BIG HUMBLE SOUNDS 12/29/06
Nels Cline Trio at The Stone
by
Nate Eckstrom
If it weren’t for this tiny crowd, I wouldn’t have had the guts to stick my head inside and see if this really was where the Nels Cline Trio was playing. The Stone is not your average insider hide-out...
CZECH PUPPETS 12/27/06
Once There Was a Village
by
Jonathan Slaff
"Everyone has two villages," says Vit Horejs, founder/director of Czechoslovak-American Marionette Theatre (CAMT), "one in the old country and one here." That's the idea behind "Once There Was a Village," CAMT's new ethno-opera with puppets and found objects...
FURRY MUSIC 12/13/06
Shtreiml at Stanton Street
by
Tibi Z. Singer
Founded by harmonica innovator Jason Rosenblatt and named for the traditional fur hat worn by Chassidic Jews, Shtreiml blends elements of klezmer, gypsy music and jazz to create a vibrant sound that is at once Eastern European Folk Music and Down-Home Blues...
LOCAL ENT 12/12/06
This Week at the Abrons Arts Center
by
Julie Muller Stahl
Tonic presents The Naughty And Nice Holiday Concert... Dancer/Choreographer, Megan V. Sprenger presents No Where... Night Kitchen Radio Theater presents Christmas in July/The Flying Latke... New Federal Theatre presents Ed Bullins' classic play, The Taking Of Miss Janie...
AUTHOR ON ROCKS 12/11/06
This Sat 8:30 Laurie Hosting Downtown Rock Event
by
Laurie Gwen Shapiro
I weighed yet another mass email, but frankly this may be the only time ever I share a stage with the fabulous folks from Luna! See me try and pass myself
off as a funny with-it type of gal...
ANGRY STAGE 12/08/06
They're Coming Back, Angrier than Ever
by
Jonathan Slaff
Theater for the New City presents Angry Young Women in Low-Rise Jeans with High-Class Issues, written and directed by Matt Morillo, a raunchy look at the psychology of nervous urban goddesses...
CRAZY STAGE 12/08/06
Dario D'ambrosi Directs his ''A Crazy Sound'' at La Mama
by
Jonathan Slaff
Dario D'Ambrosi, the Italian actor/playwright and founder of "Pathological Theater," has, for 26 years, held a mirror up to our nature with plays about society's treatment of the insane. His next New York production will be "A Crazy Sound" in which six patients in an asylum create a symphony using the materials of their beds as instruments...
JOIN THE NUTSY PARTY! 12/05/06
Festivus: The Holiday for the Rest of Us
by
Don Cruise
Join author Allen Salkin and special guests for the raising of the Festivus Pole, The Airing of Grievances and The Feats of Strength, and free Festivus wine and Festivus food this Thursday, Dec. 7 from 7 to 10 PM at The Pink Pony, 178 Ludlow Street, bet. Houston and Stanton. Free! All are welcome.
AIDS DAY 12/03/06
Ford & Fitzroy at Sin-E
by
Joe Emerald
Sin-E is both a sign of the times and a signifier of the future. The club used to be located on St. Mark’s in the early 90’s, when Jeff Buckley played there...
LOCAL SHOWS 11/30/06
This Week at the Abrons Arts Center
by
Julie Muller Stahl
Urban Ballet Theater's Nutcracker In the Lower Continues ... The Night Kitchen Radio Theater Presents: Nikolai Gogol’s The Portrait ... The Klezmatics: Woody Guthrie's Happy Joyous Hanukkah Tour ... Life on the Lower East Side ... Photographs by Rebecca Lepkoff: 1937 - 1950...
TOTALLY LEFT BEHIND 11/28/06
Yori Does Lehrer
by
Yori Yanover
Yesterday WNYC's Brian Lehrer had on Jerry Jenkins and Tim LaHaye, co-authors of the Evangelical Christian sci-fi books Left Behind. Their message is that if Jews (and everyone else on the planet) do not embrace Jesus as their savior, they'll be condemned to eternal hell. I called in to set the record straight. My apologies to Mozilla users - your browser will autostart the audio file, despite my most sincere coding. IE users won't be subject to the same abuse.
YIDDISH THEATER 11/27/06
Stardust Lost: The Triumph, Tragedy and Mishugas of the Yiddish Theater in America
by
Don Cruise
You don’t have to be Jewish to enjoy this wry take on a nearly extinct institution that left an indelible mark not only on the Lower East Side, but also on Broadway and the American stage, and whose history echoes in today’s headlines about immigration and assimilation. The Adlers, the Thomashefskys, Bertha Kalish, Maurice Schwartz, Abraham Goldfaden and Molly Picon are among the largely forgotten stars of Stefan Kanfer’s hyperkinetic ensemble. ..
KUNG FU CRACKER 11/21/06
Urban Ballet this Week at the Abrons Arts Center
by
Julie Muller Stahl
Mark your calendars for the return of Urban Ballet Theater’s celebrated twist on Tchaikovsky’s classic ballet. Set on the Lower East Side and filled with a colorful array of dance, including flamenco, hip-hop, and martial arts...
NEWSIC 11/21/06
Modest Mouse SOLD-OUT and Mellowed-Out
by
Nate Eckstrom
Modest Mouse was the hot ticket on the Lower East Side this weekend. Tickets were being scalped on Craigslist for $100 or more, which is amazing considering this was the fourth of the bands five NYC area shows...
WOODY'S MENORAH 11/19/06
Woody Guthrie's Happy Joyous Hanukkah Show
by
Melissa
Tonic is presenting at the Abrons Arts Center The Klezmatics, forever transcending genres, blending klezmer with aching shtetl melodies, raucous Latin stomps, wild jazz riffs and provocative Arabic, African, American and Balkan rhythms...
HISTORY WALKS 11/17/06
Walking With David Levinsky
by
Don Cruise
Join Rabbi Pollak and Elissa Sampson for a walking tour of the Lower East Side beginning at the Stanton Street Shul. Walk the life of David Levinsky, hero of "The Rise of David Levinsky" by Abraham Cahan. The program will begin with bagels and lox at the Stanton St. Shul, 180 Stanton Street...
DEPT. OF RIGHT ANGLES 11/15/06
Squared at the Edgy
by
David Gibson
A new generation of artist whose work twists, bends, squashes, highlights and distorts the 20th century's all important grid. "Squared" contemporary abstract painting by Peter Barrett, Caroline Burton, Jeff Feld, Danielle Mysliwiec, Keiko Narahashi, Mary Ann Standell, Bradley Wester, John Zinsser...
LOCAL MOVIE 11/14/06
The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes
by
Don Cruise The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes is the breathtakingly beautiful and long-awaited second feature from the Brothers Quay. On the eve of her wedding, the beautiful opera singer Malvina is mysteriously killed and abducted by a malevolent Dr. Droz...
SILO ART 11/14/06
Gary Burnley, Decoys, Through Dec. 16
by
Carol Markel
In his exhibition at Silo, artist Gary Burnley presents a new series of painted collages on paper called Decoys. He began this body of work in 2002 after an extended period of time focusing on public and urban renewal projects...
SCREENING 11/13/06
Orchard Street, the Movie
by
Carol Markel
Ken Jacobs will screen and discuss his first film Orchard Street (1956) Sat. Nov. 18th at 6pm. "One of the things I first got together was a film on Orchard Street, which was very, very Jewish at the time..."
DON'T MISS IT 11/11/06
MF Toys Show Opening Party Saturday Nite!
by
Carol Markel
MF Toys Show 2006 Rock N Roll opening party, Saturday, November 11, 7-10 PM. Come have a drink and see all new one-of-a-kind hand-made toys...
DEPT. OF QUANTITY 11/10/06
70 Artists at Stanton Street Exhibition
by
Wendy & Nina
Jordin Isip has invited over 70 artists to participate in a group exhibition at Aidan Savoy Gallery. Providing each artist with two 5” x 5” wood panels, they were assigned the task of creating an image of one eye on each...
YOUTH MUSIC 11/09/06
Soul Farm in Shul
by
Yarden Yanover
My girlfriends and I attended the first half hour or so of the Soulfarm acoustic show at the Stanton Street Synagogue. The audience was huge, but mostly adults, who probably appreciated the show more than we did...
NEIGHBORHOODS 11/05/06
Winter in New York
by
Ellen Bradshaw
A small works show of intimate scenes of New York in oil, capturing the quiet beauty of the winter season. New York neighborhoods - from the streets of lower Manhattan, the Seaport and Financial district, to Grand Central Station and St Patrick’s Cathedral - are transformed in winter, whether by snow or sparkling lights beckoning us in from the bitter cold...
HANGING BY STRINGS 11/03/06
Bread And Puppet Theater at 35
by
Jonathan Slaff
It's 35 years since Peter Schumann's Bread and Puppet Theater first performed at Theater for the New City, and the acclaimed ensemble will return to TNC from November 30 to December 17, 2006 with two new works, one for adults and one for children...
WALKING TOUR 11/02/06
Colonial Jewish
by
Laurie Tobias-Cohen
The Jewish Community of Colonial New York City and a Tour of New York's first Jewish Cemetery (1683) at Chatham Square, a Post Thankgiving Walking Tour in Lower Manhattan...
AT THE SUNSHINE 11/01/06
Pedro Almodóvar's Volver
by
Don Cruise
All glorious reds and billowing flowered sheets, Volver may be his finest film yet this millennium. In his three decades of filmmaking, Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar has resuscitated the much-maligned genre of melodrama by committing unequivocally to his wild-eyed, wild-side premises...
KIDS CIRCUS 10/31/06
Bindlestiff Cirkus’s Cavalcade of Youth
by
Julie Muller Stahl
the illustrious Bindlestiff Cirkus’s Cavalcade of Youth returns to the Abrons Arts Center with this popular showcase of young circus performers. Step right up and see NYC’s next generation of circus artists juggle, flip, twirl, clown, spin, dance, and much, much, more! And for those interested in becoming the next generation of performers, Bindlestiff teachers will offer Sunday workshops in Acrobatics...
SEXSELLS 10/31/06
Coming on the Shortbus
by
Nate Eckstrom
Shortbus has all the sex that the trailer promised. It has sex in different combinations, with various genders, numbers and even all alone. It is said that the average male daydreams about sex every 7 seconds, but I never found my mind wandering from the screen...
HAUNTING PUPPETRY 10/30/06
Sleepy Hollow with Puppets
by
Julie Muller Stahl
Drama of Works, the award-winning puppet
theatre company, premieres their newest full-length work, Sleepy Hollow, just
in time for Halloween. Based on the classic tale by Washington Irving and
inspired by the story’s sparse dialogue, lush imagery, and vividly drawn mood, the production features an original score by award-winning
composer Vivian Fung and will be performed live by a chamber ensemble...
SATIRICAL PUPPETRY 10/30/06
Open Door
by Jonathan Slaff
The "paranoia versus hope" mindset descends heavily upon the community of recent immigrants and is inspiration for "Open Door," a grand puppet theater work with song, being prepared collaboratively by Colombia-born master puppet theater artist Federico Restrepo, his puppet theater troupe Loco 7 and award-winning composer Elizabeth Swados. La MaMa E.T.C. will present the work December 1 to 17 in its Annex Theater...
HEAR THIS 10/28/06
Must-hear radio, Monday, October 30
by
Jonathan Bennett
Monday's "Health Action" will include a 30-minute segment on what's known, and not known, about the connection between post-9/11 exposures and illness among rescue, recovery, cleanup workers and volunteers, as well as exposed lower Manhattan office workers and residents...
LOCAL ARTS & ENT 10/25/06
A Fabulous Week at the Abrons Arts Center
by
Julie Stahl
Trees of Knowing - An Exhibition of Reflections by Children and Artists... U.S. premiere - 3 performances only - Portrait Of a Stolen Spring... The Annual Halloween Spectacular... Sleepy Hollow... The 5Th Annual Carnival of Samhain... Bindlestiff Family Cirkus Acrobatics Workshop...
OPERA 10/23/06
Portrait of a Stolen Spring
by
Don Cruise
A unique musical drama, conceived by David Verbeeck, tells the true story of his great-great-grandparents, the Ukrainian Jews Chaja Zimmerman and Moses Kalter, who left their homeland at the beginning of the 20th century, hoping to reach America via the port of Antwerp...
LOCAL STAGE 10/18/06
The Violence of Distant War Affects the Heart of America
by
Jonathan Slaff
"Home Front" is a highly-charged, explosive play by Daniel Algie that reveals how the violence of distant war affects the heart of America. Inspired by Euripides' "Herakles," Algie rips into the souls of two children, their grandfather, mother and soldier-father shattered by war...
REVIEW 10/18/06
Displacement
by
Pat Arnow
When the Brooklyn Dodgers moved to L.A., a housing project went up in its place. At the same time, in L.A., the people in a barrio lost their homes to make way for the new Los Angeles Dodgers stadium. Those misguided displacements provide a framework for an exciting piece of theater...
NEUVEAU SCRIBBLE 10/17/06
KingSize Presents Abstract Graffiti
by
Lois Stavsky
The nationally acclaimed graphic and visual artist Aaron Lazansky-Oliva aka Spaze Crafte One has been creating innovative urban artwork for over a decade. Our local Essex Street bar KingSize is hosting his solo exhibit Hard Rockz ‘N’ Cotton Candy...
DE-CLASSIC 10/16/06
The Brothers Karamazov at Red Monkey Theater
by
Ze'ev Aviezer
The company is thrilled to present this powerful new dramatization of the Russian master's story of three brothers coming to terms with themselves and each other in a world filled with often opposing desires...
DRAMAMOOD 10/16/06
Some Historic, Some Hysteric
by
Jonathan Slaff
Multimedia theater piece is set in Dr. Jean Martin Charcot's Salpetriere medical center in 19th century Paris, where hysteria became theater and neuropsychology was invented...
DANCE! DANCE! 10/12/06
Prime Mover - a Concert to Benefit CPR
by
Julie Muller Stahl
The Abrons Arts Center presents an evening of groundbreaking dance, old and new, with Prime Mover, curated by Chez Bushwick founder Jonah Bokaer. This event brings together rare archival dance film and video along with work by acclaimed dancemakers John Jasperse and Wally Cardona, who together with Bokaer, are partnering to form CPR - the Center for Performance Research...
PARTY 10/10/06
Village Halloween Costume Ball October 31
by
Jonathan Slaff
Nonstop theater, a costume competition and ballroom dancing will bewitch the East Village in Theater for the New City's 30th annual Village Halloween Costume Ball on Monday, October 31 at TNC, 155 First Avenue. A carefree fall tradition, this unique festival celebrates the creativity that comes with the season...
STREET RIDES 10/6/06
Pitt Street Luna Park
by
Yarden Yanover
My Mom and I stumbled on this mini amusement park which will start operating Friday night on Pitt Street, between Rivington and Stanton. In the middle of the night on Thursday it looked eerie, ghost-like, without the lights and the laughter of children...
WRITERS 10/3/06
Here Is New York: Then And Now
by
Liz Brown
The Educational Alliance has enlisted three very different writers, beginning with Caleb Crain, Brandon Stosuy and Melissa Plaut, the latter a blogging cab driver who keeps us down to date with her present-day account of life behind the wheel in New York City...
LANGUAGED 9/28/06
Messing With Words
by
Yori Yanover
I have the strangest hobby in the world. I enjoy messing with online translation services. Here’s one example, courtesy of the Altavista translator. I took a which appears each month on the Grand Street News editorial page, translated the whole thing into French, translated the French to German and then took it back home to English...
BOOK CLUBBING 9/28/06
Russian Immigrants As Inspiration
by
Pat Arnow
Two young authors have taken the 20th century immigrant Jewish experience as a backdrop for novels. That makes Dara Horn and T. Cooper extraordinarily appropriate writers to launch a reading series called "Young Writers Write the Immigrant Experience" at the Lower East Side Tenement Museum Oct. 11...
RUSSIAN VAUDEVILLE 9/22/06
Chekhov in a Pub
by
Jonathan Slaff
In "The Sneeze," the acclaimed author of "Noises Off" and "Copenhagen," Michael Frayn, serves up the four one-act comic vaudevilles with which Chekhov first made his reputation in the theatre, along with four adapted short stories. Rowan Atkinson, Cheryl Campbell and Timothy West first performed the piece at the Aldwych Theatre, London in 1988...
LOCAL MOVIE 9/16/06 The Protector
by
Nate Eckstrom
When Steve “Stone Cold” Austin lifts an adolescent elephant (that’s right, an adolescent elephant) off the ground to deliver a bestial version of his patented stone-cold stunner, it’s hard to believe that no animals were harmed in the making of this movie...
LOHOP 9/15/06 No Place Like Hip Hop
by
Don Cruise
The documentary There’s No Place Like Home: The History of Hip Hop in the Lower East Side is the untold story of Hip Hop’s road to success through the Lower East Side of Manhattan, and the artists who contributed to this success.
JAPANESE ABSURDISTS 9/15/06 Red Bird for Danger
by
Jonathan Slaff
"A Scene With A Red Bird" is a fable that centers around a blind woman and her younger brother, who decide to work off their parents' debt after their suicide. They are suppressed by a committee formed to investigate the parents' suicides...
JUNKIE MOM 9/15/06 New Play Vindicates Eugene O'neill's Mother
by
Jonathan Slaff
Eugene O'Neill was not kind to his mother in his memoir drama, "Long Day's Journey into Night," depicting her as a hapless morphine addict with no hope of recovery. "Miles to Babylon" by Ann Harson sheds new light on Ella O'Neill's drug addiction and runs counter to her scathing depiction in "Long Day's Journey into Night."
HAPPY DAYS 9/14/06 Macy’s Day Parade on Grand Street Friday
by Don Cruise
Yes, tomorrow, Friday, Sept. 15, as part of their first-ever "Give Back Day," some 400 Macy’s volunteers will march with a 50-piece all-girl band and a star balloon from the corner of Montgomery and Grand to the Abrons Center. It will be a 2-block parade to remember!
INNOCENCE ABANDONED 9/13/06 Death in a Vacant Lot
by
Jonathan Slaff
Terayama Shuji's avant-garde film masterpiece, "Den'en ni Shisu (Death in the Fields)," has been adapted for the stage as "Death in Vacant Lot!" a play with music, by The South Wing, an international theater company now working in New York...
STRINGS ATTACHED 9/12/06 Ten Days of Nothing But Puppets
by
Jonathan Slaff
Vision Puppet Festival will be presented October 12 - 22 by Theater for the New City to celebrate the work of a unique group of New York artists who have been creating dynamic puppet theater for many years...
NEW SOUNDS 9/11/06 Downtown Radio
by
Luis R. Cancel
The Clemente Soto Velez Cultural Center is proud to announce its collaboration with East Village Radio, a Web-based broadcaster. Every Monday, starting on September 11, 2006 from Noon to 2:00 PM tune your computer and iPod to listen to Loisaida Cultural Wire...
SORROW 9/10/06 An Adam Goldstone Reader
by Don Cruise
Born June 3, 1969. DJ, Producer and Artist who made his career in New York City, Adam Goldstone passed away on August 29, 2006, in a slip-and-fall accident in an RV shower at the Burning Man festival.
ART LIVES 9/09/06 Abrons Style ... and Substance
by Pat Arnow
When the Abrons Art Center course catalog arrived in the mail, the cover called out loud and proud. It's a thoughtful rendition of the center's place in the neighborhood and in the city...
MTV UNPLUGGED 9/08/06 Nina Nastasia Does Speigeltent
by Nate Eckstrom
Outside the Speigeltent, hidden away behind the old Fulton Fish Market, the line of fans wound along Pier 17, admiring the Brooklyn Bridge above, and the moonlit water below...
LOCAL READ 9/08/06 Crossing The Blvd
by Amy R Silberman
The Tenement Museum's New York Book Club welcomes Warren Lehrer and Judith Sloan, co-authors of the Crossing the Blvd: strangers, neighbors, aliens in a new America. Come to hear stories of an Egyptian café owner, a political refugee cargo flight stowaway, students from International High School...
THE NICE SOUND 9/01/06 Pop-Geek Heavenly Music - Free
by Nate Eckstrom
I was high on the Spinto Band two months ago, when they played the Bowery Ballroom for $15. Now they are playing the South Street Seaport for FREE this Friday...
BARD REDUX 9/01/06 Hilarious Compact Shakespeare Now Served with Drinks
by Jonathan Slaff
An irreverent, fast-paced romp through all 37 plays and 154 sonnets in just 96 minutes. Improvisation plays a heavy role and it is normal for the actors to deviate from the script and break into spontaneous conversations about the material with each other and the audience.
LOCAL PRO 8/27/06 East River's Michael Kelly in Gritty Football Flick
by Don Cruise
Walt Disney Pictures just launched its sports-underdog movie for this summer, with a a local celebrity, Michael Kelly (Detective Bobby Crocker in the short-lived revival of Kojac, with Ving Rhames), in the cast as Pete.
HEADS UP 8/24/06 Friday Concert at South Street Seaport
by Nate Eckstrom
For those of you who were thinking that the summer is quickly fading, the relentless rocker Ted Leo is here to the rescue with handclaps and tambourines.
WALKABY 8/22/06 Fun Stuff at the Abrons - Daily!
by Nate Eckstrom
On any given day, the mini-coliseum of steps in front of the Henry Street Settlement's Abrons Arts Center has been host to a non-stop circus of events this summer.
BOOK REVIEW 8/20/06 Holy Unexpected: My New Life as a Jew
by Ron Franscell, The Enterprise
Chotzinoff's "Holy Unexpected: My New Life as a Jew" is one woman's religious journey, but without the proselytizing or solemn moralizing. In fact, it's just about what you might expect from the daughter of a Catholic mother and a Jewish father...
SUNSHINE REVIEW 8/18/06 Conversations with Other Women (2005)
by Nate Eckstrom
It would have made a really great play. Sophomore Director Hans Canosa (Alma Mater 2002) tries to make a philosophical point – or perhaps tries to hide the lack of other visual storytelling – by shooting it all in split screen.
WEEKEND MUSIC 8/18/06 Magik Markers in the Park
by Nate Eckstrom
Magik Markers was picked by Sonic Youth as an opener in 2004, and shares a lot of that noise/no-wave giant’s sensibilities. The other bands on the bill are the challenging electronic chemists Excepter, Fern Knight and Blues Control. This Sat. Aug. 19, “Doors” are at 1:30 and the show runs from 2 to 6.
MUSIC REVIEW 8/17/06 Are You Ready for the CBGB Last Halloween?
by Nate Eckstrom
CBGB's, the crumbling pantheon of punk, is set to be shut-down on Halloween this year. The music fans this Monday night didn't seem to notice however.
VIDEO PICK 8/16/06 Life Lessons with Clara Inkeles
by Yarden Yanover
Seeking wisdom from the old people in her neighborhood on the Lower East Side - this is the first interview, on matters of money and spending.