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“I’m sorry, my big brother just called me up on the phone to say ‘Hi,’” Kravitz said Friday to the crowd at the Umbria Jazz Festival.

Umbria is in his 13th season in the Mariners organization but his first in this role.

Chess is a gorgeous best-selling author of self-help tomes with breezy titles like “You Got This!,” and she’s just rented the notorious Villa Aestas in Umbria for six weeks.

Interviewed on Zoom from his home in Umbria, with follow-up over email, Figes answered questions about the conflict, the politics of repression in Russia and the plight of its young people.

She advises against ciabatta, because it’s too airy, and instead recommends dense, saltless bread: “In other words, the bread of Tuscany and Umbria.”