A Different Approach
An artist, a fighter, and a basketball coach walk into a bar...
For more than two years, I’ve settled into a near-daily routine of taking walks in East Rock Park. On most days I follow the same route.
A few days ago, however, I found myself in a different part of the neighborhood and decided to do the route in reverse.
The experience was surprisingly weird, almost unnatural. My surroundings were familiar but seemed just a little off. Sunlight hit the trees in odd ways. Even the trail felt strange beneath my feet.
It occurred to me that the park was like a sculpture I was now viewing from a different angle than usual.
While pondering this, I came upon a vista I hadn’t seen before. It provided an upstream look at the Mill River, with the Eli Whitney Museum across the way and on the left, partially obscured by trees.
I stopped to appreciate the view and snapped a photo.
When I returned to the path to continue my reverse-walk, I had a realization — I had passed this spot almost every day for more than two years without noticing it, simply because I had always come from the other direction.
But on this day, taking a different approach opened me to an unexpected experience in a familiar place. And I’m looking forward to visiting that spot again in a few weeks, when spring has fully bloomed.
On to the list…
The Best…
…Book I Read This Week
Chasing Me to My Grave: An Artist’s Memoir of the Jim Crow South (Bloomsbury, 2021) — By Winfred Rembert as told to Erin I. Kelly
I had never heard of the artist Winfred Rembert until he died in 2021 at age 75. And I probably only learned of his death because he was local — he resided in New Haven for the last three decades of his life.
But I’m thankful I was exposed to his story at all, because his artwork, while deeply personal and original, also adds a vivid, first-hand account to a wider American story about the legacy of slavery.
Rembert lived through the Jim Crow era, growing up in Georgia in the mid-20th century. His life intersects with the corrosiveness of sharecropping, lynchings, police brutality, and other horrors of the time.
That he survived deep into adulthood is remarkable. That he became an artist at age 51, giving himself a creative way to express his feelings and experiences, is a miracle.
His artwork — done in the unusual medium of carving, tooling, and painting on leather — provides the illustrations for his life story in Chasing Me to My Grave: An Artist's Memoir of the Jim Crow South, written with co-writer Erin I. Kelly. It’s a beautiful production that won a Pulitzer Prize in 2022.
Rembert’s story is about trauma, yes, but it’s also about love, unlikely partnerships, and the therapeutic power of art. I highly recommend it.
Note: For folks in New York City, you can see an exhibition of his leather canvases now through April 22nd at Hauser & Wirth on E. 69th Street.
…Movie I Revisited This Week
Rocky (1976) — Directed by John G. Avildsen
Streaming with subscription on several platforms including Netflix and Amazon
A few days ago, I went to see Creed III, the ninth movie in the Rocky series. Directed by and starring Michael B. Jordan, the film is a perfectly professional piece of commercial cinema, with a wonderful performance from co-star Jonathan Majors.
To me, the bummer of Creed III is that it could have been a really powerful art movie. Judging by at least one interview with Jordan, he knows it. (My first suggestion: change the ending. I think the wrong fighter wins the climactic bout.)
Seeing Creed III inspired me to go back to old reliable, the 1976 little-fighter-that-could original, Rocky.
Rocky was a staple of my childhood. In fact, I was trying to play my family’s well-worn videotape of the film when our Betamax machine finally died in 1986.
RIP, Betamax. We had a good run together.
The original movie worked when it came out, it worked when our tape machine gave out, and it still works in 2023.
Nine pictures in, it’s easy forget that the first Rocky was really an indie movie. It was shot on location around Philadelphia, had a small budget, no major stars, and — although most people don’t remember this — the hero loses the big fight.
Sylvester Stallone was a nobody. His acting career was like his character’s boxing career: in a smelly bag on a skid row.
But Rocky changed everything.
The film was a box office smash and went on to receive 10 Academy Award nominations, winning three, including for Best Picture.
It also sent Stallone to the top of Hollywood’s A-List and created a franchise that’s still churning out sequels almost 50 years later.
The Betamax machine is long dead, but my affection for the Rocky movies — aside from Rocky V — remains. Though there will never be another indie movie in the series, rest assured, whenever Creed IV hits theaters, I’ll be there to see it.
“UConn, Dan Hurley are in the Final Four, 30 years after he almost quit basketball,” The Athletic, March 27, 2023 — By Brendan Quinn
At 11:59 p.m. on November 27, 2022, I texted my brother Jeff: “UConn is really good.”
Those were words I hadn’t used to describe the University of Connecticut’s men’s basketball team in a long time.
The Huskies entered the season unranked in the national polls. The night of my text, they had ascended to No. 20 in the country and had just thrashed Iowa State for their eighth win without a loss. Just a few weeks later, they would reach No. 2.
But then, a sudden slump made everyone wonder — are they actually good?
The answer is yes.
What I saw in November was not a mirage. The Huskies managed to overcome their midseason challenges and have trounced four opponents in the NCAA Tournament to reach the Final Four. They’ll take on Miami in Houston on Saturday night.
For me, the joy of being a sports fan comes from watching a team develop and improve over the course of a long season.
In the first edition of this newsletter back in January, I celebrated the Huskies’ surprising early success but questioned if their fiery head coach, Dan Hurley, could keep his team — and himself — calm enough to make an NCAA Tournament run.
Well, the answer to my question is in the results.
This story, published last Friday after UConn’s Sweet 16 demolition of Arkansas, explains how Hurley steered the team through its midseason troubles and back to national prominence.
But to really understand where Hurley comes from and how he got here, you have to read this wonderful profile of him and his famous basketball lineage.
This season, Hurley’s players evolved, and so did he. Now, regardless of the outcome in Houston, the Huskies are back.
But we sports fans are greedy. We want our teams to win all the games. So I’m hoping that late on Monday night, UConn will be clinching a national championship, prompting me to send my brother yet another celebratory text.
Here are a few more thoughts on work I’ve previously mentioned:
Adding to what I wrote about U2’s Songs of Surrender last week, I also recommend the companion documentary, Bono & The Edge: A Sort of Homecoming with Dave Letterman (streaming on Disney+). Seeing Letterman’s specific brand of awkward weirdness as he toured Dublin warmed my heart.
And Shrinking (Apple+) wrapped up its first season this past week. It’s not a perfect show, but it’s good for some laughs, a few cries, and hope for the world if we would all just work on our issues. In a big name cast, Jessica Williams particularly shines.