Beth Broderick and Anton Nel star in ZACH’s 33 VARIATIONS, now live on stage at ZACH Theatre. Below are photos from ZACH’s production, currently playing in the new Topfer Theatre. Feel free to share these photos, but be sure to credit Kirk Tuck wherever they appear.
Get 33 VARIATIONS tickets at zachtheatre.org or call ZACH’s box office at (512) 476-0541, x1.
This Friday, Oct. 14, Ellen Sweets – author of the new cookbook Stirring it Up with Molly – will join playwright Margaret Engel and actress Barbara Chisholm after a special performance of Red Hot Patriot: The Kick-Ass Wit of Molly Ivins. From “extremely elegant to hilariously inelegant,” it turns out that knowing Molly in the kitchen is a great way to reflect on who she was.
To see an exclusive interview with Ms. Sweets, check out ZACH’s YouTube channel at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zpcEXNiVls.
Here’s what The Huffington Post’s David Finkle has to say about Stirring it Up with Molly:
Easy Reader: Ellen Sweets’s Stirring It Up With Molly Ivins a Five-Star Feast
Sometimes when dreams don’t come true, they come partially true. On Rick Perry’s entering the presidential race, I dreamed (that’s to say, daydreamed) that superb Austin, Texas-based political commentator and first-rate reporter Molly Ivins, who died in 2007, was still here. She’d know everything — good and bad (mostly woundingly comic, I figured) — about the publicly God-fearing, evolution-theory-questioning, job-creating(?) candidate. I could almost hear her passing along everything worth passing along, and she’d sure as shootin’ do it in her inimitable thigh-slapping fashion.
Well, don’t you know that within days after fixing on this unsatisfied need, I become aware of Stirring It Up With Molly Ivins: A Memoir With Recipes by Ellen Sweets (University of Texas Press, 272 pp., illustrations, $29.95)? Turns out that the author, a writer and often food editor, had been friendly with the late, great Molly for several decades during which they shared a love of cooking and eating.
Turns out further that knowing Miz Molly — as the well-named Sweets sometimes refers to her — in the kitchen, at the supermarket and grocery store, and around the dining-room and restaurant table is a great way to reflect on who Molly Ivins was, how profoundly and amusingly she thought and the enormous amount she had to contribute to our understanding of Texas and national politics. Not the least of her contributions, it so happens, are the recipes for her favorite foods, which ranged along the wide spectrum between extremely elegant to hilariously inelegant.
“Beer-in-the-Butt Chicken” is only one example of the latter sort but — as Molly adapted them — that’un gives an idea of the humor with which she embraced life, right up to and including her death from cancer. A woman who scoured stores and the Internet for every type of classy and less classy utensil, Molly was unflaggingly eager to gather friends around her not only in order to feed them but — as the devoted Sweets emphasizes — because they would feed her with their wit and knowledge of the world. A list of the people with whom she broke the bread she often baked isn’t exactly endless but it sure is long and includes, not surprisingly, many of the leading liberal thinkers (often Yellow Dog Democrats) of the last half century.
As a reviewer whose oven is only turned on to heat the apartment when the heat goes on the blink, I can’t comment on the proof of the 46 puddings included (some Ivins’s, some Sweets’s, some borrowed from friends, associates, swanky estaminets and greasy spoons), but I can say that this is a collection that’s had an effect on me other cookbooks have rarely had: It’s made me consider taking up cooking. As a chocoholic, I certainly pored over the ingredients needed for “Texas Mud Pie.” I can also say that when Sweets mentions adding a “smidge” of this or a “skosh” of that, I nod approval, since my grandmother, a surpassing cook, was also from the “glub-glub” school of food preparation.
What I can say is that as Sweets recalls the myriad meals Ivins and she readied or participated in — and her memory for which meals went with what get-togethers does strain credulity, but it doesn’t necessarily break it — the enthusiasm she brings convincingly evokes Ivins. Although the volume is not meant as a biography, it gives a substantial sketch of Ivins’s 62-year life — her coming from a well-heeled family and at odds with a difficult father who eventually committed suicide, her career in journalism and progress from early reporting days in Houston and Minnesota and through a trying period with The New York Times, her travels with friends on, for instance, a fishing trip with a glass-ceiling-shattering group of women friends dubbing themselves the Salmonettes, her bout with alcoholism and her final cancer battle.
Before Sweets is finished tributing her marvelous, larger-than-life (and yes, large) friend — whom she does admit could be a tough cookie on occasion (no recipe for that) — Sweets echoes the very reason why I’ve been longing to hear Ivins’s twangy voice. She writes, in sync with my wish, “If only Molly were here to direct some of her formidable energy Perryward.” Amen! She also quotes Molly as insisting she wasn’t funny but only knew funny stories.
Here’s where I come to the full disclosure part of this review. I knew Molly Ivins, though my first impulse isn’t to call her a friend but an acquaintance. On second thought, however, I will call her a friend on the theory that if someone with whom you’ve spent some time when you thought she was hardly taking you in suddenly makes a sincere and accurate observation about you that you thought only you knew, that’s a friend.
This astonishing exchange took place at the home of Boulder, Colorado couple Tracy and Michael Ehlers, with whom Molly stayed when she attended the Conference on World Affairs (CWA), a yearly convocation on the University of Colorado’s Boulder campus at which she was a star speaker and where I also frequently showed up. I, too, heard Molly exclaim she wasn’t funny but only knew funny stores. Yes, she knew funny stories, but she was also — as she constantly is in Sweets’s account — funny as all-hell.
Unfortunately, I can’t say I was ever at her home for one of those unforgettable meals. I’m not even sure I ever ate anything she made with her own accomplished hands and creative impulses. Perhaps, she did rustle up one or more of the dishes Tracy and Michael put out on the many late nights they entertained lucky CWA participants. I can say I have eaten one of the dishes for which Sweets includes the recipe. It’s the “Curried Peas” Molly loved that are served by CWA mover-and-shaker Jane Butcher at her annual Thursday night blow-out. And yup, those peas are scrumptious.
And yup, this book by literal keeper-of-the-flame Ellen Sweets is one you can take to your heart and your hearth.
Click here to view this article on The Huffington Post website. For tickets to this Friday’s performance of Red Hot Patriot: The Kick-Ass Wit of Molly Ivins, call ZACH’s box office at 512-476-0541 x1 or buy tickets online.
From KVUE News:
What’s being called a “red hot” play makes its way to Austin in November. “Red Hot Patriot” will be back for its second run at ZACH Theatre.
The one-woman play features Barbara Chisholm playing the role of Molly Ivins. Chisholm was voted Best Actress by the Austin Chronicle and her work has spanned over 20 years. She joined KVUE to talk about her performance. Please click here if the video does not appear on this screen.
“Red Hot Patriot” runs through mid-November at ZACH Theatre. For more information, click here.
It is pretty kick-ass that ZACH Theatre brought a brand new staging of Red Hot Patriot: The Kick-Ass Wit of Molly Ivins to the intimate, in-the-round Whisenhunt Stage, offering Austin an up-close-and-personal look at the life, wit, humor and wisdom of Texas journalist Molly Ivins.
Here are some photos from the show starring Barbara Chisholm, feel free to share them but please remember to credit Kirk Tuck.
Tickets to Red Hot Patriot can be purchased online 24/7 or with ZACH’s box office at 512-476-0541 x1.
Martin Burke in ZACH's THE DROWSY CHAPERONE, photo by Kirk Tuck
The best and brightest in Austin arts critics presents the Austin Critics Table Awards each year. Now, in its 19th year, awards were presented last night by local arts critics to recognize the most exceptional achievements in dance, classical music, the visual arts and theatre — for a period covering May 2010 through April 2011.
This year’s committee was composed of the Austin American-Statesman’s Michael Barnes (arts), Cate Blouke (theatre), Claire Canavan (theatre), Luke Quinton (classical music/visual arts), Claire Spera (dance), and Jeanne Claire van Ryzin (arts) and The Austin Chronicle’s Elizabeth Cobbe (theatre), Jonelle Seitz (dance), Avimaan Syam (theatre) and the Chronicle’s Robert Faires (arts).
Barbara Chisholm as Molly Ivins in RED HOT PATRIOT: THE KICK-ASS WIT OF MOLLY IVINS, Photo by Kirk Tuck
ZACH Theatre and its actors were presented with several awards at the informal ceremony at Cap City Comedy Club last night, including:
Thanks to all the casts and crewmembers who worked with the theatre to make this such an exciting season! We look forward to continue bringing quality theatre to Austin in the 2011-12 Season — which we’ve just announced!
Another exciting tidbit: If you missed Barbara Chisholm’s award-winning performance in Red Hot Patriot: The Kick-Ass Wit of Molly Ivins, ZACH will be remounting the play late this summer in-the-round on the intimate Whisenhunt Stage.
For a full list of winners, please check out today’s blog at Austin360.com.
Congrats to all!
Austin’s theatre is proud to have a hometown hero playing another hometown hero live on stage in RED HOT PATRIOT: THE KICK-ASS WIT OF MOLLY IVINS. Austin theatre actress Barbara Chisholm stars as the no-holds-barred Texas journalist Molly Ivins. Here are some photos from the show, courtesy of ZACH Theatre photographer Kirk R. Tuck:
Feel free to share these photos on Facebook, Twitter or your own blog, but please credit Kirk R. Tuck anywhere they appear
Molly Ivins had an impeccable laugh and sense of humor. Ask us, we'd say: "It's pretty kick-ass."
Red Hot Patriot Director David Esbjornson, who directs James Earl Jones and Vanessa Redgrave in Driving Miss Daisy on Broadway, is doing a kick-ass job directing actress Barbara Chisholm in New York this week for the Texas premiere of Red Hot Patriot: The Kick-Ass Wit of Molly Ivins — which opens on ZACH Theatre’s Kleberg Stage in three very short weeks.
Here’s what The Austin Chronicle has to say about this Austin theatre actress: “Barbara Chisholm is a director’s dream in a siren’s body. With talent to burn, this effervescent performer has proven to be one of the greats! An enduring association with ZACH showcases her talents like the setting on a Tiffany diamond.”
Barbara can’t wait to be back home in Austin to toast the town, the show and Molly Ivins herself on Champagne Opening Night (Saturday, Jan. 29), but in the meantime everyone from the set designer, artistic staff and crew, friends of Molly’s and even the writers themselves — twin sisters Margaret and Allison Engel — are reworking, rewriting and revamping the show for an Austin audience.
There’s a lot about this city we all love, but remember the days when Ann Richards and Molly Ivins would head on over to Magnolia Cafe to skewer the lege and have a grand old time doing it? Molly Ivins is an icon in this town, and would undoubtedly have a field day laughing about the current Texas and national political scene. And her greatest mantra has always been: “Ordinary Americans are going to save us.”
It’s ironic looking at this play and revisiting the prolific life and writings that Molly left behind just how extraordinary Molly Ivins really was.
Barbara Chisholm stars as Molly Ivins in RED HOT PATRIOT: THE KICK-ASS WIT OF MOLLY IVINS
Here are some gems compiled in the blogosphere:
Click here to read more Molly-isms.
What would Molly Ivins have to say about politics today?
Kitty leads the crew as they all bake up a "Toledo Surprise", Photo by Kirk R. Tuck www.kirktuck.com
One of the most popular musical numbers in this summer’s hit musical THE DROWSY CHAPERONE is “Toledo Surprise” (CLICK LINK TO PLAY) led by our jovial gangsters posing as pastry chefs (played by Tyler Wallach and Leslie Hethcox) and the harried producer (Scotty Roberts), who’s worried his fate will be sealed in pastry dough if he doesn’t put on a show.
The recipe?
First you chop the nuts -
- then you pound the dough -
- then you bake it up nice and slow -
- and then you got your Toledo … Toledo Surprise!
The gangsters sing it with such panache, and we’ve got a few talented cooks on staff who’ve baking up their own Toledo Surprises. By popular consensus and with all local ingredients (seasonal, too!), we’ve put together the ultimate Toledo Surprise recipe Austin audiences can make from home:
ZACH’S TOLEDO SURPRISE
Here’s what you need:
Gangsters posing as pastry chefs are bakin' up a Toledo Surprise, Photo by Kirk R. Tuck www.kirktuck.com
Here’s what you do:
In a large bowl, toss the peaches and the blackberries gently with the cornstarch, the lemon juice, and the granulated sugar until the mixture is combined well. In a small bowl stir together the flour, brown sugar, oats, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Add the butter, blending the mixture until it resembles coarse meal, and stir in the pecans. Spread the peach mixture in a 13-inch-by-9-inch (3-quart) baking dish, sprinkle the pecan mixture evenly over it, and bake the crisp in the middle of a preheated 350-degree oven for 45 to 50 minutes or until the top is golden. Serve the crisp with the ice cream.
Thanks to Austin actress Barbara Chisholm for sharing her foodie expertise with us. If you have your own recipe ideas for a Toledo Surprise, post them on our blog at http://www.zachtheatre.org/blog.
Tickets to final performances of THE DROWSY CHAPERONE are going quickly, book early for the best seats online or with our box office at (512) 476-0541, x1. Ask our box office about weekly ticket specials!