I have a friend who’s a devout Anglophile, traveling to London every year to see some shows and, mostly, walk around town and bask. He will, I suspect, love Elizabeth Sharland’s Behind the Doors of Covent Garden, a book that covers the years from Bonnie Prince Charlie and Nell Gwynn to Princess Diana.
There’s a particularly interesting chapter here on the theaters of Covent Garden, among them the magnificent Drury Lane, which has housed everything from the great Ivor Novello shows of the 1930s to Miss Saigon, which ran for at least a decade.
The book also includes a lovely guide to interesting shops in the area, including Pleasures of Past Times in Cecil Court, my favorite London bookshop — actually, my favorite bookshop in the world.
Sharland, who spends part of the year in Palm Beach, knows every foot of the place — I didn’t know that the Palm Court of the Waldorf Hotel was modeled after the Palm Court of the Titanic! — and does justice to it in her rich and spirited book.
In the pipeline …
Composer Marvin Hamlisch is writing a children’s book for Dutton titled Marvin Makes Music. It’s about a little boy who loves to play the piano but hates to practice. The book will include a CD with original music by Hamlisch … Allen Barra, a frequent contributor to this page, will write a book for Crown about the friendly rivalry between Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays. Barra writes a sports column for The Wall Street Journal and will put his head in the lion’s mouth by offering a solid opinion about which of the two was the better ballplayer (I say Mays.) Mickey and Willie will appear in spring 2011.
Mike Browning’s Word of the Week …
Wittol: A man who quietly accepts his wife’s adultery; a cuckold.

Collaboration, a concept created by artists Anthony Burks, Sr., Trina Slade-Burks and Barbara Cheives with educator Lea Jefferson, offers opportunities for art collectors and professionals to view art in an inhabitable space, alternative space or business.

Raymond Burks is in 8th Grade at St. Juliana Catholic School. His artwork, “The Great Race” is a 22½ by 30 inches mixed media, priced at $360. Burks comes from four generations of artists in his family maternally and two generations paternally. “The Great Race” was inspired by artist Jacob Lawrence’s “Runner” and was created for a salute to the Harlem Renaissance program hosted by the sorority, Delta Sigma Theta. The piece represents happiness and fun in life that everyone should experience, Burks explains. His hope is to be accepted at Suncoast Community High School or Dreyfoos School of the Arts.

Raymond Burks of West Palm Beach

If you’ve been at CityPlace on a Friday evening in the past couple months, you might have seen a sandwich board in front of the Harriet Himmel Theater advertising free opera. Volunteers hand out little fliers urging you to come inside the West Palm Beach theater for an hour and check it out.

At the urging of its musical director, Bruno Aprea, the Palm Beach Opera inaugurated its One Opera in One Hour series in 2006, after Aprea said he wanted to reach a broader audience for the company’s work. The series (known as OOiOH to initiates) presents the company’s Young Artists corps, working with guest directors, in 60-minute abridged versions of various operas, accompanied only by piano (played by Bruce Stasyna, who directs the Young Artists program).

Aprea modeled the idea on the custom of his native Rome, in which post-prandial walkers drop in on musical or theatrical performances going on in the city for a brief time before returning to the street. “That’s why it’s at 9 p.m., and why it’s at CityPlace. We wanted to be where people already are, rather than making them drive to a theater,” said Daniel Biaggi, Palm Beach Opera’s general manager. “We also said we wanted this to be a free event, to give back to the community, with no barrier in the form of a price.”
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“Mary Cassatt: Works on Paper,” currently at the Boca Raton Museum of Art, is a small show but a meaningful one. Cassatt is the Impressionist nobody knows, partially because she was such a one-off — not just an American but a woman, and this at a time when the world of French art was not exactly hospitable to either.
Cassatt had a reputation for being highly opinionated and something of a tough old bird, but she had to be — she always was facing obstacles of one sort or another, ranging from her father’s resistance to her career choice, or the obstinance of the French Academy. Whether out of necessity, or just a contrarian desire for experimentation, Cassatt always was bobbing and weaving, experimenting, absorbing, trying things out to see what they looked like.
The valuable thing about the exhibit is the way it demonstrates Cassatt’s try-anything approach, which accelerated near century’s end and continued until her eyesight began to fail around 1915.
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The Florida Classical Ballet Theatre presents Giselle, a ballet first performed in Paris in 1841.
Giselle is a classic tale of love conquering all, even death.
It’s the story of a simple peasant girl who protects her lover from the vengeance of a group of evil female spirits called the Wilis. Betrayed by love, Giselle goes mad and dies of a broken heart. When she becomes a ghost, she is ordered to destroy the man who caused her pain, although she is still deeply in love with him.
The ballet deals with the powerful forces of nature, including forest spirits and death. In the end, undying love triumphs over betrayal and death.
The role of Giselle is one of the most coveted parts for a dancer. To win the role, a dancer must have outstanding grace, and great drama skills.

When: 7:30 p.m. Saturday, and 2 and 7:30 p.m. Sunday.
Where: PBSC Eissey Campus Theatre, 3160 PGA Blvd., Palm Beach Gardens.
Call: (561) 207-5900.

By BILL DALEY

The Country Cooking of Ireland, by Colman Andrews (Chronicle, $50)

What it is: Colman Andrews is such a gifted writer he can make Irish cooking not only sound delicious but also seem exciting, even newsworthy.

That hasn’t happened since the first potato landed on those green shores all those centuries ago.

This book is more than a collection of recipes. Andrews captures the Irish spirit by writing about everything from ancient fables to of-the-minute consumer trends. You really sense the people behind the recipes.

Andrews, co-founder of the esteemed Saveur magazine, expertly weaves broad observations of Irish culture with illuminating quotes and amusingly quirky details. (Che Guevara descended from one of the “tribes” of Galway.)
Of Irish stock himself, Andrews can trace his father’s side back to counties Tyrone and Donegal.

Praise and quibbles: Andrews presents 225 clearly written recipes ranging from brotchan foltchep, an ancient recipe for leek and oatmeal soup, to corned beef (it’s really Irish, he insists) and colcannon, to a smoked eel tempura and wok-smoked salmon.

His recipe sources range from 18th century manuscripts to the menus of hotels and restaurants across today’s Ireland.

Reading this book, you can see why salmon merits its own chapter as the “magical fish” while potatoes get their due as the “definitive food.”

Why you’ll like it: As with so many cookbooks today, The Country Cooking of Ireland is a big, big book.

It’s 384 pages, heavy, loaded with glossy color photographs and, at $50, not destined to be sitting out on a flour- and oil-splattered kitchen counter.

But it is a compelling book, a master work that draws you back again and again to learn more about Irish cooking.

Leek and Oatmeal Soup (Brotchan Foltchep)

In “The Country Cooking of Ireland,” Colman Andrews calls this “a modern version of the famous soup, also called brotchan (or brochan or brothchan) roy, or ‘the king’s soup,’ that is said to have been the favorite dish of Ireland’s celebrated sixth-century spiritual and literary icon, St. Columkille. It is … quite possibly the oldest traditional Irish dish for which it is possible to reconstruct a recipe.” We adapted the recipe and added more broth for a souplike consistency.

Prep: 15 minutes
Cook: 1 hour, 5 minutes
Makes: 4-6 servings

2 tablespoons butter
4 leeks, trimmed, sliced thinly
3 cups chicken broth
2 cups milk
1/2 cup Irish steel-cut oats
1/2 teaspoon each: ground mace, salt
Freshly ground pepper

Melt the butter in a medium saucepan over low heat; add the leeks. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the leeks are very soft, 12-15 minutes. Add the broth and milk. Raise the heat to high; heat to a boil. Sprinkle in the oatmeal. Add the mace, salt and pepper to taste. Return the liquid to a boil, stirring occasionally. Reduce the heat to low. Cover; simmer until oats are tender, 45 minutes.

Per serving: 241 calories, 48 percent of calories from fat, 13 g fat, 3 g saturated fat, 67 mg cholesterol, 10 g carbohydrates, 21 g protein, 812 mg sodium, 3 g fiber

Briny Breezes Art League Show & Sale features work created by its artists in residence on March 20 and 21, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Barbara Legrow

Barbara Legrow is inspired by light and shadow. “In this particular painting, I was intrigued with the idea of light on the skin portrayed against a dark background,” she said. “I enjoy painting portraits of people and animals from photographs, however, this painting is a creation of my imagination. Tango Lady reflects my love of dancing and, in particular, the Tango.”

"Tango Dancer" is a pastel on paper 10 1/2 inches by 13 1/2 inches and priced at $125.

Darlene Erickson

“Creating something beautiful is one of the highest forms of being human,” Darlene Erickson said. “The Greeks believed that when one is making art, poetry, or music, s/he is possessed by a god. That must be true because I experience amazement each time I create a beautiful canvas.”

"The Masks of Carnivale" is a 16-by-20-inch framed watercolor, priced at $450.

Jane Sheibenberger

Jane Scheibenberger came to Briny Breezes about seventeen years ago and immediately found the Briny Art League.  “My father-in-law was a well known painter in this area and he encouraged me,” she said. “The ocean, foliage, and flowers are inviting to paint.”

"Florida Sunflowers," 21 by 24 inches, is a watercolor, priced at $350.

Briny Breezes, 5000 N. Ocean Blvd., Boynton Beach, is located on A1A just south of Woolbright Road. For information, call (561) 716-8028.

By EILEEN SPIEGLER

If marijuana’s early detractors had any idea how long the embers of their outrage would burn to unintended effect, they might have thought better of their propaganda film, practically born ripe for satire.

Reefer Madness, the 1936 morality tale warning against the evils of cannabis, never found an audience until it became a comical cult classic in the early ’70s, and almost 30 years later was reborn as high camp in Reefer Madness: The Musical.

The production at Fort Lauderdale’s Rising Action Theatre takes it a little, uh, higher, gleefully embracing every caricature and building to a hilarious chaos.
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Event Listing: Buy tickets, directions, more

Spring. Summer. Fall. Winter. Four seasons, four consecutive narrators, four versions of the behind-the-scenes story of the uneasy rise, sudden success, constant ego battles and resentments of the pop music sensations, Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons.

Sure, there have been plenty of backstage biographical musicals before, but few have the emotional impact of Jersey Boys, the 2006 Tony Award-certified Best Musical. Currently in residence at the Kravis Center through March 28, the national tour is well cast and as tightly staged and fluidly cinematic as the original Broadway production. Read the full story

By CHRISTINE DOLEN

'In The Heights' playwright Lin-Manuel Miranda, at the 2009 Tony Awards. (Andrew H. Walker / Getty Images)

For Lin-Manuel Miranda, the years since he graduated from Connecticut’s Wesleyan University in 2002 have been a frenzy of hard work and achievement.

In the Heights, the musical he started writing as a Wesleyan sophomore, wound up on Broadway, won the 2008 Tony Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Miranda earned a best-actor Tony nomination for playing bodega owner Usnavi in his musical about colliding dreams and disappointments in Manhattan’s largely Dominican neighborhood of Washington Heights.

The multitasking composer-performer also worked with director Arthur Laurents and lyricist Stephen Sondheim on Spanish-language lyrics for the current Broadway revival of West Side Story. Last year, he became the youngest person to be awarded an honorary doctorate from Yeshiva University. And, in May, he debuted a number from his The Hamilton Mixtape – a hip-hop work in progress about Alexander Hamilton — for the Obamas at the White House.

Heady stuff for a guy who just turned 30, with much more in the works, including a movie musical of In the Heights starring Miranda and directed by Kenny Ortega of High School Musical fame. Miranda, whose career-making show arrives at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts on Tuesday, happily acknowledges the big changes in his life. But underneath, he says, he’s much the same guy he was growing up in Inwood, a neighborhood next to Washington Heights in northernmost Manhattan.
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