It’s tempting to cast the Bill MacCallum career bio in cinematic terms. There is conflict here. Elements of black comedy, too, and some old-fashioned territorial feuding. MacCallum is director of the Arizona Motion Picture Office. Maybe his movie is a Western, suddenly a popular genre again. To his supporters, MacCallum…
Imagine signing an agreement to buy a fancy car on layaway, then having to pay for an expensive valve job before your first installment is due. That’s sort of what’s happened in the case of the Central Arizona Project. Although Arizona hasn’t even begun repaying the $2 billion it owes…
A hushed silence fell over the room as Diane Felix began to speak. The mother of a young girl who attends the Phoenix Day School for the Deaf, Felix was quivering with rage, and her words flowed forth with a bitter edge. “Somebody at this school pulled down my little…
The television camera gives us a tight shot of Joe Bugel. The Phoenix Cardinals coach stands on the sidelines with his hands shoved into the pockets of his Windbreaker. He watches soulfully as the football sails toward the goal post 54 yards away. If the end-over-end kick by Brad Daluiso…
I still remember the day I talked to Sarah Brady about her long battle with the National Rifle Association over what has finally become known as the Brady bill. “How about Ronald Reagan? How does he feel about your campaign for gun controls?” “Well,” Mrs. Brady said haltingly, “he’s been…
Roger Rudman sits nervously on the edge of a chair, his fingers busily fondling an imaginary cigarette as he takes a momentary respite from a chain-smoking habit. His clothes are rumpled and his hair mussed. He looks as if sleep has long been a stranger, and dark circles rim his…
Kenneth Wayne Reed keeps meticulous records. He has to. His future absolutely depends on it. Locked in Maricopa County’s Madison Street Jail for the last 18 months on felony charges of aggravated assault and kidnaping, 35-year-old Reed cannot meet the $25,000 bond needed for his release on domestic-violence charges. Frustrated…
Not counting Robin, there are four givens in this mad world: Everyone dies. Only the little people pay taxes. Nearly everyone hates Neil Diamond. Everyone owns one Neil Diamond recording. You may beg to differ with that last universal truth, but check your own collection, just to be sure. Maybe…
More than two years have passed since the night her then-husband, Samuel Parker, nearly killed her, but Alice Wheeler says she remembers almost every detail of the beating–until the point she lost consciousness. She’s sitting in a classroom at ASU West, telling her story to students in an undergraduate sociology…
Lots of people know that Matt Martinez, a senior at Mountain View High School in Mesa, is editor of the school newspaper, The Viewpoint. Not nearly as many are aware that he’s also a devout Catholic, because Martinez believes that religion is a private matter. That belief prompted him to…
I am forever searching for basketball’s ultimate truths. As part of this enduring quest, I went to the Suns-Portland game last Friday night at America West Arena. Upon arriving at my assigned seat, I was surprised to see that the man in the blue blazer sitting next to me was…
We are always thrilled by the sight of armed men on horseback. The Lone Ranger. Tom Mix. Clint Eastwood. We love them all. And now just the sight of Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s posse members at our shopping centers brings a sense of the Old West’s romanticism back into…
Unexplored so far in the domed Major League Baseball stadium debate: the vendor angle. “I think it’s great for the Valley,” says the Red (pronounced “Rrrreeeedddd”) Licorice Man, a fixture in the aisles at most local sporting events. “I think it’ll put people to work.” Red, a mild-mannered municipal bureaucrat…
In a largely misspent life, I have spent entirely too much time in the company of football coaches. In a way, they have always both fascinated and repelled me. Finally, I have hit upon an unpleasant truth. Only the losing coaches have a chance to remain decent human beings. All…
I felt a tinge of sadness the other day when I read that the Chicago Bears had waived their massive defensive tackle, William “Refrigerator” Perry. Unless you lived in Chicago during the 1985 football season, you’ll probably find it hard to understand what was so special about “The Fridge,” as…
Something was terribly wrong with her son, and Marci Johnson didn’t need a mother’s intuition to know it. Although 10-year-old Michael is deaf, he had always been a lively, cheerful boy, fond of baseball and swimming. For the past few months, however, he had grown sullen and withdrawn, frequently collapsing…
Shad Kvetko’s house looks a fright. And, frankly, the 21-year-old wouldn’t have it any other way. Kvetko has spent more than half of his life collecting ghoulish artifacts that have allowed him to turn his west Phoenix bachelor pad into something resembling a year-round spook house. He may not have…
Robert Carter, Arizona’s most famous hot-dog salesman, is learning the price of fame. Right now, the tab looks to be at least five years in the pen. Carter, you may recall, is an escapee from the county jail’s work-furlough program who was pictured on the cover of New Times four…
After two years of heated public debate and countless hours of taxpayer-financed labor, Maricopa County’s effort to control pet overpopulation is “at a dead standstill” and the chief of the county’s animal-control unit might be out of a job. Tom Simplot, administrative assistant to County Supervisor Betsey Bayless, confirms that…
In his 52 years, James Osipenkof has developed strong, if unremarkable, habits. He smokes two packs of unfiltered Old Gold cigarettes per day, and drinks whatever coffee is at hand, no matter how bad. His life is arranged so that, come evening, there is a familiar bar within walking distance,…
In the early 1980s, Arizona State University was popularly viewed as the Disneyland of college campuses. While Central America bubbled with political turmoil and the Southwest was gripped by debate over human rights and the Sanctuary Movement, ASU distinguished itself by consistently rating near the top of the heap in…
“There’s only one Elvis,” Suns coach Paul Westphal has said, “and there’s only one Charles Barkley.” Maybe so. But has anybody considered the possibility that our Sir Charles and the immortal King of Rock n’ Roll are the same guy? In addition to wealth, fame and Southern accents, the two…
