Dinner
And A Movie
Schulz
and Schmaltz
By
Steve Herte
After
a busy week where my abilities were stretched three ways to
Wednesday, I needed to unravel my brain and was in the mood for light
entertainment and heavy food. I searched for a movie that was
uncomplicated and under two hours long. (Sorry, James Bond.) I also
needed to find a restaurant where I didn't have to play a role.
I found both. Enjoy!
The
Peanuts Movie (20th Century
Fox, 2015) – Director: Steve Martino. Writers: Brian Schulz, Craig
Schulz, & Cornelius Uliano (s/p). Charles M. Schulz (comic
strip). Voices: Rebecca Bloom, Anastasia Bredikhina, Francesca
Capaldi, Kristin Chenoweth, Alexander Garfin, Noah Johnston, Bill
Melendez, Hadley Belle Miller, Micah Revelli, Noah Schapp, Venus
Schultheis, Mariel Sheets, Madisyn Shipman, A.J. Tecce, Trombone
Shorty, Marleik Mar Mar Walker, & William Wunsch. Animated, Color
and 3D, Rated G, 93 minutes.
At
night, when Charlie Brown’s alone, he looks out the window at the
stars. He’s heard that everyone has a star that is exclusively
their own and he’s happy that his star will always be there for
him. And then a star drops out of view. “Good Grief!”
The
advantage that 3D animation has in this new movie is that the
familiar Charles Schulz characters are not flat anymore. They have
depth beyond their rather shallow, but lovable natures. The plot is
simple. The Little Red-Haired Girl has moved into the neighborhood
and Charlie Brown (Schnapp) sees it as an opportunity to start fresh
with someone who doesn’t consider him to be a blockhead and a
loser. The sub-plot is a twist on the familiar Snoopy (Melendez)
versus the Red Baron. Snoopy meets Fifi (Chenoweth), the poodle of
his dreams (who also happens to be a biplane flyer) and has to rescue
her from the Baron’s zeppelin.
To
conquer his painful shyness, Charlie Brown enters the school talent
show with a magician’s act. But he never gets to perform it because
his better nature tells him to save his little sister Sally’s
(Sheets) dying rodeo act by posing as a steer. He has Snoopy teach
him dance steps so that he will get to dance with the Little
Red-Haired Girl (Capaldi) at the school dance. But he gets his shirt
caught in the door while he’s holding the punch bowl and the punch
spills right where he’s dancing and that idea fails. Lastly, he
draws her name out of a bowl in school to collaborate on a book
report. She has to travel to New York and he decides to do the book
report alone and surprise her. Peppermint Patty (Schultheis) advises
him to look up “Leo’s Toy Store” in the library as the greatest
book of all time. Fortunately, he meets Marcie (Bloom) in the adult
section and she points him to War and Peace by Leo
Tolstoy.
Just
getting the huge tome home is hilarious enough, but Charlie Brown
manages it and works all weekend to read it and write the book
report, only to see it shredded by the propeller on the Red Baron’s
triplane. This plane makes its appearance at the beginning of the
movie as Linus (Garfin) intended to use it as a “show-and-tell”
item. But Charlie Brown wonders if it works and flicks the propeller.
It flies out the window, making salient appearances in Snoopy’s
fantasy.
Charlie
Brown has an unexpected moment of fame when time is running out on a
test in class and he and Peppermint Patty race to the teacher’s
desk to submit their answers. But when they are told they forgot to
sign the tests, the two get switched in the shuffle and Charlie Brown
is posted the next day with the first “perfect score, a 100%” in
the school history. This ends on stage in front of the entire student
body when he sees the test answers are not his own and must admit it.
During this happy period he teaches a Little Kid (Revelli) to fly a
kite and the kite actually becomes airborne – until the kid hands
the string to Charlie Brown.
Most
of the movie, however, is the same-old, same-old. While everyone else
is playing hockey on a snow day, Charlie Brown is trying to fly his
kite, and failing. Lucy (Miller) is forever after Schroeder
(Johnston) who could care less. Pig-Pen (Tecce) is making clouds of
dust, even in winter. Linus is always the philosopher. Violet
(Shipman) and Patty (Bredikhina) are the rest of Lucy’s clique. All
adult voices are provided by Trombone Shorty, and Franklin (Walker)
and Shermy (Wunsch) are there only for the crowd scenes.
The
scenes where Charlie Brown is trying desperately to overcome his
feelings of inadequacy and where Snoopy is soaring over Paris and the
German countryside are wonderful in 3D. But the stock footage that is
“Peanuts” is always there to bring us out of the fantasyland and
into dull reality. I would have liked to see more new and less
familiar. The kids in the audience seemed to like the movie even
though they didn’t get many of the jokes.
The
Peanuts Movie is definitely a “kids” movie trying to
appeal to adults. It succeeds in places but like Charlie Brown, fails
in others.
Rating:
3½ out of 5 Martini glasses.
Bubby’s
Tribeca
120
Hudson St. (White St.), New York
Bubby
means “Grandma” in Yiddish. “Defending the American Table”
and “Mark Twain is our Hero” are two mottos on the website with a
long quote from Samuel Clemmons about what foods are great to eat and
how they should be served. When you finish it, you’re ready to dine
at Bubby’s.
Informal
doesn’t begin to describe Bubby’s. About a block below Canal
Street in downtown Manhattan, I almost missed it. The large sheaf of
tall cornstalks, pumpkins, a park bench and greenery outside the
restaurant almost obscured the entrance. Once inside, the hostess led
me past the bar into the main dining area in the next room and sat me
at a table in the front window. The corner property is decorated with
bits of Americana (weather vanes, carved geese, straw dolls, farm
implements) and the simple wood floors and bare wood tables continue
the rustic “farmhouse” motif.
Kerin,
my server, surprised me when she informed me the place has been
around for 25 years. It began as a pie company in 1990, and three
months later was a restaurant with two tables. Traditional American
food, cooked from scratch, organically grown New York ingredients as
well as beef, and house-cured bacon are the standards of pride served
here.
Kerin
brought a bottle of tap water and poured me a glass as she presented
the food and drinks menus. After a short time she asked if I wished a
cocktail and I chose the Village Green – gin in fresh cucumber
juice, lemon and mint with a slice of cucumber as garnish. More and
more, I’m loving cucumber in my drinks; very refreshing.
I
told Kerin that I have a good appetite and am a slow diner with lots
of time. The food menu lists categories of Starters and Shared
Plates, Bubby’s Burgers, Burger Toppings, Mains, Pit Barbecue, and
Sides for the Table. Kerin didn’t bat an eye when I ordered three
courses and a side dish. She noted them all down and checked with me
on what order they should come out. Then she left me to choose a
wine. The wine list is short in comparison to other restaurants but
the prices are very reasonable (five or six whites and five or six
reds).
I
chose the 2011 Pier 41 Cabernet Franc blend from Red Hook Winery in
Brooklyn because I had no idea that there was a winery in Brooklyn
and was eager to try it. It turns out there is more than one, but the
bartender sadly said that this wine was sold out, so Kerin suggested
the 2012 Cru Monplaisir blend of Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and
Cabernet Franc from Bordeaux. Perfect! And it was a lovely red,
informal and medium bodied, exactly what was needed for rustic
American food.
The
adventure started with the first course. The mac and cheese –
bacon, cheddar, fontina, and gruyere cheeses with béchamel mezze,
and penne pasta topped with crispy onions – was obviously a shared
dish (a large ceramic crock), but I took my time and finished the
last few decadent, cheesy, bacon-y, salty (don’t try this dish if
you have high blood pressure) bites while the second course arrived.
At
a place called “Bubby’s” what else would you have next but
matzo ball soup – chicken pieces in chicken broth with vegetables
and “fluffy-style” homemade matzo balls? Compared to the mac and
cheese, this dish was almost bland. One expects to need fresh ground
pepper on macaroni and salt in soup, but this was very light on salt.
The matzo balls were so fluffy they almost floated away. The taste
was so light it was like biting into a cloud. (I think I should have
reversed the order of these two dishes.) I noted that no salt or
pepper sellers were on the table, but there was a bottle of hot
sauce, and Kerin brought over a bottle of catsup. It reminded me of a
one-frame cartoon were the waitress is glaring at a patron, saying,
“For Vat you want catsup?” But Helene’s words came back to me
as well, “The sign of a confident chef is the absence of
condiments.”
The
size of the first dish and a glance over at the next table where
enormous hamburgers were being served should have prepared me for the
dry aged 16-ounce New York strip steak. It almost did. A little over
an inch thick and about a foot long and two inches wide, this
mega-meat nearly covered the platter it was served on. Two circles of
herbal butter topped the blackened surface, seeming to look back at
me and daring me to finish it. The meat was indeed flavorful but was
riddled with gristle and difficult to cut in parts. The side dish of
Brussels sprouts had me believing that one of my favorite vegetables
was unfortunately out of season. The bright green sprouts were much
crunchier than I would have liked, and I actually preferred the cubes
of cooked apple mixed into the dish.
It’s
been a long time since I was on the Olympic Eating Team at
Grossinger’s Lodge and Bubby’s bested me. I got a little more
than halfway through the steak and two-thirds through the side when I
requested that Kerin bag the steak to go.
Otherwise, I would not have
been able to eat dessert, something Bubby’s is eminently famous
for. Though they had rhubarb pie on the menu, the peanut butter
chocolate pie called to me louder and won. It was a respectable wedge
of graham cracker crust, dark chocolate and peanut butter fluff (as
light as the matzo balls were) sided by a large ball of real whipped
cream (Whoopee!). I washed it all down with a mug of Earl Grey Tea
(the name “Bubby’s” written across the side, of course).
Bubby’s
is a homey, relaxing place to dine. There’s nothing you won’t
recognize and, when you know the portion sizes, you can finish
everything and be satisfied. Next time I’ll bring a friend and
actually share one of the “shared dishes.”
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