Fabulosity: Also over at TBD, Jenny Rogers—who is headed to the Examiner—has a profile of Joi-Marie Mackenzie, the "CEO, CFO, and janitor" of DCFab.com, a society website for "the browner D.C."

Welcome to the Bungle: DCist's headline gets it right: Axl Rose and some guys to play Fillmore.

Obama Family Fun Alert: Over the weekend, the first family took a probably-not-casual-whatsoever stroll to the Corcoran Gallery of Art to catch "30 Americans" before it closes in two weeks. Does the president still have to pay the admission price?

Extended: Studio Theatre's Time Stands Still, to Feb. 19.

Yesterday on Arts Desk: Goin' deep on Jeff Mangum.

BOOKS & TALKS

Hit this up: Following tonight's sold-out "Remaking America: From Poverty to Prosperity" event at George Washington University, Tavis Smiley and Dr. Cornel West are scheduled to take the mic at Busboys & Poets on 14th Street NW for an informal "afterword" event. 10 p.m. Free.

Earlier tonight at yet another Busboys location, anti-consumerism activist Reverend Billy will be in the house discussing and signing The Reverend Billy Project, From Rehearsal Hall to Super Mall. 6:30 p.m. at 5th & K. Free.

And down the street, New York Times Washington correspondent Jodi Kantor is at Sixth & I Historic Synagogue talkin' White House: She'll be sharing her book, The Obamas, an in-depth glimpse into the first family, their significance, and their lives at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW. 7 p.m. $10 or $29.99 with book.

MUSIC

Local electronic producer Yoko K.—formerly an artist-in-residence at Strathmore—performs tonight at the Millennium Stage. Get lost in her Heaven's Library. 6 p.m. Free.

Jon Lovett, second from right, with President Obama, former White House adviser David Axelrod, and chief speechwriter Jon Favreau.

Jon Lovett, who recently left his gig as a White House speechwriter, recently landed a pilot deal with NBC for 1600 Penn, a sitcom about a president and his or her dysfunctional family as they bumble their way through the business of the nation. The following is a spec script adapted from Lovett's pitch meeting with the peacock network.

INT. NBC EXECUTIVE SUITE, BURBANK, CALIF. — DAY

JON LOVETT, a young man in his late 20s of slight build with dark, closely cropped hair, sits down on the couch opposite an NBC executive. The network suit, a phlegmatic boulder of a man, sits behind a massive desk cluttered with Daytime Emmys, wayward scripts, and several framed photos of himself posing with Jay Leno. Behind is a large, floor-to-ceiling window, through which Lovett can see many billboards plastered with Leno's prodigious mandible.

EXECUTIVE

So, Mr. Lovett, I understand you have an idea for a new series.

LOVETT

I do. It's a show centered at the most famous address in America.

EXECUTIVE

Go on.

LOVETT

Are you ready for this? It takes place at the White House.

EXECUTIVE

Didn't we do something like this a few years ago?

LOVETT

No, my show is different. It's about the magic and enchantment of the White House told only by someone with experience working there.

EXECUTIVE

I wasn't running the network back then, but wasn't that kind of the hook of that Martin Sheen thing?

LOVETT

Maybe. But I haven't told you which president I worked for.

EXECUTIVE

Oh? Which one?

LOVETT

Barack Obama.

A pregnant pause.

EXECUTIVE

You know, kid, when I went to that Malibu fundraiser and said I wanted some access in return for my $38,500 check, I was thinking a tee time at Andrews Air Force Base, not some little punk staffer dropping by my office in search of an escape hatch.

LOVETT

But I was a speechwriter! I know how the president speaks, thinks, acts.

EXECUTIVE

Speechwriter? I thought you were tight with the folks at Parks and Recreation. Why didn't you take this pitch to them first?

LOVETT

No, no. That's the other guy.

EXECUTIVE

My mistake. Anyway, I suppose you're going to mine your White House experiences for witty banter and moving stories.

LOVETT

That's kind of the idea.

EXECUTIVE

Hold your horses, kid. Do you know how many pitches based on the Obama administration we get here? Biopics. Reality shows starring the first lady's mother. Tea party singing competitions. Some idiot claiming he was a minor communications staffer for the 2008 campaign even suggested a giant, unfilmable miniseries. And White House shows are expensive. The West Wing cost this network $6 million a week. This is NBC, kid. What, you think we got money like HBO does for that Sarah Palin show starring Elaine?

LOVETT

Oh. Well, having worked for the Obama administration —

EXECUTIVE

Yes, you said that.

LOVETT

— I've become very familiar with budget-cutting. What's cheaper than a big drama?

EXECUTIVE

Reality is cheap. Got any special talents not listed on your résumé?

LOVETT

I can do a decent impression of Arianna Huffington.

EXECUTIVE

I think not. Arianna's a close friend. Don't you read my Huffington Post blogs?

LOVETT

Um, sure. I really liked your take on, er, the enduring legacy of, um, the half-hour sitcom?

EXECUTIVE

Lucky guess.

LOVETT

So how about that? Let's do a sitcom. And we'll find a way to do it cheap.

EXECUTIVE

OK, how do we do that?

LOVETT

We'll make it about the first family, except they won't go anywhere. No trade missions, no state dinners. Just family-friendly antics you can schedule opposite Two and a Half Men. It'll be about a president with a crazy wife, ungrateful kids, and a dog that humps the shit out of the furniture.

EXECUTIVE

Could be promising. Who do you have in mind for the president?

LOVETT

Ted Danson?

EXECUTIVE

Too expensive. Try Ted McGinley.

LOVETT

But McGinley played a minor character on The West Wing. All my friends back in D.C. will notice!

EXECUTIVE

You people need to shut the fuck up about The West Wing. This is 2011 NBC, not 2003 NBC. McGinley's cheap and he's playing your president. Got it? And by the way, the last time this network did a show about the White House, Rob Lowe and that smartypants jackass walked after four years and the thing went to shit.

LOVETT

OK, fine. It could work with McGinley. By the way, did I mention that Josh Gad from The Book of Mormon is one of the producers?

EXECUTIVE

OK, you want this show? Give me the logline.

LOVETT

The West Wing meets Married... With Children meets The Osbournes.

EXECUTIVE

You got a pilot, kid.

LOVETT

Yes! But what happens if you don't pick up the show?

EXECUTIVE

We'll find something for you to do. Having former White House staffers on the payroll looks good on the corporate prospectus. Also, your name kind of sounds like Jon Lovitz. Say, have you ever wanted to meet Jay Leno?

White House photo by Pete DeSouza.

Helen Zughaib with one of her "Abaya Series" paintings.

Helen Zughaib offers me baklava soon after I enter her Foggy Bottom studio. “It’s not the real thing,” she apologizes. “It’s Greek, so it’s made with honey instead of simple syrup. We Arabs are sticklers about stuff like that,” she laughs.

Zughaib’s Arab heritage (her father is Lebanese, her mother American) informs not only her taste in sweets, but her art as well. The painter—who fled Lebanon’s civil war in 1975, finished high school in Paris, and moved to the United States to study for her BFA at Syracuse University—creates vibrant paintings in ink and gouache, an opaque watercolor. Their subjects range from her grandfather planting olive trees in Lebanon to women wearing the abaya (the robe-like garment favored by some Muslim women). One of her works, “Another Wall,” is included in a show opening today at the Jerusalem Fund Gallery, “Breaching the Wall.” The exhibit, which runs through June 24, features 11 artists’ works that respond to the barrier that has divided Israel from the West Bank since construction began in 2002—through sculpture, paintings, photographs, and film.

Though Zughaib takes on politically charged topics in her paintings, “being diplomatic is my stance,” she says. She’s more interested in helping people think differently about the Arab world than lecturing to them about what they’re not getting right. Sometimes the result is playful, such as in her “Abaya Series.” Zughaib has created a number of whimsical portraits of abaya-sporting women in the style of well-known Western painters, such as Klimt, Mondrian, and Picasso. “I wanted to mix the West and East together and turn the Western idea of the abaya as oppressive on its head,” she says. “Wearing it is a tradition in the Middle East, and it’s almost always a choice. And speaking of oppression, you have Western women plucking, pulling, adjusting, and cramming themselves into tight jeans—for men!”

Zughaib's artistic goal is to bring about cultural understanding and unity—a mission so important she jokingly applies it to her cats Stumpy (who was born with only a stump of a tail) and Clumpy. “I got them two months apart to specifically encourage unity between them,” she says, speaking like an experienced cat owner, who knows that introducing a new kitty to the mix can wreak havoc on a household. “Though Stumpy is King Kitty for sure, they generally co-exist peacefully.”

Zughaib’s work has gained her supporters among everyday citizens and heads of state alike. In 2009, President Obama gave a painting of Zughaib’s titled "Midnight Prayers" to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki of Iraq, and the following year Hillary Clinton presented Zughaib's rendition of the Washington monument to King Mohammed VI of Morocco. Former Prime Minister of Lebanon Saad Hariri gifted George W. Bush with her painting "Reconciliation" in 2007. “It’s in the White House somewhere,” Zughaib says.

Detail from Zughaib's "Another Wall."

Zughaib’s "Another Wall" comprises 20 conjoining panels that are meant to symbolize bricks. She painted each to resemble a pattern of traditional Palestinian embroidery, patterns that are particular to individual villages—many of which no longer exist. “Textiles are some of the last remnants of these villages,” says Dagmar Painter, curator of the exhibit. “Helen has turned this sad subject into a memorial and monument to the women embroiderers.”

“Breaching the Wall” also includes a 60-foot long rope by textile artist Mary Tuma. Made from women’s dresses and men’s scarves, it signifies a means by which two Palestinians, separated by the barrier after it cut through their village, can climb up and meet one

Zughaib's "Another Wall" with Rajie Cook's piece at the Jerusalem Fund Gallery.

another. And designer and artist Rajie Cook offers a hollowed-out tree-trunk sculpture with carved pieces of wood inside that encircle a nest holding a doll’s head—representing a Palestinian village encircled by Israeli settlements.

An opening reception for “Breaching the Wall” takes places tonight from 6 to 8 p.m. There might even be baklava—the real stuff.

Photos courtesy of Helen Zughaib and the Jerusalem Fund Gallery.

When it comes to rating writers, Maya Angelou is a national treasure. Over the course of more than 50 years as an author and poet, she has produced some of the most poignant, insightful, and inspirational commentary about her own life and the evolution of America. Her 1969 autobiography, I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, is still required reading for many high schoolers, while her poem for Bill Clinton’s inauguration in 1993, “On the Pulse of Morning,” will always stands as one of the most moving moments in any presidential ceremony. There are many other books and dozens of other poems worth exploring, but whether she is writing about her life experiences, race relations, or her favorite recipes (she has published one cookbook and is on the verge of publishing another), Angelou brings a singular spark to her subjects. She possesses a truly inimitable voice and, when she speaks or puts pen to paper, there is no mistaking her words. While talking to her, that singular style is always evident as she gracefully pulls together ideas, emotions and memories. In advance of her appearance tomorrow evening at the Warner Theatre, Angelou was gracious enough to spend some time discussing the art of writing, her love of good food, and her sadness about the Tea Party’s rise to prominence.

Washington City Paper: Blogging is, in many ways, short form autobiography. As a master of the genre, what do you think blogging adds to and detracts from that style of writing?

Maya Angelou: I’ll let others be the judge of that, but let me talk about writing. Nathaniel Hawthorne once said that easy reading is damn hard writing. All people in the world–who are not hermits or mutes–speak words. They speak different languages, but they speak words. They say, “How are you” or “I’m not feeling well” all over the world. These common words–these common elements that we have between us–the writer has to take some verbs and nouns and pronouns and adjectives and adverbs and arrange them in a way that sound fresh.

WCP: What’s your writing schedule these days?

MA: I never have written every day. When I’m writing a book, I write Monday through Friday. I always try to take Saturday and pretend to have some sanity. Sunday, if I’m lucky, I’ll go to church or listen to some good spiritual advice on the television or on the radio. I take three or four baths to try to cleanse myself, so I’m fresh for Monday.

WCP: Tell me about your writing ritual.

MA: I go to a hotel and try to get there by 5:30 in the morning. I keep a dictionary, a thesaurus, a bible, a deck of playing cards, a bottle of sherry, and stacks of yellow sticky pads. I shut myself in for six, seven hours. I have an arrangement with the hotel that no one may go in my room. After three or four months, they might slip notes under my door like, “Dear Ms. Angelou, please let us change the linens. We think they might be molding.” It’s probably true. I let them in if they promise not to touch anything other then the bed.

WCP: Do you have a ritual when you cook?

MA: If I think of something I’d like to eat, I will ask my housekeeper to buy it and pre-prepare it. I’m thinking now that I would like to have a Cornish hen for dinner. I have cooked for myself and my housekeeper for years, but now that I’ve gotten older, I tend to just sit at the kitchen table and direct.

WCP: What are your favorite comfort foods?

MA: I don’t eat a lot of bread. I love rice. I’m a rice woman. I married a man once and we had been married over a year before I found he preferred potatoes. I said, “I didn’t know you loved potatoes.” And he said that until he was about 13, he thought rice was potato seeds. Growing up at my grandmother’s table, she always had rice. She might do something as exotic as potatoes or spaghetti, but there was still always rice, just in case you needed a little rice fix.

WCP: You have a cookbook coming out in December, Great Food, All Day Long: Cook Splendidly, Eat Smart. What inspired you to write it?

MA: About a year ago, my doctor told me that I really should lose some weight. “You’re mildly obese,” he said. And I thought, “Well, who couldn’t afford to lose 20 or 30 pounds?” He said, “Well, a person in your category.” I said, “What is that category, doctor?” He said, “Well, you’re what I call upwardly middle aged.” And I said, “I forgive you for everything.”

I like good food. People want a certain taste, but when they’re offered something else, they’ll overeat. If they really are looking for chicken and someone gives them pork chops, they’ll say, “I will have another.” And that’s because their satisfaction is not reached. So I thought I would make great food, but eat less of it. I tried it and I’ve taken off over 40 pounds.

WCP: What’s Thanksgiving like at Maya Angelou’s house?

MA: For Thanksgiving I do the traditional turkey and all of that. For Christmas, I try to do something else. Sometimes I do feijoada, which is a South American dish with lots and lots of meats, served with black beans and white rice. What I do is slice orange very, very thin and leave that over the black beans just for the picture of it. And I put thinly sliced onion rings over the rice.

WCP: On a more serious note, tell me how you feel Obama has been doing.

MA: He’s doing as well as can be expected with the Republicans just putting their heels down and trying to make sure he doesn’t succeed. We really could move ahead–and much faster–if there was more cooperation, but I should have expected this.

WCP: Do you feel that people expect too much of him?

MA: I do, I do. I think people forget what a maelstrom that he inherited. The country didn’t get that way in a week; we’ve had years and years of getting behind in our economy. So President Obama stepped into a hellhole and people wanted him to change it as soon as he came in. But he’s got his adversaries to deal with in the House and Senate, so it’s not easy.

WCP: Over the course of your life, you’ve seen so much progress in this country. Is the rise of the Tea Party movement disappointing for you?

MA: I’m really saddened by the attempts to separate and polarize. This is a time when we have hungry people, people out of work, and people out of spirit. This is a time where we need to uplift, not to separate. It’s Machiavellian to do what those people are doing. In the 16th century, Machiavelli–in an attempt to get back in the good graces of the powerful–wrote a slim volume called The Prince. In that book he showed the powers that be how to control the people. That book is a statement: separate and rule, divide and conquer. That’s five hundred years ago and it still works, because we allow ourselves to be lead around with holes through our noses.

Maya Angelou speaks tomorrow, Nov. 11, at 7:30 pm at the Warner Theatre, 1299 Pennsylvania Ave. NW. $50-$100. (202) 397-7328.

Local artist Kelly Towles recently created a mural at 12th and W streets NW, which is captured in this video, also featuring a very adorable child and my third favorite Beirut song. Via the President Wears Prada:

Photographer Jake McGuire might be the Thomas Kinkade of patriotic office art—he peddles his unadorned (read: artless) shots of the U.S. Capitol, D.C.'s monuments, and other federal fixtures to Congressmen and various other notables, reports Style's Monica Hesse:

"I have about 10 that I sell over and over again," McGuire says. He talks very fast, very smiley. "Mostly it's the Capitol — anything that alludes to the business of the Capitol. I don't do a lot of photos of the White House." The White House is too partisan.

When he does sell shots of the White House, the buyers want to be very clear on the circumstances of the shot. "They want to know if it was taken during a Republican or Democrat administration. I try to size them up before answering." There was this one lady who looked like she'd stepped out of a Brooks Brothers catalogue — very country-club chic. He assured her that the White House photo in question was taken during a Republican's tenure, only to have her indignantly tell him that she voted for the other guy. No sale.

Also: The Post's Weekend section reminds you that 14th Street NW exists, while the Washington Examiner fails to remind you that the "ultrahot" Kings of Leon recently found themselves shat upon. Writes Nancy Dunham: "Of course opening for such powerhouse rockers at U2, Bob Dylan and Pearl Jam has also added to the band's popularity. Not that the Kings of Leon only gear the music arena-size crowds (sic) — the band has ensured that their music has an intimacy, thanks to lyrics that read almost like vignettes, that translates beyond heavy-duty rock shows. The band members have said they try to construct songs that will last beyond the initial buzz around the band, giving their group longevity." Oh.

I cheated on Washington City Paper this week. Last night Sir Paul McCartney performed in the East Room of the White House and collected the Library of Congress' Gershwin Prize for Popular Song, and I filed this report for Rolling Stone.

Based on the lineup—McCartney performed, as did Stevie Wonder, the Jonas Brothers, Emmylou Harris, Jack White, Corinne Bailey Rae, Herbie Hancock, Lang Lang, Elvis Costello, and Dave Grohl—I didn't walk in particularly excited. (I am cynical and like insular indie rock! I admit it!) And there was nothing thrilling, in theory, about watching 90 percent of the show from the White House's briefing room. (We got into the East Room for remarks by President Obama, and McCartney's performance of "Michelle.")

But despite a couple of missteps—someone misplaced Wonder's harmonica and he had to restart his "We Can Work It Out," other performers had some shaky vocals—the concert was a treat. If you'll indulge me, my favorite moments: Bailey Rae and Hancock's alternately breezy and impressionistic "Blackbird," Grohl's electrified "Band on the Run," White's aberrant, outsider-bluesy "Mother Nature's Son." Oh, and McCartney's final comment, in which he thanked the president and the Library of Congress, and then said: "After the last eight years, it's great to have a president who knows what a library is."

The day before, at that very library, McCartney answered journalists' questions: Some scribes asked great ones, others not so much. The first question—the first!—boiled down to "Will you sign my LP?" Later, a Fox News reporter declared that five days earlier he'd given his newborn son the middle name McCartney, and then asked two very specific, very boring questions: The first about a line in McCartney's John Lennon tribute "Here Today," the second about when McCartney began thinking up his verse in the Beatles' "A Day in the Life."  “I’m not sure. I’m not counting, you know," McCartney said. "Don’t ask me about Beatles history, I was too busy doing it.” There were a few policy questions (the BP oil spill, the Performance Rights Act), and few painfully rote ones (about McCartney's favorite song to play, and his advice for the other performers at the White House event).

He also answered my question, about whether there's anything to be taken from the fact that all three recipients of the Gershwin Prize (McCartney, Wonder in 2008, and Paul Simon in 2007) are performers as well as songwriters, and in what ways the role of popular songwriters has changed. "What used to happen before we came on the scene, people used to have writers, so someone like Elvis would have people writing his stuff for him, Leiber and Stoller, people like that," McCartney said. "We kind of upset the boat a bit. We came along and we were writing our own stuff, so we came along and put some of those people out of work, which you know was OK for us, not so good for them."

At the end of the press conference, journalists mobbed the dais like so many eager teenagers, pecking for autographs.

Morning, readers.

*Don't tell Beaujon! The Times previews forthcoming Obama bio by New Yorker editor David Remnick, makes goofy little gaffe. To wit, the correx:

An earlier version of this post misquoted Mr. Remnick on his comparison between the book and a New Yorker article he had previously written. He said the book would not be a “pumped up” version of the article; he did not say that it would not be a “pimped out” version of the article.

Dicey. But at least Harry Reid wasn't involved. (Hat-tip to Steve Kolowich. Who also composed the hed.)

*The Guardian solicits 10 rules for writing fiction from the likes of Margaret Atwood, Elmore Leonard, Richard Ford, Jonathan Franzen, Neil Gaiman, and PD James. My favorites come from Colm Tóibín (number three: "Stay in your mental pajamas all day"; number nine: "No going to London"), though number five ("No alcohol, sex or drugs while you are working") can't help but stick in the craw.

*Beacon Press hosts a contest for the most arresting Howard Zinn video tribute. Simple format: Read a pre-selected excerpt from Zinn's autobio, You Can't Stay Neutral on a Moving Train; upload to YouTube; submit by March 5. Could produce some moving stuff—though I believe Zinn would appreciate the irony thousands of people reciting an identical script on command. (Viz. the "Non-Conformist's Oath") More details here. (Via GalleyCat.)

*Remember how EMI was set to sell Abbey Road last week? Yeah, well...it's off.

*Time to dust off that little gray Mario cartridge—here comes the Steampunk Game Boy!

*Tonight in City Lights: Bullitt at American City Diner & Café.

To read more of Chris Klimek's review, go here.

Wow, Barack Obama—what an inspiring figure. Do you remember how, against all odds, he got elected President way back in 2008? And then, despite an about-face in conventional wisdom re: the viability of Obamacare, how he jammed health-care reform (with a public option) through a groaning Congress in late 2009?

But 2010 was really unbelievable—after consolidating his political capital in an unlikely mid-term expansion of the Democratic Congressional majority, Obama made good on his promises to end "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" and close Guantanamo. Then—who could have thought this was possible in the face of flagging support for the Afghan war—do you remember how he established a lasting peace agreement with Iran and North Korea before beating Sarah Palin in 2012 by a remarkable 20 points? I bet that, by 2016, he'll even figure out a way to get Israel to accept a future Palestinian state and withdraw from settlements in the Golan Heights. I mean, anything can happen—who, in 2014, thought that a workable immigration bill and a marijuana legalization plan would happen a year later? It's just like that original campaign slogan: "Yes, we can!"

Oh, right—none of this shit happened yet, but we're celebrating anyway.