WASHINGTON POST: NEW ORLEANS, Aug. 30 — New Orleans Mayor C. Ray Nagin (D), along with a half-dozen police, fire and community leaders, encouraged residents Saturday to leave the city as soon as possible, ahead of the anticipated landfall early next week of Hurricane Gustav. City officials said they would turn all lanes of traffic on major highways into one-way routes headed away from the city starting early Sunday morning. More specific plans are expected later Saturday evening, Nagin said. With winds of up to 145 mph, Gustav became a Category 4 storm on the Saffir-Simpson scale on Saturday, as […]
FRINGE PICKS: Sea Of Birds, Everyone
Sea Of Birds Structured like Homer’s Odyssey and reminiscent of The Little Prince, Sea of Birds takes place inside a luminous dome made of paper and bamboo, where history and imagination interweave to create a breathtaking experience for audiences of all ages. Drawing on stories from her mother’s childhood in Latvia during the Second World War, performance artist and writer Sebastienne Mundheim (Currently Franklin, 2006) brings audiences into a three-dimensional storybook of delicate paper sculpture, dance-based puppetry, and live musicians. Video preview by Woodshop films. Sun. 8/31 12:00 PM and 4:00 PM, Theater, 40 minutes, ICE BOX Projects Space,1400 North American […]
MEOW MIX: You’ve Come A Long Way, Maybe
Why did John McCain choose Alaska’s Sarah Palin, the Hottest Governor In America (a title she’ll only hold until Gavin Newsom wins California, but whatever) as his pick for vice-president? And come to think of it, given the two had only reportedly met once before she was tapped, is the former beauty queen even really his pick or just a Hillary Lite spokesmodel for social conservatives?…DEVELOPING… People don’t know anything about her, so the first words thrown out about her by right-wing pundits, “a maverick in Alaska,” threaten to stick. Look for a lot of talk in Minneapolis about where […]
INSTA-REVIEW: FUC — Fringe Unofficial Cabaret
BY TIFFANY YOON FRINGE CORRESPONDENT The “unofficial” Cabaret, also officially nick-named FUC (Fringe Unofficial Cabaret), kicked off last night at Johnny Brendas with dirty child molestation jokes, raunchy dancing and a stuffed monkey. Needless to say, it was a fucking hit, and hat tip to Scott Johnston and friends that made the efforts to keep the Fringe festival’s post-show booze n’ fun tradition alive. The stage was backdropped with footage from the old Saturday morning classic “Land of the Lost” (see video below) in between acts and all throughout Animus’s set, the band headlining last night’s events. Other than some […]
KILLADELPHIA: Three Dead Since U Went To Bed
INQUIRER: The Labor Day weekend got off to a violent start in Philadelphia with three men, including a 78-year-old, shot to death before the sun rose this morning.Police had made no arrests today in any of the shootings. Police identified the elderly victim as Enor Williams of the 6300 block of N. 11th St. He was shot in the face shortly after 6 p.m. Friday outside a Veterans of Foreign Wars post at 2033 N 33rd St. in Strawberry Mansion. Homicide detective Lt. Mark Deegan said he was told Williams was a veteran, but didn’t know whether he was a […]
INSTA-REVIEW: Disco Descending
BY AARON STELLA FRINGE CORRESPONDENT Who’d a thunk that Orpheus and Eurydice’s ancient tale of woe could be catapulted out of its musty tomes and into silk shirts, bell-bottoms, and sleek-white platform shoes. But it can, apparently. Under the artful direction of Karen Getz, director, choreographer and veteran thespian, comic-dance troupe 1812 narrates the tale through an actor-y ballet of boogie and hustle. Despite, however, Disco Descending’s fantastic soundtrack and a Saturday Night Fever vibe, the 1812 troupe are not professional dancers in any respects. They can move pretty much as well as you or I can, and in some […]
FRINGE INSTA-REVIEW: Sonic Dances
BY TIFFANY YOON Sonic Dance, wherein a troupe of dancers basically dance their way down Broad Street from City Hall to the Avenue of the Arts, articulating their bodies with rhythm and grace across any surface — sidewalk, street, mailbox, passerby — that would have them. Too bad the weather was kinda crappy and the music coulda been louder, but they certainly captured the public’s curiosity. By the end of the performance, there was a small mob, practically jogging to keep up, hoping to figure out just what this was all about. And that of course, was the point — integrating […]
THE DARK SIDE: Comcast Killed The Internet Star
GIGAOM: Karl Bode over on DSL Reports reports that Comcast will institute a 250 GB cap on its broadband connections starting Oct. 1. Expect other carriers to follow suit and make tiered broadband a reality. Much as I would like to think otherwise, this is the end of the Internet as we know it. The caps are a move to ensure that the gouging scheme put in place by Comcast and other cable providers stays intact and they can continue to sell their video-on-demand services. It was a point I made when I wrote, Why Tiered Broadband Is The Enemy […]
MCCAIN VEEP: It’s A Girl!
WASHINGTON POST: The McCain campaign had make little secret of the fact that they wanted to pick a woman as the Arizona senator’s running mate, believing that the rift caused by the protracted primary between Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton gave them an opportunity to pick up scads of disgruntled women. PHAWKER: Three thoughts up front. 1.) You can measure the fear of a man by the extremity of his choices. 2.) His choice is a response to the Democratic party circa last week. Not the Democratic party circa now. 3.) This is like saying to black people, ‘Here’s […]
TONITE: Get Your Fringe On
Sonic Dances Eight dancers adorned with iPods and speakers will turn some of Philadelphia’s favorite public spaces into an outdoor stage. Follow the dancers of Group Motion Dance Company as they make their way down Broad Street to celebrate Opening Night at the Philadelphia Live Arts Festival and Philly Fringe. Choreographed by Manfred Fishbeck, in collaboration with Group Motion dancers, Sonic Dances will conclude in front of the Suzanne Roberts Theatre as audiences gather for the August 29 opening performance of Karen Getz’ Disco Descending. DETAILS Disco Descending Greek mythology meets disco fever: it’s 1978 — a group of suburban […]
MILE HIGH: Live And Direct From Denver
[Photos by LenEdgerly & DemConvention] Our DNC correspondent Nick Powell has managed to elbow out a space at the table in the press room. He will be sending us reports from on the ground — God and WiFi willing. Also, our analysts Amy Z. Quinn and Jonathan Valania will be parsing Obama’s speech. 9:55 PM AZQ: gotta go get the kid in pjs back in a sec 9:56 PJV: Oh great, I’ll tell Obama I am SURE he can stall for five minutes just start this John Lennon record over sure nobody will notice 9:58 PM Durbin. This […]
We Know It’s Only Rock N’ Roll But We Like It
EXILE ON MAINSTREAM: Liz Phair, TLA, Last Night [Photo by JONATHAN VALANIA] 1. On the whole, it was a tidy kind of show. Liz Phair went onstage shortly after 8, rolled through Exile In Guyville and a three-song encore, during which she played on three different guitars and an electric piano, engaged in some truly priceless audience participation (more on that later), patted the show on its butt and had everybody home before curfew. 2. I was kind of disappointed not to see more college-age and twenty-something females in the not-quite sold-out TLA audience, though I guess these days the […]