Ann Bauer If you haven’t seen Waitress, now’s your chance. It’s showing at the Hopkins Cinema for $2.50 per ticket. Part fairytale, part romantic comedy, part cautionary fable, this film is far from perfect but it’s fun, colorful, unique, and features a killer performance by, of all people, Andy Griffith. A modern morality play about infidelity, spousal … Read more
My mother is a gifted caretaker. She’s nursed me through three births and two surgeries. I’ve watched her sit with dozens of friends and relatives who were sick or grieving. When I was very young, she volunteered at a hospital and I remember the things she told me when I would go with her: people … Read more
So it’s clear these are tough times, financially speaking. What with a recession looming, the Fed staying a grim course with interest rates, gas prices hovering in the $3 a gallon range, and housing values all over the country tanking like so many penny stocks — the future for middle-American homeowners is looking mighty cloudy. … Read more
Via, the stylish new restaurant by Mission American and Atlas Grill partners Anoush Ansari and Hadi Anbar, is now open in the old Pizzeria Uno location on France Avenue, across from Southdale, in Edina. If you sensed a few freakish juxtapositions in that sentence — “stylish” “Pizzeria Uno” and “Edina” — you’re not alone. The … Read more
The title character of “The Lorax,” a 1971 parable by Dr. Seuss, is a tufty, little bearded creature who’s determined to fight big business and save the endangered Truffula trees. He is perpetually jumping atop stumps outside the Thneed factory run by Mr. Once-ler and declaring in a siren-like voice, “I am the Lorax, I … Read more
We stopped for happy hour at Harry’s Food and Cocktails, 500 Washington Ave. S., Minneapolis, a few weeks ago, about fifteen minutes after they’d opened for business, and found lots of intriguing items on the menu, including starters of grilled beef ribs with garlic and ginger ($11) and braised pork ribs with lentils and escarole … Read more
I first met Dennis Banks two years ago, at a gallery opening featuring the work of Dick Bancroft, a local photographer who specializes in chronicling the American Indian Movement (AIM) and father of the famous polar explorer, Ann Bancroft. We were at Ancient Traders Gallery, on Franklin, and Banks was dressed that night in feathers … Read more
People who work in fine dining tend to be night owls who eat their first meal of the day around two p.m. They carry a wine service wherever they go but often lose their car keys. They’re rock ’n’ roll junkies who, more often than not, have been married multiple times. They put up with … Read more
This is a story with a hopeful ending. Lucky, even. But be forewarned, you have to get through a lot of hopeless, unlucky crap before you find it. Here’s how it all starts: My first-born son has autism. Now that isn’t hopeless or, in my opinion, unlucky. Autism isn’t sick or crazy. It’s rigid and … Read more
If you’ve ever fallen in love too quickly or divorced with ire or married the same person twice or threatened to maim your new spouse on your honeymoon (and meant it), you must see Private Lives, the 1930 Noel Coward comedy now showing on the McGuire Proscenium Stage at the Guthrie. As someone who’s done … Read more