Leave it to Wes Anderson to make a film about World War II without mentioning Germany. In The Grand Budapest Hotel, a wundercabinet set in the fictitious Eastern European Republic of Zubrowka circa 1932, Anderson captures the collapse of a kingdom and rise of a reich without so much as…
Think adapting War and Peace is hard? Try adapting the race car video game Need for Speed. Tolstoy’s 1,225-page behemoth has nothing on the Electronic Arts franchise’s irreconcilably complicated 20-year, 20-installment history: Sometimes cars are subject to physics; sometimes they aren’t. Sometimes they’re invulnerable; sometimes they break. Maybe you’re in…
Special Events Brides of March www.azcacophony.org The men and women of the Arizona Cacophony Society will don wedding dresses and other fancy matrimonial apparel on Saturday, March 15, for this year’s version of the annual urban prank and bar crawl. Participants will assemble at Kobalt, 3110 North Central Avenue, and…
A wise man — or, more precisely, a wiseass trucker named Jack Burton — once opined that “it’s all in the reflexes.” Few actors have had better ones than Kurt Russell, who makes a welcome return to theaters this weekend in The Art of the Steal. Having been largely MIA…
If you were to survey people who pay attention to movies — to go door-to-door with a clipboard, a sharpened No. 2 pencil, and a sheaf of forms with the word SURVEY printed in clean block letters across the top, later to be tabulated on a vintage Underwood adding machine…
According to lore, Liberace used to greet the tourists who’d come by bus to gawk at his bejeweled home with the line, “I hope you like it. After all, you paid for it!” Not everyone has to like Rob Thomas’ Veronica Mars, the feature-length incarnation of his much-loved television series,…
As of this writing, the Netflix Instant catalog boasts more than 10,000 titles available for online streaming — a number that, as per the official Netflix rhetoric, seems colossal. But the landscape of this digital paradise may not be quite so idyllic. As classic film enthusiast Jaime Christley reminds us,…
The James Beard Benefit Dinner returns to the Scottsdale Culinary Festival, and we know what that means: time to dine with the food world’s crème de la crème. At this exclusive event, guests can enjoy a multi-course meal paired with wines from Barnett Winery and prepared by James Beard award-winning…
Labyrinth always steals the spotlight for 1980s fantasy epics. Neverending Story also has its merits, but it doesn’t have Tim Curry portraying a demon that tempts the leading lady from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off like the epic Ridley Scott film, Legend, does. This 1985 sci-fi fantasy flick stars a Risky…
Whether your surname is of the Murphy or O’Brien variety or you merely have a closet full of “Kiss Me, I’m Irish” shirts, St. Patrick’s Day is one indulgent celebration that everyone, regardless of heritage, can enjoy.The Irish Cultural Center hosts its 31st annual St. Patrick’s Day Parade and Faire…
One of the Cave Creek Museum’s biggest fund-raising events, the Homes Through Time Tour, is returning to the North Valley. The four homes open to visitors this year include the Boulder House, designed by Charles E. Johnson, featured in Architectural Digest and currently owned by the Fort McDowell Yavapai Nation,…
When the AZ GOP tried to send the state backward in time with SB 1062, we were already looking forward to the riled up crowds during Phoenix Pride weekend. The regressive ghouls behind the bill might have been beaten back, but we’re still fired up for the ramp up to…
In case you haven’t heard, antiques aren’t just for grandmas anymore. Which is why we’re marking our calendars for the return of the Arizona Antique Show. This weekend, yesteryear’s retail will feature a wide array of antique dealers selling everything from toys, coins, and collectibles to vintage fashion, jewelry and…
Just about every local theater jumped on Spamalot the moment it became available. You could follow it around as some of us used to with The Grateful Dead — or, in this case, Not Dead Fred. Inspired by Monty Python and the Holy Grail, the spectacular keeps the troupe’s benevolent…
Get those green thumbs ready, Phoenix: the Desert Botanical Garden hosts the spring edition of its bi-annual plant sale this weekend.The one-stop-shop offers an array of all things garden variety, from trees and shrubbery to cacti and agave. In addition to the hundreds of plants offered — many of which…
Not unlike the police, one’s newborn children tend to arrive at the worst possible time — unless you want them, and then it can be almost impossible to get them to show up.It’s even more fraught in writer/comedian/educator/activist Monica Palacios’ play Clock, when you’re a couple of Latina lesbians and…
War Horse might prominently feature puppets but it’s definitely not going to be mistaken for a kid’s show show any time soon. The National Theatre Live presentation of the National Theatre’s production of the theatrical sensation gallops in on Friday, March 14.The acclaimed play was indeed adapted from Michael Morpurgo’s…
Spring showers may bring flowers, but with mostly warm weather, the Valley comes alive with outdoor festivals around the same time. One of the most prominent is the Scottsdale Arts Festival, considered one of the nation’s premier art events. Nearly 200 jury-selected artists from Canada and the United States will…
Frank Sinatra had a cold, once. Or so we’ve heard. But that was a long time ago, and the version of ol’ blue eyes who’ll take the stage Monday, March 17, for the Arizona Broadway Theater’s Salute to the Rat Pack has full crooning capabilities. His buddies — Dean Martin,…
As we generally are not ones to adopt -isms and ones very much for spending time frivolously watching (and incessantly talking about) Scandal, minimalism sounds like a frightening proposition. Less is less, and then when there’s less you can take away more so then there’s less. That’s the general idea…
It doesn’t take a genius to see that the mind holds infinite possibilities, from electric cars to cutting-edge medical breakthroughs, and bullet trains to Mars rovers. All it takes is a little spark, which is exactly the idea behind spark! Mesa’s Festival of Creativity.A mixed festival featuring live music, spoken…
Typically museum exhibitions stimulate just one sense. Touching art is verboten. There’s not much to smell. Sound effects, save delicate instrumental music, are uncommon and usually unrelated. And eating the works (let alone a snack from home) would qualify as beyond frowned upon.Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art currently offers a…
