SUMMER AND SMOKE, Lucid Theatre Productions, at the Preston Bradley Center for the Arts. A truer title for this moving but schematic 50-year-old drama would be “Body and Soul.” As in all his best works, Tennessee Williams splits himself between his thwarted lovers. His purpose: to show that passion needs more than the right affinities–perfect […]
Tag: Vol. 26 No. 30
Issue of May. 1 – 7, 1997
Posted inMusic
Thee Headcoats
THEE HEADCOATS In 1978 a disgruntled teenage dockworker in Chatham, England, took to heart the advice in Mark Perry’s fanzine Sniffin’ Glue: he learned three chords and formed a band. Bill Hamper quit his job to become punk rocker Billy Childish, and nearly two decades later he’s still gainfully unemployed. He’s published more than two […]
Posted inFilm
Female Perversions
An adventurous and sometimes sexy, if only fitfully successful, adaptation of Louise Kaplan’s celebrated nonfiction book by Susan Streitfeld, working with a script she wrote with Julie Hebert (1996). The focus is on the life of a successful single prosecutor (British actress Tilda Swinton, displaying an impeccable American accent) as she waits to discover whether […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Dark Of The Moon
DARK OF THE MOON, Bailiwick Repertory. Howard Richardson and William Berney’s 1945 fantasy earns its place in American theater textbooks for its roots in the rural folk ballad “Barbara Allen,” in which a witch-boy passes for human in order to marry the mortal girl he loves, with tragic results. Eerily like a fable of miscegenation, […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Money Hogs
Giant “hog cities” may produce pork efficiency, but the mere whiff of one in the neighborhood can produce something else even faster: grassroots resistance.
Posted inArts & Culture
So Long, Babe
The Atkinson Livestock Market goes the way of the family farm.
Posted inNews & Politics
Reader to Reader
Two women exiting the McDonald’s on Adams and Wells about a week ago had scored and scored big–they carried six Beanie Baby Happy Meals between them and could look forward to at least a half hour of peace at home. The question of what to do with the meals seemed to be immediately resolved when […]
Posted inFilm
Windy City International Documentary Festival
Windy City International Documentary Festival Presented by Columbia College’s Documentary Center and the International Documentary Association, the 1997 Windy City International Documentary Festival runs from Saturday through Monday, May 3 through 5; Wednesday, May 7; and next weekend at the Chicago Cultural Center, 78 E. Washington, and at Hokin Hall Theater, 635 S. Wabash. All […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Reedsburg, Wisconsin
Reedsburg, Wisconsin, the former Butter Capital of the U.S., is about four hours from Chicago, 20 minutes west of Baraboo on route 33. But why drive when you can fly? The Reedsburg Municipal Airport (1720 E. Main, 608-524-2396), owned and operated by T & J Aviation, offers two hard-surface runways, aircraft rentals, 24-hour fuel service, […]
Posted inColumns & Opinion
Savage Love
Hey, Faggot: When I have an erection, my penis curves to one side. This is a source of major insecurity to me when it comes to having sex. In fact, I’m 26 and I haven’t had sex yet. I’ve had opportunities, but when I find myself with a willing girl, I worry about how she […]
Posted inMusic
Jesus Alemany’s Cubanismo
JESUS ALEMANY’S CUBANISMO! In spite of the government’s destructive, insupportable, and hypocritical stance on Cuba–or maybe because of it–that island’s irresistible music now enjoys greater visibility in the U.S. than at any time since the 1950s. In Chicago, not only the music–in the form of salsa from other parts of the Antilles–but Cuban musicians themselves […]
Posted inMusic
Ray Brown Trio with Geoff Keezer
RAY BROWN TRIO WITH GEOFF KEEZER The bass-playing marvel Ray Brown brought his trio to town just last fall, but I can think of two reasons to recommend him again. First–and despite the word’s devaluation in describing two-hit wonders–he’s a jazz legend, one of the half-dozen most influential postwar bassists and a founding member of […]
Posted inMusic
See-Through Blues
Boz Scaggs House of Blues, April 20 By Frank Youngwerth Who is Boz Scaggs–an aging rock star or an enduring legend? The obvious answer is the former–after one genuinely successful funky rock record in the late 70s and a sparse string of Top 40 singles in the 80s, Scaggs disappeared to California to start a […]