Sometimes, usually out on the golf course near his home in upstate New York, Dan DeCarlo feels terrific, far younger than his 81 years. He’ll thwack the ball, reflect upon his 55 years of marriage to the same beautiful woman and occasionally contemplate a life spent drawing and creating some…
In the popular imagination, the year 1969 conjures up images of anti-Vietnam War protests, Woodstock, and other countercultural happenings. For Mark Silber, the seminal event of that year was the Stonewall Riots in New York City, which marked the birth of the modern gay-rights movement. Four years later Silber, an…
Perhaps such perfectly swell holy days like Polish patron Saint Stanislaus’ day (April 11) or Lithuanian patroness Saint Cunegundes’ day (March 3) would have crossed into mainstream American culture if only those folks could have figured out what color to dye the beer. The backers of Saint Patrick’s Day had…
Lance Barton, thin as paper and frail as fine china, is such a horrific standup that, during an amateur-night performance at the Apollo Theater, he is booed with so much force — the audience whips up its own whirlwind — he’s literally knocked off the stage. Lance’s manager insists he’s…
But God rattled on in his holy language about all kinds of important stuff, life-and-death stuff, and Moses just sat there like a grade A, number one goof, not understanding a single word. Well, you know what he felt like? He felt like some miserable little 12-year-old kid from West…
When the lights finally came up in the Washington, D.C., movie theater, Leonard Nimoy sat still, silent, and a bit shaken. He could scarcely believe what he had seen–and what he had not seen. The movie was beautiful, but beneath the surface sheen, there was no heart, no soul. It…
February is Black History Month, a time to celebrate and reflect on the contributions African-Americans have made to American culture. But instead of merely focusing on George Washington Carver’s peanut research or Philip Emeagwali’s invention of the Internet (that’s enough out of you, Al), the Broward County Library is taking…
If you’ve never been to an auction before, the Boca Auction Gallery in Boca Raton is a great place to go on a Saturday night. It’s fun, and it’s free — unless you buy something, of course. Even if you walk out empty-handed, you’ll have to marvel at auctioneer/owner Mike…
Ridley Scott’s Hannibal, with a screenplay by David Mamet and Steven Zaillian, is being released ten years after The Silence of the Lambs, the film that established Hannibal Lecter as an iconic villain in our culture, right up there with A Nightmare on Elm Street’s Freddy Krueger, Friday the 13th’s…
The 20th Century is replete with examples of unconscionable crimes carried out in the name of some quasi-political, military, or religious cause — acts of such misguided judgment and mindless brutality that they seem to cross an invisible threshold of decency, morality, and understanding. The My Lai massacre of 1968,…
You won’t find any trendy installation in “The Triumph of French Painting: Masterpieces from Ingres to Matisse,” now at the Norton Museum of Art in West Palm Beach. No interactive or conceptual work. Nothing contemporary that ambitiously sets out to redefine art. You will find gallery after gallery of gorgeous…
If the British have a love-hate relationship with the French, it could be said that Americans have a laugh-hate relationship with the Brits. What we find riotously funny in them is what we abhor in ourselves: repressed sexuality, sniveling impishness, and hostility behind a thin veneer of civility. Words like…
Eddie Izzard knows precisely why he wanted to become a performer, be it an actor or stand-up comedian or, for that matter, a street performer entertaining passers-by for spare change. When he was 6 years old, Izzard was living in South Wales with his parents and older brother. Before that,…
Ah, the dead of winter in South Florida, when temperatures plummet to the depths of briskness, and armored knights joust to the death in Quiet Waters Park. Well, OK, maybe not to the death. But joust they will at the ninth annual Florida Renaissance Festival, which begins Saturday. This year’s…
Question: What do Bill Murray, Chris Farley, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, George Wendt, John Belushi, Dan Aykroyd, Martin Short, John Candy, and Mike Myers have in common? Answer: All of them got their start with the Second City comedy troupe. Taking its name from the title of a New Yorker article by…
Outside avant-garde or experimental showcases, short dramatic films used to be little more than a means to an end — a risky route to an uncertain mainstream future. Getting one made was usually easy enough, as those things go. The hard part was getting it shown — especially if you…
Most dramas about modern marriage and infidelity dwell on the clandestine nature of extramarital affairs and the havoc they wreak on everyone involved. Tom Stoppard’s The Real Thing picks up where most such tales leave off, delving into what happens after the cheaters have sloughed off their former spouses and…
It’s time to stop and smell the gardenias — and orange jasmines, and pines — at the Roji-en, the latest attraction at the serene Morikami Museum and Gardens in Delray Beach. The Roji-en, meaning “Garden of the Drops of Dew,” is actually six distinct Japanese gardens, each inspired by a…
The Wedding Planner begins with footage of a seven-year-old girl performing a wedding ceremony with her Barbies. It’s a fitting opening, because the movie that ensues could almost be the result of a screenwriter literally transcribing the play scenario enacted by a small child and her dolls. If you were…
How can one not be leery of a play staged in an attic? The ominous mahogany furniture, the curled yellowed pages of old newspapers and photo albums, and the inevitable sepia-tone photos hark back to a time only remarkable to the people who own the clutter. Most attic settings are…
Long before I saw what turned out to be my favorite piece in “publikulture (a social experiment by eight Miami artists)” — one of two shows now downstairs at the Museum of Art in Fort Lauderdale — I heard it. The work, called Playground (for Mila), is a room-size installation…
A jet-set philanthropic tradition makes its inaugural appearance in Broward County Friday night. The Cattle Barons’ Ball, one of several taking place across the United States, is one of the largest fundraisers for the American Cancer Society. Tickets range in price from $150 to $1000, but because the hard-core gala…
