November 2011
Krungthep Thai: Authentic Thai cuisine comes to... →
Jeremy Iggers reports.
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Science Museum of Minnesota's "Beaker and Brush"...
Sometimes even the most lauded art gathering can leave visitors wanting. Thankfully the Science Museum of Minnesota’s monthly lecture series “Beaker and Brush” perfectly fills this void.
Every second Tuesday of the month, scientific novices and enthusiasts alike gather at the Black Dog Cafe in anticipation of whichever brain-tickling concoction lies ahead. Themes are unique to...
Arts Orbit Radar 12/1/11
On the radar
1. The Seward Arts Festival now in its 12th year is a happy gathering of poets, writers, dancers, and musicians to celebrate the neighborhood arts and taste the fruits (wine and food) of labor by local businesses. The kickoff party for the art festival and Franklin Frolic is Friday at the Playwrights’ Center.
2. When Uncle Tupelo broke up 17 years ago, everyone thought Jay...
In which Lu Lippold's husband goes on a Malaysian... →
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Borders bookstore chain collapse gives the little...
GILBERTSVILLE, PENNSYLVANIA—For the first time since this column began, I am posting from the road. Still on holiday vacation, my husband and I are visiting his family, our friends, and the small spattering of kin that I have left here. We’ve spent the week bouncing back and forth among Gilbertsville, Lancaster, and Philadelphia—all in Pennsylvania. Gilbertsville, where my husband grew up, is a...
Brown Bag with food critic Rachel Hutton
Please join us for a Brown Bag program at noon this Wednesday, November 30 with writer and restaurant critic Rachel Hutton at the East Lake Public Library, 2727 E. Lake St., Minneapolis. Rachel Hutton has worked as a writer/editor at Minnesota Monthly magazine and, most recently, served as City Pages’ restaurant critic. She also co-edited the essay collection Before the Mortgage: Real...
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"The Wizard of Oz" at the Children's Theatre... →
Review by John Olive for HowWasTheShow.com.
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“A Christmas Carol” at the Guthrie Theater: God...
Let’s make this clear up front: the Guthrie’s Christmas Carol is largely spectacle. There are zip lines, pneumatics, strobe lights, a massive backlit angel of death, and a two-story set piece that seems to move by magic. Heck, there’s even an “Aerial Flight Director” listed in the program.
Spectacle is not something I take issue with, nor is it necessarily a...
"The Dining Room" at Theatre in the Round puts too...
Theatre in the Round bills its production of A. R. Gurney’s The Dining Room as “a charming mosaic of scenes.” It is no such thing. Far from charming, the listless script is slightly preferable to watching paint dry. The stringing together of more than a dozen domestic situations doesn’t qualify as scenes or even as vignettes. Instead of each having a beginning, middle, and end, they are...
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David Daniels: Healing as an active verb
After quite a while off the radar, Rasta bard David Daniels (spoken-word-artist/playwright/actor) returns to the Twin Cities. Last the general public heard from Daniels, he’d been elected vice-chair of the Republican Party’s 4th District in St. Paul some years ago. Owing to health concerns, he didn’t complete his term. He left for Florida, moved to his beloved Denver and, now, is back in...
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"The Match Girl's Gift" on the Minnesota...
My friend Sara remembers a show she heard occasionally on a country radio station when she was growing up: the DJ would collect woeful songs of loss and pathos under the theme “Plumb Pitiful.” Hans Christian Andersen’s 1845 story “The Little Match Girl” falls squarely in the plumb pitiful tradition, and the production of Laurie Brooks’s stage adaptation now...
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Michelle Williams enchants in "My Week With...
Let’s just get this out of the way right now: I am, and have been for quite some time, a Marilyn Monroe superfan. I’ve read almost every biography, have watched Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and The Misfits about 7,000 times, may or may not have been slightly influenced to bleach my honey blonde hair to platinum because of her…I could go on and on. (I even had a cardboard Marilyn...
"The business owners constantly worry about a... →
Due to a faulty sewer, things could get real messy real fast at the Kitty Cat Klub, Annie’s Parlour, and the Loring Pasta Bar.
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"The Muppets," "My Week with Marilyn," "INNI," and...
Thanksgiving is only a few days away and with Christmas just a month from now, some of the most anticipated films of 2011 are starting to emerge. Typically Thanksgiving releases are ideal for families to go see in theaters after gorging themselves all day while watching football, and after football is over, theaters will be packed. Sometimes the hardest part once at the theater is deciding what...
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"The Muppets": It was wonderful! It was great!...
I really, really wanted to love The Muppets. It sounded so promising: new songs by one of the dudes from Flight of the Conchords, Jason Segel, Amy Adams, the beloved Muppet gang…what doesn’t sound magical about that? But if I’m being 100% honest with myself and with you, dear readers, I didn’t love it.
It’s not the Muppets’ fault. The Muppets are great. They haven’t changed in 30 years, and...
New live/work space for artists in Northeast... →
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“The ad buyer explained to me that the new Social House, which has its official...”
– Jeremy Iggers visits the (sort of) new Social House.
"A Civil War Christmas" at History Theatre: A lot...
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem “Christmas Bells”—penned during the final year of the American Civil War—has morphed with time into “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day,” a familiar carol celebrating peace on earth. But we don’t often hear the darker verses of his poem. Mourning the crippling injury his son Charles suffered in the war, Longfellow wrote, “And in despair I bowed my head,...
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Once Upon a Crime Mystery Bookstore: Uptown's cozy...
If you’re a fan of thrillers, mysteries, and crime novels and aren’t sure where you can find a group of friendly people with whom to share your love, look no farther than this paragraph, because I’m about to reveal a plot point that is going to chane the story of your life forever. On the second Wednesday of each month (September-May), a crowd of fiction sleuths gathers together at Once Upon a...
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Arts Orbit Radar 11/24/11
On the radar
1. With Thanksgiving out of the way, holiday theater takes over full time. A Don’t Hug Me Christmas Carol and The Harty Boys Save Christmas start their runs on Friday at New Century Theatre and Bryant-Lake Bowl respectively. Browse this year’s comprehensive guide to all shows in production this season.
2. Brandi Carlile is the headliner at the Fitzgerald Theatre...
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"Quick survey: anybody wish you were a critically... →
Lu Lippold talks with N.M. Kelby, author of White Truffles in Winter.
"I Wish You Love" returns to Penumbra Theatre for...
This weekend, Penumbra Theatre brought back its extremely successful production ofI Wish You Love about Nat King Cole and the early days of broadcast television. Written and developed by Dominic Taylor, the show celebrated its world premiere in its spring run at Penumbra and played to sold-out performances at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. before occupying the Hartford Stage in...
Maria Isa and Muja Messiah of Villa Rosa: Worth a...
Don’t sleep on Jon Jon Scott–owner, operator and executive producer at record label and production company Black Corners—he seriously hits a tough stride with Villa Rosa’s Blue Diamond Island. The Villa Rosa duo is better known as hip-hoppers Maria Isa & Muja Messiah.
Scott says of the pairing: “Maria Isa has been known as that [Latina] rapper-singer hot mama with political instincts...
Twin Cities holiday theater guide: From naughty to...
A Reindeer Line, Youth Performance Company Howard Conn Fine Arts Center, Minneapolis The promotional image of an anthropomorphic reindeer in long johns, tap shoes, and hip-huggers looks like something out of the fervid dream of a repressed Laplander who’s been too long on the tundra—but never mind that. Fun for all ages, surely. (December 2-18; youthperformanceco.com)
A Silent Night for...
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Drake's "Take Care": Rapper moves beyond lady... →
Review by Sally Hedberg, via The Minnesota Daily.
Mizna's Arab Film Fest panel discussion: The...
On Nov. 10, Mizna, a Minneapolis-based non-profit organization that promotes Arab-American arts and culture, hosted a panel discussion about art in revolution in the wake of the Arab Spring and as a part of its seventh Twin Cities Arab Film Festival. The discussion was held in Anderson Hall on the University of Minnesota’s West Bank. On the panel were five scholars and artist activists...
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"Silent Night," silent ball fields: Minnesota...
A hush has settled on baseball for another year. Soon Target Field will be under a blanket of snow. But be assured that not all is quiet in the offices of the Minnesota Twins. In a move that surprised many, the Twins fired Bill Smith as general manager two weeks ago. Terry Ryan has stepped back into the role that he filled successfully for many years before Smith’s promotion in 2007. The Twins...
Suds on Grand: Northern Brewer's success story →
Travelin' Moburys new album "Yesterday's Wine": An...
It’s been interesting covering Twin Cities acoustic country trio Travelin’ Moburys.
M.J. Kroll, before recently escaping to the Left Coast, dragged me out past South Hell to go see them play the St. Paul hinterlands a year or so ago at the Eagles Club/VFW. I took them in solely as a group. Last time I saw them about a month ago at Minnesota Music Café, I experienced them slightly...
Zenon Dance Company's fleet feet captivate at the...
No one could blame Zenon Dance Company director Linda Andrews for wanting a drink on Friday night: when the executive director of the venue you consider your “new home” abruptly resigns the week before you make your full-length debut at the venue, it’s not an ideal situation.
There’s also been concern that the shiny new Cowles Center would lack the sense of community...
"Actually, those are part of my new public art...
“Art always leads economic development in this town, and nowhere else is this so clear as on West Broadway,” said Minneapolis Community Planning and Economic Development Director Mike Christenson, at a celebration November 10. He spoke at the 5 Points Plaza under Blossoms of Hope, a bus stop that appears topped with huge metal flowers.
Fifth Ward Council Member Don Samuels said art had been an...
Review - Dial M for Murder - Shadowplay Theatre -...
When I walked into the Gremlin Theatre space and beheld the set for Shadowplay Theatre’s inaugural production, Dial M For Murder, I had some serious flashbacks to my old community theater days. This is not a bad thing. In fact, quite the opposite. Zach Morgan’s sturdy three walled set with multiple doors, Robert J. Smith’s props, and Ariel Leaf’s stark pre-show lighting design all promised some...
Why "Internet poetry" is no joke
Recently the techno-friendly poet Steve Roggenbuck posted this video of himself making a presentation at a poetry conference at Duke University. The video quality is poor, but I found the talk fascinating because Roggenbuck comes out from behind his curtain of ironic appropriation, deliberate misspelling, and esoteric references to speak articulately and informatively about the ways he and...
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Bob Mould, “Turning of the Tide”...
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The challenge of the Cowles Center: Why is Frank...
“The unfortunate thing is that people misread my comment about being ill suited to the culture here,” said Frank Sonntag, the executive director of the Cowles Center for Dance and the Performing Arts.
On late Monday afternoon, the Star Tribune published an article online (expanded later in the evening) reporting that Sonntag was resigning. The article quoted a statement by Sonntag, released by...
Q: Who IS that? A: Bobby Kahn, life of the party
Name: Bobby Kahn Twitter: @kobbybahn, and, with others, @FreakyDeekyMTN Websites: freakydeeky.tv, mpls.tv/bobbykahn
What’s your job? “Certified public accountant. I work at a public accounting firm in Minnetonka.”
Other than your job, what are your claims to fame? “Host of Freaky Deeky. MPLS.TV personality—I have a new show debuting this winter. Sometime TC Daily Planet...
