Wood Street Commons tenants reassured on building’s future
As new dormitories have been sprouting up across Downtown, residents of the Wood Street Commons can’t help wonder if their building will soon be put on the market. So, once again rumors swirled that the neighboring Point Park University is eyeing the 258-unit building for its expanding student body. But at a Sept. 19 residents’…
This Just In: Sept 26 – Oct 3
Highlights from the local TV news.
The Cynics to release Here We Are at 31st Street Pub
Michael Kastelic and fellow Cynic and Get Hip Records main man Gregg Kostelich are giving the local scene something to buzz about: a new record, Here We Are. The CD-release show is Oct. 4 at the 31st Street Pub with The Ugly Beats, from Austin, Texas, Black Tie Revue, The Leftovers and DJ Zombo. ……
Essential Art House: 50 Years of Janus Films
Pittsburgh Filmmakers continues a two-week film festival — 16 films that offer a primer on what came to be known as “arthouse cinema.”
Chiodo’s Bar
You either knew this Homestead landmark or you didn’t. And if you didn’t, it’s too late now: The bar closed in 2005, replaced by Walgreens at the foot of the High Level Bridge. Your only consolation is that you never know what you missed. For the rest of us, losing the bar — and seeing…
The Kingdom
After an American oil-company compound is bombed, an A-team of Feds, led by Jamie Foxx, fly in — against orders! — to catch the bad guys. For a while, there’s a slim hope that the story will forefront the awkward cooperation between the Americans and their conflicted Saudi counterpart. But the film quickly reverts back…
Everything to Lose
The Pittsburgh Pirates are rattling to the end of another 90-loss season — their third in a row. But you can detect an undercurrent of hope among fans. Kevin McClatchy is out; Frank Coonley is in. As I write this, the team seems poised to hire a new general manager. Maybe change is coming. Maybe…
Feast of Love
The drama — and the lives of its characters– unravel in Portland, Ore., where everyone seems to run into everyone just about everywhere. Morgan Freeman is the sage elder; among those seeking his advice are a café owner (Greg Kinnear); his maybe lesbian wife (Selma Blair); a pair of young’uns (Toby Hemingway, Alexa Davalos); and…
Savage Love
Who the hell wears swim caps anymore? I haven’t seen a swim cap in years. That question in your column last week from the swim-cap fetishist getting off on his visits to public pools was bullshit. I would think you, of all people, could see through it. Sexy St. Louis Girl Lots of pools require…
In the Shadow of the Moon
In July 1969, America — and much of the world — held its collective breath during an arguably singular live TV event: man walking on the moon. (In our house, a television set was rented just for this moment.) Certainly the impact of that feat has faded with today’s ordinariness of manned spacecraft. But David…
Prayer
A poem by Kevin Prufer
Park
Ten Los Angelenos — arriving in groups of two and four, and getting all mixed up — spend a life-changing afternoon at a secluded hillside park in writer-director Kurt Voelker’s comedy. It’s not a very original premise, and neither are the participants: a comically inept suicider; a philanderer, plus his wife and sexy-maid-costumed liaison; a…
Over the Hill
It might be petty to say “we told you so” now that a developer wants to open a strip club near the future Majestic Star site. But I’ll say it anyway, because it shows exactly what residents of the Hill District were worried about in 2006, when the Pittsburgh Penguins were trying to get a…
Gender Gap
As an amateur magician, Jessi Seams can make a length of rope do her bidding, or coax bottles of soda pop from thin air. But her most impressive feat, perhaps, has been to conjure a sense of identity for herself in a society that has always seemed foreign. Growing up, Seams says, “I was certainly…
Key to the Field
Turkel, whose previous local productions include “Wild Signs” and “Holler,” has purposefully set out to mystify and unmoor us. His opening scene in Key to the Field, a theatrical MacGuffin, introduces a style and story he has no intention of following through. Unfortunately, because of all his twists and surprises, I can’t explain why without…
Letters To The Editor: Sept 26 – Oct 3
Feedback from our readers.
The Music Lesson
Tammy Ryan’s 1999 drama, inspired by two teachers who fled the siege of Sarajevo, is well chosen, ably cast and sympathetically directed. The portrayal of memories from the mid-’90s break-up of Yugoslavia, and of the difficult explanations of its sectarian hatred, neighbor-against-neighbor killing, ethnic cleansing and wanton destruction of a culturally ancient city, presents a…
A Digging Pitt exhibit highlights street art as a cooperative form.
Collectively, the trio of artists in Conceived Bully incorporate techniques of superflat, agitprop, old-school punk, anime, comics, graffiti, manga, lowbrow and every other element of Now.
Julie Sokolow performs at ModernFormations
Expect a more stripped-down sound live — as a general rule, it’s Sokolow and her guitar — but even without the production tricks, the songs don’t suffer. Her impressive vocal range and slight affectations bring to mind a less country-ish Jolie Holland, though perhaps it’s coincidental: Sokolow herself is more likely to be found listening…
Photographer Diana Shearwood discusses her new show about where dinner comes from.
“The truck food imagery is like a form of seduction.”
Minus the Bear drops the punchlines with Planet of Ice
“When we first started, it was kind of a thing where we didn’t really care about song titles, so it was like, ‘Oh well, let’s just make a joke out of it,'” says Erin Tate with a sigh. “That’s still, to this day, all that is really ever talked about. … [I]t just became this…
George Saunders talks fiction, Vonnegut, Johnny Tremain and his new essay collection The Braindead Megaphone.
“I suddenly could program the VCR, because I was a genius.”
Post-punks the Mekons celebrate 30th anniversary with Natural
“The Mekons are a great sloppy rock show,” says the band’s Sally Timms. “That’s not going to go away. But I feel like our audience is about the same age as us, and must be wondering, ‘Do we have to go back to that same club we’ve been seeing [the Mekons] at since we were…
Split decision in Pamela Lawton case
Although she was found not guilty of the most serious charge against her, Hill District resident Pamela Lawton won a bittersweet courtroom victory on Sept. 21. Lawton has faced a charge of disorderly conduct and a slew of traffic offenses following a Shadyside traffic stop in August 2006. She was pulled over by city police…
Queens of the Stone Age play … a library?
Scrapping all the trimmings, Josh Homme streamlined his leviathan rock to make Era Vulgaris, heavy on riffs and light on the unnecessary, an album that should leave heads bobbing, not banging, to his heavy mettle. Steadily buzzing with bad attitude and beatitude, the album doesn’t try hiding behind its own shadow, like Songs, or hypnotizing…
P-G breaks judicial seal in Scaife divorce case
Despite his best efforts, some of the most sensitive documents filed in Pittsburgh Tribune-Review publisher Richard Mellon Scaife’s divorce are now a matter of public record. But Scaife is fighting to have those documents hidden again — with a legal petition that is itself sealed. On Sept. 16, the Tribune-Review‘s rival, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, published…
A Conversation With Nigel Ash
Acting isn’t new to Nigel Ash — he’s studying theater arts at Rogers Middle School for the Creative and Performing Arts — nor is film work: He and his three younger brothers write and direct their own home movies. But last October, the 13-year-old Hazelwood resident scored a speaking part in Universal’s home-video release, The…
Settlement reached between city and antiwar demonstrators
Pittsburgh Organizing Group and the City of Pittsburgh reached an agreement on Sept. 20 that will keep Oakland’s 24-hour anti-war protesters within two marked sections of sidewalk along Forbes Avenue. And that will keep city police officers from citing any more protesters for “obstructing passageways” while sitting or lying there during the rest of their…
Rivas Restaurant
Thanks to the resilient Rivas family, we’ve now got a taste for Nicaraguan food — and we know just where to go to get it.
Metcalfe, immigration supporters square off in forum
Held before an audience of 60 at Squirrel Hill’s Jewish Community Center, the forum was intended to explore differing viewpoints on the origins of, and solutions for, the immigration crisis. Illegal immigration “is nothing less than an invasion of our nation,” said panelist and state Rep. Daryl Metcalfe (R-Butler). He and other Republicans have sponsored…
Attack Theatre’s latest looks for connections.
The dance performance “Someplace, Not Here” begins with its ending, then tells the story in flashback. A series of movement-based theatrical vignettes depict how each character ends up at the bar; a bar-room brawl; and a bathroom scene (set in the venue’s actual bathroom). The bathroom scene is one of several that audiences will watch…
