calls to Johnson’s mother? Gaughan says, “Well, yeah, it was a difficult time, certainly uncomfortable.” He says he hadn’t thought about them, questions the use of “something from the past to do damage to the present,” and then concedes, “I can’t say anything except it was a terrible time I went through.”
Gaughan’s father, Larry Gaughan, a divorce mediator in Reston, says his son doesn’t deny the calls, realizes they were a bad idea and has worked hard to get rid of his anger from the divorce. “He was really devastated for a few months,” he says.
Lawrence Gaughan got a master’s degree from Pepperdine University in social entrepreneurship and change, regularly attends church, and became involved in politics to become a better person and to help others, says his father.
“He’s not the same person he was,” says Gaughan Sr. “If you leave out the serious effort to remake himself and find ways to do good to society, you’re only telling one part of the story. He’s trying to redeem that the best he can.”
As for Johnson’s decision to speak out now, she says she didn’t before because she lives in Charlotte and wasn’t aware Gaughan ran for Congress last year. “My motivation results from finding out he is running and feeling he is not fit for office,” she says. “Also, the name-dropping of my family is certainly a contributing factor.”
CAUTION: THE FOLLOWING EXCERPT CONTAINS GRAPHIC LANGUAGE.
Three men and UVA graduates from the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity are now suing Rolling Stone. Photo: Martyn Kyle
On July 29, three Phi Kappa Psi fraternity brothers and UVA graduates filed a complaint against Rolling Stone, Wenner Media and journalist Sabrina Erdely in U.S. District Court for the now-discredited and retracted November 2014 story titled “A Rape on Campus,” which described the alleged gang rape of a girl called “Jackie” at the fraternity house.
George Elias IV, Stephen Hadford and Ross Fowler were members of UVA’s class of 2013 and members of the fraternity at the time of the alleged rape.
Their complaint says the statements and accusations of the events that occurred at Phi Kappa Psi are “categorically false and have been disproved by publicly available information,” and “the article contained sufficient identifying facts to match plaintiffs as the rapists.” The men are suing for three counts including defamation and negligent infliction of emotional distress and asking for at least $75,000 for each count.
In 2012, the year of the alleged rape, Elias lived in the first room at the top of the first flight of stairs and at Phi Kappa Psi. The complaint says vivid evidence from the story shows that his room was likely the scene of the crime and as a result, Elias was interrogated, humiliated and scolded by family, friends, acquaintances, coworkers and reporters.
Hadford and Fowler suffered similar attacks, according to the complaint, and all three of the men’s names and hometowns were listed on blogs, such as the notorious FairfaxUnderground.com, by anonymous users, identifying them as participants in the alleged rape. Hundreds of horrific comments and accusations still exist, and the full names of Elias, Hadford and Fowler will always be associated with the story, says the lawsuit.
“I think it’s a really hard lawsuit to win,” says legal expert Dave Heilberg. Defamation lawsuits are hard to win in general and, unlike UVA associate dean Nicole Eramo, who is also suing Rolling Stone for defamation, these men were not named in the article by Erdely and are not considered public figures. In fact, Heilberg says, now that they’ve filed the lawsuit, more people probably associate their names with the alleged gang rape than ever before.
On April 5, Rolling Stone retracted the article and its managing editor, Will Dana, issued an apology to the readers and “to all of those who were damaged by our story.” After 19 years at the magazine, Dana announced July 29 that he is resigning from Rolling Stone and his last planned day is August 7, according to the New York Times.
When asked by the Times if his resignation was linked to the suits or the story, he said only via a spokesperson that “many factors go into a decision like this.”
The characters of Almost, Maine, onstage this week at the Heritage Theatre Festival, find love in unexpected places. Photo: Heritage Theatre Festival
I dream a lot.
I have vivid, semi-hallucinatory dreams, the kind that feel logical and totally substantial until I’m breathing underwater or watching a tulip tree melt onto the sidewalk. I sense sun on my skin and words in my mouth, and my captivation is so complete that my conscious mind can only ping like dim sonar: what if this isn’t real?
For David Dalton, UVA Drama Department lecturer, this liminal edge is both the aim and vehicle by which he works. “Theater can surprise audiences and take them places they don’t expect,” he says. “Sometimes you forget you’re in a theater. You forget you’re watching people you may know.”
Dalton, who worked for many years as a director on the New York theater scene, directs the Heritage Theatre Festival’s summer production of Almost, Maine, a show that happily blurs the lines between reality and almost reality.
“Stuck in a no man’s land that is not quite in Canada and not quite in the United States, the residents of Almost, Maine are forever betwixt and between,” reads the production’s press release. Lost in the darkness of a moonless winter’s night and bathed by the eerie glow of the Northern Lights, Almost’s characters move in and out of budding and fading romance, inspired by familiar impulses into tender moments, slapstick physical comedy and the occasional swell of magic.
The play features just four actors who populate 19 roles across nine vignettes, starry-eyed stories written by playwright and actor John Cariani for his own theatrical auditions. It broke box office records at its 2004 debut in Portland, Maine, and though its Off-Broadway run was brief and considered something of a critical flop, Almost quickly became a favorite among high schools and regional theater companies. The show’s 2014 New York revival was led by a UVA MFA grad, Jack Cummings III of the Transport Theatre Company. Members of the faculty were involved as well.
Dalton, who’s just wrapping up his first year with the Hoos, continues the tradition with this show and believes Heritage providesan ideal setting for another go-round. “Everyone [here] is eager to be transported,” he says. “It’s especially interesting doing a play that is about discovering love in the middle of winter in a rural environment in suburban summertime Charlottesville.”
As he constructed a vision for the show—his directorial debut at UVA—Dalton embraced the idea of transportation to far-off realms. “I tried to align the idea of being transported to the way that love can transport us when it is discovered in unexpected ways,” he says.
He designed scene transitions to facilitate a clarified sense of transformation for the audience. “When the actors come in they’re embracing [Charlottesville] summer. Then they’re transported to Almost, Maine to become the characters they are. They exist outside the play, then they’re transported in it,” he says. “Sometimes they’ll change costumes right in front of the audience. They do all the scene transitions themselves.”
Dalton has found ways to heighten a script’s blend of fantasy and reality throughout his career. A graduate of Columbia University, he directed a number of new plays with NYC-based theater company Naked Angels.
He also created adaptations of classics, like Gilbert and Sullivan’s light opera HMS Pinafore, which stretched scripted limits. “I found a children’s book Sullivan wrote after the show debuted with sheet music designed so that kids could read along and learn music, and he couldn’t help but make jokes that didn’t exist within the musical itself,” he says.
He built on that idea in his production by adding a young narrator and pop-up imagery, which allowed him to create “a sense of childlike wonder” on stage. “HMS Pinafore is often overlooked. It’s sung by a society and not seen as an innovative work, but this allowed me to create a context in which people could rediscover the joy of this piece, in which people could experience something they might otherwise overlook.”
In Almost, Dalton sees an opportunity to once again help people notice, to pay attention. “The show is so successful because it’s a sentimental play that’s surprisingly funny. That’s something that is welcomed by audiences and not so much by critics,” he says. “It’s an interesting play, and the playwright has written in some elements that surprise people. The appearance of the Northern Lights causes a disruption that creates the opportunity for love and sometimes something new.”
In other words, in a play on the border between here and there, audiences are apt to spot something strange on the periphery. To wake up and notice a type of magic woven into everyday life.
Almost, Maine plays at Ruth Caplin Theatre through August 1
Jake Gyllenhaal’s physical transformation marks his commitment to the role of boxing champ Billy Hope in Southpaw. Photo: The Weinstein Co
Southpaw director Antoine Fuqua unfortunately shares a fatal flaw with the film’s lead character, light heavyweight champion Billy Hope: despite an indomitable work ethic and mountains of sincerity, all his best efforts fall apart when he doesn’t have a plan. Fuqua is capable of being a master craftsman, capable of making potentially forgettable crime yarns like Training Day and The Equalizer into masterpieces, yet spends the years in between churning out directionless busywork like Shooter, Olympus Has Fallen, Brooklyn’s Finest and King Arthur.
Southpaw falls somewhere in the middle, full of the desire to say something about the value of humility and focus, but lacking sufficient insight into its own premise to make the journey as meaningful for its audience as it is for its characters. We meet Billy Hope (Jake Gyllenhaal) as he prepares for the fight that will land him the light heavyweight championship of the world, the crowning achievement on his rise from an orphanage in Hell’s Kitchen. Everything and everyone he knows comes from his upbringing: his entourage and his wife are all childhood friends. He doesn’t know or think about anything beyond preparing for the next fight, leaving all financial and life planning to others. When his wife (a strangely underused Rachel McAdams) dies suddenly, the ensuing downward spiral leaves him with no home, no career and no custody of his young daughter. Left with nowhere else to go, Hope takes refuge in a gym owned by “Tick” Wills (Forest Whitaker), where he learns humility and focus from the father figure he never had.
Despite a compelling and believable performance by Gyllenhaal, the exact way Hope’s life ends up in tatters is frustratingly predictable and lifeless, full of overwrought standalone moments of waving guns and taking drugs. It all goes by like a montage in a latter-day Eminem song about trying really hard to overcome his anger and do right by his child. (Fittingly, the Detroit rapper’s song “Phenomenal” features prominently in Hall’s comeback montage.) The conclusion is similarly lifeless, full of empty drama and boxing movie clichés.
Where the film really comes alive is in the relationship between Tick and Hope, thanks to deeply effective and immersive performances by Whitaker and Gyllenhaal. Both actors clearly constructed elaborate psychological profiles and backstories for these two men. Gyllenhaal’s noted physical transformation is the most obvious sign of his commitment to the role, but every word out of his mouth, every facial tic and body movement belongs to this character he has fully inhabited. Whitaker, meanwhile, is an actor of such caliber that he could make audiences weep by reading from the phone book, and scenes involving Tick playing foster parent to the orphaned Hope could have been the stuff of movie legend.
Instead of making this the heart of the film, Fuqua suddenly discards what should have been the plot’s emotional core in favor of, well, nothing in particular. There is nothing climactic or revelatory about the way the film ends, and the emotional journey of its leading man is tossed aside to make room for shots of punching and a strange fixation on bikini-clad ring girls. There is a good movie hiding in the middle of Southpaw, tucked between an overly familiar introduction and conclusion, but it falls short of its potential as a boxing classic in another example of Fuqua punching above his weight.
Hillary Clinton has impressive support in the commonwealth by other political leaders like Governor Terry McAuliffe, U.S. Senator Tim Kaine and the U.S. Supreme Court. Courtesy of the Department of Defense
So here’s the current conventional political wisdom about Virginia: a once-reliable Republican bastion that has, in recent years, drifted toward the Democrats in presidential election years due to a certain charismatic candidate (hint: his name rhymes with Shmarock Mobana), and has therefore become one of the most highly-sought prizes in the 2016 election.
In reality, this wisdom seems more than a little suspect. If you survey the overall prospects of the Democratic and Republican parties on a national level, the Democrats are firmly in control. After all, the Democrats have exactly one probable nominee: Hillary Clinton (yes, there are challengers, but the odds of Bernie Sanders, Martin O’Malley or Jim Webb actually unseating Clinton, as Barack Obama did in 2008, are infinitesimally small). Meanwhile, on the Republican side, the clown car full of presumptive nominees is so overstuffed that it’s hard to keep track of who’s actually running. And with Donald Trump currently dominating both the news headlines and most Republican presidential preference polls, it’s easy to assume that the elephants are in complete, and catastrophic, disarray.
And yet. This is politics, after all, where anything can happen, and often does. And thus we were not surprised to see a recent Quinnipiac University Poll showing Clinton trailing potential rival Jeb Bush by 42 percent to 39 percent in the Old Dominion, and lagging Florida Senator Marco Rubio by 43 percent to 31 percent. Of course, this came on the heels of a Public Policy Polling survey that had Clinton leading Bush by 8 points in Virginia, and handily beating all other Republican challengers by similar margins. But in politics, you’re only as good as your most recent poll numbers, and we are quite certain that the Clinton camp is not dismissing these numbers out of hand.
Still, there are a number of reasons for optimism among Virginia’s Hillary fans, and chief among them are 11 very important people:
Governor Terry McAuliffe. A longtime Clinton consigliere, a legendary fundraiser, and an all-around entertaining persona, McAuliffe was, hands down, the most loyal and enjoyable of Hillary Clinton’s surrogates during her last presidential campaign. You can rest assured that he will do everything in his considerable power to deliver Virginia’s 13 electoral votes to her this time around.
U.S. Senator Tim Kaine. Not nearly as flamboyant or high-profile as McAuliffe, Senator Kaine will still be a formidable asset when it comes to helping Hillary carry the commonwealth. As popular and generally well-liked today as he was when he was governor, Kaine will be a valued spokesperson, and very high on Clinton’s list of possible vice-presidential candidates.
The U.S. Supreme Court. Yes, believe it or not, the right-leaning supreme court might end up being one of Hillary’s most unexpected allies. There are two reasons for this: redistricting and voter identification laws. The supremes have, in a series of recent rulings, made it clear that they are willing to place limits on both partisan redistricting and restrictive voter ID laws. Should the court rule on either of these in the Democrats’ favor, the Old Dominion would become more favo rable for donkeys on the congressional level, and—if Virginia’s strict voter ID laws are loosened—more left-leaning overall.
But there’s still a long way to go to November 2016, and Hillary has certainly stumbled before. As usual, there’s really only one thing for a smart political prognosticator to do: wait, and see.
Odd Dominion is an unabashedly liberal, twice-monthly op-ed column covering Virginia politics.
Matthew E. White’s gospel-tinged Americana covers everything from seduction to Philip Seymour Hoffman. He plays at the Southern tonight. Photo: Publicity photo
He may be new to the solo Americana scene, but don’t consider him a musical novice. When Matthew E. White was 11, he took up the drums and played with such gusto that his mother signed him up for guitar lessons. “She paid for my lessons so that I’d learn how to play guitar; she could deal with having a guitar in the house,” he says with a laugh. “I practiced the hell out of some guitar.”
White, now 32 and based out of Richmond, has been making music ever since, and his enthusiasm and versatility hasn’t waned. He played guitar in psychedelic folk rock band The Great White Jenkins and currently leads avant-garde jazz big band Fight the Big Bull. He’s also the co-founder of Spacebomb Records, an old-school record label with a house band, producers, and an entire crew of people dedicated to recording and releasing the music of Richmond artists.
But it was only when White ventured into a solo career making soulful, gospel-infused Americana music, that he won the attention of music critics and a wider audience.
White’s 2012 solo debut, Big Inner, was an experiment for the longtime musician. He and fellow Spacebomb house bandmates—bassist Cameron Ralston, drummer Pinson Chanselle and guitarist Trey Pollard—wanted to try something new. White, who had yet to sing professionally, put his sultry voice to the microphone and began to lead the band’s direction.
He wrote lyrics with longtime friend and songwriting partner Andy Jenkins. He composed keys and horn arrangements and worked with bigger ensembles, like gospel choirs, to compliment the Spacebomb band’s subtle rock, country and jazz-influenced sound. “It was very much a ‘write the songs, record the bass and drums, put strings, horn and a choir on it and see what we get’ effort,” says White.
The album was an opportunity for White to develop his vocabulary as an artist, to put together lyrics, arrangements and production elements that define his identity as “Matthew E. White.” It may have been accidental, it may have been an experiment, but White cultivated a distinct sound, one that firmly placed Big Inner on 2012 year-end best-of lists in The Guardian, Pitchfork, Consequence of Sound and other popular music criticism platforms.
White refines that artistic vocabulary on his latest release, Fresh Blood, employing the same techniques and sounds but with greater precision. The songs are deeper, more personal and more carefully crafted, and while White continues to play with lush arrangements, the production of the album is more nuanced. Overall, says White, Fresh Blood is a more personal album than Big Inner, because it’s a further development of his artistry and identity. The music, though still a collaborative effort, is even more his own.
“I hope that this is what making records will be for me for a long time to come,” says White. “It’s important to stick to making what you make and avoid the temptation to write hit songs or write for current trends. I’m an artist and I have a voice to share. It’s important that I always be on the path to myself.”
White found songs for Fresh Blood in many places, from personal experiences and his past to lines from books and current events. In “Fruit Trees,” he sings about seduction, while in “Tranquility,” he reacts to the death of actor Philip Seymour Hoffman. “Holy Moly” laments sexual abuse in churches, and in “Rock ‘n’ Roll is Cold,” White playfully sings about his own genre- bending style.
A good song can come from anywhere, says White, but what gives a song legs to stand on is its power to distill an emotion or affirm a thought, to pinpoint the essence of human experience.
White only records what he feels are his best songs (theme doesn’t matter all that much to him), and he is grateful that, right now, audiences are packing into venues to hear him play the music he loves making.
“It’s so rewarding. I work my butt off to keep the momentum going and am thankful for the opportunity [to make music for a living],” he says. “This is something I’ll always do, but I might not always be compensated for it, because you don’t know what people are going to be interested in.”
For now, he’s enjoying the ride. White recently returned from a multi-city European tour and kicks off an American leg of the Fresh Blood tour tonight at the Southern.
White likes to play with live arrangements—he usually tours with a band and has occasionally performed with full strings, horns and a choir. “It can get a little rowdy,” says White with a laugh. At the Southern, however, White will play with only one othermusician, guitarist Alan Parker. This stripped-down lineup, he says, helps him get to the intimate nature of his songs and feels most true to the essence of Fresh Blood.
It’s this sort of experimentation, the willingness to always try something new, that drives White’s creativity. “There’s no formula for making good music,” he says. “If there was, someone would have figured it out and would be making hit songs all the time. But nobody can figure it out, and that’s why making music is exciting to me. You don’t know what’s going to work every time, and that keeps me coming back for more.”
–Erin O’Hare
Matthew E. White plays at The Southern Cafe and Music Hall tonight.
Beer Run may be known for its craft brews, but the baked wings—finished on the grill with a sticky barbecue sauce and served with a tangy aioli—never disappoint. Photo: Rammelkamp Foto
I saw the TV ad for the wing eating contest. I texted to enter. I got a text back: “You are entered into the Battle of the Braveheart Wing Off Challenge! Prepare thy gullet.”
I prepared my gullet.
As challenge day drew near, I felt like something was up. Wouldn’t they contact me to let me know I was entered?
Turns out they would have. I called Newsplex weatherman and fellow food dude Travis Koshko, who’d be emceeing the event. “So, once you texted you were entered to be chosen at random,” he told me in a text.
Bummer. The preparing of my gullet was premature. I watched from the sidelines as six other dudes (where were the women?) competed on the Fourth of July. The winner ate 12 of the hottest wings Wild Wing Cafe has to offer in eight minutes. Twelve? Please. I can eat 12 hot wings without breaking a sweat.
Thus dismissed, I decided to eat my way around town in search of the best and spiciest. Then I’d challenge myself to my own buffalo throwdown: Take the Blazin’ Challenge at Buffalo Wild Wings, eating a dozen of BWW’s hottest wings in under six minutes.
My first stop was at McGrady’s Irish Pub. No, Irish doesn’t smack o’ the wing, but hey, it’s a pub. And indeed the McGrady’s wings were pub-grub worthy. The Old Bay dry rubbed wings sounded like they’d be on point, but they read salty, and the standard hot buffalo sauce was what kept me coming back.
It’s worth noting a couple miles east there’s another Irish spot with an interesting take on wings. The Tin Whistle dresses its drummies and flats with an HP-based brown sauce. The sauce is to Britain what ketchup is to the States, and it turns out to be a bloody good wing topper.
Beer Run has long been a personal go-to for wings, so I checked in on the beer-seller-cum-gastropub. Baked rather than fried, finished on the grill with a sticky barbecue sauce and served with a tangy aioli, the wings didn’t disappoint. For another serving of nontraditional wings, I dropped in on the Shebeen. The South African grill uses peri-peri spices (crushed bird’s eye chilies) to bring the heat, but while the menu proclaims them not “for the faint of heart,” they’re not all that spicy.
I threw in an upscale wing at Oakhart Social. Chef Tristan Wraight said he put wings on the menu as a replacement for his roasted chicken this past spring, and people have responded. Now he does them two ways—Caribbean-style fried naked and Nashville-style dredged in flour, spices and cornmeal before frying—and both are brined (bathed in a salty bath before cooking).
“For me with wings it’s all about the brine,” Wraight said. “Even though they’re little, brine really helps with juiciness and flavor.”
There were the wings that got away. Timberwood, Lazy Parrot and Fardowner’s are all reported to fly right when it comes to cranking out the chicken bits, but I didn’t get to ’em. Luckily, Wings Over Charlottesville delivers their specialty, so that was easy enough to knock out. Unfortunately, hot wings are a food best served fresh, never delivered. (With apologies to the pizza joints that insist on bringing them anyway.)
I had one more thing to do before taking the Blazin’ Wings challenge. Although Wild Wing Cafe doesn’t formally host binge eating, I had to know how hot the Bravehearts were. I split an order with a buddy at a leisurely pace, interspersing them with other WWC favorites—Ragin’ Cajuns, Generals, Ranchiladas, Crazy Daisy Asians. The Bravehearts were seriously spicy. Not hallucinogenic, but the kind of kick that made you dread putting another bite of something spicy to your inflamed lips.
I was finally ready to eat hot and fast.
I sat down with my family at BWW. I told my waiter I wanted to take the Blazin’ Challenge. She looked embarrassed. She brought out a waiver. BWW would not be liable for any injury I might incur during the frenzied poultry consumption. The sauce should be kept away from children—and pets, in case you brought your hamster.
I started to get nervous. I stole glances at the kitchen to see if my nuclear wings were on their way. My family’s reasonable dinners came. No Blazin’ wings.
They finally came. Our mortified waitress sat down with an iPhone. She sheepishly said she had to sit there and time me for the whole thing. I got started.
I took down all the drummies first. I planned to finish each in two bites, stripping them from the sides, but a corn cob-type revolution was easier. I was flying through the meat and going fast enough that the heat hadn’t caught up to me.
I moved to the flats, where I figured I had an advantage. By pulling off the cartilaginous end of the wing, you can strip all the meat off the bones in one bite. I tore through the flats. The heat was only starting to creep up as I finished my 12th wing.
Time? Two minutes, 15 seconds. Heat level? Moderate at first, but it built to a decent blaze by the time I held the food down for the requisite five minutes.
No, the BWW Blazin’ wings were not the heat equal of the WWC Bravehearts, but I was proud of my speed, and Koshko called me an “iron stomach.” Maybe next year, Battle of the Braveheart.
Sandra Marks’ psychic reading business on Seminole Trail was raided in June 2014, and she was arrested a year later in New York.
Staff photo
The business known as Readings by Catherine on U.S. 29 north became even more intriguing when it was raided by federal officers last summer. No charges were filed, and its owner, Sandra Marks, 40, a.k.a. Catherine Marks, disappeared until she was arrested last week and appeared at a bond hearing in New York for a 34-count indictment that accuses her of bilking clients of nearly $3.7 million.
Some of the victims walked into her business for palm readings, candle readings, tarot card readings, astrological readings and spiritual readings, and often they’d suffered traumatic events and were “emotionally vulnerable, fragile and/or gullible,” according to the indictment.
And some met Marks at Synchronicity Foundation for Modern Spirituality in Nelson County, where Master Charles Cannon, “a modern mystic,” according to its website, “delivers a living spirituality relevant to our times that awakens us to our source and unveils the experience of true holistic reality as one blissful consciousness.”
Marks’ role at Synchronicity was that of an outside consultant who offered her readings, says Bobbie Garvey, the foundation’s managing director. “We had nothing to do with her other than we allowed her to offer her services,” much like massage therapists do at the Faber retreat, says Garvey, who declined to comment on Marks or the charges against her, suggesting a reporter speak to her alleged victims.
Kerry Skurski from Evergreen, Colorado, was one of those victims, says her ex-husband, Mike Skurski, who contacted C-VILLE in April following a story, “Dark Cloud: No charges filed in Psychic Catherine raid.” She’s listed in the indictment by the initials K.S., and made wire transfers to Marks totaling $270,000.
Skurski had ALS, says her ex. The devastating degenerative neurological disorder robs sufferers of their ability to move, to speak, and, ultimately, to breathe. It is invariably fatal. “She tried anything and everything beyond Western medicine to extend her life,” including going to Synchronicity, where Skurski says Master Charles encouraged her to see Catherine Marks.
Synchronicity did not respond to a subsequent e-mail to comment on allegations that Master Charles recommended Marks.
Kerry Skurski’s illness left her vulnerable to Marks’ claims of being a clairvoyant with a “gift from God,” believes her ex-husband. His own estimate of how much Marks took from Kerry is around $400,000 over two-and-a-half years, “about half of her net worth.”
According to the indictment, Marks would tell clients that they or their families suffered a curse and “dark cloud,” and to be cleansed, they’d have to sacrifice money and jewelry because “money was the root of all evil.” Marks says the “Prince of Illusion” would let her know how much money would be needed, according to court documents.
Marks, who preferred cash, told her victims she would bury the valuables and cleanse them through prayer, rituals and meditation, says the indictment, and then return them. Instead, she kept the money in most cases, returning it in a few instances upon threats of legal action.
Often she told clients they needed to keep the money coming or the work would be undone and harm the client or the client’s family or loved one, says the indictment.
For instance, J.D. in Kentucky gave Marks nearly $1.4 million in 2011 and 2012 in amounts ranging from $13,000 to $200,000, according to the indictment’s lengthy listing of the 31 wire fraud counts against Marks. She is also charged with two counts of mail fraud for a contract J.D. sent her that detailed $720,000 given to Marks.
D.A. from Tennessee sent Marks $920,000 in 12 transactions between 2010 and 2013. And D.R. and A.R. from North Carolina wired her $231,000 between 2012 and 2013.
Not mentioned in the indictment is Donnie Marks, who helped run the business at 4621 Seminole Trail, according to the search warrant for last summer’s raid.
The warrant noted that in 2013, Sandra Marks saw a dark energy around a confidential witness who had recently received a large inheritance, and Marks told the woman she’d need $180,000 to get rid of the dark energy. The witness gave Marks $110,000, which the Markses deposited and spent almost immediately, including $17,100 for a 1968 Camaro purchased by Donnie Marks, says the warrant.
Marks demanded another $140,000 to continue the cleansing, and conversations between Marks and the confidential witness in April and May 2014 were monitored by a Department of Homeland Security agent, according to the search warrant. One of the counts in the indictment is for a May 7, 2014, telephone conversation between Marks and K.C., presumably the confidential witness, about the $180,000.
Victim Kerry Skurski died February 28. Mike Skurski says he talked to Marks the day after Kerry’s death, and then her phone number changed.
“We’ll never get any restitution,” he said before Marks was arrested, but he wanted the public to know to “save the next person.” C-VILLE has been unable to reach him through multiple phone calls since the indictments
Marks will appear in court in Charlottesville in the U.S. District Court, but a hearing had not been scheduled at press time.
The competition is fierce and the fun is abundant at The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, onstage at Four County Players. Photo: Publicity photo
Six tweens compete for the title of champion speller in the beloved musical comedy The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. This eclectic group of kids spells through the show while disclosing a variety of humorous, honest and heartfelt stories from their home lives. Audience members can also get in on the academic action in this live interactive performance by Four County Players. With music and lyrics by William Finn and a book by Rachel Sheinkin, this heartwarming tale has been delighting audiences on and off Broadway since 2005.
Through Sunday 8/9. $8-16, times vary. Four County Players, 5256 Governor Barbour St., Barboursville. (540) 832-5355.
