AMENIA — Brimming with colorful fresh seasonal produce, a pop-up farmers market welcomed shoppers on Friday, June 27 at the Town Hall lower parking lot. Choices were varied, including seasonal harvests of leafy greens and flowers, cheeses and meats, French crepes, and plants, all accompanied by live music and crafts for youngsters.
Sponsored by the North East Community Center and the Amenia-Wassaic Community Organization, the event will repeat on the second and fourth Fridays of each month through Sept. 5. Hours are 3 to 7 p.m.
“I’m excited to see it,” said Town Supervisor Leo Blackman. “We’ve been meeting with the NECC for a long time.”
Having brought playful black lab puppies to the season’s first Amenia Farmers’ Market on Friday, June 27, Mark Hussey was pleased to show one particularly patriotic puppy that was a big hit.Photo by Leila Hawken
Pleased with the collaborative effort between the sponsoring organizations, Danielle Mollica of the AWCO said that the pop-up market idea was a great way to bring the community together.
Vendors who wish to participate at the farmers market should contact Katie Cariello, Food Programs Coordinator at the NECC. For information, go to katie@neccmillerton.org or phone 518-407-7030.
For general questions about attending the farmers market, call 845-863-4862 or email danielle@ameniawassaic.org.
Celebrating its 45th year, the Grumbling Gryphons will perform at HVRHS Friday, Aug. 1, at 7 p.m.
“We’re a touring company that is participatory,” Elias said with her trademark storytelling cadence. “Even when there’s no pre-performance workshop, it’s still participatory. Always.”
Founded in 1980 “in a little basement apartment on the lower east side with co-founder Vanessa Roe,” said Elias,Grumbling Gryphons (recipients of the 2003 Connecticut Governor’s Arts Award) has long occupied a unique niche: part performance troupe, part educational outreach, part community ritual. Whether dramatizing Greek myths, Native American legends, or original tales about bees and bogs, the company’s ethos centers on inclusion, transformation, and hands-on engagement.
This summer’s camp offers children ages six and up five fast-paced days of storytelling, acting, mask-making, and rehearsal. The first three days will take place at Elias’s own home studio — a tucked-away space filled with costumes, puppets, and instruments — before moving into full performance prep mode.
“In the ideal world, we would have more time,” she laughed. “It’s a lot of pressure to be performing for the public after five days. But we’re going to do our best.”
The gala performance, she explained, is a kind of theatrical mosaic — scenes and excerpts from Grumbling Gryphons’ vast repertoire, some showcasing seasoned adult performers and others giving campers center stage. The cast will include returning campers, newcomers, and guest artists drawn from the Gryphons’ decades-spanning circle of collaborators including mask maker and artist Ellen Moon.
“We’re still figuring out exactly what we’ll do,” said Elias, “but it’s kind of like a smorgasbord… a celebration. And it’s open — if anybody wants to get their kids involved, or even volunteer, we welcome you.”
Photo provided
Elias’s own theater background winds through early improvisational schools, Viennese dance traditions, and experimental spaces like Henry Street Settlement. As a child on Long Island, she studied with jazz pianist Ivan Fiedel and dancer Rosalind Fiedel, eccentric mentors who nurtured her taste for the surreal and spontaneous.
“Mr. Fiedel was a character,” she recalled. “He would smoke a cigar… and take the cigar in his ear and the smoke would come out the other end. I don’t know how he did it.”
Elias built Grumbling Gryphons with this sense of magic — not as a traditional company, but as a living, evolving story in itself. Whether working with preschoolers or middle-schoolers, audiences in botanical gardens or historic town halls, the Gryphons invite kids to become creators — to chant, to improvise, to embody archetypes from ancient lore or environmental parables.
And that’s what this summer’s camp and gala are all about. “It’s more than theater,” Elias said. “It’s myth, poetry, movement — it’s about building self-esteem, imagination. It’s about transformation.”
For more information, to register a child for the 2025 Summer Theater Camp, or to inquire about volunteering, visit grumblinggryphons.org
