Oct 11-17, 2017
What a Vermont Murder-Suicide Teaches Us About Domestic Violence; A Contemporary Play Asks: What If Shakespeare Were Female?; The Art and Politics of Sugar at the Shelburne Museum
Cover Story
‘Til Death Do Us Part: Maidstone’s Grisly Murder-Suicide Was Domestic Violence
Molly McLain’s mother selected the wallet-size photo that was distributed at her daughter’s August funeral in Colebrook, N.H. The image was nothing fancy, just a spontaneous selfie the 27-year-old snapped in her kitchen a few months before she died. But it captured everything Amy Benoit wanted to remember about Molly: her big brown eyes and…
Meet Innovators and Recruiters — and Speakers From Tesla and Facebook — at the 11th Vermont Tech Jam
The state’s top tech firms will be hiring at Seven Days’ Vermont Tech Jam, a free event which takes place Friday and Saturday, October 20 and 21, 2017, at the Champlain Valley Expo in Essex Junction. The expo floor will host more than 60 companies, colleges and tech organizations. But this year’s Jam is much…
Seriously: Shotgun Journalism; Group Hump; Separation Sale
In this episode, Bryan enlists a team of beverage specialists to help decipher a mysterious icon on a beer can, takes an in-depth look at the future of pornography and explores a local option for getting a discount divorce. Featuring Jordan Adams, Colby Roberts and Diane Sullivan. CREDITS Written, filmed and edited by: Bryan Parmelee…
Obituary: Toby Schwartz, 1954-2017
Peacefully, with grace and strength, and surrounded by her family, Toby Ruth Schwartz (Goldman) passed away on Saturday, October 14, 2017. Passed first by her parents Irene (Strauss) and Gerald Goldman; twin brother, Gabriel Rutabaga Goldman; and avian companion, Gravy, Toby is missed and loved by her husband, Hank Schwartz; by her children, Aurina Hartz…
Seven Days Political Editor Paul Heintz Wins Two Prestigious Journalism Prizes
For his hard-hitting political reporting and successful efforts to pass a media shield law in Vermont, Seven Days political editor Paul Heintz has been selected as the AP Sevellon Brown New England Journalist of the Year. The New England Society of News Editors honored Heintz at its fall conference with the New England Newspaper &…
![The Big Sit [SIV507]](https://i0.wp.com/www.sevendaysvt.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/episode507-4-e1755134305926.webp?resize=640%2C360&ssl=1)
The Big Sit [SIV507]
10/8/17: The Big Sit is an international event which brings bird lovers together to spend the day watching the skies and documenting bird species. The Birds of Vermont Museum in Huntington has been participating in this annual event for the past 14 years. This year a small group watched with binoculars from both inside the…
Ask Athena: Is My Guy Just Using Me for Pleasure?
Dear Athena, I began seeing this guy about four months ago. We’ve already had sex and are moving on to more kinky and fun things in the bedroom. I want a serious relationship with him and to make him fall in love with me, but he is saying to take things slow, and that he…
Theater Review: ‘The Exonerated,’ UVM Theatre
In The Exonerated, we meet six people found guilty of crimes they did not commit, left to count the days of their lives on death row. Perhaps the main thing they have in common is that they could be any one of us. The 2002 documentary play interweaves stories into kaleidoscopic variations on a theme.…
Bernie Sanders and Larry David Learn That They’re Cousins
Fan were tickled last year when funnyman Larry David delivered a pitch-perfect portrayal of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on “Saturday Night Live.” Now we’re learning just why the impression was so spot-on. A PBS program revealed last week that the balding, bespectacled older white men are actually cousins — distant ones, but cousins nonetheless. And…
Exploring Chef Martin Juneau’s Montréal Domain
A melting, mint-green ice cream cone sporting raised eyebrows and a Hercule Poirot mustache graces the door of the Monsieur Crémeux ice cream shop on Montréal’s rue Beaubien Est. Inside, patrons line up for creemee sundaes, tangy citrus ice, and pistachio ice cream sandwiches made with chunky chocolate chip cookies. Those cookies come from the…
UVM’s Soul Food Social Serves Diverse Community
When Khalil Munir attended the University of Vermont in 1970, he was one of 13 African American students on a campus of 8,000. “It was a cultural and ethnic wasteland,” he said. Since then, things at his alma mater have improved, Munir noted. About 11 percent of the current undergraduate cohort is from multicultural backgrounds,…
HUMP! Film Fest Brings Porn Party to Burlington
Last summer, the ninth annual Bike Smut film festival came to Burlington. It was the final installment of that festival, but if you’ve been missing sex-positive communal porn viewing, not to worry. HUMP! Film Festival will screen at Merrill’s Roxy Cinemas in Burlington on Wednesday and Thursday, October 18 and 19. At $20 to $25…
Wrestling the Octopus: Vermont Leaders Strive to Remake Career Education
Here’s one statistic that reflects, all at once, many of the most pressing issues facing Vermont. “There are 11,000 Vermonters between the ages of 19 and 25 who aren’t even in the unemployment system,” says Frank Cioffi, president of the Greater Burlington Industrial Corporation, a nonprofit economic development organization for Chittenden County. They’re not in…
Album Review: Tiffany Couture, ‘She Still Rises’
(Self-released, CD, digital download) Tiffany Couture is a 23-year-old singer-songwriter from Milton with some heavy-hitting associates and mentors. For starters, she’s a protégée of Vermont-born neo-soul singer-songwriter and wine enthusiast Myra Flynn. Flynn coproduced Couture’s debut EP, She Still Rises, alongside production wizard Colin McCaffrey at his Green Room studio in Montpelier. Furthermore, Trey Anastasio…
Free Will Astrology (10/11/17)
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): “I am more interested in human beings than in writing,” said author Anaïs Nin, “more interested in lovemaking than in writing, more interested in living than in writing. More interested in becoming a work of art than in creating one.” I invite you to adopt that perspective as your own for…
Soundbites: Half Awake
I’m sure I’m not the only person who’s been sitting around for the last few months, sighing deeply and casting my glance in a far-off direction, wondering what the hell is happening with Half Lounge. If you recall, the compact Church Street cocktail bar and live music venue shut down in March after serving Burlington’s…
Album Review: Michael Hahn, ‘Nash-Vegas Dreams’
(Self-released, CD) For decades, Nashville. Tenn., has stood as the country music capital of the world, a gleaming, rhinestone-studded mecca to which countless singers with nothing more than a guitar and a dream have pilgrimaged. Of course, you’ll never hear of the vast majority of those would-be stars. For every honky-tonk hopeful who realizes their…
Burlington Cops Call Out Repeat Offenders in News Releases
Before dawn on September 30, Burlington police officers descended on the downtown corner of Church and Main streets, where a man was reported to be waving a knife. They surrounded Jason Breault, a homeless man who already faced nearly two dozen low-level criminal charges. Breault followed orders to drop the knife — which was later…
Page 32: Short Takes on Vermont Books
Seven Days writers can’t possibly read, much less review, all the books that arrive in a steady stream by post, email and, in one memorable case, a scurry of squirrels. So this monthly feature is our way of introducing you to five books by Vermont authors. To do that, we contextualize each book just a…
Is That a Puking Man Icon on Stewart’s Beer?
Is Stewart’s Shops guilty of the worst package-design fail of the decade? Or is the employee- and family-owned convenience store chain just a fervent advocate for truth in advertising? The answer may depend on your personal taste in beer. This week, a Seven Days reader and regular visitor to New York’s North Country wrote us…
‘Shakespeare’s Sister’ Explores Gender Bias Then and Now
When a play exploring gender roles 400 years ago seems disturbingly familiar, it upsets the notion of progress, to say the least. This week, the Vermont Shakespeare Festival presents a reimagining of Elizabethan England with a staged reading of Shakespeare’s Sister, a 2015 play by Emma Whipday. As its title suggests, the work posits a…
Max Tracy, Burlington’s Most Outspoken Prog, Pulls No Punches
If it wasn’t a scandal that Burlington Mayor Miro Weinberger prompted a Burlington Telecom bidder to withdraw on September 20, City Councilor Max Tracy certainly treated it like one. As soon as the Ward 2 Progressive found out that Weinberger had sent a message to the bidder without city council approval, he unleashed a tirade…
Art Review: ‘Art of the Selfie,’ Helen Day Art Center
The Oxford Dictionaries define a selfie as a “photograph that one has taken of oneself, typically one taken with a smartphone or webcam and uploaded to a social media website.” But most of us don’t need Oxford to know what selfies are — at, well, face value, anyway. Seeing people take their own picture in…
UVM, Folklife Center to Present Comic Arts Fest
The phrase “pulp culture” comes from the practice of printing popular stories on pulp paper, pioneered by Argosy magazine in 1896. Once derided as trash, pulp literary forms have multiplied, thrived and, in many cases, won cultural respectability. Still, their humble origins are reflected in the title of Burlington’s upcoming Pulp Culture Comic Arts Festival…
Work: Attorney Chris Larson Is a Divorce Coach
Name: Chris Larson Town: Rutland Job: Divorce and family lawyer, Meub, Gallivan & Larson Fresh out of Harvard Law School, Chris Larson landed a job that most law school grads only dream about: He was hired by a large, prestigious law firm in Boston and given a 37th-floor window office overlooking Boston Harbor. There, he…
Letters to the Editor (10/11/17)
The Press and Pomerleau In his September 27 Fair Game column, John Walters highlighted the Burlington Free Press’ recent special section honoring Tony Pomerleau. Walters is so desperate for an opportunity to tear down the Free Press that he chooses to cast aspersions on one of our community’s most generous citizens. Yes, Pomerleau is a…
A Rock Climber’s Death Highlights Dangers of an Increasingly Popular Sport
Two smooth branches nailed into the shape of a cross adorn the trunk of a scraggly maple tree below a photograph of 20-year-old Rebecca Ryan. The makeshift memorial at the popular rock-climbing destination known as Lower West Bolton is a reminder that Ryan and her easygoing smile will never return. She died in a fall…
Theater Review: ‘Fun Home,’ Vermont Stage
The Tony Award-winning 2014 Broadway musical Fun Home is an inspired reverie of heartbreak and elation, all set loose by an honest look back at growing up. The autobiographical story is adapted from Vermont resident — and current cartoonist laureate — Alison Bechdel’s graphic novel of the same name. With inventive staging that is itself…
Movie Review: ‘Blade Runner 2049’ Shows Us Our Past in Our Future (and Vice Versa)
A belated sequel to a beloved film is always at least part homage — unless it’s all cash-grab. Blade Runner 2049 is decidedly not the latter. With this long, unwieldy and ambitious film, director Denis Villeneuve (Sicario, Arrival) makes the world of Ridley Scott’s 1982 sci-fi classic his own, bringing to it his characteristic strengths…
Twist’s Laura Hermiston Considers Her Songwriting Voice, Music Videos and Band Cohesion
In September, the New York Times published a series of pieces — including a roundtable discussion, an interactive multimedia feature and an episode of its pop-music podcast, Popcast — asserting that women and nonbinary musicians are making the best and most relevant music in rock today. The interrelated pieces feature conversations with Sadie Dupuis (Speedy…
Movie Review: Emma Stone and Steve Carell Re-Create a Landmark ‘Battle of the Sexes’
Spouses Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris seemed destined to be tagged in promos for any new film they made as “the team behind Little Miss Sunshine.” No more. The pair has directed scores of music videos and documentaries and runs a company that creates award-winning TV commercials. They’ve made just three features, however, and this…
Dutch Class Gives Students a Taste of Amsterdam
Five students straggled into a Fletcher Free Library meeting room on a Saturday morning, unusual peers for an unusual class: Dutch. Over the next hour and a half, they wrapped their minds around a language rarely heard in Vermont, and their tongues around its guttural pronunciation. Comments like “That sentence is hell” and “That’s a…
Eat This Week, October 11 to 17, 2017: Bread, Ballet and Bugs
Bread & Butter Farm’s Fall Festival is suitable for littles and their grown-ups. It begins with a Ballet Vermont performance to Antonio Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, in which a variety of insects “come to life.” Then there are dance activities and songs from Mr. Chris. Dusk brings lullabies and an encore ballet performance called “Fireflies at…
At Shelburne Museum, the Art and Politics of Sugar
If not for sugar, there would be no Shelburne Museum. As museum director Tom Denenberg points out in the fall newsletter, “Museums don’t grow on trees.” Many, he notes, owe their existence to industry titans and their heirs seeking to make a mark on the American cultural landscape. The Vermont landmark over which Denenberg presides…
City Market Hires Chef Michael Clauss
In preparation for the opening of its new location in Burlington’s South End, City Market/Onion River Co-op has created a new position: executive chef. The position went to Michael Clauss, who attended the Culinary Institute of America and worked for famed chef Daniel Boulud before moving to Vermont. Clauss cooked at the Daily Planet, Bluebird…
Bijou Fine Chocolate Shut Down in Shelburne
Bijou Fine Chocolate closed abruptly last week after the confectionery business, which had production and retail space at 120 Graham Way in Shelburne, was cleared of its equipment and furnishings, according to chocolatier Kevin Toohey. “We showed up Monday morning [October 2] to work and found the entire place had been completely emptied and gutted,”…
Shelburne Vineyard Names New Wine for Myra Flynn
On Friday, October 13, at 6 p.m., Shelburne Vineyard will host a concert and release a new dry red wine, made with Marquette grapes, in honor of singer-songwriter Myra Flynn, a former Vermonter now based in Los Angeles. The occasion is the celebration of Flynn’s marriage to Phil Wills, who went to high school in…
