File this one under “can’t miss.” Zadie Smith asked a bunch of literary cohorts to contribute to her latest project. Her only rule: Each story must bear the name of a person, and be about that person. The result is a broad-ranging collection of characters (a giant, a judge, and a monster, to name a few) presented in formats ranging from comic strip to monologue. Indeed, the only common thread in this schizophrenic anthology is the fact that each author is hotter than the next; George Saunders, Miranda July, Dave Eggers, and Chris Ware are among the contributors. Given the spectrum of genres and styles, there’s guaranteed to be something for everyone, all of it quality. Plus, all proceeds will go to Eggers’s 826NYC organization, a nonprofit that teaches children to write.
Author: Danielle Kurtzleben
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Wreck
Black Label Movement received a hearty welcome with its debut 2006–07 season, garnering praise both for its evocative choreography and athletic, hyperkinetic dancers. The company repays that kindness by opening its sophomore season with the ambitious Wreck, artistic director Carl Flink’s first evening-length piece. Claustrophobics beware: Wreck depicts ten sailors trapped inside the last watertight compartment of an ore boat at the bottom of Lake Superior. Confined to a small space defined by several benches, the dancers artfully flail, careen, and collide as they run out of air and time. Vintage 8-millimeter footage of an ore boat, along with a score by acclaimed Twin Cities-based composer Mary Ellen Childs, provide a backdrop.
Southern Theater, 1420 Washington Ave. S., Minneapolis; 612-340-1725.
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Naomi Klein
America may have spent decades fighting the evils of communism, but with The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, Naomi Klein shows us the scary side of the free market. “Disaster capitalism,” the idea at the center of Klein’s new book, employs a simple yet sinister formula: disaster strikes, the public panics, and the government promptly takes advantage of the chaos to reengineer the economy as it sees fit—often in favor of privatization. Klein’s hypotheses even venture into revisionist territory, as when she posits that governments have been using disasters to their advantage for years, from Tiananmen Square to Katrina to the I-35 bridge collapse. Whether you think it a call to arms or crackpot conspiracy theory, it’s one of the boldest and most talked-about books of the year.
Barnes & Noble, 2100 N. Snelling Ave., Roseville; 651-639-9256.
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All is Calm: The Christmas Truce of 1914
For the arts patron in search of a new holiday production: Consider the world premiere of All is Calm. Peripatetic director Peter Rothstein and his resident company, Theater Latté Da, have teamed up with the acclaimed men’s vocal group Cantus to stage this radio drama (which will be broadcast on Minnesota Public Radio). All is Calm tells the true story of a truce instigated by World War I soldiers on Christmas in 1914. Several years in the making, it consists almost entirely of found text from the veterans’ journals, letters, and official war documents, and incorporates an eclectic range of music, from World War I-era songs to traditional Christmas carols.
Westminster Presbyterian Church, December 21; Mount Calvary Lutheran
Church, December 22; St. Joan of Arc Catholic Church, December 23; 651-209-6689. -
Anton in Show Business
“The American theater’s in a shitload of trouble.” So reads the opening line in the latest offering from the small St. Paul-based troupe Starting Gate Productions. As both poison-pen letter and love note to the theater, this play is directed by a woman with no small opinions on the matter: Leah Cooper, former executive director of the Minnesota Fringe Festival. Anton depicts the chaos behind the scenes of a production of Chekhov’s Three Sisters. An all-female cast depicts everyone involved, from producers and actors to critics. Embedded within Jane Martin’s drama are countless meta-theater references; characters range from an Our Town-esque stage manager to audience members who just won’t shut up.
Mounds Theatre, 1029 Hudson Rd., St. Paul; 651-645-3503.
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Le Chat Noir: A French Cabaret
Minneapolis takes on shades of Paris for a week this fall, courtesy of Ballet of the Dolls.The company has been working its inventive and often wacky brand ofdance theater for twenty-one years now, most recently with a take onthe outer-space sex odyssey Barbarella. Artistic director andformer Parisian Myron Johnson choreographed this latest show as aseries of vignettes set to music both classic and funky—think along thelines of Erik Satie remixes. In true cabaret form, patrons are invitedto hiss, boo, and imbibe freely during the performance—and no twoperformances will be alike.
Ritz Theater, 345 Thirteenth Ave. N.E., Minneapolis; 612-436-1129; $15-$25.
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Shining City
Along with Sarah Ruhl (see here), Minneapolis is also conducting alove affair with Irish playwrights. There was Martin McDonagh’s The Pillowman at Frank Theatre in September and Brian Friel’s tragic The Home Place,currently on stage at the Guthrie; now the Jungle Theater adds to thebleak themes put forth by Irishmen with Conor McPherson’s Shining City. Billed as a “ghost story for the holidays,” it’s certainly no Christmas Carol.John is a widower who seeks therapy when he starts seeing his wife’sghost everywhere. But his own past, and that of his troubled therapist,prove to be more haunting. Uplifting? Maybe not. But arresting?Probably so. What’s more, the play is directed by local favorite JoelSass, who also quietly assumed the title of associate artistic directorat the Jungle this past year. Rumor has it he’s being groomed tosucceed founding artistic director Bain Boehlke.
Jungle Theater, 2951 Lyndale Ave. S., Minneapolis; 612-822-7063; $24-$46.
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Joe Sacco
The comic book has come a long way since Superman,with graphic novels now (rightfully) garnering literary cred andoccupying their own constantly expanding section at the local Barnes& Noble. But with his unique brand of “cartoon journalism,” Joe Sacco has put his influential stamp on the medium. When Sacco applies his “comic book” treatment to subjects like the occupation of Palestine,war in Bosnia, and the Gulf War, the results are superior works of bothart and reporting. Sacco conducts hundreds of interviews for his books,and tells these personal narratives with feverish mishmashes of framesthat are more evocative and harrowing than most front-page news photos.This month, as part of Walker’s Brave New Worlds political art series and the Rain Taxi reading series, he discusses his approach and inimitable artistic style.
7 p.m., Walker Art Center, 1750 Hennepin Ave., Minneapolis; 612-375-7600; $10 (members $8).
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Running Against Type
The idea of a footrace in North Minneapolis seems to inspire two reactions from residents of other neighborhoods: incredulity and concern. “Do you want to get mugged?” “Are you wearing a flak jacket?” And, of course, the simplest question: “Why?”
It is no secret that North Minneapolis has a reputation as one of the most dangerous places in the metropolitan area. Which is precisely what several local nonprofit organizations had in mind when they conceived the first annual Go! Northside 5K run, held a few weeks ago. A press announcement advertised that the course would be set in “one of the most blighted neighborhoods in Minneapolis, an area with high levels of crime and home foreclosures.” Not exactly typical terrain for a recreational road race. “A majority of our supporters are from the suburbs, and a lot of 5Ks are run out in the suburbs,” said Ryan Petersen, development director for Urban Homeworks, an affordable-housing organization that co-sponsored the race. “But then we figured we might as well do it in the neighborhood where we do most of our work.”
The neighborhood surrounding North Commons Park, where the race’s starting and finish lines were located, did not appear particularly blighted—to the contrary, it seemed quaint on the sleepy and quiet Saturday morning of race day. Then a local drum corps shattered the morning silence. Some runners bobbed to the beat. Others were less than enthusiastic. “Ugh,” said a fifty-ish man, checking his watch and adjusting his singlet. “Grandma’s [Marathon] has thousands of runners and even they manage to start on time. We’re gonna be ten minutes late here!”
The Go! Northside 5K drew more than two hundred participants—a modest but respectable draw for an inaugural race (though many wore T-shirts that identified them as members of teams from Urban Homeworks or the PEACE Foundation, two of the race’s sponsoring organizations). There was a 5K somewhere in the Twin Cities area every weekend this summer; why did runners choose this particular race? Certainly the cause of community-building in a beleaguered neighborhood was a worthy one, but also attached to it, as Petersen’s comment suggested, was the opportunity to see a place considered by many to be dangerous from the safety of a group of people, in a supervised setting.
Whatever drew the runners, spectators were scarce. Some might think that a largely white pack of runners passing through a predominantly non-white neighborhood, one whose streets probably never have been blocked off for a road race, would draw onlookers; however, the majority of them were actually race marshals: officials in blaze-orange vests who mark the route and assist injured runners. With one at each intersection, this made for a strangely deserted course.
The few other spectators were accidental—people out on their daily business as the runners trickled by. An elderly man stopped his lawnmower, pulling it back from the street so as to not spray the athletes with clippings. A man carrying groceries stopped and stared, greeting the runners’ waves and hellos with silence. A woman came outside in her robe and surveyed her car-free street as a handful of widely spaced runners passed. “There some sort of race today or something?” she called. “Yeah!” yelled a runner. “Wooo!” responded another.
At the finish line, the mood was more celebratory than competitive. Recreational runners congratulated each other on finishing, and race geeks joked about setting course records (an easy feat in a brand-new event). “Were you fast?” inquired a sinewy running veteran. “I was fast by thirty seconds. Must be a short racecourse.” Two women at the end of the chute were keeping track of the order of finishers, and trying to get a chattering mass of teenage runners, all wearing blue PEACE Foundation T-shirts, to move along. The kids paid no attention, hollering and adjusting their iPods. In many ways, the finish-line celebration had more of the feel of a company picnic. The Urban Homeworks team held its own awards ceremony, and members of all teams stayed on for an afternoon softball tournament.
Meanwhile, most of the runners packed up and left within an hour or two of the race’s end. Many returned to the suburbs (home to one-third of the morning’s runners, according to finish time listings) and still more to ritzier parts of the Cities (though the race did attract runners from such exotic locales as Texas, California, and North Dakota). The Go! Northside run doesn’t seem likely to spark a trend for road races on the North Side. But at least a few people got to see a hitherto unfamiliar part of town. “You know,” said a south Minneapolitan, taking in his new surroundings, “I suppose I had never really been up here before.”
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The Deception
Its 2006-07 season was chock full of chestnuts, but now, finally, Theatre de la Jeune Lune opens its new season with an original production. The Deception is an adaptation of Pierre de Marivaux’s La Fausse Suivante, a dark eighteenth-century French comedy in which a young woman disguises herself as a man so that she can better learn about her new love. On discovering his true nature, scheming, lying, and hilarity ensue. Adapted by artistic director Dominique Serrand and longtime collaborator/acting ace Steve Epp, The Deception premiered in California this summer to positive reviews, so count on classic Jeune Lune fare: a bold, stylish adaptation rendered with vigorously physical performances.
Theatre de la Jeune Lune, 105 N. First St., Minneapolis; 612-333-6200.