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WPCNR PRESS BOX. VIEW FROM THE UPPER DECK. By John Baseball Bailey. October 21, 2004: All right, the sour grapes first, but bear with me.

 

If ever there was a situation that demonstrated why you cannot have a wild card playoff setup in baseball it was this year. If you get enough second chances at a team, the odds eventually will turn in your favor.

 

View from Behind Home Plate. Fenway Park, Boston, 1999. Photo by WPCNR Sports

 

 

When you consider that the Yankees and the St. Louis Cardinals both disposed of the Boston Red Sox and Houston Astros in the regular season and now face the prospects of having those same teams get a second chance at them, you have to get rid of the Wild Card. Depending on whether Roger Clemens finds his “A” game tonight, you will have the prospect of two teams who finished second in the regular season (Houston lost by 14 games) play in the World Series.

 

It this reporter’s opinion this is wrong. Because baseball, and softball, too are to a greater degree than any other sport, a matter of luck.

 

All right, I have to say that, being a Yankee fan.

 

Of course, the Wild Card makes for great fan interest, so it is here to stay.

 

The Yankees collapsed last night, succumbing to the parasite of inconsistency and blundering into the worst defeat  of a Yankee team since 1960 when they lost to the Pittsburgh Pirates.

 

But they lost to a team they closed out by 3 games in the regular season. What is the point of that, the Wild Card? Except to give a team a second chance.

 

 

Baseball is the toughest game to win. There’s no clock that saves you. You have to go out and beat the other team. And each day, it’s a brand new ballgame. Momentum is only as good as the next day’s starting pitcher.

 

Boston is to be congratulated for their unprecedented comeback. But this was a gift of the system (though Boston did it), made possible by the fact that the Red Sox always knew they did not have to overtake the Yankees to be in the playoffs, they just had to stay ahead of Texas and Oakland.

 

The Wild Card compromises the pennant race, and has become the focus of the season instead of finishing first. The effort usually reserved for end of the season chases suddenly is discovered in the playoffs.

 

But, based on the television ratings, and the extra fan interest the Wild Card generates, it is here to stay. I just wish they would either contract baseball by one team or expand it by one team, so you would have six divisions of 5 first place teams each so that you would have 5 first place teams playing. That would solve the Wild Card problem. I simply do not like it. It kills the integrity of the regular season.

 

You finish second, you don’t deserve a shot at the Championship, because you did not have what it takes over the long haul. So, with the Wild Card, you crank it up and play better, and lo and behold, you take out the team that you could not overtake. Does it get any better? 

 

That is the unfairness of the Wild Card, it rewards second place effort in the regular season, and promotes extraordinary effort in a short series.

 

That’s off my chest. But, those who know me I have been consistent on this issue since it originated. I would feel the same way if roles were reversed and the Yankees would have been the Wild Card. I would feel the Yankees were there on a technicality, not on merit.

 

That being said – A reluctant congratulations to the Red Sox.

 

Now, any Yankee fan should know that the Yankees were entirely consistent the way they lost this series. They have a lousy pitching staff. Which can be very very good and very very bad at precisely the wrong time. They are streaky hitters as all power hitting teams are. These seasonlong flaws lost them four straight in this series.

 

During the course of the season they Yankees were always out of sync. They would win games by massive margins, lose games by a lot of margins. They played few close games. They awaited the home run ball to bail them out. They were not patient at the plate. They played poorly defensively. Especially in the outfield. They went into four and five game funks at the plate, and played .500 ball since about June.  A lot of four-game losing streaks in the second half.

 

The pitching was the worst pitching on any Yankee team since 1966. I cannot remember such an inconsistent bunch of  Grade C & D pitchers (APBA Fans you know what that means) on a Yankee club. Though the Yankees lost this series because they did not hit in the clutch, and Yankee pitchers and fielders did not make big plays, big pitches in the clutch. I mean if the Yankees had the rotation of  Doc Medich, Steve Kline, Fritz Peterson, and Mike Kekich they would have won this series.

 

That being said, fans learned a lot about baseball from the Boston comeback. One, Yogi Berra is right: “It’s never over until it’s over.”

 

What did we learn:

 

1.)   You cannot let a team off the hook. No locks in baseball.

2.)   You have to create runs, not constantly try to clock one in extra innings.

3.)   You have to play your best defensive outfield in close games.

4.)   You have to be patient and make pitchers throw strikes (Boston did a great job of this against Rivera). However, can the outfield or infield catch a ball for Rivera one of these days and not play so damn deep when a single ties it or wins it? The Yankees used to be that way.

5.)   You have to shake up your lineup when it’s not hitting. (New York did not do this. Where was Kenny Lofton? Especially on defense. Lofton catches that double in the eighth of game six. Sheffield cannot play right field, and Lofton’s a better hitter than Tony Clark, yet Torre never played him. Sierra and Clark were not hitting in Games 5,6, and 7. That’s not using all your tools. And what is it with Olerud not playing? He has a long winter to rest his instep. Schilling can pitch on one leg, but Olerud cannot? Come on! )

6.)   You cannot consistently let one hitter beat you. (Joe, next time, walk Ortiz, please. Why do you think Bonds is walked all the time?)

7.)   You cannot start your worst pitcher in the seventh game. (Kevin Brown proved once he did not have it, how was he going to be any better? Why not Mussina for 3, El Duque for 3, Gordon for 2 and Riviera for 1. Come on. Braindead pitching management. Mussina and Rivera can have plenty of rest now. I don’t want to hear about being tired in April.

8.)   You have to have a better defensive outfield than Williams and Sheffield in a tight game. Could we dive for something once? Could Williams learn to play in and go back on a ball after all these years, instead of playing deep. I mean every humpback liner falls in front of him all season long.  Could Sheffield get a jump on one ball in his life? We miss Shane Spencer. You can count on one hand the number of great catches Yankee outfielders made this season – and most were made by Matsui.

9.)   We learned that sportswriters, sportscasters who pretend to know, actually know nothing about the mysteries of the game, and are a fickle, feckless bunch, and that Tim McCarver hates the Yankees, as he always has.

10.)                       You do not win games on reputation. You win them on the field.

11.)                       Managers make mistakes.

12.)                       George Steinbrenner has a lot of class.

13.)                       There is no such thing as a curse or fate. Those are just excuses for bad performance. However, omens are real. Omens that appeared in this series: The bounce-in-the-stands Clark double that prevented the Yankees from plating the potential winning run in the ninth of Game Five.  Mike Crispino on ESPN Radio saying the Red Sox were finished after Game Three. The “Why Not Us?” sign in the stands in Fenway (very eery).

14.)                       Baseball/softball is a very hard game and you have to be very tough mentally to be able to play it successfully, and even then that may not be enough, and you have to be strong enough to go back out there the next day and play harder.

15.)                       Derek Jeter has a lot of class.

16.)                       Curt Schilling is a money pitcher and a leader. (The best clutch pitcher in a big game with the most heart since Warren Spahn.) Schilling uplifted the performances of the Boston pitchers by example. What would be interesting is for the geniuses of the sports press to ask why the Boston bullpen suddenly pitched the Yankees so well in games 4,5,6. It cannot be just a collective yankee slump.  A great job of concentration and will by the Boston relief corps. Baseball is all about will. Perhaps Schilling talked with them in the bullpen.

17.)                       When you stop hitting, making good pitches, and key fielding you lose.

18.)                       Field designers are insane. Those Red Socks cut in the green grass at Fenway, I’m sorry, that is ugly. Come on!

19.)                       It is good to be hated. That means you’re good.

20.)                       Umpires squeeze you in the late innings, especially with a one-run lead, so you have to muscle it up. (Those ball calls in the 14^th inning in Game Five, come on. Those two walks in the 14^th were huge. But, hey, Joe, you should have walked Ortiz, and you should have walked him in the first last night.)

21.)                       Manuel Rivera has tremendous concentration to pitch the way he did after the deaths of his relatives.

22.)                       You have to hit it to win it.

23.)                       Sometimes games do not feel right. You know your team is going to lose.

 

What can we expect in months ahead?  Well, George has to pull the Frankenstein Monster back into the laboratory and get the Yankees some pitching. You have to think about replacing Bernie Williams in center and getting Posada some help. You have to get a better defensive outfield in center and right  together that can go and get the ball. And perhaps some more players like Matsui, who can play the outfield and hit consistently. Giambi has to stay away from the Sushi.

 

Good things about the season: Miguel Cairo  (What a find! What a clutch player.), Mussina, Hideki, Jeter, Rivera, Lofton, Bernie Williams, Sheffield (with exception of his outfield work—he needs a defensive replacement in late innings),

 

Boston made a great comeback. Congratsos to them. It does not make it any easier to take. Now, please go out and beat the Cardinals or the Astros. And, please St. Louis, get rid of the Astros. Fourteen games behind. Come on!

 

We like Ortiz, and Mueller, and Damon, and Schilling, and Veritek and Lowe and Wakefield, and feel very good for the New England fans and for that kid General Manager, Theo Epstein – stats rule! No more feeling sorry for yourselves, fans. Hey, Neighbor, have a Ganset! Better yet have six!

 

Here’s to Teddy Ballgame, and Pesky, and Harry Hooper, Smokey Joe Wood, Tris, and Doerr, Frank Sullivan, Ike Delock, Lefty Grove,  Jim Lonborg, Yaz  and Rico, Pumpsie Green and Gene Conley, Frank Malzone, FayeThroneberry, Jackie Jensen,  The Monster,  and Bill Buckner, Fred Lynn, Jim Rice and Carlton Fisk, Luis Tiant, Curt Gowdy and Ned Martin, and the best damn ballpark ever, Fenway Park,  who are all walking tall today. They ain’t walking in New England they’re floating. They are on the best drug…baseball.

 

 It feels good, doesn’t? So good! If you love the Saux, you will not feel any better ever in your life than you do this morning, and you’re going to feel this damn good for the rest of your life. You’ll never stop thinking about it.

 

I cannot imagine how great New England feels this morning. For all the Yankee World Championships and pennants, they never did what this little team did this week. They showed what heart is all about. Baseball is a game that you have to have heart. To pick yourself up off the floor and keep battling.

 

However, the Red Sox-Yankees thing every year was getting old. It is tedious, hearing about the curse, the ghost of the Babe. Reading endless columns about how the Yankees were destined to win.

 

Ballplayers know there is no such thing as destiny.

 

Only writers believe in destiny.

 

So good-bye to the curse. And good riddance.  Goodbye to those haunting yesterdays and New England melancholy. For as long as baseball is played the 2004 Red Sox will bring a glow of special joy to New England fans, they will always have it.

 

So pop the cap off an ice-cold Ganset. Pour it into the chilled pilsner. Savor that golden stream of pure New England refreshment globble into the glass of Red Sox memories past. Watch the creamy head foam at the top, the beads form on the sides of the glass. Lift it high and taste the crisp, clean refreshing taste of a Red Sox win for all-time.

 

Never has a beer tasted so good in New England as it does today.

 

And, then, neighbor, have another!

 

 

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WPCNR Downtown Jubilation. From Rick Ammirato, White Plains BID. October 20, 2004: The Juneteenth Heritage Committee, in cooperation with the Ministers Fellowship Council of White Plains & Vicinity, is sponsoring a Gospel Concert to raise funds for the June 2005 Juneteenth Parade Festival this Saturday, October 23 at 6 in the  Mt. Hope AME Zion Church, at 65 Lake Street, White Plains.

 Juneteenth is the oldest known celebration of the ending of slavery. From its Galveston, Texas origin in 1865, the observance of June 19^th as the African American emancipation Day has spread across the United States and beyond. Today Juneteenth commemorates African American freedom and emphasizes education, achievement and cultural diversity.

 An assembly of 7 local choirs, Honorary Chairs White Plains Mayor Joseph M. Delfino and County Legislator Lois Bronz, the White Plains Common Council, Rep. Nita Lowey, local and State representatives and over 500 local supporters of the Juneteenth Parade Festival are expected to attend.   

 

       

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WPCNR Stage Door. By John F. Bailey. October 19, 2004: It was a Dracula night when Dracula opened this weekend for five performances by the Fort Hill Players: rainy, windswept, chilling. Count Dracula, the character who, with Sherlock Holmes, has held the fascination of horror and mystery aficionados, and particularly women, for a hundred years, is chillingly recreated by Peter Green whose chosen and comely companion for immortality, Suzanne Davis, is succulently vulnerable and lustfully mouthwatering as the vampire’s apprentice.

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The Wretched Renfield (Douglas Zimmer) Begs for The Master’s Mercy. Peter Green is Count Dracula walks for two more nights, Friday, the 22, and Saturday, the 23.  Photo by WPCNR StageCam

 

The production is the most elaborately-staged production the Players have done in the five years WPCNR has reviewed the group. The attention shows the fanatic reverence players and staff have for this classic. From the howls of wolves, to chants to chilling musical interludes the production is haunted with the menace of the undead. Here is staged horror: believable, eerie, compelling.  We see real persons caught in a web of mystery and the macabre. Such a mood is particularly difficult to achieve because most everyone (with perhaps the exception of the teens and young persons in the audience), knows the story.

 

The Seward Residence  Under the spell of The Count at The Rochambeau. Left to right, Larry Reina as Van Helsing; Stanley Wexler as Dr. Seward, Peter Green as The Count; On Stairwell, Suzanne Ochs as the maid; Suzanne Davis as Lucy, and Timothy Young as Jonathan Harker. The Count pays his condolences to Lucy, the ingenue is under the weather. Photo by WPCNR StageCam.

 

Dracula played to a full house Friday night of over 100 persons and drew 60 persons for the Saturday evening performance at The Rochambeau School. What they heard as they were taken to their seats were howls of wolves and eerie music, setting a mood of foreboding which carried through the evening. They saw an actual set (the detail of which was close to Broadway in effort), recreating the library of Dr. Seward in an English country estate where evil things just seem to happen.

 

A relic from another stage, another time.

 

The play, adapted by John L. Balderston and Hamilton Deane from the Bram Stoker novel, is a melodrama, filled with hysterics and long winded explanations to carry the action, complicated explanations of technical vampire lore. It is an adventure, and on a higher level a psychological exploration of temptation, control, manipulation, and fear of the unknown.

 

It is hard to articulate the part of the compulsive Count, the disbelieving Dr. Seward, the maniac Renfield, the crusading, intense Van Helsing (the vampire hunter), and the ingénue Lucy as straight action, due to the rambling, often hysteria-tinged lines actors  have to deliver. They have to feel it. This cast feels it.

 

For Dracula to work for an audience, the players who surround Dracula, the central figure, who dominates the stage, and their reaction to him, have to play in a believable manner. Their reaction to him when he glides into their midst, their fear, their interaction creates the illusion of the vampire’s power.

 

A web of a play.

 

To the credit of director Carin Zakes, she has been able to channel the actors and actresses to play off Mr. Green in a credible manner, each endowing their characters with a humanity, while Peter Green’s Dracula relentlessly demonstrates no humanity whatsoever – a key component of the Dracula character. Each of the supporting cast react as a victim reacts to the silent legs of a spider making its way towards a victim in its web.

 

The tall Stanley Wexler as Lucy’s Father, Dr. Seward,  projects his growing dread and horror, in a controlled very British sort of way. Timothy Young as Jonathan Harker is a more a manly fiancé of Lucy than we are used to seeing, demonstrating real concern for his girl friend and  her illness. Butterworth, (Kevin Rishel) the asylum aid, (Seward operates a lunatic asylum), provides  comic relief in his chatting up of Wells, the maid, played by Suzanne Ochs. Ochs is your typical English maid.

 

Douglas Zimmer as Renfield is a hideous foil to The Count, as the fly-eating maniac. His wild eyes, electric shock hair and precise movements give you the creeps. He invokes pity as he does the vampire’s bidding. Having once myself, tried out for this part, I can tell you it is no easy role, so easy to overplay. Zimmer’s first appearance slides the audience into the bizarre twisted evil of Dracula’s world.

 

Mr. Green’s Dracula is a compulsive practitioner of the seven deadly sins: lust, pride, greed, murder, sloth, gluttony, and envy. His appearance reflects it – all appetite – all predator. The shaved-head Mr. Green, though short of stature, (considering the Stoker novel describes Dracula as “a tall old man, clean-shaven, except for a moustache”), plays The Count with presence and dignity, creating a creepy aura that swirls palpably ahead of him filling the stage with a fascinating dread, enhanced by Green’s  gleaming snaky eyes, like a cobra in a cape.

 

If you’re a nice girl, you best keep away.

 

But the way Green plays him, you could not. Green is better than the pretty boy Draculas, Frank Langella  and Michael Nouri. Why? The trouble with having a pretty boy like Langella or Nouri play Dracula it gives appearance as the reason why women are attracted to him. With Mr. Green, who is striking, compelling rather than clean-cut handsome as a Langella or Nouri are – shows the seductiveness of the Count lies in his power, his mystery, the evil, not simply sexual attractiveness, in this reporter’s opinion. (While I am at it, what is it about bald headed men that women find attractive, what is going on there?)

 

Peter Green, The Prince of Darkness Calling to His “Children of the night…What beautiful music they make.” Photo by WPCNR StageCam.

 

From his first grand entrance at the top of the stair, when he is announced as “Count Dracula,” Green is the rock star of horror creatures.  Green is pale of countenance, majestic in carriage, and speaks his lines with eloquence and an attitude of self-importance as befits the King of the Vampires. He moves about, slithery, silently and throws back attackers with a flick of a gesture, and a look of pompous disdain. He was made to wear the crimson-lined cape.

 

His pomposity does not cross the line into foppish caricature. He even carries off the joke, “Thank you for reminding me of the time,” when it is just before sunrise with applomb. Another laugh is when The Count says “I love England so filled with opportunity.”

 

A Star is Born.

 

Suzanne Davis, the lissome heroine in the vampire’s cross-teeth, delivers the wailing role of Lucy Seward very convincingly. Just 22 herself,  Ms. Davis is bewildered at what is happening to her at the outset of the play, afraid to sleep in her own bed, looking suitably virginal and angelic, and wailing, crying and being depressed. It is hard for modern audiences to relate to this much emoting, but Ms. Davis appeared to get the emotions just right.

 

Ms. Davis adapts the style of the role acted by Helen Chandler as Lucy in the original 1931 Dracula motion picture. She has the wails, the anxiety, the perplexed notion of a woman who does not know what is wrong with her, and increases those levels as the first act builds in intensity. Ms. Davis confided to the CitizeNetReporter that she has studied Dracula and has long been fascinated by the story. It was obvious from the way she played her role, she has done her “homework.”

Harker (Timothy Young) consoles Lucy (Suzanne Davis). Lucy is telling him no matter what, do not tell her what he knows, even if she begs him. Photo by WPCNR StageCam.

 

The best scene in the play is the languid, sexy visitation of Dracula in Lucy’s boudoir where Dracula evokes both the consuming lust of the vampire for blood, and displays the vampire’s awesome sensual attraction. The steam generated from the couch by this subtle and compelling pas de deux is carried off with one very shocking and powerful embrace. The way this scene is lit, the overwhelming presence of a heavy atmosphere of evil,  the helpless, growing, eager anticipation of Lucy, the intensity of The Count casts a sinister, irresistible appeal. It is lusty, uninhibited, and deliciously decadent!

 

The other Lucy emerges. Suzanne Davis transitions to Vampiress.

Photo by WPCNR StageCam.

 

In Act II, Ms. Davis succumbing  to the “Vampire’s Kiss,”  transitions shockingly  to Lucy the Vampiress. She is so different, it is startling and arousing. The seductive wiles she practices on Jonathan Harker, may be a little too-2004, a little too Orange County for a 19^th century seductress to practice, the tantalizing invitation she smothers Timothy Young with in Act II is perhaps the sexiest interlude we have seen on a Fort Hill Players stage. (For example, did 19^th century ladies cross their legs? Did they flounce and slither down the front of their intended seducees? Ms. Davis is a willowy undulating slithereress. I don’t know, maybe they did.)

 

Resistance is Futile.

 

Young’s reaction to Lucy’s wiles, on the other hand, is one of shock as Lucy through her personality change radiates the evil of the vampire. Davis conveys a mature, calculating, dedicated, bright eyed intensity in Act II that rivals the presence of Dracula himself. The parallel personas Green and Davis create (as Lucy is partially turned into a vampire) through the play sends weaves a spell of evil.. Good evil is always seductive, that is one of the points of Dracula.

 

Harker on the other hand recoils appropriately. Men of the nineteenth century, the late Victorian Period, especially Englishmen were not used to strong women. Lucy’s hunger expressed in her body language, her intense eyes repel him rather than seduce. Davis acts like a beautiful wolf about to tear into a meal (Harker), which she is.

 

Enter the Crusader

 

Larry Reina as Abraham Van Helsing the vampire exterminater, brings the earnest “Reina rush” of intensity to an earnest part. He brings the exasperated impatience of a man with knowledge who is consistently frustrated that people do not grasp what he is telling them. (Much like some reporters and lawyers, of which Mr. Reina is one. ) He delivers for instance, a classic line from this play: “The strength of the vampire is that people will not believe in him.”

 

A mixture of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, (contemporary literary figures of the time), Reina brandishes a sacred wafer, a piece of garlic, and a cross like Indiana Jones brandishes his bull whip, to fight off the menacing Green, even applies deductive reasoning. He analyzes the symptoms in quizzing Dr. Seward, Lucy’s father.  WPCNR liked Stanley Wexler, the former opera star, playing Seward, and doing his best John Gielgud.  He is so British, so serious, so “shocked,” but practical. I loved him in that role.

 

Reina and Green as The Count play off each other well in the contests of wills between all-powerful vampire and spiritual hunter, choreographing Van Helsing’s resistance to the Vampire’s hypnosis, and catching the feel of the power of the vampire as well as Van Helsing’s courage.

 

The Chase is on

 

Great moments: the Van Helsing-Vampire standoff in Act One; the Vampire at bay in Act II, and Mr. Van Helsing’s words at the spiraling, catharthic denouement. The end of the play is powerful, but a little too short. However, before seeing this play, I always was disappointed at the fate of Dracula, wanting him to survive. In this play, my emotions of the moment were relieved that he does not. I think this is a tribute to the way Mr. Green embodied the evil force of the vampire.

 

Reina captures the one-track intensity of a man on a mission in Van Helsing, bringing a new heroism into a character who was played as too old a person in the original Dracula movie. Reina’s performance creates a new dimension future actors can give to the role. 

 

The character Renfield is a delicious lunatic whose performance lends an air of the bizarre to the otherworldly events. Renfield’s rantings are tortured, evoking emotion, pity and repulsion on the part of the audience. His twisted figure is a metaphor for a soul tortured by demons, restless with guilt, beholden to his mentor, Count Dracula, against his will.

 

Conflict of the Will

 

The play is all about will, of doing other’s bidding against what  is right, fighting an evil power that is too much to resist. How the characters resist the power of the vampire and the need to resist is the same.

 

 

 

The set by Anthony Fabrizio is ingenious. Built obviously lovingly by Scott Fauble and Peter Cranco, designed in posh detail by Mario Fuentes,  the three-panel set  transforms into library Lucy’s Boudoir and a crypt at the close of the play. It cleverly unfolds making scene changes shrouded in gray lighting that gives the impression of a shroud. Lighting Designer David Ulman has created eerie effects with makeup and screened patterns giving the impression of dawn through library windows, the flicker of torchlight. All I missed was candelabras (a staple of the original Dracula movie). The way Ulman lit the vault in the final act conveyed the mustiness of the grave better than any movie scene.

 

Who Trained the Bat?

 

Another actor that should be congratulated is the giant live bat, (perhaps a refugee from the Greenburgh Nature Center who wanted to get into bat pictures), who makes a very realistic appearance in the show. Whoever trained that bat, well that bat has a future in show business. Actually I assume the bat was a prop, a marionette, that was manipulated very convincingly, and whoever was the “bat trainer” kudos. Very realistic. Unless of course, it was a bat. You could not tell. Though you knew it had to be not real. Or was it? See for yourself.

 

Dracula is all about us.

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What does this play and its popularity say about women’s fascination with blood-sucking vampires? With manipulative paramours? Is submission to a higher male power what women truly like? Women’s fascination with submission to the seductive vampire male, and men’s desire to hold hypnotic total control over women go a long way to explaining why Dracula is so enduring. Dracula,  being unable to achieve eternal life through sucking beautiful ingénues’ blood, has achieved it instead by media celebrity. Dracula explores each of our capacities for evil.

 

You will see and feel this seductive power for yourself two more times, Friday night at 8 at The Roch (Rochambeau School), and Saturday night at 8. Admission is $15, $12 for students and seniors. For more visit the www.forthillplayers.com website. Box office is at 914-309-7278.

 

Some young persons after the performance were obviously attracted to the power that is in this play, the young men already appearing more intense and Count-like than before they came to the show.

 

Special effects include a very convincing mist, and a disappearing act in full view. The audience loved this show, applauding for a full two minutes, cascading The Count and his Vampiress for their transformation back into the humans they play every day, before they stalk the night in search of hot blood.

 

The Spell of Dracula. Photo by WPCNR StageCam.

 

 

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WPCNR WHITE PLAINS LAW JOURNAL. From Pace University School of Law. October 19, 2004: The Women’s Justice Center (WJC) of the Pace University School of Law in conjunction with the Committee to Promote Gender Fairness in the 9^th Judicial District and the Westchester Women’s Bar Association will co-host an informative program entitled “Domestic Violence and Responsible Mediation:  A Critical Look at Screening and Safety” at the New York State Judicial Institute, located at the Pace University School of Law, 78 North Broadway, White Plains, New York, Omni Room, on Wednesday, October 27, 2004, from 6:00 p.m. – 8:30 p.m.

 

Individual reservations are $85.00, which includes dinner and 2 CLE (continuing legal education) credits. For reservations or more information about the program, interested parties can contact James Bavero at (914) 422-4069.

 

Reflecting wide community interest in mediation within domestic violence cases, this program hopes to bring to light current knowledge about the nature and dynamics of domestic violence and whether and when mediation may be appropriate.

 

The evening’s panels of speakers reflect a range of perspectives including Westchester County’s Family Court, Integrated Domestic Violence Court, and New York State’s statewide ADR (Alternative Dispute Resolution) Coordinator.

 

Hon. Joan O. Cooney, is now the Supervising Judge of the Family Court, Ninth Judicial District. While in the private practice of law, she concentrated in the areas of Family and Juvenile Law, serving as a law guardian for the Westchester County Family Court from 1977-1992. She became a leader in juvenile rights and responsibilities. Elected to Westchester County Family Court in 1992, Judge Cooney has presided in Yonkers Family Court, New Rochelle Family Court, and White Plains Family Court. As Supervising Judge since 1999, Judge Cooney started the first specialized Neglect and Abuse Part in the Ninth Judicial District to help foster children attain a permanent plan. Judge Cooney has also initiated a specialized Juvenile Delinquency Part and has worked to implement the Integrated Domestic Violence Part.

 

Hon. Daniel D. Angiolillo, is a Justice of the Supreme Court, Ninth Judicial District of the State of New York and presides over the Integrated Domestic Violence Court in Westchester County, thereby presiding over criminal, family and matrimonial matters in addition to appellate cases. This court is the first of its kind in New York State and serves as a model for other domestic violence courts around the state.  Prior to being elected to the Supreme Court, in 1993, Judge Angiolillo was elected as a County Court Judge in Westchester County. In 2003, he was appointed Associate Justice of the Appellate Term. Judge Angiolillo has further presided over New York State’s first Domestic Violence Felony/Misdemeanor Court since June 1999. He is a former prosecutor and current adjunct professor of law at Manhattanville College.

 

Daniel M. Weitz, Esq., is the Statewide ADR (Alternative Dispute Resolution) Coordinator for the New York State Unified Court System. Mr. Weitz oversees a statewide program of court-annexed ADR initiatives involving mediation, arbitration, neutral evaluation and summary jury trial. He also directs the Community Dispute Resolution Centers Program, which provides dispute resolution services as an alternative to civil, family, and minor criminal court litigation in all sixty-two counties of the State. Mr. Weitz has over twelve years of experience in the field of ADR, serving as administrator, professor, trainer, and practitioner. He is an Adjunct Clinical Professor at Cardozo School of Law and has taught ADR and conflict resolution at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and Long Island University. Mr. Weitz has served as a mediator in a wide range of matters, including, general civil, family, employment, human rights, community, and police conduct cases.

 

Beginning with an introduction by Susan L. Pollet, Esq., Executive Director of the Pace Women’s Justice Center, who will also serve as moderator of the panel, the evening’s discussion will take up Mediation in Family Court Mediation in Integrated Domestic Violence Part and will end Screening for Domestic Violence in Mediation Cases. 

 

 

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WPCNR STAGE DOOR. From White Plains Performing Arts Center. (Edited) October 19, 2004: National television personalities Kathie Lee and Frank Gifford will host the First Anniversary Gala Celebration of the White Plains Performing Arts Center on Monday, November 8, beginning at 6:00 p.m.  The event will be held at the Performing Arts Center, located on Level 5 of City Center.  As Honorary Chairpersons of the event, Kathie Lee and Frank Gifford will join in the “Broadway Salutes White Plains” celebration, honoring White Plains Mayor Joseph Delfino for his vision and accomplishments over the years.

Ruppert Holmes and 10 Broadway Stars will perform hits from their shows in the original, one-time-only performance, “Broadway Salutes White Plains,” the second year in a row this unique “review” has been put together by WPPAC producers Tony Stimac and Jeffrey Rosenstock. 

The event will feature singer/songwriter Ruppert Holmes, a production number from the musical, “Swango,” an original piano concerto composed in honor of the special occasion, and 10 performers from various Broadway shows including “Les Miserables,”  “The Producers,” “Hairspray,” and “Spamelot,” a new musical adaptation of the most popular Monty Python movie, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, opening on Broadway in the Spring of 2005.

The Gala will begin at 6:00 p.m. with wine and hors d’ouevres, followed by performances at 7:30 p.m., and a post-performance coffee and dessert reception at 8:45 p.m.  Ticket prices range from $150 to $250, and all proceeds will benefit the White Plains Performing Arts Center.

 

For more information, please call the White Plains Performing Arts Center at (914) 328-1600, ext 10.

 

The White Plains Performing Arts Center is a professional not-for-profit producing and presenting company whose mission is to bring innovative, eclectic and always-entertaining new plays and musicals to this state-of-the-art facility. The Center also hosts local, national and international performing artists whose work reflects Westchester’s diverse population.