Battle continues over affordable housing in proposed Hill District development
Hill District residents are, once again, battling with Pittsburgh Penguins management and developers of the former Civic Arena site — this time over the amount of affordable housing proposed for the lower Hill District development. The community wants 30 percent of the residential development to be affordable housing, but at a Nov. 21 community meeting,…
Teen musicians wanted for WYEP program
Know a teen or two who write their own songs and could use some exposure? A new program from Reimagine Media — an educational wing of WYEP — might be the place for them. Reimagination 2014 is a project in which WYEP will match young musicians with professional producers so they can record their music…
Lynn Cullen Live 11/26/13
Video Archive Phone guest: Susan; US Air cancels entire flight, kicks people off plane due to protest of unfair treatment to service dog; gotta look at the positives in the world; commonly asked questions about service animals; “knockout” game targeting elderly people, media will twist it to a race issue; adults finally indicted in Stubenville…
Friday deadline to comment on hauling frack waste on rivers
Industry wants to transport waste fluids by barge
Lynn Cullen Live 11/25/13
Video Archive Short week; Black Friday; Nuclear deal w/ Iran; important to read all opinions on something; why rake your leaves when you can mow them?; no earthworms in North America before Colombus; comparing Minnesota & Wisconsin; God on grass; ACLU report on US’s incarceration fetish; Obama not taking advantage of pardoning power; Valerie Jarrett…
Final Two Shows for Quantum’s Parlour Song
Rare local staging of work by acclaimed British playwright
Part-gameshow, part concert: The Sunday Gravy Show premieres this weekend
A new series from the Pittsburgh Folk Music Society called The Sunday Gravy Show premieres this weekend.
JFK “Legacy” Reading Tonight
Program of actors reading from famous speeches
Martial-arts fundraiser for Philippines
Learn Filipino fighting techniques for a cause
Lynn Cullen Live 11/22/13
Video Archive Guest: Chris Potter; anniversary of JFK’s death; the greatest generation; Harry Reid’s threat turned out to be real; agencies Repubs don’t want to be staffed; George Zimmerman on the loose again & Jane Orie is about to be; Jim Quinn dropped from radio; Allegheny Co. has twice the cancer risk than surrounding counties…
Critics Challenge Artists’ Group’s Leaders
Associated Artists of Pittsburgh’s new by-laws disputed
Last Week for Blue/Orange at The Phoenix
The Pittsburgh-premiere staging of this acclaimed play has three more showings at The Phoenix. More in Program Notes.
Andrew McCutchen among American Music Awards presenters
It’s been a banner year for Pirates slugger Andrew McCutchen: The center fielder helped steer the team to the playoffs for the first time this century, ranked near the top of the National League in batting average and stolen bases, and was voted NL MVP. But it doesn’t stop there The American Music Awards, taking…
Lynn Cullen Live 11/21/13
Video Archive Guest: Tom Sokolowski; anniversary fatigue; Denver Broncos player quit because he doesn’t want to sacrifice his health; R. Kelly sings about sex dolphins; ACLU case against PA; FL Rep. Trey Radel voted for drug testing poor people, just got busted for cocaine; update on art found in Germany; more poor people in the…
Last Week for Blue/Orange at The Phoenix
Troupe’s inaugural production concludes with four more performances
House passes transit bill despite prevailing wage changes
A chaotic 24 hours that included three separate votes to pass a transportation bill in the state House finally ended last night with a 104-95 vote to approve a gas-tax increase that will help fund mass transit, bridge and highway projects. The bill passed along with a hotly contested change to the state’s prevailing wage…
Novelist explores hidden stories of Fallingwater
KELCEY PARKER reads from Liliane’s Balcony 7 p.m. Thu., Nov. 21 ModernFormations Gallery, 4919 Penn Ave., Garfield; $5 or free with potluck contribution; tnypresents.blogspot.com and 7 p.m. Sat., Nov. 23 East End Book Exchange, 4754 Liberty Ave., Bloomfield; free; eastendbookexchange.com). For writer Kelcey Parker, a 2009 stop at Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater was incidental —…
Blackberry Meadows Farm offers a more humane approach to Thanksgiving
You couldn’t exactly call the turkeys at Blackberry Meadows Farm “free-range” birds: “We tried that once and they all escaped,” says Jen Montgomery, who co-owns the Natrona Heights farm with Greg Boulos. But the farm’s 13 turkeys do enjoy access to fresh air and light. In fact, they got a first — and last —…
Lynn Cullen Live 11/20/13
Video Archive Guest: Jared Day, Daylee News Nuggets; impact of Obamacare & what’s really happening ( the media is no help ); Harry Reid’s threat is not that threatening; Americans don’t pay enough attention to what’s happening outside of the country; the right-wing in Europe right now: anti-semitism, anti-immigrant & anti-muslim; 50% unemployment among young…
Three Rivers Film Festival hosts bartending documentary
“Until very recently, bartending was something people looked at as something they did between other jobs. What you see here is people doing it as a profession,” says Douglas Tirola, director of the film Hey Bartender, which screens this week at the Three Rivers Film Festival. The film follows the story of two bartenders —…
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire Directed by: Francis Lawrence Starring: Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Woody Harrelson Starts Fri., Nov. 22 When we last left the kill-or-be-killed teens in last year’s The Hunger Games, the twosome from District 12 — Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) and Peeta Mellark (Josh Hutcherson) — had outsmarted the rulers of Capital…
The over-abundance of Thanksgiving is nigh
Somehow, Thanksgiving — a day we set aside to celebrate how much we already have and/or how some of our ancestors didn’t starve to death when they hit the New World — is typically marked by an excess of food. Since every year supermarket turkeys get freakishly bigger, it helps to think of them not…
The Three Rivers Film Festival continues through Sat., Nov. 23
The Three Rivers Film Festival wraps up Sat., Nov. 23. Here are reviews of two films playing during the final days. Hey Bartender. Douglas Tirola’s documentary focuses on the rise of the craft-cocktail scene by filling in the history of mixed drinks in the U.S and interviewing its forbearers and current stars. The expected roster…
Colonizing the Cosmos returns a few years on with a second full-length — and a novel
COLONIZING THE COSMOS CD/BOOK RELEASE 7:30 p.m. Sat., Nov. 23. Carnegie Library of Homewood, 7101 Hamilton Ave., Homewood. $7. All ages. (Kids 10 and under free.) colonizingthecosmos.com In 2010, Colonizing the Cosmos — a shape-shifting indie-pop outfit centered on Michael Savisky and Josh Moyer — burst onto the local music scene, releasing its debut album…
Hunters keep it moving with self-titled LP
HUNTERS with AUDACITY 7 p.m. Wed., Nov. 27. Smiling Moose, 1306 E. Carson St., South Side. $10. All ages. 412-431-4668 or smiling-moose.com To hear guitarist/vocalist Derek Watson and vocalist Isabel Almeida talk about their band Hunters, you’d think the whole thing — the widespread acclaim of their first EP, their growing notoriety as one of…
The Blues Orphans drop a new album in their 34th year
BLUES ORPHANS CD RELEASE 8 p.m. Fri., Nov. 22. James Street Gastropub and Speakeasy, 422 Foreland St., North Side. 412-904-3335 or jamesstreetgastropub.com If you assume based on The Blues Orphans’ name that the band is a standard blues outfit, you’re missing out. “It’s transformed over the years from us playing blues and country, to jazz,…
Critics’ Picks: November 20 – 26
[RECORDS] + SAT., NOV. 23 Start your holiday shopping early or just treat yourself tonight at Pittsburgh Record Fest No. 10. The event marks the 10th time Belvedere’s Ultra-Dive has hosted the fair, where record-lovers can buy and sell their collections. All are welcome to sell their stock at the festival, but you must reserve…
New Releases
Broken Fences Stormy Clouds (Self-released) Beautiful, quiet, contemplative work from the folk duo with the velvet voices. Morgan Erina’s singing recalls Joni Mitchell and Judy Dyble; Guy Russo supplies tender harmonies and takes some turns on lead. Much of the material on this four-song work recalls the ’60s folk revival as much as it does…
Pittsburgh’s version of the RAW showcase holds its season-one awards show
RAWARDS PITTSBURGH SEMI-FINALIST SHOW 8 p.m. Fri., Nov. 22. Cavo, 1916 Smallman St., Strip District. $17-20 (21 and over). www.rawartists.org RAW Natural Born Artists, a monthly showcase with iterations in some 60 cities, holds its first annual Pittsburgh awards show this week. The series is a platform for underground visual and performing artists who might…
As Harrisburg dickers over transportation funding, will cooler heads prevail on prevailing wage?
During a late-October press conference designed to pressure lawmakers into passing a much-needed transportation bill, Gov. Tom Corbett held up a piece of concrete that had fallen from an ailing Beaver County bridge. Corbett’s argument, reiterated at his re-election kickoff, has been that Pennsylvania’s crumbling infrastructure threatens to take down the state economy. The argument…
A review of Point Park’s Contemporary Choreographers showcase
Conservatory Dance Company’s CONTEMPORARY CHOREOGRAPHERS continues through Sun., Nov. 24. George Rowland White Performance Studio, 201 Wood St., Downtown. $7-20. 412-392-8000 or pittsburghplayhouse.com One thing I have learned over a decade of reviewing Point Park University’s Conservatory Dance Company’s shows is that they rarely contain a dull moment. The 2013 version of CDC’s annual Contemporary…
High Ideals: Can marijuana legalization have an effect on the race for Pa. governor?
John Hanger was excited. His run for governor of Pennsylvania had just received a “major endorsement” — from the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws PAC. Other pols might scoff: According to a recent Harper poll, Hanger is running fourth in a six-person race to win the Democratic nomination and the right to…
City Theatre’s Charles Ives Take Me Home
CHARLES IVES TAKE ME HOME continues through Dec. 15. City Theatre, 1300 Bingham St., South Side. $15-55. 412-431-2489 or citytheatrecompany.org There are a lot of dead people in Jessica Dickey’s Charles Ives Take Me Home, now getting its Pittsburgh premiere at City Theatre. Violinist John Starr talks to us about his dead dad, who couldn’t…
Same-Sex, Different Day
Brad Ankney is a man of few words. Ask the 48-year-old Brighton Heights resident why he’s suing his employer, and his answer is, “I got tired of being treated as ‘less than.'” But ask Ankney about the man whom he has shared his life with for the past 15 years, and he opens up: “He’s…
True West at Pittsburgh Public Theate
TRUE WEST continues through Dec. 8. O’Reilly Theater, 621 Penn Ave., Downtown. $15.75-55. 412-316-1600 or ppt.org A sure sign that you’re getting old is realizing that a play you saw when it was new and edgy is now a mainstream chestnut. Pittsburgh Public Theater’s “Masterpiece Season” marches on with Sam Shepard’s True West. Directed by…
Savage Love
I’m a heterosexual guy in my early 20s. I’ve been dating my girlfriend for about six months, and we’ve been having some fights. The problem: I have a high sex drive in comparison to hers. I want to be intimate on a weekly basis (at least!), and she’s told me that she’s more of a…
You Can’t Take It With You at Carnegie Mellon School of Drama
YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU continues through Nov. 23. Philip Chosky Theater, Carnegie Mellon University, Oakland. $10-29. 412-268-2407 or drama.cmu.edu When You Can’t Take It With You opened on Broadway in 1936, it took the theater world by storm, earning a Pulitzer for playwrights George S. Kaufman (a Pittsburgh native and Fifth Avenue High…
One Day in Ocean City, MD
233 miles, 4 hours & 5 minutes, & we’re here, just in time for lunch. If I eat the ham & American cheese sandwich with mustard on one slice of bread in the baggy labeled with my name, that’s it — We’re not walking the boardwalk. Don’t ask for nothing else. When the towels are…
Short List: November 20 – 28
SPOTLIGHT: Thu., Nov. 21 – Stage In its Broadway premiere, in 2011 — even with an all-star cast led by Chris Rock — acclaimed playwright Stephen Adley Guirgis’ The Motherfucker With the Hat struggled to fill seats. Guess why? Couldn’t have helped that most newspapers couldn’t print the show’s full title, or that Rock couldn’t…
Inspired by Michelangelo, an artist blends the representational and the abstract
IGNUDI continues through Nov. 25. Spinning Plate Gallery, 5720 Friendship Ave., Friendship. 412-441-0194 Richard Claraval is a romantic with a scientific point of view. He believes everything in the universe results from understandable causes, and yet there is something metaphysical about Ignudi, his exhibit of drawings at the Spinning Plate Gallery. The 38 works in…
Naya
Naya 2018 Murray Ave., Squirrel Hill. 412-421-1920 Hours: Mon.-Sat. 11 a.m.-10 p.m.; Sun. 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Prices: Appetizers, soups and salads $5-15; entrees $9-20 Liquor: BYOB Some years ago, we enjoyed a visit to a little Middle Eastern restaurant in the near North Hills. Tyma’z was valiantly decorated on a shoestring, but the warmth of…
Teacher sues Pittsburgh police officer after controversial arrest in Homewood
Photo by Alex Zimmerman Dennis Henderson (middle) answers questions at an afternoon press conference flanked by his attorneys The American Civil Liberties Union filed a federal lawsuit today against a Pittsburgh police officer who arrested a teacher outside a Homewood Community Empowerment Association meeting this summer, an incident that incensed many community members. The lawsuit…
