#phyllis richman

The Golden Rule?

I wanted to share an observation about how the social media world has changed the restaurant industry.  We’ve all heard about newspapers going out of business or famous magazines (like Gourmet) closing their doors after decades of prominence.  The introduction of virtually limitless media sources on the internet meant that anyone could write anything and put it out there for free, which makes the business of selling actual news or quality writing very difficult.  

What you might not have noticed is the gradual change in the way you read about restaurants. In the old days (you absolutely MAY NOT read that as an admission that I’m old) one could count on almost every newspaper running a restaurant review once a week, often written by one of their staff writers.  In big cities, the position of Food Critic was a huge deal.  Some of the biggest names in food writing were restaurant critics for notable newspapers – Ruth Reichl, Frank Bruni, Tom Sietsema, and lots more.

These guys were powerful.  I mean chefs had pictures of them hanging in the kitchen, with bounties paid to the server who spotted them.  The critics would go out in actual disguises, under fake names, because their review the next Wednesday could make or break a restaurant.  I remember going to an event at a farm with a couple hundred serious food people, chefs, etc. outside of Washington DC several years ago.  My wife returned from powdering her nose and told me about the hilarious lady she had run into who seemed to know everyone there.  She pointed her out to me and waved at her as she walked by. “Oh my God!” I whispered.  “What did you say to her?!  That’s Phyllis Richman!”  Ms. Richman could crush my restaurant with one off-hand insult.  All good, as it turned out, Phyllis had enjoyed more than a couple glasses of wine already.  Crisis averted.

Fast forward to today. In downsizing print media world, newspapers can no longer afford to pay food critics. Oh, sure, the LA Times has Jonathan Gold, the NY Times now has Pete Wells and I think Tom Sietsema still writes reviews for the Washington Post.  But when was the last time you decided where to eat based on an article in your local paper?  Right.  Never.  Why should you?  You can click on Yelp, or TripAdvisor, UrbanSpoon, FourSquare or any of a host of others and instantly see 475 reviews of nearby pizzerias.  You swipe down through the top 10 and find a place with a cute name, a decent review score, a nearby address and you’re off.  When you’ve finished you can go online and tell the world all about your experience. Just click on the button and start moving your thumbs.

One editor told me that although he could pay me less because I was a woman, the savings wouldn’t be worthwhile because I probably wouldn’t stay in the job as long as a man would. Another said he couldn’t risk “an act of God,” meaning, of course, that I might get pregnant.

I am about 70 pages into a book you probably haven't heard of, but is nonetheless amazing: Who's Afraid of Virginia Ham? by Phyllis Richman. The main character is Chas Wheatly, a woman in her forties who is a journalist at the Washington Examiner, and the novel itself is a murder mystery.

I know, right? One generally doesn't associate high-fallutin' famous newspapers and Pulitzer Prize winning reporters with the murder mystery genre. And that's part of the book's genius - it mashes together so many unexpected aspects in what you wouldn't think would be an elegant way, but totally is. 

And it's a very different experience for me. I like to think that I am a well-read person, but this book has given me some perspective on that front. Upon some reflection, I was embarrassed to realize that most of the books I read in my free time nowadays involve young, sexy people doing young, sexy things. WHICH IS NOT INHERENTLY BAD! But I've been thinking about literature through a teenage lens for quite a while, the same lens through which the characters I've been reading about see their world.

But this book comes at things from a whole different angle, which caught me off guard in a good way. It's like when you're little and you hate broccoli with a vengeance, but then you eat it one day and you've forgotten what it tastes like 'cuz you haven't eaten it in so long, and it turns out broccoli is delicious. And that's because you yourself have matured in the meantime, not because the broccoli has changed.

I wouldn't normally think that I would relate to a book written from a forty-year-old woman's point of view, much less a forty-year-old-woman who is a high-social-strata journalist and restaurant critic and talks all the time about fancy restaurants and the delicacies they serve and where they come from. Not that that stuff is uninteresting, it just doesn't usually interest me. But the great thing about this book is that Chas loves that stuff, and the book conveys that superbly. When she describes the food, the restaurant interiors, the plethora of tastes and smells, the reader can taste and smell her love for what she does. And that's remarkable in a book.

The novel isn't primarily about food, though. From what I gather so far, it's really about communicating with people, and how hard it is. Interpreting signals, stepping tactfully around others' feelings, guessing others' motives - these things are difficult, and failing to do them, in this case, leads to disaster. 

Which is a really relatable concept when you think about it, especially to a teenager. But the book explores it through a lens that I am entirely unused to. All of Chas's friends are her coworkers at the Examiner, and her life is a fascinating insight into an entirely different world that few people ever get a glimpse of. And they're all realistic and fun characters, too - an encouraging reminder that even those high-up people who review fancy restaurants or write for The New York Times are people, just like everyone else.