Christian

Christian Dennery (31), “a Haitian, born in Canada…no more, no less,” came to New York as a student and jazz guitarist and found work in the restaurant industry. He met and married his wife Dolores, a modern dancer, when they worked at the same East Village bistro in the 1990s. In 2000, with a one year-old son, $10,000 and a lot of sweat equity, they started Liquors, a restaurant in trendy Fort Greene, Brooklyn. Christian, as the public face of Liquors, is constantly in motion: managing employees, meeting and greeting guests, wheeling and dealing with potential investors. He is extroverted, compulsive, and single-minded in his continuous pursuit of the next deal. Christian is a charismatic dealmaker and an ambitious dreamer who has found his true calling as an entrepreneur. As the primary subject of If You Succeed, he provides the voice of the film; his soliloquies on debt, money, business, and family are insightful, but often contradictory.

Dolores

Dolores Lagdameo (29), a Filipina-American raised in Cincinnati, came to New York after college to pursue her dream of dancing professionally. Instead, she became a waitress, met Christian, and then became a wife, a mother and a small business owner. Dolores balances the books at Liquors, cares for their son Gabriel, and yet somehow still manages to find time to rehearse and perform as a dancer. A pragmatist as well as an artist, she sees business largely as a means to an end. Though she is a competent and confident businesswoman, entrepreneurship is not her true calling. Her ability to multi-task and to reign in Christian’s wildest entrepreneurial dreams, however, keeps the restaurant running, the bills paid, and food (literally) on the table.

The Contractor

The Architect

Gabriel

The Foreman

L'Quentus & Seble,

Pratt Area Community Council