Welcome back to The Flyover, your daily digest of important, overlooked, and/or interesting Minnesota news stories.
RIP Huge
Sad news in the Minneapolis theater world. After nearly two decades, Huge Improv Theater is closing at the end of October, reports Rohan Preston at the Star Tribune. According to Board Chair Amy Derwinski the company was in no position to handle unexpected expenses after moving four blocks up the street into a new $2.4 million home at 2728 Lyndale Ave. S. last fall. The Lyn-Lake venue was known for hosting a variety of improv nights, as well as the occasional performance festival. The move had been a long time coming; in 2017, after news broke that their landlord, Julius DeRoma, had donated funds to former KKK leader David Duke's Senate campaign, Huge board members vowed move locations at the end of their 10-year-lease.
On top of that, the company had been having some internal trouble—co-founder Butch Roy and artistic director Becky Hauser resigned in August. Huge raised an emergency $100,000 in donations back in May, but that wasn't enough to cover expenses. “What would save us would be if someone stepped forward with a $2 million check, no joke,” Derwinski told the Strib. Which might sound crazy until you remember how the wealthy used to actually fund the arts so they felt like they were contributing to society. Bring back rich people feeling guilty about being rich!
Strib Loses Blount After Olympics Snub
Last July, veteran Star Tribune sportswriter Rachel Blount publicly vented her frustration with Strib management deciding that, for the first time in decades, the paper would not dispatch on-the-ground reporters to cover the Olympic games. "I'd like to think senior management would recognize that this has been my heart and soul since 1998," she told Racket at the time, "that it means everything to me, but nobody from senior management has said anything to me."
Fast-forward: Friday is Blount's last day at the Strib, capping a trailblazing 34-year run at the paper. The Olympics snub very much factored into her decision to leave, reports fellow ex-Stribber Howard Sinker via his new Sports Take newsletter.
Here's Blount's full farewell Slack message, per Sinker.
I’m sad to announce I’m leaving the Star Tribune on Sept. 6. Management’s decision not to send anyone to the Paris Olympics, and its lack of clarity about the "big, hard changes" promised for the sports department, have led me to believe it’s best to step away now. The young’uns at our modern digital media company might not believe the hostility that women sports reporters faced in 1990. We were still being barred from some locker rooms. Though the term "DEI hire" hadn’t been invented yet, we were accused of taking jobs that rightfully belonged to men. We endured sexual harassment from team owners and athletes, and few of our male colleagues stood up for us… Women fought hard to claim seats in the press box, and unenlightened men weren’t going to chase us out. Besides, I was hopelessly, completely in love with my profession. That never wavered in my 34 years here. How could you not adore a job that lets you meet a nun who coaches football? Or sit in a parking lot in Tokyo at 1 a.m., pounding out a story on Suni Lee’s out-of-the-blue Olympic gold, while waiting for a bus? Or head to Canterbury Park before sunrise to help feed the thoroughbreds with a groom from Mexico, as you learn the secrets of a real-life horse whisperer? I don’t know what’s next for me, but I’m incredibly grateful for my time here. Being part of this sports staff means any day can take you down a road of drama, adventure, surprise, inspiration or wonder. And the best part: You get to share that with readers. What a privilege that is.
"Book this: Rachel is not done writing," Sinker concludes. Click here to read a nice tribute from longtime sports editor Chris Carr.
We'll get a bit gossipy here and mention that we're hearing several reports of staff shakeups and shaky morale at the Strib. None of that, of course, is addressed in this latest softball Q&A with CEO Steve Grove, who spends most of the conversation touting his org's expensive-seeming "reboot" as the *Minnesota* Star Tribune. Also, I'm sorry, when your interviewee answers "yes," Glen Taylor has infused the operation with money for the first time, your follow-up question is HOW MUCH?
Do Republicans Fear Peggy Flanagan?
They sure do, according to the Wall Street Journal. Writes John McCormick, the D.C. reporter who travelled all the way to the Minnesota State Fair to profile Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan…
While her profile is far lower than that of Gov. Tim Walz, the Democratic vice presidential nominee, her decades-long influence on him has been profound and she is poised to succeed him as the state’s next governor should her boss ascend to a higher office in the November election. Flanagan, who would be the nation’s first indigenous woman to serve as a governor if Vice President Kamala Harris and Walz win, has served as something of a progressive whisperer for Walz, according to some Democrats in this state.
Now, it's worth pointing out that many of spooked GOPers who get quoted are the same reactionary cranks who are desperately trying to paint Walz as left of Che Guevara. They're no doubt even further agitated by Flanagan, 44, being a younger woman of color who grew up in low-income housing in the Twin Cities suburbs. But McCormick still paints a nice portrait of Flanagan's political ascendency, including a nice bit about her first meeting Walz at Camp Wellstone circa 2005, and sets the table for the right-wing freakout if/when she decides to run for governor in 2026. (Flanagan says she's open to it, depending on what happens with Walz's political fortunes; she declined to say whether she's more progressive than Walz.) And hey, that "progressive whisperer" line is worth the price of admission.
Let the Leafs Be Peeped
“If it’s ‘basic’ to love leaf-peepin’, then by god, throw Racket in Basic Jail and lose the damn key,” one of us (almost certainly Jay) wrote around this time a couple years ago. But what was true then is true now. And today, the Minnesota DNR announced the start of Leaf-Peepin’ Season (I believe it is called that in the Minnesota Constitution), informing Minnesotans what to look for in the coming months. It’s been a wet year, the DNR says, which bodes well overall for foliage colors, but also causes fungal growth, which “might reduce the overall brilliance of the landscape due to early leaf shedding or dead spots and blotches on leaves.” As you can see from the DNR’s generally reliable Fall Color Finder, the state is still almost entirely green. But that’ll change soon, so be prepped to peep!
