- Next on You Oughta Know.

Halloween isn't just for kids.

At Chaddsford Winery, adults can enjoy some treats too.

Plus the Philadelphia Ballet opens its doors to support and encourage area dancers.

And from Freedom Theater to Hollywood, Philly's own Erika Alexander stopped by to talk about her latest projects and legacy.

(upbeat music) Welcome to You Oughta Know, I'm Shirley Min.

It's been a busy few weeks for the Philadelphia Film Society.

The nonprofit brought Hollywood to Philadelphia with events and a ceremony honoring Philadelphia actress Erika Alexander.

Next on the nonprofit's agenda, the 33rd Annual Film Festival.

- One of the best things about the Philadelphia Film Society is we are a nonprofit organization.

We are supported by the community and about people just coming out to the theater to experience film and that supports all our different programs.

Film is really the most accessible and enriching and engaging form of art.

It is the entry line into just opening up a whole world of ideas, emotions, empathy, compassion with other cultures.

The cornerstone of our engagement is our curator programming that runs Wednesday through Sunday.

Generally here at the Film Society Center, we have our film essentials, which are bonafide agreed upon classics in the film canon.

But we also like to introduce newer films or forgotten films, hidden Gems into that canon.

- (speaking foreign language) - We have Echoes of the Land, it's a survey of West African films and then we just concluded Movies on the Block.

We decide on a theme for not only maybe a film that we show at the end of the day, but a series of events throughout the afternoon into the evening in the neighborhood.

And they bring in not only their expertise and connection to the neighborhood, but then they bring in other associate partners, other community leaders from the different neighborhoods and then we all work together to make a day of events.

And it's really just a neighborhood building, community building and it ends with a movie.

But a key tenet of everything we do is to educate.

And so the big part of education these days is that we work not only internally, but with other teaching artists from different disciplines and backgrounds to go into high schools for whether it's a six week program, it could be the whole semester and we've done classes on teaching kids how to make short films, how to have more understanding of media literacy and understanding how to interpret what looking at and they were able to express it in a very critical, smart, and entertaining way.

The Philadelphia Film Festival is entering its 33rd year this year from October 17th to the 27th.

It's held at all three of our venues and we show over 100 feature films from around the world.

We've really made a stake in the claim that we are driving the film conversation, the culture here in Philadelphia, and hopefully being a resource and platform for other organizations as well.

- What do you see in my brother?

- He's funny.

- He not funny.

- No, not ha ha funny.

- The mid-career retrospective of Erika Alexander after her appearance in American Fiction, which was an Oscar winning film and our opening night film of our film festival last year, this is such a special moment in her career.

- [Erika] This is new Freedom Theater, theater that I was discovered in.

They're gonna name the street after me.

I'm really excited to be honored in that way.

- They wanted to do something bigger beyond that.

Us being a central film society center near City Hall, our engagement with the community, our programming.

So it's just gonna be a really special kind of Erika Alexander takeover event.

And I hope the partnership just continues.

- The Philadelphia Film Festival takes place October 17th through the 27th.

For more information, head over to their website.

Today is a special day for us.

Actress, writer, producer, and activist Erika Alexander is here in the studio with us.

Erika, you wear many hats.

We are so happy to welcome you to You Oughta Know.

- Thank you Shirley, I'm glad to be here.

I'm glad to be in Philly, certainly here.

- When your name came up, it was funny 'cause we were in a meeting and a colleague all of a sudden hears your name and says, oh my gosh, Maxine Shaw, attorney at law.

- She's more famous than I am.

- We're gonna talk about that character in a little bit, but first I wanna go all the way back to the beginning and talk about you were born in Arizona.

Moved to Philly as a teenager.

Tell me about the differences between the two places.

- They couldn't be more different.

In fact, I was born in a part of Arizona that most people don't know exist.

I was born in Winslow, which is 60 miles outta Flagstaff and eventually moved to Flagstaff.

- Your acting journey started at the Freedom Theater in North Philly.

What roles were you given there?

- Well, I was going to school there.

My mother put me in a program, it was a six week program for children, performing arts.

And I was taking an acting course, Johnny Hobbs Jr. was my teacher along with wife Pat Hobbs, Leslie Sisters, Johnny Allen Jr. who was the founder with Robert Leslie.

Those are the people who are integral at that time, because I was a student like everyone else.

And in the fifth week of our six week program, a movie came to town, a Merchant Ivory film, and they were looking for black and brown girls to audition for this movie, called My Little Girl.

And they encouraged us to do it whether we wanted to act or not.

I, at the time, didn't think I wanted to act.

I was going to Girls High, I thought I'd be a scientist.

But I showed up, I was second in line in five o'clock in the morning and by midday, excuse me, not even midday, nine o'clock, the line was wrapped three or four times around that building at Broader Master.

And after I wanna say eight auditions and four screen tests, they chose me.

- Wow, your recall of this moment is incredible.

You have a lot of detail.

- I mean listen, you have a lot less to remember when you are 14 years old, but I remember that because it was rigorous.

I think they were putting us under pressure 'cause they wanted to see if we could take it.

And so you remember how many times you auditioned, but you also remember that a lot of girls wanted that role.

There were a lot of people there.

And the fact that they could choose me out of all of them and to this day I don't truly understand why, but in that moment, I was exactly where I needed to be to be chosen to have an extraordinary moment.

So to me, I'm like Charlie in Charlie in the Chocolate Factory and somebody hands me a golden ticket.

- The film you're talking about, My Little Girl, you worked with the late James Earl Jones.

What was it like doing this film for you?

I mean, 'cause this has to be probably the biggest production you've encountered.

- At the time.

James Earl Jones, Ann Muir and Mary Stewart Masterson, shout out to everybody who made the difference there.

They were already stars in their own world.

And I don't know, I just did the best I could.

Again, I didn't know exactly why they had chosen me.

I think later on I could sort of figure it out.

There was a quiet nature around me.

I wasn't necessarily a person that stuck out, but for film acting, that was exactly what it needed to be more internal.

And so I think that whatever they saw, they chose me for that specific kind of inner interior monologue that was happening.

- We see Philly kind of like weave its way into a lot of your characters and I don't know if that's intentional or kind of coincidental, but for you, how does the city and the cultural scene here influences the choices that you make or have made in your career so far?

- Well, I think Philadelphia has a vibe and you either know it or you don't.

And I got into that vibe right at a crucial moment where I was going to school, but also becoming who I was.

And so I grafted off of a lot of young people that had a lot more courage and boldness in them and audacity, I should say.

I think I always thought I was strong because you had to be.

There were very few black people in Arizona and you start to shape yourself when you're fourth or fifth grade, people start to choose groups and become really tribal.

But here I was told immediately I was young, gifted and black.

And that at Freedom Theater, it was like a bootcamp for the mind that I didn't have the right not to be good, that hadn't earned the right to be tired.

And so Philadelphia is very much in my mind because I don't know, at the time, Rocky was big, there were the Philadelphia Sound.

I found out what that was.

It was Patty Labell, cheese steaks.

There were so many things that you could learn about that had to do with the city that up until that point, I didn't think that city identity necessarily had imprinted on me, but certainly Philadelphia did.

- Tell me about Color Farm Media.

This is an organization that you have co-founded.

What is the organization and what are you creating there?

- Wow, Color Farm Media, I co-founded that with my co-founder, Ben Arnon.

And we met each other campaigning.

We're both activists and he was in Obama campaign and I was in Hillary's campaign and we were delegates in 2008.

And we wanted to change the face of media.

We saw a need that there weren't enough, I think production companies in our mind as a modern take on what was needed because there's a lot of disparity.

And it's not just gender, race, there's disparity in geographic, age, bias, disability, all those things.

So we called ourselves the Motown of film, television, and tech and we are going to change it and have fun doing it.

And up until this point, we have, we even just launched a nonprofit called Color Farm Impact and did a report called the Maxine Shaw Effect and these are all things that are pushing us forward to talking about how we can build leadership, but how we can have a greater understanding of who we are as human beings inside of an industry that can sometimes have trouble with that.

- You mentioned the Maxine Shaw effect, that's her character from the 90s sitcom, Living Single.

And I think people know this effect because anecdotally you've heard time and time again, oh, Maxine Shaw, this character inspired me to become a very successful CEO or this character drove me to perform at my highest level.

Now it's one thing to hear anecdotes about this, but it's another thing to have numbers back it up.

And Color Farm commissioned this study.

How did the results bear out?

Like what did you find, is this effect a real thing?

- It's a real thing.

We knew anecdotally that it was happening.

I grew up with this character, I mean, I have her face, but the people who were watching it grew up.

They not only grew up, they went to school and then they did well and they had success and they had time to think about the things that influenced them and they would run me down the street.

There would be executive educators, people that I may not have known, but people that I knew and admired.

Stacey Abrams from Georgia, the congresswoman, Ayanna Pressley, Mayor De Blassio and his wife, I'm not even kidding, you said it, had a huge influence on what they did.

- [Shirley] Kamala Harris.

- I know, hey, lemme tell you, hey, how about that?

Met her and said absolutely it had an influence her.

And when I look at Ketanji Brown with her locks and her dark skin and being there, I know it had an influence on not only how they think, but how they thought they could look in that space.

And so we did that research with Yvette Lee Bowser as a partner, who, she's the creator of the show, and then also the Representation Project.

They do these types of research and data studies and Caroline Heldman and the research and the information they got back, the data blew us away.

I mean, it was mind blowing how much that one character had influenced so many people in leadership positions, especially as lawyers and just a big shout out.

- Yeah, I get goosebumps when you're talking about it because that really shows and speaks to the importance of representation.

- Representation matters, absolutely.

- The Philadelphia Film Society recently held the Erika Alexander mid-career retrospective for you and that included the renaming of a Philly street.

- Erika Alexander Way, you'd be able to drive on it.

Don't worry, I don't give out tickets.

- Outside of the Freedom Theater, so this has so much significance.

What has this felt like for you and how do you process that?

- I think I'll be processing that for quite a long time.

I can see myself already falling down.

I'm grateful, it's a beautiful moment.

It's a testimony of a legacy that has very little to do with me.

My mother and father did so much in the world and didn't necessarily see the types of, I don't know, results that they may have wanted.

But inside their children, you put your dreams.

Inside of children, you may not know, they take on from your influence, things that can push them forward.

And that happened to me my entire life.

So the fact that they'd want to honor me, the city of Philadelphia, I go outside now and I'll be walking.

Yo, we recording, I feel like Rocky Balboa half the time.

Yo, what's up, yeah, we going to the thing there.

Okay, great, it's really amazing.

So I'll always be grateful and I think just trying in a very simple way to accept this beautiful gift that the universe has given me and also see what I can do with it going down the road.

- It has been an honor to have you here.

Thank you so much for carving out time for us here.

- Absolutely, thank you.

- It takes talent, discipline, and resources to become a classical ballerina.

That's why the Philadelphia Ballet is making sure the next generation of classical dancers are given opportunities to compete.

Producer Karen Smiles has their story.

- Alright, dancers, let's go on and get started today.

Five, six, seven, eight.

- There are a lot of schools, there are a lot of places to go and dance, but sometimes they're not in a studio.

They're not in a professional environment.

When I joined the board, I wanted to do something and be purposeful and to be productive.

So I thought perhaps during the summer months, we can invite young dancers to have an opportunity to study ballet from world class instructors.

There are beautiful mirrors in the ballet bar and wonderful kids that look like them who are just excited about dance.

Hello everyone, welcome to Ballet Bootcamp.

How's it been so far?

And they got to talk about dance and they got to talk about what their futures may be like.

And it was just wonderful to make that connection with them.

I want all of you to realize and understand that ballet is the foundation.

As a young child, I ended up on 63rd Street at the Philadelphia School of Dance Arts where Joan Myers Brown is the founder.

And that's where my first play took place.

At 14, I auditioned for the training company.

At the age of 16, I started rehearsing with the professionals and then I'm on stage and performing with a world-renowned dance company.

- She understands what it's like to come into a ballet class to bring that passion and love with her.

So she's been a wonderful trustee.

It was a ballet bootcamp when it first started four years ago.

And this year, we dedicated it to her and put her name on it because it weren't for her, this program might not exist.

- We wouldn't be where we are with this project if it wasn't for her.

She's put so much work into it and she's just fabulous.

- Students from all over the Philadelphia school district, ages eight to 18 at all levels, experience and have accessibility to the School of Philadelphia Ballet and classical training.

- You can walk out of here knowing that you had an opportunity to work with instructors who poured something really special into you.

And just this past summer, we had Gary Jeter and a lot of the kids are familiar with Gary from Philadanco from Ballet X. Gary was so good with the kids, he was amazing.

- We need to make sure we keep everything going straight up and down.

- We ask that they have some dance background.

There is no audition, but we do ask that we receive a letter of recommendation from their instructors just so that we know what their experience has been like because it is a ballet-based experience.

- And we're good money to start on the other side.

- I think it's extremely important that when you see talent that has a future in that ballet world, that they get that opportunity and they get that support to be able to achieve it.

In my case, for example, when I wanted to dance, my parents couldn't afford it.

And I was incredibly lucky that they saw my talent and they gave me a scholarship and that's the only way that I could do it.

- Angel has actually sat in on some of the ballet bootcamps.

He is interested and supportive of all that we're doing right now.

- And I always speak with Evelyn.

This dancer is ready to go.

This dancer needs a little bit more work.

We sort of manage together how the next steps of each one of the of those dancers are going to be.

- Nice, dancers, good, good, good, good.

- We don't see many black ballerinas.

They're there, but we don't see very many.

I loved Dance Theater of Harlem.

I remember seeing Stephanie Dabney in the Firebird, which was just amazing and I remember running home saying I could do that, I could do all those beautiful jetes and all my point shoes, barres, and that was just beautiful to see all these gorgeous black ballerinas and grateful to have seen Debra Austin in Philadelphia.

- Debra Austin, we are very proud to claim that she was our first principal black ballerina and throughout the United States outside of Dancer of Harlem, so really we were breaking boundaries at that time in the 80s.

- And we have evolved and moved forward.

We are looking for healthy minds and healthy bodies.

Dancers are quick on their feet.

A choreographer, your instructors, they will show you a couple of steps and then you have to do it.

You're always thinking, you're always counting, you're always on your toes.

This is an opportunity to share whatever it is I can with young artists.

And we'll have a discussion on next steps as far as where you want to be and what you wanna see yourself doing.

A lot of times kids, they don't know where they belong, they aren't sure where they fit.

And parents have said, my daughter or my son had a wonderful experience.

They felt accepted, they felt seen.

Thank you so much.

Having the access is the very thing that we need to let young black dancers know there's a place for you.

You can go out into this world, and you can be successful too.

- Want more on the Philadelphia Ballet and its upcoming Past, Present, Future Gala on October 25th?

Check out their website.

Kids aren't the only ones excited about Halloween.

The Chaddsford Winery is back with its Adult Trick or Treat.

- We are at Chaddsford Winery, located in Chaddsford, Pennsylvania, right in the middle of the brand new Wine Valley.

Chaddsford Winery has been around since 1982.

We developed a concept of making wine for everyone.

We have a really robust dry wine program, but we also produce some really fun sweet seasonal wines like our spiced apple and our sunset blush.

Adult Trick or Treat is an adult's only experience where we really allow customers to come onto the property and act like children for the day.

- So the the adult trick-or-treaters are walking on this way path.

- It allows people to walk the grounds, interact with each of our pairing stations, work with our guided tour guides and learn about the wines, the pairings, but also get out into the field and have a little bit of fun.

This year, all five stations are inspired by classic horror movies.

So we have a little shop of horror station.

We have another, the Living Dead Station and a Nosferatu station.

This started about 10 years ago.

We really had an idea of we wanted to pair artisanal treats with wines that we produced in a way that was very approachable and fun.

We always try to integrate something beyond just those standard wines in our portfolio and typically that comes in the form of a wine-based cocktail.

This year we're doing one based on our spiced apple wine and it's a really fun seasonal cocktail.

- Corey, you're gonna demonstrate this year's wine cocktail for me.

- Absolutely, this way you can do it at home if you miss this year's program.

- Oh, I love it.

- So we have our spiced apple mule.

It's going to have a little bit of caramel syrup, it's gonna have a little bit of ginger beer, and it's gonna be led with a healthy pour of our spiced apple wine.

So you're gonna put that in a shaker filled with ice.

And then we're just gonna do about an ounce or two of caramel syrup and you can get this anywhere.

So you're just gonna measure that out and just pour that in.

And this is important.

We're gonna top it with ginger beer.

Do not put this in the shaker or you're gonna make it a giant mess 'cause of the carbonation.

So really it's just the caramel syrup and the spiced apple.

And then you shake it pretty generously.

And then from there, it's already gonna smell and look delicious.

- Yeah, it smells really good.

- So you're just gonna pour a little bit into each glass and then you top it with ginger beer and that's gonna give it a little bit of that spice and effervescence.

It's kind of like a riff on a Moscow mule, but definitely more autumnal.

- And I love the wine glasses, they're so cute.

- So these are our skeleton glasses.

These are not the glasses that they'll get during adult retreat.

We have a whole new glass for this year.

But these, if you come to the winery, you can either have a drink made in them or you can buy them for purchasing or gift shop.

- Oh, I love that, and is the cocktail the same every year?

- No, we like to mix things up.

All of the pairings are different every single year.

And the cocktail in particular, we always try to come up with something different to show people that you can do more with wine than just drink it by itself.

- Cheers.

- It's fall in a glass.

- That's exactly what it is, it's so good.

- Adult Trick or Treat gives us the opportunity to deliver something where adults can come out, hopefully behave themselves as adults, but enjoy themselves as children.

- Take it from me.

This year's wine cocktail is so good, but don't delay.

Tickets are selling out fast for this scary, good time.

All right, that is our show.

We hope you enjoyed it and I hope you are now in the know, goodnight everyone.

(upbeat music)