Grudge Match
Thirty years ago, Henry “Razor” Sharp (Sylvester Stallone) and Billy “The Kid” McDonnen (Robert De Niro) were on a collision course for a rubber match that could have been one for the ages. The Pittsburgh rivals couldn’t stand each other — turns out they were rivals for the affections of Sally (Kim Basinger) out of…
Bettie Page Reveals All
Sexy pin-up girl mixed with a generation’s worth of budding pop cultural awareness of social liberation, Bettie Page found herself caught up in a raging battle for the soul of America when, at heart, she was nothing more than a woman who happened to be more comfortable in her skin (and little else) than just…
Top TV Trends of 2013
T rends — whether in fashion, music or on television — are only slightly noticeable as they emerge, but become abundantly obvious in hindsight. From fleeting fads to more memorable moments, here’s what occupied our TV screens in 2013 (no spoiler-y specifics). Trend: Off with Your Head! Shows like Game of Thrones and The Walking…
Top Ten Favorite Film Memories of 2013
A round this time last year, I happened upon a copy of Roger Ebert’s memoir Life Itself and found in his narrative how movies have become, for me, fragments of experiences, some of the most precious minutes and hours of my life. And so, what else can I do but share a few of the…
Aaron Betsky Reveals Changes, Challenges at Cincinnati Art Museum
M y interview with Aaron Betsky, Cincinnati Art Museum director, came about because I was impressed by a series of small shows and changes I had noticed at CAM recently — the new Folk Art Gallery, restoration of the courtyard fountain, the reinstallation Nam June Paik’s wonderful “Powel Crosley Jr.” television sculpture in the Cincinnati…
Local Stages Kept Things Interesting in 2013
H ow was 2013 as a year for plays and musicals in Cincinnati? From where I stand — or sit, since I’m most often in a seat at one of our local theaters — it stacked up pretty well. We’re still lacking a coherent theater awards program, although the League of Cincinnati Theatres still evaluates…
Cincinnati Ranks No. 2 for Highest Child Poverty
Cincinnati ranked No. 2 for highest child poverty out of 76 major U.S. cities in 2012, the Children’s Defense Fund (CDF) of Ohio said Friday. The numbers provide a grim reminder that more than half of Cincinnati’s children lived in poverty in 2012, even as the city’s urban core began a nationally recognized revitalization period.…
Your Weekend To Do List: 12/20-12/22
Beelistic Tattoo on Short Vine presents its second annual Holiday Art Show Friday. The exhibit features works by local and national tattoo artists on sale for $25 or less. In addition to browsing artwork, guests can enjoy free craft cocktails and book future tattoo appointments. Bring a donation of toys, clothing, books or $5 to…
Stage Door: Wrapping up Holiday Shows
It's the final weekend for most holiday shows, and there are lots of good choices. I'm ranking today's listings according to the laugh-o-meter, starting with the most hilarious: No. 1: Every Christmas Story Ever Told (and then some). This is the eighth year the Cincinnati Shakespeare has put this show together, but it's fun even…
Morning News and Stuff
City Council yesterday decided Cincinnati will get a streetcar after all. After securing the six votes necessary to overturn a mayoral veto, Mayor John Cranley conceded that the $132.8 million streetcar project will restart following a two-week pause. It was a surprising journey for the project, which largely seemed like the underdog ever since the…
Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara to Shoot Movie in Cincinnati
Cincinnati will serve as the backdrop for yet another film come spring 2014 as Director Todd Haynes shoots his upcoming film Carol around the city. Starring Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara, the film is based on the book (also known as The Price of Salt) by Patricia Highsmith. While Carol takes place in 1950s New…
Cincinnati Streetcar Saved
After nearly two months of ups and downs, city leaders on Thursday announced Cincinnati will get a streetcar after all. Speaking prior to a council vote, Mayor John Cranley and Councilman Kevin Flynn announced City Council has the six votes to overcome the mayor's veto and restart construction on the $132.8 million streetcar project. Flynn…
Brick, Melody and Mortar: The Rise and Enthrall of Molly Sullivan
It was sometime back in September that I stumbled upon the story of Chvrches’ Lauren Mayberry, and her piece in The Guardian about the unfortunate realities she faced as a female musician. Only days later, I heard the stories of classical composers wearing their own diadems of misogyny. All these forces were crumbling away at…
Decision Day for Streetcar
It's decision day for Cincinnati's $132.8 million streetcar project. But hours before City Council expects to make a decision, it's unclear whether the legislative body has the six votes necessary to overcome Mayor John Cranley's veto and restart construction for the streetcar project. The deciding vote will most likely come from Charterite Kevin Flynn, who says…
Morning News and Stuff
The city would save just $7.8-$52.6 million in capital costs if it takes on tens of millions in additional expenditures to cancel the $132.8 million streetcar project, an independent audit revealed yesterday. The news appeared to throw another potential lifeline for the streetcar, which can now claim a five-member majority of supporters on City Council.…
City Keeps Controversial MSD Contracting Rules
City Council on Wednesday dismissed legislation that would have repealed controversial contracting rules for Metropolitan Sewer District (MSD) projects. Council's decision could put Cincinnati and Hamilton County on a collision course over rules governing a federally mandated revamp of the city's sewer system. The city and county jointly manage MSD. Democrats David Mann, Chris Seelbach,…
I Just Can’t Get Enough
The 2014 Golden Globes, hosted by the dream team of Amy Poehler and Tina Fey, take place Jan. 12 and nominations have been announced. Here we go! In the motion picture sector, 12 Years a Slave and American Hustle lead the pack with seven nominations each. The America’s Sweethearts Showdown will finally play out as…
Study: Supportive Housing Doesn’t Hurt Neighborhoods
Although some members of City Council appear ready to rescind support for a supportive housing project in Avondale, a previous study commissioned by the group in charge of the Avondale project found supportive housing facilities cause no negative impact to neighborhoods in which they’re located. The study, conducted by Arch City Development and the Urban…
More Than 36,000 Ohioans Could Lose Unemployment Benefits
Despite lingering signs of a weakened economy, a bipartisan budget deal working through U.S. Congress will not extend emergency benefits for the nation’s long-term unemployed past Dec. 28. If the emergency benefits are allowed to expire, the cut will hit more than 36,000 Ohioans in December and 128,600 through 2014, according to left-leaning think tank…
Private Groups Back Plan to Pay for Streetcar Operating Costs
More than a dozen business and philanthropic entities support the Southwest Ohio Regional Transit Authority’s (SORTA) offer to develop a private-public partnership to fund the streetcar’s operating costs, Eric Avner, vice president of the Haile Foundation, told CityBeat Dec. 17. If enough private contributors agree to finance the streetcar’s operating costs, they could address a…
Anti-Streetcar Logic Should Stop Uptown Interchange Project
Regardless of what happens with Cincinnati’s streetcar project on Dec. 19, it’s clear the $132.8 million project has been chilled by hypocrisy since its inception. When City Council’s budget committee unanimously approved funding for the $106 million uptown interchange project on Dec. 16, that hypocrisy was on full display. As some council members conducted their…
Future Investment
A child who doesn’t attend preschool is roughly half as likely to meet third-grade reading standards, according to local data from Cincinnati Public Schools (CPS). City officials, business leaders and local education groups are now pushing to ensure Cincinnati’s children no longer fall into that gap, but they first must find a way to pay…
The Book of Eli’s
B ack in early 2011, there was a guy making pulled-pork barbecue sandwiches on Fountain Square in the worst weather ever. During the coldest, wettest spring in memory, followed by the hottest, driest, most unbearable summer, this curly-haired, fair-skinned, fully sunburned guy stood over a blazing flattop grill, heating up scoops of hickory-smoked pork shoulder,…
Worst Week Ever!: Dec. 11-17
Rededication to Compassion Earns Catholic Church Praise The leader of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis, has a lot of things going for him that his predecessor did not. In addition to having never been conscripted into Hitler’s Youth or favoring gaudy gold-filled religious relics, Pope Francis has garnered lots of praise for his compassion and…
Fifty Types of People Who Don’t Like Mass Transit
Famous Atlanta Braves baseball player John Rocker once summed up many Americans’ problems with public transportation in what will surely go down as one of the more straightforward and concise sexist/racist/homophobic rants of our generation. Responding to the question of whether or not he would ever consider playing for the New York Yankees, the Georgia…
Christmas Me Home
They’re here. They’re my human Christmas cards, joy in the flesh and unwrapped, laughing presents exploding with a year’s worth of stories, relationships, work and secrets about places women find joy. Dani and Dean. My homies. It cannot be a coincidence that two of the most brilliant (not a word I over use), fearless and…
Cincinnati vs. the World 12.18.13
A wealthy Texas 16-year-old who killed four people while driving drunk received only 10 months of probation after defense attorneys argued that he was a product of privileged wealth who can’t stop doing whatever he wants because he has never been punished. WORLD -2 The Hamilton County Clerk of Courts let its domain name expire…
Walking With Dinosaurs
We are in the midst of a strange fascination with the life and times of the dinosaur (could it be some sense that we, humans, have crossed the point of no return along the path to extinction?), and what better way to explore the idea than to make light of it through animation? This quaint…
Saving Mr. Banks
Poor P.L. Travers (Emma Thompson); she was such a cold woman. Full of that stiff-upper-lip game-facing that we’ve come to expect from the British (although Travers is actually Australian, but who cares for such distinctions, right?), she was all principle and reserve. At the start of John Lee Hancock’s Saving Mr. Banks, it is not…
Inside Llewyn Davis
Llewyn Davis (Oscar Isaac) is a typically flawed protagonist in the Coen Brothers mold. A Folk singer of some relative note, Davis is arrogant (but not oppressively so), modestly talented and stubbornly oblivious to the feelings of those around him. He can only feel his own pain and suffering — the cruel fog of fate…
American Hustle
David O. Russell seems locked in to continue his critically lauded string of hits (following up The Fighter and Silver Linings Playbook) with American Hustle, and one of the likely reasons has to be his choice to, once again, enlist the support of what is fast-becoming the “David O. Russell” players. Christian Bale, Amy Adams,…
Holiday TV Offerings
The countdown to Christmas is on! Whether you’re braving the mall for last-minute shopping, whipping up some cookies for Santa or Grinching it up in the confines of your apartment, the holidays are in full swing. Get in the spirit with some festive shows and specials this week. WEDNESDAY DEC. 18 Kathy Griffin: Record Breaker…
The Legend of Will Ferrell Continues
Anchorman Ron Burgundy (Will Ferrell) is back, but San Diego is in the rearview mirror this time. Burgundy and his lovely lady Veronica Corningstone (Christina Applegate) have made a home in the Big Apple and the big-time big-boy anchor desk looms, as the mack daddy of news anchormen Mack Harken (Harrison Ford) prepares to make…
Joseph Gatti and Adiarys Almeida Return for ‘The Nutcracker’
Ever heard of freelance dancing? Independent ballet dancers Joseph Gatti and Adiarys Almeida — formerly of the Cincinnati Ballet — stepped out as free agents this past July, following five years of contracts with some illustrious international companies. The pair has returned to the Cincinnati Ballet to perform in the company’s next two productions, The…
Streetcar Audit Finds High Costs to Cancel
Cincinnati would save just $7.8-$52.6 million in capital costs if it incurs tens of millions in additional expenditures to cancel the $132.8 million streetcar project, according to an audit from consulting firm KPMG released Wednesday. By showing the potentially high costs of cancellation, the numbers could throw a lifeline to the streetcar project just one…
New Shows, New Ideas at The Carnegie Galleries
New exhibitions director Matt Distel’s first big show at The Carnegie gallery in Covington, Ky., which opened last week, is important in its own right as well as for what it says about Distel’s curatorial desires for the institution. The 26-work show, Take It From Me, is the first major retrospective for the late Cincinnati…
The L Foundation Benefit with The Movement and The Manifest Station
Philadelphia’s The Movement, one of America’s most popular Reggae outfits (which also blends Rock and Hip Hop influences into its sound), is headed back to Cincinnati this weekend for a special show to raise funds for The L Foundation, an organization that helps children with mothers who are suffering from ovarian cancer and also assists…
Making (Art) Mobile
B ehind any successful organization is a leader with a vision. Jonathan Sears, executive director of Professional Artistic Research Projects (parProjects), is in his fourth year of steering the Northside-based arts organization with a mission of financial and environmental sustainability. And parProjects’ traveling exhibition inside a repurposed shipping container, #MakersMobile, is the first physical building…
Spirits of Hank release party with Arlo McKinley & Friends, Straw Boss and Buffalo Wabs & The Price Hill Hustle
If you’re looking for a really cool, unique and local-centric gift for a friend or relative who digs traditional Country — or if you are a fan yourself and want a cool new CD — head to the Southgate House Revival this Saturday for the Spirits of Hank CD release party. Spirits of Hank is…
You Can’t Wrap an MP3
Every year, a fresh collection of box sets and other special releases make their way to store shelves, offering some great gift ideas for the music fan in your life. If you’re looking to pick up something last minute, here’s a look at some of the best (mostly historical) sets from 2013. If you go…
Morning News and Stuff
More than a dozen business and philanthropic entities support the Southwest Ohio Regional Transit Authority’s (SORTA) plan to develop a private-public partnership to pay for the streetcar’s operating costs, according to Eric Avner, vice president of the philanthropic Haile Foundation. If the people cited by Avner put money behind their support, they could get streetcar…
Releasing ‘Spirits’
If you’re looking for a really cool, unique and local-centric gift for a friend or relative who digs traditional Country — or if you are a fan yourself and want a cool new CD — head to the Southgate House Revival (111 E. Sixth St., Newport, Ky., 859-431-2201, southgatehouse.com) this Saturday for the Spirits of…
Alt Jeopardy
HOT “Alt” Music Has Finally Made It! Alternative music fans visiting with Grandma on Dec. 10 during Jeopardy likely mopped the floor with her while playing along — at least in one category. The game show’s “Alt” category focused on that crazy, new Alternative revolution all the kids are so into right now. The contestants…
