Thank you for “Glimpses of the Heavens” (November 29), Michael Lenehan’s interview with Chicago priest John Kartje. The paradox of the scientist who believes in and serves God is a truer emblem of the Catholic priesthood in practice than the sad images of sexual abuse with which we have been so bombarded in the mainstream […]
Tag: Vol. 32 No. 15
Issue of Jan. 9 – 15, 2003
Posted inArts & Culture
Instruments of Movement
“Beautiful dynamite” was what Fred Astaire called Cyd Charisse–and Instruments of Movement artistic director James Morrow borrowed the expression for this program, performed by his mostly female troupe and dominated by several pieces focused on women or gender relations. When the seven women in Kirby Reed’s Lies in a Bow walked offstage after rehearsing the […]
Posted inArts & Culture
The Girl Who Knew Too Much
When this 1963 mystery by Italian horror master Mario Bava first hit the U.S. it had been worked over pretty heavily by American International Pictures, which retitled it The Evil Eye and readied it for the drive-in crowd by dubbing over all the marijuana references, adding some comic scenes, and replacing Roberto Nicolosi’s eerie jazz […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Signed, Sealed and Delivered
Signed, Sealed and Delivered, at WNEP Theater, through January 31. For a trained magician, Matt Lash is awfully clumsy at removing his clothes. But that’s the point in this parody of illusionist extravaganzas, quiz shows, stunt shows, kiddie TV, and multimedia performance art. Another target is MTV-style sexuality. The resulting geeky spectacles include a spoken-word […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Instant Karma
Instant Karma, ImprovOlympic. Created to showcase Improv-Olympic’s many ensemble members–there are more than 150, divided into 19 teams–Instant Karma jumbles people from different groups together in a long-form improv directed by Jason R. Chin. Jumping off from an audience suggestion, one cast member delivers a short monologue. The other performers then weave the monologue’s themes […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Gore Gore Girls
The Gore Gore Girls’ lineup has changed three times since they started out in 1996, but the Detroit band’s commitment to trashy garage rock has remained constant. Named for B-movie king Herschell Gordon Lewis’s 1972 bloodfest (reportedly the admiration is mutual), the Girls were formed by guitarist-songwriter Amy Surdu and now-departed bassist Paula Regalado; their […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Teena Marie
When Teena Marie was in her prime there were few other white performers in R & B and none quite as distinctive. She was an independent artist, writing, producing, arranging, and performing her own material in a genre where the hit-factory mentality looms large to this day. Marie signed to Motown in the mid-70s, but […]
Posted inNews & Politics
TRG Music Listings
Rock, Pop, etc. concerts DEL SOULS Free in-store performances. Fri 1/10, 8 PM, Borders Books & Music, 1 N. La Grange Rd., La Grange. 708-579-9660. Fri 1/17, 8 PM, Borders Books & Music, 1500 16th, Oak Brook. 630-574-0800. RUSS FORSTER celebrates the release of his documentary about tribute bands, Tributary, with a DVD screening and […]
Posted inNews & Politics
So Much for Retirement/News Bites
So Much for Retirement “I’d heard it rumored for a couple of months that the Tribune was going to call me,” says Mike Downey. “Some people said they were going to call me about the sports column and others about the Bob Greene thing. After a while I wondered if they were going to call […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Flanagan’s Wake
You don’t have to be Irish (or drunk) to appreciate the shenanigans in Noble Fool’s improvised musical memorial, conceived and directed by Jack Bronis. But you should come prepared to play along. Boisterous as ever in their ninth season, the show’s ale-quaffing villagers pay homage to fallen friend Flanagan with stories and folk tunes based […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Re-Animator
In a dark little shop on the northwest side, one man brings the dead to life.
Posted inNews & Politics
Against the Tide
The movies of 2002 were full of recycled ideas. Jonathan Rosenbaum’s best-of list nominates those that dared to be original.
Posted inArts & Culture
Stealing the Fire: The Secret Story of Iraq and the Bomb
Producers Eric Nadler (Frontline) and John S. Friedman (Marcel Ophuls’s Hotel Terminus: The Life and Times of Klaus Barbie) collaborated on this gripping 2002 video profile of German technician Karl-Heinz Schaab, a bland and complacent nowhere man convicted in 1999 of having sold Iraq blueprints for a supercentrifuge that would allow the manufacture of fissionable […]
Posted inFilm
25th Hour
I consider this Spike Lee’s best feature since Do the Right Thing. Though none of the major characters is black, it’s one of Lee’s most personal and deeply felt works, and the fact that it’s based on someone else’s material–David Benioff’s adaptation of his novel–makes the film all the more impressive. The narrative follows a […]