More than just leather and sequins THU 9/9 The word “gay” is such an odd, limiting misnomer. While it’s true that many homosexuals really are gay — merry, light-hearted, showy, and vivacious — the label implies a one-dimensionality that is essentially inaccurate. Gay folks can be glum, they can be…
THU 9 If you’ve ever seen the Toxic Avenger (1985), the Class of Nuke ’em High (1986), Terror Firmer (1999) or even Tromeo and Juliet (1996), you’ve been touched (or traumatized) by the kooky cultish world of Troma, the fiercely independent film company founded by eccentric Lloyd Kaufman. Yesterday the…
Today’s upscale airport lounge may seem the embodiment of international chic (MIA excluded, of course), but there was a time, from the Twenties through the Fifties, when nothing could be more cosmopolitan than the lobby of a fine hotel. In the words of German critic Siegfried Kracauer, such lobbies represented…
Adhesive 44: Fulfilling art writer John Berger’s prediction that museums will ultimately disappear and be replaced by personal arrangements of reproductions and printed ephemera, Brazilian artist Jac Leirner unpacks her decalcomania at the Miami Art Museum. Composed of hundreds of stickers adhered to two rows of window panes and extending…
Heaven Help Us! The Swingin’ New Rat Pack Musical: This toe-tapping world premiere about God sending the Rat Pack back to Vegas to help a suicidal lounge owner is stylishly presented, with the terrific cast belting out some great tunes. Some 29 hits pop up in the show, ranging from…
In Victorian England, 40,000 novels were published every year. Of the few that have endured, perhaps none is more worthy of a film adaptation than Vanity Fair, if for no other reason than this: It’s a chore to read. At 850 pages, with frequent excursions into unrelated subjects or expendable…
You know how fear is scary? Well, director E. Elias Merhige is into that, especially in his new serial-killer thriller Suspect Zero. Absent, however, is the dark-comic malevolence the director smartly cultivated in his successful and disquieting Shadow of the Vampire a few years ago, bullied and bulldozed out of…
Retail prices rising. Oil hitting $50 per barrel. Health care collapsing, schools failing, politicians scheming. What’s a working person to do? Work. Work overtime. Then work some more. And, should the occasion permit, party like it’s 1969. Visiting (or revisiting) the bygone provides some salve for quiet desperation. Don’t go…
During her four years of presenting Surreal Saturday events, founder/curator Susan Caraballo assures that no one has ever wandered in looking for the exhibition of Surrealistic art. And now it seems there’s not a chance any such exhibition or odd encounter will occur in the near future, for in search…
Hang with a photographer in the swamp SAT 9/4 Living in Florida gives a new meaning to “getting back to the soil” — when much of that real estate is underwater. Still, it’s hard not to fall under the area’s unique spell. Ask Clyde Butcher, whose photographic style is fairly…
Friends with You rejoices THU 9/2 “A fast connection with the abstract being inside us all,” promise the organizers of the art exhibition “Get Lucky,” currently on display through Saturday, September 25, at The Box (70 NE Seventeenth St.). Those same folks are the makers of the odd-but-endearing line of…
Rap up the season with rhymes FRI 9/3 Get your oversized pants, your shiny jewelry, and your brand new, overpriced sneaks out and prepare to feel the bass booming in your chest. It’s time for what might be summer’s last rap extravaganza. Drive over in your new whip, bring some…
THU 2 Sure people bust into museums and steal works by Rembrandt, Picasso, and Munch. But has a group of masked men ever stormed a gallery and grabbed a painting by Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein or Robert Rauschenberg at gunpoint? Not that we know of. That doesn’t make Pop art…
Celebrate Miami’s many cultures SAT 9/4 How many times have you sat at a stoplight in some foreign corner of Miami, far from your turf, and wondered, “Where the hell am I?” Maybe it’s the Haitian gentleman on South Beach, scratching his head at the sight of yarmulke-topped Jewish men…
Raised in Captivity: From Nicky Silver’s deliciously twisted mind comes this black comedy of love, loneliness and loss, and also killer shower massages, disturbed siblings, psychotic, self-mutilating psychologists, and a redneck death-row inmate whose Muslim name is Ruth. Don’t ask. Just don’t miss this lively production by The Baby Factor,…
Adhesive 44: Fulfilling art writer John Berger’s prediction that museums of the future would ultimately disappear and be replaced by personal arrangements of reproductions and printed ephemera, Brazilian artist Jac Leirner unpacks her decalcomania at the Miami Art Museum. Composed of hundreds of stickers adhered to two rows of window…
It should go without saying that when one goes to see a movie about giant killer snakes, the main point of the whole endeavor is to watch people get eaten by giant killer snakes. Hardly rocket science, that. But while Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid does feature a…
The return to the screen of the ravishing Chinese actress Gong Li, who may have the most expressive face in film, should be cause for rejoicing among her millions of admirers around the world. After starring in a series of memorable and politically controversial films directed by her former paramour,…
Few people could accuse Susan McDougal of being laconic — except maybe erstwhile independent counsel Kenneth Starr. A central figure during the Clinton presidency because of her and former husband James McDougal’s partnership with the First Couple in an Arkansas land deal known as Whitewater, McDougal refused the independent counsel’s…
Get hip to the heavy set SAT 8/28 Why should a few excess pounds get in the way of true love? Thus thinks Elliot Weinstock, a former school teacher-turned-tutor and founder of the new club for stocky singles known as Full-Figured Friends. At 70 pounds overweight Weinstock, who describes his…
Bull snot, cowboys fly SAT 8/28 Clean pair of Wranglers, full can o’ Skoal, brand new Stetson, shined-up boots and belt buckle: check. Now wash the mud off the F-150 and mosey on down to the rodeo. Of course, if you’re one of the 40 cowboys signed up for the…
Rasta Surf Sensation FRI 8/27 Get up, stand up. And go check out the latest edition of the Jah Surf Expo from everybody’s favorite rastaman surfer, Lance-O. The usual goodies will be on display — reggae wear, knickknacks, bikinis, and boards for both land and sea. And representin’ FLA will…
