To celebrate the publication of his labor of love/ oral history, The Replacements: All Over But the Shouting, longtime Twin Cities music critic and columnist Jim Walsh will be undertaking his own blitzkrieg, book-tour version of the Mats’ legendary ’85 five-night stand at the Entry. In the course of one week you’ll have a bunch … Read more
In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, displaced Big Easy journalist Tisserand, the former editor of the estimable Gambit Weekly, has produced a truly inspiring and moving testament to the power of perseverance in the face of unimaginable exile. Sugarcane Academy: How a New Orleans Teacher and His Storm-Struck Students Created a School to Remember is … Read more
This ’71 film could simply be described as an homage to guys behind the wheel. James Taylor plays the Driver. The Beach Boys’ Dennis Wilson is the Mechanic. Laurie Bird is the Girl. Together, they motor along Route 66 in their ’55 Chevy. Along the way they meet Warren Oates’s GTO and begin to race—with … Read more
Director Noah Baumbach’s follow-up to his magnificent The Squid and the Whale, Margot at the Wedding looks to be yet another biting examination of family. Here, the acid-tongued title character (Nicole Kidman, whose legacy desperately needs shoring up) visits her sister (Jennifer Jason Leigh—she also could stand a modest hit), who is about to be … Read more
“This was something that a human hadn’t yet attempted to do … there was considerable doubt if a human could take it.” “This” was the 1968 Sunday Times Golden Globe Race, when the British newspaper dared any single person to circumnavigate the globe in a yacht. The five-thousand pound purse lured eight professional sailors and … Read more
After buying the rights in 2005, Sony Pictures apparently didn’t know what to do with this blue-collar musical, and left the film to rot on its shelves for the last two years. Two years later, director John Turturro wrestled back the rights from the studio and is distributing it on his own dime. Romance and … Read more
After World War II, when most U.S. businesses emphasized hiring male war veterans, Hormel Foods hatched an unusual plan to employ women. Of course, these women tended to be less needy than attractive—not to mention talented. In fact, from 1947–53, a troupe of sixty female employees from the Austin-based company, known simply as the “Hormel … Read more
It’s a big month for Zenon Dance Company. For one, they hop aboard the holiday treadmill with their premiere of The Nutcracker According to Mother Goose on December 15. But the company’s signature aesthetic—athleticism and precision, not to mention sophisticated musical tastes—will be better displayed a couple of weeks earlier, at its twenty-fifth anniversary program. … Read more
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 … Read more
“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 … Read more