NYC NOW - April 25, 2023: Evening Roundup

Episode Date: April 25, 2023

APRIL 25 EVENING New York City is remembering singer, actor, and activist, Harry Belafonte. Belafonte died Tuesday morning at his Upper West Side home. He was 96. Also, a federal monitor overseeing Rikers Island says correction officers responding to emergencies often make the situations more violent. And finally, the cronut turns 10 next month. WNYC’s Kerry Shaw shares more on the sweet little pastry

Good evening and welcome to NYC Now. I'm Jenae Pierre for WNYC. New York City is remembering the life and legacy of singer, actor, and activist Harry Belafonte. Born in Harlem to parents from the Caribbean, Belafonte lived and performed in New York City for much of his life. He spoke to WNYC in 2011 and shared why his mother decided to move their family out of the city. The city and all of its conditions so overwhelmed her. that it would be better off for her children to go back to Jamaica, so that we'd be better off being raised by a village than by the mischief of the streets of New York.

Belafonte was one of the first black performers to gain a wide following on film and sell a million records as a singer. He scaled back his performing career in the 60s in order to devote more time to his political activism. During the Civil Rights era, he worked closely with the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and was deeply involved with the March on War.

Washington in 1963. In 2013, he worked to support Bill de Blasio's campaign for mayor. Belafonte died Tuesday morning at his Upper West Side Home. He was 96. Here's a little bit of Belafonte's Jamaica Farewell. A federal monitor overseeing Rikers Island says correction officers responding to emergencies often make the situations more violent. WNYC's Matt Katz has more on a new court filing from the federal monitor who oversees the jails. The monitor detailed a recent chaotic scene in which a large number of correction officers from the emergency services unit turned a search operation into a violent disturbance. The monitor said that officers sprayed chemicals at detainees who were

attempting to comply and then beat them as they scattered. One man suffered seizures but did not get immediate medical care. An officer put a handcuffed detainee in a chokehold and then shoved his head into a door. The monitor said officers then filed incomplete reports about what happened. Correction Commissioner Lewis Molina, who did not respond to request for comment, is scheduled to testify at a federal court hearing on Thursday about this and other issues with the jails. Stay close. There's more after the break. True New Yorkers have likely heard of the cronut. It's a croixin'nette combination from chef Dominique Ansel. The sweet little pastry started a revolution when it first appeared a decade ago,

with people lining up for hours to get their hands on one. The cronut turns 10 next month. WNYC's Carrie Shaw has more. Here's the funny thing about the cronet. Even if you've never had one, it's probably changed how you eat in New York City. But let's start at the beginning. The early days of the cronut were a stressful time for Dominique Ansel. Guess we're complaining because we didn't make enough.

Our kitchen was so tiny. We're trying to produce more, but the staff was too tired. People like scalper us outside, like reselling our food for like 10, 20, 30 times more that we're selling solicitors. Like what is going to deal with? People killing the line, people picking a fight, calling the police, me having to hire like a bouncer for the bakery. That's right.

A French pastry chef had to hire a bouncer because people were trying to force their way into his store. to get a cronut. I had to push them back almost, like, physically, and I asked them to wait in line. But why? What was it about the cronut that made people willing to wait in line for hours?

Here's Jonah Berger, a professor at the Wharton School of Business and an expert in marketing. Kronut wasn't just selling food, right? They were selling social currency, right? They were selling the ability to tell everyone you know that you've had something that not everyone else has had access to.

You look smart, you look special, You look in the know. You look ahead of everybody else. Penny Stankowitz opened a bakery around the same time that Dominique Ansel opened his. She's now a chef instructor at the Institute of Culinary Education. It started a revolution of Instagramable, desirable foods. That nature of what happened with that cronut changed how people built restaurants, how people built bakeries to make places where people could take pictures. because they understood the need for the public to drive the interest in their product.

The Kronut, of course, didn't just change the restaurant world. It changed Dominique Ansel's life. He won a James Beard Award. He opened bakeries in Hong Kong and Las Vegas. He declined offers to expand the Kronut Empire into a global chain. My dad used to work in a factory. He was a factory worker. I don't want to own a factory.

The Kronut is many stories baked into one. And there are many stories Dominique Ansel is not tired of sharing. It's a product that opens so many doors to creativity, to hospitality, to connecting with people. That's a product that allows us to raise money still to this day for Charlie to fight against hunger, which is something important for me. And despite the stress of the early days, he has no regrets. I think that if I had to do it, I'll do this exact something. Carrie Shaw. Thanks for listening to NYC now from WNYC.

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