Sun 9/26 So much for not speaking ill of the dead. Whenever celebrities head to the great beyond, vicious rumors tend to fly (see Hudson, Rock). To wit: Gadabouts have speculated for years on the sexual orientation of Rudolph Valentino and his second wife Natacha Rambova, alleging their “lavender marriage”…
Nothing fully arousing your artistic interests? Come find a little, uh, release at the Blue Ball on Saturday, September 25, at the Alwun House, 1204 East Roosevelt. Self-proclaimed “Master of Hoopla” David Salcido has extended an open invitation to embrace the eccentric and indulge in excess. The Blue bill combines…
“The Landmine Prints” at Burton Barr Central Library: ASU professor John Risseeuw’s unique approach to printmaking includes what he calls “content-specific paper” — handmade paper composed of materials that relate to the topic of the artwork itself. Risseeuw brings together more than a dozen such works in “The Landmine Prints”…
THU 16 Beavis and Butt-head made him the butt of a long-running joke, but some talents won’t be diminished. Kip Winger will endure. Witness, for instance, Burnn Magazine’s review of Kip’s latest CD, Songs From the Ocean Floor: “Kip Winger’s creative music may not have a place on today’s musical…
Silver City is being marketed as a biting, bitter send-up of George W. Bush. Hence the copious use of trailer footage in which Chris Cooper, as Colorado gubernatorial candidate Dickie Pilager, stumbles over simple sentences, dodges reporters’ questions with mindless macho explications (“My message to the criminals is this: You…
9/17-10/3 The displaced actors of the Algonquin Theater Company have paid the price for their art, and now they are opening a new season in new digs at the West Valley Art Museum, 17420 North Avenue of the Arts in Surprise, with the fitting French play Art. Robyn Allen, Algonquin…
Runways during Manhattan’s Fashion Week were clogged with gauzy blouses and underskirts made of mosquito netting — perhaps in preparation for a global version of the West Nile epidemic that’s currently doing big business in the Valley. Will Humble, bureau chief of the Arizona Department of Health Services, swears that…
Fortune smiles on groovy egregiousness. In the case of Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, the filmmakers’ investment in their weird visions is wildly unorthodox, but the payoff is oddly satisfying. The movie features myriad killer robots, raucous underwater dogfights, and Laurence Olivier’s best work since he died 15…
Mr. 3000 has low aspirations, which suits it well. It’s about a 47-year-old baseball player trying to get three meager hits and the team for which he plays trying to climb out of fifth place and into third by the season’s rapidly approaching end. Not much to root for, is…
If Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence were a live-action sequel, there would be a lot of gossip about star histrionics, creative conflicts and so forth. Since the original Ghost in the Shell, first released nearly 10 years ago, made an anime icon out of its star, the frequently nude…
Arizonans love to share holidays with Mexico. Or maybe they just love to party. For years, Cinco de Mayo has been a Valley beer blowout, as residents chug cheap Coronas in celebration of . . . what? You probably think Cinco de Mayo is Mexico’s Independence Day, but it’s not…
Say you’re some hotshot Hollywood producer who wants to churn out the next big, edgy drug flick. You’ve already gone the logical route and cast Johnny Depp, but the script to your nascent narco movie feels pretty white-bread and smacks more of Go than Blow. Whaddaya do? If you’re across…
Wed 9/22 Gene Simmons ain’t got nothing on Count Smokula. While both showmen are face-painted night crawlers with ungodly long tongues, the Smokula’s more of a vaudevillian-style villain and musical comedian, who’ll fire off one-liners in machine-gun fashion when he bites into The Trunk Space, 1506 Grand Avenue, on Wednesday,…
Tue 9/21 Rasslin’ just ain’t what it used to be. Ever since The Rock became the Scorpion King of Hollywood and Steve Austin got “stone cold” feet and quit the biz, most fans have tended to come dressed as chairs at World Wrestling Entertainment events across the country. Whenever Vince…
9/17-9/22 Democrats might have halcyon memories of JFK and Camelot, but we’re betting you cigar aficionados think ol’ Jack can just cram it. When the 35th president put that trade embargo on Cuba back in ’61, he kept you from the love of your leaf. Just ask Richard “Mick” Connors,…
Ryan Singer is a Native American painter, but don’t confuse him with R.C. Gorman or some other traditionalist you see hanging in downtown Scottsdale galleries. Toss a hit or two of acid at Gorman, and you’re getting close. Singer grew up on the Navajo reservation. Today he paints in a…
THU 9 Sure, the Bard charmed our pants off (along with fair Gwyneth’s) when he was Shakespeare in Love, but — let’s face it — most of the time, he was Shakespeare in a Homicidal Mindset. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern — just two of the casualties in the blood bath that…
Any second now, Phoenix is going to start looking a lot more like Tucson. That is, if County Supervisor Mary Rose Wilcox and Youth Program Supervisor Jessica Martin have anything to say about it. They’re the folks behind Las Artes de Maricopa County, a new youth-at-risk program that swaps GED…
October 31, 1977: Tonight was extremely strange. Janette and I went to the Sombrero Theater (which is way down on Seventh Street and Camelback, kind of a scary part of town) to see Phantom of the Paradise. Janette has seen Phantom 37 times! I’ve never known anyone who has seen…
There is nothing mysterious or subdued about Stacy Peralta’s enthusiasms. A product of Southern California’s vivid beach scene, he’s been a surfer since boyhood and was a professional skateboarder in the ’70s before he started making documentaries about the defining moments of those sports. The phenomenally successful Dogtown and Z-Boys…
The most crucial piece of equipment in Hollywood is obviously not the movie camera. It’s not the casting couch. Not even the Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud or the personal trainer. It’s the Xerox machine — which was preceded by carbon paper. That’s why, over the years, we have had three Mrs…
Rocky Horror, eat your heart out. Or just leave it to the cult followers and cutups behind Broadway Bound and Gagged’s shadowcast production of Cannibal! The Musical, set for Saturday, September 11, at Spectrum Mall. “If it’s up to my doing,” says Cannibal casting director Justin Reed, “it will be…
