The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
Monday, September 19, 2016 — 5A
Classifieds
Call: #734-418-4115
Email: dailydisplay@gmail.com
ACROSS
1 Dangerous wind
for small boats
5 “You’re gonna
need a bigger
boat” movie
9 Barbecue rod
13 Actor Sharif
14 Verbal exams
16 Actress
Lollobrigida
17 Ship-fouling
organisms, on
Talk Like a Pirate
Day?
19 Lights-out tune
20 Horse hue
21 Spyglass
component
23 With 48-Down,
mediocre
24 “Alas ... ”
26 Cry of fright
27 Burning
29 Key lime __
30 Pigpen
31 Story surprises
32 What kids ask on
a long trip, on
TLAP Day?
36 What George
Washington
could not tell,
according to
folklore
37 Oregon Trail
wagon pullers
38 Ship’s right-front
section, on TLAP
Day?
43 Sends to the Hill
45 Agrees to
46 Wonderment
47 Wood-shaping
tool
48 Urgent distress
signal
49 When right turns
are sometimes
permitted
51 Tax agcy.
52 Dire fate
54 Two of a kind
55 The color of
tropical seas
57 Cold northern
region, on TLAP
Day?
61 “The Sopranos”
actress Falco
62 Human trunk
63 Ring of light
64 Flatfish
sometimes
served stuffed
65 Recipe amts.
66 Online auction
site
DOWN
1 Dollop
2 Doctors’ org.
3 Food storage
area, on TLAP
Day?
4 Swashbuckler
Flynn
5 __ of 6-Down:
French heroine
6 5-Down of __:
French heroine
7 Minnesota’s state
fish
8 Like a smooth-
sailing clipper
ship
9 Rank above cpl.
10 One tickling the
ivories
11 Sitting at the
dock of the bay
12 Tries a bite of
15 Taxpayer ID
18 Dissenting vote
22 Fictional Tom or
real-life Diane
24 Massage facility
25 Balloon filler
26 Old anesthetic
28 Wicked one
30 Mixes
31 __ Hold ’em
33 Enjoy, as
television
34 Overjoyed
35 Chess castles
38 Shove off
39 Post-WWII babies
40 Bill for drinks, on
TLAP Day?
41 Be indebted to
42 Married
43 Upper crust
groups
44 Rio Grande city
48 See 23-Across
49 Rowboat
propeller
50 Specialized
market segment
53 Giants slugger
Mel
54 All in favor
56 Director Ang __
58 Deadly snake
59 Dockworkers’
org.
60 Playfully shy
By Grant Boroughs
©2016 Tribune Content Agency, LLC
09/19/16
09/19/16
ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:
RELEASE DATE– Monday, September 19, 2016
Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle
Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis
xwordeditor@aol.com
WWW.CARLSONPROPERTIES.-
COM
734‑332‑6000
SEEKING PSYCHOLOGY GRADU-
ATE student with interest/experience in
OCD/Tourette syndrome to work as a
home companion for a 20 year old male.
Located in Brighton, 16‑24 hours weekly
for $16‑20/hour. Contact Patricia
Cagnoli, MD at (810)986‑6468
or patriciacagnoli@gmail.com.
HELP WANTED
FOR RENT
CHECK OUT OUR COOL
www.michigandaily.com
WEBSITE.
Rackham
Auditorium
was
filled
with
#20
jerseys
on
Saturday
night
as
Literati
Bookstore
warmly
welcomed
retired
USA
soccer
player,
Olympic gold medalist and FIFA
World
Cup
Champion
Abby
Wambach.
While
fans
are
used
to
watching Wambach on the field,
she now tours as the author of
her new memoir. “Forward”
follows her life as she grows from
an athletic, yet overlooked, child
of seven to becoming one of the
most successful soccer players
the world has ever seen. With
on- and off-the-field memories,
defeats and triumphs, she tells
her story with honesty and élan.
Saturday’s event, an on-stage
interview, began with Wambach
explaining that she has never
actually watched the ball hit the
net.
“It’s a momentary blackout,”
she told the interviewer. In the
first chapter of her book, she
wrote: “Although my eyes were
open and aimed in the right
direction, as soon as leather met
rope the picture went black…”
She explained the adrenaline
rushes, the pressures of being
a team leader and the lack of
choice she had in playing the
game of soccer.
“I was so good at what I did, I
never felt like I had a choice,” she
said. However, she added that
she “never wanted to be known
as just a soccer player.”
Wambach
also
made
a
powerful name for herself as an
advocate for equal rights. As the
leading scorer (184 career goals)
of any male or female player,
Wambach set high standards for
all soccer players and athletes.
“I’m in my prime for this,” she
told the audience. Her career,
she said, was in the perfect time
period of “women who didn’t
have Title IX rights and young
girls who don’t even know about
it … I am bridging that gap.”
Along with her successes,
however, Wambach also touched
on another part of her life —her
mistakes and regrets.
She
openly
spoke
to
the
audience about her mental health
and alcohol abuse. “After the
2011 World Cup, I became more
famous,” she said. But with that
pressure,
Wambach
stumbled
into a period of severe depression
and intense substance abuse, that
she said she kept a secret. As the
emotions poured out, Wambach
expressed her deep guilt about a
DUI that she received this past
April. She had begun writing
“Forward” before the incident,
but “the book took on a life of it’s
own and I had to tell my story,”
she said.
With little girls sitting front
and center, looking at Wambach,
she
earnestly
shared,
“(The
DUI) was the best thing that
ever happened to me, but I’m not
going to make the same mistake
two times.” Her vulnerability
and courageous persona was also
portrayed in certain chapters of
her memoir like “Depressive,”
“Addict” and “Failure,” which
she said are names that have been
given to her through the years.
She said writing this book, of
both the ups and the downs, was
“cathartic and healing.”
Within her memoir, Wambach
described
in
supreme
detail
moments on the field, including
specific players that she faced,
what goals she scored during
which games and, of course, her
most impactful memories. Some
of these memories were not even
during the games, but were the
moments where she wrote that
she “created relationships” and
“the
post-game
locker
room
after winning those medals.”
Recollections like this supported
Wambach’s motto that there is
more to life than soccer.
“All the labels that we give
ourselves don’t matter,” she
said. “The only label I really care
about is ‘Human.’ ”
Wambach
concluded
that
her next big goal is to break
barriers
of
segregation
and
discrimination
(especially
women’s and LGBTQ rights) and,
mainly, to enjoy her retirement
as non-soccer-playing Abby.
The night ended with a Q&A
from the audience and a book
signing.
“What is your advice to
the next generation of soccer
players?” a young boy asked.
“One, (the competition is)
gonna get harder, so watch the
game. It will only make you
better. Two, never let someone
tell you you’re not good enough
… it’s not about the end result;
it’s about the process. Stay in
the moment. Enjoy it,” Wambach
answered.
And
although
Wambach’s
memoir explained her progressive
and audacious success in moving
forward with her career, Saturday
night’s event made it clear that
she understands what it means to
live for the now, play the game for
the sake of the game and to never
let labels define her.
Abby Wambach brings
memoir ‘Forward’ to A2
ERIKA SHEVCHEK
Daily Arts Writer
Olympic champion discusses life after soccer and substance
abuse, generates warm welcome at local Literati bookstore
“Son of Zorn” ’s pilot isn’t partic-
ularly good. It’s not excruciatingly
terrible, nor is it some sort of fasci-
nating mess; there’s little to marvel
at in its pedestrian badness. It’s
simply an unin-
spiring, mediocre,
even boring half-
hour of television.
This is some-
what
surprising,
given the conceit.
“Son
of
Zorn”
is a hybrid, live-
action/animated
comedy
(think
“Who
Framed
Roger Rabbit?”) starring SNL
alum Jason Sudeikis (“Sleeping
With Other People”), Cheryl Hines
(“Curb Your Enthusiasm”) and Tim
Meadows (“Popstar: Never Stop
Never Stopping”). Zorn (Sudei-
kis) is an animated warrior from
the island of Zephyria (interest-
ingly, this isn’t based on an exist-
ing property), who decides to move
back to Los Angeles to rekindle his
relationship with his ex-wife, Edie
(Hines) and teenage son, Alangu-
lon (Johnny Pemberton, “Neigh-
bors 2”).
That central premise should
sound dispiritingly familiar to any-
one who’s watched enough televi-
sion. “Zorn” is a collection of tropes
— the deadbeat dad trying to better
himself, the fish-out-of-water, the
white male antihero, etc. — that
thinks it’s a novel spin on the genre
simply because of its visual presen-
tation. And while the animation is
deployed skillfully and creatively
(the show gets away with a nice,
winking gag involving a giant bird
and a sword), the jokes only land
sporadically.
Furthermore, Zorn looks to be
the only fully-formed
character
worth
investing in. Sudei-
kis’s
voice
acting
is impressive, even
bringing
to
mind
Will Arnett’s stellar
work as a similarly
bullish
character
on “BoJack Horse-
man,”
but
Zorn’s
development almost
certainly promises to be the same
redemptive arc we’ve seen in every
TV show with an absent father.
Meadows scores a few good laughs
at the expense of psychologists and
online professors everywhere, but
Hines’s “Curb Your Enthusiasm”
comedic brilliance is frustratingly
underused as a stock ex-wife.
What’s most frustrating, how-
ever, is the general lack of inter-
est in exploring more captivating
material. Simply transplanting an
animated character into the most
well worn of narrative set-ups does
not a successful story make. “Son
of Zorn” seems content to mine
the inherent absurdity of its prem-
ise only in the most surface-level
ways, rather than fully embracing
its narrative and comedic poten-
tial. The network sitcom is a dying
breed in the era of seemingly
unlimited content, and Fox has
managed to produce a number of
the best comedies currently on air,
but “Zorn” refuses to engage with
the substance that makes it stand
out.
Still, Phil Lord and Chris Miller
(“22 Jump Street”) are executive
producers, and a few tantalizing
gags offer their uniquely hilarious,
whacky and meta sensibility that
has already led to sitcom gold for
Fox (“The Last Man On Earth”).
An intriguing tag at the end of the
pilot, too, promises a more compel-
ling storyline going forward. But
rare glimpses of a more absurd and
surreal show lying restless under-
neath the stifling pilot can’t jus-
tify the intermittently funny slog
that we’re forced to endure in the
show’s establishing half-hour.
Reported turmoil behind the
camera might help explain an
unexceptional pilot that features
Jason Sudeikis and Cheryl Hines:
series creators Reed Agnew and Eli
Jorné (“Wilfred”) eventually left
the project midway through pro-
duction due to creative differenc-
es, and Sally McKenna (“Myrtle
Allen of Ballymaloe”) was brought
on as the sole showrunner. The
somewhat awkward mix of stan-
dard sitcom punchlines and more
visual, understated humor hints
at some of the tonal inconsistency.
Perhaps the show the original cre-
ators wanted to make might have
been more creatively ambitious
and inspired; the version we’ve got,
unfortunately, is not.
FOX
“This is so dumb, right?”
TV REVIEW
NABEEL CHOLLAMPAT
For the Daily
Despite visual presentation, ‘Son of
Zorn’ is still a stale television sitcom
New FOX hybrid comedy isn’t quite as original as it thinks it is
C+
Son of Zorn
Series Premiere
Sundays at 8:30
FOX
COMMUNITY CULTURE REVIEW
“Holy shit. It’s beautiful out
here,” Ross Gay said, opening his
reading this past Thursday at
White Lotus Farms. Such candor
is characteristic of Gay’s pres-
ence and work, an act of inviting
the reader in. It is worth men-
tioning that White Lotus Farms
is exquisite, about seven miles
off campus, dahlias in bloom,
the grass almost glowing green
against the rapid change of a
twilight sky — nearby, a minia-
ture waterfall rushes steadily.
Gay read at White Lotus
Farms as part of a reading series
curated by One Pause Poetry, a
local non-profit organization
that seeks to showcase both
emerging and nationally estab-
lished poets.
His third book of poetry,
“Catalog of Unabashed Grati-
tude,” from which he read, is
heavily touched by his green
thumb. The poet spends much of
his time gardening in the Bloom-
ington
Community
Orchard,
many of his poems acting as love
letters to the plants he handles
as they exist within the context
of a larger personal and global
world. Before reading, he cel-
ebrated that even many of the
weeds and flowers at the farm
were
“tremendously
edible,”
breaking into a Cheshire Cat
grin minus the inherent creepi-
ness.
Gay started with what he
calls “essayettes” or “delights,”
mini-essays that keep in mind a
definition of essay as an attempt
or trial. In his first essayette,
“Transplanted Figs,” he wrote
of carrying figs, in all of their
dirt and funk, through airport
security. He calls this act “smug-
gling” with a signature touch of
tenderness, as he declares, “I am
carrying joy around in my bag.”
Yet the levity of Gay’s work is
never boundlessly saccharine.
It moves to a place of loss that
exists beside what is typically
beautiful or delightful. He does
this often — a small gratitude
for a specific object or scene
can travel through memory to a
moment of hardship or intense
pain, to return to a larger and
more encompassing deeply felt
gratitude.
In another one of his essay-
ettes, he writes of waking up
from a nightmare, describing a
disturbing feeling with humor.
He jokes of a dream in which he
is chosen to be Hillary Clinton’s
vice president, poking fun at the
absurdity of it, while still touch-
ing on the panic and paranoia
that inadvertently burdens the
human psyche.
Gay read, “To the Mulberry
Tree,” a poem that opens with
a bird “pitching his swill” on
to the speaker’s face — in less
poetic terms, a bird taking a
dump dangerously close to Gay’s
mouth, an objectively disgusting
scenario. Yet the poem contin-
ues on with a sweet forgiveness
and rich nostalgia that travels to
include a haunt of death beneath
the aforementioned mulberry
tree, somehow circling back
to the lines, “the three of us
snugged in the canopy / on our
tippy-toes, gathering fruit / for
good.”
Gay ended with his title poem,
a 12- or 13-minute celebration
that overflows and extends. He
starts, “friends, will you bear
with me today…” and the audi-
ence complies. They giggle at yet
another mention of animal feces
or moments of the poem that
are more sensual — “easy tiger
/ hands to yourself. I am excit-
able” or a reference to “paisley
panties.” He spouts plant names,
as if in song, “thank you zin-
nia, and gooseberry, rudbeckia
/ and papaw, Ashmead’s kernel,
cockscomb / and scarlet runner,
feverfew and lemonbalm / thank
you knitbone and sweetgrass
and sunchoke.” Readers need
not be familiar with these plants
to relish in their sound.
You can hear murmurs and
gasps as the poem reaches the
moments of strife amid such
abundant gratitude. Gay pays
tribute to his father’s death and
with a reference to “dreadlocks
in a drawer,” harnesses the pain
of the racially charged murder
of a friend. Gay personifies an
overgrown arugula plant with
the phrase “nary a bayonet,” the
line humming as if an anthem
that encourages us to, at the very
least, try to let nature’s beauty
and the existence of a life-giving
love soften the blows of the fact
that that incumbent death lurks
among it.
As the poem nears its end,
Gay’s voice rises, becoming more
emphatic with each breath, and
he says “give me a minute,” to
which the dutiful audience com-
plies. Only the sound of a nearby
stream rushes fills the pause.
So often reminders of a need
for gratitude suggest the ignor-
ing of that which is dark and
heavy in our lives. They sug-
gest an ignorant joy or a mold
that fits only the minds of those
predisposed to optimism. Ross
Gay’s work focuses on a grati-
tude that is undoubtedly inclu-
sive of an unjust world, a loss of
a loved one, a gratitude despite
the fact that we get dirt under
our fingernails or that a bird
may indeed decide to make the
side of your face its own person-
al restroom. His work and pres-
ence radiate a joy with potential
to ease what ails us in a celebra-
tion of gratitude that is lyrical,
humorous and so unabashedly
growing toward the light.
MARIA ROBINS-SOMMER-
VILLE
Daily Arts Writer
Ross Gay reads his lush poetry at
Ann Arbor’s White Lotus Farms
Midwestern poet pays tribute to lost loves, gardening and fathers
COMMUNITY CULTURE REVIEW