“Everybody hits on me. Everyone from gay men to bisexual men to straight women to, of course, lesbians,” quips Maureen (Mo) Fischer, the pretty bisexual woman behind the brazen, blue-eyed drag king known as Mo B. Dick. But let Fischer switch into full Dick mode, and things get raunchy. “I’m…
Imagine scheduling an arts event right after September 11, 2001. Certainly not the brightest idea. Crowds, frightened for their safety and feeling a bit guilty, wouldn’t be in the mood to whup it up and have fun. But some presenters like artist/gallery owner Franklin Goldman, director of The Spanish Monastery…
When a play by Neil LaBute hits town, any town, the specifics of the production usually take a back seat to the force of the writer’s personality. LaBute’s plays and films are biting, challenging, often cruel — and by comparison, most other scripts seem bland and polite. His debut film…
Picture this: You have been invited to a party on a dark night in a strange neighborhood, and you have no idea how to get there. The host offers to meet you and lead the way. But he drives so fast, it’s hard to keep up with him. He makes…
Under blue skies, gabled and pitched roofs top bright symmetric façades, shutter windows are protected by delicate canopies, and spacious verandas and plenty of light and space render the essential building details. Careful distribution of planes and volumes are bounded by nuances of shadows and sunlight. That’s Emilio Sanchez’s “Works…
Miami film fans have long complained about the difficulty in catching offbeat independent films. The local art house cinemas — the Cosford, Soyka, the Absinthe, Intracoastal, and the Miami-based microcinema group www.straightawaymovies.com — serve up indie fare, but many hot films never make it to South Florida and those that…
Miamians have been hearing the same promise for years: The city is a certifiable and important center for the arts. It is on the cusp of greatness, as far as an arts scene is concerned. The city has culture, with artists, musicians, and filmmakers of diverse backgrounds creating a new…
“I had the whole nine yards — the tunnel, the colors, and the lights,” recalls actor/director Adalberto J. Acevedo. Not of his illustrious stage debut but of a difficult time in the hospital two years ago; after enduring open-heart surgery, he suffered a bout of ventricular tachycardia and nearly took…
Jesus is big. He always has been. The subject of songs, musical plays, books, and movies. His catchy handle used in the name of bands and once tactlessly uttered as a basis for comparison by John Lennon, bragging about the Beatles’ level of fame. Six or seven years ago, after…
Ahh, the dysfunctional family. We all have one or know one, and playwrights seem to know a lot of them. Feuding families have been with us at least as long as drama has existed. The Greeks had the house of Atreus. Shakespeare had King Lear and his daughters. Then there’s…
There’s no denying that U2 is awesome, nor that Phil Joanou is a snappy director, but the charming awkwardness of Sam Jones’s 16mm black-and-white rockumentary, I Am Trying to Break Your Heart, makes one wanna murmur, “Rattle on? Humbug!” at the Irish Grammy-grabbers’ old-school cinematic self-celebration. As we turn our…
With Frida — the story of profoundly passionate and uncompromising Mexican-Jewish painter Frida Kahlo — it’s evident that a few folks in marketing know how to work the demographics (it’ll be extremely PC, possibly mandatory, to gush in adoration of it), but that’s the first and last cynical comment of…
While playwright Dan Goggin’s Nunsense nuns may have taken vows of celibacy, their creator has been birthing hilarious stories about the Little Sisters of Hoboken in biblical proportions. Goggin’s 1985 Nunsense mother ship, which copped a quartet of awards, begat 1992’s Nunsense II: The Second Coming, which, in turn, begat…
Although the Greater Miami Convention and Visitors Bureau may not know it, Miami is a Mecca of sorts for skateboarders. Each year aficionados from around the world arrive to catch subtropical air and ride the rails and smooth concrete around Biscayne Bay, according to native son and professional skate rat…
When you go to a Mad Cat show, ya rolls yer dice and ya takes yer chances. The risk-taking theater ensemble in downtown Miami makes sure that the audience takes some risk just to get in the door. Company policy establishes a “$12 plus the roll of one die” policy…
Anyone familiar with Kenny Scharf’s work won’t be surprised to learn that the Pop Surrealist, painter of Jetsons and Flintstones characters, psychedelic space adventures and cool mutant creatures, has created an animated cartoon. Scharf’s half-hour The Groovenians premieres November 10 on the Cartoon Network and will be previewed at a…
Listen up, retards: Killing time is over. Melt down your weapons, now, forever. Wouldn’t it be nice if that sentiment echoed around the world? Well, certainly it does, every day, but weapons have a nasty tendency of drowning out sensible words. For this reason — now more than ever –…
More than just a funky film about a callow couple held captive by a transvestite mad scientist, featuring a youthful Susan Sarandon cavorting in her underwear, The Rocky Horror Show, the 1975 cult classic, is a live show too. The musical was originally written for the stage, and that’s the…
“Who sent you here?” aerobics instructor/dominatrix Michelle demands to know after the hour-long workout called Whipped. The hard-bodied mistress recently began teaching the class and judging by her puzzled expression, I could tell I’m the first sweaty subject ever to show up in full S&M regalia: a studded leather thong,…
As any wine lover can tell you, an excellent vintage is really two wines in one. When first opened, it may have a lovely, fresh bouquet and a satisfying taste. But allowed to breathe, a great wine will develop subtle complexities, new depth, and lingering flavors. That’s an apt analogy…
There are some things that are worth seeing, or hearing, or tasting, and you are probably better for it. Then there are those few things that cannot be missed, and you are definitely better for it. One of those is Daniel Senise’s “Recent Works” at Diana Lowenstein Fine Arts. Senise,…
If you’re a fan of the baseball cap-wearin’, Nader-votin’, muckrakin’, best-sellin’, corporation-confrontin’ son of a gun known as Michael Moore, all you need to know about his latest film, Bowling for Columbine, is that it’s more of the same. You know, the mix of easy humor, attempts (some successful, most…
