Veselka: The Rainbow on the Corner at the Center of the World is playing in select theaters through March 14.
By Elazar Abrahams
First opening in Manhattan’s East Village in 1954, the eatery Veselka has spent decades on the corner of 2nd Avenue as a hub of Ukrainian food and culture. But through all those years of operation, perhaps none were as crucial as 2022, when that February, Russia waged a full-scale invasion on their neighboring Eastern European country. A new documentary, titled Veselka: The Rainbow on the Corner at the Center of the World and now screening at Village East by Angelika, focuses on the 12-months following the war’s outbreak and how it affected the iconic restaurant and its workers.
The doc is lovely, and is able to cover a lot in an hour and 45 minutes. Beyond shots of mouth-watering borscht, director Michael Fiore and narrator David Duchovny tackle what it takes to run a bustling restaurant in New York City. Even without an international conflict, Veselka’s story would be ripe for dramatization, as second-generation owner Tom Birchard is in the process of passing on the family business to his son Jason, highlighting the pressures that come with those changes. As the war in Ukraine begins to take center stage in the headlines, patrons flock to Veselka as a sign of solidarity, and the Birchards turn their humble diner into an outpost of resistance.
Almost immediately, Veselka’s staff mobilizes to rally for their homeland. Nearly all the workers in the front-of-house and kitchen are Ukrainian, and have family members in the direct line of fire abroad. The restaurant begins to raise money for the cause, as well as collecting supplies to be shipped over to troops and refugees. In a couple of remarkable scenes, Jason works tirelessly to sponsor and see-through the emergency immigration of several of his employees’ relatives from Ukraine to New York, sometimes even giving them work at Veselka once they arrive in America.
The project is raw and unfiltered; often subjects will decline interviews with the filmmakers because the subject matter is all too fresh and real. In particular, Vitalii Desiatnychenko, a young man managing operations at the restaurant, gives a heartbreaking look into what Ukrainians continue to go through to this day.
I’d urge every New Yorker to seek out the documentary, as it spotlights an underrepresented community that contributes a tremendous amount to the fabric of the city. Additionally, there’s a scene where our bumbling mayor, Eric Adams, visits the restaurant, and boy does it deserve to go viral.
In fact, I connected with the movie so much that on a recent Sunday, I visited downtown’s Little Ukraine to see the vibes myself. About a third of all of NYC’s Ukrainians live in the confines of the neighborhood. Unbeknownst to me, the weekend happened to mark two-years since the invasion, and as was evident by the blue and yellow flags hanging from so many fire escapes and flown from so many windows, the people’s support for their homeland could not be stronger. Walking down the blocks I had often passed but I suppose had never paid attention to, I was struck by how often I saw the phrase “Slava Ukraini,” which translates to “Glory to Ukraine!”
I popped into The Ukrainian Museum on East 6th Street, a nice space that houses two floors of art from the country. The museum is rather small and only features three rotating exhibits, but the pieces range from ceramics and canvases to quilts and collages. If you’re a student, you can get in for just $10, a fair price to wander the galleries for a half hour or so.
The other stop on my stroll was of course Veselka itself. The store exudes a pretty majestic vibe, with colorful murals both inside the dining room and adorning the outer walls. What put a real smile on my face however, was that at 3 pm, not exactly a peak time for lunch or dinner, there was a line down the block.
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