Dan's Papers - March 14, 2008 - South O' the Highway (and the North too)

Townline BBQ was the place to be March 3 when Linda Shapiro, Ann Ciardullo, Cynthia Sesito, Valerie Smith and Wendy Jacobson hosted a Texas BBQ - a kick-off for the Texas (and other) primaries to benefit for presidential candidate Barack Obama. Over 200 people attended the wall-to-wall southern style festival, including Christie Brinkley and her son, Jane Gill and her daughter, Ina "the Barefoot Contessa" Garten, and civil rights activist Bob Zellner.

Rick Friedman, the entrepreneur who created the beloved Hamptons Home and Garden Show, has a new brainchild- ArtHamptons. The East End equivalent of Miami's ArtBasel, the anticipated event will bring $100 million worth of museum quality art to the Hamptons July 11-13. The creme de la creme of Contemporary Art will be present, including the East End's own Louis Meisel, Mark Borghi and Peter Marcelle. The American Heart Association, East End Hospice, East End Childcare, Phoenix House, The Retreat and the Bridgehampton Childcare Center will host fundraiser cocktail parties in this belle arts setting, with affordable tickets. The event is expected to raise $2 million in benefits for the community. Collectors, get out your checkbooks!

For the fourth year in a row, noted composer Bruce Wolosoff is composer in residence at the Hayground School and is conducting a three-week intensive music program culminating in a concert with the students on March 19. A much-respected composer, Wolosoff has focused on opera in recent years, composing for the Center for Contemporary Opera in New York and members of the Royal Danish Opera. Most recently, he completed "Songs Without Words," a large-scale set of pieces scored for amplified string quartet, the Carpe Diem String Quartet. At the conclusion of his Hayground residency, Wolosoff will begin scoring the feature film Iron Cross, a revenge thriller written and directed by Joshua Newton that was Roy Scheider's last film (the late actor and Hayground co-founder was a close personal friend of the Wolosoffs).

Continuing its efforts to present diverse cultural activities for the East End community as well as its international clientele, The Southampton Inn will host a special presentation of the North Sea Poetry Scene, an afternoon with two of Wales' most prolific and acclaimed poets, Aeronwy Thomas, daughter of the famed Dylan Thomas and Peter Thabit Jones on April 12.The afternoon will feature readings by the acclaimed poets, a Q&A session and a reception featuring wine and hors d'oeuvres created by Southampton Inn's four star chef Peter Dunlop. Admission is $20.

Gastronomy and philanthropy are once again joining forces to serve education with the 2008 Great Chef's Dinner, one of the food world's most eagerly anticipated affairs each year. The event is the primary fundraiser for Bridgehampton's Hayground School, the Hamptons' most creative institution for progressive nursery-to-8th-grade education. This annual tribute to the late Jeff Salaway will benefit Hayground's Jeff Salaway Scholarship Fund and Jeff's Kitchen, as well as celebrates the 20th anniversary of Nick & Toni's, a favorite East End haunt. The event will be held on Sunday, July 13 in a festive tent outside Nick & Toni's, and restaurateurs Drew Nieporent and Toni Ross are the evening's co-hosts.

Montauk's Pulitzer, Tony and Drama Desk award-winning playwright Edward Albee will direct an evening of his one-act plays "The American Dream," a startling story of murder and morality that rocks middle class ethics to its complacent core, and "The Sandbox," an allegory on life and death. Judith Ivey, Myra Carter, and George Bartenieff will star. The prolific author turns 80 years old this week.

Kudos to Hamptonite Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel, Chair of the Historic Landmarks Preservation Center, civic activist, journalist, broadcaster, producer, preservationist and author of 19 books for her 40-plus years of public service. She serves as a prominent voice on New York City issues, and was awarded the Entrepreneurial American Leadership Award on March 5 in Washington, D.C.

Randy Lerner, the Cleveland Browns owner and former chairman of MBNA Corporation, reportedly purchased Amagansett Square, a quaint group of stores on Main Street in Amagansett. The entrepreneur already owns The Meeting House, a restaurant at 4 Amagansett Square.

Dan's Papers founder Dan Rattiner of East Hampton and Christine Wasserstein of Manhattan are pleased to announce their engagement.

Hamptonites Kimora Lee Simmons and Djimon Hounsou are reportedly adding a third Hamptonite to the family. The model/actress/entrepreneur, and already a mother of two from ex-husband Russell Simmons, is reportedly pregnant with Hounsou's baby.

The Town of Southampton shut down four houses occupied by 70 undocumented Latino tenants, 20 of whom were children, on North Sea Road last week. Officers found many code violations, poor living conditions and health concerns in the four houses, and more than 30 charges have been filed in State Supreme Court against the landlords.

The Southampton Anti-Bias Task Force said the shutdown raises the bigger issue of a lack of affordable housing on the East End, and that undocumented residents usually do not report such dangerous living conditions in fear of their status being exposed.

The Bridgehampton Country Market, Cromer’s Market in North Haven, the Canoe Place Mobil and the Country Store Deli were hit by a rash of robberies in the last two weeks. But because of the excellent work of the Southampton Town Police Department, the owners and employees of the markets can finally breathe a little easier. Two suspects, John Sheats, 30, and Todd Williams, 41, are now in prison.

Both suspects have prior arrest warrants and are not from Suffolk County. They stole cigarettes and cash from the stores and caused thousands of dollars worth of damages.