TIME: It may be, as Jeff Goldberg asserts, that Bibi Netanyahu is just frustrated over President Obama’s refusal to approve an Israeli attack on Iran. Or it may be something else: an unprecedented attempt by a putative American ally to influence a U.S. presidential campaign. Either way, Netanyahu’s recent behavior is outrageous. He is trying push us into a war that is not in our national interest, a war that would only further destabilize a region that is already teetering near chaos. He is trying to get us to damage our relations with the rest of the world–especially the […]
SIDEWALKING: The Greatest
Muhammad Ali, National Constitution Center, last night by PETE TROSHAK Forget boxing, Muhammad Ali is one of the most significant cultural figures of the 20th Century. He is more than just ‘the greatest’ boxer the sport has ever known, he is a cultural game-changer. His words and actions triggered a seismic shift in public opinion about race and religion and war throughout this country and, for that matter, the world. Some would argue that he doesn’t deserve such an honor. That he was too brash, too arrogant, too divisive. That he was unpatriotic because he refused to serve in Vietnam. […]
CONTEST: Win Tix To See Bon Iver @ The Mann
Bon Iver mainman Justin Vernon is in full possession of the most heartbreakingly beautiful falsetto to emanate from a hairy guy in blue jeans and flannel since Neil Young woke up in a burned-out basement with a full moon in his eyes. At the risk of sounding like the 21st century equivalent of the guy who booed Dylan at Newport for going electric, I should disclose up front that I am not a fan of the super-dense seven-layer cake of sound of Bon Iver’s self-titled second album, though not for lack of trying. For me, the beatific, naked-bulb bedroom folk […]
REEFER SADNESS: Diane Riportella, NJ Medical Marijuana Activist, Dies Of ALS Waiting For Her Prescription To Be Filled
Illustration by ALEX FINE We just learned the sad news that New Jersey medical marijuana activist Diane Riportella succumbed to ALS on August 31st. Riportella’s struggle with ALS and her quest to get medical marijuana legislation passed was the subject of a July 2010 cover story we wrote for PW. Here is an excerpt: Of all the shitty ways to die, ALS is arguably the shittiest. Also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, ALS stands for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, and in short it is slow death brought on by the steady and methodical withering of the nerves that control your muscles. […]
LIVE REVIEW: Bob Mould @ Union Transfer
!Photo by PETE TROSHAK BY PETE TROSHAK Until recently, chances were slim that you would hear much Sugar and Husker Du material if you went to a Bob Mould show. Mould always seemed more comfortable leaving the past, and the old wounds that came with it, alone and being in the moment, which left a generation of fans who loved (or missed out on) Husker Du and Sugar aching to hear those classic songs from alt-rock’s days of yore. The last few years have seen Mould open up more – both in his live song choices and in a fascinating […]
WORTH REPEATING: Being Barack Obama
FRESH AIR: Author Michael Lewis made a radical request to the White House that he says he was almost certain would be denied: He wanted to write a piece about President Obama that would put the reader in the president’s shoes. To do this, the Vanity Fair contributing editor would need inside access. So what did he propose? “I’ve got to basically come and loiter and just kind of get to know him. It’s going to be very free-flowing; I want to do things like play basketball with him,” Lewis tells Fresh Air’s Terry Gross. “I said I wanted to […]
BAD RELIGION: Morons Stirred Up By God Bullies Storm The American Embassy In Libya and Kill The U.S. Ambassador
WALL STREET JOURNAL: The U.S. ambassador to Libya, Christopher Stevens, and three other American diplomats were killed when suspected Libyan religious extremists stormed the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi late Tuesday, sparking a security crisis across the North African country and raising tensions across the Middle East. Libyan officials spent the night in a manhunt trying to find those responsible for the killings, which occurred when an angry armed mob attacked the diplomatic complex in an apparent protest against an anti-Islamic video created and produced by an American-Israeli real-estate developer. MORE WIRED: On Tuesday, Sean Smith, a Foreign Service Information […]
BOB DYLAN: Duquesne Whistle
NEW YORK TIMES: Bob Dylan’s voice isn’t getting any prettier. At 71, on his 35th studio album, “Tempest” — and a full 50 years after he released his debut album in 1962 — Mr. Dylan sings in a wheezy rasp that proudly scrapes up against its own flaws. That voice can be almost avuncular, the wry cackle of a codger who still has an eye for the ladies. But it can also be calmly implacable or utterly bleak, and it’s completely believable when Mr. Dylan sings, in “Narrow Way,” “I’m armed to the hilt, and I’m struggling hard/You won’t get […]
CINEMA: True Lies
LITTLE WHITE LIES (2010, directed by Guillaume Canet, 154 minutes, France) THE WORDS (2012, directed by Brian Klugman & Lee Sternthal, 96 minutes, U.S.) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC Taking four years to follow-up his international hit thriller Tell No One, director Guillaume Canet has brought us Little White Lies, a very French concoction that seems eager to make some concessions to an American audience. Dubbed “a French Big Chill” for its reliance on 1960s rock and soul oldies, the comparison favors the indestructible quality of the French film industry, which even with audience-friendly product like this, shows a sophistication […]
INTERVIEW WITH A FRINGE DWELLER: Q&A With Nick Stuccio, Producing Director Of The Live Arts Festival And Philly Fringe
Illustration by GRAHAM SMITH BY BRANDON LAFVING ARTS CORRESPONDENT Nick Stuccio has been the producing director of the Live Arts Festival and Philly Fringe Festival from the very beginning. This year marks the 16th time that performance artists from Philadelphia and across the globe will showcase their work, communicate new and sometimes radical ideas, collaborate, brainstorm, party and, in some cases, get naked — not necessarily in that order. Before Mr. Stuccio became a presenter of the performing arts, he danced for the Pennsylvania Ballet and started the AIDS fundraising program Shut Up and Dance in the mid-1990s. Now, he […]
CINEMA: Beasts Of The Southern Wild
BY DAVID CORBO In Beasts of the Southern Wild, first time director Benh Zeitlin transmutes Lucy Alabar’s one act play, Juicy and Delicious, into a deeply humanist film that speaks to the urgent fact that we have disrespected the resources of our Mother Earth, perhaps irreparably disrupting the balance of nature that is so necessary to our survival. This myopic view of an impoverished isolated community threatened by global warming won Zeitlin the Caméra d’Or award at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival, the Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival, and was designated a 2012 critics pick by the […]