A pair of new businesses in Jacksonville may lead to the eventual creation of new forms of liquor licenses.

The Jacksonville City Council approved the first reading of an ordinance that would increase the number of liquor licenses by two for the new Waters Edge Winery on East Morton Avenue and the Cork and Crown Boutique at the corner of Main and College.

Mayor Andy Ezard says the new license for the winery has been in the works for a while now.

“We’re looking at that closely. City Attorney, Beard has been working with local developer Mike Hayes on what he’s been doing as far as the winery and his other building out there. They need two separate liquor licenses because they have two different addresses. Which is disqualified with the state.

You have to get a local license first before you obtain a state license. I know Dan has been working with Mike, there is more to come on that. I also know we need to get him a liquor license for McClelland Hall, he wants to use that as a venue or banquet facility.”

Mike Hayes informed the Council that his operation has already started making wine in the building at the winery that has an existing license. Waters Edge is a franchise and Hayes has signed a deal with the company to eventually produce all of the wines for the company.

Discussion on the production aspect lead the council to consider a new class of license better suited to the production and distribution of alcohol, such as a craft brewery license, something the current city ordnance does not cover.

Ezard says an additional license request by the owner of Cork and Crown could lead to another class type of license that’s on the other end of the spectrum.

“The other potential is to create a petite license for Elizabeth Lynch, she has a new business in town and she would like to see some things being done as far as purchasing some bottles of wine and some craft beer.

We’re looking at all of those things, we just wanted to get the ball rolling tonight. With first reading, more to come between meetings is two weeks. We will work out a lot of the details and if we need more time we will have to do a second reading. At the next meeting, we can table that till we are fully ready in October and everyone is satisfied.”

The creation of the boutique license would allow for the tasting or sampling of wine or craft beer on-site without being a full-fledged onsite consumption license.

Ezard said during the workshop he wanted to keep the annual license fee lower for a boutique license as the sale and possible consumption of the alcohol would be far and away from a traditional bar or tavern, nor would the sales aspect be near a standard package liquor retail store.

In other action, the city council approved the second reading of ordinances amending the zoning for several parcels of the former MacMurray campus, including changing Annie Merner Chapel and the McClellan Dining Hall from Public to B-4 with special use.

Mike Hayes is turning the combined properties into a wedding and reception, event hall. Hayes said during the meeting last night that the McClellan Dining Hall would now be named just McClellan Hall, and Annie Merner Chapel would not have a name change. He said it is his intention to keep the original names as much as possible of the buildings he has purchased on the campus, in an effort to help keep the spirit of the college alive.

Paris (AFP)

French star Gerard Depardieu is a living film legend but his excessive life off screen has been marked by scandal and tragedy.

His giant frame may have ballooned over the years, with his love of food and drink overshadowing his art, but his outrageous talent always ensured Depardieu would be forgiven even as he cosied up to Russian leader Vladimir Putin.

That may no longer be the case for France’s errant national treasure following Tuesday’s revelation that the 72-year-old has been charged with raping and sexually assaulting a young actress.

Darkness has never been far from the actor whose sublime sensitivity in such international hits as “Jean de Florette” and “Cyrano de Bergerac” made him one of cinemas greats.

In Depardieu the brute and the poet sit uneasily together and are what make him so magnetic on screen.

– ‘The thug in me’ –

The man who would come to personify a certain type of unabashed, expansive Frenchness grew up in extreme poverty, the son of an illiterate alcoholic metal worker father.

He was the third of six children.

Depardieu said his mother told him she had tried to abort him using knitting needles. They couldn’t afford another baby.

By his own account, he mixed with bad company, hanging out with prostitutes before working as a rent boy and committing various crimes including grave robbing.

At 16 he landed in jail for stealing a car and at 20 “the thug in me was alive and well,” he wrote in his 2014 autobiography.

Acting proved a salvation. He started on stage in Paris in 1965 and his breakout film came nearly a decade later playing a ruffian in the erotic comedy “Going Places”.

– Hollywood fame –

Money, he has never been embarrassed to admit, was the motivating factor in him first becoming an actor.

“That may sound vulgar but that’s how it is,” he said in 2015.

Depardieu’s star rose in Hollywood with the Oscar-nominated “Green Card” in which he and Andie McDowell tried to cheat US immigration with an arranged marriage and then fell in love.

Depardieu’s physique and large nose did not fit with the Hollywood model but his endearing friendly-giant portrayal won him admirers worldwide.

“He dominates the screen merely by leaving no room on it for anybody else,” wrote the critic and poet Clive James in 2017. “I have always wanted to be him.”

Despite his uncontested place among the global film elite, Depardieu never smoothed the edges of his rough beginnings.

– Scandal and tragedy –

His future in Hollywood and his hotly tipped best actor hopes for Cyrano in 1991 crashed and burned after an interview with Time magazine in which he claimed he witnessed many rapes during his dirt-poor childhood.

“I say a lot of stupid things,” the actor later said, trying to limit the damage, with a mistranslation of one of his quotes not helping.

Scandal followed scandal, veering from the comic to the tragic.

His relations with son Guillaume were so bad the younger Depardieu was charged with pointing a pistol at his father in 2003.

Guillaume, a hugely talented actor who struggled with drug addiction and lost a leg in a motorcycle accident, died in 2008 without reconciling with the father he described as selfish and violent.

“I basically screwed up with those I love,” Depardieu later admitted.

Meanwhile, the circus of his private life veered from drunk driving offences to no-shows at high-profile film premieres, controversial friendships, and one particularly notorious episode missing the bottle he was trying to urinate in on a plane.

“I’m not a monster. I’m just a man who wants to pee,” he told CNN after the story had been plastered across the world’s gossip pages.

Depardieu has four children with three partners, the longest relationship being with Elisabeth, an actress whom he married in 1970 and divorced in 2006.

– Gargantuan appetite –

Known for his gargantuan appetite, he owns several restaurants, vineyards, bistros and brasseries around the world.

His love of wine is matched by his astonishing capacity for consuming it, reportedly downing up to six bottles some days, though in his autobiography he claims the number can reach 14.

“If I hadn’t been an actor,” he said, “I’d happily be a pastry chef or a butcher.”

Once frequently listed as one of France’s favourite personalities, his popularity plunged after he sparked uproar by announcing he was returning his French passport and adopting Belgian citizenship to avoid a government tax hike.

He then accepted Putin’s offer of a Russian passport, sparking a bromance between the two men.

Depardieu has since become a staunch defender of the Kremlin’s policies, including its annexation of Crimea.

“I’m a citizen of the world,” he declared. “France is likely to become a Disneyland for foreigners, populated by imbeciles making wine and stinky cheese for tourists.”

© 2021 AFP

In a 1995 article in the Journal of Black Studies, Kenneth Christmon describes an interaction between the French ethnographer Marcel Griaule and a Dogon elder and priest named Ogotemmeli. Griaule, who was doing work in Mali, told Ogotemmeli that he was confused by the occasional ramblings he had heard from older, apparently drunk men who repeated what he believed to be a curious phrase: “The dead are dying of thirst.”

Ogotemmeli explained the phenomenon thusly: Death, he said, requires certain rituals to be performed before the departed can join the ancestors in peace. These rituals included a costly amount of food and drink; to economize, a family might wait until they could be performed with other families. While they waited, the spirits, caught between two worlds and in search of something to quench their thirst, would gather at the vats of fermenting beer that the families traditionally prepared for religious and secular purposes. They imparted the beer with their energy, giving it its intoxicating qualities. When an older man consumed it, Ogotemmeli continued, his ensuing state of drunkenness was the struggle between his own life force and that of the departed. So what sounded like incoherent nonsense to Griaule — “the dead are dying of thirst” — was actually the drinker’s attempt to expel the foreign energy. It made people take notice. The spirits are getting restless; it’s time to give them peace.

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The Black American cookout is a sacred institution. And just like church and the fundamentals of mac and cheese cookery, it has its own set of sacred rules. They govern every aspect of the function, from who can make potato salad to how to deal with your dietary restrictions to the variety of drinks you’ll see: juices, teas, Sprite, “sprite,” and — if you’re grown enough — brown liquor. Beer, though, is another question entirely.

I’m not saying you won’t find any beer at the cookout. I’d place a sure bet on Heineken, a solid one on Corona, and a possible one on Bud heavy. But if you arrive with only craft beer, all who see you will scorn you, and I can’t say I’d disagree with them. This culinary and social event is not for your Ahab’s Shanty Sea Salt Ale or Bobo Brazil Coffee Stout. That’s because the Cookout operates with a grace afforded it via a social contract. And while any number of things could be written about its governing rules, I’m eternally fascinated by ones concerning beer.

Before I continue, let me offer a simple acknowledgement: The ways that Blackness is lived and expressed are myriad, but sometimes you’ve got a hunch that your massive mental file of anecdotes might be part of a record that illustrates a larger, shared experience. As such, the question of how my melanated companions consume beer has lately been an ongoing topic of conversation between me and Christopher Gandsy, the chef, brewer, and owner of Flatbush, Brooklyn’s Daleview Biscuits and Beer. “I remember going to cookouts at my family’s house and men were always drinking beer,” says Gandsy, who named his brewery after Dale View, his hometown neighborhood in Columbia, South Carolina. “Only Budweiser, the tallboy cans.”

Regardless of how we do and don’t drink beer, there is, I believe, a widespread assumption that Black folks don’t drink — or make — the stuff. Beer, as it appears in American pop culture, is hilariously white. The idea of craft, as critic Lauren Michele Jackson has observed, is steeped in that whiteness. Of craft breweries, she writes, “the founders, so many former lawyers or bankers or advertising execs, tend to be white, the front-facing staff in their custom denim aprons tend to be white, the clientele sipping $10 beers tends to be white.”

You know the image: an hirsute white guy swilling beer in specialty stemware, in an “authentic” bar riddled with fugazi bullets in a gentrified neighborhood, frequented by patrons who read far too deeply into hip-hop lyrics.

To be fair, this is an exaggerated idea of craft beer, but that overwhelming whiteness colors the macro stuff too. White America has a monopoly on the stereotype of college-aged students crushing a 30-rack of Natural Light, and I dare you to find me a Coors Banquet TV spot featuring Black people.

The dominant image of beer culture in this country has always been predominantly white, or more specifically European: German lederhosen and Oktoberfest, English and Irish pubs, kitschy “authentic” biergartens. While beer certainly has a place in many European cultures, these images monopolize the collective imagination.

But it’s disingenuous, factually incorrect, and socially irresponsible to peddle that lily-white narrative, because it discounts the Black brewers and entrepreneurs deep in the beer game. Take, for instance, Sacramento’s Annie Johnson, who in 2013 became the first woman in 30 years — and the first Black brewer outright — to win the American Homebrewers Associations’ Homebrewer of the Year award. In Pittsburgh, Day Bracey and Mike Potter co-founded Fresh Fest, the nation’s first beer festival with a focus on brewers of African descent. Up in Harlem, Celeste Beatty runs Harlem Brewing Company, the first brewery in the country owned by a Black woman.

CORBIS via Getty Images

The overwhelmingly white imagery of beer culture erases a much longer, far-reaching narrative, too, as you’ll learn if you journey to Washington, D.C., where Kofi Meroe and Amado Carsky run the Sankofa Beer Company. Sankofa takes its boozy cues from ingredients and fermentation practices back home — “home” meaning Nigeria and Ghana for Meroe, and Nigeria and Benin for Carsky. Something Meroe told me revealed the presence of a cultural equation that was begging to be balanced. “It’s not necessarily that we’re bringing African beers or beer styles to America,” he said. “It’s more so that we’ve adopted American and European beers but [are] looking at West African fermentation, processes, styles, and ingredients as well.”

Beer, in other words, occupied a central role in pre-colonial West African religion and social life — and still does. From Africa to Colonial America to The Birth of a Nation, Black folk were no strangers to beer. But something had to happen to explain where we’re at now: a largely monochrome craft brew economy, macrobreweries that have historically neglected to market their core products to a Black demographic, and — in the instances when beer is around in Black homes — a fridge full of Heineken.

To understand why, it helps to begin in Africa: The more you learn about the role beer played there, and the practices and social norms around it, the easier it becomes to draw parallels to the lived experience of Black America.

“The ancestors of African Americans, they were fermenters. They were really good at making their own liquor and making their own beers and also making wine from fruit,” says the culinary historian and writer Michael W. Twitty. “One of our Africanisms, in fact, was producing all these things, and one of the reasons why we did that was because it was related to our traditional spirituality.”

Libation, Twitty adds, “is the heart of African spiritual worship.” He recounts seeing this firsthand on a trip to a Tikar village in Cameroon. “They pull out a big ceramic vessel full of their traditional beer,” he says. “And even though a lot of Tikar are Muslim, this is one of the traditional religious practices they kept alongside Islam.” While beer drinking may be nonexistent on Friday, Twitty notes, you better believe that at social functions to honor youth, celebrate a marriage, or put the deceased in the ground, alcohol is poured out and passed among the elders.

When trying to account for Black America’s apparently absent relationship with beer, hearing about this ritual consumption explains a lot — at least for me. When I was a kid, for instance, beer was never a presence in the fridge. It was limited to holidays and celebratory meals and functions: crab feasts, cookouts, and family reunions.

But if ritual and social mores might account for a great deal of why different cultures drink the way they do, climate informs it as well. And in the case of alcohol production and consumption, arguably no change in climate was more impactful than the Little Ice Age, a period of regional global cooling that stretched roughly from the beginning of the 14th century to the middle of the 19th.

While wine was no stranger to Northern Europe in a pre-cooled world, chillier weather devastated the region’s grape crop. “That Little Ice Age canceled grape growing in the British Isles and Scandinavia, and along the Baltic Coast,” Twitty explains. “Northern Europe went from being able to grow grapes to only being able to grow hops and grain.” On top of that, the historian Philipp Blom argues, the Little Ice Age ignited rapidly changing social, political, and philosophical movements across the world, fueling an age of exploration and the birth of capitalism. So from there, it wasn’t a big leap for white folks to build some big boats and then go a-sailin’ for spices, get crazy rich, engage in some casual acts of murder and land theft, then build even bigger boats and pack them to the gills with human bodies with the intent of forcing them to work as slaves to keep the economy alive.

The prevailing image of an enslaved Black person is that of someone laboring in the fields or being ordered around the big house, but American slavery built and sustained pretty much every aspect of this American life. And that included beer — again, the West African societies from which so many bodies were stolen were no stranger to the mechanisms of fermentation. “We know that enslaved Africans and African Caribbeans were brewing beer or were cultivating hops or other grains that would have been used in the brewing process,” says Theresa McCulla of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. Black brewing skill was no secret, she adds. Advertisements for enslaved people who were skilled brewers? Absolutely. Wanted posters that identified fugitives as skilled brewers or otherwise involved in the brewing industry? As American as apple pie. Peter Hemings, enslaved at Monticello, was a master brewer.

I’m loath to call this knowledge “revelatory,” yet I’m having a hard time thinking of a more fitting word. Erasure is deliberate. Black folks’ labor and participation in the production of a craft product should be tied to that product itself. It’s a bizarre occurrence, really, that a niche economy obsessed with craft conveniently ignores the forced, unpaid labor that made those goods. Beer hardly stands alone in this conversation — think of the aesthetic and consumer culture surrounding barbecue or whiskey. Or, as Lauren Michele Jackson puts it, the “character of craft culture, a special blend of bohemianism and capitalism, is not merely overwhelmingly white — a function of who generally has the wealth to start those microbreweries and old-school butcher shops, and to patronize them — it consistently engages in the erasure or exploitation of people of color whose intellectual and manual labor are often the foundation of the practices that transform so many of these small pleasures into something artful.”

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If a culture’s drinking practices are transmitted through generations, then the Black relationship to alcohol can be explored through a couple of factors. For one, there’s the complicated issue of temperance, which was far more tangled up in race than its name would have us believe.

Back in the 19th century, abolitionists combined their moral crusade to rid the nation of the evils of slavery with the goal of persuading it to abandon the perils of drink. The causes were intertwined to such an extent that it became an “every abolitionist was a teetotaler but not every teetotaler was an abolitionist” kind of situation, says H. Paul Thompson, history department chair at North Greenville University. Not only were many slave narratives and the contemporary fiction from abolitionist authors anti-alcohol, alcohol “was always associated with the oppressor,” Thompson points out. In Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Prue becomes an alcoholic and is whipped to death; in Frederick Douglass’s slave narrative, he recounts the free flow of booze for a week during Christmas, which he argues kept the enslaved from plotting an escape. And in 12 Years a Slave, Solomon Northup writes about how his “friends” offered him drinks in a saloon, culminating in a drugged dram that landed him in a slave pen. (For the record, I can’t help but think of Northup when I remember being warned as a kid to neither drink around white people nor accept boozy gifts in open containers.)

“Black people’s attitude toward alcohol in the 1800s was not ideological. It was strictly pragmatic,” Thompson says. Black America wasn’t anti-drink, we just stuck with what we knew. Alcohol only came around at Christmas? Cool. The only non-Blacks that are friendly to us are these Northern folks that say alcohol is bad? Got it. And then there are the implications of emancipation and the Thirteenth Amendment, too.

“The last thing [Black people] were were drunkards under slavery,” Thompson explains. “So when they get free it’s not like, ‘Oh, now we’re free to drink.’” At the top of the agenda were things like getting an education or a job or legally married, property ownership, and generally not being treated like garbage in a society where “all men are created equal.” Throw poverty in the mix? It’s counterintuitive to keep booze around when there are groceries to be had. Still, that doesn’t come close to explaining how beer culture grew in America among different ethnic enclaves. The chronicles of immigration are tightly woven into the country’s fabric, and of course they have something to say about the history of brew here.

For much of American history, beer and cider were produced in small batches for consumption at home, but as the 19th century chugged along, so did German immigration. Those immigrants both populated the beer trade and brought with them a bonafide beer culture that dramatically changed the way beer was made and consumed. Professional breweries were set up, and brewing became an increasingly profitable business with its own insular social and financial networks. “And so African Americans began to be shut out of the process of employment and breweries,” says the Smithsonian’s McCulla, “whether that was by the brewers themselves or eventually by unions who, because of discriminatory practices, would not hire African Americans into unions.” All to say: if you were a Black brewer trying to find work in the latter 1800s, good luck.

Exclusion, though, occupied two sides of the same coin. On one side, the German-American beer garden wasn’t necessarily shutting out “others” because of any racial animus. “That was their Sunday outing,” Twitty says of its patrons. “They had a culture, and they weren’t really fraternizing with us. It wasn’t because they didn’t like us or anything.” Tack on the fact that these beer gardens were in generally urban areas (and we’re talking about a pre-Great Migration United States here) and this checks out. If you’re Black person (or any non-German) in a Midwestern city, why would you spend your leisure time with Teutonic folk speaking German, as if you could even understand the conversation?

On the flip side, there was saloon culture. As beer became an increasingly mass-produced commodity, consumers became less inclined to imbibe their own homemade table brew. Saloons popped up seemingly everywhere, as did the social codes that defined them. If segregation in beer gardens was more passive, then in saloons, it took a more intentional form. “Suddenly beer was less consumed at home and more likely to be consumed in taverns or saloons, which would also discriminate against Black consumers,” says McCulla. “They would not allow them to enter the same spaces as European Americans or white Americans.”

With all this attention to the North, maybe it’s time to turn an eye to the postbellum South.

Not all temperance activists believed in stuff like “equality.” In the decades leading up to the national Prohibition, some of them were freaking out. The temperance movement did include abolitionists, and later social progressives and suffrage activists. But nativists and segregationists also counted themselves among the temperance crowd — what if alcohol destoryed the fabric of white supremacist society itself?

“There was always a tension between the industry, which wanted to sell product, and powerful local interests that wanted to control the use of the product,” says Thomas Pegram, a history professor at Loyola University Maryland. Below the Mason-Dixon, he explains, there was increasing concern about the idea of the saloon, because “it was one of a few places in Southern society where recreational mixing across racial lines was possible.” Up north, where dry activists were becoming increasingly suspicious of new immigrants congregating over drinks, temperance could take on an anti-immigration slant, too.

Many breweries were forced to shut down during Prohibition’s enforcement from 1920 to 1933. Those that did survive could not afford to go through a similar experience again. “[After repeal], the industry is working really hard to reestablish itself while simultaneously treading extraordinarily lightly with regard to federal regulation,” notes J. Nikol Jackson-Beckham, diversity ambassador for the Brewers Association. As part of those efforts, big brewers like Miller and Anheuser-Busch recast their brand image as something definitively patriotic and “American.” “Beer [culture] just became this flag-waving, rah-rah-rah America type of culture,” she says. And yes, in this context, beer culture means “white” — although some breweries did go out of their way to court the Darker Audience. The Bushwick, Brooklyn-based Rheingold, for example, was the regional sponsor for Nat King Cole’s 1956 television variety show, as well as a sponsor of Jackie Robinson’s weekly radio show.

Mark Peterson/Corbis via Getty Images

While beer was increasingly “all-American,” not all Americans were drowning in suds. The alcoholic beverage industry that began to emerge after the repeal of Prohibition got a further boost by the white flight to the suburbs that followed the end of World War II. More space and disposable income to entertain helped to create a new cocktail culture — one whose sophisticated, cosmopolitan drinks made beer, the everyman’s brew, look flat by comparison. So how could the average beer company compete? By developing a high-ABV product to compete with the demand for cocktails.

If you’ve never seen a vintage malt liquor ad, there are few features you should look out for. First is the name: Country Club, Olde English, Private Stock. Classy stuff. You’ll also see smiling white folks having the time of their white lives. And you’ll notice the booze is served out of a bottle, in coupes, tumblers, or wine glasses. This was the drink of the future, targeted squarely at a cocktail-drinking white American. But, as Jackson-Beckham notes, “that product really just didn’t resonate with that audience.”

Malt liquor is, to put it lightly, an exceptionally acquired taste. So how did it go from garden party aspirations to Boyz n the Hood levels of despair? The exact why is a matter of lore, but Jackson-Beckham has a pretty good idea. “The best story I’ve been able to get is that there was some kind of persistent market research saying that urban audiences make more purchasing decisions based on ABV and that urban audiences tend to buy for volume,” she says. “The decision was made to market malt liquor not as an upscale product, but a specifically urban product and to put it in a large vessel.“ Boom: the 40.

Advertising has more to do with what we buy than most of us care to admit, and the malt liquor ads of the ’70s and ’80s were tailor-made for Black America — or at least, what brewers imagined Black America to be, thanks to some choice celebrity endorsements. During that time, Schlitz malt liquor had a loaded roster, featuring ads from the Platters, Kool & the Gang, Richard Roundtree, the Spinners, Teddy Pendergrass, and, singing what is easily a top-10 jingle of all-time, the Lockers. Colt 45 famously employed the cool of Captain Calrissian himself, Billy Dee Williams. And the talents of high-profile musicians provided a clear throughline to later campaigns, most notably the ’90s-era St. Ides spots that featured specially crafted verses from Snoop Dogg, Dr. Dre, Ice Cube, Wu-Tang, 2Pac, and Biggie.

The politics of malt liquor are conflicted and fascinating, largely because of the calculated exclusion of Black consumers by major brewers and their abstention from marketing more “respectable” beer brands to Black America. Pabst owns Colt 45. Molson Coors pushes Olde English. King Cobra? That’s an Anheuser-Busch brand. And yet the popular image of Black American drink does not include Pabst or Coors or Bud Light. I’m not saying it needs to, but I am saying it’s in part by design.

“There’s no kind of upward or lateral mobility through the brand portfolio,” says Jackson-Beckham. “You kind of get stuck in the 40 bubble. In a lot of other companies’ brand portfolios, you might try a product and go, ‘Oh, well, okay. I liked this one, maybe I’ll try that one.’” Such a consumer path doesn’t exactly lead out of the 40-ounce bottle.

The relationship of Black America to malt liquor continued its evolution at the same time the country experienced a moment of upward mobility (although our collective memory of a mass entry of Black Americans into the ranks of the middle class may be somewhat inflated). But that mobility informed respectability, too. “A lot of Black people were going through this kind of Cosby Show-esque upward social mobility,” Jakson-Beckham explains. “They did not want to associate themselves with the symbols of a kind of urban Blackness — that is for them like a bit of a danger of association.”

But that narrative — that being associated with “Black” things will make the white establishment think less of you — smacks of the worst kind of respectability. “This is a clearly infantilizing narrative,” says Jackson-Beckham. “It’s like, you are either incapable or too irresponsible to moderate on your own.” In Black America, that narrative went, malt liquor is beer, beer is bad, and that badness ruins communities. Beginning in the late ’80s, a number of episodes portrayed malt liquor as a symbol of Black community decay. Some were factual, like Black-led protests over malt liquor ads perceived to target a vulnerable Black community in Baltimore. And some were fictional, like the aforementioned 1991 John Singleton film Boyz n the Hood, or Michael Jai White’s Black Dynamite, a 2009 Blaxploitation send up in which a crime-fighting team uncovers a nefarious scheme by the U.S. government to “alter” the bodies of Black men by getting them to drink an aggressively advertised malt liquor.

Macrobrews weren’t marketed to Black people, and the one style of beer that was — malt liquor — was being rejected by some in the community. But there was one type of product that filled that void: premium spirits. Brands like Hennessy became the products of Black cosmopolitanism and upward mobility. Far more costly than beer, these mid- to high-shelf spirits imbued alcohol consumption with an even greater connotation of luxury. Sure, maybe Black people are saddled with a D’Ussé stereotype, and Hennessy may be the “Spirit of the NBA,” but these brands marketed to Black America when home-grown beer wouldn’t.

Still, it’s not like beer didn’t make a play — if you’re looking for a consistently referenced brew in hip-hop history, you’ll see Heineken again and again. The argument you could make for Heineken being a “Black” beer is that it came with the same cosmopolitan prestige that accompanied premium spirits. Ditto Beck’s (or Grey Poupon, for that matter). Similar to the way premium spirits functioned, Heineken may have occupied the role of “sophisticated” brew, worlds apart from the domestic blandness of Miller and Coors.

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The story could end there, but that would erase the picture of the Black brewers making legitimately tasty craft beer, shattering old stereotypes in the process.

“We’re reclaiming beer because it’s ours,” Kim Harris says when I ask her what she wants people drinking craft beer to know about the relationship between the brew and the African continent. In 2018, Harris, along with fellow HBCU graduates Stacey Lee and Kevin Bradford, opened Harlem Hops, an uptown craft brew bar that’s taken up the mantle of reorienting the relationship between beer and Black America. Sometimes that means getting customers to try something new. Someone may pop in, apprehensive about the menu because of a bad experience with a particular alcoholic beverage. “Once we tell them why we like to sell craft beer and liquor, they really get to understand what it is that we’re doing, and they taste it,” says Lee. “And they actually end up liking it better than a beer they’ve had before. Better than the Grey Goose or Jack Daniel’s that they experienced.”

It’s equally about forging a connection to Africa’s beer past, too. “It’s all about history for us,” Harris chimes in. “Once we can have a better understanding of our history, it makes us a better group of people.”

But I had to ask them: Was alcohol a casual presence in their homes during their youth? It was for Lee and Harris, whose fathers preferred beer and whiskey. But it wasn’t for Bradford. Alcohol “wasn’t really a thing in my house,” he recalls. “Just special occasions. Mom would drink wine every now and then. It wasn’t prevalent in my home. I got interested in beer in college, and the rest is history.”

I can relate to this, and so can Daleview Biscuits and Beer’s Christopher Gandsy. Beer was around when he was coming up, he says, but the thing to drink was that brown. Gandsy didn’t stumble into the craft beer game until Father’s Day nine years ago, when his wife gave him a Mr. Beer homebrew kit. One kit turned into four, and that’s when Gandsy says he realized “beer wasn’t just that American lager that I wasn’t used to, like in college.” Today, his beer menu changes frequently, with brews bearing the name of friends and Black heroes alike — the Paul Bogle, a sorrel-infused pale ale named for the Jamaican national hero, is a neighborhood favorite. For Black History Month 2021, he’s lined up a slate of beers to honor civil rights leaders like Pauli Murray (a dark ale), Diane Nash (an IPA), and Claudette Colvin (a red wheat ale). “And a majority of the beers coming out are [named for] women,” Gandsy says. “My belief is that lots of movements that happened throughout history, especially during the diaspora, wouldn’t have happened without strong women.” Each beer will be accompanied by a bio, so if you don’t know, then you will know. That theme of education pervades much of Gandy’s work: Although he got into the beer game because he genuinely enjoys drinking the stuff, he also had a desire to inform and facilitate cultural conversation — all while turning Flatbush into a craft-friendly neighborhood.

But it’s through an internship program he’s piloting that he hopes to make the biggest impact. Called Lovibond, after the inventor of a device used to measure the color — and thus the quality — of beer, its ultimate goal is that the people of color who go through the training “can find a job in the brewing community, in the city,” Gandsy says. For an industry that has historically been so blindingly white, this is a move to inject some much-needed perspective.

The mere act of thinking about beer and Black culture feels, for lack of a better word, weird. There are a lot of assumptions and a lot of hearsay. But something that Michael Twitty told me assuages those uncertain feelings and legitimizes that most delightful feeling I get when I share details of my childhood or adolescence with another Black person who had a similar experience, despite living hundreds of miles away.

“Some aspects of our culture don’t fit the mold of Western scholarship, because Western scholarship demands that there is some kind of written transmission of information and culture that explicitly says that something occurred,” Twitty told me. “I’ve abandoned that to some extent, because I think it’s bullshit. I think that it’s a way of obfuscating our ability to reckon and make peace with our own story. Part of our story is not based on written words. It’s based on oral tradition, it’s based on intuition, based on imagination. It’s based on feeling, it’s based on stories. It’s based on anecdotes and it’s our job to weave them together, to create a nexus that gives us a sense of fulfillment and peace that we know who we are. That having been said, you know, Black folks were master distillers.”

There’s much to learn, and much to teach. And much respect and acknowledgment that’s long overdue. So tarry here no longer, and pour out a Heineken brew for your deceased crew on Memory Lane. The dead, after all, are dying of thirst.

James Bennett II is a writer and so-called “critic” who spends his days thinking about food and music.

Lead image photo credits: MOFAD, Martin Goodwin/Getty, Archive Photos/Stringer/Getty

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French actor Gerard Depardieu has been charged with rape and sexual assault allegedly committed in 2018 against an actress in her 20s. 

The 72-year-old is alleged to have repeatedly attacked the young woman – who cannot be named for legal reasons – over a number of days in August 2018. 

It follows a series of #MeToo complaints against powerful men in the Paris arts establishment who are said to have raped or otherwise abused young women working as models and actresses.

Depardieu’s alleged victim is said to have been involved in play rehearsals in the French capital at the time of the rapes. 

Depardieu – who made his names in Hollywood films such as Green Card and Cyrano de Bergerac –allegedly invited her back to his Paris mansion to ‘help her with her career’. 

A first probe of the rape accusations against Depardieu was dropped for lack of evidence but later reopened, leading to criminal charges filed in December, a judicial source told AFP on Tuesday.  

The French actor was initially accused of assaulting and raping the actress at his Paris home in August 2018. 

A probe into the allegations was dropped in 2019 but the actress subsequently relaunched proceedings, Paris prosecutors said last year. 

Depardieu’s lawyer, Herve Temime, told AFP that the actor, who is free but under judicial supervision, ‘completely rejects the accusations’.

According to a source close to the case, Depardieu is a friend of the actress’s family.

Some reports have suggested Depardieu and the actress were rehearsing a scene of a theatre play, but the source said ‘there was nothing professional about the encounter’.

Two rapes are alleged to have taken place inside Dépardieu’s Parisian home in 2018 – one on August 7, the other on August 13 – and there were also multiple sexual assaults around the same time.

The victim has told judicial police she was visiting Dépardieu as a ‘family friend’ and not in any professional capacity.

In turn, Dépardieu has spoken of a ‘consensual relationship’, saying he was a good friend of the woman’s father, and had offered her career advice.

She first made a complaint in the city of Aix-en-Provence, in the South of France, but a nine-month investigation came up ‘with no evidence of a crime,’ said the investigating source.

It included the victim facing Dépardieu in a meeting set up by the authorities, but the case was originally formally dismissed on June 4, 2019, before being reopened last August.

The actor’s lawyer, Hervé Temime said his client was now free on bail, and was ‘sorry that this information has been made public.’ 

The woman’s lawyer, Elodie Tuaillon-Hibon, said that she hoped her client’s ‘private sphere will be respected’ as the case unfolds. 

Ms Tuaillon-Hibon said her client ‘requested privacy’ and would remain anonymous, in line with her legal fight.

She said her client had been able to ‘automatically reopen the case’, despite it being closed originally. There was no immediate indication as to what new evidence had come to light.

Described as a controversial and larger-than-life character, Depardieu became the face of French cinema due to roles in films such as such as Cyrano de Bergerac, Jean de Florette and Camille Claudel.

He has also had a successful international career, having made more than 180 films, working among others with Peter Weir in Green Card and with Ridley Scott in 1492.

He has also acted in Cyrano de Bergerac in 1990, The Man in the Iron Mask in 1998, and Life of Pi in 2012.  

A preliminary investigation was opened on August 27, 2018 after the young woman filed a complaint near the southern city of Aix-en-Provence for rape and sexual aggression against the star. 

It was then passed on to officers in Paris but the probe was dropped after nine months in early 2019 after investigators failed to gather enough proof to proceed to formal charges. 

At the time, Depardieu’s lawyer, Herve Temime, said the actor ‘absolutely denies any rape, any sexual assault, any crime’ and dismissed the complaint as ‘groundless.’

The young woman relaunched proceedings by acting as an ‘injured party’ – which under French law almost always leads to a case being examined by an investigating magistrate. 

Depardieu’s made his name in the 1974 film ‘Going Places’ after which he enjoyed a meteoric rise, demonstrating talent and allure in wide-ranging roles in classics, dramas and comedies alike.

In 2013 Depardieu sparked a huge outcry by leaving France and taking Russian nationality in protest at a proposed tax hike on the rich in his homeland.

Russian President Vladimir Putin treated him to a dinner to present him with his new citizenship and Depardieu was subsequently full of praise in an interview to Komsomolskaya Pravda daily.

The French actor’s romantic history has been turbulent with him divorcing his first wife actress Elisabeth Guignot in 1996.

The couple married in 1970 and share two children, Guillaume and Julie. 

His son Guillaume died in 2008, aged 37. 

While separated from Guignot, he had a daughter named Roxanne, with model Karine Silla in 1992. 

Depardieu dated Carole Bouquet from 1997 until 2005. Ms Bouquet is also a successful French actress who plaid Melina Havelock in the 1981 James Bond film For Your Eyes Only.

Most recently, he ha been linked to Clémentine Igou, a 41-year-old Harvard University graduate. 

The pair met in Italy 2004 and were reportedly drawn to each other due to their mutual love of wine.  

The couple have lived together since 2005 and have a 30-year age gap.  

As well as he romantic life, the actor has been in the headlines for his public row over tax arrangements in France and his decision to become a Russian resident.

The Cyrano de Bergerac star took Belgian residence after a bitter dispute with the French government over high rates of tax.

He later became a Russian citizen in 2013 after befriending President Vladimir Putin.

The Green Card star caused controversy at the time after slamming his home country.

He described France as a place ‘populated by foreigners and imbeciles making wine and stinky cheese’.

While in 2014, he was accused of throwing water over revellers beneath his Italian flat after being annoyed by their noise.

And in 2011 he had to apologise for urinating into a bottle on a flight from Paris to Dublin after being told by the flight crew that he would have to wait at least 15 minutes until he could use the onboard lavatories.

The actor was fined in 2013 after falling off his scooter while driving drunk in Paris.

He failed to turn up at the hearing at which he was fined €4,000 and had his licence suspended for six months.

Depardieu has also never been afraid of taking a swipe at the film industry, slamming the Oscars in 2016.

He said: ‘Cinema doesn’t exist any more. There is a world of entertainment and people, terrorised by the Americans, don’t know any more which language to speak.’

‘There are 10 stars and they are all American. Their films are crammed with special effects… and the rest of the world of cinema is struggling to exist.’

In 2014, Depardieu claimed he sometimes drinks up to 14 bottles of wine per day. 

He told French magazine So Film: ‘I can’t drink like a normal person. I can absorb 12, 13, 14 bottles per day.

‘In the morning, it starts at home with champagne or red wine before 10am, then again champagne.’ 

Gerard said he breaks up the wine intake with a little aniseed liqueur pastis. 

However, his behaviour was condemned at the time by French mental health expert Professor Michel Lejoyeux, who blasted French attitudes to the heavy consumption of alcohol, and the media’s admiration of his alcohol intake. 

He said: ‘We smile about heavy users, calling them ‘bon vivants’, while non-consumption is not allowed. In society, it is the one who does not drink who will feel guilty.

‘A consumption of 14 bottles a day is beyond all data, all thresholds and health references of the World Health Organization.

‘This is proof of the positive vision we have of alcohol poisoning.’

Previously Depardieu made headlines after he was banned from an Air France flight for urinating in the aisle as it prepared to take off, forcing the plane to turn back to its parking spot.

A passenger on the flight said Depardieu appeared to be drunk and insisted he be allowed to use the bathroom during takeoff, when passengers must remain seated.

The case follows French film director Luc Besson in January being classed as an ‘assisted witness’ in a court case over allegations that he raped an actress.

The case is the second brought against the ‘Fifth Element’ director by the Dutch-Belgian actress Sand Van Roy, who has accused Besson, 60, of repeatedly raping her over a two-year period.

In France, assisted witness status indicates that a judge considers there is some evidence to suggest culpability, but not enough to charge the suspect.

Van Roy, who has renounced her anonymity, initially filed a rape claim against Besson in May 2018, a day after meeting him at the five-star Bristol Hotel in Paris.

Others who have been accused of rape include director Roman Polanski, who is also wanted in the United States for the statutory rape of a 13-year-old girl in 1977.

Big names in the world of Paris fashion who have been accused of rape include the former scout Jean-Luc Brunel, who was a friend of the late American convicted paedophile billionaire Jeffrey Epstein.

White wines stand up to fierce storms and hearty dishes

While we’re in the midst of a bunch of winter weather advisories, there’s no better time to consider some winter whites to help you through the storm.

But, that can be a hard sell.

“The last thing most people want to do is drink a cold glass of white wine when it is snowing outside,” says Kevin McGuire, DipWSET, a sommelier at the Wine House in Fairfax, Va.

The solution? Warm it (and yourself) up.

“One of my customers’ biggest misconceptions about drinking white wine in the winter is that it must be served at a much cooler temperature than red wines,” he says. “When wines are chilled down to 40 degrees or below, their aromas and flavors tend to shut down.” But warming them up a bit—45 to 50 degrees, depending on the variety but especially with richer whites like Verdejo or older Soave—will maximize their aroma and flavor profiles.

McGuire says look for dry white wines that are high in acidity or alcohol (or both): “They are best because they can stand up to heavier foods such as stews, ham, and pot roast.”

Jeff Harding, wine director at Manhattan’s Waverly Inn and creator of the wine education site, ThisIs.Wine, is also a fan of whites in the “off season,” saying, “For me, [they] are all about texture and depth of flavor, achieved either through grape skin contact, vine age, lees contact, or structure of the grape variety.”

He likens winter-white drinking to having a “shower beer”—a matter of food/body/drink physics.

“You have this intense voluptuous heat from the shower (or the cassoulet, if that’s what you’re eating); the acid and cold temperature are refreshing and the depth of flavor and bigger bodied texture does not have trouble competing with a hearty or fatty winter foods that are slow- or fire-cooked.”

Harding gives white Grenache or Sémillon from Bordeaux as illustrative examples or a powerful Riesling such as one from Trimbach, which “provides a refreshing complement with interesting, deep and complex flavors,” he says.

So, while you and your tastebuds hunker down for a few more weeks of stormy weather, consider some hearty whites, more redolent of warm, baked yellow apples in grandma’s kitchen than seaside snaps of saline. There are even a couple of Texan whites here, because you know, even they get snow sometimes.

FRANCE

Famille Vincent “Marie Antoinette” Pouilly Fuisse 2018. A tasty medium-bodied wine with yellow apple and juicy pear flavors, lemon curd, slightly botanic, a friendly player with soft cheeses, creamy pastas, sausage. $28

Herve Dubourdieu Chateau Graville Lacoste Graves 2016, Bordeaux. Driven by Sémillon, this is round and rich, mouth-filling with warm baked apple and uplifted with a citrus note. Sexy mineral, sulphur aspect. Classic example from the area. This can go a few ways: White bean cassoulet, roast game or sweet lobster meat on pasta. $19

Pascal et Chrystel Collotte Château Jean Faux “Sainte Radegonde” 2015, Bordeaux Blanc. A more oxidized/caramel style redolent of yellow apples ripening on the kitchen counter. In a beautiful vintage bowl. Round and juicy with hazelnut tones and a dry lemon twist, backed by good acid. A rounder style of 85% Sauvignon Blanc and 15% Sémillon. Certified organic. A good match with egg-based dishes. $20

Saget La Perrière “La Perrière” Sancerre 2019. White floral notes give way to a rich palate featuring tropical fruits, juicy ripe peaches, this classic Sauvignon Blanc from the Loire wants fish in buttery sauce or creamy poultry dishes. $39.99

Trimbach “Classic” Riesling 2018, Alsace. After 13 generations, the Trimbach family knows a thing or two about making wine. Known for terroir-driven wines of precision, this “Classic” Riesling is dry with bright acidity, snappy lemon and green apple notes. Few wines on earth are this food friendly: drink with classic Alsatian Choucroute Garnie (or any sausage dish), any kind of Asian dishes. $27.99

SPAIN

Heavier, richer varieties such as Verdejo are best when served between 45-50 degrees when “their aromatics are at their peak” McGuire explains.

Bodega Gonzalez, Beronia 2019 Rueda Verdejo DOC. Bright, pale yellow, this medium-bodied wine pops with pear and orchard fruit, quince, a bit of lime. Clean, refreshing acid, great with roast chicken and artichoke ravioli tossed with EVOO and garlic. $12

Matarromera “Granza” Medina del Campo, Rueda Verdejo DOC. This starts with a shy nose that carries over on the palate. White flowers somewhat honeyed and tropical with pineapple notes, slight nut-skin note on the finish. Not complex, but it’s not meant to be: pleasant on its own and with composed winter salads. $12

PORTUGAL

Esporão “Monte Velho” 2020, Alentejo. A blend of indigenous white grapes, this is an affordable and reliable performer—approachable and round with apple, yellow plum and quince flavors, easy and modern; plays well with many dishes and by itself. $12

Herdade do Rocim Olho de Mocho Reserva Branco 2016, Alentejo. Made from 100% Antao Vãz, an indigenous Portuguese grape, this is a slightly oxidized style with yellow apple, quince and tart plum skin; a round, creamy aspect, texture from skin tannins, savory and vegetal. Drink with quiche, soft-baked cheese. $20+/-

Quinta dos Carvalhais Encruzado 2019, Dão DOC. Smelling this wine takes me back to the farm with its honeyed sweet hay and yellow apples on the ground aromas, and it has the same happy fullness in taste. Full bodied, mouth-watering acid, this calls for roasted parsnips and grilled sausage. Cool back label features graphics indicating complexity, body, fruit, oak treatment and suggested food pairings. $20

ITALY

Alois Lageder “Terra Alpina” 2019, Pinot Bianco, Vigneti delle Dolomiti. From the foothills of the Dolomite mountains, this is one in a gateway line from a well-known producer. Aromas of white pear and flowers are followed on the palate by more pear, yellow apple, honey tones and an almond nut-skin finish. Round, medium-bodied and waxy in a Chenin Blanc kind of way. Delicious with the Austrian-inflected cuisine that is typical of the region. $15

From the same producer (but not the Terra Alpina line), the 2016 “Porer” Pinot Grigio is not your auntie’s PG: Slightly pink tinged with a pretty white flower aroma, this biodynamic version is rich and full, round and textured with ripe stone fruit. Delicious and substantial. I liked this as a starter with soft cheeses, and after with roasted shrimp and grits ($26). Lageder’s sister “Forra” wine (2017) is made from from low-yielding high-altitude old Manzoni Bianco vines. Yellow, clear and sparkly, this is a ripe-yellow-apple-in-the-bowl-on-the-counter wine (yes, that is a category I’m going to trademark). This is a slightly oxidized style with elevated herbal notes: I keep thinking mountain laurel. And I think you’ll like this with sausage and roasted broccoli rabe (a great wine for pairing with a cranky green vegetable) pasta or roasted parsnips. $31.

Tasca Tenuta Regaleali Grillo, Cavallo delle Fate, 2018 Sicilia DOC. Grillo is an ancient variety, usually used for Marsala production, but that’s become fashionable of late. It’s also a good ambassador for Sicilian lifestyle: a sunny-lemon yellow wine with honeycomb and white flower aromas, saline and a stony minerality underneath the fresh white peach and pineapple layers; an earthy bitterness has a nice bite. $20

USA

Chateau Ste Michelle Eroica Riesling 2018, Columbia Valley, Washington. Always a reliable performer, this balanced wine is off dry in style, featuring a twist of lime, ripe peach and apples. This was tops with Thai green curry. $20

Duchman Family Winery Vermentino “Bingham Family Vineyards” 2018, Texas High Plains. This medium-bodied wine is more textured than its Italian cousin, with oak hints on the palate. Floral, fresh lime blossoms, zesty acid, tart green apple. Good alternative to Sauvignon Blanc and a good player with cream-, egg- or pastry-based dishes, $26 (order online)

Duchman Family Winery Viognier “Bingham Family Vineyards” 2018, Texas High Plains. Round and textured, yellow orchard fruit, apples, botanic savoriness. Waxy like Chenin. Not the Viognier you’d expect but the one you’ll love. Beautiful seductive smoky nose, stellar with smoked pumpkin chowder (you are having that, aren’t you?) $25 (order online)

DLynn Proctor is one of the co-founders of Wine Unify, a nonprofit looking to increase diversity in the wine industry through education, and the current director of Napa’s Fantesca Estate & Winery.

Proctor’s 20-year career includes leadership roles with Penfolds, a sommelier career in fine dining in Dallas and Los Angeles, building the cellars of private clients and many educational efforts. But Proctor is perhaps best recognized for his appearance in the Somm films and his work as associate producer on Netflix’s feature film Uncorked.

He recently chatted with senior editor MaryAnn Worobiec about his journey from busboy to sommelier to winery executive and how he’s hoping to give younger people of color opportunities.

Wine Spectator: Where did you grow up?

DLynn Proctor: Wow, I haven’t had to go back to the beginning in a long time. I was born and raised in Dallas. My dad was a mortician for 30 years, my mom worked for the postal service for 35 years. I’ve got a brother and I’ve got a sister and I’m the youngest.

WS: When you were growing up in Dallas, what did you want to be when you grew up?

DP: I always wanted to be an Olympic track runner. I ran track in high school. I played football. I was just focused on sports. I loved being a hurdler. But I guess in the back of my mind I kind of figured that, ok, I’ll probably be a mortician.

I was always asking for stuff. Can I have this, the coolest this or the latest that? And my dad sat me down and said, “Look, you can ask all you want. But unless you start working, it’s not going to happen. We provide what we can, what’s a necessity for you. But all these extra wants because your friends have them? That can happen if you go to work.”

So I found a way to bus tables when I wasn’t in practice or in school. Even if I was out of practice at 4:45, I was bussing tables by 5:30 p.m. My dad got an ID for me that said I was actually two years older. I started bussing tables as a freshman in high school.

WS: When you graduated from high school, was your next step a no-brainer?

DP: I was so sucked into restaurants and the culture and the people and the energy and the diversity of it. I grew up in Dallas, so they were mostly lily-white people and that’s okay, totally fine. But I was drawn to the diversity of what people’s careers were and gauging different levels of wealth that would come in and out of the restaurant.

WS: By the time you graduated, were you serving?

DP: I was a host at that point. But I knew I wanted to be a server really soon. I also wanted a change of scenery. I had Europe in my sights very badly. It would be Mr. So-and-so’s 58th visit to the restaurant this year. He eats here five days a week for lunch. His office is right across the street. And I would be hearing about his second home in Tuscany and his travels to Bordeaux. And I was thinking, why can’t that be me?

I figured out I could keep to this path or get really serious about this path. My next step being that word that I’m just learning how to pronounce—sommelier. So I was looking up what this wine person is about online. I saw stock images of older white guys in suits, but also saw photos of Tuscany and Spain. That’s where I want to go, that’s who I want to be. I’ve got to do this, and I’ve got to get really, really good at this.

WS: So it wasn’t just about money, but about adventure and experience?

DP: Adventure and I wanted to learn. I knew that that this lifestyle of wine and traveling, I could do that.

I went to L.A. I wanted a change of scenery. It has great restaurants. I knew my opportunity was bigger there. Soon I had exposure and was meeting suppliers and distributors that were eager to do things. I was excited about that. My first trips to Europe were because of great suppliers and great distributors saying, “Wow, this guy is selling so much Italian wine because he’s dialed in.”

WS: You’re very friendly and appear extroverted, but you’re also incredibly polite. I imagine that’s part of your training, but is it also reflective of your father and his career? I imagine understanding how to navigate uncomfortable situations is something that he was pretty good at.

DP: Yeah. Dealing with death, he’s got to be very polite and understanding and genteel and show a lot of empathy obviously. That’s one of the number one things in hospitality—the word empathy. I did learn a lot of that from my parents, and I learned by watching people I thought were positive.

Some things you just can’t go look up in a book, but you can watch an individual. Watch how they act, watch their mannerisms, how they talk, how they respond if they’re angry or emotional or excited. I just paid attention. It’s as simple as that.

WS: Let’s talk about the transition from restaurant to Foster’s. How did that happen?

DP: I started working for Foster’s before [their wine division] became Treasury Wine Estates. A lot of people think I got the job at Penfolds because of the Somm movie, but I was already on a trajectory for the Foster’s folks to be like, ‘Who is this young kid in Dallas selling all this Grange?’

There was a guy who was director of sales back at that time who traveled a lot and spent time in the big markets. He would always hear about this young guy who dressed very well. I should point out I didn’t dress well because I was rich or anything like that. I dressed well because I knew how to buy consignment suits and then get them tailored to fit me so well.

I always wanted to wear suits and be corporate and go into the meeting and have the presentation prepared. I always wanted that stuff and honestly, that’s what happened at Treasury and Foster’s.

WS: Let’s talk for a moment about your sense of style. Did you always like dressing up? You are often the best dressed person in the room, and that’s kind of your signature.

DP: My dad was always impeccably dressed. … He always had suspenders, a suit and a pair of Lucchese on.

There are photos of me, maybe in first through fifth grade. I always had a suit on for my class photos. Even in sixth grade when I had the little Gumby haircut style.

When I became a sommelier and became GM, I got to look better and, you know, I’m making a good salary. … I remember buying suits out of Mervyn’s and getting them altered so they looked custom. Then I remember going to consignment stores and buying designer suits that were probably seven or eight seasons old but getting them tailored.

WS: Is there a performance aspect to putting on a suit? Or do you feel better received when you look your best?

DP: Yeah, it is a performance. I mean every server that you’ve ever encountered, even if they’re not part-time actors, knows this. It is a performance when you have to recite the specials and when you have to talk about the dishes, whether you’re in Eleven Madison or The French Laundry or Massimo’s joint in Genoa.

It is a performance. So I think putting on the suit and getting yourself ready and thinking about the guests that you’ve got coming in tonight and feeling good about it. It is also very important to look the part, feel the part, and act the part too.

WS: Was there ever any confusion about you showing up to a table as the well-dressed Black man on the floor when someone asked to speak to the sommelier?

DP: When I was able to first put that on my business card, I was fortunate that enough of the Dallas diners had introduced me to other people of their ilk, that when people came into my restaurants, they were not surprised to see me. I would step up to their table with the napkin draped over my arm and talk about the current vintage of Opus and Mouton.

Going to trade shows I might have been looked at more funny. I knew how to play the game though. I would go up to the Frescobaldi or Mastroberardino table and say “ciao” and start speaking the best Italian I could. So before they would have the opportunity to judge me and say, “Black guy, huh?”, I disarmed them first. I made them feel that I already wanted to be a part of what they had at the table. So I think I was perceived in a different way.

WS: What was your role at Penfolds?

DP: I worked at every single side of the business. I worked or reported to supply, I reported to commercial strategy, sales and marketing. In my seven-and-a-half-year career at Treasury, I was happy to do all those different roles.

WS: What did Penfolds chief winemaker Peter Gago teach you?

DP: Peter wasn’t trying to teach me anything. But I spent a ton of time with Peter. I just watched, I absorbed and I paid attention. I never had to ask questions because Peter is a storyteller. … He never sleeps on flights, I don’t care if it’s from Adelaide to Sydney or Sydney to SFO. He will not sleep. Peter just talks.

I learned more about the history of Penfolds, or the Penfolds relationship in Asia, specifically China, our relationships in the UK, how we came about, who owns what. I learned all of that just listening to Peter. And I learned how to properly strategize and forecast and think about what quarter 2 and quarter 3 and the next three years of fiscal would look like, just by being around Peter.

If you want to say he was a mentor, but he wasn’t trying to be. If anything, I was like a nephew, and I still call him Chief. What a remarkable person he is to make everyone in the room feel comfortable, to appear very humble when obviously he has no reason to be humble.

WS: Why did you leave?

DP: I was clamoring to stop the 300,000 to 350,000 miles a year in air travel.

WS: So how did you meet the people at Fantesca?

DP: I met Duane and Susan Hoff back in 2005. I met Kirk Venge, who was making wine at Fantesca before Heidi Barrett. I met Duane first, not Susan. She was still full-time at Best Buy with her dad, who started Best Buy.

WS: There are a lot of brands in Napa and many started by people who have been successful in other ventures. What sets Fantesca apart in your eyes?

DP: We’re all about sustainability. We’re all about this family. And I think Spring Mountain is a very special place. It has always been my favorite AVA in all of Napa. I remember back to the days of collectors bringing Philip Togni wines, and I fell in love with not only Napa but Spring Mountain. So I think Spring Mountain makes Fantesca special. I have to be honest, last but certainly not least, I think Heidi Barrett makes Fantesca special.

WS: So what is your role?

DP: I’m director. But any smart or wise person will tell you my day-to-day job is the staff, vineyard crew, DTC sales, marketing, distribution. If the internet goes out, that’s me. With Duane and Susan, we sit down and talk about the strategy of the next year, the next six months. What markets would we go into?

WS: What is something that people misunderstand about the wine industry?

DP: I think people don’t really realize, apart from the restaurant side, the amount of strategy and planning and programming that goes into it. Getting your wines priced for each of the markets, whether it’s on premise or off-premise, and prognosticating the type of inventory that you think New York is going to need versus Illinois versus Florida versus Texas versus California—all that strategy that goes into it.

And then new product development. I was a part of five or six of those at Treasury. I remember the early days of 19 Crimes. People don’t realize the amount of strategy that goes into that. I think what I’m really gifted at is strategy and marketing and what the market will receive, and how you go into the market and what you prepare and present. That’s something that I didn’t even know I had a knack for.

WS: How did Wine Unify start?

DP: I met [fellow board member] Mary Margaret McCamic back in 2017, and we immediately clicked. We were talking about the fact that only white people—white men—were in the senior vice president, CEO, vice president roles. Why are they the only ones at these levels in the supply world and the distribution world?

Why is that and how will we be able to change that? How are we going to bring a new set of optics to that? She and I just continued to chat and have glasses of wine whenever we’d see each other.

We talked about it even more seriously around 2019, but I was fresh into my job at Fantesca. Of course 2020 rolls around. The world stops on March 15th. Everything is uncertain and then George Floyd. Mary Margaret and I get on the phone. Now it starts—a nonprofit, giving access to people of color, to change the optics, change the access and reshape the aspirations of people in this industry. It’s as simple as that.

WS: Wine Unify gives educational support to minority individuals who want to learn for new roles in the industry. What has the response been like and what progress have you’ve seen?

DP: The response has been absolutely amazing. In our first round, we were only going to give Welcome Awards to 10 recipients. We don’t call them winners or losers, they are recipients. No one shouldn’t win access. We were able to give 20 Welcome Awards to individuals.

Maybe they’ve been bussers, maybe they have a full-time job and they also host at a nice restaurant on Saturday and Sunday just to make some extra cash. Maybe they are not in the wine industry, but they want to be, and this gives them something to look for.

We were set to give five of the Elevate Awards [the next highest level], but because of generous donors we gave out 10, including one-on-one mentorship with Annette Alvarez Peters, Alicia Towns Franken, and others.

WS: When you were getting the applications, were there any common threads that you saw?

DP: The applications were 100 percent objective; we read them all blind. People wrote about being in the industry for 14 years or 24 years, and a lot of the stories were how they didn’t feel like they were being paid well, or they are trying to get ahead. They would really like to be the wine guy or the wine girl and it’s not happening.

After the Elevate level, we’re going to do the Amplify level. We’re looking at people that are in the industry. They have some confidence. Maybe they run cool bars or maybe they run cool restaurants and they feel good about what they’re doing. But no one knows them. Think about all the Black and brown faces that do all these amazing things everywhere.

While my day job is very important, I think my most important contribution is Wine Unify. I didn’t have what I’m fortunate to be able to give people. I’m fortunate to now give someone an opportunity. All of the introductions that were made to me were made to me by white men. I’m not ashamed of those, that’s not a bad thing. But now it’s time for more brown and more Black people to be in high positions to be making these great introductions, you know.

WS: Have you seen more Black and brown people in the industry since you’ve been in it?

DP: In the last five years, absolutely, and probably because of the Somm film, because I’ve been told a million times that some black sommelier exists because of my face.

So you see more Black men and women and more wonderful individuals that are just wanting to be everything and anything they can within this beautiful industry, whether it’s cork maker, barrel maker, label maker or GM of the St. Regis. I mean, whatever you can dream of.

There is an increase in number of local market players in the wine cork market owing to the ease of doing business facilities by many governments and also due to the increased production of wine worldwide

“Wine Corks Market by Type and Distribution Channel: Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 2021–2027,” The wine corks market size was valued at $20.8 billion in 2019, and is projected to reach $27.6 billion by 2027, growing at a CAGR of 7.4 % from 2021 to 2027. Europe dominated the market in 2019, accounting for nearly 48.2% of the total market share.

The wine corks market exhibits an incremental revenue opportunity of $6.6 billion from 2019 to 2027.

The wine corks market holds a substantial scope for the market growth. The market is currently in its maturity stage; however, its contribution to the global market is expected to increase significantly during the forecast period.

Increase in demand for synthetic and new types of corks has enforced the market to produce innovative products made with various materials including polyethylene and rubber. Growth of the global population and rise in per capita income boost the market growth, thus increasing production of wines.

Change in consumer behavior in the beverage and alcoholic drinks segment and preference of consumers for various new types of wines are expected to affect sales of wine corks in the coming years.

Numerous players are entering the wine corks market with innovative corks. Emerging innovative cork types and corks produced by various other materials are expected to increase the market competition in the years to come.

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Growth in population in developing countries, such as China and India, has increased the demand for alcoholic beverages and especially wine. This increase in population, coupled with per capita income has increased the demand for wines, further boosting the production of wines and indirectly production of wine corks.

In emerging countries, per capita income is more as compared to the developed countries and hence, adoption of various wine flavors such as sparkling and fortified wines is eventually higher.

The wine corks market is segmented on the basis of type, distribution channel, and region. By type, it is categorized into natural and synthetic.

The natural segment was the highest contributor to the market, with $15,075.6 million in 2019, and is estimated to reach $18,796.9 million by 2027, at a CAGR of 6.6% during the forecast period. The synthetic segment is estimated to reach $8,829.2 million by 2027 at a CAGR of 9.4%.

The fastest growth of natural segment is attributed by the increase in demand for natural corks from the manufacturers who are making wine to store for longer period of time. 

On the basis of distribution channel, the market is divided into offline and online sales channels.. Region wise, the market is segmented into North America (U.S., Canada, and Mexico), Europe (France, Italy, Spain, Germany, Russia, and rest of Europe), Asia-Pacific (China, Japan, India, Australia, and rest of Asia-Pacific), and LAMEA (Argentina, South Africa, Chile, and rest of LAMEA).

Europe leads the global market, in terms of value, and is anticipated to continue to dominate its leading position throughout the forecast period. This is attributed to majority of wine is produced and consumed in the region.

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Key Findings Of The Study

• The natural corks products segment is expected to grow at a CAGR of 6.6% during the forecast period.
• Asia-Pacific is anticipated to dominate the wine corks market growth, registering a CAGR of 9.0%
• The offline segment is projected to contribute with highest market share during the forecast time period, with around 70% market share in 2027, and CAGR of 6.6%
• The online distribution segment is anticipated to grow at very fast rate in the global wine corks market, with a CAGR of 9.5% during the forecast period.
• The synthetic segment is estimated to grow at a CAGR of 9.4% during the forecast period. 

The global market is fragmented with the presence of several market participants across various regions. The strong presence private label brands is giving tough competition to global players.

The key players operating in Global Wine corks market include Precisionelite, Waterloo Container Company, J. C. Ribeiro, S. A., Amorim Cork, S.A, Ltd., We Cork Inc., Zandur, Jelinek Cork Group, Widgetco, Inc., M.A.

Silva Usa, Llc, And Allstates Rubber & Tool Corp.

About Us:

Allied Market Research (AMR) is a full-service market research and business-consulting wing of Allied Analytics LLP based in Portland, Oregon. Allied Market Research provides global enterprises as well as medium and small businesses with unmatched quality of “Market Research Reports” and “Business Intelligence Solutions.” AMR has a targeted view to provide business insights and consulting to assist its clients to make strategic business decisions and achieve sustainable growth in their respective market domain.

We are in professional corporate relations with various companies and this helps us in digging out market data that helps us generate accurate research data tables and confirms utmost accuracy in our market forecasting. Each and every data presented in the reports published by us is extracted through primary interviews with top officials from leading companies of domain concerned.

Our secondary data procurement methodology includes deep online and offline research and discussion with knowledgeable professionals and analysts in the industry.

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Drew Barrymore & Adam Sandler’s “50 First Dates” Turns 16: E! News Rewind

No one has lived more life than Drew Barrymore.

There’s a bit of odd poetry in the fact that the iconic actress spent three seasons on the Netflix comedy Santa Clarita Diet, playing undead realtor Sheila Hammond who only truly came to life after a traumatic incident that should’ve left her for dead. Because if there’s any actress on this planet who can relate to that concept, it’s Barrymore. 

With a career that started when she was still in diapers and, brief fallow periods aside, that has never really stopped, a family history that’s not without its struggles, a childhood that was anything but child-like, the actress-turned-daytime talk show host has been through it. And like her character Sheila, she’s miraculously managed to live through it all and come out, stronger, on the other side.

She may have been born into Hollywood royalty, but she’s a legend to so many because she’s the ultimate example of what it means to be a survivor. Santa Clarita Diet may have been put out to pasture in 2019 by the streaming giant after three seasons, but Barrymore lives on, celebrating her 46th birthday on Monday, Feb. 22.

“If you’re going to go through hell,” Barrymore once said, “I suggest you come back learning something.”

But her story isn’t solely about the hell that she’s been through. It’s also about the happiness she’s been able to build out of those lessons she’s learned along the way. And it’s all made for the sort of life that seems only possible in Hollywood.

So today, let’s take a look at 20 of the most fascinating facts from a life like no other.

Barry King/WireImage

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MARK RALSTON/AFP/Getty Images, Lou Rocco/ABC vis Getty Images

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Barry King/WireImage

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Ron Galella/WireImage

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Steve Granitz/WireImage

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Dimension FIlms

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Mark Sullivan/WireImage

(Originally published on March 29, 2019 at 12:15 p.m. PT.)

The night Caleb and Jaimie Mackey signed a contract to purchase the unit that would turn into The Assembly Food + Wine, Jaimie went into labor with their daughter. The day they took over the space, they had yet to find a chef to plan the cuisine. And at their grand opening on August 9, 2020, Eagle County restaurants operated at 50%, or 34 guests in The Assembly’s case. But when a passion is supposed to manifest, it does — despite an apparent lack of chef, a first-born child coming into the world or a global pandemic.

Food, wine and cooking has been a cornerstone of the Mackey’s relationship: they have bookshelves loaded with cookbooks, and they plan their trips based upon what they’ll eat. And, last August, their dream of owning a restaurant not only came to fruition, but also was embraced by the community.

Roundabout beginnings

Although the Mackey’s didn’t have any sit-down restaurant experience, Caleb brought his small-business knowledge from owning Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory in Silverthorne, while Jaimie contributed her hospitality expertise as a former luxury event and wedding planner.

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When they moved to Eagle in 2017, they did so with the intention of planting deep roots in the community and hopes of opening a restaurant “someday,” they said. In the meantime, Caleb worked for a bank and kept an eye out for the perfect commercial space. Then, in the summer of 2019, they found the space where Luigi’s used to be, and they knew it was perfect.

“It was kind a pipedream that turned into ‘Let’s do this now.’ It’s where we want to be … in a part of town that’s really ready for revitalization,” Jaimie said. “We thought: If we don’t do this now, we’re going to regret it forever.”

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On Aug. 20, 2019, they signed a contract to buy the unit, and Jaimie went into a very, very long labor that night.

In November 2019, they began a full renovation of the restaurant. By the time COVID-19 made it clear that businesses weren’t opening at full capacity anytime soon, it was too late to back out of their dream. So, they opened late last summer.

“There were a lot of challenges, but we benefitted by opening a few months in(to the pandemic),” Jaimie said, explaining that they simply built in COVID-19’s new safety protocols into their staff training. “It was a blessing in disguise, because we didn’t have to retrain staff on cleanliness. Keeping things safe had been built into the opening.”

More challenges

Though The Assembly opened at 50% capacity, three months later, Eagle County dropped restaurant capacity to 25%. The Assembly closed its dining room for a few weeks and offered solely take out from a three-course menu, which changed weekly — from downhome fried chicken and roasted potatoes to Asian stir fry or Belizean inspired dishes.

On Jan. 27, the dining room reopened at 25% capacity, and The Assembly kept the to-go, three-course meals, which attracted regulars every week. But as the to-go guests began to stay and dine, they also began to request take-out from the dining room menu. So, on Feb. 17, The Assembly stopped offering the three-course to-go meal, and, instead, allows guests to order off the dining room menu, which currently offers four entrees: charred cauliflower, butter-seared Pacific cod, braised short ribs and ricotta gnocchi, as well as weekly specials. Appetizers and salads include: stuffed dates, merguez croquettes, roasted beets and whipped goat cheese salad, antipasti platter and a house salad.

World-inspired cuisine

The Mackey’s lucked out with their executive chef, Chris Aycock, who has worked for some of the valley’s finest restaurants, as well as some of Portland’s most prestigious restaurants.

After honing his skills at the Cordon Bleu Culinary Academy in Portland, OR, he mastered the art of sushi and Asian Pacific cuisine. After living and working in the Vail Valley, he moved to Belize and owned a restaurant for over a decade. In the fall of 2019, he returned to the valley and worked for Sweet Basil.

Meanwhile, the Mackey’s had been searching for a chef, and, two months before the grand opening, they still hadn’t found their perfect match. And then Aycock emailed them, inquiring about the position.

“We just got super lucky,” Jaimie said. “He was a trained sushi chef, and he had a wide-reaching culinary perspective, and that was really important to us.”

The Mackey’s never wanted to pigeon-hole their restaurant — they wanted a variety of cuisine and flavors, “a place where people could bring their ideas and inspiration.”

“He’s so talented, and really creative,” she said.

Aycock expertly blends globally inspired flavors, from North African cuisine to Mexican and beyond. Jaimie said The Assembly doesn’t pretend to create traditional Mexican, African, Asian or other cultural cuisine.

“He mixes flavors together in a more innovative way than traditional Mexican or Japanese (or another culture),” she said. “Not tying ourselves to a specific cuisine frees us. We’d like to introduce our customers to something they may not have tried before.”

Unique wine

And those new tastes don’t end with the food. Caleb has curated a wine list based on organically farmed and produced products from around the globe. Some are even naturally fermented or biodynamic.

The Assembly focuses on smaller wine producers, often with interesting stories. For instance, Lady of the Sunshine is produced by a female under 30, who’s been making wine since she was 22. Other vineyards have an extensive family history.

“We approached the list as artisan products,” Jaimie said. “We see wine as the next wave in craft beverages. First it was beer, then distilleries. … We’re always bringing in new wines and expanding options that are unusual to find in the valley.”

Community based

In addition to innovate flavors and unique wines, the Mackey’s aim to foster a sense of community through The Assembly. They prioritize care and hospitality toward their guests, and either Caleb or Jaimie are always at the restaurant, helping out and talking to diners.

“We represent the idea of coming together, seeing friends at the next table, trying something new in a comfortable, welcoming, open-minded (restaurant),” Jaimie said.

They add an automatic 20% gratuity to all checks in order to provide a living wage for their staff, since they view staff as a larger extension of their family.

And, they make donations to nonprofits, like World Central Kitchen and the Wildland Firefighter Foundation, as well as Eagle Valley Community Foundation.

Jaimie said they are adamant about The Assembly playing a role in the community through donations and personally volunteering. They even list: Help Feed Local Families for a $25 donation on the menu.

And, the community is apparently adamant about supporting The Assembly.

“We’re so grateful for the responses and support of the community,” Jaimie said. “I don’t know how we’ll ever accurately thank people for that.”

For more information, visit theassemblyeagle.com.