Five Reasons to Leave the House this Weekend

A music-meets-techno party, a nifty new beer release, and more.

Posted by Anne Vickman on 2/9/2012 at 10:50AM | No Comments

New-York-based Phantom Limb Company brings ’69ËšS. (The Shackleton Project)’ the Paramount Center. (Photo courtesy of Phantom Limb Company.)

Theater
69ËšS. (The Shackleton Project)
An “installation-in-motion” is how New York-based Phantom Limb Company describes the amalgamation of puppetry, photography, film, dance, and music that they’ve put together to create a series of tableaux vivants that recreate the harrowing, true story of Ernest Shackleton’s 1914 trans-Antarctic expedition. With original music by the Kronos Quartet, this tale of survival in a frozen wasteland will remind you that there’s no real reason to miss the snow this year.
$25-$79, February 7-12,  Paramount Center Mainstage, 559 Washington St., Boston,617-824-8400, artsemerson.org. READ MORE

Will the Real Star of the Super Bowl Please Stand Up?

Manning may have won the title, but Madonna rocked the house.

Posted by Katherine Ozment on 2/7/2012 at 8:01AM | 8 Comments

There was a distinctly weird moment during Sunday’s Super Bowl, and I’m not talking about Ahmad Bradshaw falling backward into the end-zone for that touchdown that Bill Belichick wanted the Giants to make.

No, it was the only other part of the three-hour spectacle that I actually watched: the half-time show. I live 364 days of the year in a football-free zone and confess that I didn’t know Madonna would be performing. But, as half-time approached, the friends and family I watched the game with began to buzz. There was genuine — albeit condescending — concern about whether the 50-something material girl still had it.

As if. READ MORE

Southie Isn’t Interested in Reality TV

I'm glad the Jersey Shore production team is getting a lot of doors slammed in their faces.

Posted by Shannon Fischer on 2/7/2012 at 6:47AM | No Comments

What you’re about to read is the formal announcement for a show that’s looking to find and follow five real South Boston housewives and their families. (Note: This could sound very, very familiar to those of you who’ve followed the Real Housewives of South Boston parody that’s been floating around.)

TLC ORDERS WICKED AWESOME NEW SERIES

As one of the nation’s most historic neighborhoods, South Boston is known for hard-working residents who display an outrageous passion for life, family, and town. Now, TLC takes viewers into this tight-knit community in the new TLC series SOUTHIE PRIDE (wt), going inside the homes of five South Boston women as they struggle to make a life for their families and protect the people they love the most.

495 Productions (Jersey Shore) is producing the series for TLC. The series is currently casting, and filmed in South Boston this past weekend as the town suffered through a devastating Super Bowl loss by the Patriots. Eight episodes have been ordered, and the series is scheduled to premiere this Fall.

“Spend some time with the women of South Boston and you quickly learn that pride runs deep, family comes first, and that their friendships and rivalries are forever,” said SallyAnn Salsano, President of 495 Productions. “And, their accents are wicked awesome.”

I honestly can’t decide which part of this is the most ridiculous. Is it the fact that the Jersey Shore makers are trying to jam their reality-TV-coated shoe in the South Boston culture door, after having presumably had their fill of orange people from New Jersey (I’m sorry New Jersey, I don’t mean that)? Is it the fact that their vocabulary has spontaneously and unfortunately developed an excessive fondness for the word ‘wicked?’ Is it the fact that when the Pats lost this weekend, somebody was running around with a camera thinking “This is so great! How wicked is this footage!?”

Wait! I know! It’s all of the above!

What’s more, as BostInno points out, this isn’t even the only show looking for real South Boston women. The optimistic makers of Southies have, since January, also been trying to collect “an extraordinary group of women from South Boston, who appear between 21-35, blue collar, hard working, harder partying, tough talking, damn good looking, wise cracking, sexy Southies.” Apparently, nobody gives a hoot about the men in Southie, possibly because the inspiration for both of these shows was more than likely stemming at least in large part from a YouTube video parody posted in October that happened to feature women and not men.

So far, the TLC crew has mostly been talking to closed doors, according to the Herald:

“We are getting a lot of people shutting doors in our faces. I can’t tell you the amount of times my staff has been told to (buzz) off since we have been there,” said Salsano, who is the creator and executive producer of “Southie Pride.”

The Long Island native said she is not deterred.

“The same people that tell me to (buzz) off are the ones I want,” she said. “In order to not be misrepresented, tell (your story).”

Good luck with that. I’m not sure if this shines on through in my writing here, but I’m not really that much of a reality-TV show kind of person, and so it’s possible I’m just experiencing some highly biased NIMBYism, but I say: good on you, Southie.

Five Reasons to Leave the House This Weekend

Hot chili, cabaret ballet, strange silent films set to music, and more.

Posted by Courtney Hollands on 2/3/2012 at 10:02AM | No Comments

A scene from “Oyster”. (Photo by Gadi Dagon.)

Music
The Kills
Oh, Jamie Hince and Alison Mosshart. You had us at “Cat Claw.” The rough number is from the duo’s first full-length album, 2003′s “Keep on Your Mean Side” — Hince (also known as Mr. Kate Moss) and Mosshart (also known as a member of Jack White’s Dead Weather super group) have been churning out gritty punk tunes ever since.
18+. $22. 6 p.m., Friday. Royale, 279 Tremont St., Boston. 617-338-7699, royaleboston.com

Dance
‘Oyster’
Dancers with doll-like white faces creep, twirl, and leap through a fantastic and slightly macabre circus world. Intrigued yet? This work from Israel’s Inbal Pinto & Avshalom Pollak Dance Company blends ballet, contemporary dance, mime, and acrobatics, and is set to opera, tango, and Tuvan throat singers — and it debuts in Boston this weekend.
$50 or $60, 7:30 p.m. Friday and 8 p.m. Saturday. Paramount Theatre, 560 Washington St., Boston. 617-482-6661, celebrityseries.com READ MORE

Dropkick Murphys Freakin’ Own the Month of March

Just face it: You can't enjoy the third month of the year without Ken Casey and the gang.

Posted by Matthew Reed Baker on 1/27/2012 at 8:15AM | 1 Comment

Full disclosure: I should say right off the bat that I’m a big Dropkick Murphys fan, like so many Bostonians and hooligans worldwide, so much so that I’ve often mentioned them here and managed to finagle this magazine to let me interview lead man Ken Casey. Not only does their music kick royal arse, but they’re a great story of hardworking local guys who play all over the globe and raise lots of money for charity here at home. And yet, with every new year there are groans whenever I suggest writing about them yet again, and even a part of me wearily wonders how this band is going to try this year to reinvigorate their usual activity around St. Patrick’s Day.

Indeed, it makes sense that this crew of (mostly) Irish guys take this celebration to heart, which is why — no matter where they are — they always come back to Boston to celebrate the day with a series of raucous, sold-out shows. While everyone touts Red Sox Opening Day, the July 4th Pops, and the Marathon as quintessential annual events, good ol’ DKM is chugging along and adding themselves to the tradition. The challenge with tradition, though, is how to make it a little bit fresh each year, and Ken Casey and the boys are no exception. READ MORE

Five Reasons to Leave the House This Weekend

Laughter, papier-mâché, Yo Yo Ma, and more.

Posted by Anne Vickman on 1/26/2012 at 8:43AM | No Comments

Good Cause
Polar Grill Fest 2012
The Portsmouth, New Hampshire outpost of Seattle-based Redhook Brewery is teaming up with The Meat House to fire up the grills for charity. Local grill masters will cook steak tips, chicken, and pulled pork alongside heated tents, fire pits, outdoor bars, and live music to raise money for Share Our Strength, a nonprofit working to end childhood hunger.
$5 admission; food and beer is extra, 21+, Saturday, January 28, from 1-5 p.m., Redhook Brewery, One Redhook Way, Portsmouth, NH, 603-430-8600, polargrillfest.com. READ MORE

Highlights: The Magners Comedy Festival

The must-sees from this weekend's laugh-out-loud lineup.

Posted by Thomas Lewis on 1/26/2012 at 6:12AM | 2 Comments

Colin Quinn Colin Quinn brings his Broadway show “Colin Quinn: Long Story Short” to the Wilbur on Saturday night.

What better way to kick off the third-annual Magners Comedy Festival than a hilarious, raunchy retelling of some of William Shakespeare’s most-beloved works? That’s exactly how the ORFEO Group set the tone, and tonight, the festival begins in earnest with the Upright Citizens Brigade Touring Company at the Wilbur, the Improv Asylum’s main-stage show “Life Before Sext,” and the annual standup contest semi-finals at Nick’s Comedy Stop. The finals of the “Stand-Off” will be held on Saturday, and the winner gets to perform at the Glasgow International Comedy Festival. READ MORE

Tufts Shows Its ‘Poker Face’

The university is the latest to offer a course on Lady Gaga.

Posted by Courtney Hollands on 1/20/2012 at 7:30AM | No Comments

Tufts University has gone Gaga. That is, the school’s Experimental College is following in the footsteps of the University of South Carolina, the University of Virginia, Arizona State, and Wake Forest by offering a course on the gender-bending poptart this semester:

EXP-0005-S: Gaga’s Holy Monsters
Through in-depth analysis of her musical, textual and visual aesthetics, this course will explore Lady Gaga’s work as represented mainly by her music videos in relation to the implications for gender and sexuality. This course will investigate how her work draws on Christian ideas and practices to frame her commentary on issues of gender and sexuality, and how such appropriations may yield positive and/or negative effects.

Tufts senior Emmanuel Hernandez — a double-major in music and religion — is leading the class, which kicked off yesterday. The Fame Monster’s impact on fashion and design is indelible. And her Born this Way Foundation (just down the street at Harvard) and campaign against the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy clearly demonstrate her stance on LGBT politics and sexual equality. I’m most interested in how her work draws on Christian ideas.

The BostonInno blog suggests that if Gaga is indeed taking over higher ed, Emerson should be next in line, if only because of this epic, 9-minute long lip dub:

(And, yes, the Emerson Quidditch team makes an appearance during “Poker Face.”)

‘Green Eyes’ Gets a Room

Company One presents Tennessee Williams' steamy play in a suite at the Ames Hotel.

Posted by Courtney Hollands on 1/19/2012 at 8:19AM | No Comments

Photo by Travis Chamberlain

Tennessee Williams’ long-lost erotic thriller “Green Eyes” (he wrote the one-act play in 1970, but it was only published posthumously in 2008) is at the Ames Hotel, after a raved-about run at the Hudson in Manhattan. READ MORE

Q+A: Comedian David Cross

Cross talks Todd Margaret, what he doesn't like about SNL, and his upcoming work.

Posted by Thomas Lewis on 1/19/2012 at 7:19AM | No Comments

David Cross (as Todd Margaret) and Will Arnett (as Brent Wilts) in a scene from The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret. Photo by Colin Hutton/IFC.


While you could say that writer/comedian Davis Cross (whom you may also recognize as Tobias Funke from Arrested Development) got his start as a teenager doing stand-up comedy on stages in Atlanta, the comedian also has a few ties to Boston, where he attended Emerson College and formed his sketch comedy group, “Cross Comedy,” in the early 1990s.

Last year the cable network IFC re-aired his critically-acclaimed HBO series Mr. Show as part of the buildup to his newest project, The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret. Two weeks ago, as the second season of Todd Margaret began, I had a chance to sit down with Cross in New York as he explained the genesis of the show and its protagonist, Todd Margaret.

Cross plays Margaret, a bumbling and incompetent American who has been sent to the United Kingdom to market an energy drink of questionable quality called Thunder Muscle. Will Arnett (also of Arrested Development) plays Margaret’s boss, Brent Wilts, and is somehow even more incompetent than Margaret. The story of what becomes the pair’s criminal incompetence is told in a flash-forward and flash-back style that Cross said was influenced by his obsession with Lost and Battlestar Galactica while he was writing the story. READ MORE
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