Freeway follies

The classics are classics for a reason, but how many Rizzos and Eponines does the world of high school theater really need? So it was refreshing to see something new cruise across the Palo Alto High School stage last night: an original musical, "Love Songs in Traffic," penned by school choir teacher Michael Najar.

“Traffic” focuses on two star-crossed lovers (is there any other kind in musical theater?) battling over building a freeway extension in South Pasadena. Najar calls the performances “the first step in what I hope will be a successful creative process,” and there is still roughness in the road. A couple of the duets are muddy, with their parts running together; and there are several lines rolling perilously close to cliché. The relationship between the lovers could also be further fleshed out.

But the concept is fresh and many songs have a zing, such as the tango-y “Don’t End Up in Reno” and the cute ode “My Beautiful Car.” Loved “The Morning Paper,” in which the hilarious Tim Goble as perspiring Caltrans boss Tyler bemoans the negative press coverage of his transit agency. You can watch a clip from this number below.

In other comments on the performances, the chemistry between the two leads (Jovan Bennett as Caltrans worker Dave and Kat Cravens as freeway opponent Sarah) is sweet, and Jovan has nifty comic timing.

But the true show-stealers are the Greek chorus of Aaron Jones, Martin Gutfeldt, Danya Taymor and Nicole van den Haak, who croon and gab as various charismatic radio personalities in between each scene. The radio device makes perfect sense in a world of commuters whose lips often move in time with their car stereos (very funny when it happens all over the stage at the same time).

DJ Aaron especially cracked me up as Pavel, a beer-swilling DJ for a college radio station no one listens to; a Mexican radio host; and a bursting-with-hubris on-air evangelist. Kid, you’ve got moxie.

With me in the audience last night was Ron Evans, who shot some video of the performance (with permission from Michael Najar). It includes clips of the songs "The Morning Paper" and "You'll Never Know Us." Ron also took the above photo of the front of the Paly theater.

Right place, right time

So I'm walking through the "A Wealth of Ideas" exhibit at the Hoover Institution on Stanford campus, eyeing a chunk of the Berlin Wall, grainy old photos from World War I trenches, and a first edition of "Mein Kampf."

Love the exhibit, and it made a great Weekly cover story, but I keep wondering: How the heck do the Hooverites get their hands on these things?

Historian Bertrand Patenaude, who wrote the book that sparked the exhibit, says it's a little bit of luck and a lot of the right connections. For instance, the Hoover archives got film footage of the 1945 Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombings because it was donated by a physicist who was on the plane that came along for the ride with the Enola Gay.

Then there's that noble breed: the intrepid American on an overseas treasure hunt. Take historian Frank A. Golder, who in 1921 was chomping at the bit to get into Soviet Russia to score documents. Fortunately for him, Herbert Hoover sent in relief workers to aid famine victims, and Golder tagged along. His gem of a reward: a rare personal diary of the 1917 Russian Revolution, written by Moscow historian Yuri Got’e.

But it’s not just the enterprising Yanks who bring in the goods. Sometimes it’s citizens of other nations who leak documents about their own country to Hoover for safekeeping.

One such person was Basil Maklakoff, who was ambassador to France for the Russian Provisional Government in 1917. When the Bolsheviks came a-knockin' at the Paris embassy a few years later, Maklakoff decided not to turn over a stash of files about Tsar Nicholas II's secret police to them. Instead, he claimed the files had been burned -- but instead shipped them to Hoover.

S0 17 wooden packing cases showed up on Stanford’s doorstep, detailing the work the secret police had done keeping a, shall we say, rather close eye on emigre revolutionaries plotting against the tsar. The files included surveillance records and a scruffy mug shot of Leon Trotsky, among their other wealth.

There was a catch. Maklakoff required that the files be sealed for 30 years. When 30 years had passed, he changed the rules again, saying Hoover had to wait until after his death.

The former ambassador, wrote Patenaude, “may not have counted on living a long life, and … apparently had no desire to go out with a bang.”

So it wasn’t until 1957 that the Hoover Institution finally opened the collection and then held a press conference announcing that the files existed.

Wish I could have been there with my notebook.

Pictured: An American propaganda poster from the First World War exhorts Yanks not to sleep through the war effort. The poster is included in Bertrand Patenaude's book "A Wealth of Ideas."

Learning to love the blog

One of my favorite quotes about the journalism biz comes from Jerry Seinfeld: "It's amazing that the amount of news that happens in the world every day always just exactly fits the newspaper."

If only that were true. We editors are often reluctant scythe-wielders, forced to cut perfectly good stories that just won't fit in the paper. There's a reason to learn to love the blog: we can use it to add in things from time to time that didn't make the print edition.

Case in point: I ran a blurb in this week's paper about Palo Alto artist Anthony Montanino and his exhibit of paintings at the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts, but I didn't have room for the pictures. Pity, because his urban and suburban landscapes have an intriguing style to them: sometimes jazzy, sometimes eerie. (Word has it Madonna owns one of his paintings.) So I've included two images here.

Montanino's exhibit runs through April 24; here are the details.


Pictured: Top: "Donut World II," a 2005 oil on paper. Above: "Allied Arts IV," a 2005 oil on canvas. Both are by Anthony Montanino.

'Tis the season

At first I thought the California Bach Society had forgotten to update its website. But the choral group really is hosting a sing-it-yourself Messiah this Saturday in Palo Alto.

Messiah in the spring? Helen Barrios, vice president of the society, says it makes sense: this is the time of year Handel always performed it. Also, the California Bach folks are focusing on the lesser-known Parts II and III of the work. Barrios says the sections' themes -- such as resurrection -- seem apropos for Easter time.

Of course, there are also practical reasons, such as not having to vie with all the other groups throwing sing-it-yourself bashes in December.

Practicality aside, I’m getting a kick out of the event because it’s unexpected. Why not a March Messiah? Kudos to this and other arts organizations who try something different. Why not mix ballet and bluegrass music, like the Smuin Ballet? Why not have artists paint your city utility boxes?

Which leads me to the coolest thing I’ve found on the Internet today. Officials in the city of Tempe, Arizona, have decided to design city library cards with original artwork, commissioning four artists. Check it out (so to speak).

The California Bach Society’s Sing-it-Yourself-Messiah takes place this Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at the First Presbyterian Church, 1140 Cowper St., Palo Alto. Here's your ticket info.

A plethora of pierogies

Being the A&E editor means I'm also the Weekly's food editor. Which means I get the most hilarious swag in the mail.

Today, for example, there was a pierogy fiesta on my desk. A Pennsylvania company called Mrs. T's sent me a heap of recipes for the little dumpling delicacies (which it describes as "a delicious pairing of pasta and potatoes") along with chirpy photos that must have kept several food stylists off the streets for at least half a day.

Oh, baby. Imagine, if you will, the shrimp & pierogy skewers. The pierogy bruschetta. The Pierogy Primavera. Is this what my Polish grandmother dreamed of finding in the New World?

Then Mrs. T's gave me a slap in the face by including a map of the nation and the areas of highest pierogy consumption. Shockingly, Palo Alto is not part of the "Pierogy Pocket," which has a decidedly northeastern bent. This is an outrage. We demand to be lumped in with such exalted company as Hartford, Connecticut; Cleveland; Detroit; and Buffalo.

Betcha there's a place on the Peninsula to procure a prime pierogy. Any suggestions?



Pictured: Shrimp & pierogy skewers (top right) and pierogy minestrone soup (above). Photos courtesy of Mrs. T's.

Finding your way

You can truly appreciate how far we've come in technology when you realize that sailors once measured speed by throwing something overboard and seeing how long the ship took to pass it.

That's the first thing you learn at the "Art & Evolution of Navigation" exhibit at the Museum of American Heritage in Palo Alto. Interesting. I may try it on the freeway.

Then there's the ever-popular “navigation by echo,” illustrated by a wooden ear trumpet you listened to in the fog while letting loose a foghorn. “Elapsed time between the blast and the echo gave the approximate distance from the reflection point,” says the exhibit.

It’s a fun little exhibit, especially educational for today’s whippersnappers who think the world revolves around those newfangled Google maps, which allow you to see the roof of your favorite McDonald's in Russia. Throw them a cross-staff and see if they can find the latitude of Honolulu using only a fake North Star on the wall.

There’s plenty of more modern stuff, too, including an aircraft magnetic compass, radio-based direction finders and info about how the Mars Rover finds its way around.

Should I give you the address of the museum, or do you want to find it yourself? Awright, awright: it’s at 351 Homer Ave. Open hours are 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Friday through Sunday.

Pictured above: A revolution counter that counts the number of ship propeller revolutions, allowing you to estimate the distance the ship has traveled in a given time. Below: An old globe in the exhibit. Photos by Ron Evans.

An editor's life

I never know what's going to happen when the phone rings at my desk. On a good day, it's an oboe player telling me about an upcoming Palo Alto performance of an orchestral suite. Oboes are cool. On a bad day, it's a publicist from an area code somewhere east of the Smokies.

"This is Rebe-"

"Yes this is Gretchen-Heidi LaTorte from Wheee PR calling to confirm that you got my six press releases about Two-Speed Girl the exciting new washboard-maraca combo..."

I try to derail the train. "Is the band from Palo Alto? Is it playing locally?"

"Locally? Oh, yes, yes, yes," Gretchen-Heidi assures me. "In Yuba City (she pronounces it 'Yubba'). That's near you, isn't it?"

Sometimes it's a call somewhere in the middle: a little off-topic, but sweet. The other day, an older lady wanted to know "who that doctor picked on television."

We don't write much about TV, I said, but obligingly tried to figure out what she was talking about. Turns out she was wondering whether
"The Bachelor" chose Moana, the freaky California chick, or Sarah, the nice Tennessee kindergarten teacher. I'm the A&E editor. Apparently I must follow these things.

The woman didn't have Internet, so I looked it up for her. The winner was Sarah, and the woman was tickled. "Good," she said. "He should pick a girl who has the same roots." She had a lot more to say about the show and the girl, but I didn't bother trying to find a local angle. Sometimes there's something endearing about someone's rambling. Just not on deadline.