CUNY, or Change: The Jeffrey Wiesenfeld Guide to Campuses and Anti-Semitism With a Key to Board Politics
By David Freedlander and Dan Duray | May 10, 2011 | 11:16 pm
Jeffrey Wiesenfeld's mother doesn't... MORE»
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Movie Review: What Is Antonio Banderas Doing In Campy Catastrophe The Big Bang?
By Rex Reed | May 10, 2011 | 8:36 pm
With eyes closed and jaw firmly set, concentrating hard enough to break a blood vessel, I cannot think of a movie more incomprehensible, moronic, pointless or abominable than a load of trash called The Big Bang. Torrents of blood splatter the opening credits, preparing you for what's to come--a droning farrago of violent stupidity written by Erik Jendresen, who watched Joel Coen's sub-mental The Big Lebowski too many times and doesn't have a clue how to string five words together with any coherence.... MORE»
Movie Review: Hesher Is a Lurid, Psychotic Mess
By Rex Reed | May 10, 2011 | 8:29 pm
Joseph Gordon-Levitt has come a long way from his blank-eyed zombie look in lifeless early flops like Brick and Halloween H-20. But he remains unpredictable. One minute, he's an appealing, fresh-faced romantic lead in 500 Days of Summer. Turn around and he's covered with tattoos, wearing filthy rags, sporting long greasy hair and blabbing obscenities in the title role of a horror like Hesher.... MORE»
Movie Review: Will Ferrell Plays It Straight In Everything Must Go
By Rex Reed | May 10, 2011 | 8:21 pm
Everything Must Go is benign comic Will Ferrell's bid for respect as a serious actor. After a career dedicated to rotten movies, he seems to crave critical approval for at least trying to prove he can do something besides make dumb faces and rude noises and mooning the audience. Unfortunately, like Jim Carrey, he faces the immaturity of an undemanding low-brow fan base that loves to see him make a fool of himself and wants nothing extra--no acting, no intelligence, nothing that (God forbid!) might be construed as good taste.... MORE»
The British Are Coming! (Maybe...) Anatomy of an Art World Rumor
By Michael H. Miller | May 10, 2011 | 8:16 pm
"I don't know if it's the worst kept secret in the art world," said Jessie Washburne-Harris, the director of Harris Lieberman in Chelsea, from a couch in her gallery last Saturday morning. She was referring to the well-documented rumors circulating among dealers and collectors in New York that Frieze Art Fair, the influential showcase of contemporary art in London's Regent's Park every October, would be expanding to the city in the near future. "New York," Ms. Washburne-Harris continued, "needs a fantastic contemporary art... MORE»
Movie Review: Funereal Food Doc Forks Over Knives Makes Me Lose My Appetite
By Rex Reed | May 10, 2011 | 8:13 pm
If we are what we eat, then our only hope for longevity is to start eating grass. According to Forks Over Knives, a funereal documentary by Lee Fulkerson, we're all committing suicide, one hamburger at a time. We are a planet of bloated, self-indulgent apes who do not want to be lectured, hammered, ridiculed or shamed into eating tofu and cottage cheese. The average American carries 23 extra pounds, leading to diabetes, hypertension, chronic fatigue, heart attacks and prostate cancer. Health care costs more annually than the defense budget.... MORE»
Rem, the Destroyer: Prada Patsy Plans Preservation's Eviceration
By Matt Chaban | May 10, 2011 | 8:05 pm
Twelve percent of the Earth's landmass is untouchable by Rem Koolhaas' count. Whether a U.N. World Heritage site, plush nature preserve or lowly landmarked brownstone, architects are running out of room, with only 44,700,815 square-miles left to build. It is for this reason that the severe Dutch architect--The New Yorker once accused him of trying to kill the skyscraper--believes there must be a Landmarks Destruction Commission. ... MORE»
The Wee Hours: Tongue Twister en Française at the New Blood Garden Party
By Nate Freeman | May 10, 2011 | 8:03 pm
"This is a nice room,” Nicolas Pol said. The Parisian artist was sitting in an empty white storage warehouse, wedged in a corner of the dirty cement floor, wallowing in the bits of clumping plaster. “Yeah, it’s great,” The Observer responded. Asbestos was scattered about... MORE»
Is That A Dagger I See Before Me? A New Kind of Slice from Lucali
By Nate Freeman | May 10, 2011 | 7:50 pm
Jay-Z and his girlfriend, Beyoncé Knowles, frequent a favorite pizza place in Carroll Gardens. It’s called Lucali and it’s been an object of fetish for pie lovers since it opened to long waits in 2006. “It’s the best pizza I ever had in my entire life,” the rapper told The New York Times in 2009.... MORE»
Identity Politics, With a Twist: 'By the Way,' 'Meet Vera Stark' and 'The Intelligent Homosexual’s Guide to Capitalism'
By Jesse Oxfeld | May 10, 2011 | 7:32 pm
The name of the play--By the Way, Meet Vera Stark--is only the first of many subtle, clever bits of writerly business in Lynn Nottage's clever, funny and ultimately thought-provoking new comedy about race, gender and the unattractive machinations behind the glamour of Old Hollywood. In the play, which opened Monday night at the Second Stage... MORE»
Being Boccanegra: Throwing the Spotlight on Directors, the Met Brings Back Elijah Moshinsky
By Zachary Woolfe | May 10, 2011 | 7:26 pm
I've seen many performances of Elijah Moshinsky productions at the Metropolitan Opera, but according to Elijah Moshinsky, I have never seen an opera actually directed by Elijah... MORE»
City Ballet's 'Black and White' Week Was, Ironically, Full of New Colors
By Robert Gottlieb | May 10, 2011 | 7:24 pm
You could say that City Ballet's opening "all black and white" week was a marketing gimmick, and you'd be right. But you could also say it was a highly instructive, even impressive, event, and you'd be right again. On the most basic level, it gave us seven programs with absolutely no dross--no second-tier Robbins or third-tier Martins (they're coming); no Susan Stroman (it's coming back--duck!). This entire season is loaded with Balanchine, from La Sonnambula and Divertimento No.... MORE»
What Can You Tell From a Fancy Prose Style?
By James Camp | May 10, 2011 | 7:21 pm
Vladimir Nabokov wrote Lolita, but he was no mere writer. The famous novelist was also a distinguished lepidopterist, husband, pedant and avuncular cutie--"a fat hatless old man in shorts," as he described himself--and Lila Azam Zanganeh's The Enchanter: Nabokov and Happiness (Norton, 228 pages, $23.95) duly showcases these facets of his character. Formally, the book is something of a collage. There are paraphrases, biographical vignettes, interviews and drawings. There are also kooky components, like dream sequences. There are also kinky components.... MORE»
The Eight-Day Week: May 11-18
By Daniel D'Addario | May 10, 2011 | 7:21 pm
Wednesday, May 11 Fifteen Minutes... MORE»
Jon Ronson Wrings Meaninglessness From Madness in 'The Psychopath's Test'
By Maureen Tkacik | May 10, 2011 | 7:20 pm
The amygdala is a region of the temporal lobe of most vertebrate brains that acts as a gatekeeper to the long-term memory, assigning priority to memories on the basis of the emotional intensity that accompanies them and in the process molding our emotional reflexes. Anyone who has been in combat or a car accident or read Dostoyevsky's fictionalized account of his astonishing mental clarity in the minutes leading up to his near-execution should get the idea.... MORE»
