Made in USA

A spirited exhibit THU 6/30 With our new national pastimes of waging illegal wars, sending jobs to India, and telling everyone else to screw off, it’s easy to think of the American spirit as something to read about in history books. But the exhibit “Salute to America: A Celebration of…

Flip Out!

You’re getting creepy… very creepy THU 6/30 He helped you quit smoking, and he got rid of your fat ass. Who is he? He’s your hypnotist! Now it’s time to let him make you laugh by tapping into others’ inner silliness. That’s right, the jaw-dropping comedian-hypnotist Flip Orley is in…

Gross Encounters

Quite simply and quite literally, Steven Spielberg’s adaptation of H.G. Wells’ War of the Worlds is Close Encounters of the Third Kind turned inside-out: They’re still out there, only this time the aliens are out for our blood, which they spray all over the countryside like so much red paint…

You So Lazy

Martin Lawrence has never exactly been among the world’s more gifted comedians, yet his movies seem to keep raking in the cash, so there must be legions of loyal Lawrenceheads out there somewhere. But even they, who have made financial successes of Black Knight, Big Momma’s House, and National Security,…

Diddelyada-Toot Chicks

The Andrews Sisters, who rose to mega-stardom during the World War II Big Band era, were the Dixie Chicks of their time. That is, if you first replace the Chicks’ antiwar sentiment with patriotism and then add an unbridled popularity no girl group since the Andrews Sisters has ever quite…

Stagebeat

While the effort behind The Secret Life of Walter Mitty is plain to see, the Delray Beach Playhouse’s production just can’t breathe life into this boring 1964 musical about a boring man. Walter is a husband and father taking stock of his life on his 40th birthday. Unsatisfied as a…

Accidental Teapots

There are teapots and there are teapots. There are the sleek stainless steel teapots designed for Italian manufacturer Alessi by architect Michael Graves and popularized by Target — teapots that are both beautiful and functional. Then there are porcelain teapots that inspire the devotion of collectors, ranging from classic British…

Artbeat

Aquarian Age in Boca Raton smells incredible, with a light incense infusing the air. The shop, part boutique and part art gallery with a spiritual theme, opened April 1 in a storefront inside a bright-yellow, upscale minimall on just another unremarkable stretch of Federal Highway. Paintings, glasswork, and pottery from…

Illin’ in Hollywood

The difference between doing an impression of Sammy Davis Jr. and actually becoming Sammy Davis Jr. is the difference between an ordinary comic and Tommy Davidson. Sprightly, bursting, and spontaneous, the In Living Color alum is a master of the impromptu performance, often commenting in interviews that his shows are…

This Week’s Day-by-Day Picks

THU 23 If Judas Priest’s current success proves anything, it’s that even metalheads have moved into the 21st Century. When head Priest Rob Halford announced in 1998 that he is homosexual (not the biggest shocker), it could have spelled death for his metal career. But when Judas Priest did a…

Florida Über Alles

By now, the story of the Dead Kennedys’ bitter legal battle with former vocalist Jello Biafra is old news (Biafra’s label, Alternative Tentacles, was ordered to pay the band $200 G’s for damages resulting from unpaid royalties). So it was no surprise that, when punk rock’s legendary troublemakers re-formed in…

Revolutionized

Nicole Richie, DJ AM… and Axl Rose on trapeze FRI 6/24 Jeffrey John, the 28-year-old owner of Revolution (200 W. Broward Blvd.), the downtown Fort Lauderdale concert venue, is amped. Beginning with this weekend’s megaparty, the space will become “a major metropolitan city nightclub” on Fridays and Saturdays. “Come here…

Pool Party

Lady killers carry big sticks THU 6/23 In a sport of fierce competition, where names like “The Black Widow” and “The Duchess of Doom” are heralded, Ewa Mataya Laurance knows that her 25 years of professional pool-playing experience can give her an edge. The veteran is counting on her skill…

Seine Scene

Boca’s got the je ne sais quoi WED 6/29 Invited to gawp at the surreal boulevards of gay Paree through the lusty lens of a brilliant photographer, you see it as an opportunity to fantasize about sipping absinthe with your ex-patriate Jazz Age friends. But, alas, you’re no Hemingway –…

Whodunit?

FAU, again FRI 6/24 Who knew the King of Pop could inspire classic theater? “Michael Jackson goes to court and everybody pays attention,” says Richard Gamble, artistic director of Florida Atlantic University’s 2005 Festival Repertory Theatre. In hopes of drawing some attention himself, Gamble chose a whodunit called The Hollow…

Dance, Dance, Revolution

Forget Mad Hot Ballroom. The real dance documentary hit of the summer is more likely to be Rize. After all, which do you think the kids are going to find more appealing: formal steps that require suits, partners, and schoolteachers or shaking the booty and slamming into fellow dancers while…

Girls Interrupted

Not many people saw Lost and Delirious, the 2001 boarding-school drama about two girls in obsessive love, and that was probably for the best. Yes, Piper Perabo (Coyote Ugly) made a stunning androgynous rebel, but she couldn’t rescue the film from its unctuous self-importance. My Summer of Love, a bewitching…

Orthodox Meshugaas

Culture clash always makes for great comedy. It’s fun to poke fun at ourselves through archetypes colliding on stage and screen. The resulting yin-yang battles have well-known, usually entertaining results, like neat freak Felix versus slob Oscar or straight-acting gay Will versus nelly gay Jack. In his engagingly cute Modern…

Stagebeat

William Shakespeare needs no excuse. And the Shakespeare Project 2005, an ambitious, summerlong festival now on stage at the New Theatre, holds the immense promise of some of the most exciting drama the world has known. Romeo and Juliet, which will be followed by The Merchant of Venice in July…

Artbeat

The best reason to visit Art Expressions right now is a small but powerful one-woman show, “Selene Vasquez: In No Strange Land.” About two dozen acrylic paintings by the Hollywood-based Vasquez take up nearly half of this tiny Fort Lauderdale gallery, which has been open in an easy-to-miss strip mall…

Car Trouble

Anyone who would insist that movie reviewing is not a real job (‘Sup, Mom) hasn’t been forced to sit through screenings of Bewitched and Herbie: Fully Loaded in the span of five days — and by forced, I mean either you see both movies, write 800 words about each, or…

Provident Improv

It takes a lot of practice to be spontaneous. That’s the first thing you learn when you’re in a good improvisational comedy show. Improv isn’t just acting. It’s a sport, with its own skill sets and formal vocabularies. It takes a lot of training to make improv look so sweetly…