Pass the Hearts

An evening that ends with the man dropping me off calling, "You want to go dancing?" from the car is a very good night.

Our culture tonight came via the new documentary "Amy," playing at the Criterion. Standing in line to buy tickets, I struck up a conversation with the man in front of me (or maybe he struck it up with me), eventually asking if he, too, was going to see "Amy."

"She wants to see "I'll See You in My Dreams," he began before I stopped him to compliment him. Any man who starts a sentence with "She wants..." is a man worth talking to. When I mentioned this, he turned fully around to school me.

"The most important thing a man can learn to do in a relationship is to yield," he explained before sharing a story about a full bird colonel he met as a young man who advised him that he'd do well with women if he remembered one phrase: "Yes, dear."

It sounded like something out of a gentlemen's guide circa 1955, but he was adamant about a man's role in making a successful relationship. Checking his cred, I asked how long his relationship has been going on. "Years," he said with a big smile, bragging that he'd taught his son the secret, too. "He's been married for years, too," he said with not a little pride.

It was a good thing I met Joe Positive before the documentary about Amy Winehouse because, man, was hers a tragic story. The beauty of it was that she'd come up in an era when a young person's every move was captured on camera, so the film contained some amazing footage of her in every possible situation: talking, singing, sleeping, looking at her phone, drunk onstage.

Casually referred to as "Just another North London Jewish girl," the  footage delivers irrefutable proof that she had a once-in-a-generation talent that deserved to be compared to Dinah Washington and Billy Holiday. This was something I hadn't known before I discovered "Frank," her first album, recently.

And she was funny, too, looking at herself and mumbling, "I look so f*cking grim,"  when she really just looked young and un-made up. A journalist asks her about her "Back to Black" album, wondering if she "used that album to clean out her emotional closet," a fabulous phrase to describe that kind of writing.

It was painful to watch her unravel, her body becoming skeletal because of her eating disorders, her enthusiasm for making music dimmed by drugs and alcohol (never more so than when she wins a Grammy and says, "It's so boring without drugs") and the men closest to her - her Johnny-come-lately father and her white trash, bad teeth druggie husband (and, sadly, love of her life) Blake - milking her for everything they could long after they knew she was past the breaking point.

Most annoying throughout the movie was the couple next to me (not my dates, but on the other side), who talked throughout, making inane comments such as, "Didn't she have lots of money? Okay, so if she did, why would she use crack?"  Apparently they thought rich people should use better drugs.

It was easily one of the best documentaries I've seen and this documentary dork has seen plenty.

Because of so many hot topics to consider - the perils of the music industry, drugging and drinking, eating disorders, dysfunctional families, enabling, paparazzi - we'd planned a post-film outing for discussion purposes, landing at Rancho T just as the dinner crowd was winding down.

Taking the last three seats at the bar in front of a favorite bartender we trusted implicitly, we put our cocktail futures in his hands and he rewarded us handsomely. My drink began with Del Maguey Crema de Mezcal, because the bartender was impressed by its slogan: "For women only...and...a few strong men."

While he may have thought it applied to me, it could have also applied to Amy, who sang of being like a man and having to deal with a lady-boy for a partner. This evolved into discourse about why men's and women's sex drives are perceived so differently, even as recently as the past decade covered in the film.

The cocktail hit on all cylinders, a satisfying combination of the mezcal, rum, grapefruit juice and hot sauce with a pineapple basil garnish. My dates' drinks were just as seductive in different ways so we passed them around for sampling.

One of the servers remembered me from a prior visit, asserting himself in the most amusing ways with jazz hands, offhand quips and double-entendres.

Overhead, the music was a solid playlist called "Playing with the Band" (as in, the Band) and on the bar, the snacks were outstanding. Specials of cast iron-seared chicken hearts with hominy were swoon-worthy while fresh tomato gazpacho was, in essence, a bowl of summer.

Busy talking about an upcoming wine dinner, we barely noticed that a nearby bar sitter was hanging on our every word. "Where is this dinner?" she asked, not afraid to let on she'd been eavesdropping. I returned the favor later when she mentioned Rumors on 19th Street and my ears pricked up.

As a D.C. girl, I spent far too many nights in the '80s dancing at Rumors not to catch a reference to the long-time club when it's tossed around.

Back in those days, I was a rum drinker and tonight I picked that back up at my friend's recommendation with an exquisite sipper, Ron Zacapa Centenario Sitema Solera 23. The nose alone spoke to those 23 years of aging. "I wouldn't think of mixing this," my friend said. No, sir.

Never fear, we also discussed the film as planned, all of us agreeing it had moved us to tears in parts as we witnessed Amy's decline while the people around her stood by.

Pru may have had the funniest observation when referring to the sleazy boyfriend/husband who saw her as a cash cow and drugging buddy. "Oh, I could tell what kind of person he was from the first second. I could smell him from a mile away!"

You know, the kind of guy who could brag on camera about how handsome he was through horrid, British teeth.

Of course, we also discussed plenty that had nothing to do with jazz singers, namely where Aziza's cream puffs will land, how our mothers gave us bad Lilt perms as children ("The smell!" I said. "The burn!" Pru recalled) and how living in the Heron suite will benefit a relationship.

"You can't date when you live in the same house!" Pru protested. Tragic but true.

After much discussion, we decided on orange caramel pie to round out the evening. Beau and I had tried it together on a previous visit, but were told they're using a new recipe now. It was indeed an improved dish (although we agreed that pie crusts suffer in the refrigerator), one made even better by a practically perfect dessert cocktail featuring Frangelico and Cava, not too sweet, not too heavy.

The kind of drink suitable for women only...and...a few men, namely the ones who know how to yield. They're few and far between, I hear.