Arts & Culture

Miami’s official celebration of Hanukkah (which began this past Friday night) will take the Festival of Lights to a truly sensory level, featuring a twelve-foot-long, six-foot-high menorah with candles illuminated by showers of Fourth of July-style sparks. Mayor Manny Diaz will be the first of many dignitaries to light a…

Udonis Haslem has a great local-boy-made-good story. The 26-year-old forward from Liberty City worked hard to make it from the trenches of French professional basketball back into the NBA’s good graces, and last season Haslem made his hometown especially proud. The blingtastic NBA Championship ring he’s sporting nowadays is the…

You have the idea in your mind — the perfect shoe to go with your New Year’s Eve ensemble — but you can’t find it anywhere, and you have the mileage on your car and the blisters on your feet to prove it. If you can hold out for a…

A winter wonderland this is not, but you can still bust out the mittens and scarves and sit around a cool hunk of ice if you choose to cheer on the Florida Panthers as they face the Philadelphia Flyers tonight. The Cats have slipped into last place in the Southeast…

Who’s the Boss? There’s only one. And if you answered Tony or Angela, run to Books & Books tonight at 8:00 to get schooled by Bruce Springsteen biographer and best-selling rock writer Dave Marsh. Acquaint yourself with one of America’s most legendary singer/songwriter/storytellers through a photographic timeline titled Bruce Springsteen…

Generally speaking, the 27th birthday isn’t particularly special. You have long passed the legal drinking age, so nobody is pressuring you to choke down test tubes of Jägermeister. The quarter-century feels like a more significant landmark (cheaper car insurance rates!) and is worthy of a no-holds-barred commemoration. The typical 27th…

My call for festive libations went unanswered, so I have decided to use my mad Martha skills to mix up some of my favorite holiday beverages and share the best recipes with you. Little Miss Sunrise: It is never too early to commence drinking during the month of December, so…

Okay, so the Dolphins aren’t headed to the playoffs this year. Does that really matter when swarms of transplanted New Yorkers – ahem — descend upon the stadium in Jets gear and act like they own the place? With a significant portion of the stadium occupied by enemy fans, the…

Let’s face it: Foodwise, Thanksgiving, not Christmas, is the holiday that’s about hours of stirring pots and basting turkeys in a hot kitchen. After all, you’ve spent the past few weeks with your elbow in some other holiday shoppers’ rib cage, or with your foot on someone’s neck while you…

Although reunion shows by the likes of the Cure and Violent Femmes do exist, you’ll most likely have to dish out a Jackson or two and settle for half the original lineup. The cover band Radioactive might not boast Robert Smith or Gordon Gano crooning to the audience, but the…

Local hero Udonis Haslem has shown himself again and again to be reliable, talented, versatile, and, perhaps most important, uninjured. But the Miami Heat has struggled much with the question of what to do at the other forward spot. Both Antoine Walker and James Posey have demonstrated ample skill, but…

Alcohol is sometimes called liquid courage. After a few shots or beers, stage fright just melts away, along with sobriety. This is where the fun of karaoke comes in. Patrons who are usually meek and quiet emerge from their shells to let everyone know how much they really love Michael…

Brown-paper packages tied up with string — no, better yet, yellow-skin bananas tied up with T-shirts, and raisins hidden in brightly wrapped boxes — these are a few of a chimpanzee’s favorite things. Especially the chimps at Miami Metrozoo, where it is a holiday tradition for zookeepers to pass out…

You really should be done with your holiday shopping by now, but you keep stuffing your own stocking instead. This is the season for giving, remember? Since you obviously can’t do this on your own, we are here to suggest a few last-minute gift ideas. Give a gift that keeps…

Just like your neighbor’s light-saber-wielding toddler, the Pinot Noir grape can be difficult. It is tough to grow and has a reputation for fermenting violently. But with the right guidance, that little fruit can become one rich and rewarding wine. The silky liquid is full-bodied without being too heavy, so…

Year after year, you get your holiday giggles from your cousin Chip, who always returns from his “breath of fresh air” smelling like a different kind of pine tree, and from Auntie Josephine, who is never without her glass of special eggnog. But this year, get your Christmas chuckles from…

Since you like to do your holiday shopping the old-fashioned way — you know, by trudging through the malls while schlepping heavy bags – it’s time to take a break and unwind before your last round of holiday parties. You have to get your nails done anyway, so you might…

One of Miami’s legitimate cultural treasures, the Miami Beach Cinematheque, defines itself with the word escapism. Two current projects take that idea to its ultimate, um, conclusion. Robert Altman, a key figure in America’s auteur movement of the late Sixties and early Seventies – who, unlike, say, Dennis Hopper, didn’t…

Cheer up, lads! Sometimes it isn’t easy to preach to the choir. FIU’s rock and roll professor, Dr. Armando Tranquilino, lectured about the Beatles to an audience of eager babyboomers — and a few twenty- and thirty-somethings — at last night’s Culture in the City talk in Coconut Grove. For…