“Bibles. Bibles for sale,” the young, bearded man announced as the Jackson Park B train pulled out of the tunnel south of Roosevelt. “I’ve got Bibles here. Bibles for sale. All sizes, all shapes. Bibles.” A seasoned rider, he paused in the aisle as the train jerked, not even grabbing for a handhold, then repeated, […]
Tag: Vol. 17 No. 27
Issue of Apr. 21 – 27, 1988
Posted inNews & Politics
Those Gangs: How Dare They!
To the editors: It’s a good thing Roberto Rivera is no longer with Chicago Intervention Network if he believes that [although] “the city will never be able officially to recognize groups as groups to bargain with . . . a community organization could recognize a gang’s “turf’ and strike a deal based on that.” It’s […]
Posted inNews & Politics
The stadium game: who loses if the White Sox win?
If all goes well, the planners say, in a year, maybe two, the bulldozers will come and level the old neighborhood. By that time the residents, mostly working-class blacks, will have been “relocated.” And then–hooray–the White Sox will stay in Chicago, playing baseball in a brand new $120 million stadium built at the public’s expense […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Charleen
Fans of Ross McElwee’s Sherman’s March (1985) will undoubtedly recall the character Charleen Swansea, the filmmaker’s friend and former teacher, and will be pleased to discover that McElwee devoted an entire feature to this memorable woman back in 1977. An unorthodox fifth-grade teacher, small publisher, and poet who at one point was a protege of […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Dancing to the New Music
DANCING TO THE NEW MUSIC at MoMing Dance & Arts Center April 15-16, 1988 In its most potent form, a collaboration between composer and choreographer infuses a work with a double charge. Such joint ventures have produced some of the richest ballet and modern dance works of all time. The Marius Petipa-Pyotr Tchaikovsky union begat […]
Posted inMusic
Chicago Symphony Orchestra–From the Archives, Volume III
FROM THE ARCHIVES, VOLUME III Chicago Symphony Orchestra Radiothon 13 Premium S15-35 (LP), S17-50 (CD) (Reviewed on CD) “Mr. Still, have you ever played this piece before?” “Of course I have.” “Oh yes, I forgot. It must have been in Baltimore–with the Orioles.” This infamous little exchange took place in Orchestra Hall over 30 years […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Local Color: A Night in Court
One after another the prisoners file in, and just as quickly out, as the paperwork flutters furiously from hand to pen to stapler to pen to hand to pile. . .
Posted inArts & Culture
Losing Control
THE MAGIC OF KATHERINE DUNHAM Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater at the Auditorium Theatre April 13-15, 1988 An evening spent with Katherine Dunham–whose works the Alvin Ailey troupe revived this season–is vibrant, boisterously theatrical, and subtly disturbing. We can’t see with the fresh eyes of 40 or 50 years ago (these dances were first choreographed […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Not For Real
NOT FOR REAL Organic Theater As I watched Leonard Pitt begin his one-man show, Not For Real, I thought, it’s true, anyone can be a performance artist. All you have to do is assemble some odd and arbitrary actions, put them in front of an audience, and presto! Performance art! I might defend that assertion […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Feiffer’s America
FEIFFER’S AMERICA Northlight Theatre Anyone setting out to adapt the work of cartoonist Jules Feiffer to a live theatrical format faces several problems right off the bat. First, there’s the obvious fact that no live actor could ever capture the unique visual vitality of Feiffer’s inimitable drawings; even cartoon animation would fall short. The strength […]
Posted inArts & Culture
The Ties That Hide
PASSING ON Blue Rider Theater For the past few weeks I’ve been on a death watch as a close relative fades away, and the experience has reminded me once again that death is seldom a private affair. Family members and friends gathered around the dying person react like an organism in distress. First there’s the […]
Posted inNews & Politics
A Fire in the Family
Laverne Williams, 19, died in a fire in her west-side apartment on January 27. She saved her son Derrick, 3, and her daughter Delina, 1, before succumbing. She is survived by her mother Glo, her twin sister Lavette, and a large extended family.
Posted inArts & Culture
Music Notes: Neil Rolnick’s checkered career
“The whole world of music comes at us from all sides these days,” says Neil Rolnick, oblivious in this Indian restaurant to the guy playing ambient music on the African kora immediately behind him. “Looking back, what I got from studying with [French composer] Darius Milhaud is that–he lived over the Place Pigalle [the red-light […]
Posted inArts & Culture
On Stage: French farce in a paisley shirt
Madness, impotence, adultery, prostitution, alcoholism, and sadomasochism are all ingredients for a light comedy in the hands of Georges Feydeau. Writing for the bourgeoisie in turn-of-the-century Paris, Feydeau (1862-1921) served up dizzyingly funny bedroom farces that teased his audiences while ultimately reassuring them. In his 1907 La puce a l’oreille–known in English as A Flea […]