BOOKS & AUTHORS
Pen Pals Author Yann Martel
If any an author has been influenced by his travels, I’d say it’s Yann Martel. If any an author can weave stories of gold from scraps of tattered garments, I’d say, too, it’s Yann Martel. The Spanish-born Canadian has traveled the world over, collecting fodder for his tales: Costa Rica, Mexico, France, Iran, Turkey, India — the world in an ink well. But Martel’s world is etched from a philosopher’s stone. He studied philosophy at Trent University, in Ontario, and his earlier stories reek of existential angst. While his interest in the philosophical, as well as the spiritual has waned little, however, his writing has matured significantly as he has pushed the storytelling to the forefront and left the storyteller behind (in other words, a little less navel-gazing). Martel is best known for his second novel, Life of Pi — an epic survival story about a son of Indian zookeepers shipwrecked with a zebra, a hyena, an orangutan, and a 450-pound Bengal tiger. See what I’m saying? This is story-telling at its finest. I hear his upcoming novel, about the Holocaust, features two talking animals on a man’s dress shirt. Sounds like a Tom Robbins novel to me. Did you hear the one about the sock and the spoon on a hejira to Jerusalem?
7:30 p.m. (tomorrow at 11 a.m.), Hopkins Center for the Arts, 1111 Mainstreet, Hopkins; 651-209-6799; $35, $45.
BENEFIT
The Kidney Kabaret
Janet Paone has been entertaining Twin Cities audiences since she graduated from Ausburg in 1983. She was one of the original cast members
of Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding, a comedy at the Hey City Theater in
Minneapolis that set records as the city’s longest-running theatrical
production. She spent two years in Nunsense. She played Mrs. Vivian Snustad in Church Basement Ladies. And for 24 years she served as Irondale High School’s Director of Theater. On November 27, 2007 Northwest Airlines pilot and fellow actor John Vaughn gifted Paone with a life-saving kidney. Tonight, the Twin Cities community honors her with a Kidney Kabaret
benefit to help cover the costs. Join Dale Conelly and Frank Vascellaro as they host a gathering of Twin Cities talent lending their support. Scheduled performers include: The Church Basement Ladies, Those Lutheran Ladies, Christine Karki & David B. Young, Dennis Curley & Katy Hays, Martini & Olive, Andrew Wilkowske, Drew Jansen & Jimmy Martins, Irondale High School Drama Department, Tod Petersen, Jim Cunningham, Tim Sparks, Lori Dokken, Judy Donaghy, Patty Peterson, and Erin Schwab.
Silent Auction at 6:30 p.m.; show at 7:30 p.m., Augsburg College Foss Center, 2211 Riverside Avenue, Minneapolis; suggested donation of $25.
WINE & DINE BENEFIT
Minnesota’s Night of 1000 Dinners
Also tonight, help raise funds to remove landmines in Afghanistan. Da Afghan will be hosting a fundraising dinner featuring stuffed grape leaves, hummus, kabli palow with sautéed chicken, chicken tandoori, kofta kabob, chalow, and other delights.
6:30 – 8:30 p.m., Da Afghan Restaurant, 929 West 80th St., Bloomington; 952-888-5824; $30.
THEATER & PERFORMANCE
Goodnight Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet)
"What’s so funny about a handkerchief?" asks the plays promo, making clear the shift from tragedy to comedy in Ann-Marie MacDonald’s play Goodnight Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet). If we paid attention in our high school English classes, then we know by now the importance of the Fool in Shakespeare’s plays. But where was the Fool in Romeo and Juliet? Where was he in Othello? MacDonald’s play centers on Constance Ledbelly an academic basing her thesis on the premise that both of these Shakespeare plays were written as comedies until the author removed the Wise Fool from the list of characters. Enjoy this Theater Unbound production, directed by Genevieve Bennett and starring Delta Rae Giordano, Anna Sundberg, Rick Logan, Nicole Devereaux, and Nicholas Crandall. It’s sure to be be full of wild surprises.
7:30 p.m., The Neighborhood House at the Paul & Sheila Wellstone Center, 179 Robie Street East, St. Paul; 612-721-1186; $18, but tonight is a Pay-What-You-Can performance.
FILM
The Whole Town’s Talking
Best known for his Westerns and war stories, John Ford brought us one great crime comedy in 1935. Watch as the life of an ordinary man, played by Edward G. Robinson, is turned on its head after a simple act of oversleeping. (Yes, it appears I’m in grave danger then.) Ever upholding the classics, The Parkway brings us The Whole Town’s Talking tonight. And believe you me, the town shall be a’talkin’ with the likes of Jean Arthur on screen.
7 p.m., Parkway Theater, 4814 Chicago Ave. S., Minneapolis;
612-822-3030; $5.
LECTURE
The Case for Impartial Courts in Minnesota
Join Former Governor Al Quie and Minnesota Supreme Court Chief Justice Russell Anderson tonight as they outline an amendment to the state constitution that would deflect
threats to the fairness and impartiality of Minnesota’s judicial
appointment system. The two distinguished statesmen will discuss the issues on the proposed constitutional amendment, suggest solutions, and answer questions. Key components of the proposed constitutional amendment would focus the selection, appointment, evaluation, and election process on a judge’s qualifications and performance, rather than political factors. It would also ensure that voters have the final say on retaining or removing judges.
7-9 p.m., Opus Hall, Room 201, University of St. Thomas Minneapolis Campus; free.
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