I would be remiss if I didn’t start BOLDFACE with a prayer for the people of Ukraine, across the ocean where their lives are in the most danger, and within the many communities in-and-around Philadelphia, and New York City where I spent my youth in deep connection to Ukrainian friends, traditions, food, music and laughter. Here’s hoping we’ll share good times together, safely and soon, and for all time. бог благословить і тримати вас.
“Never steal anything small.” I’m reminded of that old script line from a film that none of you remember by the absolute BOLDFACED-ness of everything this week: how Avram Hornik is furiously reading his 28,000 square, 1,400-folk-holding, tri-level Liberty Point restaubar for April 1 opening. How Sixers Joel Embiid and James Harden are the biggest thing in basketball country-wide. How Chef Jean-Georges atop the Four Seasons is going to needle-drop the single most pricey meal Philly starting March 10 with a six-course tasting menu for $198 per person. How Local 98 union chief Johnny Doc will go out with a bang (or at least a loud electrical spark and some smoke) on March 10 with a top ticket, fundraising “retirement” party for $200 a head at Vie on North Broad. The Ides of March is coming, the spring is going big-big-BIG, and I’m busting out of L7 at the very thought of that moneyed, size-counts breadth and height.
When you drop that $198 per at Jean-Georges, make sure and say hello to Cornelia Sühr. She got the Chef de Cuisine gig at the J-G 4S last summer, but, you know, Covid. It is, however, Sühr, in collaboration with Vongerichten, who is responsible for crafting this singularly epic, epicurean experience.
Helen Leicht, the mistress of all local pop music and the longtime host of the Leicht Lunch at WXPN-FM 88.5, is calling midday (as well as terrestrial radio) a day, after almost 50 years on the radio to focus on her ‘Shine a Leicht‘ podcast from home. Has she really thought this all through? Does Leight realize that she’ll now have to spend more time with her husband, band manager Biff Kennedy? The mind reels. (I kid).
Why aren’t more people upset that NBC10′s bow tie daddy, meteorologist Glenn “Hurricane” Schwartz, is getting out of the game? He put out a statement the other day, and announced that his last day on-air would be May 27. “I’ll always be grateful beyond words to my work ‘family’ with whom I’ve shared so much,” Schwartz wrote in a statement. OK. That’s fine. But WXPN is giving Helen Leight a day. Can “Hurricane” get an on-air shout out from Brittney Shipp or Bill Henley or someone he calls ‘family’ at that station? Do I have to get this man a cake? I mean, I also just found out that the Pennsylvania Restaurant & Lodging Association’s President & CEO John Longstreet announced his intention to retire in July 2022, but my guess is that someone at the very least, will make him dinner.
Part time Philadelphian, songwriting singer Lucy Dacus, and local guitar hero Kurt Vile’s best friend, Courtney Barnett, just announced that they’ll hit the road together this summer with a local show at the Skyline Stage at the Mann on July 28.
The last time I spoke to chef-champion and restaurantrepeneur Jose Garces he mentioned that he would be making some changes to his menu at The Olde Bar in Old City, his tony re-do of ye old Bookbinders. I’ll have more to report after the fact, but it looks as if (or tastes as if) Garces makes the Olde Bar menu shift on Wednesday, March 9. I trust Garces already has cake and doesn’t need my iced offerings.
Federal Donuts will never ever need help selling out of its fried chicken or its doughy nuts. Now, however, they will strain to keep its official sweatshirts in stock, now that yet another new trailer for Netflix’s filmed-in-Philly dramedy, Hustle. just dropped featuring local conspicuous consumer, star-producer Adam Sandler, wearing a thick and snuggly FedDo top.
When you weren’t paying attention, Marcie Turney and Valerie Safran turned their Jamonera on 13th Street in MidtownVillage into Good Luck Pizza Co. Wasn’t I just eating ham in there the day before? Never snooze, Philly diners.
Masked Philly: Anna Faye Lieberman
Since pandemic’s start, I’ve asked mask-donning local celebrities what they’ve done beyond their day jobs: from lockdown, reopenings, vax cards, maskings and unmaskings, and every variant. Today, BOLDFACE reached out to Anna Faye Lieberman.
Lieberman is a self-described “scrappy, orange, theatre artist” psyched to make her debut with Azuka Theatre playing “Rach” in ‘Carroll County Fix.’ Along with a steady slew of roles for Philly companies such as InterAct, Arden and the Wilma, you can catch Anna hanging with her partner and pup, watching ‘Twin Peaks’, and yodeling.
Orange. Yodeling. Twin Peaks. It’s like I’m reading my autobiography.
What Liberman got into, specifically, during Covid, is gardening.
“My partner is an avid gardener; I learned to love getting my hands in the dirt, planning our garden for the summer, and eating the fruit and veggies we grew. Watering the plants became a calming ritual for me, especially at the start of the pandemic when anxiety was through the roof. I also had the pleasure of being part of many Zoom theatre projects throughout the pandemic.” Zoom is where readings for ‘Carroll County Fix’ started, so that’s a thing.
Lieberman loves her mask from BAGGU (“an Asian-owned, sustainable company I love to support, who also make the best, and cutest, foldable tote bags that I have way too many of”) because it shows that she is still smiling underneath it. “They also have a filter pocket, and I can layer a surgical mask underneath if I’m in a riskier environment, #doublemasklife.” Plus, she is proudly vaccinated and proudly donning her mask, “to keep each other safe, and signify community care. When I am out and wearing a mask, and so is my neighbor, I feel that we have a sense of trust and care for each other.”
Along with smelling all the smells she’s been missing with a mask (“When I was returning from a trip to Key West, standing on the tarmac, all I wanted to do was get one last breath of sea air”), Lieberman’s future includes a trip to Arizona for a month, and of course, playing in ‘Carroll County Fix’ with Azuka at The Drake opening in preview March 5.
