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Officer Involved in a Shooting in Belmont Heights

Reporters Desk
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Officer Involved in a Shooting in Belmont Heights

LONG BEACH — An officer-involved shooting took place at about 6 p.m. Oct. 21, on the 200 block of Park Avenue, within the BelmontHeights neighborhood of Long Beach.

Officials said armed suspect, 49-year-old Greg Treadway, was in violation of a restraining order from an ex-girlfriend, when he broke into a garage and retrieved the handgun. Treadway proceeded to point the gun at the Long Beach Police Department officer. The officer fired.

Treadway is in stable condition with a gunshot wound in the upper torso. The officer was not injured.

Treatway has been booked on attempted murder, assault against a police officer with a firearm, burglary, and violation of a restraining order.

The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office will conduct an investigation of the shooting

Details: (800) 222-8477; www.lacrimestoppers.org.

Matthew Cordle: Rupert Pupkin for the Internet Generation

Greggory Moore
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Matthew Cordle: Rupert Pupkin for the Internet Generation

By Greggory Moore

In Martin Scorsese’s The King of Comedy, Robert De Niro plays Rupert Pupkin, a delusional comic manqué who kidnaps late-night talk-show host Jerry Langford (played by Jerry Lewis), pledging to release him only after Pupkin gets a stand-up set on Langford’s show. Pupkin’s ploy works to perfection, and after serving two years and nine months of a six-year prison sentence—during which time he wrote his autobiography for a $1 million advance—Pupkin is given his own talk show. The film ends with slow zoom-in on Pupkin as he basks in endless cheers of welcome from his adoring fans.

Whether or not you can see something Pupkinesque happening behind Matthew Cordle’s eyes, it’s easy enough to spot in his actions. If we take Cordle at his word, the motivating force behind his three-and-a-half-minute video confession that he drunkenly and homicidally piloted his car into oncoming traffic is to stop others from doing the same.

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Nothing But Conversation at The Weir

Reporters Desk
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Nothing But Conversation at The Weir

By John Farrell, Curtain Call Writer

Nothing much happens inThe Weir, Conor McPherson’s extraordinary play that opened, Sept. 20, at Little Fish Theatre in San Pedro.

Except for the drinking, whisky, Guinness, and the delightful, witty and revealing talk, there is almost no action. It doesn’t matter. You are on intimate terms with the five lovely people who are in Brendan’s pub on a wet and stormy evening in the immediate past, and all you need is a Guinness (which you can get at the theater) to settle down and enjoy yourself.

Brendan is Cylan Brown, Jack is Bert Pigg, Jim is David Graham, Finbar is Don Schlossman and Valerie is Kristina Teves.

The evening starts with an Irish fairy story and then a ghost story. As the whisky begins to flow the stories become more personal and revealing, passionately describing experiences and regrets of the five very ordinary and extraordinary lives: four old friends and the female newcomer. Nothing is shocking in this modern word, but interesting and timeless. All five actors speak with fine Irish accents, and the pub, designed by Chris Beyries, is an intimate space, with a fire and a few tables, the audience sitting around the two open sides, as cozy as can be. You come to know these five people, become part of their lives, and wish you could tell a story, too.

Director Stephanie Coltrin lets her fine cast tell those stories without interfering with them. Together they have put together a play of subtle brilliance, affecting and moving, as real as anything you’ll see on the stage, and so simple, telling its story with the wild wind as background. You’ll come away, with or without that beer, deeply moved and wondering at the still-powerful lure of plain storytelling.

Tickets are $27, $24 for seniors and $20 for students. Performances are at 8 p.m. Sept. 27 and 28, and Oct. 2, 3, 11, 12, 17, 18, and 19, with an additional show at 2 p.m. Oct. 13.

Details:(310) 512-6030;www.littlefishtheatre.org
Venue: Little Fish Theatre
Location: 777 Centre St., San Pedro

Little Shop: Doesn’t Leave Room Dessert

Reporters Desk
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Little Shop: Doesn’t Leave Room Dessert

By John Farrell, Curtain Call Writer

If the Kentwood Players gets any more ambitious, it is going to have to move to a bigger theater.

It did manage Leonard Bernstein’sCandidein the Westchester Theater recently, and other musicals as well. But its most recent productions just about overflows the small theater.

Little Shop of Horrorshas been done elsewhere recently, and more productions are planned. It has been done better, but it has never been done with such energy, such a huge cast (and by huge we mean even by big theater standards) or with such audacity.

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Getting Around Campaign Reform

Reporters Desk
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Getting Around Campaign Reform

The Long Beach city attorney recently sent out a memo citing questions “from several parties” that raises constitutional questions about the 1994 Campaign Reform Act.

The questions are about whether large amounts of campaign contributions from state campaign accounts could be flipped to a local Long Beach campaign account.

“For example,” the letter states, “the question has arisen as to whether a person who currently has campaign funds remaining from a state elected office can transfer those funds directly into the controlled committee account for a City of Long Beach election without regard to the City’s current campaign contribution limitations. .

Long Beach has had a strict campaign finance reform act since the voters approved it in 1994. Contributions are limited to $750 per contributor and fundraising can’t happen sooner than 12 months before the election. Special interests can give up to $3,600 to state campaigns.

If money raised for a state assembly or state senate campaign is allowed to be flipped into a local campaign account then there will be no more limits on how much can be contributed at one time to a campaign for mayor or city council.

The city attorney’s letter also stated that the Fair Political Practices Commission will also be consulted with regard to these matters. The outside legal opinion will be released directly to the City Clerk.

A copy of the letter can be found at http://lbcityattorneyletter_campaigns

Mikado at Pacific Opera Project

Terelle Jerricks
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Mikado at Pacific Opera Project

By John Farrell

You will never see a more colorful Mikado than the one Pacific Opera Project is presenting at the Miles Theater in Santa Monica.

It’s unlikely, too, that you’ll hear a better-sung, livelier and more attractive performance anywhere else. And where else would you be able to see Yum-Yum, the female star, with purple hair?

The Mikado is Gilbert and Sullivan’s most-produced operetta, and in nearly 130 years it has been transformed a dozen times. This time around director and designer Josh Shaw (he is also Pacific Opera Project’s artistic director) decided to return The Mikado to its erstwhile Japanese roots (it is actually a very thinly veiled satire of British Victorian life) clothing the three little maids in manga-style costumes, with artificially colored hair and tennis shoes. Yum-Yum appears onstage with a Hello Kitty backpack. The Gentlemen of Japan are a variation on Japanese salary-men, with coats and ties, but brightly colored shirts and voluminous trousers. Maggie Smith designed the very delightful, colorful and effective costumes.

That’s just the design, but the colorful costumes don’t hide a cast that has all the moves, from snapping fans to deep bows, and the singing ability to make The Mikado a musical and comic delight. Mind you, the pit orchestra was a bit wheezy when it performed last Sunday, but the singers were spot-on vocally and, what’s more, were clearly having fun on stage, fun that was directly communicated to the sold-out audience. There was a scramble to bring out more chairs just before the performance began.

E. Scott Levin played Ko-Ko, the Lord High Executioner, in Sunday’s performance, channeling Allan Sherman in the most delightful of all G and S roles. He is a chubby, befuddled and bespectacled Ko-Ko, dressed in a bright orange jump-suit with a purple bow tie, over which he wore a bright orange Hapi coat: He was a little mournful even when he is at his happiest. His first song, “I’ve Got a Little List,” was pretty much completely re-written by Kelsey Namara in a tradition that extends back to William Gilbert himself, and he handled her new lyrics with skill. In the second act he made the plaintive “Tit-Willow” delicious, and was a delicious foil to Adelaide Sinclair’s towering Katisha.

The “Three Little Maids,” Katy Tang as Yum-Yum, Ko-Ko’s intended, Jessica Mamey as Pitti-Sing and Aubrey Scarr as Peep-Bo, her two delightful companions. The stage exploded with color when they came one, for every girl in the chorus wore the same incredibly colored wigs and sported parasols as well as fans. It was a Japanese teenager’s delight, with kimonos that were too short, tennis shoes and cell-phones as well as colorful backpacks. They sang and danced with precision and a delightful sense of fun.

Nanki-Poo (Mathew Miles) was in perfect voice and understood how to play the audience –on-stage and in the paying seats– with a delightful mixture of grace and comic understatement. Tim Campbell played Pooh-Bah, Lord High Everything else, just the opposite, full of ego and pomposity and self, to everyone’s satisfaction.

The usual role of Pish-Tush was turned into a double act, with Michael Bannett and Joseph von Buhler playing Pish and Tush, the two-headed, two-armed, four-legged conjoined twin, dressed in black hats with yellow bands, singing the role in alternate lines. Surprisingly, their comedy was equaled by listening to how perfectly they sang together.

The best was saved for last, when the Mikado (Matthew Ian Welch) made his imperial appearance on stage, dressed in a shiny satin suit with riding pants, boots, an arm-band and a hat two sizes bigger than hi head required. If he looked a little like a certain Second World War dictator, he “Let the Punishment Fut the Crime” in a song re-written by Namara that includes digs at the Kardashians and condemned everyone to ride on the L.A. trains and buses. He was hardly frightening, but hugely comic.

Stephen Karr conducted the orchestra with real support for his singers, even if the music was less than perfect.
Tickets are $30, $20 for seniors and students Performances are September 20 at 8 p.m., September 21 at 8 p.m. and September 22 at 4 p.m.
Details: (323) 739-6122, www.pacificoperaproject.com
Venue: Miles Playhouse
Location: 1130 East Lincoln Blvd., Santa Monica

Finding the Light in the Darkness

Reporters Desk
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Finding the Light in the Darkness

By John Farrell, Curtain Call Writer

Light in the Darknesstells a story of East Los Angeles gang life that many people would rather ignore.

Since the play has been around for almost 15 years (it premiered at East Los AngelesCollege in 1999 in a production directed by Ramon Monxi Flores, who directs this revival) you know that the problems it addresses are still out there.

Gang violence hasn’t vanished. This story, a violent and sometimes poetic mix of Dicken’sChristmas Caroland a story from the Eastside streets, is a powerful mixture of reality and a ghost story. The play has 19 cast members in more than 40 roles in Victor Tamayo’s play, adapted as well as directed by Flores.

The story centers around Carlos Alvarado (the young Johnny Ortiz) who is caught up in the gang life. But he may change his ways, with more than a little help from spirits, including the Aztec god Tezcatlipoca, (Victor Yerba), who appears in full dance regalia: all black and white with a pheasant feather headdress to dance the dead into eternity.

Yerba’s costume is rich with images of death. His dancing, a true Aztec version, is fascinating. Carlos kills a man and is only able to regain his life after seeing the results of his own death, including an encounter with his 11-year-old self, played with real passion by Xolo Madriduena.

Josh Duron has five separate roles, and he is a delight in all, sometimes comic relief, sometimes serious. Sara Aceves is Liz, Carlos’ love interest, and she is moving and real in her scenes with Carlos.

There is much good in this long play, set under a bridge abutment that doubles for many scenes, but it is also more than a bit preachy. We all know the horrors of the gang life, from TV news — if nothing else; and it is horrible. But this solution, involving ghosts and death and resurrection, is not a solution. The fact that so many actors are willing to come together to act in a play about these crimes, in a theater built in East Los Angeles, suggests that there is a real solution. Director Flores does a good job of keeping the action moving. And, he does so convincingly.

Performances are Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m., Sundays at 5 p.m. though September 29.

Details: (323) 263-7684,www.casa0101.org
Venue: New Casa 010 Theater
Location: 2102 E. First St., BoyleHeights

 

A Fall Twist On A Legendary Tart

RLn
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A Fall Twist On A Legendary Tart

By Lori Lynn Hirsch Stokoe, Food Writer and Photographer

Stéphanie Tatin’s inadvertent “mistake” in cooking an apple pie upside-down has become a part of culinary history.

Back in the late 1800s in France’s Loire Valley, two sisters took the duties of running L’Hotel Tatin after the death of their father. Caroline managed the business side of the hotel and her older sister Stéphanie ran the kitchens. While she was an accomplished cook, Stéphanie also had a reputation for being a bit scatterbrained.

Her apple tart was already very popular with the local hunters. Legend has it that on this particular day, she cooked her apples as usual, in sugar and butter but something went wrong. It is unclear whether she was distracted and cooked the apples so long that they became deeply caramelized, or that she just forgot to line her pan with pastry dough. Without time to start over, Stéphanie placed a sheet of pastry on top of the darkened apples and put the pan in the oven. To make it appear like her everyday tart, once cooked, she inverted it onto a platter and served it hot. The guests loved the light flaky crust and the deeply caramelized apples. It was an instant hit and went on to become the hotel’s signature dish.

Years later, her tart made it onto the menu of the famous Parisian restaurant Maxim’s, where it was called La Tarte des Demoiselles Tatin (the tart of two unmarried women named Tatin). Eventually, Stéphanie’s recipe of just four components — apples, sugar, butter, pastry dough — baked in an unconventional manner, became world famous.

Her method has been endlessly copied and transformed. Creative cooks have made over Tarte Tatin (pronounced tart tah-TAN) with all sorts of fruits and vegetables including plums, pears, apricots, even tomatoes and onions.

With sweet, earthy, flavors and rich colors, my Squash, Maple & Bacon Tarte Tatin was inspired by that classic inverted French pie originally made with apples.

But be sure to serve it right away ~ while the heady aromas of Autumn waft from the warm tarte, the sage is crispy, the cheese is melting, and the pastry is light and flaky.

fall recipe02

Squash, Maple & Bacon Tarte Tatin Recipe

Ingredients:

1 butternut squash – peeled, seeded, cubed

1 acorn squash – peeled, seeded, cubed

salt and pepper

4 slices smoked bacon, trimmed of excess fat and diced

olive oil

1/4 cup butter, plus 1 tablespoon, divided

2 tablespoon maple syrup

2 tablespoon dark brown sugar

3 fresh thyme sprigs

1/3 cup hazelnuts – toasted, chopped

1 sheet defrosted store-bought puff pastry dough

a handful fresh sage leaves

aged goat cheese, small wedge

fall recipe01

Method:

Toss squash with olive oil, season with salt and pepper. Roast in a 400 degree oven in a single layer for about 20 to 25 minutes until al dente.

Sauté bacon in a small amount of olive oil until cooked but not crisp. Drain on paper towels.

In a cast iron pan, heat 1/4 cup butter with maple syrup and dark brown sugar. When the butter starts to bubble, stir in the bacon.

Add cooked squash to pan and stir to coat. Add fresh thyme leaves. Sprinkle hazelnuts over the squash mixture.

Cut puff pastry dough into a circle slightly larger than the circumference of the pan. Lay the dough over the squash mixture and tuck the sides in around the edges. Pierce four steam holes in the dough. Bake at 400 degree until the pastry is golden brown, about 25 to 30 minutes.

While the Tarte Tatin is baking, fry whole sage leaves in 1 tablespoon butter until crisp, about one minute. Reserve on paper towels.

When the pastry is golden brown, remove the pan from the oven and allow to rest for 5 minutes.

Place a wide shallow serving platter over the pan. Invert the Tarte Tatin onto the platter, carefully lifting off the pan.

Immediately top the Tarte Tatin with crumbled goat cheese so it begins to melt. Finally, top with fried sage leaves.

Lori Lynn Hirsch Stokoe blogs about food, wine, and entertaining at Taste With The Eyes http://www.tastewiththeeyes.com and tweets as Tasteblog at https://twitter.com/tasteblog.

 

Not Telling It Like It Is: How Did a Detailed Inaccuracy Make Its Way into a Local News Story?

Greggory Moore
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Not Telling It Like It Is: How Did a Detailed Inaccuracy Make Its Way into a Local News Story?

People say believe half of what you see, son
And none of what you hear
I can’t help bein’ confused
–Marvin Gaye, “I Heard It Through the Grapevine”

Jerlene Tatum’s was already nervous enough, with her two children embarking upon their first public-school experience. But her emotional edginess jumped to a whole new level sometime after 11 a.m. on September 12, when a story alert that popped up on the Long Beach Press-Telegram Website: Los Cerritos Elementary School was on lockdown.

She clicked the link and read the brief news item, which quoted Los Angeles County Sheriff’s officials as saying a perimeter around the Long Beach school had been set up shortly after 9 a.m. when a deputy in the area of Bixby Rd. and Country Club Dr. noticed a man who appeared to be armed and who ran away when the deputy approached him.

“When I first saw [the story], I panicked,” Tatum says. “And then my first thought was, ‘Why wasn’t I notified [by the school]?’ Then I looked at [the story] again, and I said, ‘Something’s not right.'”

When she called Los Cerritos, that’s exactly what she found. According to school officials, while it was true at approximately 9:20 a.m. the received telephoned instructions from the Sheriff’s Department to go into lockdown mode, it was near the Los Cerritos Elementary School in Paramount, not in Long Beach, that a deputy had spotted a man who may have been armed. The Long Beach school was notified of the mistake 11 minutes later.

Such confusion may be partly understandable. But what’s a little harder to get a handle on is how the Press-Telegram posted such specific inaccuracies, inaccuracies that lent the report a chilling veracity for Tatum.

“[W]hat is most puzzling is he following statement [from the story]: ‘Shortly after 9 a.m., a deputy was in the area of Bixby Road and Country Club Drive when she noticed a man who appeared to be armed, officials said,'” Tatum wrote to Ron Hasse, publisher and president of Los Angeles News Group, which owns the P-T. “So, [was] this completely made up? Not only am I disturbed as a parent who has children at Los Cerritos. I am disappointed as a resident of Long Beach that reads the Press Telegram daily.”

According to Beatriz Valenzuela, the P-T staff writer who penned the story, this misinformation came from the Sheriff’s Department—specifically, from Sgt. Daniel Gillespie, a Sheriff’s deputy at the Lakewood station whom she quotes by name in the article.

“[Gillespie] did say the deputy spotted a man who appeared to be armed,” Valenzuela told Random Lengths News. “When I asked him about the location of the school, I was the one who asked if it was near Bixby and Country Club[,] and he said yes. He went on to say a deputy was in that area.”

But according to Gillespie, this is simply not the case.

“Absolutely not,” Gillespie said when asked whether he provided the misinformation in the P-T article. “That was made up.”

Gillespie told RLn that, as with all incoming calls to the Lakewood station, the call between himself and Valenzuela was recorded. At RLn‘s request, Gillespie says he reviewed the recording of the call, which he says reveals part of the misunderstanding. According to Gillespie, Valenzuela asked whether the school in question was near San Antonio Rd. and Country Club Dr. (an intersection proximate to the Long Beach school), to which Gillespie says he mistakenly replied, “That sounds about right,” due to the fact that several streets with “San” in the name—San Juan St. and San Marino Ave. in particular—come as close as a half-block to the Paramount school.

But Gillespie says that, contrary to what Jiminez tells RLn, Jiminez never identified the Los Cerritos Elementary School about which she was inquiring as being located in Long Beach.

“I think [Valenzuela] tried to say [in her story] that Sgt. Gillespie said this happened in Long Beach or something like that,” Gillespie says. “[…] Our incident was happening nowhere near Long Beach. We knew at the time [of Jiminez’s call] that this was not in Long Beach. I think maybe [Valenzuela] heard ‘Los Cerritos’ and Googled it and saw that Los Cerritos [Elementary School] was near Bixby Road. Bixby was nowhere near the location of the [actual] event. That [detailed misinformation] would not have been provided by me, nor [by] anyone else at this station.”

RLn requested the audio recording for verification. Gillespie stated that while he is not in a position to authorize the release, he would consult those who are. However, RLn did not receive a reply to our follow-up on the matter.

Valenzuela did not learn that the story she posted was inaccurate until over two hours later, when Tatum e-mailed her at just before noon.

“Call the school, [a]nd they will tell you that the Sheriff’s department called them about putting the school on lock down and the Sheriff’s were told they had the wrong school,” Tatum wrote to Jiminez. “[…] I hope you can retract [the inaccurate story. A]s a parent it was a bit disturbing to read about it and being unsure of it was correct.”

Valenzuela called the school and confirmed the error, then promptly wrote a corrected story. However, that story made no mention of the initial, inaccurate story, but simply replaced it.

While Valenzuela says she doesn’t know why the P-T Website did not note that her second story was a correction—standard practice in the news media (including at the P-T, Valenzuela says)—she maintains, despite Gillespie’s assertion, that her initial story was an accurate reflection of the information given to her.

As Tatum recognized in her e-mail to Hasse, the specificity of the claim that at 9 a.m. on September 12 a Sheriff’s deputy spotted a possibly armed man near the intersection Bixby Rd. and Country Club Dr. seemingly cannot be explained by miscommunication. So it would seem that either a Sheriff’s deputy provided specifically inaccurate information to a reporter, or a reporter fabricated details for a story; and that same person is falsely blaming the other of being responsible for the error.

Whichever is the case, it’s a reminder that inaccurate information can pop up everywhere, no matter how presumably credible the source.

Note: This story has been corrected to reflect that the Press-Telegram writer was Beatriz Valenzuela (originally mislabeled “Beatriz Jiminez”).

Cymbeline at Richard Goad Theatre: A Shakespearean Play That’s More or Less Equal to Others

Terelle Jerricks
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Cymbeline at Richard Goad Theatre: A Shakespearean Play That’s More or Less Equal to Others

By John Farrell

Helen Borgers, the director of the Shakespearian play, Cymbeline (which opened at Long Long Beach Shakespeare’s Richard Goad Theatre Aug. 23 continues there through Sept. 21) says that all the plays Shakespeare wrote are equally great.

Perhaps, but as another great writer wrote in a very different context, some are more equal than others.

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