Suburban dining

Fine dining, close at hand

April 29, 2012 | Taryn Plumb, Globe Correspondent

WINCHESTER - Thirteen years ago, when Tuscan-born chef Vittorio Ettore was scouting for a location to open his first restaurant, he didn’t go for the obvious choice of Boston. Instead, he opted for something a little outside the city, in Medford.
Last November, when Ettore expanded to a second restaurant, he went farther west, settling on a slightly less urban spot in downtown Winchester.
“In the city, there are always so many people coming in and out. You don’t get that close relationship as much with your customer,’’ Ettore, chef and owner of Bistro 5 in Medford and A Tavola in Winchester, explained of his decision to locate in the suburbs. “You do get that outside Boston a lot more.’’
His decision to forgo the crowded Boston culinary scene represents a growing movement: From Somerville to Salisbury, many communities north of Boston are blossoming into strikingly diverse dining destinations in their own right, with Winchester being one of the most recent to develop its culinary cachet.
“All around the state, there are little communities, little enclaves, that have become restaurant-centric,’’ said Peter Christie, president and chief executive officer of the Massachusetts Restaurant Association, a nonprofit trade group.
Fitting in with that theme, regional restaurant weeks and “taste of’’ events have taken off around the country, Christie said.
Salem recently held a 10-day spring restaurant event, showcasing nearly two dozen of its casual and fine dining spots. Portsmouth and other Seacoast towns took part in a similar nine-day event in late March. Other dining-themed events have been held throughout the Merrimack Valley and in Greater Newburyport.
Winchester recently showed off its culinary offerings at the Griffin Museum of Photography’s sixth annual fund-raiser, A Taste of Winchester.
In less than two years, four new restaurants have come to town, according to Janet Wolbrom, associate director of the Winchester Chamber of Commerce. They include A Tavola on Church Street, the Black Horse Tavern on Waterfield Road, the Rodeo Mexican Grill on Swanton Street, and the Stone Hearth Pizza Co. chain, which is planning to launch a new location on Main Street.
The new additions join old standbys such as Lucia Ristorante and Bar, the Greek Grille, La Patisserie bakery, and Swizzles Yogurt.
“Winchester really has a little bit of everything,’’ Ettore said. “There’s a decent variety of restaurants.’’
And that’s a common selling point around the region.
“You can really come to downtown Lowell and feel you’re eating in another country,’’ said Danielle Bergeron, president and chief executive officer of the Greater Lowell Chamber of Commerce, noting the city’s mix of Greek, French, Southeast Asian, Mexican, and Italian fare, as well as good old pub food. That lineup has been accented by the downtown newcomer Fuse Bistro, which offers American food with French and Asian influence.
In Newburyport, Enzo Restaurant and Bar and Brown Sugar by the Sea are new arrivals. Then there are the longtime town favorites, such as the Grog, Michael’s Harborside, Starboard Galley, and Agave Mexican Bistro.
“We hold our own,’’ said Ann Ormond, president of the Greater Newburyport Chamber of Commerce and Industry, which has 40 member restaurants.
Restaurateurs who settle in the suburbs are looking to cater to the convenience factor for residents, and also capture an often untapped audience that wants to go out to eat but doesn’t necessarily want to make a big production of it.
“They don’t want to drive to Boston, they don’t want to deal with the hassle of parking and traffic,’’ Donato Frattaroli, owner of Lucia Ristorante in Winchester, said of the majority of his customers, who come in from surrounding towns.
His brother started the restaurant in 1986 because he saw a dearth of Italian offerings in the market. Frattaroli said he would like it if even more eateries opened in Winchester, to create more diversity and ignite more curiosity among out-of-town foodies.
“It’s kind of like the staycation, but on an even more local level,’’ Bergeron said of the trend.
“I definitely think there’s that movement of eating local, staying local, supporting your downtown,’’ Ormond agreed.
That’s been Ettore’s experience. Bistro 5 draws Medford residents and Tufts students, as well as diners from Somerville, Cambridge, and Arlington, he said.
A Tavola in Winchester, meanwhile, sees diners come from Lexington, Burlington, Stoneham, and Arlington, but mainly they are local residents.
“I can’t believe how many people from Winchester won’t even go to Bistro 5 because it’s a few towns away,’’ said Ettore, who lives in Winchester.
Still, from a culinary standpoint, smaller towns can sometimes mean bigger challenges. For one thing, it’s harder to find quality help, Ettore said, because new culinary graduates want to be in Boston, where the action is.
And in the case of A Tavola, he has tweaked a bit, as any new restaurant does, making some portion sizes bigger and adding simpler offerings - such as a rigatoni-and-tomato-sauce dish- to his more high-end stable of octopus, squid ink pasta, rabbit, and cuttlefish.
Some of those items, he acknowledged, could be a little too exotic, especially for a small-town restaurant.
“We added dishes that are simple, put together, that people can handle without having to look things up in a dictionary,’’ he said.
But ultimately, whether you’re in Winchester, Boston, or even Tuscany, it’s all about what’s on the plate, Ettore said.
“No matter where you are, you should be able to have good food.’’

Giving away good old fashioned books

Communities celebrating World Book night

April 22, 2012 | By Taryn Plumb

The voice of the narrator was what really hooked Benjamin Lally: He is mysterious; you do not really know who he is. He slips in and out of slang; he shifts locations; he drops casual and crude (and often subjective) historical tidbits.

“It’s very much tongue-in-cheek,’’ Lally, head of the English department at Burlington High School, said of the best-selling and award-winning 2007 novel “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao,’’ by Junot Diaz. “It’s a funny book and really relevant.’’

Lally hopes it resonates with others, too, specifically 20 students who will receive copies as part of a worldwide literacy event.
On Monday, those students and tens of thousands of others will take to the streets, gather at libraries, and congregate at social programs, all with a goal to hand out books - yes, the good old-fashioned kind with bindings and paper pages - as part of the country’s first annual World Book Night.

The goal is to distribute a half-million books across the United States.

“It’s putting books in the hands of people who might not ordinarily have them,’’ said Chris Kelley, principal of Winchester’s Lynch Elementary School, whose students will be giving 220 copies of 11 different titles tomorrow night to several local organizations.

World Book Night was conceived in England in 2011; this year, it is being celebrated there again, as well as in Ireland, Germany, and the United States, according to the progam’s website. The event is managed by nonprofits of the same name in both Britain and this country.

April 23 was chosen to honor the accepted anniversary of the death of Miguel de Cervantes and of the birth of William Shakespeare.

Designated givers will hand out brand-new paperback copies of 30 best-selling contemporary books. Specially printed for the event, the titles cover a wide range of authors and genres, from Maya Angelou’s “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings’’ to Stephen King’s “The Stand’’ to Orson Scott Card’s “Ender’s Game’’ to Patti Smith’s “Just Kids.’’

Each giver - there are 25,000 in the United States, according to the trade journal Publishers Weekly - was individually selected by World Book Night; the process involved writing an essay, selecting three books from the list of 30, and making the promise to actually give out the books and not resell them for a profit. Givers picked up their books last week at designated drop-off points - typically book stores, including Barnes and Noble in Burlington and the local Hugo Bookstores chain - with most individuals getting 20 to hand out at their discretion. Local givers are in Winchester, Burlington, and Salisbury, among other places.

Winchester, for its part, took the opportunity for a dual initiative.

“It’s getting books in people’s hands and getting our elementary school kids involved in giving back to the community,’’ said local coordinator Rick Emanuel, who works in commercial printing.

Monday night, six chaperoned teams of students from Lynch Elementary will distribute books to New Horizons assisted living in Woburn, Jenks Senior Center in Winchester, Winchester ABC, Winchester Hospital, the Woburn Council of Social Concern, and the North Suburban YMCA.

The 220 books will then be disseminated to residents and participants of each program; some of the titles include Suzanne Collins’ ever popular “The Hunger Games,’’ Kate DiCamillo’s “Because of Winn-Dixie,’’ Octavia E. Butler’s “Kindred,’’ and Rebecca Skloot’s “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.’’
Although the school has a number of in-house literacy programs that promote reading as an “everyday, lifelong’’ practice, according to Kelley, “this particular event is less about promoting their own reading and really [about] promoting their love of reading with others.’’

At nearby Burlington High School, 20 books will be given to a selection of the school’s 1,000 students who do not necessarily consider themselves readers, Lally explained.

Salisbury Public Library director Terry Kyrios said her goal, meanwhile, is to reach out to what she called “the moms and dads in minivans’’ who cart their children to the library, but insist they do not have enough time to read themselves.

Kyrios was selected as a giver, and her pick is Robert Goolrick’s 2009 novel, “A Reliable Wife,’’ a gothic psychological thriller set in Wisconsin.

She hopes to persuade minivan-driving mothers and fathers to take the book, leave it in their vehicle, and read it in snippets between work, soccer games, religious education, and other activities.

“People need to remember that reading can be fun,’’ Kyrios said. “You can still get caught up in a book.’’

Lally, who teaches classes on contemporary literature and creative writing, agreed, adding that day-to-day water cooler or cubicle-to-cubicle conversations often do not include books, unless they are hard-to-ignore pop culture phenomena like “The Hunger Games’’ or “Twilight.’’

“I love this idea of a one night ‘literacy matters, books matter,’ event,’’ he said.

Kyrios was particularly drawn to the endeavor because its target audience is adults, while most literacy programs are geared to children.

“When you were a little kid, you were excited to be under the covers with a flashlight, reading for another 15 minutes,’’ she said. “World Book Night reminds adults of what that was like.’’

For more on the program, to see the full list of books, or to find out about giveaway locations and events, visit worldbooknight.org.

A bat fit for Paul Bunyan

Plainville’s new sculpure: a giant baseball bat

GEORGE RIZER FOR THE BOSTON GLOBE

Medway chainsaw artist Jesse Green’s work has drawn legions of fans viewing his bat sculpture in Plainville.

By Taryn Plumb | Globe Correspondent 

April 22, 2012

 PLAINVILLE — All across the country, from Bangor, Maine, to Bemidji, Minn., giant Paul Bunyan statues loom over roadsides. 

And if one of them ever happened to need a Louisville Slugger instead of the fabled lumberjack’s requisite ax, they’d find one just their size in Plainville. 

Standing sentinel over the Plainville Athletic League fields on Everett Skinner Road is a 24-foot-tall baseball bat, freshly carved from the remains of a Northern red oak tree by local chainsaw artist Jesse Green. The town’s new, neck-craning landmark was completed earlier this month, and was officially unveiled during the league’s opening day parade and ceremony on April 14. 

 “It’s something you wouldn’t expect in the middle of the woods in Plainville,” said Chris Murphy, the nonprofit league’s facilities and safety manager, who had the idea to turn the dying tree into a colossal baseball homage. 

In addition to honoring the town’s long tradition of youth sports, Murphy sees it as giving new life to a once-majestic tree. Still rooted and estimated at between 80 and 100 years old, the oak was recently deemed unsafe because it was sporadically dropping large branches; an arborist surmised that soil compression from the parking lot and the adjacent road had, over the years, stressed its roots, Murphy said.

A monstrosity of a tree — 80 to 90 feet tall, and 12 feet in diameter — it had become somewhat of a town landmark itself. 

“It witnessed every single game, every single happening, every single win” over the athletic league’s 57-year history, said Murphy. “It would have been terrible to just cut it down.” 

And considering it was right beside the fields, where roughly 400 to 450 kids from ages 4 to 18 play baseball and softball every season, the idea of a bat came naturally. Plus, Murphy said, its “nice straight trunk” lent itself to that shape. 

Green, of Medway, who goes by the fitting nickname “the Machine,” started the massive job on April 9, working for hours at a time with different sizes and styles of chainsaws, often perched in the bucket of a boom lift. Finer work included sanding, staining, and sealing. 

And tagging along with him? A film crew. 

Green, who creates chainsaw sculptures big and small, cartoonish, lifelike, or artsy, will have his own TV show, “American Chainsaw,” which is expected to air on the National Geographic Channel next year. His work on Plainville’s giant slugger — along with the carved sculpture’s unveiling, and the opening day parade for this season’s 40-plus teams — is expected to be featured in one of the eight episodes planned for the series. 

Because the show is still being filmed, representatives of the National Geographic Channel would not allow Green to be interviewed for this story. 

But Murphy was full of praises for the brawny, bearded Green — who is not unlike Paul Bunyan himself in appearance. 

“He’s very much an artist,” Murphy said. “Never did he have a picture of a bat. It was 100 percent out of his head. It went right out of his head onto the tree.” 

For his work, the league will pay Green $1,500, a fee it is raising through various means, including the sale of miniature embossed bats, and T-shirts with Green’s likeness. Likewise, two local companies provided free services for the project: Tree Tech Inc. of Foxborough chopped off the top two-thirds of the tree (roughly 60 feet), and Brodie Toyota-Lift of Lawrence donated the use of the 40-foot boom lift that Green used to craft his sculpture. 

“It was very much a coming together of the community that made this happen,” said Murphy. 

That spirit of volunteerism is a hallmark of Plainville, according to Andrea Soucy, chairwoman of the town’s Board of Selectmen. 

Another athletic area on School Street, dubbed the “field of dreams” complex, was built by volunteers, as was the town’s senior center, she said. 

“It’s like an extended family around here,” Soucy said. “People are very supportive of one another.” 

She called the enormous bat, meanwhile, a “wonderful idea that serendipitously came together.” 

And while it hasn’t yet appeared on any of the number of roadside attraction websites, such as www.roadsideamerica.com, keep a watch for its inclusion, based on what Murphy described as a “stunning” reaction to the sculpture. 

Most notably, cars both local or just passing through stop to unload wide-mouthed youngsters or smartphone picture-snappers. 

“They slow down, they gawk, they rear-end each other in traffic,” he quipped. “It’s getting Plainville on the map a little bit more.”

Steampunk's mad scientist

Full steampunk ahead

Sharon resident Bruce Rosenbaum takes a whimsical design aesthetic very seriously

 

Bruce Rosenbaum and his wife, Melanie, have turned their home in Sharon into a Victorian-themed steampunk showcase. (Photos by Bill Greene/Globe Staff) 

By Taryn Plumb Globe Correspondent / April 19, 2012 

SHARON - He waits for you on the front steps, glancing at a stopwatch on a chain, one hand tucked into the front pocket of his Victorian-style vest.

Then a nod, a handshake, and you’re inside the three-story, gabled turquoise house just a block from Sharon’s downtown.

You look around: There are clocks and coat racks with fantastical, doodad-covered bases. A pump organ-turned-21st-century work station. A closet door with a porthole that opens by valve wheel. And a desk with a polka-dot wheel that maybe - just maybe - could be a time machine.

And you think to yourself: What did I do here, walk into some kind of Jules Verne fantasy world?

And that’s precisely the essence of the design sensibility, the art form, and the culture that is “steampunk.’’

“It’s old and new at the same time, past and present,’’ said Bruce Rosenbaum, the Victorian-dressed (and, as he’ll admit, obsessed) host, who has become a mad scientist of sorts in this whimsical domain.

It’s a world of “what-if’’: Steampunk melds eras divided by centuries, fuses opposites, coaxes the inside out. Heavily influenced by the likes of Verne and H.G. Wells - and believed to be coined in the 1980s by science fiction author K.W. Jeter - it involves reimagining and reinventing period objects, most notably from the Victorian age. Gears, mechanical gadgets, nautical and steam power elements, and cast iron are all imbued with 21st-century technology.

“It’s kind of if the future happened in the past,’’ explained 50-year-old Rosenbaum. “But everything’s functional. That’s the great thing about steampunk.’’

Just over 10 years ago, he - like many who may be reading this - had never even heard of that term. Now he is redesigning his 5,000-square-foot, 1901 home, room by room, into a steampunk showcase. He started two companies, Steampuffin and ModVic, through which he’s had commissions to design single pieces - such as turning an old phone booth into a Skype station - as well as full restoration projects in business offices and historic hotels. He’s been involved with dozens of art exhibits and antique and craft shows throughout the country - including at a Manhattan tattoo gallery, as well as the upcoming “Steampunkinetics’’ at Animazing Gallery in SoHo, opening June 28 - and recently paired up with Audio Concepts in Boston to create a steampunk home-theater showroom.

Then he’s pitching a reality TV show (consider it a steampunk version of The History Channel’s “American Restoration’’), and there’s a book in the works, too.

And all this is in addition to helping to raise his two sons and running a marketing company, N2N Direct.

“It started out as just a hobby, a passion,’’ said Rosenbaum.

But, now, he freely admits with a laugh, “I’ve gone over the edge.’’

It was a 19th-century stove that gave him his first shove. When he and his wife, Melanie, moved into their 111-year-old home, they decided to restore a cast-iron Defiance wood-burning cook stove, giving it a modern glass cook top, and using its warming compartments as storage for pots and pans.

Then, they just kept going.

“It’s about repurposing and recycling,’’ said Rosenbaum, “giving new life to objects.’’

One such object was a Berry and Orton Co. bandsaw, which Rosenbaum incorporated into a desk/conference table for Boston patent lawyer John Lanza. The 1880s cast-iron saw is the showpiece of Lanza’s office at Foley and Lardner LLP: Standing upright, it gives the illusion of being cut in half, with the desk at its center, and two giant wheels above and below.

The usual reaction? “Wow, that is some desk,’’ said Lanza. “It’s sitting there almost as a sculpture. It has this grace to it that a lot of modern furniture just doesn’t have.’’

He liked it so much, he decided to steampunk his whole office; he now has Rosenbaum fashioning an old lathe into a credenza.

“There’s something very appealing about taking an old piece of equipment that once was useful, but in today’s world is just garbage, and repurposing it back into something useful,’’ he said.

It is a sensibility Rosenbaum wholeheartedly shares. But, he said, it’s also about the inherent challenge of each project.

“It’s learning history, using both sides of your brain, and making things functional,’’ he said, noting that he has a particular affinity for Victorian-era items because of their nostalgia and beauty, and also the pride people took in making them.

And Rosenbaum, in turn, takes pride in reusing them. Over time, he and his wife have revamped a late 1880s printer’s desk with four stools into a kitchen island; installed a detailed copper sink; and re-faced their fridge to look like Victorian cast iron. Rosenbaum also set up a working copper water filtration tank, and uses an embossed brass late-1800s cash register as a dispenser for treats for their dog, Zasha. (The dinging sound it makes when opened is the steampunk version of the Pavlovian bell.)

But climbing the stairs to Rosenbaum’s third-floor office is to enter a truly alternate world: There’s an antique rotary phone, a binnacle (or ship’s compass) that looks like a squat wooden robot and serves as a storage unit, telescopes and rare clocks, Victorian optometry gadgets, and copper moonshine stills awaiting inspiration for a future project.

And the centerpiece: a late 1800s pump organ fashioned into a desk with a three-monitor array, a tucked-away digital scanner, a keyboard outfitted with typewriter keys, and a Brownie camera that works as a webcam.

The organ’s pipes, still intact, rise out of the back like a utilitarian array of peacock feathers.

Even the casing on Rosenbaum’s USB flash drive has a Victorian look, as does his smartphone - he attached an 1882 pressure gauge to the back of it.

Elsewhere in the house - whose unassuming, remodeled exterior and well-manicured yard reveals nothing of its whimsical interior - there’s a Graphophone, a working elevator, and an entertainment center and flat-screen TV integrated into a salvaged mantel and 1880s stove. And, if you happen to use the bathroom, you might ponder for a moment over the pull-down flush toilet.

Many of the items are salvage, discovered through frequent trips to flea markets and fairs, through a network of dealers, or on eBay.

“We go for the ‘What the heck is that?’ and the ‘Cool!’ factor,’’ Melanie said as she sipped tea and occasionally flicked at a tablet computer while seated at her family’s kitchen table - which is decidedly not steampunked. “It’s a rebellion against the plastic, sleek, throwaway culture. It’s meant to be beautiful; it’s meant to last.’’

And, ultimately, it’s been a transformative experience that goes far beyond the objects.

“In a way,’’ Rosenbaum mused, “we’ve been repurposing ourselves as well.’’

© Copyright 2012 Globe Newspaper Company.

The enigma of orchids

IMMORTAL BEAUTIES

 

In a greenhouse somewhere, Jim Marchand worked among an array of the precious orchids he inherited from Victor DeRosa. (Bill Greene/Globe Staff) 

By Taryn Plumb Globe Correspondent / April 19, 2012 

The lanky man with dirt-caked gardener’s hands and the twinge of a Texas drawl points to a small round nub at the base of a potted flower.

“See this?” He leans down in the muted light of the greenhouse, rubs it gently with his thumb. “New growth.”

Giving the unbloomed orchid an approving look, he nods. “Look at that growth. That’s healthy.”

As far as Jim Marchand, 63, is concerned, orchids are the “ultimate plant obsession.” The Hopkinton resident and Texas native has been collecting, cultivating, and hybridizing the elegant, diverse, and vibrantly colorful family of flowers for nearly 20 years.

And now, he has a whole lot more to care for: He recently came into possession of one of the area’s most prized private orchid collections. Formerly owned by Victor DeRosa, who in his late 80s has retired and recently moved to Florida, the flowers are what remain of what was once one of the most successful cut flower businesses in the Northeast, DeRosa Florist in Natick.

The collection includes roughly 400 hybrid  cat- tleyas, members of a prolific genus known for its variety of colors and large blooms (as well as its long-held position at the center of corsages); several dozen Paphiopedilum examples (most commonly known as lady’s slippers, featuring wild, unusual, and often spotted flowers); and a handful of other genera.

Most of the plants, which are housed at a private estate in the area, will be transferred to a greenhouse on Marchand’s property sometime this summer. He will sell off the duplicates.

Marchand purchased the collection last September, but declined to say how much he paid, noting that it has much more than monetary value. DeRosa was not available to be interviewed for this article.

“They talk about that orchid obsession,” said Marchand, an assistant professor and researcher in the anatomy and cellular biology department at Tufts University who left his hometown of Houston more than 25 years ago. “I’ve got it.”

As, said Marchand, does DeRosa, an old friend who sold Marchand his first orchid decades ago, and who entrusted the collection to him with the express purpose of keeping it largely intact.

“He still thinks of it as his,” Marchand said. “It’s his love.”

After emigrating from Italy in the midst of the Depression, DeRosa started his business in 1941, according to past Globe stories. His biggest business was in cut orchids and corsages. For decades, according to Marchand, DeRosa controlled the Northeast orchid market, and won top awards for his plants from the Massachusetts Orchid Society and the American Orchid Society.

But the game changed in the 1990s, when competition started coming from overseas, and orchids could be had for much lower prices at home improvement and department stores.

When things were going well, the collection was five times its current size; but DeRosa whittled it down over the years, keeping the prize-winners and his personal favorites, Marchand said. In a 2001 interview, DeRosa told the Globe he had 25,000 orchid plants in many varieties that he started from seed, cloned in his Natick lab, and sent in bottles to be grown in Hilo, Hawaii.

“These are the special ones that Victor’s collected over 30 to 40 years,” Marchand said of his new collection. “Some are unique. No one else has them.”

Sheer diversity is one of the hallmarks of the orchid, according to expert William Cullina, author of “Understanding Orchids.” No one knows how many varieties there are, he said, with new ones are being discovered all the time, but he put the ballpark figure as 25,000 to 35,000 species.

“You never run out of orchids, there are always new ones,” said Cullina, who lives on Southport Island in Maine. He also described an “elegance and sophistication” that are not found in other flowers. “There’s an almost infinite variety of form and color and size. For a collector, it’s perfect.”

Marchand certainly feels that way. His first green-thumbing was crossbreeding rhododendrons; when he tired of that, he moved on to orchids, which he called the most highly evolved flower, and also the most difficult to grow, requiring a perfect amount of water and sun exposure.

But, he noted, “they’re immortal, as long as you take care of them.”

Ultimately, DeRosa’s collection will accentuate Marchand’s own assemblage of a few hundred flowers, his favorite being the lady’s slippers, which he likes for their “weird” look.

“These orchids are part of Victor,” Marchand said as he stood in the greenhouse housing them. But after 15 or 20 years watching his friend cultivate them, seeing them bloom, he added, “the collection has become part of my life, too.”

The potted orchids sat all around in various levels of rows; none were in bloom. Patches of clover grew in pots with some of them; others had outgrown their confines, their spaghetti-like roots hanging out in tangled protrusions.

Marchand walked around to inspect them, rubbing his fingers over their thick leaves, testing the dampness of their soil. As he worked, he explained that the collection has its biggest bloom in winter, although it can bloom all year round, lasting anywhere from three weeks to three months.

Many of them, though, he has never even seen bloom. And, because most of the flowers are not labeled — DeRosa was so familiar with them that he could tell what they were just by looking at their foliage — Marchand doesn’t know what many of them are.

“There are some beauties I haven’t seen bloomed,” he said. “It’s a big mystery.”

Twisting a dead leaf off a plant, he shrugged. “They all need work.”

He noted that some were recently infected by scale insects; he sprayed them with insecticide. He will eventually repot all of them, and divide others that have overgrown their pots.

He pulled one off a shelf, carrying it to a work table that was a bramble of tipped pots, clippers, scoops, and screwdrivers. Leaves lay scattered on the floor, blown in from outside through the open entryway.

He set to work on dividing the flower, removing it from its pot, cutting off its dead roots, then repotting it with a mulch-like mixture, broken clay bits, and foam pieces that aid with oxygen and drainage.

“It’s very peaceful, having your hands on plants,’’ Marchand said.

“This is why I do it.’’

© Copyright 2012 Globe Newspaper Company.

Holliston the new Elm Street?

Wicked dedicated to his hometown

Filmmaker Adam Green left Holliston for Los Angeles years ago, but the burg gets a starring role in his new TV show

 

Judy DeWitt of Holliston greets Adam Green at Holliston Town Hall after a screening of two episodes from his upcoming comedy-horror TV series. (Gretchen Ertl for The Boston Globe)

By Taryn Plumb Globe Correspondent / April 17, 2012 

Let’s just say – we’re talking hypothetically here – that you’d never been to Massachusetts, and you wanted to visit the state’s more notable landmarks and locales.

Where would you go?

Faneuil Hall and Fenway Park, for sure. Probably the Common and the State House. Maybe Salem, maybe Plymouth, possibly Holliston.

Wait a minute ... Holliston?

You know, fabled home of the Mudville nine in Ernest Thayer’s poem “Casey at the Bat.” Childhood abode of Instagram cofounder Kevin Systrom. And now, setting for the comedy-horror TV series “Holliston,” created by Adam Green, the native son filmmaker best known for the gory-but-fun “Hatchet” movies, and the stranded-with-nowhere-to-go genre flick “Frozen.”

Billed as a fusion of comedy and horror – which Green has fittingly dubbed “hori-com” – “Holliston” airs Tuesdays at 10:30 p.m. on FEARnet through May 8.

“It looks like ‘Seinfeld’ or ‘Friends,’ but it has a very genuine sensibility of horror culture,” the 36-year-old Green, who moved from Holliston to LA more than a decade ago, said during a recent publicity tour of the area.

The premise: Adam and Joe, two best friends and recent college grads (played by Green and Joe Lynch, director of “Wrong Turn 2”) are desperate to escape their hometown of Holliston to become big-time horror directors. While they work on their side projects — “Faucethead,” which they boast will do for dishwashing what “Jaws” did for swimming, and “Shinpads,” about zombie soccer players — they eke out a living shooting commercials at the local cable access channel where they’re supervised by a big-haired, spandex-wearing, stuck-in-the-’80s boss named Lance Rocket (Dee Snider of Twisted Sister).

Meanwhile, they’re on the cusp of poverty — subsisting on peanut butter, renting a dingy apartment, and stealing toilet paper from gas stations to save money to buy fake blood for their films.

As for their love lives? Adam lusts after his former longtime girlfriend, Corri (played by actress and country singer Corri English), while Joe mooches off his girlfriend Laura, (played by Laura Ortiz from the remake of “The Hills Have Eyes”), a lovable airhead and morbid painter.

If you hadn’t noticed by now, the actors and their characters share first names, and their real-life personalities defined their characters as Green was writing the show.

Holliston, meanwhile, is as much a star as any of the actors. Though most of the show was shot on an LA soundstage, exteriors highlight local destinations such as Casey’s Publichouse, Holliston Grill, and the gravity-defying landmark Balancing Rock, while characters shop at Cumberland Farms and Market Basket (one running joke revolves around the pronunciation of the store’s name). As any native New Englander might, they sprinkle the word “wicked” on their sentences like salt.

“It’s a comfortable, quaint town,” said Green, who’s made references to it in his films as well. One quickly — and brutally — whacked character in “Hatchet” wears a Holliston Panthers sweat shirt, and a trio of skiers in “Frozen’’ get stranded on “Mount Holliston.’’

“I like to keep acknowledging home and where I came from,” he said. As a director, however, he likes to change things up. Besides the hori-com of “Holliston,” Green has launched his own production company, ArieScope Pictures, and is working on “Killer Pizza,” an adaptation of the Greg Taylor young adult novel for MGM.

Melding gore and guffaws isn’t as dichotomous as you might think. The same “beats” that go into generating a scare apply to delivering a joke — that is, you set it up, get their attention, then “hit ’em,” Green explained.

In the show, comedic antics are entwined with absurd and cartoonish gore and violence: Joe and Adam get sprayed by a skunk and spend the entirety of one episode in a bathtub together. In one fantasy sequence, Adam peels off his own skin in a nod to an atrocious effect from “Poltergeist. ” In another, he and Joe telepathically explode people’s heads, “Scanners”-style.

Then there’s Adam’s imaginary friend (played by Oderus Urungus of the metal band Gwar): a thorny-faced, putrid-smelling, leather-thong-wearing alien who lives in his closet, and often dispenses the worst advice possible.

Popping in and out of all this is a series of cult-status guest stars: Bill Moseley from “House of 1,000 Corpses,” Tony Todd of gravely-voiced “Candyman” fame, and Kane Hodder, who has played his share of mute, mindless, and ever-purposeful killing machines, including Jason in “Friday the 13th”.

“It was a chance to really do something special with the traditional sitcom,” said Green, in jeans, a Megadeth T-shirt, and a backward baseball cap, as he sat in Holliston Town Hall before a recent screening with his castmates, the four of them cracking jokes, ribbing each other, and all admittedly a bit loopy from a lack of sleep. “And you don’t need to like horror to get it.”

Although the show is “outrageous,” said Lynch, a perpetual jokester dressed in black, his wild hair tamed by a baseball cap, it “really relates to everyone. There’s a lot of heart in the show.” (And no, he’s not talking about the kind that get ripped out, a-la “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.”)

Ultimately, that’s because it’s semi-autobiographical (minus the exploding heads and all that, of course), and it’s also something Green has been trying to get off the ground for more than a decade, since making “Coffee and Donuts,” its inspiration, for $400 while still living in Holliston.

“This is genuinely my true story,” Green said, noting that, at the beginning, he was so poor he ate out of the trash at the LA bar where he worked. But then he made “Hatchet,” which premiered in 2006 and quickly gained a cult following, and its even more notorious sequel, which the Motion Picture Association of America pulled from theaters its opening weekend in 2010.

“These struggles, these hard times, it does get better,” he said, noting that you have to embrace the struggle to get where you want to go, rather than let it “disenchant” you.

Still, as he noted when he returned to Holliston for the screening (his first visit back in 13 years; his parents have since moved to Las Vegas), “so much of it feels exactly the same. The whole show is about wanting to get out of here, but at the same time, I miss it.”

And apparently, townspeople — and others — feel the same. As they crowded the town hall’s auditorium for the recent showing, there were many hugs, handshakes, and exchanges of “howaya!” Fans lined up to meet Green afterward.

“This is what he wanted to do his whole life, and he never lost sight of his goal,” Marty Perlman, his former communications teacher, said admiringly.

“I love that he’s making a show about horror fans,” said aspiring actor James Baker, a fan who made the trek to the showing from Derry, N.H. “Hopefully this can do for Holliston what ‘Cheers’ did for Boston.”

For more on the show, visit fearnet.com/holliston or ariescope.com.

Here's the boston.com story link.

© Copyright 2012 Globe Newspaper Company

Newburyport waterfront: To build or not to build?

NEWBURYPORT

Open land debate renewed

Group opposes city on any development of waterfront lots

By Taryn Plumb / Globe Correspondent / April 12, 2012 

The enduring and contentious debate over what to do with the city’s remaining undeveloped waterfront parcels - build on them or leave them open - has flared up again.

The Newburyport Redevelopment Authority, supported by Mayor Donna Holaday, is in the preliminary stages of analyzing options for retail, dining, and residential development on 4.2 acres of downtown riverfront that now serves as dirt-and-gravel public parking lots.

In response, some residents and other locals involved with regional preservation efforts have reestablished the Committee for an Open Waterfront, which has fought development on that site in the past, most recently a hotel in the late 1980s. The group prefers to have the area kept open to preserve the view, public access, parking, and, potentially, an expanded public park.

“Any additional building on the waterfront is damaging and inadmissible,’’ said Jim Critchlow, a member of the committee who has lived in the city for more than 25 years. “The open space of the waterfront is the jewel in the crown of Newburyport.’’

But not all share that view, and the town Redevelopment Authority, which manages the property, has long eyed it for development. Most recently, the authority signed an agreement with the state agency MassDevelopment to formulate requests for proposals for development possibilities on the site. It is also working with consulting firms, including Providence-based Union Studio, and is sharing $25,000 in consulting costs with the city.

The goal is to have a proposal request ready by midsummer, and host a public input meeting sometime this spring that would include a site walk. The Redevelopment Authority’s next public meeting is April 18.

“It’s important to state that we’re at the preliminary stages of putting this together,’’ said authority chairman James Shanley, a former city councilor. “There is no proposal at the table.’’

Ultimately, “we are years out,’’ he said.

The Redevelopment Authority, which was established by state law in 1960, is currently determining the possibilities for the property, which was active commercial space for hundreds of years until the 1960s, according to Shanley.

Through that process, they will assess local zoning and the state’s Public Waterfront Act, as well as parking requirements and five preserved “ways to the river’’ that cross the parcel.

Shanley confirmed that the group is looking at mixed-use options, including retail, restaurants, and residences, as well as multistoried buildings. It is not exploring options for a hotel, he said.

“We’re trying to improve the waterfront and make it a more vital place, year-round,’’ he said. However, he stressed that “nothing we’re proposing, or even thinking about, is going to preclude anybody from enjoying the waterfront.’’

Holaday agreed, calling herself a “strong proponent’’ of an open waterfront.

Although the city and the redevelopment authority have long “been at odds’’ about the disposition of the site, she said, she sees the current partnership as a means to identify property that can be used for “very controlled and very limited development’’ to ultimately finance the creation of a maritime park, and to also reduce parking.

Those are goals that would be in line with the goals of the citizen committee.

Ideally, the group would like to see the parking lots converted to grassy, tree-lined open space with paved walkways.

“Downtown Newburyport doesn’t need more condos and stores,’’ said member Lon Hachmeister, a Newbury resident and frequent Newburyport visitor.

Much like the proposal, the group is still in its preliminary stages: It plans to circulate a petition, and has been meeting every other Sunday at 6 p.m. at the Grog Restaurant.

Members have so far expressed concerns about the effect on established businesses should more competition be introduced in the way of new stores, a further strain on parking should spots be eliminated, as well as the impact on tourism if the view is blocked by development.

“Whenever you go to a city, one of the things you remember most is the open space,’’ said Critchlow, a retired foreign policy worker for the federal government who traveled all over the world for his job. “I would hate to see us give that up here in Newburyport.’’

But Shanley says that many of the group’s concerns are unfounded.

“What they’re saying is fundamentally a zero-sum game argument: That if something new shows up, then something old must go. That’s really not how economies work,’’ he said.

He pointed to nearby Portsmouth, where new restaurants and stores are introduced “all the time. . . . It adds, it gives people options and choices, which creates more of a destination.’’

And, while Hachmeister said that “everyone we talk to agrees’’ with the group’s stance, Shanley said that hasn’t been his experience.

“It’s not accurate to say that they speak for everybody in Newburyport,’’ he said.

© Copyright 2012 Globe Newspaper Company

A less taxing process

Trained volunteers help make filing time less taxing

Free preparation available for seniors and many others, too

By Taryn Plumb  / Globe Correspondent / April 1, 2012 

Jim Seger spent 40 years of his life overseas, traveling all over as a teacher with the military.

The 78-year-old musician started out in Hawaii in the mid-1950s before it was a state, and later spent time in Turkey, Korea, and England, as well as many other countries.

And for 26 years, he lived in Germany. He learned to speak the language fluently, and was in Berlin three days before the wall started going up in 1961, and again when it came down in 1989.

But after experiencing all that he has - the intricacies of different cultures, the connective threads of human nature, the countries torn up by war - there’s still one thing that overwhelms and confounds him: his taxes.

“My mind boggles,’’ the Haverhill resident said with a hearty laugh.

In an attempt to minimize the pain, he is one of many to take advantage of numerous free tax services for seniors and others with low to moderate incomes.

“I just have no taste for it at all,’’ he said.

Not that he’s alone in that: Many of us experience brain cramping, bewilderment, and sometimes even bug-eyed, hair-pulling terror when it comes to the yearly chore. And that anxiety and fear only build as the dreaded April 15 deadline approaches.

This year we’ll all get a bit of a reprieve, as the due date is actually April 17 for both federal and Massachusetts returns, the federal extension due to Washington’s observance of Emancipation Day, the state extension due to the celebration of Patriots Day, both holidays falling on April 16.

Still, you don’t necessarily have to suffer on your own. Many people, whether they’re seniors or they fall below a certain income threshold, are eligible for free help through various programs.

One of the more popular and long-running ones is AARP Foundation Tax-Aide, which is sponsored by the nonprofit organization for those age 50 and up, in conjunction with the IRS.

Every year, volunteers are trained to provide free tax preparation to those with low to moderate income (which is not specifically defined), with “special attention’’ to those 60 and older.

Nearly four dozen cities and towns north of Boston take part in the program, typically linking people with volunteers through their councils on aging or senior centers.

Meanwhile, other local nonprofits and organizations, such as Community Teamwork Inc., serving greater Lowell; Tri-City Community Action Program Inc., serving Everett, Malden, Medford, and surrounding communities; and Community Action Programs Inter-City Inc., in Chelsea and Revere, offer their own free assistance for qualifying individuals and families.

And according to those who administer the various programs, scores of people take full advantage.

Since it was established in 1968, Foundation Tax-Aide has been adopted by all 50 states and Washington, D.C., and has helped roughly 50 million people complete their taxes.

North of Boston, about 2,500 people participate in the program every year, according to district coordinator John McManus. Typically, as he and others explained, because the definition of low to moderate income is not strictly defined, volunteers will usually assist anyone who comes to them, within reason.

“It’s great to have it done for nothing,’’ said 86-year-old Alice “Dolly’’ Brown of Amesbury, who collects Social Security and has her taxes done in her city through a Foundation Tax-Aide volunteer. “Not too many things are free anymore, especially when you’re on a fixed income.’’

“I’d just as soon have somebody else do it. They know what they’re doing more than me,’’ agreed 69-year-old Sis Harris of Amesbury, a retired housekeeper who also collects Social Security and has her taxes done through her city’s program. “I probably could do it, but I’d get too frustrated.’’

But just what is it about taxes that causes so much apprehension and confusion?

“It’s daunting to read something like this,’’ said Marie Messner, a North Shore volunteer for 15 years, holding up a manual for the 1040 form for 2011. “The rules get to be complicated; also, they change. And people don’t always know what the terms mean.’’

Also, she said, people aren’t always aware of the credits at their disposal. There’s the Circuit Breaker Tax Credit program for low-income seniors, for example; it calculates a refund of up to $980, with homeowners gaining eligibility if they spent more than 10 percent of their income on real estate taxes. The law has a provision for renters as well.

Messner, a senior herself, is one of about 60 local volunteers through the Tax-Aide program, according to McManus. To qualify, they have to go through several days of training before every tax season, as well as sign a confidentiality agreement and score well on a take-home test, he explained.

Messner started sessions on Feb. 1, will continue them through April 17, and will see roughly 12 to 16 people a week, she said.

Typically, participants come in for one or more sessions to provide Messner with their 1099s and other documentation, and to answer a series of questions about their income, pension, investments, real estate taxes, charitable contributions, and any part-time income, she explained; she’ll then fill in the answers on a computer program.

All told, Amesbury had 132 people take advantage of the program in 2011, according to Council on Aging director Annmary Connor.

Brown, for her part, has done it for about four years now.

“It’s just so confusing,’’ said the retired nurse and former Sweet Adeline, or female barbershop singer. “I suppose I could figure it out if I sat there long enough, but I never tried.’’

Seger, the former world traveler, used to do so. While working overseas, he, in fact, did his own taxes every year, as he only had to file a federal return.

But when he retired and finally had to start doing state taxes, “they fuddled me,’’ said Seger, who originally hails from Wisconsin (and still has a touch of the accent), and continues to play the organ.

And when he tries to do his own taxes now? “I go blind,’’ he quipped.

So for the past 12 years, he’s worked with Messner.

On a recent weekday afternoon, the two met in the Amesbury veterans’ office to work on his 2011 return; he had a briefcase at his feet organized with plastic folders, and rifled through stacks of papers on his lap. The two analyzed various forms and eventually got deadlocked on an investment question, having to make another meeting for another day.

“I was thinking of just throwing in the towel,’’ Seger joked as he packed up.

Messner laughed and asked, “I’ll be hearing from you, right?’’

“Oh, you bet you will,’’ he replied.

But whether you’re brave enough to do it on your own or you seek out paid or free help, Messner has one piece of universal advice.

In preparation for tax season, she said, “put all the things that pertain to your taxes in one spot - use a shoebox if you want to - so you can access them easily, and you won’t forget anything.’’

© Copyright 2012 Globe Newspaper Company