Good morning on this freezing Friday.
This month, we asked readers to nominate candidates for New York Today’s New Yorkers of the Year series, our annual celebration of citizens who have made a difference in the city over the last 12 months. We received more than 100 submissions, and this week we are highlighting a few of our exemplary neighbors.
“Meow, meow, meow, meow, meow, meow, meow.”
So went the vocal warm-ups for a pantomime production of “Jack and the Beanstalk” at the Abrons Arts Center on the Lower East Side.
Moments later, the cast gathered for “family circle,” a preshow pep talk led by Mat Fraser and Julie Atlas Muz, the couple who wrote and directed the play. “Be brighter, be bigger!” Ms. Muz told the huddle before the red curtain rose and the room went dark.
Mr. Fraser and Ms. Muz had gotten married years before on the same stage where “Jack” just finished its three-week run and where they put on a raunchy rendition of “Beauty and the Beast” in 2014. They called the theater their chapel and their community center.
This year, they decided they “wanted to spread the love and give something back to this place that has given us so much,” Mr. Fraser said.
So for the first time, the couple broke from their repertoire of risqué theater and staged a show for families — and they filled the audience with inner-city children. Many were from the Henry Street Settlement, a social service agency that runs the arts center. By the final show on Saturday, more than 500 children who are homeless, living in public housing or at the federal poverty level had seen the show free.
Continue reading the main story“They were the best audience — they got all of the gags, and they landed heavy,” Mr. Fraser said. “We thought: ‘This is our ideal audience. This is who we made the show for.’”
The duo reimagined the centuries-old English fairy tale for present-day New York. There was commentary on poverty, hunger, rising rents and man buns. The city skyline backdrop was accompanied by a set with rats, fire hydrants and double Dutch jump ropes. The score mixed holiday classics with Jay-Z’s “Empire State of Mind.” And among it all: an “Occupy Beanstalk” protest, jabs at Chris Christie, a laughable leader named Mayor de Blasé, and an orange-haired giant, G. Rump, living atop the beanstalk in Rump Towers.
“Kids these days are as obsessed with politics as their parents are,” Ms. Muz said, “and to have this be a lightly political, secular holiday spectacular is just a blast.”
But the cast itself — a representation of the residents of New York City — was responsible for driving the most poignant message.
“We have two visibly disabled people in the cast and it’s accepted by everybody,” Ms. Muz said. “We have a mixed-race cast, a mixed-gender identity cast, a mixed cast in age, a mixed cast in everything, and everyone’s respectful. That, in itself, is a great lesson.”
Jack, the male lead, was played by a woman. Dame Delancey, the female lead, was played by a man. The good fairy was a burlesque dancer, and Fibi, a strong-willed character and role model, was an adult actress under 4 feet tall. Mr. Fraser, who played drums for the show, has chest-length arms. (He and Ms. Muz met while working in a sideshow on Coney Island.)
“My safe space is a place where nobody is going to be singled out for being different; nobody is going to have any attention made of them because of what they are, but what they do,” Mr. Fraser said, referencing a quote from Mr. Rogers. “It speaks to me as a bullied kid, it speaks to me as a stared-at disabled person.”
As some politicians use people’s differences to divide them, Mr. Fraser said, he was hoping to show how strong a community can be when everyone comes together.
“Let’s get schoolkids in, let’s have them watching disabled people, people of all colors and genders getting on with each other in a pretend society where they collectively sort a problem out against the Man,” he said.
The youngest cast members, part of the “Babe Chorus,” took that cue.
“If they have a different condition or a syndrome or something that you don’t have, something that’s different from you, you should always be a community and be a friend to everyone that you know,” said Briseis Mendez, 9.
Dylan Cox, 11, quoted a favorite line from the show: “When we get together, we’re stronger.”
On opening night, a stranger from the audience, who was crying, approached Ms. Muz. She was a gay woman, whose partner was transgender, and had been struggling to tell her child how he could explain the relationship to his peers at school.
“She was so grateful for the casting choices because her sons were able to see a drag queen, and a girl playing a guy, and have it be normalized and fun and not talked about,” Ms. Muz said.
Mr. Fraser added, “We’re outsiders with inclusivity at the heart of what we do.”
Here’s what else is happening:
Weather
So. Cold. Fingers. Numb. Can’t. Type.
It will feel between 0 and 10 degrees today with the wind, and the high won’t budge much above 20.
The snow expected on Saturday should stop before Sunday, leaving us with a bright but brutally chilly New Year’s Eve.
Things will look much the same on New Year’s Day: You’ll want to stay cocooned in a blanket.
In the News
• At least 12 people were killed when a fire tore through a Bronx apartment building Thursday night, New York City officials said. It was the deadliest fire in the city in more than a quarter-century. [New York Times]
• Why is New York City home to the most expensive mile of subway track in the world? A Times investigation found that construction is plagued by excessive staffing, little competition, generous contracts and archaic rules. [New York Times]
• In “About New York,” the columnist Jim Dwyer discusses a new pilot program by New York City Transit that will pull workers out of the station booths and put them on the platform. [New York Times]
• Two police officers are under scrutiny over how they responded to a wellness check, after a woman who had previously reported domestic violence was found dead. [New York Times]
• The reputed mobster Vincent Asaro was sentenced to eight years in prison for ordering his underlings to set fire to a car that cut him off in Queens. [New York Times]
• The New York Police Department plans to beef up security for the New Year’s Eve ball drop to counter the threat of terror. [New York Times]
• When asked to describe “the most fun thing” he got to do in his first term, Mayor Bill de Blasio struggled to produce an answer. [New York Times]
• Yehoshua Zvi Hershkowitz, who founded a kosher meals-on-wheels program over 40 years ago in Brooklyn, has died at 92. [New York Times]
• After struggling with a lifetime of drug addiction and mental health issues, a Yonkers man is looking to found a nonprofit that will focus on those with a similar history. [New York Times]
• An NYC Ferry boat was stranded for hours in the Coney Island Channel after hitting a sandbar. [New York Daily News]
• One teenager died and another person was injured in a shooting at a Bronx sweet 16 party. [PIX 11]
• The Bronx Zoo’s last polar bear has been euthanized because of health issues. [New York Post]
• Today’s Metropolitan Diary: “Kite-Eating Tree in Inwood Hill Park”
• For a global look at what’s happening, see Your Morning Briefing.
Coming Up Today
• “New York on Ice: Skating in the City,” an exhibition on how the sport has evolved here since the 1800s, at the Museum of the City of New York in East Harlem. 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. [$18 suggested admission]
• Children can see “The Three Bears Holiday Bash,” a variety show with puppetry and music, at the Swedish Cottage Marionette Theater in Central Park. 10:30 and 11:30 a.m. [$12 adults; $8 children]
• Adults can explore the Holiday Train Show after hours, with cocktails and live music, as part of “Bar Car Nights” at the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx. 7 p.m., through Saturday. [$35]
• A Kwanzaa celebration with family-friendly activities — including arts and crafts, story time and more — at the Brooklyn Children’s Museum in Crown Heights, through Saturday. Times vary. [$11]
• Devils host Sabres, 7 p.m. (MSG+). Rangers at Red Wings, 7:30 p.m. (MSG). Islanders at Jets, 8 p.m. (MSG+2). Nets at Heat, 8 p.m. (YES).
• Alternate-side parking remains in effect until Monday.
• Weekend travel hassles: Check subway disruptions and a list of street closings.
The Weekend
Saturday
• Escape the cold and meet hundreds of butterflies in the Butterfly Conservatory at the American Museum of Natural History on the Upper West Side. 10 a.m. to 5:45 p.m. [Prices vary]
• ... Or stop by the museum’s Kwanzaa festivities, including gospel music and other live performances. Noon to 5 p.m. [Prices vary]
• “Regeneration Night,” a music and dance show honoring Kwanzaa, at the Apollo Theater in Harlem. 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. [$20]
• “Your Love, Our Musical — Science History Edition,” a musical improv comedy show about science and romance, at Caveat on the Lower East Side. 7 p.m. [$15]
• Devils at Capitals, 7 p.m. (MSG+). Knicks at Pelicans, 7 p.m. (MSG).
Sunday
• Ring in 2018 at a New Year’s Eve celebration with fireworks, live entertainment and more on the Coney Island boardwalk in Brooklyn. 6 p.m. [Free]
• Swing by a Roaring ’20s Gatsby Party, where revelers can “kick off 2018 like prohibition just ended,” at the Footlight in Ridgewood, Queens. 8:30 p.m. [Free admission]
• Catch the New Year’s Eve fireworks celebration on Grand Army Plaza at Prospect Park in Brooklyn. 10 p.m. [Free, R.S.V.P. requested]
• Join New York Road Runners for a Midnight Run through Central Park — with music and dancing at 10 p.m., a 4-mile run at 11:59 p.m., and fireworks to follow. [Prices vary; registration required]
• Jets at Patriots, 1 p.m. (CBS). Nets at Celtics, 5:30 p.m. (YES). Islanders at Avalanche, 8 p.m. (MSG+). Giants host Redskins, 1 p.m. (FOX).
• For more events, see The New York Times’s Arts & Entertainment guide.
There will be no New York Today on Monday in observance of New Year’s Day. Enjoy the celebrations! We’ll be back on Tuesday.
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