But for each Ingmar Bergman there’s a Michael Bay, each “Last Supper’’ a velvet Elvis. In some hands, rock ’n’ roll is a dark, brooding force. In others, it’s treacle for tweens. The interpreter of the art makes the call.
Max Brenner is an interpreter of sugar — a character who exists as an outline drawing on company materials, the glabrous figurehead for a chain of restaurants specializing in sweets, its tagline “Chocolate by the Bald Man.’’ He began as a composite of founders Max Fichtman and Oded Brenner, who started a small shop in Israel. The restaurants, now owned by food and beverage company the Strauss Group, have since undertaken a sticky, surefooted march to Australia, Singapore, the Philippines, New York, Vegas, and beyond.
Now the trail of chocolate footprints leads to Boston. A branch opened on Boylston Street at the end of March. It ignores everything serious pastry chefs have accomplished, running roughshod over technique, balance, surprise, restraint. It deals in gooey, gloppy desserts that pile chocolate on top of marshmallow on top of peanuts on top of caramel. It invents its own language, serving drinks in “Hug Mugs’’ and “Kangaroo Cups,’’ merging words to create the hot chocolate shots called “suckao.’’ And it has its own mythology. Max Brenner, the story goes, went to Paris to write literature but wound up making candy.
Says the menu: “I wanted to wear Versace suits with tight pants, drink lots of wine, let the light shine in my eyes, fall in love with the prettiest women and write. I designed and created a chocolate lifestyle and dove into decadence, but most of the time I was drunk and did not write.’’ Who can’t relate?
