Ann Lemons Pollack

  • Tony’s

     Is Tony's really so different from similarly-priced restaurants in town? Is there another place we explain carefully to outsiders and the unfamiliar? I don't think so, and it seems to me that what makes the difference is the aura of the place. Diners today expect servers to say, "Hi, I'm Phil and I'll be your

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  • Human Terrain

     It seems like many of the most powerful works about crises come out of the middle of them, rather than being written or sung or painted with the benefit of hindsight. Certainly no single work of art can capture more than a millisecond of the situation, especially one as complex and long-lasting as the Middle

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  • Annie Moon’s Cafe

    Located in Tower Grove South, Annie Moon's is slightly wacky but tasteful and tasty. Whoever heard of a bakery/cafe with an associated comic book store?  St. Louis Magazine is using some of my restaurant reviews, so I am happy to say that you can read about it here. Other reviews, plus theater, travel and whatever strikes my

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  • A Few Notes On The Majestic

    It was, for many years, almost an adjunct dining room for the Barnes, Washington U Med School, Jewish and St. Louis College of Pharmacy students. That's how I met it. When it closed in the spring, I wrote this for St. Louis Magazine.

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  • New York: Brunch at The Tribeca Grand

     Brunch in New York can be a.) a contact sport, b.) excellent people watching c.) confusing. d.) expensive e.) all of the above The correct answer is, naturally, "e". Experienced test-takers know to re-read questions to look for key words, and here the key is "can be". Not "is", at least not necessarily. I've found

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  • Brunch: River City Casino

     Ah, casino buffets…visions of the horn of plenty, slightly out of tune, perhaps, but tootling "We're In The Money" as food pours out, filling tables to overwhelming. Fruit rolls off the side, a turkey tips at an unseemly angle, pies and cakes vie for space with potato salad – that sort of thing. Casinos, at

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  • A Pizza Story

     Sometimes I forget there are certain things that some people need to hear over and over. One of them is that there are lots of different ways to make pizza. The stuff that appeared in college dorms is not the only kind of pizza out there, and to go to a pizza place expecting what

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  • The Pollack Scholarship

    Yesterday afternoon I had the honor and pleasure of presenting this year's Joe Pollack Memorial Scholarships to two great young adults, Amber Lloyd, who wants to eventually do pharmaceutical research, and Edward Thirdkill II, who's aiming for his own business with computer engineering. The Scholarship Foundation is our vehicle for doing this for the St.

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  • Quills

     "Quills" is about the Marquis de Sade. And if there's anyone out there who doesn't know who he is, sufficient to say that he's the person who gave his name to sadism. A film with Geoffrey Rush and based on this play came out several years ago but – I am told – is considerably

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  • Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll

    "And who carries around an egg salad sandwich in their pocket?" That's a sample of dialogue from "Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll". It's Joe Hanrahan, our own Man In Black and leading local purveyor of author Eric Bogosian's works, in the opening monologue of this 75-minute spree. This particular fellow is a street person who

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