North Phoenix will soon find a lot more to laugh about. At least, that’s the goal of local comedians Sidney Smith and Jamie Camire as they take their knack for making people chuckle all the way to Interstate 17 and Union Hills to open up the all new comedy club,…
My grandmother makes wedding cakes for a living. The cakes are always delicious, but it’s their decorative aspects I’ve alway found fascinating. The tiers are pilled high, seemingly in defiance of gravity, and the sugary coating looks impossibly smooth, like untouched snow. When I first walked into “Domesticated,” Carrie Marill’s…
Everything in the opening scenes of Jeremy Saulnier’s nerve-wracking revenge drama Blue Ruin is the color of a bruise, from the ocean to the bullet-hole-pocked 1996 Pontiac Bonneville that homeless near-mute Dwight (Macon Blair) calls home. It’s fitting. Dwight has never overcome the pain of his parents’ murder when he…
One of the great pleasures of regular moviegoing isn’t seeing great films. It’s finding the little oddballs, the modest entertainments that miss just as often as they hit, but leave you with the feeling that someone poured heart, soul, and a sense of humor into the work at hand. Fading…
Watching Kristen Wiig on Saturday Night Live, you maybe sometimes wondered if she was from outer space, perhaps some planet where women have big foreheads, tiny hands, and sing like chickens on helium. As sheltered housekeeper Johanna in Liza Johnson’s proudly frustrating Hateship Loveship — a pun on the emotions…
How much can you take away and still have a movie? Steven Knight’s Locke is an experiment in reducing contemporary screen storytelling to its irreducible essentials, which isn’t quite the same thing as being an “experimental” film, despite the ravishing early reviews from England. It shows us just one actor,…
Special Events Chandler Downtown Public Library Courtyard 100 E. Commonwealth Ave., Chandler Got a Chihuahua that’s both cute and quick? Those wee beasties will be celebrated during Chandler’s Cinco de Mayo Festival, where they can participate in both the yearly Chihuahua races and beauty pageant, which are the hallmark of…
The temperature hangs in the mid-70s in Miami, and New York City-based actor/writer/director John Turturro remarks, “It’s just so nice to be outside. I’m so happy to be outside.” Though it’s breezy, his neat crop of salt-and-pepper hair remains unshakable. He sits in the shade of a large gazebo at…
When film director David DeCoteau, a former production assistant for Robert Corman who’s famous for the “boxer briefs horror” genre, wants to stretch his artistic muscles (we’re guessing), he makes (under an assumed name) feel-good family romps like A Talking Cat!?! — reputedly not the finest “so bad it’s good”…
Arizona State University’s Gallery 100 hosts “Harder Than it Seams,” a week-long group thesis exhibition by bachelor’s of fine arts candidates. The display, which ends Friday, May 2, chronicles the relationship between fibers and fabrics and the popular world. Fiber arts students Damian Alzua, Chelsea Lyles, Jill Miller, Amanda Shochat,…
Nobody does awkward like Mike Birbiglia. The Boston-bred comedian has made a career of telling tales of his embarrassing encounters on the road, on stage, and in his personal life. His anecdotes about porn viruses on his parents’ computer and sleepwalking out the window of a La Quinta Inn can…
When it comes to whosits, whatsits and how-tos, Ignite Phoenix is the place to be. The bi-annual presentation series holds its sixteenth session this week.In the past, both prominent members of their fields and next-door-neighbor types have taken the stage to share for five minutes. Topics cover the gamut from…
One of the pinnacle moments with comic book superheroes is when we get a peek at the secret identities behind the masks. The Third Annual Arizona Comic Mini Expo goes one step further and gives us a good dose of the artistic personalities behind the pages on May 3.Saturday is…
It’s a minor miracle that Arizona still has a professional soccer team. The Phoenix FC Wolves’ 2013 was nothing short of disastrous. The club ended its season with10 players on roster, 500 fans in the seats, and tens of thousands of dollars in debt. It almost killed professional soccer in…
A good rule of thumb for Cinco de Mayo: If you can correctly spell “chihuahua,” then you need another margarita. In fact, if you can correctly spell your first name — well, you get the picture.Fortunately, you’ll be able to get your fill of tequila and tiny dogs on Saturday,…
Dumpster diving isn’t for rookies, and antique hunting isn’t just for grandmas. Nowadays, nearly everyone wants to get their hands on salvaged industrial signage, mint condition mid-century furniture, and that made-for-me vintage cocktail dress. Fortunately, there’s a market that meets the demands of your yesteryear yearnings. Junk in the Trunk…
Moshe Kasher has been through some stuff. Before graduating high school and becoming a writer and playwright, he was a sign language interpreter, drug addict, Hasidic Jew, and avid gangster rap fan. Lucky for audiences, Kasher added stand-up comic to his list of titles, working through his past and present…
It’s a fact that merits yelling from the mountaintops: Ballet Arizona’s creative director, Ib Andersen, studied under George Balanchine, the father of American ballet, at the New York City Ballet and is one of the few dancers allowed to stage Balanchine’s works. And that’s quite the coup for both Valley…
A strong friendship should be able to overcome any obstacles, especially distance and cultural differences. Sometimes, something ever-lasting develops. Hopi Summer: Life, Friendship, and Survival on the Hopi Mesas is a book by Carolyn O’Bagy Davis based on one such enduring friendship that began in 1927 when Maud and Carey…
For most of us, our daily lunch break is hardly glamorous, much less cultured. Unless, of course, you packed some aged Gouda. Which is why the Herberger Theater Center, 222 East Monroe Street, is encouraging patrons to “think outside the lunch box” with its Lunch Time Theater series. Six bucks…
R. C. Davis is the given name of a renowned American actor, writer, and activist. An inattentive county clerk (or family affection) morphed the baby’s name into Ossie. It didn’t seem to harm Ossie Davis any, evidenced by his Broadway career and memorable roles in everything from Car 54, Where…
We’ve known for a while that the Internet is for porn, but when Avenue Q initially hit Broadway in 2003, it was good to have its catchy ditty remind us. The hilariously raunchy musical has returned to the Valley this month.The Muppet-esque puppets and Sesame Street-style songs by Robert Lopez…
