Immediately before the opening-night performance of Planet Earth Multi-Cultural Theatre’s production of Shakespeare’s The Tempest, downtown was appropriately drenched by one of Phoenix’s surprise monsoon thunderstorms. Through much of the first act, audience members dried out in Planet Earth’s stuffy, hangarlike theatre space, while the usual suspects romped through a…
Opening night of Guv: The Emperor Strikes Back, the New Scottsdale Playhouse was half empty when the curtain rose on this much-anticipated sequel to 1990’s Guv: The Musical. Perhaps all the local Democrats had headed for Sun City to witness President Clinton’s campaign stop there. It’s just as well. Watching…
In 1994, PBS ran the 90-minute documentary Before Stonewall about events leading up to the 1969 riot outside the Stonewall Inn in New York’s Greenwich Village, an incident regarded by some as the beginning of the modern Gay Pride movement in America. The late filmmaker Nigel Finch has taken another…
Score one for the character actors. Paul Newman’s chubby, dim sidekick in Nobody’s Fool, which was set in a small town in upstate New York, was played endearingly by Pruitt Taylor Vince–one of many times that Vince has shown his reliability in supporting roles. Beautiful Girls, JFK, Natural Born Killers,…
fright nights Silo X: The creaky doors at the season’s first spook house yawn wide this weekend. The high-tech haunt is a faux military missile silo whose abandoned personnel have gone mad. The Silo, recommended for those age 8 and older, is located at Hardy and Elliot in Tempe, next…
thursday september 19 Carousel: Royal National Theatre of Great Britain’s retooled production of the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical is not to be confused with Hollywood’s light-handed, Production Code-governed adaptation of ’56, which starred Gordon MacRae as a rowdy carny barker and Shirley Jones as his (much) better half. This version…
The names of the three main characters in The Spitfire Grill are Hannah, Shelby and Percy. That last name, the heroine’s, is short for–get this–“Perchance.” Still haven’t heard enough? Okay, here’s writer/director Lee David Zlotoff holding forth, in the production notes, on the theme of his film: “This film is…
The documentary A Perfect Candidate is like Al Gore doing the macarena at the Democratic National Convention–proof that political satire has become impossible. Under the opening titles, we see a combo called the Angry Young Pachyderms at the Virginia Republican Convention, performing a ditty called Don’t You Know It’s Your…
thursday september 12 Dave Alvin and the Guilty Men: Former Blaster and X man Alvin and his Guilty collective have been on a trip that’s spanned three years and the majority of America’s highways. The journey is reflected in the band’s new HighTone release, Interstate City, a paean to the…
young at art “Animal Crackers”: Shemer Art Center, located at 5005 East Camelback, presents this “please touch” exhibit, curated by Sam Mindrum-Logan and featuring “tactile art experiences for blind children” and “altered-vision experiments for sighted kids.” It continues through Friday, October 18. Admission is free. Call 262-4727. “I-CAN” Art Show:…
Part of Andy Warhol’s genius was his witty skill at daring us not to think he was a genius. Plenty of people took this dare, and it was no skin off his pasty nose–he may well have agreed with them. But if the art world was sufficiently gullible, or frightened…
Not far into The Trigger Effect, we see a street sign which reads “Maple Ct.” This is probably a nod by writer/director David Koepp to “The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street,” a 1959 episode of Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone. If it isn’t, it ought to be. “Maple Street”…
thursday september 5 Guv: The Emperor Strikes Back: Guv: The Musical, the Star Wars: A New Hope of Arizona musiopolitical revues and one of the Valley’s biggest hits of the early ’90s, has given way to this sequel by the original Guv collaborators: Candice St. Jacques Miles (book/lyrics), Bruce Miles…
arts and minds “All Aboard!!!! The Rhythm and Reading Express”: Music therapist Jamie Showers hosts this pro-literacy program of sing-along songs and play-along games for kids ages 5 to 9. It’s scheduled for 1 to 2 p.m. Saturday, September 7; and 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. Monday, September 9, at Glendale…
About two thirds of the way into Christopher Durang’s 1987 comedy Laughing Wild, the Infant of Prague appears. He comes not as a miraculous apparition or an ornate symbol of retribution, but as a guest on a daytime talk show. While He is grilled by a woman who may or…
H.G. Wells’ brusquely brief novel The Island of Dr. Moreau is one of the kinkiest of all classic horror tales. The likably flawed narrator/hero, Edward Prendick, finds himself stranded on the title island, where he is the guest of Moreau, a researcher, and his tippling associate Montgomery, a disgraced medical…
Those of us who were children during the late ’60s and early ’70s remember the kiddy movies of the time as a sorry, syrupy lot–as, I suspect, our parents do even more acutely. 1971’s Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory has much of the same saccharine quality around the edges,…
thursday august 29 Ronnie Dawson: The Texas hellbilly, self-proclaimed “Blond Bomber of the Monkey Beat,” has been cutting sizzlin’ sides since 1958–starting with “Action Packed” and “Rockin’ Bones,” both recorded under the alias Ronnie Dee. The latest disc from Dallas-born Dawson, Just Rockin’ & Rollin’, kicks pretty hard, too. Definitively…
screen gems “Fun Flicks for Kicks”: Borders Books & Music at Biltmore Fashion Park, 24th Street and Camelback, Suite 200, hosts this free, all-ages series, which continues with a screening of The Little Mermaid (G) at 2 p.m. Thursday, August 29. Each kid receives a gratis bag of popcorn. For…
“When the Unabomber’s in his cabin, he’s thinking about blowing people up, not about making the bomb,” says Al Price. Four of Price’s kinetic sculptures–which he calls “Traps”–are on display at Scottsdale Center for the Arts until September 1. They are carefully balanced, welded steel structures, mounted on Swiss watchlike…
The Fan marks Robert De Niro’s fourth stalker. He’s Gil Renard, a San Francisco knife salesman whose avocation is his twisted, fanatical enthusiasm for the Giants. Gil is especially fixed on a new addition to the team’s roster, a power hitter named Bobby Rayburn who has recently led the Braves…
thursday august 22 Pam Tillis, Lorrie Morgan, and Carlene Carter: This might be called the “Family Tree Tour.” Pam’s dad is corn-pone crooner Mel Tillis, and Lorrie also has followed in the footsteps of her singin’ pop, late Grand Ole Opry member George Morgan. Carlene, the least-known and -commercial member…
