Summer is Knocking
This Week: Dinner and a Movie
The sun rose at 5:06 this morning and will set at 8:16 this evening.
The scent of multiflora rose fills the air. Tall, fat rose bushes bearing clusters of tiny white flowers line the dirt road leading up to our driveway and are prevalent along the edges of the yard.
In the Garden
Along with that pesky vine, bittersweet, multiflora rose is one of two invasive species that dominate Nantucket’s wild spaces. Their seeds, spread by birds, show up as innocent tendrils or miniature rose bushes in my flower gardens. Ignore them at your own peril. Once they establish deep roots, they are extremely difficult to eradicate and they strangle and smother any adjacent plants.
I blame my mother for the presence of these two species in our neighborhood. When my parents settled in this area in 1951, after moving a cottage from Sconset – a wedding present from my great-grandfather, noted island carpenter TH Giffin – the area was nothing but wide open spaces, former farmland mown for hay.
My mother was a Midwesterner from Illinois, so she knew nothing about island plants. She ignored advice from an island friend, not to plant bittersweet, which she loved for its ornamental berries that developed in the fall, and planted it along with multiflora rose to define the borders of our yard. Today, both these obnoxious plants are all over our Somerset Road neighborhood.
Since the beginning of the month, I’ve spent most of my free time getting our gardens in shape. Weeding, planting annuals, and figuring where best to integrate new perennials to fill out borders that have continuous bloom cycles.
This morning I finished deer-proofing the front yard border, digging up all the day lilies I planted eons ago, to relocate them in the fenced-in garden where they will flower and not be gobbled up by the deer. I replaced them with purple catmint and yellow yarrow, pretty, resilient plants that are not at all appealing to deer.
At the Movies
The film festival begins today, and with my garden work behind me, I am free to attend whatever I want over the next five days. I expect to spend many hours in a darkened theatre.
We have been attending the film festival from the beginning. The Inquirer and Mirror, the newspaper I ran for over 40 years until July 2023, was the first media sponsor of the event 31 years ago. The festival has been a good cultural boost for the island and good for tourism too. We have continued to support the festival since I retired, buying passes to the event each year.
My husband John has had four documentaries in the festival. In 1995, the first year, his film “Witch City” premiered at Bennett Hall. Ben Stiller, who wasn’t really famous yet, attended and afterwards went down to the stage to talk to John and his partners. Later the film was shown on PBS. He’s had three more films in the festival: “Last Call,” “Wood, Sails, Dreams,” and “The Last Bay Scallop.”
There was a great deal of energy and excitement around that first year, when Jonathan and Jill Burkhart founded the festival. Yes, it was chaotic, but oh so fun to watch it develop over the years and take root.
This year the local connection is “Five Star Weekend,” which was shot on Nantucket last September starring Jennifer Garner. It’s the closing film of this year’s festival.
Elin Hilderbrand wrote the book from which the screenplay was adapted, and when it was optioned by a studio, she lobbied hard for it to be filmed on Nantucket. “The Perfect Couple,” another Hilderbrand book turned into a TV series by Netflix, was filmed across the pond in Chatham.
However, I’m more interested in the opening night film, “The Invite,” with Seth Rogen, Olivia Wilde, Ed Norton and Penelope Cruz, and written by Rashida Jones and Will McCormack. You most likely know Jones from the television series “Parks and Rec,” and before that, “The Office,” where she was Jim’s girlfriend for about five minutes.
Jones and McCormack will also be on stage on Sunday at 12:30 at the Methodist Church as part of the “In Their Shoes” series.
Where To Eat Now
I’ve had two good lunches at The Galley this month, which is encouraging. Halibut with red curry coconut broth and spring vegetables was very flavorful, filling and beautifully presented. My other dish was the chicken Milanese, a favorite, which always gives me leftovers. The Galley has the most beautiful ocean view of any restaurant, here or on the Cape. It’s a bonus when the food is good too.
The Rose and Crown will likely be my quick lunch spot in between films this week. They have a great cheese steak sub, and their grilled cheese with tomato soup brings me back to my childhood.
It is too bad that the old Atlantic Café/Charlie Noble hasn’t reopened yet. New tenants have leased the space, and it looks like the interior has been completely redesigned. Maybe they can’t find any help?
The Atlantic Cafe was always a favorite dinner spot before the movies back in the day when Billy Hunter owned it, and later the O’Connors. And it was a great place to take the kids.
My spies tell me that the best lobster rolls on the island these days are at two places: 167 Raw and Walters. The benefit of 167 is that you can get your food from the truck and take it into the grassy fenced-in patio for a pleasant sit-down lunch. Personally, I like the hot, buttered lobster roll at Straight Wharf Fish.
We went to The Ship’s Inn last week and, again, had an amazing dinner - grilled swordfish for me and steak frites for John. The Ship’s Inn is one of those places that just feels like summertime, and Mark Gottwald’s food is reliably delicious. I usually get the dory bar cake or chocolate souffle for dessert, but this time the Grand Marnier souffle called to me, and it was fabulous. If you haven’t been lately, the shrimp gumbo and Caesar salad are my two favorite appetizers there.