Jessica DeCarlo at the grand opening of her shop, Rosemary Rose Finery where she will be selling her internationally known jewelry designs which she will customize for weddings and other occasions. Here she stands at a table where visitors could make their own perfume with essential oils.
SALISBURY — The grand opening of Rosemary Rose Finery took place May 4 at 19 Main St. in Salisbury.
Rosemary Rose Finery’s owner, Jessica De Carlo, was based in Brooklyn for sixteen years and has recently become a resident of Amenia.
Jessica said, “I am thrilled to be part of this beautiful community. I am happy and excited to be here, and I feel lucky to be part of this beautiful town. It is important for me to have community and to experience joy.” She hopes to impart that to her customers.
DeCarlo has been making jewelry since she was a teenager. She worked in the corporate world as an adult but made the choice to go back to making jewelry and began selling her jewelry at Brooklyn Flea. Her designs are now sold globally.
She uses the “last wax process” in many of her designs. These pieces are carved in wax and then cast in metal. Her designs are influenced by nature, her world travels, and her life in the city.
At her shop in Salisbury, DeCarlo is excited to offer “Jewelry, both modern and vintage, gifts,” and “artful objects for the home and heart.” She plans to feature “small batch apothecary items, like locally made perfume and plant-based products.”
She selects and makes the items in her shop with the idea of giving her customers, “little moments that make you feel happy.”
She will have monthly lectures on plant education “highlighting season medicinal plants by community herbalists.” DeCarlo herself learned about herbs when she did an apprenticeship at an herbal education school.
She will also offer lectures from local artists. Eventually she hopes to have classes for children.
DeCarlo distills her own essential oils for her perfume in a “big old fashioned glass distiller.” She said that she harvests her own plants. She added that to distill the oils, she must harvest a lot of plants, such as wild bee balm or sage, and may end up with only five drops of oil.
There will also be “alternative bridal options” like custom engagement or wedding bands, and she will do other custom jewelry designs.
At the grand opening celebration there were opportunities for anyone visiting the shop to make their own perfume and sage bundles.
Graham Corrigan
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
For centuries, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart has overshadowed nearly everyone in classical music, including the talented musicians in his own family: his father Leopold, his sister Maria Anna Mozart and his son Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart who were all prolific composers and musicians in their own right.
On March 15, Great Barrington’s Mahaiwe Theater will explore the legacy of Mozart with its “Meet the Mozarts” concert. It’s mostly Amadeus — a quartet will perform the maestro’s “Piano Trio in B-flat, KV 502” and “Quartet in G minor, KV 478” — but the evening will feature works from both the elder and younger Mozarts.
“The story of Mozart is forever an enigma,” said Close Encounters with Music’s artistic director Yehuda Hanani. “It’s really a mystery. How did a man who, as a child, dazzled the royals of Europe end up in an unmarked grave?”
Leopold Mozart is best known for writing a foundational textbook on playing the violin. His catalog included church music, opera dances and symphonies, though much of it has been lost over time. Amadeus was his seventh child, and he served as the boy’s primary music teacher after the toddler began imitating the piano lessons taken by his older sister.
“Mozart’s father really made him what he was,” Hanani said. “He was a devoted pedagogue. He drilled him, and he corrected his early pieces. And then, of course, he was a great promoter. He created the legend.”
Mozart’s son, Franz Xaver Wolfgang, was born just four months before his famous father’s death. His musical education included lessons connected to such figures as Joseph Haydn and Antonio Salieri, and he socialized with contemporaries such as Franz Schubert and Robert Schumann. He was a renowned composer in his own right, “and he probably would have been much more acknowledged and known if not for his misfortune of being the son of a great genius,” Hanani added. Wolfgang would often perform his father’s work alongside his own. As his tombstone notes, “May the name of his father be his epitaph, as his veneration for him was the essence of his life.”
The Mahaiwe’s concert will feature a fourth Mozart: AI Mozart. “We are living in a very revolutionary technological, artistic, cultural time with AI, and it’s creating some kind of cultural crisis,” Hanani said. “So, we’re doing something a little whimsical, a little naughty and a little serious at the same time.” The three-minute piece uses Mozart’s existing oeuvre to create a composite work.
Hanani has mixed feelings. “If you compare [AI Mozart] to Leopold and Wolfgang Mozart, it’s not so bad. But next to the real Mozart, it’s full of clichés and platitudes, and it’s really drawing on something that was already there… There’s no spark in it.”
For more information and tickets, visit Mahaiwe.org
Brian Gersten
With awards season upon us, it’s that familiar time of year when one might realize they have seen little to no buzzworthy films this past year. Perhaps you were too busy shoveling your driveway this February to catch “K-Pop Demon Hunter.” Or maybe, after realizing there are 469 known feature films featuring Frankenstein’s monster, you thought it untoward to see the latest iteration of “Frankenstein” by Guillermo del Toro before viewing the previous 468 installments.
Whatever the case may be, if you need some last-minute conversational guidance for your upcoming Oscar party, I am here to get you up to speed on some of the 2026 Academy Award nominees that are worth seeing — and worth skipping.
“One Battle After Another” — SEE IT
Arguably the best movie of the year and a film that reflects our contemporary American moment better than anything else. Watching “One Battle After Another” is like looking in a mirror — witnessing an oppressive white nationalist government (represented by a grotesque Sean Penn) attempting to thwart a coalition of resolute freedom fighters (led by Leonardo DiCaprio, Teyana Taylor, Chase Infiniti, Regina Hall and Benicio del Toro). It’s a 3½-hour revolutionary roller coaster with unexpected laugh-out-loud humor, capped off with one of the greatest chase scenes ever put on film. A must-see.
“F1”— SKIP IT
A 2½-hour formulaic car commercial with next to no redeeming qualities. I’d skip it faster than Brad Pitt driving a McLaren at 200 mph.
“Bugonia” — SEE IT (BUT EXPECT NIGHTMARES)
Emma Stone and Jesse Plemons are hauntingly terrific in this twisted kidnapping escapade. Plemons plays a gaunt conspiracy theorist who thinks our capitalist overlord (Stone) is an alien intent on destroying mankind and taking over the world. A brilliant take on the complexity of conspiracies, the film keeps you guessing until the very end about what’s true and what’s not.
“Hamnet” — SEE IT (BRING TISSUES)
A Shakespearean tale of love and loss. To call it a tearjerker would be an understatement. A powerful and instant classic.
“Sinners”— SEE IT (IF YOU LIKE HORROR FILMS)
The one film of the year where the buzz surrounding the project might outweigh its artistic ambitions. Racist white vampires terrorizing Black juke joint patrons in the Jim Crow South is as scary a horror premise as there is, and there’s loads of powerful symbolism at play. But at the end of the day, it felt like just another gory, gruesome horror movie. Loved the Buddy Guy cameo, though.
“Marty Supreme” — SEE IT
Whether you like Timothée Chalamet or not, his performance as the Trump-esque Marty Mauser — a professional pingpong player and hustler who will stop at nothing to achieve his goals — is an astute take on the affliction of American exceptionalism. With an anxiety-inducing pace and cadence we’ve come to expect from director Josh Safdie, the film is full of truly bizarre and memorable moments and characters.
“The Alabama Solution”— SEE IT
Pine Plains resident Andrew Jarecki takes viewers inside the Alabama state prison system in a documentary constructed almost entirely from cellphone footage covertly shot by prisoners. The conditions inside are utterly deplorable and completely shocking — resembling modern slavery more than rehabilitation. One struggles to make sense of the inhumanity and to come to terms with the fact that this is happening in America in 2026.
The 98th Oscars will take place Sunday, March 15, 2026, at 7 p.m. The ceremony will be hosted by Conan O’Brien and broadcast on ABC, with streaming available on Hulu.
Mike Cobb
Students at Berkshire Waldorf High School rehearse for the performances of “Little Women” March 13-15 at The Unicorn Theater in Stockbridge.
The Berkshire Waldorf High School presents “Little Women” by Kate Hamill, adapted from the novel by Louisa May Alcott, at The Unicorn Theater in Stockbridge, Massachusetts.
Director Kendell Shaffer has taught screenwriting for the Writers Guild Foundation High School Screenwriting Workshops. About the choice of play, Shaffer said,
“The idea of ‘Little Women’ came from our senior girls who wanted a play with a heavy female cast after doing ‘The Outsiders’ last year. Kate Hamill’s adaptation is spunky, funny, with a contemporary feminist slant that transcends Louisa May Alcott’s ideas to today’s audience.”
Students learning “fight” choreography.Mike Cobb
Actor Noelle Bodenstab said, “My role is Hannah. She’s very sassy and a very big contrast from the role I played in ‘The Outsiders’ last year. I feel as though it’s exercising my acting abilities, and I’m really excited to see how it turns out in the play.”
Actor Leo Martinez said, “I am playing Laurie, who is a friend of the Marches and this lonely, rich, sentimental guy who doesn’t really like the traditional idea of a man. His character revolves around his love for Jo, who doesn’t fit into the role of a girl very well, and them growing up together.”
The production features contemporary and original songs performed by the Berkshire Waldorf High School rock band.
Some of the updates to the production involve changing traditional gender roles.Mike Cobb
“Having been a TV producer in L.A. before relocating to the Berkshires, I like to add live music to plays I direct, similar to underscoring a film or TV episode,” said Shaffer. “The music helps guide the emotion and elevates the experience for both the audience and actors. Using contemporary music performed by our school’s rock band updates this classic play.”
“We are fortunate to have so many talented students at the Berkshire Waldorf High School and professional mentors working with the students as costume designer, choreographer, musical director, and vocal coach. The Berkshires are alive with artists, and it’s a gift to work with its seasoned and emerging talent,” Shaffer added.
Performances start at 7 p.m. Friday, March 13; 7 p.m. Saturday, March 14; and 2 p.m. Sunday, March 15.
For more information, visit berkshiretheatregroup.org.
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Lakeville Journal
On Friday, March 13, The Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook will host a reception and lecture with Robin Wall Kimmerer, bestselling author of “Braiding Sweetgrass.” A plant ecologist and member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, Kimmerer blends Indigenous knowledge and Western science to explore how plants and ecosystems can teach us about reciprocity, resilience and our relationship to the natural world. The in-person event is sold out. To register for the online event, visit caryinstitute.org
Lakeville Journal
Deborah Simon’s “Ecological Streams of Consciousness: Sika Deer (2025).”
This Must Be the Place, the winter exhibition at Wassaic Project, will have its closing reception on Saturday, March 14. The exhibition showcased the work of 11 artists throughout the seven floors of Maxon Mills, exploring personal and cultural history, material transformation, the sacred and speculative and immersive encounters. There will beartist talks beginning at 2 p.m. followed by open studios of the March artists-in-residence program.
Riley Klein
FALLS VILLAGE — Housatonic Valley Regional High School’s girls varsity basketball team advanced out of the first round of the Divison V state tournament with a 41-38 victory over Howell Cheney Technical High School Friday, March 6.
HVRHS was ranked 19th in the tournament and Cheney was ranked 14th.
Senior captains Olivia Brooks and Maddy Johnson each posted a double-double in the first round. Brooks had 14 points and 10 rebounds while Johnson had 14 rebounds and 10 steals.
HVRHS advanced to play 3rd-ranked Academy of Aerospace and Engineering in Windsor Monday, March 9. Aerospace won 58-20 and knocked Housatonic out of the tournament.
The @Housy_athletics Instagram page praised the effort of the team. “So proud of our girls!”
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