Marisa LaScala: Writer, Editor, and Good Addition to Your Bar Trivia Team

Our Frugal Guide certainly couldn't have been better-timed, wouldn't you say?

The Backyard Backlot

The Jacob Burns Film Center, the go-to spot for film nerds in the county, gets even better by opening up a new Media Arts Lab for film education: "The building itself, situated on the corner of Manville Road and Grant Street, just down the street from the Jacob Burns Film Center, is special enough to warrant its own making-of documentary. The whole thing is LEED-certified, meaning it’s held to the greenest of standards. The offices are made of recycled materials, work off of natural light, are heated and cooled by geothermal energy, and have solar panels up on the roof—as well as a roof-deck perfectly suited for a swank film premiere party."

Oxen Free

How this year's designation as The Year of the Ox bodes for 2009: "Craig Haney, livestock manager of Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture, praises the animals for their industriousness. 'They literally put their shoulders into their work,' he says. 'If you think about our current financial crisis, we’re going to be seeing a lot of that this year.'"

Culture, Etc.

Edwin McCain, a New York animation exhibition, and more.

Home Theater

Breakfast at Tiffany's, Pineapple Express, Repo! The Genetic Opera.

Assigned:

Give Her the Slip

First-person essay: "When moving from LA to Westchester, climate isn’t the only reason for a change in wardrobe, says DeLauné Michel, author and founder of Spoken Interludes, a literary salon."

It's a two-for-one deal in this week's Time Out New York. Both my recent articles wound up coming out the same week. I love it when that happens.

Bite My Style

Since it is the "Fall Fashion" issue, I trailed a guy looking to get fashion advice from his better-dressed buddy: "The entire day, Gary is on the hunt for some nice-fitting corduroys because, he says, 'cords are so fall.' He finally finds some at Urban Outfitters and pairs them with a red-plaid shirt and a tweed blazer. 'This is by far the most comfortable outfit,' says Shawn. 'I could fall asleep in this.'”

You Asked For It: Community Gardens

A primer about how to get started with community gardens: "Did you kill your last spider plant, but somehow still think you’ve got what it takes to be a gardener? That’s cute. You might want to check out the Riverside-Inwood Neighborhood Garden, where prior experience—or even interest—in gardening certainly is not necessary. 'I’m not into gardening at all,' says member Elizabeth Popiel. 'I just love the garden.' At this casual no-individual-plots, no-veggies spot, people do what comes naturally to them: paint, hold art fairs, build benches, and even install a koi pond (for a $10 annual fee)."

This issue is all about food, but I'm the arts editor...so articles about dinner theater it is!

Live from New York
The local dinner theater has been in business for 34 years, and they let me in on the most cringe-worthy live theater moments: "The show had to go on during a production of Fiddler on the Roof in 1978—in the first building, before the stage was raised—when a disoriented patron walked into the middle of a musical number and asked Tevye for directions to the men’s room."

Beyond the Beyond
A handy guide to help parents pack up their soon-to-be college freshmen: "The problem is, a quick scan of the online checklist reveals that Bed, Bath & Beyond has deemed no less than 114 items to be college 'essentials'—like the old school-supply list on steroids—and that’s without including textbooks, pens, notebooks, or that little college-name sticker everyone places in the back windshields of their cars. Take it from two recent college grads: half of what you buy from that list will return to you in the exact same color-coded, name-taped, neatly packed condition you shipped them off in."

Culture, Etc.
Jean-Luc Godard, Bard Summerfest, DVD recommendations, and more.

September is my Fall Arts Preview package—and proofs look great—so stay tuned.

Best of Westchester: Art & Leisure

Our most popular feature of the year surveys the best the county has to offer, including new hiking trails: "Let’s face it: it was easy to get lost at the Ward Pound Ridge Reservation, and not in a good lose-yourself-in-nature kind of way. Yet a core group of volunteers has taken it upon themselves to re-blaze all 35 miles of trails, complete with new markings and a beautiful map (one that actually makes sense)."

Fave Five By the Fab Four

Always one for a nerdy list, I asked a local Beatlemaniac and radio DJ to rank his favorite Beatles albums: "Leave it to a true music fan to treat ranking two great albums like deciding between children."

Close Encounters in the County

In honor of World UFO Day (it's real), I dug up some reports of UFOs in Westchester: "It was the brightest thing I’ve ever seen in the sky ever…I do know that it was in the area of a power plant."

Resident Ringtones

I corralled the musically inclined and asked them what their ringtones are (and plugged my own). Says Kimberly Locke: "I have the theme from The Jeffersons, 'Movin’ On Up,' as my ringtone. It’s pretty uplifting and it makes me laugh every time my phone rings. But it’s only programmed for specific friends. Only they receive the high honor of a George and Weezy ring tone!"

Alfresco Entertainment

Now no one can say that I recommend staying inside watching movies all day, since I recommended eight outdoor events: "Long for the days of drive-in theaters? Well, you can’t sit in your gas-guzzler, but you can still park yourself outside (sans auto) and watch a film at one of the county’s outdoor movie screenings."

Culture, Etc.

Lyle Lovett, Ani DiFranco, and more.

May means the start of the summer season--and that means big summer movies. Hence, one of my favorite assignments of the year:

Summer Film Preview

A round-up of the must-see films of the summer: "Apparently, even after you find the Holy Grail, there’s still more whip-cracking adventuring to do. An older, crankier Indy takes young Mutt Williams (Transformers’ Shia LeBeouf) along for the ride this time."

Also in this issue:

Our Parents' Divorces

A lifestyle piece about what happens to people after their parents get divorced: "'When their parents divorce, many children go through an emotional roller coaster,' says Peter Salem, executive director of the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts. 'There is a fundamental change in the child’s world. There could be a change of residence, or the family income isn’t what it once was because it has to support two homes. The bedrock of their lives—the family unit—is being dismantled. The question turns into whether or not there will be emotional damage to the children and, if so, what the extent of it will be.'”

From CNN to ASU

A follow-up article with CNN's Aaron Brown: "In June 2005, we profiled Aaron Brown, then an anchor for CNN’s NewsNight and <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Scarsdale</st1:place></st1:city> resident. Today, almost all of what we wrote has changed. He’s no longer with the cable net, having been replaced after four years by a certain silver-haired anchor whose name rhymes with Schmanderson Schmooper." (It's the sixth item down.)

UPDATE: This article was picked up for an item in Page Six. Read it here.

Ask the Expert

A tiny item about generic vs. name-brand pills: "According to the FDA, a store-brand or generic drug must be the same as the original in terms of dosage, strength, performance, use, quality, and safety. However, the look of the brand-name drug is trademarked, so the store-brand version uses the inactive ingredients to change the size, shape, color, or taste, and those ingredients may give you a different reaction." (It's the fourth item down.)

Culture, Etc.

Joan Osborne, Jacques Goudstikker, art galas, and more.

The redesign of our magazine went live in April, and it couldn't look better. I placed these articles in the fresh-looking issue:

Oh What a Web We Need
A short list of our staff's we'd-die-without websites: "Who says that traditional media is afraid of the Web? Here at the magazine, we couldn’t live without the Internet (for work—honest)." (It's the fifth item down.)

Culture, Etc.
The B-52s, Ira Glass, Josh Ritter, and more.

In addition to writing the articles above, I assigned these meaty pieces:

X Saves Westchester
Our Subprime Crisis
Culture Shock

...And one last item of business:

Aqua Teen Hunger Force Vol. 5

In the midst of preparing the April issue, one PopMatters review wormed its way onto the site, too: "If you’ve watched Aqua Teen Hunger Force or the show’s first feature film, Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters, you know that everything about the show defies logic. Especially the film which, for a full-length film based on an 11-minute, late-night cartoon about talking food, managed to be released in 877 theaters its opening weekend. And that’s after a viral marketing campaign for the movie caused Boston officials to call the bomb squad."

Much more in May!

It'll take the whole holiday weekend to get through this issue.

Loves Music, Loves the Bronx

A spotlight on local WFUV DJ Darren DeVivo: "DeVivo’s love of music, especially of that famous Liverpudlian quartet, began so early that his mom wrote down 'Favorite Music Group: The Beatles' in his baby book when he was still an infant."

Ballroom Blitz

Getting in on the ballroom dancing craze: "So you’ve watched actors and amateurs waltz their way to stardom on reality shows like Dancing with the Stars and So You Think You Can Dance—and it looked fun, didn’t it? Well, you’re in luck. There is a slew of local studios willing to teach you the steps, the twirls, the dips, and the kicks of these famous cheek-to-cheek dances."

Yankee Ingenuity

Why "Yankee Swaps" are better than other gift-giving gimmicks: "You don’t have to pick out a present for a specific person, so there’s no dread that you’d be stuck with figuring out what to get a man who doesn’t golf (my perennial present dilemma. And there’s something sadistically pleasurable about ripping a great gift out of the clutches of someone you know really, really wants it. Now, that’s the Christmas spirit!"

A Kinder, Gentler Phantom

My review of a local production of the Kopit/Yeston Phantom: "Kopit and Yeston actually started work on their musical version of the Leroux novel before Andrew Lloyd Webber but, when he beat them to the stage in London, their version, like the Phantom himself, fell hidden into obscurity. It was later revived by the 'Theatre Under the Stars' in Texas, and has found great success in regional theater ever since; in 1992, when the Westchester Broadway Theatre first staged the musical, it ran for almost a year (the longest-running show in WBT history) and attracted 120,000 audience members who wanted to see the Phantom story told by someone who wasn’t responsible for Cats."

Arts & Entertainment

Aimee Mann, Symphony Space, and More

I only just started compiling my clips, but I've been a professional writer since 2003. If you'd like to see anything else, I certainly can provide you with more. Highlights include "No More Empty Nest," about the social and economic reasons why young adults choose to live with their parents longer (no link available but I have the PDF), and "Cosmetics 101," about my personal foray into the world of beauty.