Ready for a slice of pie?
This Sunday, Jan. 11 at the Lido Theater in Newport Beach, KCRW presents “Pieowa: A Piece of America,” a feature-length documentary that celebrates how pie is baked into Iowa’s culture, the lengths people go to for a slice, and how this pastry can make the world a better place.
According to press information, pie is not only an iconic American dessert, but also a nonpartisan symbol kindness, comfort, generosity, unity, and love—all the things we need more of right now.
To convey how something as simple as a homemade pie can make the world a better place, filmmaker, author, and piemaker Beth M. Howard aims her lens at her native Iowa, where pie is woven into the state’s cultural fabric.
From church fundraisers to old diners, farmers markets, myriad pie shops, international flavors, Iowa State Fair competitions, the next generation of piemakers, and a 500-mile bike ride across the state where people come from all over the world just to eat pie, we learn how pie is as diverse as America’s population.
Wholesome, heartfelt, and hopeful, “Pieowa: A Piece of America” is as satisfying as a slice of warm apple pie. Audiences and critics agree that “it’s a tonic for what ails us.” The film features comedian Tom Arnold, NPR economics correspondent Scott Horsley (NPR = No Pie Refused), Better Homes & Gardens food editor Jan Miller, and everyday people: church ladies, farm wives, pie shop owners, State Fair pie competitors, chefs, food historians, RAGBRAI bike riders, and humanitarians of all ages.
Producer/director of “Pieowa” Beth M. Howard is the author of three pie-themed books and the former (and final) resident of the American Gothic House where she ran the Pitchfork Pie Stand.
Howard experienced Iowa’s far-reaching influence of pie when she once got hired as a pie baker in Malibu. When asked what her qualifications were, she answered “I’m from Iowa” and got the job. Her film expands on the themes of her TEDx Talk, in which she espouses pie’s healing powers. how pie can build community and be used as a tool for social good.
Doors open at 3 p.m., film starts at 4 p.m. followed by a post-screening Q&A and book signing with Beth Howard. For tickets: https://www.thelidotheater.com/events/pieowa.
Following the screening, there will be a pie party on the patio at Woody’s Diner adjacent to the Lido Theater. Community members are encouraged to bring a pie to share. They can bring the pie covered and in a bag if they go to the movie (just put it under your seat and then bring it next door). For those who don’t want to bring a pie, Woody’s is offering a dollar off slices of apple pie for those who attended the movie.
For more info on the film visit www.pieowa.com.
