BOYS DON’T ASK, DON’T TELL, DON’T CRY
Barry Winchell spent his short life overcoming one prejudice, only to die by another. Dyslexic, Barry endured taunts from his schoolmates who called him stupid. Beset with Attention Deficit Disorder, he struggled to control his temper. But Barry was neither dumb nor unkind: Although as a child, he couldn’t read the directions in a model…
OF EBOLA AND ENO
The Mechanical Walking Robot Boy’s Chris Smart is audibly squeamish about the prospect of a formal interview, but eventually insists that nothing except “needles and Ebola” make him nervous these days, the first of many thinly veiled, age-effacing jokes. His manner of speech, much like his music, is always pleasantly salted with the cultivated sarcasm…
CD REVIEW: WEEN
WEEN Live at Stubbs, 7/2000 (CD, 2003 Chocodog Records) Available only through the Ween Web site at www.ween.com Frank Zappa, the Garrick Theater, NYC, New York, 1967. Bruce Springsteen, the Roxy Theater, Los Angeles, California, 1975. The Sex Pistols, Randy’s Rodeo, San Antonio, Texas, 1978. For certain musicians and their fans, there exist dates and…
ED GARZA, TAKE TWO
The incumbent leads the herd in one-horse mayoral race “It is certainly an extraordinary time for San Antonio,” Garza continued, relating the importance of Toyota’s decision to build Tundra trucks to the city’s economic well-being. By the time the March 19 candidates’ filing deadline rolled around, Garza had repolished his slightly tarnished reputation, and he…
JAZZING THE IVORIES
Legendary pianist Dave Brubeck appears at the Laurie Auditorium Brubeck was born in California in 1920. His father was a cattle rancher, and his mother was a piano teacher. He wanted to go into the cattle business like his father, but instead began playing piano at age 4; by his teens, Brubeck was playing in…
DARK HORSE
Kay Turner sees Garza as formidable in mayor’s race Since her stint as treasurer for the still-influential Good Government League – which has since dropped the moniker and evolved into leadership at the Greater San Antonio Chamber of Commerce – Turner erupted onto the political scene in the 1980s, loaded with political savvy. She dubbed…
HELLO, IT’S TODD
Todd Rundgren’s great gift – and equally great curse – is that he has spent most of his career ahead of the pop-music curve. As a result, Rundgren has very little chart success to show for a highly prolific, 35-year recording career. Widely viewed as a can’t-miss superstar during his 1972-73 heyday, he’s proven to…
FACES IN THE CROWD
City Council candidates District 1 Thomas Aguillon Rene Balderas Roger Flores Jr. Joe Garcia Richard Gonzalez Daniel Monreal Distrct 2 Floria Fox Sandra Martinez John Sanders Linn Waiters Joel Williams Ron Wright District 3 Jerry Clancy Martin Cordero Joe Farias Toni Moorhouse Ron Segovia District 4 Phil Cortez David Fernandez John Clinton Freeman Joe Montoya…
SOUND AND THE FURY
A WEEK ON THE SCENE DEFICIT DEFINITE Three weeks’ worth of classical concerts have been compromised to decrease costs for the remainder of the San Antonio Symphony’s performance season. The first cut was made to the March 21-22 program of John Adams’ Harmonielehre, which was replaced with Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 3. Future cuts include cancellation…
IL MAESTRO
The Bisiach became Campesi’s favorite fiddle. “What attracted me to it is the very dark, Italian sound,” Campesi says, cradling the instrument in his hands, as if it were a newborn baby. Campesi, 82, is one of the few remaining jazz violinists of his generation, a rich heritage that includes Joe Venuti and Stephane Grappelli.…
PC OR NOT PC: WHO CARES?
The woman sitting next to me has her bare foot hiked practically into my lap, and she scratches and picks at it in between whoops and bursts of applause. I am grossed out, but, looking at the bigger picture, I’m also impressed, because this isn’t a rock concert, or a tractor-pull, this is the opening…
WAR AS A MYTH AND REALITY
War, Hedges said, is a narcotic. After spending five years in El Salvador, he had a nervous twitch in his face. He had been evacuated three times by the U.S. Embassy because of information that death squads planned to kill him. “Yet each time I came back. I accepted with a grim fatalism that I…
CUCHI-CUCHI COUP: LATINAS STILL DEMANDING CHA-CHA-CHANGE
The opening scene sets the tone for the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center’s latest theatrical production, Beautiful Señoritas. Playwright Dolores Prida’s satire following four beauty pageant contestants and an impressionable young girl BEAUTIFUL SEÑORITAS Show times and prices vary. Call for details. Through April 12 Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center 1301 Guadalupe Street 271-9070 laments the sexual…
DUAL CITIZENS
“All Mexicans that acquired U.S. citizenship before 1998 automatically lost their Mexican nationality,” explained Carlos Vidali, Mexican Consul General in San Antonio. Vidali said he advertised the looming deadline periodically on Spanish-language television, and Univision began a series of stories about the deadline last week, hence the long, semi-circular line of applicants who wanted to…
CASUALTIES OF WAR
‘Requiem’ exhibit revisits photojournalists who paid the ultimate price in Southeast Asia ‘It is impossible to describe to those who do not know what horror means. Horror.” – Marlon Brando as Colonel Kurtz in Apocalypse Now. We as a culture are immune to cinematic violence. Often, words culled from a film – even one as…
SHOW TIMES
FRI 3/28 – THU 4/3 These show times are provided by the theaters and are subject to change. The Current includes show times submitted by press deadline, and is not responsible for the changes in the ever-morphing film industry. All times are p.m. unless otherwise indicated. DOWNTOWN AMC RIVERCENTER 9 Did not submit showtimes by…
ARTIFACTS
Blue Star Art Space’s annual fundraiser – recently renamed Red Dot & Glam – is scheduled for 7 p.m. on Thursday, March 27. General admission tickets to the opulently themed, “Moulin Rouge meets Moroccan Harem,” extravaganza are $60 per person at the door. DJ and artist Agosto Cuellar will provide the night’s entertainment; and the…
ALL EARS
RABBITS AND CATS But here it is, and forget about turning it away, because it’s been many years since the arrival a band like this: over a decade, in fact, on the Cowboy Junkies’ 1989 Trinity Sessions. As with the Junkies, Hem showcases a woman who sings lyrics written by a man, but convinces you…
AUTOPILOT CITY
It says something about this film’s ambitions that the best its heroine can hope for is to tell international travelers to return their seat-back trays to their original upright position. Or maybe it says something about screenwriter Eric Wald, who appears to be snickering behind the scenes at the lower-class characters in this low-rent flick.…
NEW REVIEWS
BASIC Dir. John McTiernan; writ. James Vanderbilt; feat. John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson, Connie Nielsen, Brian Van Holt, Timothy Daly, Giovanni Ribisi, Taye Diggs, Roselyn Sanchez (R) Set during the American occupation of Panama in the ’80s, Basic opens with exposition by Connie Nielsen about the human cost of constructing the Suez Canal. But director…
STILL PLAYING
ABOUT SCHMIDT Dir. Alexander Payne; writ. Louis Begley (novel), Payne; feat. Jack Nicholson, Hope Davis, Dermot Mulroney, Kathy Bates (R) Schmidt is a road movie set on the other end of life’s cycle from Nicholson’s Easy Rider, as full of metaphoric ambition and as devoid of solid meaning. The actor is utterly convincing as a…
