Exhibit of the Week
10.31.07
1. Big Bon Bhutan magic at the Rubin
3. New York Comedy Festival yuks things up
4. Socially conscious film festivals all over town
Volume 7, Number 22
October 31 — November 14, 2007
Look for our new weekly column, now available at www.TimesSquare.com!
Send all comments, suggestions, reviews, and questions to Mark Rifkin
at admin@twi-ny.com.
If you forward any part of this guide to someone who has not subscribed, please be sure to attach the following line: To subscribe to this list,
which includes e-mail-only bonuses twice a month, please e-mail the administrator at admin@twi-ny.com with the word Subscribe in the Subject line. We at twi-ny thank you.
Site Design/Subway Photo:
Fred Gates Design, New York.
Brooklynites climb the walls at Brooklyn Industries in Chelsea (photo by twi-ny/mdr)
Rubin Museum of Art, fourth & fifth floors
150 West 17th St. at Seventh Ave.
Through April 14
Closed Tuesday
Admission: $10 (free Friday nights from 7:00 — 10:00)
212-620-5000
Rubin Museum of Art
Peaceful/Wrathful Deities (Shitro), Tibet, 18th/19th century, pigments on cloth
The first-ever exhibition of Bon art, “Bon: the Magic Word” could just as easily been called “Bon: the Magic World.” Little is still known about this ancient religion, which predates Tibetan Buddhism and is actually still alive today, with maybe as many as two million adherents in Tibet, India, Bhutan, and other parts of the Himalayan region. Covering the top two floors of the Rubin Museum, “Bon: the Magic Word” is a revelation. Although at quick glance the art of the Bonpo is remarkably similar to that of Tibetan Bhuddism, it is fascinatingly different in the details. Its central figure is Tonpa Shenrab, who takes the place of honor at the center of many of the pigment-on-cloth paintings, much like Shakyamuni does in Tibetan works. But the symbols are different, from the hand gestures to the animals depicted to the number of attendants to the inclusion of the yungdrung scepter and the repeated use of the swastika image; many of the paintings also feature text on the front (as well as on the back). Bon art, though often made by the same artists who created Buddhist painting and sculpture, is less symmetrical, and of course it tells the unique and undocumented story of the Bon, Tonpa Shenrab, and his mystical homeland, Olmo Lungring. One particular nineteenth-century Tibetan work, “Homeland of Tonpa Shenab, Olmo Lungring,” is filled with narrative detail and symbolism; be sure to pick up one of the Rubin’s magnifying glasses and get lost in its wonderment.
Rubin Museum of Art
Nagaraja, Tibet, gilt copper alloy; repoussé, ca. 14th century
Other important deities and figures of Bon myth who come alive in tangkas and gorgeous metal sculptures include the Goddess of the Road (Lamlha); Meri, Mountain of Fire of Shanshung, whose head is surrounded by a canopy of flames; the Tathagata Vajrasattva, the mystical revealer; Dralha Yesi Gyalpo, the King of Primeval Existence; and the Mountain God of Amdo, Machen Pomra. Among cosmogony depicted are the thirty-three Bon ritual experts, the Five Gods of the Five Sciences, and the Five Gods of the Head. Many of these pieces feature numerous circles, painted over the main image, that contain individual figures laden with meaning. And don’t miss the colorful modern-day thread-cross constructions, known as namka, on the main floor. The exhibit is supplemented by an outstanding catalog that includes several essays, reproductions of the works, a glossary and pronunciation guide, and a foreword by museum cofounder Donald Rubin. This magnificent look inside the world of the Bon is magical indeed.
Collection of Kenro Izu, Druk # 131
Kenro Izu, Taksang Monastery, Paro, Bhutan, platinum/palladium print on watercolor, 2003
Rubin Museum of Art, third floor
150 West 17th St. at Seventh Ave.
Through February 18
Closed Tuesday
Admission: $10 (free Friday nights from 7:00 — 10:00)
212-620-5000
Brooklyn-based photographer Kenro Izu, who was born and raised in Osaka, Japan, completes his trilogy of sacred-landscape-related works with “Bhutan, the Sacred Within,” a stunning collection of more than thirty of his hand-printed platinum photographs taken during his trips to Bhutan from 2002 to 2007, using a special custom-made three-hundred-pound camera that makes prints that Izu then hand brushes over. Capturing the uplifting spirit of the culture, Izu was fascinated by both the people and the location. “Traveling many years,” he writes, “I have not yet seen a place as peaceful as Bhutan, or a place that affects such peacefulness within me.” (The display also includes excerpts from his journal.) In his last few visits to Bhutan, Izu turned his camera onto men, women, and children for the first time in his career, deciding that what is sacred comes from the heart of a population, not from the structures themselves. His inexperience with the genre, combined with his subjects’ unfamiliarity with how to pose for a picture (and lack of innate self-consciousness), results in remarkable studies of monks, nuns, reincarnated Rinpoches, masked (and unmasked) dancers, and young boys and girls that fabulously reveal a community whose Gross National Product is frighteningly low but whose Gross National Happiness is intoxicating. Izu has also caught them on what might be the precipice to change, with the first-ever elections to be held there next year and the outside world quickly discovering what a magical place it is. “I can’t help fear for its delicate fragility,” he opines, “which may easily dissolve into surrounding clouds and fog.” Izu is clearly affected by his subject matter; after traveling through the Angkor monuments in 1995, he started the nonprofit organization Friends Without a Border, which helps provide medical care to Cambodian children in need.
Saturday, November 3 PhotoTalk: Kenro Izu and Owen Flanagan on the Sacred Within, introduced by Miles Barth, $15, 4:00
Monday, November 12 PhotoTalk — Across the Tibetan Plateau: Wildlife, Ecosystems, and Conservation, with Robert L. Fleming Jr., with opening comments by Bill McKibben, $75 (includes signed first edition print of "Across the Tibetan Plateau,", 6:00
Rubin Museum of Art
Louise Bourgeois, Untitled, digital print, 2004
Rubin Museum of Art, theater
150 West 17th St. at Seventh Ave.
Through February 11
Closed Tuesday
Admission: $10 (free Friday nights from 7:00 — 10:00)
212-620-5000
To celebrate the opening of the Rubin Museum of Art on October 2, 2004, Kiki Smith and Arlene Schechet invited 120 fellow contemporary artists to create prayer flags, or dar cho, for the event. Their art is now on display downstairs at the Rubin. Filled with color and symbolism, Tibetan prayer flags most likely date back to the Bon civilization. “The rituals associated with prayer flags are intended to increase good things and prevent or suppress bad things,” Katherine Anne Paul writes in the excellent catalog that accompanies the exhibition. The works on view feature bright colors, depictions of people and animals, text, Buddhas, abstract shapes, flowers, repeated geometric patterns, and photographs. Robert Alter’s “Apartment Building Series” is a slightly skewed photo of an apartment complex with dozens of windows. Fredericka Foster’s “Tears of Avalokiteshvara” shows gentle ocean waves. Robert Wilson repeats the word “There” on a black background. The figure in Luisa Rabbia’s “Homeless” has a plant growing where the head should be. Peter Max’s prayer flag consists of a playful version of the American flag. Though not necessarily “Tibetan” in execution, each flag evokes peace, life, emotion. The catalog also includes a preface by Simon Winchester, who writes about the history of flags — “devices more often associated with war and conquest, patriotism and chauvinism,” he notes while also pointing out that they are also “all about offering hope for the spreading of goodness.”
Rubin Museum of Art
Shiva Vishavarupa, Universal Form with Consort, Nepal, pigment on cloth,
mid-19th century
Rubin Museum of Art, sixth floor
150 West 17th St. at Seventh Ave.
Through March 3
Closed Tuesday
Admission: $10 (free Friday nights from 7:00 — 10:00)
212-620-5000
Reaching into its rich collection, the Rubin is presenting “Big!” an exhibition that features more than thirty of its larger-themed works, including photographs, tangkas, textiles, sculptures, and murals. One of the most exciting pieces is Nancy Jo Johnson’s photo of an enormous tangka being unfurled down a mountain, but our favorite just might be “Shiva Vishavarupa, Universal with Consort,” a mid-nineteenth-century painting of a Hindu deity balancing dozens of heads on his shoulders — be sure not to miss what he is standing on as well. Other highlights include a trio of paintings depicting Padmasambhava and artist-in-residence Pema Rinzin’s fab mural of the Four Great Kings.
A K2 Lounger looks forward to seeing Chris Marker’s LA JETEE
Rubin Museum of Art
150 West 17th St. at Seventh Ave.
Friday nights from 7:00 to 10:00; includes free admission to galleries
212-620-5000 ext 344
One of the most happening places to be on Friday nights is the Rubin Museum of Art. There’s free admission to the galleries starting at 7:00, live music, art talks, film screenings, book signings, and plenty of food and drink in the lounge, which features DJ sounds as well.
Friday, November 2 Book signing: Kenro Izu, BHUTAN: THE SACRED WITHIN, 6:30
Friday, November 2 Harlem in the Himalayas: The Jazz Museum in Harlem All Stars, $20, 7:00
Friday, November 2 Book signing: Thomas Cahill, THE HINGES OF HISTORY, 9:00
Friday, November 2 CabaretCinema: LA JETÉE (Chris Marker, 1966), introduced by Thomas Cahill, free with seven-dollar bar minimum, 9:30
Friday, November 9 Harlem in the Himalayas: Frank Kimbrough, $15, 7:00
Friday, November 9 Talkingstick at RMA, 8:30
Friday, November 9 Book signing: Thomas Cahill, THE HINGES OF HISTORY, 9:00
Friday, November 9 CabaretCinema: THE SEVENTH SEAL (Ingmar Bergman, 1957), introduced by Thomas Cahill, free with seven-dollar bar minimum, 9:30
Friday, November 16 Book signing: Thomas Cahill, THE HINGES OF HISTORY, 9:00
Friday, November 16 CabaretCinema: THE NIGHTS OF CABIRIA (Federico Fellini, 1957), introduced by Thomas Cahill, free with seven-dollar bar minimum, 9:30
Friday, November 16 Naked Soul: Jonatha Brooke, introduced by Corny O’Connell, $40-$45
Friday, November 23 CabaretCinema: SANSHO THE BAILIFF (Kenji Mizoguchi, 1954), introduced by Thomas Cahill, free with seven-dollar bar minimum, 8:00
Friday, November 30 Book launch: Melba Levick, INDIA SUBLIME, 6:00
Friday, November 30 The Interfaith Experience, 7:00
Friday, November 30 Naked Soul: Paula Cole, $45-$50, 7:00
Friday, November 30 Book signing: Thomas Cahill, THE HINGES OF HISTORY, 9:00
Friday, November 30 CabaretCinema: TOM JONES (Tony Richardson, 1963), introduced by Thomas Cahill, free with seven-dollar bar minimum, 9:30
twi-ny/mdr
Store brings Brooklyn to Chelsea in more ways than one
Brooklyn Industries Chelsea
161 Eighth Ave. at 18th St.
Admission: free
212-206-0477
http://www.powerhousebooks.com
http://www.brooklynindustries.com
Artists Lexy Funk and Vahap Avsar came to New York City in 1995 with dreams of success, but they never thought that twelve years later they’d own a local chain of eight stores that sell bags and clothing. (It all began when they found a vinyl billboard in the garbage and turned it into a handbag.) Their Brooklyn skyline logo, drawn by Avsar, has come to represent their dedication to thinking globally, acting locally. The first store opened on Bedford Ave. in 2001; the Chelsea location opened last year, carefully constructed with the four Rs in mind: recycle, reuse, repair, and reduce. Combining art and clothing, the Eighth Ave. store is currently hosting an exhibit featuring works from THE BROOKLYNITES by Seth Kushner and Anthony LaSala (powerHouse Books, September 2007, $35). Photographer Kushner and writer LaSala made their way across the great borough of Brooklyn, taking pictures and talking to some of the fabulous characters that give our birthplace its well-deserved reputation. (As we’ve said before, there are only two types of people in the world: Those who were born in Brooklyn and those who wish they were.) Among the Brooklynites you’ll find hanging on the walls, on shelves, on fitting-room doors, and on display tables are Spike Lee, Steve Buscemi, Marty Markowitz, Matisyahu, and other famous and not-so-well-known men and women who help make Brooklyn a place like no other. There’s also a flat-screen monitor by the register that shows behind-the-scenes footage of Kushner and LaSala’s travels.
twi-ny/mdr
Better Burger goes all-natural in Chelsea
178 Eighth Ave. at 18th St.
Open till 11:00/11:30 pm every night
212-989-6688
http://www.betterburgernyc.com
After experiencing the fascinating, soothing exhibits at the Rubin Museum and shopping at the environmentally conscious and sustainable Brooklyn Industries store, you can continue your peaceful Chelsea adventure by settling in for a bite at Better Burger, which uses organic ingredients that are free of antibiotics, hormones, nitrates, fillers, and preservatives — and even features karma ketchup (among other condiments). One of three locations (the others are in Murray Hill and Hell’s Kitchen), the Chelsea spot includes counters that look out onto Eighth Ave. and Eighteenth St., which can be quite entertaining as you down your air-baked French fries and all-natural chicken, ostrich, beef, turkey, soy, or veggie burgers. There are also beef, turkey, and soy hot dogs, veggie chili, salads, mango lemonade, smoothies, and orange-plate specials borrowed from their parent restaurant, Josie’s. We also like the soft chocolate-chip cookie, which is made with organic wheat, cane sugar, chocolate chips, silken tofu, and other natural ingredients. However, Better Burger can be pricey — a half-pound bacon cheeseburger with fries, a drink, and a cookie can run you close to twenty bucks — and it’s not really meant for the burger connoisseur.
twi-ny/mdr
Leo Villareal’s “Stars” light up BAM’s 1908 facade
Brooklyn Academy of Music
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
Music: Howard Gilman Opera House
Film: BAM Rose Cinemas
Tickets: $15-$20
718-636-4100
The Brooklyn Academy of Music is one of the city’s most innovative institutions, featuring an eclectic mix of film, theater, dance, music, and art. On Saturday, November 3, they are staging Takeover, an all-night open house with live performances by Antibalas, Be Your Own Pet, the Exit, Heartless Bastards, and Dirty On Purpose; a Lindsay Lohan Mid-Career Retrospective and the violent, edgy cult favorite the Pusher Trilogy by Danish filmmaker Nicolas Winding Refn; dancing and DJ sets from Ubiquita NYC; and art installations throughout the building, taking place at BAM’s Howard Gilman Opera House from 9:00 pm to 4:00 am. It’s a wonderful way to get just the merest flavor of what BAM is all about. Below is the complete schedule, in addition to several upcoming events that are part of BAM’s twenty-fifth annual Next Wave Festival.
Saturday, November 3 Live performances by Heartless Bastards, Be Your Own Pet, Dirty on Purpose, the Exit, and Antibalas
Saturday, November 3 DJs and Dancing, with DJ Reborn, DJ Moni, and DJ Selly, aka the Ladies of Ubiquita NYC, BAMcafé
Saturday, November 3 Art installations by Mighty Robot A/V Squad, Neal Wilkinson of the Uncertainty Principle, Dustin O’Neill of the Fountainhead Design, Jean Shin, and Leo Villareal
Saturday, November 3 Lindsay Lohan Mid-Career Retrospective: FREAKY FRIDAY (Mark Waters 2003), 9:15 pm
Saturday, November 3 Lindsay Lohan Mid-Career Retrospective: I KNOW WHO KILLED ME (Chris Sivertson 2007), 12:35 am
Saturday, November 3 Lindsay Lohan Mid-Career Retrospective: MEAN GIRLS (Mark Waters 2004), 10:55 pm
Saturday, November 3 Lindsay Lohan Mid-Career Retrospective: THE PARENT TRAP (Nancy Meyers 1998), 2:25 am
Saturday, November 3 When Animals Hug: Cubs, Dog Baseball, and More, with animal trailers and videos by Jonas Mekas, DOG BASEBALL by William Wegman, KITTY PORN by George Kuchar, and YELLOWSTONE CUBS by Charles L. Draper, 9:15 pm
Saturday, November 3 When Animals Hug: Experimental & Educational Animal Film Program, including DOG SHOW by Jerry Bloedow & Rollie McKenna, PASHT by Stan Brakhage, UNSERE AFRIKARESE by Peter Kubelka, CHIMP THE AVIATOR by Castle Films, and the educational shorts MOTHER CAT AND HER BABY SKUNKS and CATS, 1:00 am
Saturday, November 3 When Animals Hug: THE CAT FROM OUTER SPACE (Norman Toker) and THE VAMPIRE (Jean Painleve), 11:00 pm
Saturday, November 3 When Animals Hug: World Without Sun (Jacques Cousteau), animal trailers, and HICKORY HILL (Richard Leacock & George Plimpton), 2:10 am
Saturday, November 3 Burning Down the House: GIMME SHELTER (David Maysles, Albert Maysles 1970), 9:20 pm
Saturday, November 3 Burning Down the House: STOP MAKING SENSE (Jonathan Demme, 1984), 12:40 am
Saturday, November 3 Burning Down the House: ZIGGY STARDUST AND THE SPIDERS FROM MARS (D.A. Pennebaker 1973), 11:00 pm
Saturday, November 3 Burning Down the House: THE FILTH AND THE FURY (Julien Temple 2000), 2:15 am
Saturday, November 3 Stay in Your Seats: PUSHER (Nicolas Winding Refn, 1996), 10:00 pm
Saturday, November 3 Stay in Your Seats: PUSHER II: WITH BLOOD ON MY HANDS (Nicolas Winding Refn, 2004), 12 midnight
Saturday, November 3 Stay in Your Seats: PUSHER III: I’M THE ANGEL OF DEATH (Nicolas Winding Refn, 2005), 2:00 am
The PUSHER trilogy takes over BAM Rose Cinemas — along with Lindsay Lohan
http://www.pusherthemovie.co.uk
Danish filmmaker Nicolas Winding Refn’s PUSHER trilogy is a gritty, violent, brutal, and brilliant look at the devastation wrought by drugs. In PUSHER (1996), Kim Bodnia stars as Frank, a small-time hood who loses both the money and the drugs when a deal goes bad. Over the course of a week, he grows more and more desperate as druglord Milo (Zlatko Buric) and his henchman, Radovan (Slavko Labovic), grow more and more impatient, preparing to do some serious damage to Frank. PUSHER II: WITH BLOOD ON MY HANDS focuses on Tonny (Mads Mikkelsen), Frank’s former partner who has just been released from prison. Addled by a beating he took, Tonny gets lost in a drug haze, trying to prove himself a worthy criminal to his big-time father, the Duke (Leif Sylvester Petersen), while also refusing to accept that he might be the father of Charlotte’s (Anne Sorensen) child. With the whole world crashing in on him, Tonny goes to extreme measures that affect everybody in his sphere. The gritty, powerful trilogy concludes with Refn’s masterwork, PUSHER III: I’M THE ANGEL OF DEATH, this time with Milo in the forefront. While preparing for his daughter’s (Marinela Dekic) twenty-fifth birthday party, he discovers that a major score has changed significantly, and he is forced to deal directly with a new generation of drug dealers — and by himself, because his cooking has made his crew sick. Shuttling between the ever-worsening situation, NA meetings, and his daughter’s party, Milo is faced with some deadly choices. Buric is spectacular as the aging druglord who does not like what he sees as he takes stock of his life. While the first two films feature hard-driving punk music, classical music slows things down in the far more contemplative conclusion. To add to the remarkable realism, many of the supporting actors were actual criminals. The grand finale is unforgettable, a multilayered, deeply philosophical, and extremely violent statement on the nature of drugs and the men and women addicted to that life.
Alex Escalante
John Jasperse’s MISUSE gets all tied up at BAM
BAM Harvey Theater
651 Fulton Street between Ashland Pl. & Rockwell Pl.
October 31 - November 3 (11/2 performance reviewed below)
Tickets: $20-$45
718-636-4100
Manhattan-based choreographer John Jasperse begins his latest piece, the evening-length work MISUSE LIABLE TO PROSECUTION (commissioned specifically for the twenty-fifth Next Wave Festival), by emerging from a tangled web of orange cord and sharing with the audience a litany of statistics and comparisons concerning money, production costs, arts salaries, and success — including his own annual income — read through a traffic cone used as a megaphone. For the next hour-plus, Jasperse and four dancers — Michelle Boulé, Levi Gonzalez, Eleanor Hullihan, and Kayvon Pourazar — incorporate such found, borrowed, and stolen objects as plastic water bottles, a cardboard box, a dark sheet, milk crates, an air mattress, and other items, reappropriating them from their intended use in a creative dance that is as entertaining as it is environmentally friendly. One of the most exhilarating moments occurs when the dancers throw a beanbag chair against one another, then lay it out on the floor as they fall into it and roll over it. Even the company’s outfits are made of recycled bags and packages. Live and prerecorded music is supplied by harpist and electronic-music master Zeena Parkins onstage and David Watson and Matthew Welch playing bagpipes and other instruments from the side mezzanine; prerecorded music, often involving found materials as well, was composed by turntablist Christian Marclay, Jim Pugliese on household objects, and Ikue Mori on laptop. Joe Levasseur’s lights are set amid hundreds of hanging plastic hangers. Slight but involving, MISUSE is, in its own way — and we mean this favorably — trashy fun.
Courtesy of the artist / Victoria Miro Gallery / Metro Pictures
CAST NO SHADOW features Isaac Julien’s evocative photography
BAM Harvey Theater
651 Fulton Street between Ashland Pl. & Rockwell Pl.
November 6 - 10
Tickets: $20-$45
718-636-4100
Turner Prize nominee Isaac Julien creates multiscreen cinematic installations in which he plays with perception and time and space, resulting in a sort of dance across the screens. Julien takes the next step into actual dance performance with CAST NO SHADOW, a mesmerizing three-part collaboration with choreographer Russell Maliphant dealing with actual and spiritual journeys. In “True North,” Vanessa Myrie, representing little-known black North Pole explorer Matthew Henson, walks through a barren landscape of icebergs and waterfalls projected across three screens. Meanwhile, Alexander Varona, Kyoung-Shin Kim, and Riccardo Meneghini dance in front of and behind the screens, their silhouetted figures at times becoming part of the film even as Myrie herself walks across the stage, emerging into the real world. The second part, the film-only “Fantome Afrique,” takes place in Burkina Faso and Namibia, depicting a mix of modern and indigenous cultures that features Myrie as the omniscient observer and Stephen Galloway as a dancing phantom.
The third section, “Small Boats,” brings everything together in captivating ways. The film is projected onto one huge scrim covering the length of the front of the stage, fading into and out of opacity. Varona, Kim, Meneghini, Daniel Proietto, Juliette Barton, and Saiko Kino dance behind it, sometimes barely visible, sometimes vividly clear, as they expand upon the onscreen images, which contrast poor blacks escaping North Africa in unsafe boats, seeking a new life in Europe, with wealthy white families vacationing at a Sicilian resort. Myrie is back again, in scenes where she watches as a dead traveler is carried through the elegant Sicilian palace made famous in Luchino Visconti’s THE LEOPARD. As a dancer falls down stairs on film, Michael Hulls’s lighting design creates steps on the stage, where the same dancer seems to be falling downward in similar movements. Later, as people onscreen are drowning in the sea, dancers are supported in midair by a net behind the screen, seemingly drowning as well. Avant-garde electronic sounds generated by composers Paul Schütze (“True North”) and Andy Cowton (“Fantome Afrique” and “Small Boats”) propel Julien’s abstract narrative and Maliphant’s very physical choreography. A free post-show BAMdialogue with Julien and Maliphant will take place on November 8. In conjunction with this Performa 07 presentation, Julien’s complete five-screen “Western Union: Small Boats” can be seen at Metro Pictures gallery in Chelsea (519 West 24th St.) through November 17.
Gadi Dagon
Israeli troupe will dance in Brooklyn
BAM Howard Gilman Opera House
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
November 13 - 17
Tickets: $20-$55
718-636-4100
Ohad Naharin’s much-celebrated Batsheva Dance Company returns to BAM with this three-part work featuring sound design by Ohad Fishof, lighting design by Avi-Yona Bueno, costume design by Rakefet Levy, and music by J. S. Bach, Brian Eno, Chari Chari, Kid 606 + Rayon, AGF, Fennesz, Kaho Naa, Pyar Hai, Seefeel, and the Beach Boys, all crammed into about seventy minutes. There will be a free post-show BAMdialogue with Naharin on November 15.
twi-ny/mdr
Yu-Sheng Ho paints a Harvey wall with light
In conjunction with the Next Wave Festival, BAM is also presenting Next Wave Art. At the Harvey, it’s worth seeking out James Esber’s colorful, distorted “Songbird” and “Soldierboy” paintings on Sintra, and be sure to linger by Yu-Sheng Ho’s mesmerizing “Yesterday, Tomorrow” and “White Painting” video installations. In the latter, white paint is slowly brushed over a black surface, as if the wall itself is being covered. In the former, day turns into night and vice versa in a video projection onto a surfaced canvas depicting a small room. Over at the Howard Gilman Opera House, Jean Shin’s “Sound Wave” creates a rising tide out of recycled vinyl records, and Leo Villareal’s “Stars” lights up the building’s facade in a sparkling LED display.
Brooklyn Academy of Music Opera House Café
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
No cover, no minimum
718-636-4100
http://www.bam.org/events/bamcafelive.aspx
Friday, November 2 Tonolec, 10:00
Friday, November 9 Chanda Rule, 9:00
Saturday, November 10 Brasil Guitar Duo, 9:00
Friday, November 16 BAM Jam: The Maria Project, 9:00
Friday, November 23 Funk Buddha Hip-Hop Holiday: Zimbabwe Legit, 9:00
Saturday, November 24 Funk Buddha Hip-Hop Holiday: Urban Tea Ceremony, 9:00
Friday, November 30 Olu, 9:00
Patrick Stewart brings MACBETH to BAM this spring
Brooklyn Academy of Music
January 8 – May 26
Tickets: $20-$90
718-636-4100
http://bam.org/events/springseason.aspx
The Brooklyn Academy of Music follows up its twenty-fifth Next Wave Festival with another diverse spring season, opening January 8 with Fiona Shaw starring in Samuel Beckett’s HAPPY DAYS (running through February 2), with Deborah Warner directing the National Theatre of Great Britain. Warner and Shaw previously teamed up for MEDEA at BAM five years ago. Sir Ian McKellen recently starred at BAM in KING LEAR; next up is Patrick Stewart tackling MACBETH (February 12 - March 22) in a three-hour production directed by Rupert Goold. The theatrics continue April 9-19 with the Baxter Theatre Centre’s production of the politically charged seminal 1972 South African play SIZWE BANZI IS DEAD, by Athol Fugard, John Kani, and Winston Ntshona. Things are not quite as serious in Domenico Cimarosa’s playful opera IL MATRIMONIO SEGRETO (May 28 - June 4), directed by Jonathan Miller and with music by the Brooklyn Philharmonic.
twi-ny/mdr
Mavis Staples comes to the Howard Gilman Opera House on January 22
A quartet of concerts displays BAM’s eclectic tastes. On January 22, legendary soul singer Mavis Staples will play the Howard Gilman Opera House, and Brooklyn Next will show off three local bands whose impact is spreading outside their home borough: Soulive (February 15), Citizen Cope (February 16), and the National (February 22).
Every BAM season includes innovative dance performances. This spring, Nina Ananiashvili and the State Ballet of Georgia come to Brooklyn with Bolshoi ballet principal Andrei Uvarov and the orchestra of the Tbilisi Theatre of Opera and Ballet (February 27 - March 1). Grupo Corpo delighted audiences with “21” and O CORPO in 2002 and LECUONA and ONQOTO in 2005; the Brazilian troupe is back with BENGUELÊ and BREU (March 25-29), two dances choreographed by Rodrigo Pederneiras. One of our favorite weekends of the year is DanceAfrica, when BAM turns its Fort Greene neighborhood into an all-out festival of African culture. Led by artistic director Chuck Davis, this year’s party (May 23-26) celebrates the 125th anniversary of the Brooklyn Bridge as a “bridge to cultural rejuvenation & enlightenment,” with performances by troupes from Africa and the diaspora. The season concludes with the return of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, their first appearance at BAM in more than a quarter century. Presented by the Joyce, the performance will include two programs, Classic Ailey (Ailey’s MASEKELA LANGAGE and REVELATIONS) and Best Of (Camille A. Brown’s THE GROOVE TO NOBODY’S BUSINESS and selections from the troupe’s repertory).
Richard Termine
Baba Chuck Davis will welcome all to honor cultural bridges at DanceAfrica 2008
BAM is surprisingly affordable, with tickets for every event starting at $20-$30. Individual seats go on sale to the general public January 2 (December 3 for the January shows), but subscription tickets are available beginning November 5, with a twenty-percent discount for four or more shows. It’s probably worth getting a subscription just to make sure you get to see Stewart as Macbeth, but there’s a lot of other great stuff to choose from as well.
Louis CK will chew things up at Town Hall on November 8
Multiple venues
November 6-11
http://www.nycomedyfestival.com
It’s time to laugh it up all around the city with the New York Comedy Festival, taking place at such venues as Town Hall, Carolines, Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, the 92nd St. Y, and the Beacon. This year includes benefits for the homeless, Scleroderma, and the Bob Woodruff Family Fund, the last featuring performances by Lewis Black, Robin Williams, and Bruce Springsteen. Also holding court with their stand-up routines will be the hysterical Louis CK, the riotous Sarah Silverman, the politically minded Andy Borowitz and Bill Maher, and the wild and crazy Mario Cantone as well as Denis Leary, Charlie Murphy, Damon Wayans, Artie Lange, and D. L. Hughley, making for quite an all-star lineup. And on November 10, SCRUBS’ Farewell Tour shows up at the Paley Center, with much of the cast on hand to celebrate what is likely to be their final season.
Tuesday, November 6 Cool Comedy — Hot Cuisine: An Evening to Benefit the Scleroderma Research Foundation, hosted by Bob Saget and Caryn & Jeff Zucker, with Jimmy Fallon, Gilbert Gottfried, and Robin Williams and Latin-American-themed food by celebrity chefs Susan Feniger and Mary Sue Milliken, Carolines on Broadway, 6:00
Tuesday, November 6 Opening Night: Rosie O’Donnell, Rosie Live at Lincoln Center with Special Guests, Avery Fisher Hall, benefiting Rosie’s Broadway Kids, $45-$85, 8:00
Wednesday, November 7 Comedy Cares for the Homeless, with special guests Joy Behar, Susie Essman, and Kathleen Madigan, Carolines on Broadway, $200 and up, 6:00
Wednesday, November 7 Stand Up for Heroes: A Benefit for the Bob Woodruff Family Fund, hosted by Conan O’Brien, with special guests Lewis Black, Bruce Springsteen, and Robin Williams, Town Hall, 8:00
Wednesday, November 7 Sarah Silverman with special guests Todd Barry and Doug Benson, Carnegie Hall, $33.50-$67.50, 8:00
Wednesday, November 7 Andy Borowitz Countdown to ’08: Only 363 Days Left, with special guests Alec Baldwin, Arianna Huffington, and Mo Rocca, 92nd Street Y, $26, 8:00
Thursday, November 8 Stand Up for Diversity, Carolines on Broadway, auditions begin at 10:00 am, showcase at 7:00 pm
Thursday, November 8 Louis CK Chewed Up, Town Hall, $30-$35, 8:00
Thursday, November 8 Denis Leary and Friends, with special guests Jim Jeffries, Robert Kelly, Mike Birbiglia, Adam Ferrara, and others, Beacon Theatre, $39-$84, 8:00
Thursday, November 8 Mario Cantone, Carolines on Broadway, $38, 7:30
Sarah Silverman will host Carnegie Hall event November 7
Thursday, November 8 John Pinette, Carolines on Broadway, $32.75, 9:30
Friday, November 9 Fun Facts, Floaters, Top Tens, and Stupid Humans: The Writers of THE LATE SHOW WITH DAVID LETTERMAN, with Justin and Eric Stangel and moderator Bill Scheft, Paley Center for Media, $10-$25, 5:30
Friday, November 9 MySpace Secret Stand Up presents Jim Norton, Carolines on Broadway, free with printout of your MySpace profile (donations will benefit Hope for the Warriors), 7:00
Friday, November 9 Artie Lange Fully Loaded, Town Hall, $37.50-$57.50, 8:00
Friday, November 9 Damon Wayans Live in Concert, Beacon Theatre, $39.50-$66.50, 8:00
Friday, November 9 Time Out Approved, hosted by Jane Borden, Upright Citizens Brigade Theater, $10, 8:00
Friday, November 9 The Longest Sketch Show Ever, Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre, $20, Friday at 10:00 pm through Saturday at 10:00 pm
Friday, November 9
and
Saturday, November 10 Charlie Murphy, Carolines on Broadway, $40.75, 8:00 & 10:30
Friday, November 9
and
Saturday, November 10 Chicken & Waffles, starring Paul Mooney and hosted by Ed Lover, Carolines on Broadway, $32.75, 12:30 am
Saturday, November 10 SCRUBS: The Farewell Tour, with special guests Zach Braff, Sarah Chalke, Donald Faison, Judy Reyes, Ken Jenkins, Neil Flynn, and executive producer/creator Bill Lawrence, Paley Center for Media, 3:30
Saturday, November 10 An Evening with Bill Maher, Beacon Theatre, $49-$79, 7:30
Saturday, November 10 DL Hughley Unapologetic, Town Hall, $35-$42.50, 8:00
Sunday, November 11 Artie Lange Fully Loaded, Avery Fisher Hall, $35-$65, 7:00
Sunday, November 11 Mario Cantone, Carolines on Broadway, $38, 7:30
Sunday, November 11 ASSSCAT, with Matt Bresser, Amy Poehler, Ian Roberts, and Matt Walsh, Irving Plaza, $20, 9:00
Sunday, November 11 John Pinette, Carolines on Broadway, $32.75, 9:30
Dengue Fever takes its music to the Mekong in documentary
American Museum of Natural History
Kaufmann Theater (KT) / Linder Theater (LT) / LeFrak Theater (LFT) / Leonhardt People Center (LPC)
November 9-11
Tickets: $10
Friend of the Festival: $75 (opening night plus six other screenings)
212-769-5305
November features a number of film festivals that explore the current state of society around the world, screening works that are meant to educate, exasperate, and energize. The thirty-first annual Margaret Mead Film & Video Festival at the American Museum of Natural History includes documentaries that examine such subjects as global warming, autism, HIV/AIDS in Africa, transsexuals in Iran, mining in South America, and Chinese laborers in Germany. It also celebrates such figures as Harry Smith, Jakarta-based puppeteer Agus Nur Amal, California band Dengue Fever, Basque musicians Harkaitz Mtnez. de San Vicente and Igor Otxoa, and filmmaker Salim Muhammad. And Ritu Sarin and Tenzing Sonam return to Drepung Monastery in India with THE THREAD OF KARMA, a follow-up to their 1994 festival film, THE REINCARNATION OF KHENSUR RINPOCHE.
Friday, November 9 Opening Night: SLEEPWALKING THROUGH THE MEKONG (John Pirozzi), followed by reception with the filmmakers, LFT, $45, 7:00
Saturday, November 10 SALIM BABA (Tim Sternberg) and GHANAIAN VIDEO TALES (Tobias Wendl), KT, 1:00
Saturday, November 10 LOSERS AND WINNERS (Ulrike Franke and Michael Loeken), LT, 1:15
Saturday, November 10 VILLAGE OF DUST, CITY OF WATER (Sanjay Barnela) and THIRST (Deborah Kaufman and Alan Snitow), KT, 3:15
Saturday, November 10 STRANGER COMES TO TOWN (Jacqueline Goss) and GRITO DE PIEDRA (SCREAM OF THE STONE) (Ton van Zantvoort), LT, 3:45
Saturday, November 10 SCHOOLSCAPES (David MacDougall), LPC, 4:00
Saturday, November 10 AUTISM: THE MUSICAL (Tricia Regan), KT, 5:45
Saturday, November 10 YEAI HEM REAU–A CAMBODIAN MEDIUM (Yasuko Ichioka), LPC, 6:00
Saturday, November 10 SCAREDYCAT (Andy Blubaugh) and PROMISED PARADISE (Leonard Retel Helmrich), LT, 6:15
Harry Smith is celebrated at museum on November 10
Saturday, November 10 Mirror Animations (Harry Smith) and THE OLD, WEIRD AMERICA: HARRY SMITH'S ANTHOLOGY OF AMERICAN FOLK MUSIC (Rani Singh), KT, 8:15
Saturday, November 10 THE BELOVED ONES (Samantha Moore) and THE THREAD OF KARMA (Ritu Sarin and Tenzing Sonam), LT, 8:30
Sunday, November 11 SUPER AMIGOS (Arturo Perez Torres), LT, 1:00
Sunday, November 11 EL AGUA EN TIEMPOS EXTRAS (WATER IN EXTRA TIMES) (Dominique Jonard), GIMME GREEN (Isaac Brown and Eric Flagg), THE WATER FRONT (Elizabeth Miller), KT, 1:15
Sunday, November 11 THE ART OF REGRET (Judith MacDougall), LPC, 2:00
Sunday, November 11 OUR BRILLIANT SECOND LIFE (Shelley Matulick) and THE BIRTHDAY (Negin Kianfar and Daisy Mohr), LT, 3:15
Sunday, November 11 KEEP THE DANCE ALIVE (Rina Sherman), LPC, 4:00
Sunday, November 11 THE MACHINE IS US/ING US: User-Generated Content, KT, 4:30
Sunday, November 11 PRAYING WITH LIOR (Ilana Trachtman), LT, 5:15
Sunday, November 11 Closing Night: McLAREN’S NEGATIVES (Marie-Josée Saint-Pierre) and NÖMADAK TX (Raul de la Fuente), KT, 7:30
Rituparno Ghosh’s feature film DOSAR screens November 8
Loews 19th St. & Broadway
Newport Mall Theatre, New Jersey
November 8-11
Tickets: $10-$15
The Indo American Arts Council is presenting its annual film festival with screenings of dozens of independent features, shorts, and documentaries from India and the diaspora, held at two main locations, the Loews Theater at 19th & Broadway and the Newport Mall Theatre in Jersey City. Below are only some of the screenings at Loews; visit the above Web site for the complete schedule, including all of the Jersey City screenings.
Wednesday, November 7 Opening Night Screening & Gala Benefit Dinner: SAAWARIYA (Sanjay Leela Bhansali, 2007), 6:00 screening at Loews AMC Empire on 42nd St. and reception at Madame Tussauds on 42nd St. between Seventh & Eighth Aves., $200 for screening and cocktails, $500 for screening, cocktails, and gala
Thursday, November 8 DOSAR (THE COMPANION) (Rituparno Ghosh), 6:00
Thursday, November 8 MANASAROVAR (Anup Kurian, 2004), FLIGHT 208 (Parvez Imam, 2006), and THE ANT AND THE MONKEY (Alka Raghuram, 2007), 8:30
Friday, November 9 VALLEY OF FLOWERS (Pan Nalin, 2006), 6:00
Friday, November 9 FROZEN (Shivajee Chandrabhushan, 2007), 8:30
Saturday, November 10 INDIA UNTOUCHED — STORIES OF A PEOPLE APART (Stalin K) and SAVING HINDUISM (Rakesh Chaudhary Rakesh, 2007), 12:30
Vasant Nath’s SHANU TAXI screens with THE VOYEURS on November 10
Saturday, November 10 THE VOYEURS (AMI, YASIN AR AMAR MADHUBALA) (Buddhadeb Dasgupta, 2007) and SHANU TAXI (Vasant Nath, 2006), 2:30
Saturday, November 10 MISSED CALL (Mridul Toolsidass & Vinay Subramanian) and LONDON BRIDGE IS FALLING DOWN (Jagannathan Krishnan, 2007), 6:00
Saturday, November 10 VIA DARJEELING (Arindam Nandy, 2007), HEARTS SUSPENDED (Meghna Damani, 2007), and UNFINISHED (Arun Vir), 8:30
Sunday, November 11 APNA ASMAAN (Kaushik Roy, 2007), 12:30
Sunday, November 11 AIDS JaaGO: MIGRATION (Mira Nair, 2007), BLOOD BROTHERS (Vishal Bhardwaj, 2007), PRARAMBHA (THE BEGINNING) (Santosh Sivan, 2007), and POSITIVE (Farhan Akhtar, 2007), with public service announcements created by Nandita Das, 2:30
Sunday, November 11 MANORAMA SIX FEET UNDER (Navdeep Singh, 2007), 6:00
I AM THE ONE WHO BRINGS FLOWERS TO HER GRAVE (Hala al-Abdallah & ’Ammar el-Beik, 2006)
IFC Center unless otherwise noted
323 Sixth Ave. at West Third St.
November 8-15
Tickets: $7.50-$11
718-282-5938
The second biennial CinemaEast Film Festival focuses on independent works from fifteen countries that "present contemporary Middle Eastern artists to a wide audience in order to foster more complex understanding of the region’s arts and cultures and promote artistic excellence." Many of this year’s films, which hail from Lebanon, Egypt, Turkey, Iran, Tunisia, Syria, Italy, Algeria, France, and other nations, will be followed by discussions with the filmmakers and/or star.
Thursday, November 8 Opening Night: THE TV IS COMING (TALFZA JAYA) (Moncef Dhouib, 2006) and CINÉ-BUS (Moncef Dhouib, 2006), followed by a Q&A with actress Fatma Ben Saidane, 7:00
Friday, November 9 WHAT A WONDERFUL WORLD (Faouzi Bensaidi, 2006) and ONE IN A MILLION (WAHED FI EL-MILION) (Nadine Khan, 2006), followed by a Q&A with Faouzi Bensaidi and actress Nezha Rehil, 7:00
Friday, November 9 VHS KAHLOUCHA (Nejib Belkadhi, 2006), followed by a Q&A with Nejib Belkadhi, 9:30
Saturday, November 10 Political Activism, Bloggers and New Uses of Digital and Mobile-Phone Videos: film screenings and panel discussion with Wael Omar, Hossam el-Hamalawy, and Karim Tartoussieh, moderated by Khaled Fahmy, the Kevorkian Center, NYU, 50 Washington Square South at Sullivan St., 12 noon
Saturday, November 10 ROME RATHER THAN YOU (ROMA WA LA N’TOUMA) (Tariq Teguia, 2006) and DEAD MONEY (FILOUS MAYTA) (Rami Abdul-Jabbar, 2006), 3:45
Saturday, November 10 WE WILL LIVE TO SEE THESE THINGS (Julia Meltzer & David Thorne, 2007) and YOU, WAGIH (TOI, WAGUIH) (Namir Abdel-Messeeh, 2005), followed by a Q&A with Julia Meltzer and David Thorne, 6:05
Sunday, November 11 TEHRAN HAS NO MORE POMEGRANATES (TEHRAN ANAR NADARAD) (Massoud Bakhshi, 2007), followed by a Q&A with Massoud Bakhshi, 4:30
Sunday, November 11 IST’IMARIYAH: WINDWARD BETWEEN NAPLES AND BAGHDAD (IST’IMARIYAH: CONTROVENTO TRA NAPOLI E BAGHDAD) (Michelangelo Severgnini, 2006) and 3,494 HOUSES AND ONE FENCE (Mireille Astore and Fabian Astore, 2006), followed by a Q&A with Michelangelo Severgnini, 7:00
Monday, November 12 I AM THE ONE WHO BRINGS FLOWERS TO HER GRAVE (ANA ALATI TAHMOL AZOUHOUR ILA QABRIHA) (Hala al-Abdallah & ‘Ammar el-Beik, 2006), followed by a Q&A with Hala al-Abdallah, 4:30
Monday, November 12 SALADE MAISON (SALATA BALADI) (Nadia Kamel, 2007), 9:30
Tuesday, November 13 THE ROOF (AL-SATEH) (Kamal Aljafari, 2006) and (POSTHUMOUS) (Ghassan Salhab, 2007), followed by a Q&A with Kamal Aljafari, 2:30
Tuesday, November 13 THE RABBI’S 12 CHILDREN (Yael Bitton, 2007) and PRINT 1 (EMPREINTE 1) (Nadim Asfar, 2007), 4:30
Wednesday, November 14 IN THE HELIOPOLIS FLAT (FI SHAQIT MASR AL-GADIDAH) (Mohamed Khan, 2007), followed by a Q&A with the director, 6:30
Wednesday, November 14 DANCERS (MIRAYAT EL-MASRAH) (Celame Barge, 2007), DEMOCRACY 76: STATE OF EMERGENCY (Wael Omar, 2006), and DAY AND NIGHT (NAHAR WA LEYL) (Islam Azzazi, 2006), 9:30
Thursday, November 15 TEA IN THE HAREM (LE THÉ AU HAREM D’ARCHIMÈDE) (Mehdi Charef, 1985) and MY LOST HOME (MA MAISON PERDUE) (Kamal El Mahouti, 2001), Tinker Auditorium, French Institute/Alliance Française, 55 East 59th St., 2:30
THESE GIRLS screens with THEY CALL ME MUSLIM on November 6
Symphony Space, Leonard Nimoy Thalia
2537 Broadway at 95th St.
Tickets: $11
212-864-5400
According to its mission statement, Women Make Movies "is a multicultural, multiracial, non-profit media arts organization which facilitates the production, promotion, distribution, and exhibition of independent films and videotapes by and about women." Symphony Space is hosting a brief look at some of the works funded by WMM, examining street children in Cairo, race and class in New Orleans, tomboys, the F-word, coming of age, cultural identity, and a multitude of people named Grace Lee.
Sunday, November 4 TOMBOYS! (Julie Akeret and Christian McEwen, 2004) and I WAS A TEENAGE FEMINIST (Therese Shechter, 2005), 6:00
Sunday, November 4 MOHAWK GIRLS (Tracey Deer, 2005) and LA BODA (Hannah Weyer, 2000), 8:15
Tuesday, November 6 THEY CALL ME MUSLIM (Diana Ferrero, 2006) and THESE GIRLS (Tahani Rached, 2006), 6:00
Tuesday, November 6 FAR FROM HOME (Rachel Tsutsumi, 2005) and THE GENDER CHIP PROJECT (Helen De Michiel, 2005), 8:15
Tuesday, November 20 REAL INDIAN (Malinda Maynor, 1996) and THE GRACE LEE PROJECT (Grace Lee, 2005), 6:00
Tuesday, November 20 DESIRE (Julie Gustafson and Teenage Girls’ Documentary Project, 2005), 8:00
Adi Refaeli’s EMPATHY has been a film festival favorite
Symphony Space, Leonard Nimoy Thalia
2537 Broadway at 95th St.
Tickets: $11
212-864-5400
Following on the heels of the Israel Film Festival, the Other Israel Film Festival is "dedicated to showcasing the lives, images, voices, and stories of Arabs in Israeli society." The films take a look at the drug slums of Lod, Arab Israeli widows who team up to start a pickle factory, the battle between incarcerated Jews and Arabs in Central Prison, and the fight for personal and cultural freedom.
Saturday, November 10 THE RED TOY (Dani Rosenberg, 2004) and RINGO & TAHER (Jony Arbid, 2006), followed by Q&A with Jony Arbid, 3:00
Saturday, November 10 CITY OF ORANGES: A Conversation with Adam Lebor, 5:00
Saturday, November 10 ATASH (THIRST) (Tawfik Abu Wael, 2004), followed by Q&A with Tawfik Abu Wael, 7:00
Sunday, November 11 ARAB LABOR (Roni Ninio, 2007), 3:00
Sunday, November 11 ROADS (Lior Geller, 2007) and EMPATHY (Adi Refaeli, 2006), 5:00
Sunday, November 11 PICKLES (Dalit Kimor 2005), followed by Q&A with producer Nitza Gonen, 7:00
Tuesday, November 13 BEHIND THE WALLS (Uri Barabash, 1984), followed by Q&A with actor Mohammad Bakri, 7:00
AMC Empire 25 (AMCE)
234 West 42nd St. between Broadway & Eighth Aves.
212-398-3939
Loews Village 7 (LV7)
66 Third Ave.
212-982-2116
November 9-18
http://www.horrorfestonline.com
All right already; enough with the serious flicks about the problems of everyday life around the world. If you want to see something really scary, check out the second annual After Dark Horrorfest, which features eight frightening flicks screening over two weekends at the AMC Empire 25 and Loews Village 7. The low-budget indie frightfests tackle such genre standards as a graduation road trip (BORDERLAND, with Sean Astin), demonic doings in downtown Manhattan (MULBERRY STREET), survivors of the apocalypse battling nasty cannibals (TOOTH AND NAIL, with Rachel Miner), childhood friends gathering for a funeral that leads to yet more death (CRAZY EIGHTS, starring Traci Lords!), and a man dying over and over again until he can discover the mystery behind his unending fate (THE DEATHS OF IAN STONE).
Friday, November 9 UNEARTHED (Matthew Leutwyler, 2007), AMCE & LV7, 12 noon, 6:00, 12:15 am
http://www.unearthedthemovie.com
Outside a small town in the middle of nowhere in the New Mexico desert, an unidentifiable foreign object causes an oil truck to crash and explode, blocking the main route in and out, leaving the local populace and a group of travelers (including beautiful Beau Garrett and comic relief Charlie Murphy) stranded — and potential victims of the bloodthirsty creepy crawly thing. The town has lost faith in its sheriff, Annie Flynn (Emmanuelle Vaugier), who drowns her troubles and unsettling past mistake in alcohol. Needing help, she turns to scientific researcher Nodin (Tonantzin Carmelo) and Nodin’s grandfather (Native American actor and activist Russell Means), but the more they learn, the more dangerous the situation becomes. Meanwhile, Kale (Luke Goss), an Indian with a strange tattoo on his face, lurks in the shadows. Written and directed by horror/sci-fi award winner Matthew Leutwyler, UNEARTHED is a derivative yet chilling frightfest, mixing in elements of such films as ALIEN, PREDATOR, SAW, and THE DESCENT, incorporating a high-tech look and sound into its very basic plot. There are some gaping plot holes and very silly explanations, but it’s still a fun ride, especially for fans of the genre.
Friday, November 9 BORDERLAND (Zev Berman), AMCE & LV7, 2:00 & 10:00
Friday, November 9 CRAZY EIGHTS (James Koya Jones), AMCE & LV7, 4:10
Friday, November 9 THE DEATHS OF IAN STONE (Dario Piana), AMCE & LV7, 8:00
Saturday, November 10 LAKE DEAD (George Bessudo), AMCE & LV7, 12 noon, 6:00, 12:15 am
Saturday, November 10 MULBERRY STREET (Jim Mickle), AMCE & LV7, 2:00 & 8:00
Saturday, November 10 TOOTH & NAIL (Mark Young), AMCE & LV7, 4:10 & 10:00
Sunday, November 11 NIGHTMARE MAN (Rolfe Kanefsky), AMCE & LV7, 12 noon & 6:00
Sunday, November 11 TOOTH & NAIL (Mark Young), LV7, 2:00
Sunday, November 11 CRAZY EIGHTS (James Koya Jones), AMCE & LV7, 4:10 & 8:00
Sunday, November 11 BORDERLAND (Zev Berman), AMCE & LV7, 10:00
Denzel Washington walks tough in AMERICAN GANGSTER
Opens Friday, November 2
http://www.americangangster.net
Based on a true story, Ridley Scott’s AMERICAN GANGSTER follows the path of two very different men during the Vietnam War era. Frank Lucas (Denzel Washington) is a proud, dedicated man from poor southern roots who is determined to become the most respected and loved drug lord of Harlem. Richie Roberts (Russell Crowe) is an honest-to-a-fault Jewish cop studying to become a lawyer while failing miserably in his personal life. Cold, calculating, and smooth as silk, Lucas will do whatever is necessary to ensure his absolute success, including shooting another player in the head in plain view on an uptown street. Meanwhile, Roberts becomes a pariah in the corrupt police department when he finds nearly a million dollars in cash and turns it in. As the war escalates in Southeast Asia, Lucas and Roberts are both on a dangerous road that threatens to explode all around them. Filmed in New York City, AMERICAN GANGSTER — featuring an excellent script by Steven Zaillian and intense, superb direction from Ridley Scott — is a compelling thinking man’s mob pic, a worthy successor to (and mash-up of) such genre classics as THE FRENCH CONNECTION, SERPICO, and NEW JACK CITY. The diverse all-star cast also includes Chiwetel Ejiofor, RZA, T.I., Josh Brolin, Carla Gugino, Cuba Gooding Jr., Common, and the great Ruby Dee and Clarence Williams III.
Jerry Seinfeld has created quite a buzz with new animated movie
Opens Friday, November 2
Jerry Seinfeld should be ashamed of himself. BEE MOVIE is an awful animated children’s flick that is as unfunny as it is preposterous. Seinfeld, who cowrote the pathetic script with Spike Feresten, Barry Marder, and Andy Robin, voices Barry B. Benson, a bee who dreams of being more than just another worker for the hive. When he gets out into the real world, he is shocked to see that humans have taken over the honey business; he also develops a crush on Vanessa (Renee Zellweger), a florist who develops a crush on him as well. The story quickly devolves into a ridiculous courtroom drama with an environmental message that will leave you openmouthed in horror. Among the other actors lending their voices to this disastrous mess are Matthew Broderick, John Goodman, Chris Rock, Kathy Bates, Barry Levinson, Oprah Winfrey, Michael Richards, Rip Torn, and, perhaps most absurdly, Larry King, Ray Liotta, and Sting. BEE MOVIE gets a D.
Hejewa Adam takes up arms to defend her people in Darfur
Opens Friday, November 2
Angelika Film Center
18 West Houston St. at Mercer St.
212-995-2000
Lincoln Plaza Cinemas
1886 Broadway between 62nd & 63rd Sts.
212-757-0359
http://lincolnplaza.moviefone.com
http://www.city-cinemas.com/angelika
http://www.myspace.com/darfurnow
http://www.participate.net/darfurnow
In July, Congress passed a resolution declaring that "the atrocities unfolding in Darfur, Sudan, are genocide" and "urging the Administration to seriously consider multilateral or even unilateral intervention to stop genocide in Darfur, Sudan, should the United Nations Security Council fail to act." While both the UN and the U.S. fail to act in Darfur, it has fallen into the hands of activists to make a difference. Ted Braun spent five months in Darfur earlier this year, putting together a documentary that details the senseless killings taking place in Darfur while following the exploits of six people who are trying to do something about it: recent UCLA grad Adam Sterling, who is fighting to get states to divest their holdings in countries and corporations that do business in Sudan; Ahmed Mohammed Akbar, a refugee leader at a camp in Hamadea; Luis Moreno-Ocampo, a prosecutor for the International Criminal Court in The Hague who is preparing a case against Sudanese leaders; Pablo Recalde, an Ecuadorian who now runs the World Food Program team in West Darfur; Hejewa Adam, a mother who has joined the rebellion; and Oscar nominee Don Cheadle, who is traveling around the world to raise awareness about what’s going on in Darfur. The film is primarily a call-to-action more than a history of Sudan; it puts partisan politics aside and instead strives to get viewers to want to get involved in spreading the word that it’s criminal to allow this state-sponsored terrorism to continue. We highly recommend renting Ricki Stern and Anne Sundberg’s shocking documentary, THE DEVIL CAME ON HORSEBACK and Christopher Dillon Quinn’s revealing GOD GREW TIRED OF US: THE LOST BOYS OF SUDAN before seeing DARFUR NOW in order to get a better history of what is occurring in Darfur — and then learning about some of the ways you can help make a difference.
The life and career of Joe Strummer are celebrated in new doc
IFC Center
323 Sixth Ave. at Third St.
Opens Friday, November 2
212-924-7771
http://www.joestrummerthemovie.com
Director Julien Temple, who has made two outstanding documentaries about the Sex Pistols (THE GREAT ROCK AND ROLL SWINDLE and THE FILTH AND THE FURY), turns his camera on Joe Strummer of the British punk group the Clash in THE FUTURE IS UNWRITTEN. Temple collects remarkable home movies of Strummer, from his early days as young John Mellor, a career diplomat’s son, through his time as the leader of one of the most famous and controversial bands in the world and his death at the age of fifty from a congenital heart defect. Strummer’s friends and family gather around a campfire in Brooklyn’s Empire St.-Fulton Ferry Park and talk about Strummer’s life and career, sharing keen insight in a format that the musician loved; his campfire get-togethers came to be known as Strummerville, a place for people to assemble and discuss life, art, and anything else that came to mind. Temple adds lots of footage of the Clash in action, as well as clips from Strummer’s earlier band, the 101ers, made up of squatters fighting the power, and his last band, the Mescaleros. Temple also brings some of Strummer’s drawings to life, animating them in humorous ways. Strummer essentially narrates the film himself, as Temple includes audio excerpts from Strummer’s "Last Call" radio show and interviews he gave over the years. Temple, a close friend of Strummer’s, paints a fascinating portrait of the complex man, featuring stories from the likes of Bono, Johnny Depp, Flea, Mele Mel, Courtney Love Cobain, Martin Scorsese, Steve Jones, John Cusack, Matt Dillon, Steve Buscemi, Damien Hirst, Roland Gift, Don Letts, Mick Jones, and many others. And there’s lots of music as well, of course, including several versions of "White Riot."
Film Forum
209 West Houston St. between Sixth & Seventh Aves.
November 7-20
212-727-8110
http://www.filmforum.org/films/note.html
http://www.notebynotethemovie.com
NOTE BY NOTE is a lovely little documentary that details the extraordinary care and love that goes into the making of a concert grand piano by Steinway & Sons, the last company crafting the instrument by hand, eschewing modern technology. Filmmaker Ben Niles follows the fascinating journey of the L1037, from the wood selected in Alaska to the building and toning of the piano in Steinway’s Astoria factory (on Steinway St., which was named for the company) to the 57th St. showcase room where pianists come to pick out the right one for them, often to be used right around the corner at Carnegie Hall. Niles lets the employees tell their own story, from case maker and plate fitter to bellyman and tone regulator, from wood technologist to chief concert technician. Many of the workers are gruff-talking neighborhood guys wearing football jerseys and tie-dyed T-shirts, proudly describing the delicacy that goes into each of their responsibilities. Along with the primary narrative of the 1037’s yearlong journey, Niles weaves in the nearly heartbreaking story of chief concert technician Ron Coners’s desperate attempt to find just the right keyboard for Pierre-Laurent Aimard. And in one of the film’s most special moments, Niles turns the wood-shaping part of the process into a symphony of piano and tools. In addition to Aimard, other master pianists who tickle the ivories in search of the perfect piano include Harry Connick Jr., Marcus Roberts, Hank Jones (who insists there is no such thing as the perfect piano), Bill Charlap, Kenny Barron, Lang Lang, and Helene Grimaud, playing pieces by Gershwin, Bach, Rachmaninoff, Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Ives, Mozart, Liszt, and Schubert as well as their own compositions. NOTE BY NOTE is a charming film that will appeal even to those who don’t have an ear for classical music.
Ethan Hawke and Philip Seymour Hoffman have some family problems in Lumet flick
Angelika Film Center
18 West Houston St. at Mercer St.
212-995-2000
Lincoln Plaza Cinemas
1886 Broadway between 62nd & 63rd Sts.
212-757-0359
http://lincolnplaza.moviefone.com
http://www.city-cinemas.com/angelika
http://www.7h58cesamedila-lefilm.com
Sidney Lumet (DOG DAY AFTERNOON, NETWORK) spins an intriguing web of mystery and severe family dysfunction in BEFORE THE DEVIL KNOWS YOU’RE DEAD. Andy (Philip Seymour Hoffman) and Hank (Ethan Hawke) are very different brothers who are both in desperate financial straits. Andy, a real estate exec, has a serious drug problem and a fading marriage to his sexy but bored young wife (Marisa Tomei), while ne’er-do-well Hank can’t afford the monthly child-support payments to his ex-wife (Aleksa Palladino) and daughter (Amy Ryan). Andy convinces Hank to knock off their parents’ (Albert Finney and Rosemary Harris) jewelry store, but when things go horribly wrong, everyone involved is forced to face some very difficult situations, leading to a harrowing climax. Seymour and Hawke are both excellent, the former cool, calm, and collected, the latter scattershot and impulsive. Tomei gives one of her finest performances as the woman sleeping with both brothers. Lumet tells the story through a series of flashbacks from various characters’ point of view, with fascinating overlaps – although a bit overused – that offer different perspectives on critical scenes. Adapted from a script by playwright Kelly Masterson – whom Lumet has never met or even spoken with – BEFORE THE DEVIL KNOWS YOU’RE DEAD (the title comes from an Irish toast that begins, "May you be in heaven half and hour…") is a thrilling modern noir that is from one of the masters of melodrama.
Three very different brothers go on a spiritual quest in DARJEELING
In theaters now
http://www.foxsearchlight.com/thedarjeelinglimited
Wes Anderson takes viewers on a wild ride through India aboard THE DARJEELING LIMITED in this black comedy that opens the New York Film Festival. Francis (Owen Wilson), Peter (Adrien Brody), and Jack (cowriter Jason Schwartzman) are brothers who have not seen each other since their father’s funeral a year before, after which their mother disappeared. Having recently survived a terrible accident, Francis — looking ridiculous with his face and head wrapped in bandages — convinces them to go on a spiritual quest together to reestablish their relationship and help them better understand life. Peter and Jack very hesitantly decide to go along on what turns out to be a series of madcap adventures involving bathroom sex, bloody noses, jealousy, praying, cigarettes galore, running after trains, and savory snacks. Anderson (THE ROYAL TENENBAUMS, RUSHMORE) injects his unique brand of humor on the action, ranging from the offbeat to the sensitive to the absurd as the brothers bond and battle in a search for themselves and what’s left of their family, set to a score adapted from the films of Satyajit Ray and Merchant-Ivory. The film features cameos by Bill Murray, Natalie Portman, Barbet Schroeder, and Anjelica Huston; check the Web site to watch the very entertaining related short “Hotel Chevalier.”
Jennifer Garner heads into dangerous Saudi territory in THE KINGDOM
In theaters now
http://www.thekingdommovie.com
After a horrific terrorist attack on an oil company family event in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, kills and wounds hundreds of American men, women, and children, the FBI wants to go after the cell behind the vicious plot, but the attorney general (Danny Huston) denies their request because of the U.S. government’s cozy relationship with the Saudis. But Special Agent Ronald Fleury (Jamie Foxx) figures out a way to buy a few days in Saudi Arabia with three of his fellow agents — bomb expert Grant Sykes (Chris Cooper), forensics examiner Janet Mayes (Jennifer Garner), and intelligence analyst and comic relief Adam Leavitt (Jason Bateman). Initially hamstrung by protocol, the four agents, watched closely by Col. Al Ghazi (Ashraf Barhom), start uncovering evidence that could potentially lead them to Abu Hamza (Hezi Saddik), one of the most feared terrorists in the world, while taking them into the most dangerous parts of Saudi Arabia. Written by Matthew Michael Carnahan (SOLDIER FIELD) and directed by Peter Berg — who makes a big jump from such family fare as FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS and THE RUNDOWN — THE KINGDOM, inspired by an actual attack by Saudi Hezbollah in Khobar in 1996, is a tense, gripping procedural that makes some cogent points about the state of the world post-9/11.
Tom and Davey find they have something in common in Eastwood melodrama
In theaters now
http://railsandties.warnerbros.com
Alison Eastwood, the daughter of Clint Eastwood and Maggie Johnson, has appeared in nearly two dozen films, but she makes her directorial debut with RAILS & TIES, a weepy, manipulative melodrama reminiscent of her father’s vastly overrated MILLION DOLLAR BABY. Kevin Bacon stars as Tom Stark, a railroad engineer and train aficionado who is avoiding facing the reality that his wife, Megan (Marcia Gay Harden), is dying from cancer and regretting that they never had children. But their life takes a radical turn when the much-troubled Laura Danner (Bonnie Root) parks her car on the tracks — with her beloved son, Davey (Miles Heizer), inside — waiting to be steamrolled by the oncoming locomotive. An angry Davey later shows up at the Starks’ door, and — well, you can guess the rest. RAILS & TIES is the kind of Hallmark Hall of Shame drama that belongs on cable, not in movie theaters across the country. You’ll still get a little teary if you stay to the end, and you’ll hate yourself for it, but you’ll also wish you had done something better with the last two hours.
Michael Caine and Jude Law play a murderous game in smooth remake
Lincoln Plaza Cinemas
1886 Broadway between 62nd & 63rd Sts.
212-757-0359
http://lincolnplaza.moviefone.com
http://www.sonyclassics.com/sleuth
In 1972, Anthony Shaffer adapted his Tony-winning play, SLEUTH, into a film, leading to Oscar nominations for director Joseph L. Mankiewicz and its two stars, Laurence Olivier and Michael Caine. Olivier played mystery writer Andrew Wyke, while Caine played Milo Tindle, a young man having an affair with Wyke’s wife. Thirty-five years later, Harold Pinter has rewritten the script for director Kenneth Branagh in a thrilling update of SLEUTH that teeters on the edge of ridiculousness but always rights itself just in time. Jude Law (also one of the film’s producers) is Tindle, a hot hairdresser locked in a battle of wits against the older, more experienced Wyke, a role now taken on by Caine in a marvelous triumph of casting. Wyke has invited Tindle to his country home, which is festooned with all sorts of electronic gadgets and cool colors courtesy of production designer Tim Harvey. The back-and-forth cat-and-mouse game between the two are a joy to behold as the audience never quite knows who is telling the truth, especially after a few gunshots enter the fray. Law stands up well to Caine, who maliciously chews up all the scenery he can muster. Pinter’s script goes occasionally over the top but is mostly razor-sharp, and the gadgets, though sometimes too gimmicky, add plenty of fun to the complex battle of wits.
Angelika Film Center
18 West Houston St. at Mercer St.
212-995-2000
http://www.city-cinemas.com/angelika
http://www.2daysinparisthefilm.com
Julie Delpy’s delightful debut, 2 DAYS IN PARIS, is a true DIY indie, with Delpy serving as writer, director, editor, star, composer, soundtrack performer, and one of the producers. Delpy plays Marion, a flitty Frenchwoman who decides to bring her boyfriend of two years, Jack (a heavily tattooed Adam Goldberg), to spend two days with in her hometown in Paris as a stopover on their way from Venice to their apartment in New York City. But spending forty-eight hours with Marion’s family (Delpy’s real-life parents, Albert Delpy and Marie Pillet, and sister, Alexia Landeau) and bumping into a seemingly endless stream of Marion’s former boyfriends while not understanding a word anyone is saying might be a bit much for Jack, an interior designer whose own insides are rife with stomach problems and migraines. 2 DAYS IN PARIS is Delpy’s ANNIE HALL (Woody Allen, 1977), an engaging film filled with slapstick humor, inventive characters, and underlying truths about love and life.
Christian Bale and Russell Crowe are on opposite sides of the law in remake
Cinema Village
22 East 12th St.
212-24-3363
http://www.cinemavillage.com/chc/cv
James Mangold’s remake of Delmer Daves’s 1957 Western 3:10 TO YUMA starts out promising but ultimately delves into the wholly ludicrous. Christian Bale stars as Ben Evans, a hobbled Civil War vet who is about to lose his ranch — and the respect of his wife (Gretchen Mol) and kids (Logan Lerman and Benjamin Petry). Desperate for money, he signs on to help transport vicious killer Ben Wade (Russell Crowe) on a dangerous three-day journey from Bisbee to Contention, where Wade will be sent straight to prison on the 3:10 train to Yuma. But even handcuffed, Wade is a dangerous criminal and a more-than-worthy adversary; meanwhile, his villainous crew, led by the brutally evil Charlie Prince (Ben Foster), has set out to rescue him, killing all who get in their way. Based on an Elmore Leonard story, the film gets muddled quickly, with far too much of the action beyond belief. Why don’t they just tie up Wade’s arms and legs, or at least cuff him behind his back? How many hundreds of bullets does it take to miss easy targets? By choosing to focus more on the transporting of Wade — which was not the center of the 1957 original, which starred Glenn Ford as Wade, Van Heflin as Evans, and Richard Jaeckel as Charlie Prince — Mangold (HEAVY, WALK THE LINE) has turned the film into an annoying chase flick lacking in real drama. But it’s always fun seeing Peter Fonda, here playing grizzled Pinkerton detective Byron McElroy.
Available November 6 on DVD
After taking on GM in ROGER & ME, the gun lobby in BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE, and the Iraq war in FAHRENHEIT 9/11, Michael Moore goes after the health-care industry in SiCKO, another vastly entertaining and wildly informative documentary that will make you laugh till it hurts. Instead of focusing on the 50 million Americans who don’t have health insurance, Moore zeroes in on the 250 million who do — and still can’t afford treatment when they become seriously ill. Collecting ridiculous stories culled from tens of thousands e-mailed to him via his Web site, Moore shares remarkable tales of maddening insurance company denials, including one woman who was dragged unconscious from a car accident and taken to the hospital — and whose carrier refused to pay for the ambulance because she failed to get it preapproved. And that’s only the tip of this melting iceberg. Moore goes inside the industry to reveal frightening details of how these for-profit institutions run — and why it is always in their best interest to say no. He also travels to Canada, France, England, and even Cuba to show how the supposed evils of socialized medicine actually can work for everyone. And just wait till you see how Nixon and Reagan are involved. SiCKO rips the million-dollar mask off the health-care industry; be prepared to get as mad as hell and not willing to take it anymore. The DVD features more than eighty minutes of new material, including a great extended interview with former British parliamentarian Tony Benn and yet another tragic health-care horror story that didn’t make it into the film.
I AM AMERICA (AND SO CAN YOU!) (Grand Central Publishing, October 2007, $26.99)
http://www.hachettebookgroupusa.com
Stephen Colbert’s I AM AMERICA (AND SO CAN YOU!) is much like his late-night television program, THE COLBERT REPORT — an extremely tongue-in-cheek political talk show in which Colbert plays a conservative host, a la Bill O’Reilly, who never fails to make everything be about him. It took a while for the series to get cooking, and it takes a while for the book to develop a flow as well. But once it does, it can be laugh-out-loud funny — but it still doesn’t quite know when to slow down or stop lauding itself. "You’re lucky to have this book as your one and only scripture," he tells the people of the future near the end of the tome. "Every word of it is the revealed Truth, so interpret it literally." The elaborately designed book — printed in the United States even though most such projects need to go to China to keep costs down — features Colbert’s take on such subjects as family, sports, homosexuals, the media, class, religion, Hollywood, and higher education. Colbert proudly states his case with such bold proclamations as "Racism no longer exists in America," "America is not a land of immigrants," and "It’s natural to be curious about the world, but scientific method is just one theory about how best to understand it." The book is filled with margin notes similar to "The Word" feature on THE COLBERT REPORT, "Fun Zone" and "Stephen Speaks for Me" sidebars, stickers, a ribbon place holder, thumbnails, charts, footnotes, and lots of pictures of Colbert — but there’s only so much readers can take of his character at one time — say, about twenty-two minutes? — so it’s best to read I AM AMERICA in bits and pieces, not in one long sitting. The appendix includes the full text of his brilliant speech at the 2006 White House Correspondents’ Dinner as well as some behind-the-scenes tales from the infamous event.
Upstairs at the Square: Writers and Artists Mixed
Barnes & Noble Union Square
Wednesday, November 7
33 East 17th St.
Admission: free
212-253-0810
http://storelocator.barnesandnoble.com
The Great Hall at the Cooper Union
7 East Seventh St. at Third Ave.
Monday, November 19
Admission: free
212-353-4195
http://www.cooper.edu/month.html
Over the last few years, writer, editor, filmmaker, and teacher Antonio Monda spoke with eighteen men and women about faith, including Paul Auster, Spike Lee, Grace Paley, Elie Wiesel, Richard Ford, David Lynch, Salman Rushdie, Arthur Schlesinger Jr., Derek Walcott, and Toni Morrison. The Q&As are collected in DO YOU BELIEVE?, with such intriguing chapter titles as "Christ Was the First Feminist" (Jane Fonda), "Reality Is an Illusion" (Jonathan Franzen), "God Is Not a Torturer" (Martin Scorsese), "I Believe in God But I Don’t Bug Him" (Saul Bellow), and "God Is the Name of Something I Don’t Understand" (Paula Fox). To celebrate the book’s release, Monda will be making three area appearances with several of the book’s participants: On Wednesday, November 7, he’ll be at the Union Square Barnes & Noble with musician Nellie McKay and journalist Katherine Lanpher; on Monday, November 19, he’ll be at the Great Hall at Cooper Union with Paul Auster, Nathan Englander, Paula Fox, and Colum McCann; and on January 24, he’ll be at Temple Emanu-El with Daniel Libeskind, Jonathan Safran Foer, and Gay Talese.
Hilton Theatre
213 West 42nd St. between Broadway & Eighth Ave.
Tickets: $50-$120 ($450 Premier Seating)
212-556-4750
http://www.youngfrankensteinthemusical.com
In 1974, Mel Brooks wrote and directed YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN, a hysterical horror spoof that is an American comedy classic. Following the enormous success of the Broadway version of his 1968 film THE PRODUCERS, Brooks has teamed up again with director Susan Stroman to turn YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN into a no-holds-barred musical, starring Roger Bart as Dr. Frederick Frankenstein, Shuler Hensley as the Monster, Christopher Fitzgerald as Igor, Sutton Foster as Inga, Megan Mullally as Elizabeth, and Andrea Martin as (cue neighing) Frau Blücher. Among the musical numbers penned by Brooks for the show are “Roll in the Hay,” “He Vas My Boyfriend,” and “Transylvania Mania.” To celebrate the musical’s opening on November 8, twi-ny is giving away a pair of tickets to the lavish production to one lucky reader who answers the following question correctly: What depression-era number by Irving Berlin does the Monster perform in YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN, both the film and the musical? Please submit your answer, along with your name, age, and daytime phone number, to contest@twi-ny.com. In addition to the highly coveted tickets, we will be giving away other official show merchandise, including a T-shirt, a hat, and an exclusive signed poster. All entries must be received by Tuesday, November 13, at 5:00 pm. And don’t forget to drink your Ovaltine.
Hiro Ballroom / Maritime Hotel
363 West 16th St. between Eighth & Ninth Aves.
Saturday, November 3, 7:00
Tickets: $20
212-242-4300
Eleanor and Matthew Friedberger like to do things their own way. The Brooklyn-based brother-and-sister duo are the leaders of the Fiery Furnaces, who have just released their sixth album, WIDOW CITY (Thrill Jockey, October 2007), consisting of sixteen songs that can be divided into sweet mini-suites. The record opens with the tantalizing, carnivalesque seven-minute epic "The Philadelphia Grand Jury," which goes all over the musical map as Eleanor declares, "More crooked sons of bitches you can’t ever have come across / Make sure that they notarized my will / Make sure Mom don’t look at the news." The Brecht-Weill dance of death is a fabulous kick-off to the disc, which mixes in offbeat electronic sounds (supplied by Matthew) over, under, and all around Eleanor’s distinctive voice and the album’s mysterious, poetic lyrics. The storytelling in the trio of "Duplexes of the Dead," "Automatic Husband," and "Ex-Guru" is downright theatrical; the last of the trilogy features an infectious chorus, with Eleanor singing, "She means nothing to me now / I tell myself that every day" before Matt adds a Middle Eastern break that is followed by "Clear Signal from Cairo" and "My Egyptian Grammar." "Uncle Charlie" gets going with a drum solo and even makes a stop in Centereach. This summer, the Furnaces played an amazing free show in Socrates Sculpture Park; it was supposed to preview WIDOW CITY, but instead Matt and Eleanor experimented by stringing together different versions of older songs in a kind of indie-rock opera all its own. They’re more likely to play tracks from the new disc, along with Robert D’Amico on drums and Jason Loewenstein on guitar, at this gig at the Hiro Ballroom, their final stateside show before heading over to Europe. Pit Er Pat opens up.
Hawaiian Tropic Zone
49th St. & Seventh Ave.
Wednesday, November 7, 9:00
Tickets: $15 (includes free drink)
212-626-7312
http://www.undergroundgarage.com
http://www.hawaiiantropiczone.com
On October 31, Little Steven’s Underground Garage held its inaugural show at the Hawaiian Tropic Zone in Times Square, Halloween a Go-Go, featuring hot sets by the Saints and the Chesterfield Kings along with the groovy Garage Girls a Go-Go. Among the celebrities on hand were Vincent (Big Pussy) Pastore and David Chase, the man behind THE SOPRANOS. On November 7, the theme changes to Mexican Wrestling Swedish Surf Rock a Go-Go, with the masked avengers of rock and roll, Los Straitjackets, and Sweden’s one and only Hawaii Mud Bombers, playing their first show ever in America. The Garage Girls a Go-Go will be back as well, choreographed by Maureen Van Zandt. Tickets are $15 and come with a free drink.
Maria Hassabi holds NYC premiere at P.S. 122
P.S. 122
150 First Ave. at East Ninth St.
Tickets: $10-$20
212-477-5288
Wednesday, November 7
through
Saturday, November 10 New York premiere of evening-length piece featuring dancers Hristoula Harakas and David Adamo, musician Jody Elf, dramaturge Marcos Rosales, fashion designers ThreeAsFour, lighting designer Koe Levasseur, visual artist Scott Lyall, and choreographer Maria Hassabi
Mercury Lounge
217 East Houston St. at Ave. A
Monday, November 12
Tickets: $12
212-260-4700
http://www.mercuryloungenyc.com
http://www.myspace.com/busdriver
West Coast rapper Busdriver mixes funk, soul, pop, rock, reggae, electronica, and anything else he can think of into groovin’ tunes that are as eclectic as they are fun. His latest album, RoadKillOvercoat (Epitaph, January 2007), features some of the most complex rhymes and lyrics in rap, attacking the status quo, sell-outs, and the ruling class on such songs as “Pompous Posies! Your Party’s No Fun,” “Kill Your Employer (Recreational Paranoia Is the Sport of Now),” and “Mr. Mistake (Bested by the Whisper Chasm),” on which he sings, “Wielding racy aphorisms / I Billy club your color line / Refusing to join forces with your indie-stud wunderkind / I rather embrace what your city slum undermines / And encourage the idiom bump-and-grind / Sickly glum of unbuttoned minds.” He tears through “(Bloody Paws on the) Kill Floor” like Evelyn Wood on speed, declaring, “I’m fitted for a heat-resistant sleeve / Keep your distance please.” And on “Sun Shower,” he opines, “Our artistic merit is questionable / We’ll fall on our face.” You can question Busdriver’s merit for yourself by not keeping your distance at the Mercury Lounge on November 12, where he will be playing with Beans, Daedelus, and Antimc.
twi-ny/mdr
Tyondai Braxton leads the techno revolution with Battles
Webster Hall
125 East Eleventh St. between Third & Fourth Aves.
Tuesday, November 13
Tickets: $25
http://www.myspace.com/battlestheband
The New York-based band Battles features Tyondai Braxton, Dave Konopka, Ian Williams, and John Stanier pouring out thrilling techno-dance pop that sends fans into a frenzy. This past summer they featured songs from their latest record, MIRRORED (Warp Records, May 2007), to a packed crowd at the South Street Seaport. This time they’ll be playing the sweaty confines of Webster Hall.
© Kathleen Lolley
Kathleen Lolley, "Forsake the Prey"
Giant Robot Gallery
437 East Ninth St. between First Ave. & Ave. A
Through November 14
Admission: free
212-674-GRNY
Kentucky-based artist and twi-ny fave Kathleen Lolley’s solo exhibition at Giant Robot features her unique birds who are unable to catch their own prey, smiling through their own fairy-tale stories.
© Chris Mars Publishing
Chris Mars, "A Patch of White While Dying," oil on panel, 2007
Jonathan LeVine Gallery
529 West 20th St., ninth floor
Through November 17
Closed Sunday & Monday
Admission: free
212-243-3822
http://www.chrismarspublishing.com
http://www.jonathanlevinegallery.com
Former Replacements drummer Chris Mars continues his exploration of persecution and cruelty with "New Salem," on view at the Jonathan LeVine Gallery in Chelsea. Mars, who lives in Minneapolis and prefers not to travel, is deeply influenced by his brother’s battle with mental illness. His Gothic characters are creepy and skeletal, trapped in a spectacularly evil and frightening world.
Etherea
66 Ave. A between Fourth & Fifth Sts.
Through December 12
Open daily 12 noon - 10:00 pm
Admission: free
212-358-1126
http://www.myspace.com/eugenemerinovphotography
Eugene Merinov’s black-and-white photographs of such seminal bands as New Order, Bush Tetras, Gang of Four, the Jam, XTC, Pere Ubu, Bauhaus, X, and many more are on view through December 12 at Etherea on the Lower East Side, not far from the old CBGB’s, where many of these pictures were taken between 1977 and 1981.
All contents copyright 2007 by Mark Rifkin and twi-ny. All rights reserved. Contents may not be reprinted without written permission. Please note that events, dates, and prices are subject to change.
Send all comments, suggestions, reviews, and questions to mark.rifkin@twi-ny.com.
To subscribe to this list, please e-mail the administrator at admin@twi-ny.com with the word Subscribe in the Subject line; be sure to ask for back issues, which are free as well. To unsubscribe from this list, please think it over twice before e-mailing the same address. Please let us know what you didn't like about this forum and we'll do our best to correct it in the future — if we agree with you. If you would like to see something covered in a future issue, please let us know. Without you, there is no need for us to exist.
Vanderbilt Hall, Grand Central Terminal
Admission: free
http://www.spafinder.com/thespaexperience
Wednesday, October 31
through
Saturday, November 3 Free facials, massage, hand treatments, and more, including pumpkin facial and pumpkin cream pie hand treatment from Oasis Day Spa, Count Chocula hand and arm mask from Red Mountain Spa, IMT (Carotid Ultrasound Intimal-Medial Thickness) testing from Pritikin Longevity Center & Spa, hot-stone hand massage and mini neck-and-shoulder massages from Red Door Lifestyle Spa at the Hyatt Regency Bonaventure, BlackBerry hand massage from Hyatt Pure Spas, Pulsar (light and sound experience), scalp, and hand massage from Tourism Quebec, Thai ritual foot cleansing and massage from Body Holiday St. Lucia, on-the-go version of Repechage seaweed oxygen facial from CuisinArt, chakra alignment from the Lodge at Woodloch, reflexology, yoga demonstrations, lots of product samples, and much more
Multiple locations
Tickets: $8 - $280
718-388-6780
Through November 21 Third biennial festival, featuring workshops, film screenings, lectures, and live performances at such venues as the Japan Society, the Noguchi Museum, Anthology Fillm Archives, CUNY’s Graduate Center, Dance Theater Workshop, Movement Research, and festival home Cave at 58 Grand St. in Williamsburg
Max Fish
178 Ludlow St. between Houston & Stanton Sts.
Admission: free; $20 for bid number to participate in auction
718-372-5159
Thursday, November 1 Second annual Coney Island USA Fall Auction Kick-off Party, featuring more than fifty works available for bidding (starting at less than $100 and reaching $1,000 or more), including pieces by Hank Murta Adams, Gary Beeber, World Famous Bob, Leee Black Childers, Chris Capuozzo, Katrina Del Mar, ESPO, Bob Gruen, James Harmon, Michelle Handelman, Tessa Hughs-Freeland, Todd James, Darryl Lavare, Laure A. Leber, Patrice Lorenz, Meridith McNeal, Bambi the Mermaid, Julie Atlas Muz, Mangina, Peter Moore, Tina Paul, Dave Savage, and Timothy White, 6:00 - 9:00 pm
CRG Gallery
535 West 22nd St. between Tenth & Eleventh Aves.
RSVP: 212-867-1117
http://www.crggallery.com/goodshepherdservices
Thursday, November 1 Silent auction from 6:30 to 8:00 and live auction by Isaac Mizrahi at 7:30, featuring works by Richard Crotty, Jim Hodges, Ellsworth Kelly, and others, benefiting Good Shepherd Services, “a non-sectarian, social service and youth development agency which positively affects the lives of more than 18,000 children and families annually”
School of Visual Arts, third-floor amphitheater
209 East 23rd St. between Second & Third Aves.
Admission: free
212-592-2010
Thursday, November 1 Public symposium with keynote speaker Steve Mumford and veterans of the Vietnam War and WWII reading from POST TRAUMATIC PRESS, 7:00
Seventh Regiment Armory
Park Ave. at 67th St.
Admission: $20
212-674-6095
Thursday, November 1
through
Sunday, November 4 Seventeenth annual fair, featuring prints for sale from Old Masters to contemporary artists from more than one hundred international galleries and fine-art companies and the Saturday-morning panel discussion "Passion and Stragegy: Public and Private Collecting in the 21st Century" with Peter Trippi and Leslie J. Garfield (advance reservations recommended)
The Tunnel
261 Eleventh Ave. between 27th & 28th Sts.
Admission: free (gala $50)
212-647-9111
Thursday, November 1 Opening night gala benefiting Art Radio WPS1.org, featuring a cocktail reception, a live performance by Eric Singer’s LEMUR (the League of Electronic Musical Urban Robots), DJ Jeannie Hopper, and more, $50
Friday, November 2
through
Sunday, November 4 More than fifty publishers of fine art editions and more than one hundred artists from all over the world will be displaying and selling their wares in tenth anniversary celebration
Various venues and events
Admission: free
212-423-2249
Thursday, November 1
through
Saturday, November 3 Health and Fitness Expo, Jacob Javits Convention Center, free
Saturday, November 3 2008 U.S. Olympic Team Trials — Men’s Marathon, Fifth Ave. at 50th St., then in and around Central Park, 7:35 am
Saturday, November 3 International Friendship Run, free for marathon entrants, $20 for friends and family of entrants, United Nations to Tavern on the Green, 9:00 am
Saturday, November 3 Marathon Fireworks, with live entertainment, Central Park finish line, adjacent to Tavern on the Green, 7:30
Sunday, November 4 The New York City Marathon: staggered start times, including professional women at 9:37 am and professional men at 10:08 am, followed by awards ceremony and celebration at the Hammerstein Ballroom); race begins on Staten Island at the foot of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge and ends by Tavern on the Green in Central Park, with entertainment zones throughout
MoMA Film
Roy and Niuta Titus Theaters
11 West 53rd St. between Fifth & Sixth Aves.
November 1—14
Tickets: $10, in person only, may be applied to museum admission within thirty days, same-day screenings free with museum admission, available at Film and Media Desk
212-708-9400
Thursday, November 1 AM ENDE KOMMEN TOURISTEN (AND ALONG COME TOURISTS) (Robert Thalheim, 2007), introduced by Thalheim ,7:00
Friday, November 2 PRATER (Ulrike Ottinger, 2007), 6:15
Friday, November 2 Next Generation, 2006—07: shorts from twelve German film schools, 8:30
Saturday, November 3 DEM DEUTSCHEN VOLKE (CHRISTO AND JEANNE-CLAUDE: THE WRAPPED REICHSTAG) (Wolfram Hissen, 1996), 2:00
Saturday, November 3 MADONNEN (MADONNAS) (Maria Speth, 2007), 5:00
Saturday, November 3 VALERIE (Birgit Moeller, 2006), 8:00
Sunday, November 4 AM ENDE KOMMEN TOURISTEN (AND ALONG COME TOURISTS) (Robert Thalheim, 2007), introduced by Thalheim, 2:00
Sunday, November 4 PRATER (Ulrike Ottinger, 2007), :30
Monday, November 5 YELLA (Christian Petzold, 2007), 5:00
Monday, November 5 An Evening with Birgit Moeller: VALERIE (Birgit Moeller, 2006), introduced by Moeller, 7:00
Wednesday, November 7 YELLA (Christian Petzold, 2007), 6:00
Wednesday, November 7 GOOD BYE, LENIN! (Wolfgang Becker, 2003), 8:00
Thursday, November 8 ERNST LUBITSCH IN BERLIN–VON DER SCHOENHAUSER ALLEE NACH HOLLYWOOD (ERNST LUBITSCH IN BERLIN–FROM SCHOENHAUSER ALLEE TO HOLLYWOOD) (Robert Fischer, 2006), 6:15
Thursday, November 8 LOLA RENNT (RUN LOLA RUN) (Tom Tykwer, 1998), 8:30
Friday, November 9 MADONNEN (MADONNAS) (Maria Speth, 2007), 6:00
Friday, November 9 HANNA HANNAH. (Hanna Schygulla, 2006) and IM LICHTBILD DER GROßSTADT (BERLIN–PICTURES OF A CITY) (Manfred Wilhelms, 1998), 8:30
Saturday, November 10 DAS LEBEN DER ANDEREN (THE LIVES OF OTHERS) (Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, 2006), 2:00
Saturday, November 10 NACH DER MUSIK (A FATHER'S MUSIC) (Igor Heitzmann, 2006), 5:00
Saturday, November 10 ERNST LUBITSCH IN BERLIN–VON DER SCHOENHAUSER ALLEE NACH HOLLYWOOD (ERNST LUBITSCH IN BERLIN–FROM SCHOENHAUSER ALLEE TO HOLLYWOOD) (Robert Fischer, 2006), 8:00
Sunday, November 11 Next Generation, 2006—07: shorts from twelve German film schools, 2:00
Sunday, November 11 DEM DEUTSCHEN VOLKE (CHRISTO AND JEANNE-CLAUDE: THE WRAPPED REICHSTAG) (Wolfram Hissen, 1996), 4:30
Monday, November 12 HANNA HANNAH. (Hanna Schygulla, 2006) and IM LICHTBILD DER GROßSTADT (BERLIN–PICTURES OF A CITY) (Manfred Wilhelms, 1998), 6:00
Monday, November 12 NACHTGESTALTEN (NIGHT SHAPES) (Andreas Dresen, 1998), 8:15
Wednesday, November 14 NACHTGESTALTEN (NIGHT SHAPES) (Andreas Dresen, 1998), 6:00
Wednesday, November 14 NACH DER MUSIK (A FATHER'S MUSIC) (Igor Heitzmann, 2006), 8:15
Mondays at 1:00, St. Paul’s Chapel, Broadway at Fulton St.
Thursdays at 1:00, Trinity Church, Broadway at Wall St.
Suggested donation: $2
212-602-0747
http://www.trinitywallstreet.org
Thursday, November 1 Proteus Ensemble: Works by Copland, Piazzolla, Carter, and Gershwin
Monday, November 5 Invert
Thursday, November 8 Ma’ a lot Quintet: Works by Beethoven, Dvorak, Piazzolla, and Glanert.
Monday, November 12 Sean Katsuyama, cello, with Jing Li, piano: Works by Beethoven, Schumann, and Piazzolla
Bronx Museum of the Arts
1040 Grand Concourse at 165th St.
Admission: free
718-681-6000
Friday, November 2 BRB: Bronx’s Rap Is Back! Celebrating Hip Hop History Month and honoring Bronx’s own Afrika Bambaataa and the Zulu Nation, hosted by Jeru the Damaja, with DJ Chela, emcees Patty Dukes and RephStar, Rebel Diaz + LF (Brazil) and Meswy, 6:00
Jack H. Skirball Center for the Performing Arts
566 La Guardia Pl.
Tickets: $30-$50
212-925-3988
Friday, November 2 Rare New York Performance of traditional Cantonese opera from Hong Kong, produced by stage legend Chi Kei Li and featuring the New York debut of Candy Tang and Pui Yan Li, with excerpts from DREAM OF THE RED CHAMBER, PEONY PAVILION, MULAN, and other epic tales, 7:30
Hiro Ballroom / Maritime Hotel
363 West 16th St. between Eighth & Ninth Aves.
Tickets: $25
Friday, November 2 Koop plays its first New York show in five years, with special guest Alice Russell and a DJ set by Mocean Worker, 8:00
Asian American Writers Workshop
16 West 32nd St. between Fifth Ave. & Broadway
Friday, November 2, 7:00
Admission: $10
The New School
6 East 16th St. at Fifth Ave., eleventh floor
Saturday, November 3, 10:00 am — 6:00 pm
Admission: free
The South Asian Women’s Creative Collective will be holding its fifth annual literary festival with two days of readings workshops, and panel discussions.
Friday, November 2 The Mashup Reading, with Sita Bhaskar, Roohi Choudhry, V. V. Ganeshananthan, Sheba Karim, Keshni Kashyap, Yesha Naik, Nina Sharma, and Marian Thambynayagam
Saturday, November 3 Workshops and panels featuring such participants as Sejal Shah, Samantha Edussuriya, Anna John, Janki Katau, Shobhan Bantwal, Saira Rao, Monica Pradhan, Mira Kamdar, Sita Bhaskar, V. V. Ganeshananthan, Robin Mookerjee, and Sunita Mukhi
Metropolitan Pavilion
125 West 18th St. between Sixth & Seventh Aves.
Friday, November 2, 7:00 - 10:00 pm
Saturday, November 3, and Sunday, November 4, 10:00 am - 7:00 pm
Admission: $6
Desperate Collectors: Early Friday admission (4:00) and all weekend long, $20
http://www.metropolitanevents.com
Nearly two hundred dealers will be selling good old vinyl from all over the world at WFMU’s annual fundraiser. It’s only six bucks to get in, so come on out and support free-form independent radio and that old turntable that’s gathering dust in your closet. And learn what some of us already know: Music just sounds better on LPs, with every crack and pop part of the fun. But yes, for you young kids, there will be plenty of CDs as well. The weekend also features live performances and live radio shows that will be broadcast over WFMU — which is 91.1 FM, for those of you too embarrassed to ask.
Warsaw
261 Driggs Ave.
Tickets: $35-$40 per day, $90 for all three shows
http://www.myspace.com/cavestomp
The tenth anniversary of CaveStomp!, the self-described Garage Rock Festacular will feature the first appearance by the Sonics in thirty-five years.
Friday, November 2 The Sonics, the Thanes, the Satelliters, the Outta Place, the Staggers, with MC Peter Zaremba
Saturday, November 3 The Strawberry Alarm Clock, the New Colony Six, the Alarm Clocks, the Urges, and the Higher State, with MC Peter Zaremba
Sunday, November 4 The Sonics, the Fleshtones, Lyres, the Wildebeests, the Hall Monitors, with MC Lenny Kaye
Brooklyn Museum of Art
200 Eastern Parkway
Admission: free after 5:00 pm (some events require free tickets available that night)
718-638-5000
Saturday, November 3 Performance: Michael Arenella and his Dreamland Orchestra play hot jazz of the Roaring Twenties, Hall of the Americas, first floor, 6:00 — 8:00
Saturday, November 3 Artist Talk: Chitra Ganesh, free tickets available at the Visitor Center at 5:00, Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art, Forum, fourth floor, 6:00
Saturday, November 3 Dance Performance: Bridgman/Packer Dance, free tickets available at the Visitor Center at 5:30, Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Auditorium, third floor, 6:30
Saturday, November 3 Hands-On Art: Create your own watercolor landscape painting, free timed tickets available at the Visitor Center at 5:30, Education Division, first floor, 6:30 — 8:30
Saturday, November 3 Young Voices Gallery Talk: Student Guides Bella Yarmolnik and Anna Piazza lead an interactive tour of Brushed with Light: American Landscape Watercolors from the Collection, meet at the entrance to Brushed with Light, first floor, 7:00
Saturday, November 3 Film: DAYS OF HEAVEN (Terrence Malick, 1978), free tickets available at the Visitor Center at 6:30, Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art, Forum, fourth floor, 7:30
Saturday, November 3 Curator and Conservator Talk: Assistant Curator Karen Sherry and Paper Conservator Toni Owen discuss the exhibition Brushed with Light: American Landscape Watercolors from the Collection, free tickets are available at the Visitor Center at 7:00, meet at the entrance to Brushed with Light, first floor, 8:00
Saturday, November 3 "Say It Loud!" Interact with Infinite Island artist Satch Hoyt's installation for free speech and discussion, and have your participation recorded for YouTube, Infinite Island exhibition, fifth floor, 8:00 — 10:00
Saturday, November 3 Film: CHICAGO (Rob Marshall, 2002), free tickets available at the Visitor Center at 7:30, Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Auditorium, third floor, 8:30
Saturday, November 3 Dance Party, with DJ Paolo and the band King Memphis,
Beaux-Arts Court, third floor, 9:00 — 11:00
Church of St. Paul the Apostle
60th St. & Columbus Ave.
Admission: free
Saturday, November 3 Fourth annual International Latin/Tropical Music Collectors Festival, celebrating the importance of Mexican cinema in the promotion of the tropical Latin music industry, featuring a collectors flea market, live musical performances, DJs and dancing, conversations, exhibitions with film clips, videos, and displays, a special tribute to Ralph Mercado, appearances by Ray Santos, Lupita O’Farrill, Chocolate Armenteros, Rene Lopez, Aurora Flores, Bobby Sanabria, Junior Vega, Humberto Corredor, Benny Bonilla, Milton Cardona, Ninon Sevilla, Alejandro Zuarth, Nelson Gonzalez, Henry Fiol, Mitch Frohman, Felipe Luciano, Jaime Jaramillo, and more, 1:00 — 11:00
The Town Hall
123 West 43rd St. between Sixth Ave. & Broadway
Tickets: $25-$45
212-608-0555
http://www.the-townhall-nyc.org
Saturday, November 3 Performing the sema ritual of spiritual rebirth, commemorating the eight-hundredth anniversary of the birth of Rumi, 8:00
Lakeside Lounge
162 Ave. B between 10th & 11th Sts.
Admission: free, no cover
212-529-8463
http://www.myspace.com/theizzys
Saturday, November 3 The Izzys celebrate the release of their latest CD, 11:00
The Fillmore New York at Irving Plaza
17 Irving Pl. between 14th & 15th Sts.
Tickets: $21
212-777-6800
Saturday, November 3 with Old School Freight Train opening up, 8:00
Brooklyn Lyceum
227 Fourth Ave.
Admission: $10
866-gowanus
Saturday, November 3 Joebass, Michael Farkas, and Parrish Ellis celebrate the release of their latest CD, the follow-up to HAT TRICK, with Curtis Ellers American Circus, the Second Fiddles, and the Two Man Gentlemen Band, 9:00
Murray Street Studio
19 Murray St. between Church St. & Broadway, third floor
Admission: $35
Reservations: info@aboveandbeyondance.com
http://www.aboveandbeyonddance.com/company/auction2007.htm
Sunday, November 4 Fundraiser benefit party and auction for new dance troupe formed by artistic director Chiselle D. Tidrick, featuring hors d’oeuvres, drinks, and performances (attendees will be asked to remove their shoes to get inside), 6:00
Central Park West
Near Tavern on the Green
http://www.tanser.org/shoe.htm
Monday, November 5 Marathoners and others can donate their old shoes and sneakers to be sent to Kibera, one of the world’s most poverty-stricken and disease-ridden populations where people get sick by walking barefoot in sewage, hosted by Anthony Edwards and Toby Tanser, 7:00 am — 2:00 pm
CUNY Graduate Center, Proshansky Auditorium
365 Fifth Ave. at 34th St.
Admission: free
212-817-2005
Monday, November 5 Katha Pollitt & Anna Quindlen in Conversation, 6:30
Skylight
275 Hudson St.
212-946-7149
Monday, November 5 Annual fundraiser for Aperture, featuring a cocktail reception, live and silent auctions of contemporary and classic photographs, and a sit-down dinner, honoring Sally Mann, Gillian Laub, Joanne Leonhardt Cassullo, and Laurence Miller, co-chaired by Lisa Anastos, Bonni Benrubi, Beth Rudin DeWoody, Larry Gagosian, Todd Oldham, and Diane Tuft, 6:30 — 10:00
School of Visual Arts, room 101C
133/141 West 21st St.
Admission: free
212-592-2010
Tuesday, November 6 Lecture by conceptual artist Roxy Paine, who currently has an installation in Madison Square Park, 6:30
Aperture Gallery
547 West 27th St. between Tenth & Eleventh Aves.
Admission: free
212-505-5555
Tuesday, November 6 Dutch conceptual artist Hans Eijkelboom will discuss his new book, PARIS — NEW YORK — SHANGHAI (Aperture, November 2007), and sign copies, followed by an opening reception for his first major solo exhibition in America (which runs at Aperture from November 9 through January 3), 6:30
CinémaTuesdays
French Institute Alliance Française
Florence Gould Hall
55 East 59th St. between Park & Madison Aves.
Through November 27
Tickets: $10
212-355-6160
Tuesday, November 6 YVES SAINT LAURENT: HIS LIFE AND TIMES (David Teboul, 2002) and 5 AVENUE MARCEAU 75116 PARIS (David Teboul, 2002), 12:30, 4:00 & 7:30
Tuesday, November 13 AND GOD CREATED WOMAN (ET DIEU CRÉA LA FEMME) (Roger Vadim, 1957), 12:30, 4:00 & 7:30
Cornelia Street Café
29 Cornelia St. between West Fourth & Bleecker Sts.
Admission: $12 (includes house drink)
Reservations: 212-989-9319
http://www.corneliastreetcafe.com
Wednesday, November 7 One-man play written and performed by Peter Carlaftes, 6:30
The New School, Tishman Auditorium
66 West 12th St. between Fifth & Sixth Aves.
Admission: $5
212-229-5488
Wednesday, November 7 Multimedia installation artist Stan Douglas, 6:30
The Hungarian House Dance Hall
213 East 82nd St. between Second & Third Aves.
Admission: $13-$15
Thursday, November 8 Old-time session, 6:30; barn dance, 8:00 — 11:00, with live music by Two Lost Turkeys, dance calling by Dave Harvey, and beer, wine, meat, cabbage, and sweet strudels available
Various locations and ticket prices
Sponsored by the Museum of the Moving Image
718-784-4520
Thursday, November 8 NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN (Joel Coen, 2007), with Javier Bardem and Josh Brolin in person, Manhattan theater TBA, $12, 7:00
Friday, November 9 An Evening with Ang Lee and James Schamus, including film clips, a conversation, and remarks by actors they’ve worked with, Times Center, 242 West 41st St., $25, 7:00
Saturday, November 10 I’M NOT THERE (Todd Haynes, 2007), with Todd Haynes in person, AMC Loews West 34th St., 312 West 34th St., $18, 7:00
Monday, November 12 MARGOT AT THE WEDDING (Noah Baumbach, 2007), with Noah Baumbach and Jennifer Jason Leigh in person, Clearview Chelsea West, 333 West 23rd St., $18, 7:00
Thursday, November 15 THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY (Julian Schnabel, 2007), with Julian Schnabel, Mathieu Amalric, Max Von Sydow, Emmanuelle Seigner, Marie Jose Croze, Jon Kilik, and Kathleen Kennedy in person, Clearview Chelsea West, 333 West 23rd St., $18, 7:00
Tuesday, November 20 THE SAVAGES (Tamara Jenkins, 2007), with Tamara Jenkins, Laura Linney, and Philip Bosco in person, Loews Kips Bay, 550 Second Ave. at 32nd St., $18, 7:00
Café Emilia
139 First Ave. between St. Marks Pl. & Ninth St.
Fee: $35
212-415-5500
Friday, November 9 Culinary historian and cookbook author Alexandra Leaf leads a nosh-and-nibble tour of St. Marks Pl., including hummus, chocolate, hibiscus sangria, brick-oven pizza, a bomboloni breakfast, and more, 1:00
National Academy Museum and School of Fine Arts
1083 Fifth Ave. between 89th & 90th Sts.
Admission: $5 (includes entry to exhibits at National Academy)
212-369-4880
http://www.nationalacademy.org
http://www.artcritical.com/REVIEWPANEL/index.htm
Friday, November 9 David Cohen, Arthur Danto, Vincent Katz, and Linda Yablonsky discuss Antony Gormley at Sean Kelly, Isaac Julien at Metro Pictures, Kate Shepherd at Galerie Lelong, Karen Yasinsky at Mireille Mosler Ltd., and Kara Walker at the Whitney, with National Academy galleries open prior to panel, 6:45
French Institute Alliance Française
Florence Gould Hall, 55 East 59th St. between Park & Madison Aves.
Tickets: $10-$25
212-307-4100
Friday, November 9 Monique Nichanian of Hermes, 7:00
Japan Society
333 East 47th St. at First Ave.
Monthly Fridays through May 2008
Tickets: $12
212-715-1258
Friday, November 9 THE WARPED ONES (KYONETSU NO KISETSU), 1960), 7:30
New York City Center
130 West 56th St. between Sixth & Seventh Aves.
Tickets: $10-$75
212-581-1212
Friday, November 9 Benefit Concert featuring music from the film AUGUST RUSH (Kirsten Sheridan, 2007), with live performances by Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Freddie Highmore, Keri Russell, Five for Fighting’s John Ondrasik, David Crosby, the Berklee College of Music Symphony, Impact Repertory Theatre, Jamia Simone Nash, Leon Thomas III, and more, with musical director Phil Ramone and composer Mark Mancina, 8:30
Crossroads
78 North Ave., Garwood, NJ
Admission: $5
908-232-5666
http://www.myspace.com/thedoughboysnj
Friday, November 9 Richard X. Heyman, Gar Francis, Myke Scavone, and Mike Caruso of the reunited Doughboys celebrate the release of their latest CD, IS IT NOW?, 9:00
Glasslands Gallery
298 Kent Ave. between South First & Second Sts.
Admission: $8
Friday, November 9 Multimedia cabaret celebrates its fifth anniversary, with live performances by Services, Martha Colburn, Shana Moulton, DJs Tropical Jeremy, Matthew Radune, and Ceci Moss, projections by English Kills and Mighty Robot, and more, hosted by Nicklcat, 10:00 pm
Java Street Hall
176 Java St. between Manhattan Ave. & McGuinness Blvd.
917-689-1899
Tickets: $20-$25
Friday, November 9
through
Sunday, November 11 Fifth annual festival presented by the Faune Dance Troupe, featuring dance excerpts from ROSE ADAGIO, THE DYING SWAN, LE SPECTRE DE LA ROSE, and DON QUIXOTE, the Celebrity String Quartet, a Taiko Extravaganza short play, tap dancing by Masato Nishitani and the Street Tap Jam Sessions, Martial Arts Theater presentation of Spinnin Ronin’s LIU on November 9-10, and a Samurai Sword Soul performance of "Power of the EMBLEM" on November 11
IFC Center
323 Sixth Ave. at West Third St.
Tickets: $11
212-924-7771
Friday, November 9
through
Sunday, November 11 KAMA SUTRA: A TALE OF LOVE (Mira Nair, 1996), 12 noon
Various Chelsea galleries
Sign-in and Passport pickup: Bond No. 9 New York Boutique, 399 Bleecker St. at Eleventh St., 11:00 am — 3:00 pm
Self-guided tour: 11:00 am — 6:00 pm
Cocktail reception and silent auction: The Xchange, 640 West 28th St., ninth floor, 6:00 — 8:00
866-468-7619
http://passporttothearts2007.com
Saturday, November 10 Self-guided tour of eighteen Chelsea galleries, including Mary Boone, Cheim & Read, CUE Art, Paul Kasmin, Metro Picture, Mixed Greens, and Printed Matter, where participants receive a limited-edition pocket-size art collection, followed by cocktail reception and silent auction (including works by Michael De Feo, Folkert de Jong, Terence Koh, Gary Panter, Milton Rogovin, and Joel Sternfeld), with part of the proceeds benefiting Friends of the High Line
Roulette
20 Greene St. between Canal & Grand Sts.
Admission: $15
212-219-8242
Saturday, November 10 Three-hour dance installation by Eileen Fisher (audience can come and go as they please), with a dozen fifteen-minute segments featuring such guest music curators as Meredith Monk, Gary Graham, Theo Bleckman, Nick Brooke, Ching Gonzalez, and others, 3:00 — 6:00 pm
Theresa Lang Community and Student Center
The New School
55 West 13th St., second floor
Admission: free
212-229-8919
http://www.parsons.newschool.edu
Saturday, November 10 A symposium presented by the Illustration Department of Parsons, the New School for Design, with introductory remarks by Nora Krug, “Reading in Public” with Ben Katchor, “A Light in the Dark: Ruth Marten and Tara McPherson in Conversation with Steven Guarnaccia, and “Shaky Line, Shaky Times: Ed Koren and Ed Sorel in Conversation with Dan Nadel, 3:00 – 7:00
Galapagos Art Space, back room
70 North Sixth St. between Wythe and Kent
Admission: $5
718-384-4586
http://www.galapagosartspace.com
Saturday, November 10 A Benefit Concert for the Victims of the Southern California Wildfires, with Cornmo, the Bollocks, SO3, Audition Lab, and DJ G Force, 10:00
Museum of the City of New York
1220 Fifth Avenue at 103rd St.
Admission: $9 (RSVP required)
212-534-1672 ext3395
Saturday, November 10, 11:00 am
and
Tuesday, November 13, 2:00 Walking tour through the Lower East Side, from the Manhattan Bridge to the Williamsburg Bridge, led by urban historian John Tauranac
Fortune Society Academy
140th St. & Riverside Dr.
Tickets: $25
212-255-4834
Sunday, November 11 Gregory Singer’s eight-piece string ensemble, Manhattan Symphonee, will play a benefit concert for the Fortune Society, featuring works by Mozart, Bach, Britten, Barber, Schubert, and Hoagy Carmichael, 3:00
Noguchi Museum
9-01 33rd Rd. at Vernon Blvd.
Free with museum admission of $10
718-204-7088
Sunday, November 11 Materials and Process: Tradition and Experimentation, panel discussion with architect and designer James Carpenter and furniture designers Michael Puryear and Mira Nakashima, moderated by Phil Patton, 3:00
The Jewish Museum
1109 Fifth Ave. at 92nd St.
Free with museum admission
212-423-3337
Sunday, November 11 Featuring arts and crafts, a collaborative mural project, a live performance by Princess Katie and Racer Steve, an appearance by Shrek, and more, in celebration of the exhibition "From the New Yorker to Shrek: The Art of William Steig," for children ages three and up and their families, 12 noon — 4:00
Steven Kasher Gallery
521 West 23rd St. between Tenth & Eleventh Aves., second floor
Admission: free
212-966-3978
Monday, November 12 Stephen Shames Foundation benefit for Concern for the Future, which raises funds and awareness for Uganda’s forgotten children, hosted by His Excellency Ambassador Francis K. Butagira, featuring a one-day-only exhibition of thirty-by-forty signed Stephen Shames photographs of Ugandan children and drawings by Ugandan children, all available for sale
World Financial Center Winter Garden
225 Vesey St.
Admission: free
212-945-2600
http://www.worldfinancialcenter.com
Monday, November 12
and
Tuesday, November 13 U.S. premiere of musical work by composer Joby Talbot, part of New Sounds Live, 7:00
B.B. King Blues Club & Grill
237 West 42nd St. between Seventh & Eighth Aves.
Tickets: $125
212-997-4144
Monday, November 12
and
Tuesday, November 13 B. B. King himself headlines two nights at his blues club, with Ryan Shaw opening up, 8:00
Three-course prix-fixe dinner: $25/$35 (excludes beverages, tax, and tip)
Reservations strongly suggested
212-835-2789
Monday, November 12
through
Sunday, November 18 More than three dozen downtown restaurants will be serving three-course dinners for $25 or $35 (not including drinks, tax, and tip), including Battery Gardens, Roy’s New York, Delmonico’s, Fraunces Tavern, Brasserie Les Halles, Gigino at Wagner Park, Harbour Lights, Harry’s Cafe, Giovanni’s Atrium, P.J. Clarke’s on the Hudson, Steamers Landing, Smörgas Chef, MarkJoseph Steakhouse, and more
BAMcinematek
BAM Rose Cinemas
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
October 15 — November 19
Tickets: $11
718-636-4100
Tuesday, November 13 PANDORA’S BOX (G.W. Pabst, 1928), new print presented with live musical accompaniment by 3epkano, 7:30
Museum of Modern Art
Roy and Niuta Titus Theater 2
4 West 53rd St. between Fifth & Sixth Aves.
Tickets: $10
212-708-9781
Tuesday, November 13 Curator John Elderfield in conversation with Martin Puryear, discussing Puryear’s new exhibition at MoMA, 7:00
Union Square Café
21 East 16th St.
Tickets: $45
RSVP: 646-747-0581
Wednesday, November 14 Discussion of cauliflower with Kevin Smith of Sycamore Farms, with recipe demonstrations with chef Carmen Quagliata, a Q&A with Danny Meyer, homemade pastries, hot coffee, and more, 8:00 am
The New School, Tishman Auditorium
66 West 12th St. between Fifth & Sixth Aves.
Admission: free
212-229-5353
Wednesday, November 14 Panel discussion with Marina Abramovic, Vanessa Beecroft, and Babette Mangolte, moderated by PERFORMA founder/director RoseLee Goldberg, 7:00
Symphony Space, Peter Jay Sharp Theatre
2537 Broadway at 95th St.
Tickets: $24-$30
212-864-5400
Wednesday, November 14 Selected Shorts: A Celebration of the Short Story, with John Lithgow, Bill Irwin, and others reading from TELLERS OF TALES and THE POETS’ CORNER, 7:30
Mickey Mantle’s Restaurant
42 Central Park South
Tickets: $200
212-625-1025
Thursday, November 15 Eighteenth annual awards presentation, honoring Brett Yormark of NETS Sports and former New York Mets reliever John Franco, featuring a cocktail reception, live and silent auctions, awards ceremony, and dinner, with proceeds benefiting Camp Brooklyn, 6:00