Barry's Life in Napa Blog

It's mid February, 2020. I have a business meeting over a drink at nice Napa Valley bar and grill. There's no way of knowing that such simple pleasures will soon become off limits for more than a year.   At the theatre my biggest worry is the new law, AB5, that is going to turn community theatre financials upside down. But our rehearsal room is busy with dance classes and vocal lessons, and two new projects are underway - rehearsal for Sweeney Todd, and a theatre arts unit for a local elementary school that will wrap up in three weeks, on March 10th. That turns out to be a significant date.   On the weekend, I catch a show in Rohnert Park and see my granddaughter perform in Sacramento. We sit shoulder to shoulder and there's lots of hugging like always around theatres. We go out for food, naturally. There are no hand sanitizer stations, no markings on the floor six feet apart, no one wears a mask because it still seems the thing can be contained. Or it's like earlier sc

The first two weeks... One year ago today the calendar was chock-a-block with things to do and places to go. It was Saturday, February 1st, 2020, and over at Lucky Penny we had some classes for kids going and a rehearsal for our upcoming musical. I was set to work a half day in a local tasting room, and the Kiwanis Club of Napa crab feed was a highlight on the social scene that evening (which tells you a lot about Napa). Roddy Ricch had the number one song that week but I don't think the DJ played it at the crab feed.  One day earlier, on January 31st, 2020, the first positive coronavirus test in the Bay Area had been recorded in Santa Clara County.   One year ago this week we were meeting with potential donors for our biggest fund development project in Lucky Penny's 11-year history, and we hosted the Boys and Girls Club and Poetry Out Loud at the Community Arts Center. Most of the morning radio shows were kind of B- that week even though the California primary was only a mont

About five years ago, this blog vaulted out of the water, flopped around on the shore a little, and then stopped breathing. It wasn't that the water was too hot, or too cold, or too filled with plastic trash. Time, or the lack of it, conspired against me. But lo and behold, this blog survives! And it's time to jump back into the deep end. To prepare yourself properly, I encourage you to review and read my brilliant and insightful blog posts from the past. There are about five of those. You might also want to read the hundreds of others that are dumb and petty. That's up to you. In days to come I will be writing about the Napa-Focused Play Cycle Project, about news of the day, about things that strike me as funny/stupid/intriguing. I hope you will read and respond. More to come.

Yesterday a Starbucks opened at First and Main in downtown Napa. It is across the street from the long-time popular Napa Valley Coffee Roasting Company. Reaction to the event falls into one of three categories: 1.  Cool, that's convenient. 2. There was a corner somewhere that didn't already have a Starbucks? 3. APOCALYPSE!! GO TO YOUR BUNKERS!! THE CORPORATIONS HAVE EATEN YOUR BRAIN!! Having shed most all vestiges of brand loyalty long ago, I mercilessly vote with my feet and dollars in the most selfish ways; meaning, I buy stuff wherever it makes sense to me at the moment. My decision might be based on price once in awhile, but more often it's just convenience. To wit, this morning I wanted a coffee. I proceeded to the ground zero of Napa's new worldview-meets-retail thrill ride, First and Main. Finding that I was on the Coffee Roasting Company side of Main Street and Starbucks was 100 feet further to go, I opted for the immediate solution - but the line insi

Ever have a burr under your saddle about something and no one to complain to? Feel like you could Tweet it till Christmas but no one would notice? I did - a complaint about an annoying trend in live theatre. I decided to open my big fat mouth and say something about it, and wrote this piece for Howlround , which is a website for theatre nerds like me. http://www.howlround.com/here%E2%80%99s-your-hat-what%E2%80%99s-your-hurry-by-barry-martin/

This was NOT the "Greek" topic I was thinking of. I was sitting around looking for an excuse for not memorizing the lines I need to memorize, and I started thinking about how I am part of a fairly small subset of American men today - those who were excited about both European Cup soccer and the Tony Awards in the same day - and naturally that led me to furrowing my brow over the prospect of the Greeks voting this week on whether to stick with the euro or not. My life is complicated and I'm sure you feel sorry for me. In any case, it seemed like the only option was to pour another large glass of cheap red wine and give this whole mess some thought. Strap in, here we go. We owe the Greeks a lot. They gave us the foundation for western civilization as we know it, developing essential concepts like democracy, geometry, and theatre, and useful things like maps, plumbing and baklava. Without the Greeks, we might not have the Olympics, and we might have never discove