CD Spotlight Failer’s return
A few months ago, No Doubt diva Gwen Stefani made her solo debut with a wildly narcissistic ditty entitled “What You Waiting For?” On her new sophomore album, Back To Me, Canadian singer-songwriter Kathleen Edwards offers a track with the nearly identical title, “What Are You Waiting For?” Stefani’s song is an admiring look in…
Missing the high notes
The ghost of opera’s most infamous diva doesn’t haunt ‘Callas Forever’ Stunning French actress Fanny Ardant gives dramatic voice to the woman who brought the word “diva” to life, opera star Maria Callas, in Callas Forever. Forget Garland, Streisand, Midler, and Madonna. The definitive diva is Maria Callas, the imperious, temperamental, and inimitable soprano who…
Current Choice Haus party
DJ Jester has used SXSW as an excuse to bring Lucil’s pigtailed giddiness to jaded Texans. This year, he raised the stakes… Lederhosen Lucil The month of March represents many things to people in this part of the state: spring break at South Padre, South By Southwest in Austin, and, of course, Lederhosen Lucil’s annual…
New Reviews ‘Kung Fu Hustle,’ and the ‘Ring Two’
Kung Fu Hustle Dir. Stephen Chow; writ. Chow, Tsang Kan Cheong, Xin Huo, Chan Man Keung; feat. Chow, Wah Yuen, Chan Kwok Kwan, Yuen Qui (R) A kick-ass musical from the director of Shaolin Soccer makes kung fu a feel-good affair. After introducing American audiences to his comedy and action finesse with Shaolin Soccer, director…
That’s a wrap The low-down on this week’s premieres
Let’s start with a remake of ‘Guess who’s coming to dinner’ starring Bernie Mac as Spencer Tracy Racial lines intersect in Guess Who, a remake of 1967’s Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner starring Katharine Hepburn, Sidney Poitier, and Spencer Tracy. This time around, Bernie Mac (Mr. 3000) plays a father who is surprised when his…
Special screenings Upcoming local film events
CineMujer, El Santo, Short Ends Project, European Film Forum, and Women’s History Month films CineMujer The Esperanza Center and Palo Alto College co-present a week-long multicultural film festival, March 28-April 2, celebrating the tribulations and triumphs of women, from the personal to the political and all of the territory inbetween. Esperanza Center director Graciela Sanchez,…
Not-so-great expectations
The children ‘Born into Brothels’ in Calcutta may find their way out with a camera Calcutta’s red-light district is the setting for Zana Briski’s activist documentary, which follows the children of prostitutes as the director teaches them to use a camera and dream about a life outside of the brothels. “The men who enter our…
Headlines Foreign policy – or hypocrisy?
A conversation with Chinese dissident Harry Wu Harry Wu Harry Wu was labeled a counter-revolutionary by the Communist Party in 1960, and sentenced to imprisonment in the laogai, or Chinese slave-labor camp. Shortly after his release in 1979, Wu came to the U.S., where he has worked to spread awareness of the laogai system, and…
Review Tandoori dream
The spices of India Palace are a delicious mystery Fish Tandoori, Baingan Bhartha, and saffron rice (Photos by Mark Greenberg) Open the door and the impact is immediate: sexy, exotic, earthy, intense. The smells of India Palace are the ultimate advertisement and, given that there was a line out the door for much of a…
Headlines Reviving La Causa
What does it take to name a street after Cesar Chavez? This small sign designates Commerce Street as Cesar Chavez Memorial Way; now imagine it as an official green sign hanging over a traffic light. On March 26 at noon the annual Cesar Chavez March will start at 1321 El Paso and wind down Commerce…
Recipes Cottontail cuisine
Six local chefs share the how-to on cooking hare If you’ve seen the B-movie classic, Night of the Lepus, then you’ll think twice before cooking your cottontail. Editors note: Recipes from this story can be found at the end of the article. “You are very bad to cook bunny rabbit at Easter,” laughs Crumpets chef…
Speed Reads “Journalist” comes to Trinity, and a request for a union hotel
For a moment let’s suppose that Molly Ivins outed an undercover CIA operative — do you think Robert Novak would be concerned? Is breaching national security a concern that only applies to liberal reporters? Ask me about Valerie Plame: “Journalist” Robert Novak, who outed CIA agent Plame in his syndicated column, will discuss “After the…
Green eggs, organic ham
More Easter food events Prepare for Easter by taking the kids to Whole Foods Market, 255 E. Basse, on Saturday, March 26, from 11am-2pm for a workshop on dying Easter eggs naturally. Dress for a mess, as the participants will work hands-on with all-natural dyes and other potentially clothes-staining crafts. The event is free. For…
Star-crossed
Cabbies fight City, taxi company in court Cabbies Debra Traphagan, Alfredo Flores, and Sam Lajzerowicz stand next to Traphagan’s former Star Cab. (Photos by Mark Greenberg) Cab driving is a game of averages, a bet that the driver only occasionally wins. One day you’re in the hole for $40, the next, you’re up $100 at…
All You Can Eat
News and notes from the San Antonio food scene Mythic Smithwicks I first drank Smithwick’s in 1997, during my honeymoon in Ireland. What a revelation: Its weight fluttered between Harp and Guinness, and it arrived in a pint glass with a creamy, white head that left a mustache on my upper lip like milk. With…
Stage In the round
News and notes from the San Antonio theater scene The biggest theater news this month is still a rumor, albeit a very well-substantiated one: The Magik Theatre and Arts San Antonio are finalizing the structure and logistics of a partnership to bring Shakespeare in the Park back to San Antonio audiences, and to do it…
B is for chicken-fried steak
‘Texas Highways’ is a treasury of classic recipes, the trick is finding them Texas restaurants and home cooks serve a lot of shrimp. One of the first dishes I had when I visited San Antonio 16 years ago, was Maggie’s Restaurant’s barbequed shrimp, each little shellfish stuffed with a sliver of jalapeño, wrapped in bacon,…
Playing with the Passion
The singers may change, but the song remains the same when Christians reenact Jesus’ crucifixion A bloody, lacerated James Caviezel portrays Christ on the cross in Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ. Lawrence of Arabia grew by 11 minutes when re-released in 1970, eight years after the epic’s premiere. The 1990 version of Spartacus…
All Ears Reissue Roundup
Web Exclusive Stones, Miles, Solomon, Mose, Tijuana Brass and other old school box sets Don’t ask why it’s taken so long – this is one of the most fetishized bands in history – but Abkco records has finally gotten around to doing for the Rolling Stones what has been done for New Wave bands aplenty:…
Party Lines Banning the wheelchair-bound
When we last checked in on Leon “Eddie” Massón, he was navigating the streets in the Medical Center, demonstrating to District 8 Councilman Art Hall the difficulty of getting around town in a wheelchair. Hall quickly learned that the civil engineering of roads, sidewalks and utility poles often don’t account for those confined to a…
Briefs Election reform, family planning, and Cuellar sides with GOP on trade
Cuellar sides with GOP on trade It wasn’t a surprise, but opponents of the Central American Free Trade Agreement are nonetheless dismayed that House Democrat (or is he a Republican?) Henry Cuellar joined the GOP in his support for CAFTA. He announced his position at a recent speech to business supporters of the deal. Lesley…
Arts Feature Post identity and pre revolution
Depending on your (Chicano or not) perspective, Latinos have just arrived or they’re about to be obsolete “SUPERMAN COMES TO THE SUPERMARKET: How I found the ‘REAL’ MAGIC BULLET on the GRASSY KNOLL 42 years after JFK was ASSASSINATED” by 2005 Artpace resident Daniel Joseph Martinez. Racial identity, says Martinez, “is not a subject that…
Reluctant reps
Skullening delivers organ-fueled SA punk to SXSW Skullening didn’t plan on applying for a showcase at this year’s South by Southwest. The San Antonio punk quartet, composed entirely of former Churchill High School classmates, formed in 2002, and in their two-and-a-half years together, they’d never given SXSW more than a passing thought. Skullening rocks The…
Stage And they lived independently and diet-free ever after
Gemini Ink and Magik Theatre take different routes to the same goal: deposing Prince Charming and the beauty industry (Photo illustration by Julie Barnett) The Princess says, “I would gladly trade away all the beauty and riches in the world for my intelligence any old day.” Or at least she does in Robert Munch’s book…
Sound and the Fury Build me up, Buttercup
A week on the scene Build me up, Buttercup “We’re used to such large stages,” joked Buttercup singer/guitarist Erik Sanden about halfway through the band’s March 16 showcase at SXSW. Set up under a white tent next to the Co-Op Bar, Buttercup made the most of its cramped surroundings. Beyond the ardent fans who stood…
Visual Arts Thoroughly modern milliners
Sometimes it’s hard to tell if a new fashion means liberation or exploitation Come on up and see me sometime: 1930s Japanese film star Irie Takako lounges in a westerly direction on a chaise lounge. A contemporary counterpart, BLACKMARKETLA’s logo girl, sports classic anime hair and doe eyes, appealing to American girls’ desire for all…
Buck shots
The thinking-man’s white emcee takes on Eminem and the mass consumption of hip-hop Buck 65: a native Nova Scotian currently living in France It’s a sunny St. Patrick’s Day afternoon in Austin. Inside a dank club the underground emcee formerly known as Zev Love X, aka MF Doom, is bouncing on stage and serving up…
Visual Arts The art capades
Unusual exhibits and a runway show take aim at the fashion canon Where the Impressionist flowers grew (amidst Constructivism and social repression): “Lilacs,” a 1950 oil painting by Piotr Fomin is among the dozens of works on display in the Greenhouse Gallery’s Russian Impressionism exhibit. This week, my happy trails led me to some mixed-up…
