'Seven Days' Arts and Culture Writers' Warm Wishes and Wild Predictions for 2023

Seven Days staffers are fans of the NPR show "Wait Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me!" The final segment of "Waiting Wait" is about panelists' predictions for the week ahead. Seven Days staff members tried their hand at prognostication for 2023.

In Seven Days' exclusive interview with Champ, the Lake Monsters mascot, a minor league team from Vancouver Vikings will be established in Burlington in 2023. Elon Musk will buy Vermont for cash, stock options and promises to be broken later. Critical Twitter Theory will become a mandatory part of secondary school curricula. Ben & Jerry's will launch a new flavor: EggoManioc.

In 2023, Vermonters in a range of industries will adopt Peter Schumann's cheap art ethos. Hill Farmstead Brewery will shift from selling bottles and cans to unloading kegs. Weed stores will sell bricks of pot at discount prices. Landlords will reduce rents to the rates of the 1960s Lower East Side Manhattan.

Theater in Vermont is too stubborn to fail. Disney+ has 46.4 million subscribers, while playhouses have 50 to 300 seats. Alex Brown's dream is that ticket prices drop to match those of movies and young people start infiltrating the audience.

Art can be fun. It's been a downer-ish year or six. There are many catastrophes facing the state, nation and world.

In 2023, Vermont galleries will have exhibitions whose sole mission is to provide comfort and joy. Pamela Polston is an art critic.

In 2023, Congress will hash out federal banking laws and tax codes for cannabis businesses. Vermont legislature will embrace cannabis as a value-added agricultural product. In the New Year, the federal action on cannabis will likely continue at a glacial pace. Competition in the cannabis market will put some licensees out of business.

Harry Bliss and John Butler wrote a screenplay about the origin of the great white shark in Jaws. The animatronic great whites broke down during filming. Bliss' and Butler's screenplay is a buddy comedy/road-trip story about two delivery drivers transporting the shark from a Hollywood studio lot to Martha's Vineyard.

In 2023, Taylor Swift will be elected and introduce legislation to break up the Ticketmaster monopoly. Big Heavy World will turn the bike lane into an all-ages venue. Burlington musician Matt Hagen will fake his own death and reemerge five months later as Hatt Magen. Chris Farnsworth predicts that Memorial Auditorium will finally reopen as a bike lanes and hot yoga studio.

Amy Lilly predicts that the number of students studying classical music in Vermont will grow in 2023. She also predicts the organization that promotes classical musicians will be flooded with funds.  

Netflix series "Wednesday" was filmed in Romania, not Vermont. Vermont doesn't provide film production tax incentives. The state hasn't had a film commission since 2011. There is a new organization called the Vermont Production Collective that aims to foster grassroots connections among film professionals. The original print version of this article was headlined "Forward Thinking | Seven Days arts and culture writers' warm wishes and wild predictions for 2023".