by Michael Cecconi

In the movies, as in life, there is the introduction.  I, for one, prefer the laconic approach, letting the words accrete and begin to form an image after much time.  But sometimes the ball must roll faster.  To this end, I crib from Daniel Day Lewis for my introduction, and look forward to many more words to create many more images.  And rest assured, when I say that there will be cocktails, I am fully equipped to make good on that promise. 

Ladies and gentlemen…  I’ve traveled over half a lifetime to be here tonight.  I couldn’t get away sooner because my new cocktails were coming in at Zazu and I had to see about it.  That bar is now flowing at two thousand drinks and it’s paying an income of five thousand dollars a week.  I have two others in the works and I have ten cocktails at Two Sisters; so, ladies and gentlemen, if I say I’m a bar man, you will agree.  Now, you have a great chance here, but bear in mind, you can lose it all if you’re not careful.  Out of all men that beg for a chance to write about movies and drink, maybe one in twenty will be barmen (who can write); the rest will be speculators—that’s men trying to get between you and the word—to get some of the writing and recipes that ought by rights come to you.  Even if you find one that has money and means to writing, he’ll maybe know nothing about cocktails and he’ll have to hire the job out on contract, and then you’re depending on a contractor who’ll rush the job through so he can get another contract just as quick as he can.  This is … the way that this works.

I do my own mixing and writing, and the words that work for me work for me, and they’re words I know.  I make it my business to be there and to see their work.  I don’t lose my tools in the ice well and spend months fishing for them; I don’t botch the measuring off and let water in the drink and ruin the whole cocktail.  I’m a family man.  I run a family business.  This is my son and my partner, F.Y. Cecconi.

We offer you the bond of family that very few barmen can understand.  I’m fixed like no other company in this field and that’s because this opportunity to write for EatDrinkFilms has just come in.  I have a string of tools all ready to put to work.  I can load a word into sentences and have them here every month.  I have business connections so I can get the spirits for the drinks—such things go by friendship in a rush like this—and this is why I can guarantee to start writing / mixing and to put up the words to back my word.  I assure you, ladies and gentlemen, no matter what the others promise to do, when it comes to the showdown, they won’t be there.

Michael likes all things drink related.  Michael likes movies.  And, in an odd twist of fate, Michael loves words about movies.  These three facts combine to make a perfect storm of sensibility, ability, and enebriation needed to fulfill duties at EatDrinkFilms.  When not rhapsodizing about film, Michael tends the bar at Two Sisters Bar & Books in San Francisco.  He teaches mixology in San Francisco and New York.  And lately, he’s been trying to capture the magic of what he does in a bottle so he can spread his tasty libations across the land.  Please feel free to contact him at  themobilemixologist@gmail.com with all queries.