Adam Leon’s Stellar First Film — and TV show — Toasts the Tag Artist
For a movie as much in love with New York’s outer-borough street life as Adam Leon’s Gimme the Loot, it will not do just to talk about the film. That’s what Leon insists, and so I find myself heading north with Leon on FDR Drive on an overcast Friday afternoon,…
To most of the world, spring break seems like a lot of fun, but people who live in Miami, Fort Lauderdale, or South Padre Island understand the dark side. Damn college kids pass through for a week to drink liquor, trash the streets, and wear T-shirts announcing, “I survived spring…
“All you need to make a movie is a girl and a gun” goes Jean-Luc Godard’s quip. Add to that a few more girls and their bikinis and you have the rough formula for Harmony Korine’s Spring Breakers, which looks like the most expensive Girls Gone Wild video ever made…
For thirteen years, Phoenix College’s Latino Film Festival has offered celluloid glimpses into Latino culture across the world. This year, the fest brings together films under the banner of music from the U.S., Latin America, and Spain, and it gets rolling Thursday, March 21, at Phoenix College.The fest’s first selection,…
When relatives of the already-famous tout their familial ties, normally it does not bode well. So weary of name-droppers are we that it takes quite the moniker to pique our interest.In the case of actress and writer Diane Ladd, discovering that she’s a cousin of playwright Tennessee Williams gave us…
Native American performance artist James Luna (Puyukitchum/Luiseño) obeys no boundaries when it comes to his installations, which often include him as a subject. Because his art is anything but stereotypical, Luna has pushed the public’s perception of what native art is by grappling with his ethnic identity in his works.Luna…
Well, Arizona. It’s official. The Grand Old Party has gone so off-the-radar berserk that even us liberals can identify with old-school conservatives, who would absolutely not fit into today’s political landscape as such.Imagine a conservative from Arizona that wasn’t completely insane. Sounds like pure fiction, but at one point in…
New, vintage, and handmade goods meet gardening at Roosevelt Growhouse and GROWop Boutique. Makes sense, then, that the shop/community plot’s Honey Harvest promises more than just sweetener. Along with a big batch of nectar-infused treats, the garden party will feature an exclusive collection of 25 paintings from Rebecca Green and…
Ever since George Clinton promised, “Free your ass and your mind will follow,” funk bands have aimed to find the perfect cerebral groove. Orgone, a nine-piece Los Angeles-based Afrobeat/funk/soul ensemble keeps the axiom in mind, searching for the midpoint between booty-shaking and chin-stroking. The group has been playing together for…
Go fly a kite, dude. No, seriously. You have no excuse for saying there’s little culture in the suburbs. Pakistani tradition has it covered, yo. For the eleventh year in a row, the Pakistan Information and Cultural Organization hosts a free Kite Festival, otherwise known as Basant Mela.This annual festival…
Before Ahmed Alsoudani took the contemporary art world by storm, he grew up in Iraq, lived in Syria as a refugee, and fled to the United States where he was granted asylum. His young life experiences were heavily surrounded by violence and consequences of violence — themes reflected in his…
Though Aspen and Santa Fe are okay places to visit if you have to, we’re pretty stoked to be on the limited tour schedule of Aspen Santa Fe Ballet, fresh from its Moscow debut earlier this month. The company’s danced at Kennedy Center, Wolf Trap, and Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival…
Cave Creek and Carefree are gateways to old west living. Once you get past rush hour on the Carefree Highway and do a little exploring, you can imagine the rumble of cattle herding by while true American tough guys, a.k.a. cowboys, use their skills to harness those thousands of pounds…
If you get writer’s block from penning out your grocery list, you might look to the prolific masters who can crank out compelling reads seemingly at will. Terry Brooks has appeared on the New York Times bestseller list 25 times throughout his 36-year career — so listen up when he…
The air traffic controllers occupying the tower at Sky Harbor have enormously high-stress jobs to be sure, given they deal with more than 1,200 flights on the daily. Fingers crossed those radar geeks won’t lose their shizzle if a few unknown blips pop onto their screens Saturday. Those won’t be…
Yes, it’s super-impressive that comedian Laurie Kilmartin was a finalist on the eighth season of Last Comic Standing. But hitting the exceedingly cool mark is her status as a staff writer for late night weirdo Conan O’Brien. Get an earful of Kilmartin’s killer jokes when she performs at the Comedy…
Is there any aspect of sport more gripping than a hockey fight? Gloves tossed on the ice act as starting flags. The crowd rises and roars. The pugilists involved twirl around the rink in a flurry of yanked jerseys and swinging fists. What’s amazing is that this behavior is permitted…
With the exception of one itsy-bitsy bench-clearing, national headline-grabbing, no-holds-barred brawl between Canada and Mexico during a World Baseball Classic game on Sunday, March 10, spring baseball in the Valley has gone off without a hitch. And with Cactus League play winding down, most skippers oughta be just about done…
Once again, it’s a sort of apprenticeship with Woody Guthrie that’s drawn Billy Bragg into a new realm. Thirty years since his debut, the seven-song Life’s a Riot With Spy vs. Spy, Bragg is back with a new album, Tooth & Nail, out this week on Cooking Vinyl. Bragg calls…
So you’re all dressed up with no place to go on Easter. There you are, all full of ham, sitting in your penguin coat, accessorized by a monocle and top hat. We’ve all been there. But you’re not one to succumb to the lures of crappy reality show reruns. You’re…
Jared Mancuso stars as the bespectacled lead in this Buddy Holly musical, directed by Nearly Naked Theatre founder Damon Dering. Tuesdays-Fridays, 7:30 p.m.; Saturdays, Sundays, 2 & 7:30 p.m.; Wednesdays, 2 p.m. Starts: March 1. Continues through March 27, 2013…
Hate musical theater? Check out Theater Works’ The Musical of Musicals (The Musical!), which heaps ridicule on Rodgers, Hammerstein, Sondheim, Fosse, Lloyd Webber, and other dinosaurs, uh, we mean innovators of the form. Writers Joanne Bogart and Eric Rockwell take the basic story of two young lovers, an evil landlord,…
