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pjo-hoo-nextgen · 5 years

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Magic Is Dangerous I

The Sorting

Andy sat at the Slytherin table waiting impatiently for the newcomers to arrive. He was always eager to see new people, and what better way to be introduced than the sorting ceremony. Of course, he, like everyone else, remembered his own sorting like it was yesterday.

The tables were packed with ogling kids all craning their necks to identify fresh meat. Andy, unlike some of the others, had comfort in the great hall. His brother shouldn’t have been too far away, nor Maria, or Grey, or Sol, or Eli. In fact, he had eyes everywhere belonging to familiar faces.

However, there was the fact that Jaxon was one of the best wizards at the school and a prefect for Gryffindor. Andy couldn’t afford messing up like he did at home all of the time. Swallowing hard and stuffing his hands into the pockets of his robe, Andy watched others go before him.

Then, at last, it was his turn. He didn’t have to look to know Jaxon was watching him closely. Raising his chin, pushing his shoulders back, and walking with purpose, Andy took the stool with an aura of confidence he didn’t actually possess.

‘Mmmm. Another Grace. Interesting, your brother-I remember him,’ The Sorting Hat mused. ‘Currently the Gryffindor Prefect. But you, you’re different. Brave yes, but cunning too. A bit mischievous at heart but caring and playful too. Tricky, tricky, tricky.’

“Did I stump you?” Andy wondered softly to himself.

‘Quite on the contrary,’ The Hat replied, ‘Slytherin!’

Andy could practically feel Jaxon deflate. He’d been hoping to mentor his little brother, but instead, Andy shuffled off to the Slytherin table where Maria slung an arm around his shoulders.

“Welcome to the dark side,” She teased, ruffling his hair.

“Uh, thanks.” Andy smiled thinly.

Shaking his head Andy focused back on the current event at hand. He was aware of Maria beside him with a sort of distant look in her eyes. He supposed that she too was remembering her own sorting. He’d heard plenty of stories about it.

Maria couldn’t understand the insecurity of those around her. It was a hat. That was all. It could hardly hurt a fly unless it ate the fly. Still, there were kids all around her quaking at the knees over the prospect of a dusty old piece of clothing shouting out a word.

Sure, she had some empathy, but she was certain of one thing. She was Gryffindor like both of her parents. It made sense, the stats didn’t lie, and more times than not a kid with parents from the same house was also destined to be a member of the same house.

So Maria waited impatiently until she was finally called. With a few mumbled excuse me’s she took the steps with perfect poise and plopped upon the empty stool. “Alright mister hat, lets get this over with shall we?”

‘Bossy are we?’ The hat grumbled. ‘Well, that explains it. Jackson blood. Mother and father both champions of Gryffindor. True genetics must be impeccable. Yes, you’re brave, smart too, but there’s something else....yes...you’re a trickster aren’t you? Sly, cunning, prideful too. You know what you want and you take it. Efficient at everything but not without a little fun. Yes, I know where to put you. Slytherin!’

Maria’s heart froze. Slytherin. She couldn’t be Slytherin. It wasn’t possible, she’d done as much preparation for this as she could! How would she explain it to her parents? They’d both teased her about being anything other than Gryffindor but she knew a bit of truth was there.

She felt like crying. How could she be so different from them and yet so similar?

Grey laughed from his place at the Hufflepuff table, watching Andy make faces at Maria as she zoned out. He couldn’t believe how much they’d grown. He remembered each of their sortings. The way he’d comforted them against their doubts. It had been equally scary for him, as he’d been the first to go through he process, but it wasn’t too bad.

Grey locked eyes with his father swallowing nervously as he tried to convey his nerves through his eyes alone. Will gave him a reassuring smile, but Grey wasn’t too comforted. He wasn’t sure what to make of everything. Most kids ended up in a house associated with their familial relations but he was adopted! He’d grown up most of his life believing magic was a hoax and yet there he was.

“Mister Solace!” Grey snapped from his daze and awkwardly stumbled up the steps muttering apologies as he went. As soon as he was settled the hat set to work.

‘Aha! A Solace! I remember your father! Dashing young man, good natured, helpful, kind, and nurturing. You’re a shivering little lot aren’t you? Nervous?’ The hat chuckled.

“Y-Yes sir. I am.” Grey stammered.

‘Sir?! I quite like you!’

“Th-Thank you sir.”

‘Hufflepuff!’

“Really?” Grey’s eyes widened in surprise and he nearly took the hat off to hug it. Then, without thinking, he bolted from the stool and tackled his father in a hug. “Dad! I’m like you!”

“I know!” Will laughed, blushing slightly at the looks he was earning, “Go sit at your table. I’ll talk later.”

Grey nodded and after waving at the other teachers scampered off to join his fellow house mates. He couldn’t sit still the rest of the night.

Grey even recalled the night Eli joined him. How he’d sat so stoic on the stool, face unmoving, no indication of nerves, and then he was declared Hufflepuff. The singular word brought a bright grin across his face and he all but skipped over to Grey. The two hugged and the elder boy was happy to finally have a companion.

Eli had been worried he wouldn’t fit anywhere but the Sorting Hat saw a friendliness in him, a kindness, and a fierce protectiveness despite the cool demeanor at times. Grey couldn’t have agreed more.

Sol glanced up from where she’d been examining the table to scan the room. She felt a bit detached from the chaos at hand but she wasn’t keen on getting involved where it wasn’t needed. The last thing she wanted was another upstart Ravenclaw to think they knew everything. She remembered her first night in the common rooms, how it’d been a competition between first years to see who was the smartest, and how she’d gotten our first. It was humiliating.

She still couldn’t see the intelligence that stupid hat said she had. She couldn’t spout facts, emend unimportant things, solve riddles with ease, or anything of the sort. Her father was a mechanic at the ministry but magic usually solved everything. Her mother didn’t dabble in machinery of any sort, and focused on cooking more than anything. So Sol couldn’t figure out how and why she was so good at working with her hands. In a school of magic there was no use for it, and each day was a struggle. She hated the place, her inadequacy, and the fact that she was in Ravenclaw. She’d have complained but she didn’t have it the worst on sorting day. Thia took the icing on that cake.

Thia sat quivering on the stool. She was terrified. Too many people were watching her at once and what was worse-her friends and family were all there too. She was so rattled she nearly missed the sorting hat’s initial greeting.

‘Another Grace, my goodness. Well, I suppose you know where you want to be.’ The hat waited for an answer, but all This could do was shiver like a frightened chihuahua. ‘Interesting. You’re quite complicated.’

Thia swallowed hard and prayed no one heard the small whimper she’d made.

‘Brave, indeed. Protective too. Nothing stops you from doing what’s right. Your moral compass is driven in the direction of justice and kindness. However, you’re loyal to the bone. Impressively so. Never one to turn your back on a friend or family member. An intense compassion thrives in you. So strong I haven’t seen it in years. It’s tempting to stop there, but I sense other attributes. You’re clever. Not in the outright sense. No, you’ve got brains in other areas. Your mind wanders to the unknown. Contemplates the deep reality existing below the everyday surface of life. Cultivated your mind could be deadly. Then, beneath it all, and equally as strong-ambition. You know what you want. You desire to do something spectacular, grand, and meaningful. To right the wrongs of the world and to bring justice and strength to the weak. Noble in intention. Yes, you are very complicated.’

Thia wanted to puke. This was taking impossibly long. The longest had been an hour. She was certain she was already creeping up on that time mark.

At first she thought finding Jaxon would help but it didn’t. She nearly burst into tears and asked him to take her home then and there. The only thing that helped her remain relatively in control was the idea of her moms playfully arguing over what house she’d be sorted into. Even they had struggled to decide.

Still, the anxiety ate away at her temporary memories. It was always a nuisance that anxiety, and it only worsened with each second. Thia was certain she’d fainted at some point but upon refocusing he realized she’d simply zoned out.

When the voice burst out in a triumphant decision she fell backwards off the stool in fright. “Gryffindor!”

So shocked was she that Will, the medic, had to help her over to Jaxon. She’d never been so embarrassed in her life.

Even now Sol knew Thia felt the same she’d always had. ‘I’m not brave. Not like they say I should be’ and Sol only had to take one look at Thia to know despite the other girl’s seniority, she had identified every single first year that would be far better than her at any field.

Sol only paid attention when the names were finished and the food appeared because then she didn’t have to think. She just smiled like everyone else and set about the evening, destined to hear first years compete for their intellectual prestige, just as And and Maria would hear kids talk about their biggest wrong doings, or Grey and Eli would comfort home sick kids, and Jaxon and Thia would listen to people boast about everything and nothing.

“Here’s to Hogwarts,” Sol sighed, watching Thia shrink in her seat from afar, Andy go into his own world, Maria glare at unfriendly kids, Jaxon puff out his chest to appear authoritative, and so on, “and another year of disappointment.”

#pjo #hoo #caleo #caleokid #frazel #frazelkid #jasiper #jasiperkid #percabeth #pjofandom #harry potter #harry potter au #magic is dangerous #theynakid #thia #jaxon #maria #grey #sol #andy #eli

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michaelfallcon · 4 years

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Kendra Sledzinski: The Sprudge Twenty Interview

Welcome to The Sprudge Twenty Interviews presented by Pacific Barista Series. For a complete list of 2020 Sprudge Twenty honorees please visit sprudge.com/twenty.

Nominated by Kayla Baird

“How do I put into words how Kendra has affected my life and countless others? We met at Joe Coffee in New York five years ago and hit it off right away. Who was this friendly person, I wanted to know! Soon I became aware of Kendra’s influence in the coffee community of Philadelphia. When I went to visit her, everywhere we went, she knew someone. Kendra constantly went above and beyond in Philly to encourage professional development and community with the Joe staff and baristas of Philly—doing palate development and cuppings that were never required, but she knew how to make baristas stay. She works hard for her community, and works hard to lift other people up—and she does so selflessly. Thank you Kendra!”

What issue in coffee do you care about most?

Equal access to education, resources, and professional development and opportunities. The industry is incredibly complex with lots of moving parts and many issues more critical than this, but I say it because it’s within my immediate reach. So many coffee professionals start as baristas. I think back to the days when I subscribed to some elitist coffee thought and language, and I cringe when I think of it.

These days, I want to use my experience as a trainer and educator to empower people with the knowledge they can grow with. This means promoting diversity and giving someone who is only working in coffee because it’s the job they have just as much attention as someone who wants it as a career. It also means listening. I stayed interested in coffee early on in my career because I was lucky to have managers and leaders who took me and my curiosity seriously and encouraged me to grow and learn. When I was training baristas, I would tell them that regardless of how long they occupy the role, knowing how to make coffee well is a valuable (and employable) life skill. I had the time of my life as a barista made easier by safe, healthy, and supportive work environments. Because of that, it’s important to me to help others have a positive experience working in coffee, too.

What cause or element in coffee drives you?

The humanity of the entire value/supply stream. Coffee isn’t possible without the labors of humans and that is a fact that has never eluded me.

What issue in coffee do you think is critically overlooked?

The value of that labor on all ends of the supply stream. Producers are not paid enough for their coffee and baristas are not paid enough to make it, either. I don’t think this is overlooked and certainly do not want to oversimplify it, but I do think it’s an ongoing challenge and conversation that should not stop. I hope we can find ways in our industry to make those challenges and conversations more tangible and accessible to our customers and guests without being polarizing.

It starts with our offerings and even how we encourage them to engage with the coffees they buy—encouraging them to buy what they like, not what we think is best or more righteous. I think the pandemic has put a bit of a lens on all supply streams and how consumers buy and interact with products and goods. Maybe we’ll see some positive impacts of this in the aftermath. Either way, working in coffee isn’t sustainable for so many people. How can we make it so we can all be prosperous? I don’t have an answer but I’ll spend my life’s work trying to make it so.

What is the quality you like best about coffee?

Coffee is an arbiter of human connection, culture, and social change. The industry is a global community and cafes are community spaces. We can diversify and educate our communities by making those community spaces welcoming and inclusive to all. I went to journalism school because I wanted to see and understand the world, but a career in coffee has given me that in a different, more enriching, and meaningful way.

Did you experience a life-changing moment of coffee revelation early in your career?

There have been so many moments that impacted my trajectory and kept me going and eager to learn that it’s hard to pinpoint just one. However, there is no doubt that many of those early moments were facilitated by Betty Ortiz at Spruce Street Espresso. Spruce Street closed a long time ago, but Philadelphia coffee wouldn’t be what it is today without its influence.

What is your idea of coffee happiness?

Usually I’d say I’m outside a coffee shop with some buddies and we’re sipping, sharing, and laughing in the sunshine. Because that world doesn’t exist right now, it’s my first cup in the morning. I’ve been using brewing my coffee as a way to practice some mindfulness at the start of my day. I brew my cup and sit in my window to drink it. I don’t look at my phone, I don’t read the news. I just sit, sip, and watch the day get brighter.

If you could have any job in the coffee industry, what would it be and why?

In some ways, I’ve already had the job I wanted for so long. I love sharing the joy of learning about coffee and flavor with others. My own ambitions are still malleable. In my fantasy world, I have the means and financial security to start a cooperative company with a bunch of badass coffee friends. We will be approachable, we will provide a great working environment and pay well. People will want to work with us and we’ll lead by example by having a diverse team, balanced power, and transparent, accountable leadership. This, of course, will be after I live out the other part of my fantasy world that involves me learning everything I can about coffee production by studying or doing research and living and working in a producing country for an extended period of time. I have never wanted to stop learning or growing my coffee skill set and I never will!

Who are your coffee heroes?

Many of them are also included on the Sprudge Twenty list. What a true honor it is to be here with them! I am also fiercely inspired by Coffee At Large and really any organized group of coffee workers. Taking risks and standing up for what you believe in isn’t easy and it takes a lot of courage. Folks farther ahead in their careers can learn a lot about workplace health, safety, and justice by taking some cues from these folks. I have so much hope for the future of coffee because of them.

And after this year’s Brewers Cup season, it would be remiss of me not to mention Beth Beall and the way she supports and encourages others. She’s a role model to so many, supports her own team’s growth and professional development in a way that makes me aspire to be able to do the same one day. Most of all, she does it with wisdom, kindness, and grace. We love you, Beth! Thank you for everything you do for the greater coffee community.

If you could drink coffee with anyone, living or dead, who would it be and why?

My late grandmother Elsie Flora Spencer Sledzinski, but she would be drinking tea because she was British and that’s all I ever knew her to drink. She passed in 2009, but I’d like to talk to her openly as a grown adult woman and hear her take on the state of the world. I know she would be disgusted by Trump, and I’d love to bond with her over that.

If you didn’t work in coffee what do you think you’d be doing instead?

Anytime someone asks me this I say, “lavender farmer.” Doesn’t that sound like a nice way to live?

Do you have any coffee mentors?

I wish! I always wanted one, which is why I think I try to be a mentor I never had to others. But I still have so much to learn, and it’s never too late to have one if anyone is feeling generous!

What do you wish someone would’ve told you when you were first starting out in coffee?

To not take myself so seriously! I started having a lot more fun when I quit worrying about being perfect or being right. There is absolutely no one way to brew or enjoy coffee.

Name three coffee apparatuses you couldn’t do without.

I feel stumped, especially after spending more time with brewing vessels during quarantine. Going to have to go with a Baratza grinder, a glass V60, and one of my favorite mugs.

Best song to brew coffee to at the moment.

Tell me you don’t want to get back behind the bar and crush a rush when you hear “Space Jam” by the Quad City DJs?

Where do you see yourself in 2040?

Hopefully happy, healthy, and living extra well because I am finally living out my dream of residing in a beautiful place next to a body of water.

What’s your favorite coffee at the moment?

*sips* Jen Apodaca is slaying it with Mugshots by Mother Tongue! I love a coffee that is easy to brew and tastes sweet and balanced.

How has the COVID-19 pandemic impacted you personally and professionally?

I am one of the thousands of coffee workers laid off from a job I loved. I miss it and many of my colleagues dearly. In the first few weeks, I felt minor relief. Sure, it was a full-time job just navigating the unemployment portal, but with rapidly evolving news made it hard to focus on much of anything but that. Now that more time has passed, it’s hard not to feel discouraged or disheartened. How can I be laid off? I’ve given 13 years of my life to coffee. Am I not good enough? Are my contributions and ideas not valuable? These are some thoughts that have entered my brain despite trying so hard not to. How can any of us in this position not have these thoughts? There’s no manual or reference for how to get through this and it looks different for everyone. We all have different needs. I’ve accepted that some days are just going to be harder than others and truly take it one day—sometimes one hour—at a time. Yet, there is an extraordinary amount of comfort in knowing I am not alone in navigating this. I cannot say I’d be managing it as well if I weren’t connected to so many coffee friends and peers at this time. The shared experience, the empathy; it’s refreshing and it makes me feel immense gratitude for the life choices I made that led me to this work and the coffee community.

I know that one day I will reflect upon this time of cooking projects, 24/7 athleisure, Zoom hangs, movie marathons, and learning the choreography to all my favorite ’90s music videos because I have the time. I know I will ultimately be thankful to have spent it safely in my home with my love and our house plants. Until then, what a way to get better at being patient.

Is there any donation fund or resource in your community we can share with our readers?

I’ve been co-hosting Coffee Break Northeast with the imitable Tommy Gallagher! It’s a way to connect with others in a time of social distancing and we support virtual tip jars, employee fundraisers and coffee businesses in our region daily at 1 pm. We have quite the crew of “regulars” and the camaraderie of Coffee Break has been instrumental in getting me through this time! coffeebreak.group is the website and we do ours at 1 pm eastern. All are welcome!

The Sprudge Twenty Interviews are presented in partnership by Sprudge & Pacific Barista Series. For a complete list of 2020 Sprudge Twenty honorees and a complete interview archive, please visit sprudge.com/twenty.

Kendra Sledzinski: The Sprudge Twenty Interview published first on https://medium.com/@LinLinCoffee

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shebreathesslowly · 4 years

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Kendra Sledzinski: The Sprudge Twenty Interview

Welcome to The Sprudge Twenty Interviews presented by Pacific Barista Series. For a complete list of 2020 Sprudge Twenty honorees please visit sprudge.com/twenty.

Nominated by Kayla Baird

What issue in coffee do you care about most?

What cause or element in coffee drives you?

The humanity of the entire value/supply stream. Coffee isn’t possible without the labors of humans and that is a fact that has never eluded me.

What issue in coffee do you think is critically overlooked?

What is the quality you like best about coffee?

Did you experience a life-changing moment of coffee revelation early in your career?

What is your idea of coffee happiness?

If you could have any job in the coffee industry, what would it be and why?

Who are your coffee heroes?

If you could drink coffee with anyone, living or dead, who would it be and why?

If you didn’t work in coffee what do you think you’d be doing instead?

Anytime someone asks me this I say, “lavender farmer.” Doesn’t that sound like a nice way to live?

Do you have any coffee mentors?

I wish! I always wanted one, which is why I think I try to be a mentor I never had to others. But I still have so much to learn, and it’s never too late to have one if anyone is feeling generous!

What do you wish someone would’ve told you when you were first starting out in coffee?

To not take myself so seriously! I started having a lot more fun when I quit worrying about being perfect or being right. There is absolutely no one way to brew or enjoy coffee.

Name three coffee apparatuses you couldn’t do without.

I feel stumped, especially after spending more time with brewing vessels during quarantine. Going to have to go with a Baratza grinder, a glass V60, and one of my favorite mugs.

Best song to brew coffee to at the moment.

Tell me you don’t want to get back behind the bar and crush a rush when you hear “Space Jam” by the Quad City DJs?

Where do you see yourself in 2040?

Hopefully happy, healthy, and living extra well because I am finally living out my dream of residing in a beautiful place next to a body of water.

What’s your favorite coffee at the moment?

*sips* Jen Apodaca is slaying it with Mugshots by Mother Tongue! I love a coffee that is easy to brew and tastes sweet and balanced.

How has the COVID-19 pandemic impacted you personally and professionally?

Is there any donation fund or resource in your community we can share with our readers?

from Sprudge https://ift.tt/36yw8Tu

#Sprudge

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itsfinancethings · 4 years

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List season has hit particularly hard this year, as the end of our first full decade of social media immersion has culminated in a multi-month spree of ranking and revisiting the likes of which humanity has probably never seen before. So I feel compelled to open by thanking you, the reader, for giving yet another highly subjective hit parade your attention.

My hope is that along with a few of the zeitgeisty critical darlings (Fleabag, Watchmen, Succession) you’re sure to find in every other top 10 of 2019, this list will point you in the direction of some equally wonderful series (Vida, David Makes Man, Back to Life) that haven’t gotten the shine they deserve. What you won’t find here, incidentally, is anything from the initial slate of shows on brand-new streaming services Apple TV+ or Disney+. Whether that disappointment turns out to be a pattern or a fluke, only time will tell.

10. Back to Life (Showtime)

Few characters have embodied the saying “you can’t go home again” as fully as Back to Life creator Daisy Haggard’s Miri Matteson. Out on parole after spending half her life in jail for a crime she committed at age 18, Miri returns to her small English hometown—not because she’s missed the place, but because she has nowhere to go but her parents’ house. While enduring harassment at the hands of neighbors who will never forget what she did, she struggles to find work, companionship and peace. From the producers of Fleabag, this quieter, gentler traumedy weighs Miri’s crime against the less extreme but more malicious transgressions of her family and friends. It poses the question of whether anyone who pays their debt to society really gets a fair chance to start over—and it suggests that you can tell a lot about a community by getting to know its scapegoats.

9. When They See Us (Netflix)

Ava DuVernay is the rare popular artist fueled by an irrepressible optimism about building a better future as well as righteous anger about the past and present. She brought both of these defining traits to bear on this four-part drama about the Central Park Five—whom her miniseries rechristened the Exonerated Five. Along with exposing how and suggesting why a broken New York City criminal justice system was so eager to vilify blameless children of color in the aftermath of a monstrous act of sexual violence, DuVernay and her stellar young cast worked with the real Five to create multifaceted portraits of regular kids with hopes, ambitions and communities that suffered as a result of their incarceration. And she found echoes of their story in the current movement against mass incarceration and in the presidency of Donald Trump, who stoked public fury at the boys. When They See Us celebrates the righting of a grievous wrong while acknowledging that no vindication, or remuneration, could fully heal such deep wounds.

8. Watchmen (HBO)

For those of us who haven’t enjoyed our culture’s never-ending superhero craze so much as endured it, the news that the most prestigious of all prestige cable outlets was adapting a DC Comics book sounded kind of like a betrayal. Et tu, HBO? But we should never have doubted The Leftovers creator Damon Lindelof’s ability to make Alan Moore’s brilliant, subversive 1980s classic resonate more than three decades later. Instead of revisiting the Cold War, Lindelof set his Watchmen in an alternate 2019 where the events of the comic are canon, Robert Redford (yes, that one) has been President for decades and a white supremacist group called the Seventh Kavalry is slaughtering police who are loyal to the liberal administration. Into this mess rides masked vigilante Sister Night (Regina King, in the would-be hero role she’s long deserved), a cop who is supposed to have retired from crime-fighting. There is (or should be) enough carryover from Moore’s original to appease its cult fandom, but the show is at its best when contending with our confused, misinformed, politically polarized current reality. And in that respect, it’s every bit as intelligent, provocative and mysterious as it is entertaining.

7. Undone (Amazon)

Fans worried that BoJack Horseman mastermind Raphael Bob-Waksberg would turn out to be a one-hit wonder could take comfort in this wildly imaginative sci-fi dramedy that he co-created with Kate Purdy, about a disaffected young woman (Rosa Salazar’s Alma) who narrowly survives a catastrophic car crash. In hospital-bed visions tied to her sudden physical trauma and preexisting mental illness, Alma reunites with her long-dead father (Bob Odenkirk), learns that he was murdered and allows him to guide her on a time-travel mission to prevent the crime from happening. Yet Undone is more than just a high-concept mystery; it’s a journey into human consciousness, a beautiful example of Rotoscoped animation and a subtle meditation on family, identity and spirituality.

6. David Makes Man (OWN)

The success of Moonlight sent ripples through Hollywood, elevating writer-director Barry Jenkins and a cast including Mahershala Ali, Jharrel Jerome and Janelle Monáe to the highest echelon of their art form. It also opened industry doors for MacArthur honoree Tarell Alvin McCraney, who wrote the play on which the film was based. This year he unveiled David Makes Man, a lyrical drama about a smart, troubled 14-year-old (Akili McDowell, astonishing in his first lead role) in the Florida projects who’s struggling to get into a prestigious high school and avoid being drafted into a gang, while mourning a mentor. Though it shares a lush aesthetic and many themes—black boyhood, complicated role models, queer identity—with Moonlight, the expanded format allows McCraney to explore the people around David. His privileged best friend (Nathaniel McIntyre) suffers abuse at home. His gender-queer neighbor (Travis Coles) takes in runaway LGBT teens and plays a delicate role in the local ecosystem. And his single mother (Alana Arenas), an addict in recovery, holds down a degrading job to keep the bills paid. This isn’t just the old story of excellence and poverty battling for the soul of one extraordinary child; it’s the story of a community where both qualities must coexist.

5. Lodge 49 (AMC)

At least once a year, a series too smart for prime-time gets canned even as network execs re-up long-running bores like NCIS for 24 more functionally identical episodes. In 2019, it was Lodge 49 that ended up on the wrong side of the equation. A loose, semi-stoned account of a young man (Wyatt Russell’s Sean “Dud” Dudley) treading water in the wake of his beloved father’s death, the show expanded over the course of its first season into an allegory for the isolation of contemporary life. The Southern California landscape around Dud, an affable dreamer, and his self-destructive twin sister (Sonya Cassidy) had been scarred by pawn shops, breastaurants, temp agencies, abandoned office parks. Refuge came in the form of the titular cash-strapped fraternal organization, where Dud found two precious things late capitalism couldn’t provide: a sense of community and a mysterious, all-consuming quest. Both propelled him and his cohorts to Mexico in this year’s funny, bittersweet second season; perhaps sensing the end was near, creator Jim Gavin’s finale provided something like closure. Still, the show—which is currently being shopped to streaming services—has plenty left to say. Here’s hoping the producers find a way to, as the fans on Twitter put it, #SaveLodge49.

4. Vida (Starz)

In its short first season, creator Tanya Saracho’s Vida assembled all the elements of a great half-hour drama. Mishel Prada and Melissa Berrera shined as Mexican-American sisters who come home to LA after the death of their inscrutable mom, Vida—only to learn that the building and bar she owned are on the verge of foreclosure. It also turns out that Vida, whose homophobia destroyed her relationship with Prada’s sexually fluid Emma, had married a woman. Meanwhile, their angry teenage neighbor Mari (Chelsea Rendon) raged against gentrification. These storylines coalesced to electrifying effect in this year’s second season, testing the sisters’ tense bond as they found themselves in the crosshairs of activists who saw their desperate efforts to save the family business as acts of treachery from two stuck-up “whitinas.” Thanks largely to the talented Latinx writers and directors Saracho enlisted for the project, Vida brings lived-in nuance to issues like class, colorism and desire—yielding one of TV’s smartest and sexiest shows.

3. Succession (HBO)

Right-wing tycoons and their adult children have gotten plenty of attention in the past few years—most of it negative. So why would anyone voluntarily watch a show in which the nightmare offspring of a Mudoch-like media titan (Brian Cox) compete to become his successor? A rational argument for all the goodwill around Succession might point out the crude poetry of its dialogue (from creator Jesse Armstrong, a longtime Armando Iannucci collaborator), the fearlessness of its cast (give Jeremy Strong an Emmy just for Kendall’s rap) and the knife-twisting accuracy of this season’s digital-media satire (R.I.P. Vaulter). But on a more primal level, one informed by the increasingly rare experience of watching episodes set Twitter ablaze as they aired, I think we’re also getting a collective thrill out of a series that confirms our darkest assumptions about people who thirst for money and power. It’s a catharsis we may well deserve.

2. Russian Doll (Netflix)

To observe that there was a built-in audience for a show created by Natasha Lyonne, Amy Poehler and Leslye Headland in which Lyonne starred as a hard-partying New York City cynic might’ve been the understatement of the year. But even those of us who bought into Russian Doll from the beginning could never have predicted such a resounding triumph. In a story built like the titular nesting doll, Lyonne’s Nadia Vulvokov dies in a freak accident on the night of her 36th birthday. The twist is, instead of moving on to the afterlife or the grave, she finds herself back where she started the evening, at a party in her honor. Nadia is condemned to repeat this cycle of death and rebirth until she levels up in self-knowledge—a process that entails many cigarettes, lots of vintage East Village grit and a not-so-chance encounter with a fellow traveler. Stir in a warm, wry tone and a message of mutual aid, and you’ve got the best new TV show of 2019.

1. Fleabag (Amazon)

Fleabag began its run, in 2016, as a six-episode black comedy about a scornful, neurotic, hypersexual young woman caught in a self-destructive holding pattern of her own making. The premise didn’t immediately distinguish creator and star Phoebe Waller-Bridge as all that different from peers like Lena Dunham, Aziz Ansari and Donald Glover. But the British show’s execution was sharp, funny and daring enough to make it a cult hit on both sides of the Atlantic—and to anoint Waller-Bridge as TV’s next big thing. She went on to helm the exhilarating first season of Killing Eve, giving this year’s second and final season of Fleabag time to percolate. It returned as a more mature but, thankfully, no less audacious show, matching Waller-Bridge’s somewhat reformed Fleabag with an impossible love interest known to fans as the Hot Priest (Andrew Scott). The relationship offered a path to forgiveness for the kind of character most millennial cris de coeur have been content to leave hanging. By allowing Fleabag a measure of grace without sacrificing her life-giving vulgarity, Waller-Bridge conjured the realistic vision of redemption that has so far eluded her contemporaries—and closed out the 2010s with the decade’s single greatest season of comedy.

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vitalmindandbody · 7 years

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Jonathan Demme obituary

US film director whose 1991 thriller The Silence of the Lambs won five Oscars

Jonathan Demme, who has died aged 73 from complications from cancer, rose from his colourful if tawdry beginnings under the aegis of the exploitation maestro Roger Corman to become one of the most eclectic, delightful and original film-makers in Hollywood. He also happened to be one of the nicest: the compassionate sensibility that lent his work its warmth and musicality was no put-on. Plainly put, he loved people.

Even his darkest work, such as the hit thriller The Silence of the Lambs (1991), which gave him his first taste of box-office success nearly two decades into his career and also brought him a best director Oscar, had a beguiling tenderness about it. For all that films gruesome frights, it was the connection between the FBI agent Clarice Starling (Jodie Foster) and her macabre mentor, the serial killer Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins), that lent the film its emotional bite.

His movies could be bewilderingly diverse he made the innovative concert film Stop Making Sense (1984), the uproarious screwball thriller Something Wild (1986), the Aids drama Philadelphia (1993) and a remake of The Manchurian Candidate (2004) but they were united by their colour and vim, as well as a deep-seated sense of conscientiousness and community. Demme cared deeply about what he put on the screen.

Thats one of the joyful aspects of the work and I also feel its part of my responsibility as a film-maker, he said in 2004. You have to remember that the behaviour you visualise on screen will be witnessed by thousands or millions of people, and will ultimately say something about us as a species. Thats why it gets harder for me to have pure villains in my films. When people tell me, Oh, Meryl Streeps great in The Manchurian Candidate, I hated her so much! well, I dont wanna hear the hated part, because I see her as a fully fledged, emotional person.

Crucially, he never lost touch with his B-movie roots. He always remembered Cormans advice to keep the viewers eye stimulated; as a mark of affection, he gave Corman cameo roles in most of his films.

Tom Hanks, left, and Denzel Washington in Philadelphia, 1993, directed by Jonathan Demme. Photograph: Allstar/Tristar Pictures

He was born in Baldwin, Long Island, the son of Robert Demme, who worked in PR, and his wife, Dorothy (nee Rogers). Jonathan was educated at the University of Florida, where he became a film critic on the college newspaper and came to the attention of the producer Joseph E Levine, who was so impressed (not least by Demmes positive review of Zulu, which Levine had produced) that he hired him as a publicity writer.

Demme met Corman while working in London on publicity for the latters war film Von Richthofen and Brown (1971), and was soon recruited into the stable of writer-directors that had already spawned Francis Ford Coppola and Peter Bogdanovich. He shot one scene of the sex film Secrets of a Door-to-Door Salesman (aka Naughty Wives) (1973) and wrote assorted scripts for Corman, such as Angels Hard As They Come (1971) and The Hot Box (1972), before making his directing debut with the women-in-prison thriller Caged Heat (1974) and the lighthearted gangster movie Crazy Mama (1975). In both instances, he insisted that the criminals should survive; Crazy Mama even ends with the outlaws cheerfully running a hot-dog stand. They escaped! Youve got no ending! cried an outraged Corman.

After his last outright exploitation picture, the revenge thriller Fighting Mad (1976), Demme made his major studio debut with Citizens Band, aka Handle With Care (1977), intended by Paramount to cash in on the CB radio boom but shaped by Demme into a sweet-natured comic roundelay. The agent turned producer Freddie Fields interfered in the production and even sacked Demme at one point, until Roman Polanski, who had heard about the incident through a mutual friend, demanded his reinstatement. Glowing reviews (Pauline Kael likened Demme to Renoir) did not translate into ticket sales and the film was a flop, as was Last Embrace (1979), his witty homage to Vertigo. There was praise, too, for Melvin and Howard (1980), which dramatised the true story of an unassuming milkman who helps an old man stranded in the desert one night after a motorcycle accident; only later does he discover that he came to the rescue of Howard Hughes and that he has been made a beneficiary in his will. Demmes intimate, easygoing humour, and his affectionate work with his cast (including Mary Steenburgen, who won an Oscar) brought purpose and definition to this featherweight tale.

He had another bruising encounter with Hollywood on Swing Shift (1984), a wartime comedy-drama which was re-edited by its star Goldie Hawn, who was also the producer. But Stop Making Sense was a triumph a fully cinematic visual record of a Talking Heads performance, with the band and the show assembling gradually, song by song, beginning with just the singer David Byrne on stage with a guitar and a tape-recorder and ending with a full battalion of musicians, dancers, backing singers, props and costumes (including, famously, Byrnes boxy, over-sized suit).

Something Wild threw together an uptight businessman (Jeff Daniels) and an unpredictable kook (Melanie Griffith) in an on-the-lam adventure steeped in colour, eccentricity and music; Demme negotiated masterfully the switch halfway through from comedy to suspense.

In Swimming to Cambodia (1987), he brought to a one-man show by the actor and raconteur Spalding Gray some of the same minimalist magic of Stop Making Sense and delivered another quirky marriage of crime and comedy in Married to the Mob (1988), starring Michelle Pfeiffer as a mafia widow. However, the audiences were not won over. I wondered if I was missing some commercial gene, he said. Or if I had a curse.

Demme claimed to be as surprised as anyone about the success of The Silence of the Lambs. I had just done what I always did. Only this time it worked. That was an understatement. The film was only the third in history to win all five major Oscars; it made more than $240m worldwide and its influence was strongly felt on the thriller genre, though it was to Demmes credit that he opted not to direct the sensationalist sequel (Hannibal) and prequel (Red Dragon). Philadelphia, about the efforts of a lawyer (Tom Hanks) to sue the practice which dismissed him after discovering that he was dying from Aids, could hardly have been more different. It was credited with encouraging a better understanding of HIV/Aids.

We got together and tried to come up with a movie that would help push for a cure and save lives, Demme said. We didnt want to make a film that would appeal to an audience of people like us, who already had a predisposition for caring about people with Aids. We wanted to reach the people who couldnt care less about people with Aids. That was our target audience.

He later conceded that the success of those two films changed the course of his career, and not exclusively for the good. There is some seductive upward spiral, which I might have got sucked into, where once you have success, you get to make even more expensive films, you get paid more and your work seems even more important and major. His adaptation of Toni Morrisons novel Beloved (1998), though intensely powerful and boasting a spectacular performance by Thandie Newton, did not continue his box-office success, while The Truth About Charlie (2002) was an insipid remake of the much-loved caper Charade.

He rediscovered his earlier vitality with Rachel Getting Married (2008), a fizzy family drama which drew on memories of his mothers alcoholism and starred Anne Hathaway as a woman leaving rehab to attend her sisters wedding. Shot with hand-held cameras (camcorders were even placed in the hands of the extras playing wedding guests, and their footage spliced into the movie) and peppered with impromptu musical turns, it fulfilled Demmes ambition to create the most beautiful home movie ever made. Less well-received, but brimming with bonhomie, was Ricki and the Flash (2015), with Meryl Streep as a rock singer re-connecting with the daughter she abandoned.

Aside from his fiction work, Demme was an accomplished documentary maker whose subjects ranged from family (his cousin, an Episcopalian minister, in the 1992 Cousin Bobby) to musicians (Robyn Hitchcock, Neil Young, Justin Timberlake) and politicians (Jimmy Carter in the 2007 Man from Plains).

In 2008, I asked him whether he had anything to add to the formula he had outlined in 1986 for making a decent movie You get a good script, good actors and try not to screw it up. He let out a joyful laugh and gave an exaggerated slap of the thigh: Thats the formula, baby.

He is survived by his second wife, Joanne Howard, and three children, Ramona, Brooklyn and Jos.

Robert Jonathan Demme, film director, born 22 February 1944; died 26 April 2017