Gretchen Kalwinski

You figure the joint might be half empty. Who goes to a bar to hear people read literature? You walk into a crowd. The back room at the Hideout, at 1354 W. Wabansia, is standing room only, full of mostly thoughtful, bookish, beer-sipping twentysomethings, all striped sweaters, knit caps and undecided facial hair.
You figure the sound system must stink and, because you’re not twentysomething and blew out your ears at too many rock concerts, you’d better get up close. The sound system is excellent, designed for the bands that will take the stage later.
Jonathan Messinger, who runs the Web site THISisGRAND, is your host. He explains the concept. This is the Dollar Store, he says. What he does, he says, is go to a real dollar store and buy “the most evocative crap” he can and gives this crap to various writers around town, people he really respects, and they go away for a few weeks and “make something wonderful out of it.” And then, he explains, they show up here — at the Dollar Store at the Hideout on the first Friday of the month — and read aloud what they’ve written.
You figure this can’t be good. Who writes well for free? Actually, just about everybody at first. James Joyce, right? He must have scribbled like mad growing up in suburban Dublin. And Hemingway in Oak Park. Bet they had to call him twice to come down to dinner.
Messinger reads a story first. His dollar store gift to himself was a tiny plastic woodpecker that pecks its way down a foot-long pole. He stands it on the table, lets the woodpecker slide down, pushes it back to the top and begins reading a short story titled “Winged Attack.”
“The American-born kung fu master does not have his father’s respect,” he reads. “The son is brawnier, tattooed up his arms and on his legs and handsome in a way that makes his female students dislike him.”
You can’t follow the story completely, which is no knock at all. A short story, even a fine one, can be tough to track when being read aloud. You know that from listening to actors read stories on WBEZ. But it’s got a nice pace, and it’s visual — the grandmaster goes for the throat — and it’s satisfyingly dark — the grandmaster knees some hapless kid. And the theme matters to you, about the shifts in power and respect between fathers and sons. And there’s that woodpecker, which Messinger, just for laughs, moves up and down the pole to punctuate turning points.
Everybody cheers when Messinger finishes, and you think the Dollar Store is some kind of bargain. You’re having a great time and all it cost was a $1 cover — a dollar.
Gretchen Kalwinski is up next. Her dollar crap from Messinger is a tiny ceramic knicknack of two cats, one cat holding up its left paw, the other its right. She explains that she did a little research online and learned they are called “Lucky Cats.” One cat attracts wealth and other protects wealth.
She reads a story titled “Spooky Action” about the evolving relationship between two teenage girls, not unlike two Lucky Cats, and once again you can’t seem to follow completely, but who cares. Kalwinski has a lovely way with imagery and carries you along. She reads aloud: “That same night, Amy could have sworn that they were inhabiting bodies other than their own, bodies from Mexico or Russia that were drifting through the night air, needing to take form. An out of body thing was happening as the bed shook and the windows wailed and the neighborhood kids whooped and hollered in the old factory next door, clattering garbage tops and whistling bottle rockets.”
You figure one or two of tonight’s five stories might be OK and the rest will be stinkers. But as reader follows reader, every story shapes up as at least half decent, and a couple are much better than that. But of course: This was a juried show, invitation only. These are writers Messinger admires. In the 15 months the Dollar Store has been around, he’s featured many an unknown writer but also some definite knowns, including Elizabeth Crane, Joe Meno and Lisa Buscani, who is executive director of the Poetry Center of Chicago.
You wonder on this night if Messinger might be saving the best for last, and that’s just what happens. Jeremy Sosenko, who is also Messinger’s new co-host, climbs up on stage with a magazine in his hand and explains that he didn’t write an original story because he recently read that Pat Morita, the actor who played Mr. Miyagi in the movie “The Karate Kid,” has died. So, in honor of Morita, Sosenko says, he thought he might read aloud from an Esquire interview with the man who wrote and directed “The Karate Kid,” John Avildsen. The movie was based on Avildsen’s experience growing up in California, and there really was a Mr. Miyagi.
You think this is weird. In the Esquire interview, which Sosenko begins to read, Avildsen cautions that he had to change a few things about the real Mr. Miyagi for the sake of narrative in the movie. For example, there’s “a thread about Miyagi’s love for bonsai trees,” when in real life Mr. Miyagi had no interest in bonsai or gardening.
But as Sosenko continues to read, the Esquire interview turns surreal — and tears-in-your-eyes hilarious — as the real Mr. Miyagi is unintentionally revealed as a sadistic and racist monster. He in no way (he loved to inflict pain), shape (he weighed over 450 pounds) or form (he wasn’t even Asian) resembled the lovable Mr. Miyagi of the movie.
“He had a great sense of humor,” Avildsen says of Miyagi in the interview. “He loved practical jokes, especially ones involving food. You know that novelty candy, you eat it and your mouth turns a certain color? He got such a kick out of those. He would offer me a piece of candy, next thing you know my mouth would turn blue or start burning with unimaginable pain.”
You remember then: Sosenko’s dollar store crap from Messinger, which he mentioned when he took the stage, was a sucker that turns your mouth blue.
Later that night, while driving home, you wonder why you found it so hard to believe that Sosenko — and not some highly paid Esquire humorist — wrote this perfectly tuned parody.
Maybe because it was so good, and you didn’t expect so much from the Dollar Store.
And now you know better.
The next Dollar Store is at 7 p.m. Friday at The Hideout. Featured writers will be Jimmy Vickery, Latoya Wolf and John Beer. For more information, go to Dollarstoreshow.com.
tmcnamee@suntimes.com
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