If you appreciate our in-depth reporting and you can help us pay for it, please become a recurring donor to Seven Days. Peter Schumann sat in a wobbly plastic chair, a gin and tonic in one hand and a cigar in the other, crossing and recrossing his legs. The 89-year-old founder and director of Bread and Puppet…
St. Johnsbury is having a moment. Since the start of the pandemic, the former factory town’s central district has sprouted 31 businesses; launched a flourishing series of Friday night block parties; and begun attracting young, artsy types who already have opened an upscale vintage shop, a quirky brewery and, of course, a record store. It’s…
Moviegoers who watch the closing credits of Oppenheimer may notice a familiar name. Writer and director Christopher Nolan’s three-hour biopic about J. Robert Oppenheimer, the theoretical physicist who led the Manhattan Project during World War II to develop the atomic bomb, ends with a thank-you to retired U.S. senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont. Unrelated to…
Draft horses. Dairy cows. Racing pigs. They’re all animals you’d expect to find at the Champlain Valley Fair. But this year, a surprising aquatic addition has joined the barnyard menagerie: a trio of nurse sharks. At 12:30 p.m. on Monday, spectators lined metal bleachers in a shady corner of the Essex Junction fairgrounds in advance…
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sep. 22): Virgo journalist Anthony Loyd has spent a lot of time in war zones, so it’s no surprise that he has bleak views about human nature. He makes the following assertion: “We think we have freedom of choice, but really most of our actions are puny meanderings in the prison yard built…
“Fatherhood has changed my perspective a bit,” comedian David Cross told me. He was speaking by phone from his house in the Catskills in upstate New York while watching his daughter play outside. Fatherhood, he went on, “has forced me to find hope where I might have just glossed over that before.” Then he paused…
Indie Latin singer-songwriter Marcie Hernandez has released a new video for her single “Easy on Me.” Directed by Burlington filmmaker Trish Denton, the clip was filmed on location in Mojácar, Spain, earlier this year and funded by a Burlington City Arts Elevation Grant, along with support from Mojácar’s Valparaíso Foundation. The song was produced by…
(Self-released, CD, digital) Guitarist Scott Tournet has an on-again, off-again relationship with rock and roll. Raised on a dirt road in rural Vermont in a house with no electricity, Tournet didn’t start playing the guitar until he attended college. At Goddard College in Plainfield, he took up the art of rock with gusto, studying at…
At Montpelier’s Hexum Gallery, a pair of solo exhibits illustrate how artists can be very different yet have much in common. It’s tempting to draw a timely societal lesson here, but we’ll stick to the art. Similarities: Both Erickson Díaz-Cortés and Fiona McTeigue present drawings on white paper, many of which feature scenes of daily…
If you were looking for a stellar example of a multimedia artist, you could head to South Barre, Vt. More specifically, to Stevens Branch Studios. That’s where Sabrina Fadial makes and teaches art and where the pleasant clutter of her three-room workspace reveals a remarkable range of activities — from drawing and painting to sewing…
The irony of the title of Robert D. Putnam’s 2000 book Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community is that it describes something absurd: Isn’t bowling an intrinsically social activity, best enjoyed with friends and surrounded by an upbeat crowd? Rick Winston would surely say the same of moviegoing. In his new book,…
Weinberger Is No Racist During his tenure as Burlington mayor, Miro Weinberger may have made some mistakes — just like any other human being — but not one that rises to the level of being a racist. The mayor has worked on many consequential issues, such as making the Racial, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging Office…
Dear Reverend, For the past couple of years, I have been starting to realize that I am sexually attracted to females. And just females. I have also been romantically attracted to males, but not sexually. Is this still bisexual? Or is it something else? I’ve never been able to find something that I feel comfortable…
Built in 1901, the East Monitor Barn in Richmond is one of the largest barns in the state. The years have not been kind to this former dairy barn, visible to many people who drive by its Route 2 location on the Vermont Youth Conservation Corps campus. Over time, the barn has been pushed forward…
July’s flooding damaged Montpelier’s Savoy Theater, one of Vermont’s most important cultural institutions. A new memoir from its founder, Rick Winston, details the theater’s early decades as a landmark purveyor of indie and foreign films. In 1989, the Savoy was where I saw Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing. In April, it was the first…
For decades, Vermont has tried to encourage housing development in downtowns and village centers to keep them vibrant, limit suburban sprawl, and protect farm and forestland. As incentives, the state has offered tax credits and streamlined permitting for developers who build in 274 designated areas. The only problem: Most of those community centers sit on…
Acclaimed poet Robert Frost spent his last 24 summers living at the Homer Noble Farm in Ripton and lecturing at Middlebury College’s Bread Loaf School of English before his death in 1963. But the former poet laureate of Vermont will come alive again in Robert Frost: This Verse Business, a Middlebury Acting Company production playing…
In 2020, Keegan McCall briefly rented a tiny room in a Burlington boardinghouse. For the three years since, he’s been trying to recover his security deposit. McCall, 28, has become his own amateur debt collector, navigating the city’s housing board and the state’s small claims court to secure judgments in his favor. In the process,…
new in theaters THE EQUALIZER 3: Denzel Washington is back as the former government assassin and champion of the oppressed, now taking on the mafia in Italy, in Antoine Fuqua’s action thriller. With Dakota Fanning and Eugenio Mastrandrea. (109 min, R. Essex, Majestic, Palace, Roxy, Star, Sunset, Welden) LANDSCAPE WITH INVISIBLE HAND: In this satire…
(Self-released, digital) Producers Matt Scott and Sam Clement met at Bennington College in 2004 and soon became frequent collaborators. Between doing session work together and playing in bands such as psych-rock trio Tighten, Scott and Clement developed an indie rock-meets-funk-meets-pop sound that is encapsulated by their new project, Beard & Glasses. Scott’s musical résumé boasts…
Burning Man has nothing on Vermont’s Bread and Puppet Theater. When I moved here in 1978, everyone in the know made the August pilgrimage to Glover for its two-day Domestic Resurrection Circus. Scattered throughout the forest were pop-up performances about greedy capitalists, obscure foreign wars, environmental degradation. Later in the day, the action moved to…
On a Friday in April, University of Vermont senior Tucker Paron stopped by the campus Hillel at 439 College Street to pick up a free meal kit of locally grown potatoes, onions, spinach and garlic, plus canned tomatoes, spices and eggs. The bag also held a printed pamphlet illustrated with original student art. It contained…
Rebecca Freedner grew up in the Poughkeepsie, N.Y., area eating bulk halvah from a health-food store her family frequented. “I loved it,” she said of the rich, crumbly-textured, sesame-based sweet. Now 47 and living in Lincoln, Freedner has retained her love for halvah and appreciates that “it’s super-high in protein and good fats.” But the…
I first tried the Phnom Penh Sandwich Station’s eponymous sandwich during a sunset hike up Mount Cardigan for a friend’s wedding celebration. Love was in the air as we ate under a starry night sky. For me and that colorful, crunchy sandwich bursting with flavor, it was love at first bite. Ever since, I’ve made…
Morning Light Bakery, which has offered freshly made Hong Kong-style sweet and savory baked goods at 106 East Allen Street in Winooski since spring 2019, expanded its menu in mid-June to include noodle bowls. The stir-fried noodles topped with chicken, beef or pork belly are also on the menu of the business’ newly launched Fei’s…
Pingala Café co-owner Trevor Sullivan confirmed that the vegan café’s second Burlington location, which opened in July 2022 at 1353 North Avenue, has closed temporarily due to staffing constraints. The original Chace Mill restaurant remains open, and Sullivan said he and co-owner Lisa Bergström hope to reopen the North Avenue location by the end of…
Mathematics professor generously shared his passion for nature, hiking, skiing, camping, canoeing and birding
Fiddle Me This Sunday 3 The 31st annual New World Festival takes over Randolph’s Chandler Center for the Arts for 11 rollicking hours of music and community. Vermont’s Celtic and French Canadian heritage is on full display with acts including Québécois rockers Le Vent du Nord, Scottish foursome Cantrip and Montréal trad outfit Genticorum. Ducks…
Most important things to freelance writer and owner of Rock Crest Gardens were faith and family
Professional chef believed creating delicious food was a way to bring happiness to others
Vermont Law and Graduate School is allowed to cover a controversial campus mural depicting enslaved people despite the artist’s objections, a federal appeals court ruled last week. Artist Sam Kerson sued the school in December 2020, arguing that permanently concealing his work violates the Visual Artists Rights Act, a 1990 federal law that protects an…
Nurse, community volunteer and marathon runner found her happy place in her garden
