Author: Mya Blanchard

Three days of film

The Manchester International Film Festival returns

The second Manchester International Film Festival will feature short films by independent and award-winning filmmakers at the Rex Theatre and Palace Theatre in Manchester from Thursday, Aug. 10, through Saturday, Aug. 12.

“Ever since the Rex Theatre opened we wanted to celebrate the history of the theater as a movie theater by showing films,” said festival director Warren O’Reilly “[The festival] came about because people love films and love to be able to go out and see films … together, so the idea was to do a film festival that would be able to combine the efforts of all the other amazing film festivals in the state and be a smaller celebration of the both the city of Manchester and a celebration of film. … It’s continuing the legacy of bringing movies back to the heart of Manchester.”

Each day of the festival will showcase a different type of film. Due to the popularity of animation at last year’s event, animation will kick things off with a night of its own on Thursday. Friday will feature New England short film and comedy, with a film and post-screening Q&A with director Roger Kabler. Saturday will close with documentaries, LGBTQ+ short films, international short film, television pilot and feature film scripts as well as audience choice. There will also be a career retrospective with actor Kevin Pollak, who will be in attendance.

“Having Kevin Pollak come has been a huge honor for us because he’s been involved in some really incredible movies,” O’Reilly said. “He’s been really supportive of our film festival … and having him involved has been really important.”

Among the featured animated films is Under the Endless Sky by award-winning Ukrainian illustrator and animator Alexandra Dzhiganskaya, who currently lives in Austria. Her film tells the story of her memories of growing up in Ukraine. Although she started working on this film, originally a short comic, before the war broke out, she says the memories captured in this film have since taken on a new level of meaning.

“With the medium of animation, I tried to show the fluidity of memory and that it can be fragmented, it can be very sharp … and our memories also change with time, so these were the kinds of thoughts that I put into the animation,” Dzhiganskaya said. “I also wanted to dedicate it to place where I grew up where my best memories came from, and when the full-scale invasion in Ukraine came it kind of became a new level for me because I think [that] all people have these places or people that they kind of go back to, but somehow it hurts especially when these places and people literally don’t exist anymore.”

The film is meant to encapsulate summer and childhood carelessness in Ukraine, something she says kids nowadays won’t likely experience in the same way she did. She hopes that people can relate to her story and think back on their own memories, maybe even unearthing ones long forgotten.

“We want it to be a fun weekend full of movies for everybody,” O’Reilly said. “Getting to work with New Hampshire filmmakers has been such a treat and we look forward to working closely with New Hampshire filmmakers in future years to come because at the end of the day we’re here to celebrate film and animation in New England.”

Manchester International Film Festival
When: Thursday, Aug. 10, 7 p.m.; Friday, Aug. 11, 7 p.m.; Saturday, Aug. 12, noon to 10 p.m.
Where: The Rex Theatre, 23 Amherst St., Manchester. The event will close on Saturday, Aug. 12, at the Palace Theatre, 80 Hanover St., Manchester, starting at 7 p.m.
Cost: Tickets are $10 or $25 for all three days and can be purchased at palacetheatre.org or at the box office at the Palace Theatre or the Rex Theatre.

Celebrating local artistry

Manchester Arts & Crafts Fair returns for a second year

Back for its second year is the Manchester Arts & Crafts fair at Veterans Memorial Park on Saturday, Aug. 12, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. with vendors, food trucks, children’s programming and more.

“This year’s arts and craft fair has three times more vendors as we did last year … featuring all kinds of fine art, painting, drawing, pottery, fabric art, woodworking, crocheting, all sorts of wonderful stuff,” said Kathy Daneman, organizer of the fair.

Among the 60 vendors is Melissa Goodman, an oil painter and illustrator. Growing up, Goodman enjoyed art in school. She went to university with the intention of studying science but quickly realized that something was missing.

“I couldn’t not be doing art,” She said. “Life just felt so much less colorful because art wasn’t involved in it. I would get jealous when I’d see kids walking on campus with their art portfolios and so I ended up taking a few art classes and realized this was what I really needed to do.”

While studying and exploring art, she developed preferences for some media over others. Now one of her media of choice is oil painting, which she originally hated.

This changed after she took a workshop taught by still life painter Jeff Legg years later.

“I took it and I ended up being like, ‘Oh my gosh, this is so much better. This is everything,’” Goodman said. “I had taken oil painting classes before and just disliked it so much, but when I took it from him it was like something clicked.”

During her time in college, she also discovered that she loved working with ink and became fascinated with still lifes.

“I really loved the idea of making objects that to most people feel really ordinary feel so extraordinary. I feel that’s what life is; a lot of ordinary moments, but to us those moments feel so extraordinary,” Goodman said. “The world is such a beautiful place and I’ll see something beautiful and I’ll just know … what I need to paint, even if it’s completely unrelated. Everything around me is inspirational.”

Fiber artist Emily Reilly will have a booth at the arts and crafts fair. A graduate student at the University of New Hampshire, she found that crocheting is a great way to cope with stress.

“About a year [or] year and a half ago I kept seeing all these videos pop up [of] these girls making the cutest crochet tops and I was like, ‘I would love to do that,” Reilly said. “I fell in love with it and I found that it was just a good outlet for me. I really like doing it when I’m stressed and it’s just really satisfying to see the finished project.”

The Manchester Arts & Crafts fair will be the first Reilly has participated in. People encouraged her to sell her work and despite being hesitant she applied for a spot, where she hopes to inspire others to pick up a craft one day. She says she couldn’t have done this without the help of her sister.

“My twin sister, Hannah, has been a huge help,” Reilly said. “I’ve been doing the crocheting but she has handled everything else.”

According to Daneman, other new additions to this year’s event include face painting, the Manchester City Library Bookmobile and a children’s art wall with Unchartered Tutoring.

“We really wanted to make sure that it was something that everybody could enjoy,” Daneman said. “It’s fun to get together in the summer and see our neighbors and celebrate the art they make and the thoughts they’re expressing through their work.”

Manchester Arts & Crafts Fair
When: Saturday, Aug. 12, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Where: Veterans Memorial Park, 773 Elm St., Manchester
Cost: Free

In the kitchen with Lindsey Bangs

Lindsey Bangs has always had a passion for baking. Her mom taught her how to bake, buying her her first cookbook when she was just 2 or 3 years oldA few months ago, she decided to step away from her job as a medical receptionist to focus on I Whisked It full time. She specializes in custom cakes, cupcakes and cake jars as well as hot chocolate bombs with homemade marshmallows and French chocolate during the winter. You can find I Whisked It at the Bedford farmers market every Tuesday from 3 to 6 p.m. through Oct. 17, and the Candia farmers market the third Saturday of every month through Oct. 21 from 9 a.m. to noon.

What is your must-have kitchen item?

I would have to say my small offset spatula. I reach for it for everything from smoothing brownie batter in pans to decorating cakes.

What would you have for your last meal?

I would start with a croissant with apricot or raspberry jam, Rhode Island-style calamari, halibut tacos and cheesecake with a traditional graham cracker crust and raspberry coulis.

What is your favorite local eatery?

I love Tuckaway Tavern in Raymond. .

Name a celebrity you would like to see eating in your restaurant?

I would love to have any of my favorite musicians, like Dave Matthews or Chris Carrabba, buy a cake from me just so I could thank them for the music and lyrics that so often keep me going. Or one of the cast members from Friends or The Office. They’re all responsible for delivering so many laughs in my house.

What is your favorite thing on your menu?

I love my Pina Colada cake jar. It’s layers of light coconut cake, coconut cream buttercream and a pineapple coconut filling. It’s so good.

What is the biggest food trend in New Hampshire right now?

I’ve noticed a lot of food, drink and even ice cream flight options, so it’s not just beer anymore. It’s great because I love being able to try a little bit of everything.

Banana bread
From the kitchen of I Whisked It

¾ cup sugar
1½ cups mashed bananas (three large)
¾cup vegetable oil
2 eggs
2 cups all-purpose flour
½ cup chopped walnuts (optional)
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 teaspoon of cinnamon
½ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt

Heat oven to 325 degrees.
Grease a loaf pan with shortening, butter or non-stick spray.
Mix sugar, bananas, oil and eggs in a large bowl. Add in remaining ingredients and stir until just combined.
Pour into the greased loaf pan. Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center of the bread comes out clean (60 to 70 minutes). Let cool in the pan on a cooling rack with the pan on its side for 10 minutes, then remove the loaf from the pan. Let cool completely before slicing. Makes 1 loaf.


Featured photo: Lindsey Bangs. Courtesy photo.

Friends and family on the farm

Vernon Family Farm hosts agritourism events

For the past nine years, Vernon Family Farm, a livestock farm in Newfields, has been supplying the community with fresh meat, farm-to-table meals and agritourism events like live music and outdoor classes hosted by other organizations. Their next event will be on Friday, Aug. 4, from 4 to 8 p.m. with dinner and live music by New Hampshire Grateful Dead tribute band Not Fade Away.

Having grown up in New London in a family that raised and processed animals for consumption, Jeremiah Vernon developed a love for the farming lifestyle. This interest was reinforced while attending college in Maine.

“There was a big dairy farm near the school and the dairy farm had a restaurant … and I just became enamored with the whole farm scene they had going on over there,” he said. “That was sort of my start of production farming and basically I’d been farming for other people for about 10 years and then in 2014 we bought our own property and started our one farm.”

What started out as Jeremiah’s passion has turned into a family affair, his wife Nicole Vernon, a Spanish teacher at Exeter High School, co-owning the farm with him.

“It’s what I wanted to do having worked on farms for so long. This is who I am and what I want to do,” he said. “Nicole at the time [was] on the outside looking in as far as her farming experience, but now 10 years in she’s as deep in it as I am. … Now it’s definitely a shared passion and shared career.”

The farm has come a long way since growing 1,200 broiler chickens on leased land in 2012. They now annually produce about 15,000 to 20,000 chickens as well as other livestock, like pigs and sheep and a small amount of vegetables, such as cherry tomatoes and sugar snap peas, on their 33-acre property. They have a farm store open daily from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., host dinners on Thursdays and Saturdays from 4 to 8 p.m. and Sunday brunch from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and have even created a second business, Vernon Kitchen. While the catering company used to be a part of Vernon Family Farm, it made more sense to have it be its own entity that the Vernons could hire to cater events.

“[It] means that we can do more events more often and we also have more resources available to us,” Jeremiah said. “It is also the highest-profit market aspect of our business, so having a customer buy a ticket and sit down for a fried chicken dinner, that’s the most profitable way we can get that chicken to you.”

On average, about 50 to 100 people attend these events, with upward of 300 on nights when there is live music. Tickets can be purchased on their website ahead of time or upon arrival for music events. For non-music events, a $5 cover is charged that is donated to various nonprofits.

In addition to dinners, entertainment and tours, the farm also functions as a space for other businesses to use for classes on yoga and meditation, cooking and art.

“Our farm is very beautiful, like many in New Hampshire,” Jeremiah said. “We have a big wildflower meadow, nice seating, there’s animals everywhere [and] ample parking. It’s a nice … creative space to occupy.”

Upcoming events at Vernon Family Farm

Kids Art Classes: Treehouse Construction
When: Friday, Aug. 4, 10 a.m. to noon
Where: 301 Piscassic Road, Newfields
Visit: vernonfamilyfarm.com

Not Fade Away
When: Friday, Aug. 4, 4 to 8 p.m.
Where: 301 Piscassic Road, Newfields
Visit: vernonfamilyfarm.com

Featured photo: Event at Vernon Family Farm. Photo courtesy of Vernon Family Farm.

Cherry trees & memories

Authors on Main series features Ann Patchett

In the end, it is the elated, tragic and everyday moments in between that make life beautiful. This is the feeling I was left with after reading Tom Lake, the latest novel by award-winning author Ann Patchett, which is set partially in New Hampshire. Patchett will be at the Capitol Center for the Arts in Concord for the sold out Authors on Main series event on Tuesday, Aug. 8, at 7 p.m.

For as long as she can remember, Patchett has wanted to be a writer.

“If you had interviewed me when I was 5, seriously, I would have been like, ‘Yeah, I want to be a writer,’” she said. “I don’t understand where that comes from, but it’s the sort of defining thing about me that even when I was a kid I always knew that was what I was going to do and I really never strayed from that, which made my life very simple.”

When Patchett first read her favorite piece of American literature, Our Town by Thorton Wilder, in high school, it planted a seed in her mind that would blossom into her ninth novel decades later. Our Town follows Emily Webb and George Gibbs, two neighbors who fall in love, get married and go through the course of life together.

“Nothing really happens,” Patchett said. “It’s not a play of action so much as it is a play about learning to see that life is beautiful and brief and we are best advised to pay attention to it.”

The same could be said about Tom Lake, a sentimental, heartfelt portrait of one woman’s life. Lara’s three daughters return to the family cherry farm in the spring of 2020. We follow along as Lara tells her children the story of her romance with a famous actor in the summer of 1988 during her time at Tom Lake, a theater company in Michigan.

Lara’s story begins in New Hampshire, where her spontaneous involvement in the community theater production of Our Town as Emily sets the ball rolling.

At the Authors on Main event, Patchett will discuss her new book with her longtime friend, author and editor Katrina Kennison, and will take part in a Q&A hosted by NHPR Morning Edition host Rick Ganley.

“We are old friends … and she was somebody who I talked to a lot about this book early on in the process, so she feels like she’s really a part of the story,” Patchett said of Kennison. “I like to go see somebody that I know while I’m on book tours. It’s just really helpful to have somebody who’s kind of an anchor for me in every place, so the fact that Katrina lives nearby and that we will be doing this event together makes it a very happy thought.”

When asked where she draws inspiration from for her stories, Patchett said, “Life itself is inspiration. It’s just a matter of being an observant person and an interested person and a good listener.”

“I think that appreciating what you have is maybe a good thing to take away from this book,” Patchett said. “It’s a lot about what we want [when we’re young] versus what we want when we’re older, [and] also telling the story of your life to the people that you love.”

Lots of singing and dancing on stage

Peacock Players present Legally Blonde The Musical Jr.

The 2001 Reese Witherspoon classic comedy film Legally Blonde was reimagined into a musical stage play in 2007. Nashua-based theater company Peacock Players will be among the latest to present the youth production of this show, Legally Blonde The Musical Jr., at The Janice B. Streeter Theatre (14 Court St., Nashua) from Friday, Aug. 4, through Sunday, Aug. 6.

“It’s a show about a young woman who thinks her whole life revolves around [a] man,” said Elle Millar, the show’s director. “She finds out that her whole life is actually worth so much more than that.”

Millar has been the executive director at Peacock Players for about a year. Originally from Mont Vernon, New Hampshire, Millar was involved in theater growing up and went on to study opera performance in college. She soon realized being an opera performer wasn’t the lifestyle she saw for herself, and decided instead to be an English teacher.

“Over Covid, like a lot of people, I was doing a lot of soul-searching,” she said. “I really enjoyed what I did but I didn’t feel like I was fulfilling every part of myself. I was the drama director at the middle school but I just felt like, ‘This isn’t the best way to do the things that I love to do.’”

Over the pandemic, Millar was planning to open an arts education nonprofit when the executive director position at Peacock Players opened up.

“I had heard from some of our teens that this was the show that got canceled right before Covid,” she said. “I also love the show personally … [and] it’s always been a dream of mine to direct [it] so it’s really exciting to get to do it here and in this way.”

Making her Peacock Players debut is Gianna Stewart-Markert. The starring role of Elle Woods is quite different from characters she is used to playing, like Carrie in Carrie: The Musical and the role of Matron “Mama” Morton in Chicago that she will play this fall.

“Elle Woods is definitely very bubbly and determined,” Stewart-Markert said of her character.

So when her Harvard-attending boyfriend breaks up with her, she uses that determination to get into the law school herself. She is then assigned to defend famous fitness guru Brooke Wydham, who is accused of murdering her husband.

“She’s this fitness queen [who] makes millions of dollars with her fitness DVDs,” said Lily Azevedo, who plays Wyndam. “She’s kind of a girl boss. … She is definitely strong, independent and an entrepreneur because she’s making those millions.”

As this was a show involving a lot of dancing, Azevedo went into auditions with an open mind, knowing that even if she ended up only being in the ensemble that she would still get the chance to dance.

“There’s one dance called ‘Whipped Into Shape’ and it’s gotten me whipped into shape,” she said. “[There’s] a lot of jumping and a lot of singing and high notes and belting but it’s like a love-hate relationship. I really enjoy it but it’s also really difficult, but the more we work on it, the turnout will be fabulous.”

According to Millar, strong vocalists are a must for this show. About twice as many kids as the show requires auditioned, and while this called for tough, heartbreaking decisions, it meant the cast would consist of solid, committed members, she said.

“This is a show you don’t attempt unless you think you have the voices to pull it off,” Millar said. “You need a lot of strong singers in a very specific pop, belty style, so this would not be a show I would [have] picked before I got to know the kids, but we had the people we needed.”

Peacock Players present Legally Blonde The Musical Jr.
When: Friday, Aug. 4, at 7 p.m.; Saturday, Aug. 5, at 2 and 7 p.m., and Sunday, Aug. 6, at 2 p.m.
Where: The Janice B Streeter Theatre (14 Court St., Nashua)
Cost: Tickets range from $12 to $18; call the box office at 886-7000 or visit peacockplayers.org

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