twi-ny recommended events

TWI-NY TICKET GIVEAWAY: SPAGHETTI & MATZO BALLS — FUHGEDDABOUDIT

Sarah and Tony experience some familial complications in new Brooklyn-set romantic comedy (photo by Benjamin Chambers)

SPAGHETTI & MATZO BALLS — FUHGEDDABOUDIT
Baruch Performing Arts Center
25th St. between Lexington & Third Aves.
Select dates from June 18 to July 23, $34.50 – $43.50
212-352-3101
www.spaghettionstage.com

The world premiere of SPAGHETTI & MATZO BALLS — FUHGEDDABOUDIT takes place tonight at the Baruch Performing Arts Center, hosted by KTU DJ Goumba Johnny. Produced by the same team behind the popular PLATANOS & COLLARD GREENS, this Brooklyn-set romantic comedy reveals “what happens when a nice Italian boy falls in love with a sweet Jewish girl.” Written by David Lamb and directed by Renée Lynette Ferrara, the show features Bryan R. Craine, Michelle Cammarata, Mindy Cassle, Jennifer Leigh Cohen, Paul D. Failla, Jessica Goldstein, Peter Marinaro, and others and is scheduled for only four more performances after tonight: June 26 at 8:00, July 9 at 8:00, July 18 at 2:00, and July 23 at 8:00.

This Week in New York has three pairs of tickets to give away to this love story between Tony and Sarah and all the problems that ensue when both families get wind of their relationship. Just send your name, daytime phone number, and preferred performance date to contest@twi-ny.com by Monday, June 21, at 3:00 pm. Winners will be selected at random and must be at least twenty-one years of age to enter. Good luck!

HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH FILM FESTIVAL: MOLOCH TROPICAL

Raoul Peck’s Haiti-set political drama MOLOCH TROPICAL is centerpiece of Human Rights Watch Film Festival

MOLOCH TROPICAL (Raoul Peck, 2009)
Film Society of Lincoln Center, Walter Reade Theater, 165 West 65th St. at Amsterdam Ave.
Sunday, June 20, 7:00 (festival continues through June 24)
212-875-5601
www.hrw.org
www.filmlinc.com

Selected as the centerpiece of the 2010 Human Rights Watch Film Festival, Raoul Peck’s MOLOCH TROPICAL follows the sad decline of democratically elected Haitian president Jean de Dieu (Zinedine Soualem) as power corrupts and overwhelms him. A combination of nineteenth-century Haitian leader Henri Christophe, twentieth-century president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, any of several Shakespearean kings, Aleksandr Sokurov’s Nazi drama MOLOKH, and General Vargas from Woody Allen’s BANANAS, de Dieu lives in a mountain fortress where he takes advantage of the female servants, gets all excited when a Hollywood film crew shows up to meet him, and tries to prevent his mother from visiting because he is ashamed of the poverty he came from. In the beginning of the film, he steps on a piece of broken glass, so he limps through the rest of the movie, symbolic of his shaky regime. Although the film does suffer from an overabundance of clichés, it’s still a compelling portrait of the downfall of a powerful man. The Haitian-born Peck (LUMUMBA), who received the festival’s Nestor Almendros Award for courage in filmmaking in 1994 (this year’s winners are Rob Lemkin and Thet Sambath, who made ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE, about the Khmer Rouge siege of Cambodia), will participate in a postscreening Q&A with Kent Jones following the June 20 screening.

THE NEW YORK 48 HOUR FILM PROJECT

Cantor Film Center
36 East Eighth St.
Friday, June 18, $10, 7:00
917-596-4155
www.48hourfilm.com/newyork

On June 4, New York teams set out to make a short film in forty-eight hours, with the results shown June 11-13. The field has been narrowed down to thirteen finalists, which gather together at the Cantor Film Center tonight to compete for Best Directing, Best Script, Best Cinematography, Best Use of Prop, and other awards as well as the chance to qualify for the International Grand Prize and potentially get shown at Cannes. Among the films are Drop Table Productions’ “Adventure Cereal,” Girard Street’s “Lights Are On, Nobody’s Holmes,” Cup O’ Meat’s “das Ei und die Lenkbare,” Tiger Fight’s “Clark Holographics,” and Proper Villains’ “Swing, Set.” The Best of New York 48HFP Screening will be followed by an after-party at BLVD at 199 Bowery that will include a two-hour open bar and food.

WORLD CUP LIVE: AFRICA CELEBRATES!

The World Cup comes alive in art and on-screen at the Paley Center

Paley Center for Media
25 West 52nd St. between Fifth & Sixth Aves.
Through July 11
Admission: free
212-621-6800
www.paleycenter.org

Looking for somewhere different to watch the World Cup? Perhaps crowding into a pub at 9:30 in the morning is a bit much? The Paley Center will be screening all the World Cup games — live and for free — in its upstairs theater at 9:30 am and 2:00 pm every day, so you can enjoy the matches with other soccer lovers playing hooky from work during the week or sneaking out on weekends. In addition, the Steven Spielberg Gallery on the main floor is hosting “Africa Celebrates!” an exhibit of photographs taken by Joseph Peter during his whirlwind 2009 tour following the FIFA World Cup Trophy as it made its way through fifty African nations prior to arriving in South Africa. The photographs, shown alongside African art and furniture from the Hemingway African Gallery on 55th St., are divided into four sections: Happiness, Inspiration, Motivation, and Celebration, focusing on the people themselves and their love of the sport. Be sure to catch the United States, who earned a stunning, rather lucky, draw with England last week, as they take on Slovenia on June 18 at 9:30 am and Algeria on June 23, also at 9:30 am.

NEW YORK BREWFEST 2010

Governors Island, Water Taxi Beach
Saturday, June 19, $55, 3:30 – 8:00
www.nybrewfest.com

More than 120 international breweries, with a heavy emphasis on New York and the United States, will be pouring cold brews on June 19 on Water Taxi Beach on Governors Island at the fourth annual New York Brewfest. We highly recommend trying the fineries of Brewery Ommegang, Middle Ages, Goose Island, Magic Hat, Otter Creek, Smuttynose, Duvel, and Samuel Smith, among plenty of others. The event will feature live music by Alexis P. Suter, Mikey Powell, Dark Hollow, the Horseshoe Lounge Playboys, and Bagpipe Dudes; the seminars “Beer & Chocolate,” “Women in Beer,” and “The State of New York State Hops”; and food from Van Leeuwen, the Sullivan St. Bakery, Sigmund Pretzelshop, and Brewfest sponsor Heartland Brewery. And you don’t have to worry about finding a designated driver, as transportation to and from Governors Island will be handled by free water taxis all day.

THE GOODNIGHT LOVING

The Goodnight Loving will be all over the tristate area this weekend

Thursday, June 17, the Silent Barn, 915 Wyckoff Ave., Ridgewood, 8:00
Friday, June 18, Bruar Falls, 245 Grand St., Williamsburg, $8, 8:00
Saturday, June 19, Cake Shop, 152 Ludlow St., Manhattan, $10, 8:00
Sunday, June 20, Maxwell’s, 1039 Washington St., Hoboken, $12-$14, 9:00
www.myspace.com/thegoodnightloving

Goodnight Loving, where have you been all our lives? We can’t believe we’re only just discovering this amazing Milwaukee band, which has been around since the early 2000s. All that time lost! Well, we’ve been catching up with such fine tunage as the frantic “Mad Is the Man,” the rollicking “Colin Attends a Party,” the acoustic shanty “Purple Death,” and the country-tinged “Dead Fish on the Banks” from such earlier records as THE GOODNIGHT LOVING (2008), CROOKED LAKE (2006), and CEMETERY TRAILS (2005) as well as the groovy “The Pan” from their latest, SUPPER CLUB (Dirtknap, July 2010). Fans of the Black Lips, Drink Up Buttercup, and the classic Nuggets collections will fall in love with the GL’s garage band psychedelia, girl-group harmonies, Brit-pop melodies, and 1960s ephemera. James, Ross, Paul, and Jerome are in the midst of a nonstop U.S. tour right now that brings them to the Silent Barn on June 17 with Big Troubles, Bright Lights, and Fire Season, Bruar Falls on June 18 with Bass Drum of Death, Ex Humans, DJ Daed Pizza, and free ice cream, Cake Shop on June 19 with Prince Rupert’s Drops, and Maxwell’s on June 20 with Reigning Sound, giving everyone a chance to party to their infectious party rock.

THINKING PERFORMANCE

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
1071 Fifth Ave. at 89th St.
Thursday, June 17, 8:00, and Friday, June 18, 2:00
Tickets: $30
212-423-3500
www.guggenheim.org

In conjunction with the exhibition “Haunted: Contemporary Photography / Video / Performance,” the Guggenheim is presenting “Thinking Performance,” a two-day examination of performance art. On Thursday night, Joan Jonas will stage an expanded version of her 1969 work “Mirror Piece I: Reconfigured,” followed by a discussion between Jonas and curator Chrissie Ilies. On Friday beginning at 2:00, there will be a series of talks and discussions, including Rebecca Schneider’s “The Immaterial Labor of Temporal Drag: Tino Sehgal, Photography, and Interinanimation,” Carrie Lambert-Beatty’s “Performance Police,” Claire Bishop’s “Delegated Performance — Outsourcing Authenticity,” and a pair of artist conversations, one between Susan Philipsz and Nat Trotman, the other with Marina Abramovic and Nancy Spector. The two-day symposium will conclude with a viewing of the exhibit and a reception.