Thanks to sponsor Comedy Central, comedian Jim Breuer is hitting the road to perform his uncontrollably funny standup at clubs across the country. But maybe “The Lighten Up Tour,” which comes to the Tempe Improv this weekend, should really be called the “Lightin’ Up Tour” — either the ultra-talented Breuer…
Jim Campbell’s advantage as an artist is that he wasn’t trained as one. Hatched as an electrical engineer, he made the leap from pragmatism to poetry on his own, bringing with him a wariness about the limitations of digital media. This caution has served him well. As the art world…
No theatergoer should be made to stare at an ugly set for three hours. If one must, however, one should do so at Phoenix Theatre’s new production of Into the Woods. Its dreary gray forest, designed by usually dependable scenic designer Gregory Jaye, is hung limply with unsightly rope and…
It’s September 11, 2002, but Richard J. Botto isn’t at home watching the relentless CNN coverage of last year’s terrorist attacks. Instead, the native New Yorker has agreed to meet me for drinks at Sapporo to talk about Razor, the national men’s magazine he launched two years ago. Botto is…
Among the more preposterous rumors spread by Harry Knowles, whose Ain’t It Cool News movie-biz gossip Web site garners undue attention from studios too craven to do their own thinking, was one from this year’s beginning: Terrence Malick, Knowles “reported,” was working on an adaptation of The Catcher in the…
In The Banger Sisters, Goldie Hawn plays Suzette, an aging groupie too stuck in a gloriously seedy past to move into the future. It’s 2002, yet she acts as though it’s 1969 and nothing’s changed — not the Sunset Strip’s Whisky A Go-Go, where she still tends bar behind sunglasses…
Movie buffs are about to get the silent treatment — and it’s all the buzz among Valley cinephiles. The Silent Sundays film series returns for its fourth season this Sunday, September 22, with a screening of The Phantom of the Opera, the 1925 classic starring Lon Chaney and Mary Philbin…
Every year, from the Indy Racing League to NASCAR, the racing world’s big players make their way to the sizzling one-mile oval at Phoenix International Raceway. But an event showcasing the biggest ones of all — literally — will be there this weekend for the first time. The Truxpo Monster…
Greg Esser is a man who thinks in broad, connected strokes — a big-picture guy. “What we’re doing here,” he says, standing in the middle of a raw, modest space at 515 East Roosevelt, “is creating a synergy and an aggregate. A destination.” When he says “here,” Esser refers not…
The Fantasticks is not. What begins as a promising rerun quickly becomes — somewhere after its third or fourth musical number — just another small-time production of a big-deal show. Pleasant performances and familiar tunes aren’t enough to elevate this tuneful repeat, and so Stagebrush Theatre’s season opener winds up…
No matter how wide his triumphs, Ron Dible will probably always be known around these parts as Porno Cop. Dible was sacked by the Chandler Police Department earlier this year when naughty photographs of himself and his wife were discovered on an adult Web site. Never one to take his…
For those with any kind of pop cultural memory, it’s more than a little surprising to see Ice Cube in a movie like Barbershop. Not because it’s a light comedy — Friday was, too, and that was certainly in character. What’s odd about Barbershop is its seeming embrace of positions…
Read My Lips (Sur Mes Lèvres) puts forth the fascinating and heretofore unexamined theory that being deaf offers estimable rewards. It allows one the chance to tune out the world, to ignore everything and everyone. To the deaf, chaos can feel like soothing calm, and madness comes with its own…
So the boss refused your vacation request for September 10-17, and you have to cram your celebration of Mexico’s Independence Week into a single evening? Well, Saturday night’s your night, as the Fourth Annual Chandler Mariachi Festival gets loco at the Chandler Center for the Arts. The maracas will shake…
When computer geeks grow up, make millions, and have too much time on their hands, fully remote-controlled robots are born. And of course, when you spend thousands of dollars and eons of time building your own remote-controlled robot, the obvious question to ask next is, “Can my robot beat up…
Marla Wing begins talking before we actually meet. She comes huffing up the stairs at Nixon’s Lounge, trailing scraps of paper and shiny pamphlets that sneak out from the pile of mangled folders she’s got clutched to her chest. We settle into an upstairs booth, and, surrounded by the bar’s…
Like Clint Eastwood, Robert De Niro is one of those guys who can make just about any material inherently enjoyable. Also like Clint, he will sometimes make you wish he’d pick roles that are a little more challenging. His recent record of relatively disposable films speaks for itself: Tough-yet-sensitive cop…
To misappropriate a choice comment from TV journalist turned music-biz impresario Tony Wilson, I’ll just say, “Ian Curtis.” If you know what I mean, great; if you don’t, it doesn’t matter, but you should probably read more. That is, one need not be a fan of the late Ian Curtis,…
Even though he’s reached the rung of success where he could call all the shots, Jay Mohr still gives the people what they want. What the people want, of course, is Christopher Walken. “He has to come out,” the comedian says of his most illustrious impersonation, sure to hit the…
It’s hard to fathom that it’s been a year since that clear blue morning on the East Coast when everything changed. It’s also hard to forget, given that every media outlet in America is trying to outdo the competition with so-called commemorations. In these weird times, we’re fortunate to have…
I hesitate to expect too much from any theater season, but the upcoming calendar of plays and musicals certainly looks more interesting than the last several have. This season, old Will is hotter than ever, and there are more musical tributes than you can shake a baton at. If there…
When Robin Williams was America’s favorite funnyman in films like Mrs. Doubtfire, it always felt a little strange admitting that the guy seemed kinda creepy. When he “got serious” in irritating tear-jerkers like Hook and What Dreams May Come, it was certainly in vogue to proclaim him annoying, but few…
