As staged at Court Theatre, the two parts of Tony Kushner’s epic Angels in America take seven hours to unwind. That means lots of intermissions, which in turn means lots of lobby conversations on the subject of what the person standing next to you thinks of the show so far. I was surprised at how many of the people standing next to me said something like, “Well, it’s really a period piece now, isn’t it?...
“My name is Amy,” announces the main character of Sleeping Dogs Lie in an opening voice-over, “and yes, at college, I blew my dog.” Played with humor and gravity by Melinda Page Hamilton, Amy is a perceptive, down-to-earth woman who doesn’t consider herself a sexual deviate, just a person who did something stupid out of boredom or perhaps curiosity. “Immediately I was full of guilt, but at the same time, as disgusting as it was, another part of me kinda thought it was funny....
Sometimes it seems as though modern jazz history has been conducted by the sticks of drummer Roy Haynes. Still swinging fiercely and crisply at age 86, he’s been a paragon of expert timekeeping for a virtual encyclopedia of jazz greats, including Sarah Vaughan, Charlie Parker, Lester Young, Bud Powell, Thelonious Monk, Sonny Rollins, John Coltrane, Stan Getz, Miles Davis . . . well, you get the idea. Haynes is interviewed by fellow drummer Tim Daisy, a mainstay of Chicago’s free-jazz scene who plays in numerous groups, from his chamber trio Vox Arcana to hard-charging combos like the Engines, the Rempis Percussion Quartet, and Arrive....
To put these numbers in perspective, Revolution Brewing produced 24,000 barrels in 2013, and expects to hit 42,000 next year. It distributes in much of Illinois and part of Ohio (assuming its website is current). Maine ships a small fraction of that amount to a significantly larger area—the east coast from Maine down to Virginia, plus Chicago—so its beer ends up spread pretty thin. Best of Chicago voting is live now....
When I was 16 I spent a summer as an umpire in a kids’ baseball league. I stood behind the pitcher so I could call the pitches and the bases, and I did the best I could. Which wasn’t especially good. The coaches gave me long looks over an erratic strike zone, and the players kicked a lot of dirt. But who ever appreciates the ump? There was a lot of screaming but I stuck to my guns....
Drag City Records usually rolls out some good promotional gimmicks every year, though two of its stunts pushing Bonnie “Prince” Billy’s Wolfroy Goes to Town missed the mark—the custom BPB coffee blend (by Hawaii roasters Kona Rose) and the BPB condoms felt pretty hokey and predictable. The label outdid itself, though, plugging Cave‘s latest album, Neverendless, last September. They pulled off a stunt that had also been famously perpetrated by the Rolling Stones in 1975 to announce a North American tour, renting a flatbed truck and having the band play on it while it drove around northwest Chicago—the main difference is that the Stones were already stars, while Cave merely should be....
Golden boy Theo Epstein—general manager of the Boston Red Sox when they ended an 86-year World Series drought—was hired last year to bring the grail to the Chicago Cubs, bereft of the title for 103 years and counting. Gabe Klein, Rahm Emanuel’s transportation commissioner, doesn’t face a benchmark quite as daunting, though getting across town sometimes seems as interminable as the quest for another Cub pennant. Like Epstein, Klein arrives as a young east-coast success story—in his case, as a former transportation head in D....
But when we met up there last Saturday we were seated at a table, and the friendly young waitress who came to take our order was new. Kelley appeared to be caught off guard. “They know what I want,” he said, suggesting the waitress consult with the restaurant manager. For a moment, Cliff Kelley wasn’t sure how to order his food. Kelley, the popular talk show host on WVON radio, usually sits at the end of the counter when he visits his favorite breakfast spot, Ms Biscuit, a bustling south-side diner....
Coming-of-age movies, at least in America, often hinge on a loss of innocence, either one’s virginity or one’s naivete. The formula tracks a misfit’s stumble toward acceptance or transcendence, usually to the tune of a greatest-hits soundtrack. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » The new movie The Spectacular Now, based on Tim Tharp’s celebrated young-adult novel, is exceptional in that its young hero is socially confident and genuinely outgoing....
February appears to be Artist Suicide Month at the Gene Siskel Film Center. C. Scott Willis’s documentary The Woodmans, which screens daily through February 17, profiles Francesca Woodman, the gifted young New York photographer who leaped from a window to her death in 1981. Steven Soderbergh’s And Everything Is Going Fine, opening at the Film Center on Friday, uses performance and interview clips to create an autobiography of Spalding Gray, the actor and monologuist who was fished out of the East River in 2004 after he presumably jumped from the Staten Island Ferry....
Make Friends With Brown Nance Klehm wants humans to reconnect with the soil—in part by composting their own bodily waste. (4/16/09) By Anne Ford Have a Green Day Twenty-four ways you can help the planet, from how you wake yourself up in the morning to how you get drunk at night. (4/17/08) By Mick Dumke The Carp Are Coming Forget multimillion-dollar barriers and pesticides, says river activist Chad Pregracke – let’s just eat ’em....
Though there’s never even been a good name for it, American “experimental” or “avant-garde” filmmaking has been one of the most vital and transformative movements in the history of the medium. Since its inception in the 1930s, makers of TV commercials, music videos, and Hollywood features have been influenced by or even borrowed directly from experimental work. But more important, it has redefined the possibilities of the medium and the whole relationship between viewer and screen....
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » “Dr. Howard Ehrman from the University of Illinois-Chicago and the Little Village Environmental Justice Organization says that no other city in the U.S. ‘comes anywhere close to the lack of funding for public transportation than the city of Chicago.’ Ehrman says that for the last 32 years the city has spent $3 million per year, or $1 per person out of the city’s budget, on the CTA....
On a recent morning, thinking I might be able to catch a performance of Porgy and Bess at Lyric Opera, I checked Lyric’s website. The cheapest seat in the house—a perch in the vertiginous reaches of the upper balcony—would set me back $59. And you don’t have to pretend to be a kid or a college student to claim them. (Lyric has had discount programs for them for awhile.) You can just walk up or go to the website, and take your chance at getting lucky....
QI am a straight male, 30, in a long-term monogamous relationship. I love my wife, we have good sex, and often. When we first got together, I had a mild foot fetish, and she has gorgeous pedis. We have done and still do foot play on occasion. But my fetish has grown stronger as time has passed, and I have grown thirstier for her appendages. They are all I can think about....
Presented by the Society for Arts, the Polish Film Festival in America runs Friday, November 8, through Sunday, November 24, at Facets Cinematheque, 1517 W. Fullerton; Rosemont 18, 9701 Bryn Mawr, Rosemont; and Society for Arts, 1112 N. Milwaukee. Unless otherwise noted, tickets are $14; passes are $75 (seven films) and $150 (15 films), excluding the opening- and closing-night programs. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Floating Skyscrapers In this bleak second feature by Tomasz Wasilewski, a closeted, ultramasculine professional swimmer (Mateusz Banasiuk) falls head over heels for a younger man (Bartosz Gelner), which complicates the athlete’s relationship with an unsuspecting girlfriend and distracts him from his intense training....
The story about how I got started starts with my mother. She would play her albums on Saturday and Sunday mornings—Eddie Jefferson, Billie Holiday, John Coltrane. I remember just laying there and listening while she ironed and singing along. Dee Alexander is a versatile jazz singer who leads her own straight-ahead quartet as well as the more exploratory Evolution Ensemble. She recently received a prestigious 3Arts Award. —Peter Margasak Best of Chicago voting is live now....
Riot Fest continues to expand each year, cementing its position as the city’s finest concentration of punk, hardcore, ska, pop-punk, and plain old rock ‘n’ roll. For its sixth installment the schedule includes 17 shows (not counting yet-to-be-announced secret shows) at six venues—Metro, Subterranean, Double Door, House of Blues, Cobra Lounge, and the Congress Theater—from Wed 10/6 through Sun 10/10. This year also features an extraordinary number of sets from reunited bands or groups that rarely tour, among them the Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Cap’n Jazz, Snapcase, the Bhopal Stiffs, Cro-Mags, the Zero Boys, Corrosion of Conformity, Negative Approach, Circle Jerks, and Articles of Faith; the sold-out Busted at Oz reunion at Double Door Wed 10/6 includes Naked Raygun, the Subverts, Silver Abuse, and Toothpaste (the Effigies recently canceled)....
Kevin Warwick Chicago’s first annual Cider Summit took place at Navy Pier on Saturday from 11 AM to 7 PM, and judging from the effusive greeting we got from a couple strangers when we first walked in around 3, the pours had been pretty generous up to that point. Which is actually sort of surprising unless they’d spent some extra money: the entry fee ($20, $25 at the door but it was sold out by the time we arrived) included 10 tasting tickets, each good for maybe two to three ounces of cider—though additional tickets were available for two dollars apiece....
The African Festival of the Arts celebrates its 24th year this long weekend in Washington Park, hosting nonstop R&B, soul, gospel, blues, house, African music, and more, plus at least a dozen pavilions with food, beer, wine, historical artifacts, films, quilting, and other vendors and activities for kids and families. The Dee Parmer Woodtor Stage presents the big headliners, and its lineup includes house-music pioneers the Chosen Few DJs and Zenith Dance on Friday; Zimbabwean singer Oliver Mtukudzi and a set from R&B divas Syleena Johnson (Syl‘s daughter) and Monifah on Saturday; soul legend Otis Clay and Linda Tillery & the Heritage Gospel Choir on Sunday; and R&B superstar Brandy on Monday....
