A pair of plays that hovers tantalizingly between success and failure caught my attention this past weekend. Both of them are commentaries on racial discrimination, and each is well-written and–unfortunately, in their Phoenix debuts–inexpertly directed. Black Theatre Troupe’s Avenue X, now playing at the Helen K. Mason Center for the…
When Montoya, one of the fearless vampire killers in John Carpenter’s Vampires, tells another character that nobody believes in the title creatures because nobody wants to, there’s no mistaking the ancestry of the line. It comes down, through two generations of horror films, from the moment in the original Dracula…
In 1994’s The Monster (Il mostro), his last film to gain wide American release, the Italian writer/director/star Roberto Benigni put himself at the center of a mistaken-identity farce about a serial killer. In Life Is Beautiful (La vita e# bella), Benigni plays a wacky, high-spirited man who convinces his young…
A young couple arrives at a rural cemetery to decorate their father’s grave. Both thin and blond, they look like siblings. But they’re not–just amateur actors in a low-budget movie. Minutes into the visit, the brother, Johnny, begins to carp about having to visit the grave–he no longer even recalls…
Holy flyin’ fried chicken! Comb out your best wig, whip up a batch of banana puddin’ and practice your Camel Walk! SCOTS is comin’ to town! This finger-lickin’ foursome, better known as Southern Culture on the Skids, has been dishing up its distinctive version of trailer-park twang since 1985. Based…
Thanks to the success of shows like Riverdance and Stomp, dance programs with vaguely cultural themes have formed a kick line across the country. The latest entry in this dance marathon, Forever Tango, features 14 world-class hoofers, an 11-piece orchestra, and a vocalist, all of them selling the story of…
thursday october 29 Regarded as a “comic’s comic,” standup man Dave Attell, who’s been seen on Letterman and Conan, is also a veteran comedy writer whose credits include Saturday Night Live, The Jon Stewart Show and Everybody Loves Raymond. Attell takes the stage at 8 p.m. Thursday, October 29; 8…
Great art from past civilizations always seems to contain more future than past. Some of that might be because of the money and grandiose faith we cast in the direction of old treasures and the cliche of “art for the ages.” Yet you can trace much of the verve in…
I figured I wouldn’t like Barry Williams. I expected that if I didn’t find him personally repellent, I’d at least hate his performance in The Music Man, which I saw last weekend in Tucson, and which opened in Phoenix on October 20. I don’t have anything against Williams, who’s best…
It comes as no surprise to learn that Paul Devlin, the producer, director and editor of SlamNation, is an Emmy winner for his work on TV sports shows like NBC and CBS Olympic coverage and Extreme Games 101 on ESPN2. SlamNation is a documentary chronicle of the 1996 National Poetry…
At the beginning of Gary Ross’ Pleasantville, fraternal twins who are unhappy suburban teenagers (is there any other kind?) fall down the rabbit hole of their television set and find themselves trapped in a parallel universe: a Fifties sitcom of the same name in which the family is more idealized…
A riveting but darkly disturbing thriller, Apt Pupil isn’t easy to sit through. The subject matter proves deeply unsettling, while two brief acts of sadism are so horrifying as to be unwatchable. And yet this brutal film borders on being brilliant. Beautifully structured and edited, with a chilling central performance…
thursday october 22 Coming at a time of growing curiosity and concern about the nature of the Valley’s own emerging urban sprawl, ASU’s Western Humanities conference will present a spectrum of bright talk about the cultures of cities, “Cities on the Edge,” which will view city culture through the varied…
Although psychologist Mel Roman took down his shingle more than 10 years ago to concentrate on his visual art career, he’s still manipulating minds. Roman draws his viewers in with safe, recognizable images–television sets, Polaroid snapshots, photographs of movie stars–and, once we’re there, engages us in a conversation about whatever…
Know how to give CPR to a lizard? According to one of the illustrated handouts in the Arizona Red Cross Pet First Aid course, there are four steps. The first two are my personal favorites: 1. “Scoop lizard from pool”; and 2. “Shake out lizard.” Clear so far? From there…
There are worse things to do than sit through a boring history lesson–like attending a dismal comedy trying to pass itself off as a history lesson. A pair of plays that plunder the past opened on neighboring stages at Herberger Theater Center last week. Actors Theatre of Phoenix’s The Complete…
Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita still has the power to scare off people. Proof is the book’s new movie adaptation, directed by Adrian Lyne and scripted by Stephen Schiff and starring Jeremy Irons as the passionate pedophile Humbert Humbert, a man entranced by nymphets. Completed more than two years ago, the movie…
Insofar as filmmaker Tony Gatlif’s justly admired “Gypsy trilogy” is an exploration of his roots and a search for his nature–he was born in Algeria to Gypsy parents of Spanish origin, but later educated at Paris’ L’Ecole des Beaux Arts–it comprises one of the most passionate and telling self-examinations in…
The Jonathan Demme-directed Beloved runs nearly three hours, and it’s a long slog. This adaptation of the 1987 Toni Morrison novel bursts with ambition. On one hand, it tries to get inside the fevers of the African-American slave experience, but it also wants to be an epic family saga and…
The hero of The Mighty–the title character, in fact–is an eighth-grader known by the nickname “Freak” (Kieran Culkin). His might isn’t physical–he’s a small, frail boy who suffers from a degenerative birth defect. His spine curves painfully, and he’s able to walk only with crutches and leg braces. But he…
The new album Step Inside This House has Lyle Lovett singing a love song to his home state of Texas, or at least to many of the Lone Star State’s finest songwriters. A two-CD set of cover versions of songs by many well-known and not-so-well-known iconoclastic songsmiths from that musically…
Whirling dervishes? That’s one of those phrases that has somehow entered the language even though most folks have no idea of its meaning. The first thing that pops into your mind could be that destructive cartoon character Tasmanian Devil, or perhaps Grateful Dead fans twirling away at some outdoor concert…
