Posted inNews & Politics

Field & Street

Scaup were my introduction to the true terrors of birding. For those who do not follow the sport, I should explain that scaup are ducks. Diving ducks, to be more precise. Diving ducks hunt for food well underwater, propelling themselves through the depths with their feet. They are to be distinguished from dabbling ducks, such […]

Posted inArts & Culture

Miss Julie/The Stronger

MISS JULIE and THE STRONGER Intimate Theatre at the Swedish American Museum Center Geniuses are rarely pleasant people in the ordinary social sense, but August Strindberg continues to hold the prize for the one with whom you would least want to share an office. Although recognized as Sweden’s most prominent playwright (in most theater history […]

Posted inArts & Culture

Dangerous Women

KAREN FINLEY at Beacon Street Gallery and Theatre “The fight goes on.” –Pat Murphy, director of arts, Beacon Street Gallery Stripped down to her infamous panties, the notorious Karen Finley scooped scandalous gobs of chocolate out of a candy box and slathered them across her controversial chest. “This,” she said dryly, “is what they’re scared […]

Posted inArts & Culture

Penn & Teller

Stage magicians are routinely billed in hyperbolic terms: the Amazing So-and-So, Such-and-Such the Great. Penn & Teller, in keeping with their wryly understated style of humor, describe themselves as “eccentric guys who know how to do a few cool things.” In fact, this pair of postmodernist prestidigitators, transform the well-worn craft of illusionism into highly […]

Posted inNews & Politics

Unabashed Activists

To the editors: I’d like to express our appreciation for your coverage of the status of the Commonwealth Edison/City electric franchise negotiations, which appeared in Harold Henderson’s article of October 12, 1990 [“Com Ed Watch: Keeping Us in the Dark”]. Henderson did an excellent job of outlining the complexities of the issue and the political […]

Posted inArts & Culture

Soul Asylum

Soul Asylum are too smart to be heavy metal, too dumb to get enough good songs together to put out a great album, too sexy to ever be without fans, and too great live to ever be forgotten. The Minneapolis foursome may be the last great rock ‘n’ roll touring band: their records have gotten […]

Posted inArts & Culture

To Sleep With Anger

It seems scandalous that Charles Burnett, the most gifted black American director offering purely realistic depictions of black urban life, has had to wait for more than a decade to get any of his films distributed in this country, and that this one only got made because Danny Glover agreed to play a leading role […]

Posted inNews & Politics

Outside Agitators

To the editors: I would like to reply to Jane Juffer’s article about Operation Clean Sweep [October 5] and the security at Chicago Housing Authority projects. I was surprised to learn that Ms. Juffer resides in a comfortable neighborhood on the north side only 4 blocks from my own residence. Surely she is familiar with […]

Posted inArts & Culture

Annie Sprinkle

ANNIE SPRINKLE at Club Lower Links October 20 Annie Sprinkle’s Sex Education Class was the first performance I’ve seen stopped–but not because Sprinkle’s work was “obscene.” Sprinkle, a self-described “postporn modernist,” talks about and shows us things that the far right wing would find morally abhorrent and the far left might find pretty darn distasteful […]