Arts & Culture

Sooner or later, the impracticality of the Fourth of July is going to come crashing down, and America is going to lose one of its most revered pastimes: the ignition of dangerous explosives in close proximity to small children and stunted adults drinking too much booze. It will be a…

Friday, 5 p.m. — You and your most stylish girlfriends embark on a glorious mission to enjoy complimentary Ladies’ Night Belvedere vodka drinks while club hopping at the Hard Rock. 5:15 to 7 – Weekly work worries dissolve as you imbibe at Center Bar, Council Oak Bar, Bluepoint Ocean Grill,…

You think times are tough now? If the Lake Worth Playhouse could talk, it’d teach you a thing or three about survival. In the 85 years since it was first built (originally as the Oakley Theatre), the building at 713 Lake Avenue has been through it all: the Great Depression,…

Poor Pittsburgh Pirates. Their city is two-for-two in sports championships this year, following a dominating romp through the NFL playoffs by the Steelers and an improbable (and epic) comeback march by the Penguins in the NHL playoffs. The Steel City hasn’t been this ecstatic since, well, it was actually making…

Down the garbage chute goes the leftover wedding cake that sat — spoiling — in your freezer. That cake is rotten and useless. It may be hard to express how freedom tastes, but a Fourth of July hot dog has nothing on a divorce cake (divorce cake’s much sweeter). And,…

Time in Florida goes by in dog years – when some place turns 80 here, it’s actually the equivalent of 200 somewhere else. Which is why the city of Oakland Park’s 80th birthday is cause for celebration. The little town that could has a bright musical heritage, and so music…

Ah, college. That immutable, coming-of-age period so accurately depicted in films like Old School and Animal House is supposed to be the best time of our lives. And thanks to events like Tuesday’s College Night and Hot Bod Contest going down at Cheers, it certainly is. Undulating bodies will converge…

Shake, shake, shake your way into Land Shark stadium tonight for a special Fourth of July version of the Florida Marlins’ Super Saturdays starring disco/funk purveyors, KC & the Sunshine Band. Following the Marlins/Pirates game, the stadium will come alive with a fireworks display and the sounds of the band…

For Miami-based guitarist and bandleader DJ Le Spam (AKA Andrew Yeomanson), his band’s name, the Spam Allstars, has nothing to do with the famed meat substitute. Instead, what the moniker actually represents is this eclectic act’s mission “to blend improvisational electronic elements and turntables with Latin, funk, and dub to…

What’s Fourth of July without fireworks? Humans are indescribably attracted to anything shiny, and this holiday represents the most democratic indulgence in our love for sparkles; everyone can afford to enjoy fireworks since they’re free. After the musically synchronized fireworks display Friday, stroll into the Seminole Hard Rock for a…

Good theater is where you find it, and through July 19 at Rising Action Theatre, you’ll find it in actor John McGlothlin’s stubbly, twitching face, which spends the heartbreaking second act of Bent staring at the ground. Resignation is at war with rage in that face. Imprisoned by the Nazis…

Game shows mostly fill the air slots of daytime television – and during the day, it’s exciting to win prizes such as a really cool orange juice maker. (Or so it seems by the elated faces on the television set.) And even though these shows are held in a studio…

You’re hopeless at wooing. Your last date was offended by your venue choice – even though Bow Hunter magazine assured you that chicks dig taxidermy. And the one before her? Remember? She had that great smile – until you took her to a dog fight. Don’t worry, not everyone was…

If you were an American girl living in the last fifty years, you belonged to one of two groups: The pro-Barbie set, who lauded the Mattel creation for her iconic fashion sense, or the anti-Barbie crowd, who loathed the blonde bombshell for her influence on unrealistic body images. Maybe you…

The Florida Marlins’ favorite tackling dummies, the Washington Nationals, are in town this week. And you could not ask for a better match up for a team that seems to have finally regained its mojo. The Marlins had been stumbling around like a moose on tranquilizers in the last few…

In the land of iPods and iTunes, CDs are passe and eight tracks are prehistoric. But to music geeks, nothing can replace the rich sound quality of records – or the implication of elitism that a 10,000-piece-and-growing vinyl collection affords a person. In a format that will bring South Florida…

Though mostly unknown to international audiences, Skank is one of the most revered rock bands in their native Brazil, owing to their catchy songs and fiery shows. Lead vocalist (and main lyricist) Samuel Rosa is a charismatic frontman who is outspoken about his political beliefs and his passion for soccer…

While the ska resurgence that began in the mid-’90s brought renewed interest in the music of the late-’70s/early-’80s U.K. scene, there was a noticeable generation gap between the young upstarts and their supposed influences. Had more bands then sounded like South Florida’s Spred the Dub, we might have been spared…

Virginia Woolf once said, “All women together, ought to let flowers fall upon the grave of Aphra Behn… for it was she who earned them the right to speak their minds.” Restoration humorist, Earl of Rochester enthusiast, and noted lady lover, Aphra Behn was one of the first professional female…

If you tune your cable box to Comedy Central at any given moment, chances are you will find a South Park re-run or a marathon of the film Beer League (the funniest movie ever, apparently). What you won’t often find is stand-up comedy, unless it’s 2 in the morning. This…