The best news about the Christmas pageants playing professional stages this holiday season is that not one of them features a fat guy in a red suit. The bad news is that they’re all the same shows as last year, and the year before that. What’s more, the companies producing…
There’s no synopsizing Gus Edwards’ new play. Four Walls’ brief, unformed trio of scenes whizzes by like the trailer for a bad movie–one with no budget or much of a story. And the fact that this wan one-act is playing in repertory with Michael Grady’s passionate The Raising of the…
First of all, if you’re among the benighted who’ve never seen Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 shocker Psycho, stop reading at the end of this paragraph. A movie review, even one as incisive and elegant as this, is no way to be introduced to Hitchcock’s horror masterpiece. Your assignment is to rush…
The relentless charm of Kirk Jones’ Waking Ned Devine lies in its embrace of two lovable Irish geezers who manage to work beautiful mischief on the world, in the raw beauty of their sun-splashed coastal village, and in the general notion that Ireland is the land of poetic conversations, enduring…
thursday december 10 Following film appearances in Speed 2: Cruise Control and the upcoming My Favorite Martian, and TV appearances everywhere from Letterman to The Jon Stewart Show, Canadian funnyman Jeremy Hotz takes the stage at 8 p.m. Thursday, December 10; 8 and 10 p.m. Friday, December 11; the same…
Once upon a time, when the world was different, there were such things as pockets of popularity and regional stars. Contemporary radio and the monolithic record companies have made that concept a memory, but as recently as the mid-Seventies, Phoenix had its very own local hero in the person of…
Hang around long enough, and just about everything has a chance to be polished up for another shot at the spotlight. It was about 50 years ago when big-band music faded from the public’s fancy. The current revival of all things “swing” has brought several bands to prominence, including the…
Someone asked me the other day what I want for Christmas, and I didn’t have to think very long before replying that I want no one in Arizona–no one in the world–to make the mistake of attending the horrible play I sat through the other night in Mesa. I had…
If Brecht had ever written a kiddy movie, it might have come out something like Chris Noonan’s Babe. Co-adapted by its producer, George Miller, from a book by Dick King-Smith, the 1995 Australian film about a runty but purehearted little pig who takes it into his head to work herding…
Here we go again. Enemy of the State is Fascism in America 1998, Chapter Four . . . or Five . . . or whatever we’re up to. It readily invites comparison to The Siege, but, for better or worse, its goals are more mundane. While The Siege seems like…
Clark Griswold, the hapless fool played by Chevy Chase in National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, is just a hair too familiar. Clark’s house-lighting ceremony is a hilarious and well-targeted send-up of how real revelers attempt to best each other–in wattage–during the holidays. But it doesn’t exactly warm the Yuletide spirit. This…
To describe the Hall of Flame Museum of Firefighting as a big building full of old fire trucks is accurate enough, but nowhere near complete. It may sound like a tourist trap or a collector’s vanity showplace, and probably for this reason, if Valleyites are aware of the facility’s existence…
1998 DECEMBER 3-9 december 3 thursday Does the phrase “A river of liver and an ocean of fish” ring a bell? If so, then you’re probably a rerun junkie–it’s from the “Adam’s Ribs” episode of M*A*S*H, in which Hawkeye Pierce starts raving about the wretched cuisine dished up by company…
thursday november 26 It’s Thanksgiving, for heaven’s sake. Stay in, stuff your face, and lapse into a tryptophan-induced stupor in front of the tube. If, after showing your gratitude to the Powers That Be by gorging yourself on Earth’s bounty, you recover any energy later in the day, eat pie,…
If you’re among those whose most frequent use of this publication is as a blanket, then a home-cooked feast or a chow-down at a fancy restaurant may not be in the cards for you this Turkey Day. If you’re wondering how you’re going to fill your belly or the bellies…
Many a Valleyite’s introduction to the ballet has come in the form of a yearly Ballet Arizona production–serving not only to enchant wide-eyed little girls with big ballerina dreams, but also to light the desert’s Christmas candle at both ends, officially signifying the beginning of the holiday party season. This…
The 20th anniversary of the Movimiento Artistico del Rio Salado–better known downtown as MARS Artspace–is as much a milestone of resilience as it is one of culture. The organization, now hosting its anniversary show, “20 Years On,” has outlasted the involvement of most of its Chicano founders. It has long…
A third of the way through Home Fries, you may begin wondering if the filmmakers haven’t outsmarted themselves. Overloaded with oddities but a bit short on horse sense, this is one of those stubbornly defiant, attitude-driven movies that’s so busy scrambling genres, breaking rules, and dashing expectations on the road…
Is there anyone, save the amateur rappers over his show’s end credits, willing to admit that they like Jerry Springer? Somebody somewhere must, considering the enormous success of his syndicated TV talk show. But whether his devoted audience is likely to head down to the multiplex for a feature-length dose…
In the rancid nightmare farce called Very Bad Things, Peter Berg, in his movie writing-directing debut, creates characters that you immediately want to see killed off. From the title to the ads to the Web site (which features a Vegas stripper who will dance for you), Very Bad Things has…
For nine years Michael Cole starred as one of Merce Cunningham Dance Company’s dancers. Now he’s starring on stage and screen. Computer screen that is. The tall, gorgeous, dreadlocked dancer/choreographer could easily star on the silver screen too. Cole dances his work Command X/V, Versions 1, 2, and 3 during…
If they’d been written today, the Tyrone clan of Eugene O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey Into Night would be just another dysfunctional family whose shrieking harangues would be best appreciated by a Jerry Springer audience. The more refined crowd that came to see this infamous family at the Herberger Theater Center…
