| Davis Square mag does DoubleTake for the Boss
By Pat Healy When DoubleTake magazine got into financial difficulties this winter they called the Boss, who was able to help them raise about $900,000 in two nights. This isn’t any ordinary boss though. This is THE Boss, Bruce Springsteen. How on earth did this Davis Square-based quarterly with a staff of seven get the Grammy Award-winning Rock & Roll Hall of Famer to play two back to back benefit concerts for them at the 900-seat Somerville Theatre last week? According to employees of DoubleTake it was a last ditch effort for them to save their magazine, and an incredibly generous gesture on the part of Springsteen, who is a friend of DoubleTake Editor Dr. Robert Coles. Staff Writer Kirk Kicklighter said the publication had enough money to pay employees until the beginning of 2003. After the Christmas holiday the staff planned to come in for one last day to clean out their stuff and shut down the office for good, but a fateful pre-holiday brainstorming session yielded a possible solution. “We were desperate and knew that Bob had connections to some big name people, but we also knew that he’s usually reluctant to do that sort of thing,” said Kicklighter of Dr. Coles. “We thought, ‘this is going to sound crazy, but maybe Bruce Springsteen would do a concert.’” The staff presented the idea to their editor, who agreed to see if his friend would lend a hand. He Federal Expressed a letter to Springsteen’s New Jersey home and followed up with a phone call. Springsteen said he would do whatever he could do to help. Expecting to face the anguish of unemployment and suddenly being rescued by a rock legend was surreal, said Kicklighter. “We couldn’t believe that we finally found something that might save us,” he said, “and add to the fact that it was going to be Bruce Springsteen, it just blew our minds.” The magazine, which moved to Davis Square from Duke University in 1999, has put out 29 issues of its unique weave of photo essays, poetry, short stories and interviews. The most recent issue came out in summer 2002, but after realizing they did not have enough money to put out a fall issue of DoubleTake, publication was suspended. “It was partly the economy, and partly that it’s an expensive magazine to produce,” said Kicklighter. Each issue of DoubleTake is a handsome, thick-spined glare-free volume of crisp black and white photography, clear color reproductions of paintings and other vibrant visual art. “We’ve always paid our writers and photographers really well, and we’re still young,” he added. “The first five to seven years of a magazine is when you either go under or take off, and we’re still technically in that phase.” The magazine has received a great deal of critical acclaim, including a National Magazine Award from the American Society of Magazine Editors, but at its peak DoubleTake only had about 75,000 subscribers, which is now down to about 35,000. Publisher Hugo Barreca said now that publication has resumed, the staff will concentrate on getting that number back up. “We want to put renewed emphasis on circulation and distribution,” he said. “Every single magazine puts effort into a circulation campaign, and we need to bolster ad sales. We don’t need too many, but we need more than three.” Kicklighter explained that from the start the magazine had a philosophy of not wanting to have too many ads, but Barreca reasoned that there are science magazines whose credibility is not questioned because they have a lot of advertisements. “We’ll accept advertising that is consistent with what we like to see in the magazine,” he said. “It’s perfectly possible to have the best of both worlds.” Having the best of both worlds is what gives spark to the content of DoubleTake. The works of world-renowned writers like Joyce Carol Oates and Tobias Wolff sit beside drawings by Cambodian children and real life stories by a pastors, police officers and schoolteachers. The name DoubleTake not only symbolizes the fact that we sometimes see the profound element in the ordinary, but also that equal weight is given to words and pictures in the importance of telling a story, said Kicklighter. Editor Dr. Robert Coles is the essence of this dichotomy. Since 1977 he has taught a course called "The Literature of Social Reflection," which placed emphasis on learning about problems and lessons in life through the work of great writers and photographers. For years he has divided his school years so he would teach at Harvard in the fall and Duke in the spring. He is both a child psychiatrist and a professor of psychiatry and medical humanities. In 1989 Dr. Coles helped start the Center for Documentary Studies, an independent non-profit organization affiliated with Duke, to promote and support the work of documentary photographers and writers. And in 1995, with the help of a grant from the Lyndhurst Foundation, DoubleTake was born as part of the Center. But the magazine was so expensive to produce that by 1998 the Center could no longer afford to pay for it. Dr. Coles moved the operation up to Somerville in 1999 to be closer to his fall headquarters and the magazine struggled to exist as an independent non-profit. While Dr. Coles’ connections in the literary world kept submissions from esteemed writers coming in, without advertising the magazine, it was difficult to get the word out beyond the literary community. In addition to helping the magazine out financially, the Springsteen concerts helped with publicity. “A lot of people don’t know about us,” said Kicklighter. Both nights of the concert each audience member received a free issue of DoubleTake from 1998 featuring an interview with Springsteen, and a form to fill out for a complimentary subscription to the magazine. “That was not just to spread the word to the audience, but more importantly to say thank you,” said Kicklighter. The concerts were unprecedented. Springsteen had never played solo acoustic shows where he spoke about each song’s origins, and took questions from the audience afterwards. Tom Lowenstein, executive editor of DoubleTake watched in awe from the back of the empty theatre as Springsteen performed a two and half hour soundcheck last Wednesday afternoon. “He could have just flown up right before the show, played for an hour and left, and people would have been happy,” he said. “but he took it so seriously.” Barreca, who was moved to tears during Springsteen’s skeletal rendering of the classic “Thunder Road,” said what he found most inspiring was how consistent Springsteen’s lyrical vision was with DoubleTake’s mission. “One of the things Springsteen spoke about was how several times during the day you reflect, and woven into the fabric of an ordinary day are the things that you hold important, and it’s something that stretches across class and race,” he said. Kicklighter agreed. Springsteen sings about highway patrolmen, Vietnam vets and immigrants, he said, and DoubleTake tries to get a lot of different perspectives too. “We’re not interested in whether or not you have a big name, we’re just interested in if you have an interesting story to tell,” he said. “If you’re a cop in Somervillle and you have an interesting story about what you do, there’s a good chance we’ll publish it.” He said future goals for the magazine include publishing bi-monthly and becoming more involved with the community. “We want to stay here and spread our roots in Somerville,” he said, “and maybe down the road hold public readings at the Someday Café or have smaller music events at Johnny D’s. You can’t do what we did the other night every night.”Back |
 The Boss fills out some paperwork backstage at the Somerville Theatre  And performs for a captive audience |