Paul Vallas’s latest maneuver looks like an end run around LSC autonomy.
Tag: Vol. 28 No. 30
Issue of Apr. 29 – May. 5, 1999
Posted inNews & Politics
Which Side Are You On?/And Now a World From the Methodists…
By Michael Miner Which Side Are You On? “The clown handed me your card,” growled the voice. It was a low, thick, nameless voice, speaking from a pay phone (at one point it had to put in more quarters), and it told me the deal with Thomas Geoghegan. “This,” it said, speaking of the clown […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Violet
VIOLET, Apple Tree Theatre. Strong and true, this prizewinning, emotionally textured 1997 musical by composer Jeanine Tesori and lyricist Brian Crawley mines every feeling behind its sturdy songs. A midwest premiere, Eileen Boevers’s staging electrifies. Based on Doris Betts’s story “The Ugliest Pilgrim,” Violet recalls Sondheim’s Passion as it paints a down-home portrait of a […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Charlie Hunter & Adam Cruz
Charlie Hunter & Adam Cruz Charlie Hunter’s devotees have doubtless heard more than enough about his eight-string guitar technique. True, Hunter’s astonishing–he plays sly improvisations on the top five strings and fully independent bass lines on the bottom three, and sends each line out through a separate amp–but that parlor trick is responsible for so […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Baby Jane Dexter
BABY JANE DEXTER New York cabaret star Baby Jane Dexter returns to Chicago this week with a new show, The Real Thing–a collection of love songs Dexter calls “an intimate opera,” which suggests she’ll be doing less talking and more singing this time around. That’s not necessarily good: Dexter’s open-hearted, big-mouthed spontaneity is a natural […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Richard the Third: The Story Becomes the History
RICHARD THE THIRD: THE STORY BECOMES THE HISTORY, Open Eye Productions, at the Greenview Arts Center. Like would-be king Richard Nixon, real-life king Richard III has been the subject of revisionist history from the moment he took power. Contemporary opinion varied greatly–one bishop said, “He contents the people where he goes best that ever a […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Joan Crawford Goes to Hell!
JOAN CRAWFORD GOES TO HELL!, Sweetback Productions, at the SweetCorn Playhouse. It’s hard to parody excess. But David Cerda in his 90-minute takeoff on La Crawford adds hell to histrionics, sending Joan to perdition where Lucifer–Mr. DeVille–forces her to review her life as if it were a B movie. Even there the self-crowned Queen of […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Group Efforts: Salsedo Press shakes it to the left
A poster promoting one of Salsedo Press’s Cinco de Mayo blasts–which are famous in Chicago’s lefty ghettos–shows a few of the world’s best-known politicos shaking their booties on a fire escape high above Chicago’s skyline. Emiliano Zapata looks stern. But an olive-drab Daniel Ortega is getting down, and a dapper Nelson Mandela has his fists […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Duh
Duh Great piece on the dangers of steroid-using bodybuilders sharing needles [April 23]. Can’t wait till next week’s piece on drunk drivers who smoke while pumping gas. Michael Gebert W. Newport
Posted inNews & Politics
Caught in the Net
Captured at www.nasinet.org/faq95b.html Internet Virtual Bigfoot Conference “I.V.B.C.” Frequently Asked Questions Is “Bigfoot” real? And if you believe it is real, what is your best evidence for believing so? Whether or not “bigfoot” is real, the “bigfoot phenomenon” is real. The “bigfoot phenomenon” is the certain fact that we continue to receive “bigfoot” sighting reports, […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Billy Branch
Billy Branch Blues harpist Billy Branch has always been mindful of his role as a keeper of the flame. He can evoke the better part of the Chicago harmonica canon in a single solo: He might start with a few of John Lee Williamson’s rollicking arpeggios, then segue into burnished Little Walter-style jazz licks, tempered […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Heritage by the Yard
The figures form black history that surround Charles Smith’s Aurora home stand in mute testimony to a singular vision.
Posted inNews & Politics
Destructive Attitudes
Destructive Attitudes Dear Reader: I hope your article on the danger of HIV transmission through steroid needle sharing [April 23] has the intended effect–getting people who are injecting to stop sharing needles. But I fear that some of the rhetoric in your article (not to mention the monstrous cover drawing) will have the (I hope […]