Cover Art: ‘A Burst of Butterflies’
By Christine Stoddard | cstoddard@queensledger.com
The following is the art that appeared on the cover of the Feb. 1, 2024 print issue for Black History Month:
Digital illustration by Christine Stoddard
‘Badass Lady-Folk TV’: Clinton Hill Comedian Hollie Harper
By Christine Stoddard | cstoddard@queensledger.com
The following is an excerpt from an episode of the TV talk show Badass Lady-Folk, featuring guest Hollie Harper, a comedian and actress based in Clinton Hill. Hosted by Christine Stoddard and filmed at Manhattan Neighborhood Network, Badass Lady-Folk is a feminist talk show that originated on Radio Free Brooklyn, where it airs on Fridays at 9am. This transcript has been edited and condensed for print purposes:
Badass Lady-Folk talk show episode featuring guest Hollie Harper and host Christine Stoddard.
Christine: Hello there, you’re watching or listening to Badass Lady Folk. I’m your host, Christine Stoddard. And this episode, my guest is Hollie Harper. Welcome, Hollie.
Hollie: Hi, thank you. Thank you for having me.
Christine: Yeah, of course. I had the director, who you know, Melanie Goodreaux on the show.
Hollie: Yes, yes.
Christine: She was our first guest.
Hollie: Oh!
Christine: And that, dear listeners, is how Hollie and I met working on this production, [“The White Blacks” at Theater for the New City]. But Hollie is really just a brilliant all-around actress.
Hollie: Thank you.
Christine: Comedian especially.
Hollie: Thank you. I’m silly. You are silly. I say inappropriate things and then I realize that’s my strength.
Christine: I like how everywhere on your branding it’s comedy nerd.
Hollie: Yes.
Christine: So tell me, what is that about? A comedy nerd.
Hollie: Okay. It took me a long time to realize I was a comedy nerd. But, okay, it started when I was like eight or nine, nine years old with Mad Magazine. And I was like,
Christine: R .I .P.
Hollie: Yes. (laughing) And then it was Cracked, you know what I mean? But I felt like, I remember when I saw it the first time I was like, “Is this real?” I was like, “Oh my God, this is the best thing I’ve ever seen in my life.” Like, and then Cracked was like a shoot off of Mad. I just, I was religious with it. And then any kind of comedy sitcom, any kind of comedy movie. And I love funny songs, I love sketch shows, I love sitcoms, I love funny moments on talk shows. And I realized you’re, you’re a freaking comedy nerd. Like I love stand-up, I love to do funny plays. So, I am just a nerd, a nerd for things that are comedic.
Christine: Yeah, what were some of–besides Mad and besides Cracked–what were some of the early references, some of the sitcoms and movies and whatever else you just adored as a kid?
Hollie: Okay, this is so great: Three’s Company. That stuff was trash, it was trash. But it was high art trash. And I realized, I started getting to the point. where I started keeping a journal. I kept a diary from five to 25. It’s the strangest thing, to go back, I kept a consistent diary for 20 years. From kindergarten until the second year out of theater school.
Christine: Did your parents read it?
Hollie: They’ve read a couple things. I got grounded a few times. I was like, why y’all reading my stuff? Like, what’s wrong with you? But I was not a bad kid. I was just like, damn. (chuckles) Guess I thought I could write here but it was not a safe space. Why are you–just to get intel, but I would keep a diary and I would watch sitcoms and I would start listing different types of jokes and I didn’t realize that I was really just breaking down what comedy was to the point where I’d be watching Three’s Company and I remember realizing when there were double entendres, telling things that meant two things. Like, I remember Jack and Chrissy were, like, moving a couch, moving a mattress in the bedroom, and Janet would be in the living room and they’d be like, “It’s too big !” And she’d be like, “So, it’s too big.”
Christine: Yeah.
Hollie: So that just, yo.
Christine: That show was not for children.
Hollie: It was not.
Christine: But so many people watched it as little kids.
Hollie: Okay, my son is in the sixth grade, right, and let me tell you something, when you have kids, you get these crazy flashbacks of things you did when you see them at that age you long forgot. So my son had a science project (and I went through this with my 16-year-old, too). I went through this last night. BS they do. It’ll be like 10 o ‘clock at night, they be like. “I got a science project.”
Christine: Oh no.
Hollie: You’re like, what? Look, I got to rush. You got to come up with a hypothesis and like, remember that [three-sided presentation board].
Christine: They’re so big.
Hollie: It was a nightmare. They’re huge, and they still do it. They still do it. You know, just once, I want to do adult science projects with comedians.[When I was a kid], I had some science project. I don’t even know what it was, but I waited. And all of a sudden I was like, “Oh my God, I’m just gonna have to dazzle them with a performance.” And my dad was like, “No, like you need–”
Christine: This is middle or high school?
Hollie: I was 11, in sixth grade. And everyone had to go up and present this project. And I don’t know what I was thinking, but I just came up in front of the class and they’re all just sitting there ‘cause they knew I was a little silly They’re like, “What is this girl gonna do?” And all of a sudden I just said, “Hit the lights,” and I had a friend, he was on the lights, and the lights went out and the teacher was like, “What’s going on?” And the lights came on and it went poof! This big, like, baby powder and then came on Herbie Hancock’s “Rockit,” and I started, like, moonwalking and, like, doing this whole dance. And I was just something like, “Oh, the clouds, really, the clouds.” But it was ridiculous. I got, like, an A for presentation and then, like, a D for my report.
Christine: Was the teacher laughing during all that?
Hollie: The teacher was dying. The teacher was like 28 years old and like, “What is happening?” I was like dancing all around, I felt the desk, I was like leaping over the desk…oh my God, it was ridiculous. I changed, I had an outfit and I went on the hallway and I put an outfit on and came back in.
Christine: Wow.
Hollie: They were just like, “Why’d you do all that?” And I was just like, “I had nothing prepared.” And I was like, “I think if I could just razzle -bazzle them, they would just…” And it worked. All of the teachers looked at me for a week. Like, “You’re the kid with the baby powder?” And the janitor’s like, “I had to clean that sh*t out.” Janitor was pissed.
Christine: Early improv, right?
Hollie: I think back on it, I’m like, “If my son did that now, I’d be so pissed.” I told him that, and he was like, “You didn’t…why didn’t you do your project?” I was like, “No, I danced it out and had sound effects. It was ridiculous.”
Christine: So let’s fast forward to theater school. What made you decide to do that? well it was crazy to
Hollie: When I was a little kid, I got into acting in Philly. I was Tinkerbell at a community theater in a suburb of Philadelphia. My mom got remarried and we moved to South Jersey. I had a teacher who really hated me in the sixth grade. But I tried out for the play. and I hadn’t done any acting since I left Philly when I was nine. So I was like 11. And I was like, I auditioned for this play, but my mom had a dentist appointment. She’s gonna pick me up and the callback sheet wasn’t going up to the end of the day. So I was like, “Mr. Dixon, did I make it in the callback?” And she goes, “No, and you aren’t very good.”
Christine: (gasps) No!
Hollie: Yo. She, like, crushed the acting me for years.
Christine: How could she crush a child like that?
Hollie: Evil -hearted woman.
Christine: Yeah, when I hear people say, “Oh, anyone can be a teacher,” that is not true.
Hollie: No, they can pass the test, but you actually being…no, she was horrible. She hated me.
Christine: I’m so sorry.
Hollie: That’s okay. It wasn’t till I was almost 17 that I started acting again. And then I was at a boarding school and this girl on my cheerleading squad was like, “You know, my mom’s a director and she’s going to be directing the play here. Why don’t you just try out for it?” And I was like, “Oh, no.”
Christine: Did you tell that friend about what happened to you?
Hollie: No, I didn’t.
Christine: But she sensed.
Hollie: Yeah, ‘cause I was like, we talked about movies all time. And she was a Broadway actress, a child Broadway actress that was just in our boarding school. And so I auditioned for the play. I got the lead in the play and her mother and then the new acting teacher at our school were all “Gung ho, Hollie Harper.” They changed the trajectory of my life. They taught me what theater school was. And so they found the auditions, they were like, this is where you need to go, this is what you need to do. They helped me do everything. They really changed the path of my life. And that director, I still talk to her on Facebook at least once a month. This is like 30 years later. I still talk to her. It was precious. She’s just a really good person.
Christine: So you went to DePaul.
Hollie: Yeah, I went to DePaul Theatre School.
Christine: Okay, you’re gonna talk sh*t or sing your praises or was it both?
Hollie: Okay, it was a horrible time in my life and it was a beautiful time in my life. I had to really sort this out in 2020 with the racial reckoning because I saw something with Jon Baptiste and all these different black actors and musicians were talking about what it’s like to be Black at music and theater conservatories and I was like, I don’t think a lot people really understand. But the actual instruction I got I think is second to nothing. Okay, ‘cause my mom got remarried, I got new siblings. They’re awesome, but I went from being in Philly, which was like Brooklyn, very multicultural, to being like in a Trump pants land in South Jersey. I was the only black kid in the class. I remember being in the first day of school, like getting on a school bus and there were, you know, all white kids and me, and like nobody even wanna sit next to me.
Christine: Gross.
Hollie: I dealt with a lot of racism when I was little and it was crazy. What’s crazy is the fact that I see these people now and we’re adults and we’re like, “Hey, how are you?” I don’t think they really processed how they affected a kid. Do you know what I mean? I went there and then I went to boarding school. My favorite place on earth is my boarding school. Like, when I go back to my boarding school now, I lay on the grass and I cry. Like I wanna be buried there. Like I love that place.
Christine: How many years were you there?
Hollie: I was there for three years.
Christine: Okay, wow.
Hollie: I went back and I taught sketch comedy this past January. I love that place, they changed my life. But it was mostly a white space. And then by the time I got to theater school, there was a part in me that was just burnt out from being in white spaces. Like, it was funny how there was like the racial reckoning in 2020. That sh*t happened for me in 1988. I was a teenager, that happened for me. All of a sudden I just started really looking around at power structures, class, gender, race, just capitalism, just being an American. ‘Cause our school was a Quaker boarding school. All you do is talk about ideas. And you live there, so there’s no off button. You know what I mean? And you either fit in or you don’t. You know what I mean? If you’re like, I just think America’s cool, you’re not gonna fit in. You know what I mean? They’re gonna be like, uh, you don’t have questions? So by the time I got to theater school, racially, it was a nightmare, but for me, like internally, there was nobody beating me down. There was nobody mean, you know what I mean?
Watch the full episode at YouTube.com/@badassladyfolk. Find out more about Badass Lady-Folk at BadassLadyFolk.com.
Letter From the Editor – From Feb. 1, 2024 Print Edition
By Christine Stoddard | cstoddard@queensledger.com
The following first appeared in the Feb. 1, 2024 print edition:
Dear readers,
Happy Black History Month! In this issue, I am excited to introduce you to Black comedian Hollie Harper if you do not know her already. I always find value in creating and reading transcripts of video interviews. After all, “watching a video” is not a universal experience. Somebody who is blind or vision impaired has a different frame of reference for a video interview than someone who has a more standard range of vision. Same goes for the deaf and hearing impaired versus those who are not. Reading a transcript allows us to focus on the content of what is being said, though it does of course limit our ability to observe body language or tone of voice. A transcript privileges the text, which has its pluses and minuses.
This issue also features a submitted essay on Black Land Ownership, a community organization in Greenpoint, from Melissa Hunter Gurney, a poet and fiction writer I have known since before I even moved to Brooklyn. I know reading it made me pause and reconsider what land ownership means for Black folks.
Now for some lighter fare: The letter from Jackie Cavalla on our ‘Dispatch’ page honestly surprised me. A couple of weeks ago, when I whipped out a pigeon doodle and brainstormed ways to make pigeon facts a little silly, I was not expecting any kind of response. Sometimes, we writers come up with content that amuses us or follows our personal interests. We fill a page and hope it brightens someone’s day or makes them chuckle. No further reaction required or anticipated. But it just goes to show that any story can inspire a reply–even a written one! With photos!
I cannot mention personal interests without acknowledging poetry. Your emails and social media comments made it very clear that many of you have been loving the Brooklyn Poetry Feature. Just because the New York Times stopped running poems does not mean we have to do the same! Your enthusiasm convinced me to keep the poetry series running just a tad longer, or at least until the submissions run dry. Keep ‘em coming!
Yours in all things BK,
Christine Stoddard
Brooklyn Community Editor
cstoddard@queensledger.com
Williamsburg Fire Exposes Urgent Need for Renters Protection
By Stefanie Donayre | news@queensledger.com
In the early hours of Dec. 15, a devastating fire swept through a two-story residential building in Williamsburg, displacing residents and presenting equally numerous challenges for those in adjacent apartments. The fire, caused by unattended food cooking on a stove, began at nearly 4 a.m. at 137 Kingsland Ave., spread to 135 and 139 Kingsland, and burned for three hours before being contained by FDNY. Residents were evacuated, and the Red Cross was called in to assist. However, for many, the challenges were just beginning.
One resident, Shantelle Lim, who resided at 139 Kingsland Ave. since March 2023, was out of town during the incident when she received frantic calls from her roommate at 5 a.m. unraveling the emergency.
“At first, I didn’t realize how serious it was, until he told me that he and my other neighbors were being sent to a hotel and were unable to re-enter our building,” wrote Lim in an email interview. “We didn’t have renters insurance. No one in our building did.”
The absence of renters insurance meant there was no financial safety net to protect personal belongings.
While building owners are mandated to insure the residence, this coverage primarily shields the structure alone. In case of fire, water damage, or other disasters, a landlord’s insurance doesn’t extend to renters’ personal items.
The management at 139 Kingsland Ave. told residents to find alternative housing. Lim, affected by a layoff in 2023, struggled to secure another apartment and had to relocate back to California to stay with family.
“I came back to NYC briefly to settle things at the apartment and retrieve whatever belongings that may be salvageable, which were none,” wrote Lim. “I think more efforts to be proactive and availability for conversation would be helpful.”
In response to the challenges faced by residents, District 34 Council Member Jennifer Gutiérrez’s spokesperson shed light on the city’s response and acknowledged the district’s high rate of residential fires, emphasizing the need for improved transparency and communication.
“The transparency comes from being able to track the process from A to Z,” said the spokesperson. “If A is being displaced, and Z is being able to get back into your home, being able to read the whole alphabet in between.”
The spokesperson mentioned an upcoming package of bills focused on fire remediation, aiming to add transparency and accountability and prioritize essential processes after a fire. The bills seek to bridge the communication gap between agencies and affected residents.
“Our office has been specifically looking into if there is anything that we can do, mandate, or we don’t really want to mandate renters’ insurance, but provide in terms of renters insurance,” said the spokesperson.
The aftermath of this Williamsburg fire highlights the necessity of better transparency, communication, and resident support networks. City officials are working toward legislative measures to address the shortcomings in the current system and better support those who may face similar emergencies in the future, while the affected community navigates through this devastating fire.
‘Believe the Hype’ Column: Black History Month & African Art Museums
By Christine Stoddard | cstoddard@queensledger.com
It is February, which means it is Black History Month, and in Brooklyn of all places, that must be observed. On the website Brooklyn.org, run by the Brooklyn Community Foundation, bold text declares that the borough is home to the second-largest Black population in the United States. Who’s in first place? Chicago. And despite Atlanta having a higher percentage of Black folks (47.6 vs. 38. 8 percent, per Census.gov), Brooklyn has more Black residents than Atlanta and Detroit combined. Brooklyn’s Black population is more than 730,000 people, which is bigger than the entire population of Washington, D.C. How does this compare to the national percentage of Black people? 13.6 percent of the U.S. population self-identifies as Black. Stats—they’re fascinating!
Bedstuyfly
There’s a clothing shop called Bedstuyfly (styled like that, all as one word) that opened when Ralph Ave. was my C stop. It has a second location that I have come to know on Fulton St., closer to the Kingston-Throop stop on the C. The flashy designs, with bright colors and memorable slogans celebrating Brooklyn and Blackness caught my attention from first glance. The style seems to be Hip-Hop Meets Hipster and, when in doubt there’s the aesthetic choice of “put a pigeon on it” à la Portlandia’s “put a bird on it.” One ball cap that especially stands out bears the words “There should be more Black billionaires.”
Side note: If you are curious about which African-American entrepreneurs, athletes, and entertainers are billionaires, don’t worry, I found you the answer: Tyler Perry, LeBron James, Tiger Woods, Tope Awotona, Alexander Karp, Michael Jordan, Jay-Z, Oprah Winfrey, David Steward, and Robert F. Smith. Notice that I specified African-American, not African or Black more broadly.
Black Billionaires
One argument for why there are not more Black billionaires is colonialism and its lasting legacy. The notion of “post” in the pop academic term “post-colonialism” is false if disparities based on race and ethnicity, steeped in colonial hierarchies, still exist. The challenge is, how can Black people build wealth if they are still coping with such socio-economic inequity?
Museums’ Reckoning
When you think of colonialism, it’s natural to turn your mind to museums. Right now museums are undergoing a major reckoning. The Biden administration changed the 1990 Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGRPA), making it so that museums must have consent to display items from Indigenous cultures. This has meant a big upheaval at the American Museum of Natural History, where the admissions of guilt flooded a letter from President Sean Decatur to his museum staff. This letter is publicly available on the AMNH website. In it, the president of the museum admitted that the institution holds remains from five enslaved African-Americans. Their bodies had been extracted from a burial ground in Inwood during a city road construction project in 1903-1904.
In the letter, Decatur writes, “Enslavement was a violent, dehumanizing act; removing these remains from their rightful burial place ensured that the denial of basic human dignity would continue even in death. Identifying a restorative, respectful action in consultation with local communities must be part of our commitment.” You can say that again!
Cultural Museum of African Art
One museum that has piqued my curiosity, though not yet my attendance, is the Cultural Museum of African Art. You will find it in Bedford-Stuyvesant at 1360 Fulton St., 2nd floor. You probably know this shopping complex, which is home to Restoration Plaza, for its Applebee’s and the post office. In 1971, a Brooklynite named Eric Edwards purchased a maternity female statue of Senufo-Bambara origin from Mali; the rest, as they say, was history. I’m skipping a few steps to fast-forward to 2023: Edwards eventually curated more than 3,000 artifacts from all 54 countries of Africa. The museum, which opened in February of last year, houses his collection spanning 4,000 years. The opening was scheduled to coincide with Black History Month. Now you can visit Tuesday through Saturday, 10am to 5:30pm.
Museum of African Art & World Cultures
Being a journalist makes me a naturally inquisitive and observant person, and these qualities have only been strengthened through training and experience. Every time I walk out the door, there is potential for a new discovery. On Bedford Avenue, on the Bed-Stuy/Clinton Hill border, perhaps you, too, have noticed the banner that reads “COMING SOON! Museum of African Art & World Cultures.” You will see it between Madison St. and Putnam Ave.
Now, running errands this past week, the banner caught my eye mainly because I have only recently started sojourning to that area regularly again but also because it was bright white on a gray day. It triggered a memory: a smaller museum called the Bedford Stuyvesant Museum of African Art (BSMAA) from years ago. I had these nagging questions. When was that? Where had this museum been exactly? Was it in this same spot or farther east? The pandemic has blurred my sense of time and place. Besides, I have to be honest: I never stepped inside of that museum.
So I did some Googling. It turns out that the Bedford Stuyvesant Museum of African Art shut down due the pandemic, unsurprisingly, but it did not do so permanently. It has been renamed the Museum of African Art & World Cultures. The address–for when that reopening eventually comes–is 1157 Bedford Ave., Suite 2.
On Oct. 15, 2023, user @path_1873 posted a comment on the museum’s last Instagram post: “Is this museum permanently closed?” So I know I am not the only one who was wondering about it. The Instagram account is called @bedstuymaa, so it has not been updated to reflect the museum’s new name. Maybe that will change. The current account does not have a particularly large following: 474 followers as of Jan. 28, 2024. For comparison, @queensledger, the account for the Queens Ledger, the flagship newspaper of BQE media group, which owns the Brooklyn Star and other hyperlocal titles, has 6.8K followers. (Meanwhile, @brooklynstarweekly has a lowly 525 followers. Trust me, we are working on it! Just started this job.) If you think I’m getting hung up on numbers this column, I really am not. It is important to measure and compare things from time to time. Looking at numbers makes that possible. With the museum’s 474 followers, it may be possible to start fresh without too much hassle.
I have reached out to the Museum of African Art & World Cultures via email and made phone calls to both numbers listed on the website (office and cell) to no avail. Do you have intel? Let me know: cstoddard@queensledger.com. I am eager for updates, as I am sure the community is, too.
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Brooklyn Poetry Feature: Miranda Dennis, Emily Hockaday & Jiwon Choi
This was originally printed in the Jan. 25, 2024 edition of the newspaper.
Photo by Christine Stoddard.
In December 2023, the New York Times Magazine announced that it was ending its poetry feature after nine years. We asked Brooklynites to submit their poems to be published here. This week’s poets are Miranda Dennis and Emily Hockaday. This is the last installment in this series.
“The Lights Under Essex Street”
By Miranda Dennis
At the mouth of the sky
now that the trolleys are dead
each bulb a constant star
a forest of light
a low hum
lulled by
the cost of doing business
fixed parameters:
a city growing taller
but not always braver
a skyline made of glass
and steel
the sand that makes both
a full moon hangs low
its ear to the ground
for the secrets you are thinking
quietly, or so you think:
the tropes of married men
or gas rumbling low in your belly
your tender eyes unblinking
to the shifting light
I hold a space for you
it attracts moths furious
banging their soft heads
“Olivia Benson”
By Miranda Dennis
Cool cop I love you / mythic, a sainted nun in a cellar / a burnt down house brittle on the lips of a politician / I’m alive at dawn and grateful / I’m collared and treated gingerly and grateful / I toast my bread but suffer for it / and must I now lay my head across cool tile floor / and must I now stoke this fever and be dragged over my own coals / here in the flickering box that media built / here we are intermediaries with plummy bruised lips / and cool cop give me the icebox to curl into / and your jaw is a mountain range scalable as a defense / but you, too, are softer than this / you trim my nails when I cannot even read my own palm / you give me grace / you give me calm
Miranda Dennis’s previous work includes essays published in Granta, Witness Magazine, Quail Bell Magazine, and Hypertext Magazine, with a short story recently out in Allium. Her poetry has been previously published in storySouth, the Hollins Critic, Meridian, Cold Mountain Review, and others, with poetry reviews in the Hollins Critic and Quail Bell Magazine. She lives in Park Slope with an ancient, immortal cat.
Photo by Christine Stoddard.
“Live in this Body”
By Emily Hockaday
It was my mother who spotted the nighthawk
perched on the rail. A sort of hawk, she said.
Dark wings and sharp beak stood out
against the rushes and reeds. Even in the face
of bitter wind, I didn’t want to leave: the Sun
lit the hills of tall grass a flashy pink; the clouds
gathered at the edges of the day; nighthawks
were waking. Beyond this former landfill,
Brooklyn rose in sandstone peaks and glittering
glass windows. I have seen something ugly
transformed by beauty. I don’t know how many batteries
lie below the surface, left to leach into the bay
and surrounding vegetation. A city’s worth?
For now, I live in this body and try to forget
the destruction we wreak on this one, unlucky
ecosphere. How the lines of clouds light up
different colors. How the wind shakes the dry stalks
and moves ripples through the bay. How predators
take to the sky in the early winter dusk, unaware
of the land’s history.
Emily Hockaday’s latest collection, In a Body, was published by Harbor Editions in October 2023. She writes about ecology, chronic illness, parenthood, grief, and the urban environment. She’s on the web at www.emilyhockaday.com.
“I Am the Robot of the Situation”
By Jiwon Choi
Inside the coldest supermarket on Fifth Avenue
next door to the Spanish language daycare
brown mouse in-a-beret decal ambassador on the door
that is now the electric bike shop
is where you tell me how ready you are to hear all the answers
to the inquiring questions you are ready to ask
is it so easy to trust me in front of this bin of shiitake
mushrooms? Because who wouldn’t trust somebody ready
to plunge their hand into a gomorrha of fungi, but I am only good
at saying things you don’t want to hear:
marriages end in divorce or when one of us dies
veggie hot dogs are really 1000 pencil erasers hammered together
plastic roses are bad for the environment
no, I don’t want to visit your parents over Christmas
and though my advice will sound like a reckoning, consider:
if there’s a two-for-one sale on deli meats, just say no.
Jiwon Choi is the author of One Daughter is Worth Ten Sons and I Used To Be Korean. Choi’s third poetry collection, A Temporary Dwelling, will be forthcoming in June 2024. She started her community garden’s first poetry reading series, Poets Read in the Garden, to support local writers. You can find out more about her at iusedtobekorean.com.
‘Stolen Dough’ Docudrama Details Bensonhurt Inventor’s Legal Battle with Pizza Hut
By Christine Stoddard | cstoddard@queensledger.com
The next time you are salivating over a stuffed crust pizza, consider its origins. It just might be another Brooklyn invention. A new docudrama, Stolen Dough, directed by Stefano Da Frè, tells the story of Bensonhurst native Anthony Mongiello, claiming him as the real inventor of the stuffed crust pizza at the tender age of 18.
According to that same narrative, his patent was stolen by Pizza Hut, who brands the dish as Original Stuffed Crust® Pizza. The controversy stems from Mongiello’s history of communication with the company, including pitching his patent, which dates back to 1987.
The film, now streaming on Amazon Prime, tells the story of Mongiello’s one-billion-dollar lawsuit against the famous pizza franchise. At its heart, Stolen Dough is a story about capitalism, competition, and theft.
Prior to inventing the stuffed crust pizza, Mongiello worked at a local pizzeria that his friend’s father owned.
“I had a lot of respect for the small business owners, who put in 15-16 hours each day, with all the preparation of ingredients, and running a small business,” wrote Mongiello in an email forwarded to the Brooklyn Star by his media rep, Ryan McCormick of Goldman McCormick Public Relations. “However, most importantly, the person I respected the most was my father. He worked in the manufacturing of cheese products and held several patents all related to manufacturing inventions.”
Mongiello continued crediting his father in saying, “My father was a guiding force in my life as an inventor. He was the man who invented the actual Polio String Cheese stick that was sold as snacks to families across America. We were extremely inventive as a family. My father taught me to never take anything for granted and that supplied me with the values I still hold to this day.”
Mongiello has more than 30 years of experience in the cheese industry, most notably as CEO of Formaggio Cheese.
Getting Stolen Dough from concept to streaming was a years-long process. In 2022, director Da Frè, working in collaboration with Laura Pelligrini from Rosso International Films, won a grant from the Russo brothers, known for directing four Marvel films. The brothers, Anthony Russo and Joseph Russo, who are active members of the Italian Sons and Daughters of America (ISDA), fund the The Russo Brothers Italian American Film Forum Grant, which is administered by the National Italian American Foundation.
Mongiello said, “Stefano had pitched my story to them, and they loved the aspect of a true Italian American drama. The rest is history! Stolen Dough was only 1 out 7 features chosen to get funding and support from the Russo Brothers out of 1, 200 submissions.” The project won an additional grant from the Sons and Daughters of Italian American Foundation in May 2023.
Stolen Dough runs 46 minutes and is shot in a crime-suspense style. The film mixes interviews with stylized re-enactments of a young Mongiello inventing the stuffed crust pizza, pitching the idea to Pizza Hut and other major pizza franchises, and bonding with his brother over family history and pride.
“Seeing my story on the big screen and now streaming, is a dream come true,” wrote Mongiello. “I wanted to share my story with people for a very long time.”
Comic: Forget Fairytales (No. 1)
By Christine Stoddard | cstoddard@queensledger.com
The following comic is from Christine Stoddard’s Forget Fairytales series and was published in the Jan. 4, 2024 print edition:
Forget Fairytales comic by Christine Stoddard.
A Brooklynite’s Quick Museum Guide to Mexico City
By Christine Stoddard | cstoddard@queensledger.com
Right now, local museum-lovers gushing over the Spike Lee exhibition, which was recently extended at the Brooklyn Museum. But what if you are a museum nerd who longs for warmer locales? You might consider a trip to Mexico City, which is in some ways comparable to New York City for its size, cultural touchstones, and diversity in arts and entertainment.
A round-trip flight from JFK to MEX is typically $400-600 this time of year, and I swung a private Airbnb for just under $40 a night during my six-night, mid-January stay. During the day, temperatures reached highs in the 70s and, at night, the lows hit the mid-40s. With a currency exchange rate 16 times in our favor as Americans, the cost of eating out (and just about anything else!) is a gift to a Brooklynite’s wallet.
A view of Teotihuacan, a pre-hispanic archeological complex northeast of Mexico City.
Here are some of the Mexico City museums you might visit:
Museo Nacional de Antropología/National Museum of Anthropology: A massive museum full of Indigenous and ancient, pre-Hispanic wonders. Lose hours here.
Castillo de Chapultepec/ Chapultepec Castle: The Viceroyalty of New Spain lived here, so the visit feels like a mini escape to Europe. You will find many artifacts from the 1700s and 1800s. Think Hamilton-era but Spanish.
Teotihuacan: Not technically within the city, but nearby (and worth the hour drive), this archeological wonder is unlike anything in the Tri-State area. Giant pyramids call for your comfiest sneakers!
Museo Mural Diego Rivera/Diego Rivera Mural Museum: You have probably seen it in a thousand art history textbooks, but here you can soak in its full splendor: the sweeping Sueño de una Tarde Dominical en la Alameda Central mural.
Museo Frida Kahlo/Frida Kahlo Museum: This cobalt blue house museum is sometimes referred to as la Casa Azul. A must-see for Frida fans.
Museo de Arte Moderno/Museum of Modern Art: A unique collection of Mexican Modern art (roughly 1860s-1970s), including work by Rivera and Kahlo in its permanent collection, but also artists less frequently known to Americans. It is similar to the Mexican version of our MoMa. The gorgeous sculpture garden truly distinguishes the experience.
Museo de Tamayo/Tamayo Museum: The contemporary art museum, full of exciting work by international artists working today. It is our equivalent of the New Museum or the Whitney Museum of Art.