Jan 25 – Feb 1, 2017
An Eye for Life: Over six decades, photographer C. Smith has created a portrait of African-American life in Cincinnati
Hundreds gather outside City Hall to protest Trump immigration ban
Hundreds turned out in frigid temperatures Monday night for a rally outside Cincinnati City Hall to support immigrants and refugees. That rally came in the wake of President Donald Trump’s 90-day ban on travelers from seven majority-Muslim nations and his 120-day freeze on refugee resettlement. The rally was organized by local immigrant and refugee advocates…
Local Leaders Declare Cincinnati a Sanctuary City
A diverse group of faith and nonprofit leaders and city, county and state elected officials including Mayor John Cranley today held a press conference to push back against President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily ending refugee resettlement in the U.S. and limiting travel from some Muslim-majority countries. "We are here today because we are in…
MusicNOW to Become a Bigger Festival in 2018
Last Friday afternoon, when the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra announced the 2017-18 schedule marking its return to Music Hall after a 16-month renovation, the MusicNOW festival was notably missing. This is the “new music” festival — encompassing Contemporary Classical, artistic and experimental Rock and Pop, Jazz and other eclectic musical forms — that The National’s Bryce…
Morning News: local response to Trump immigration ban; Cranley and Winburn feuding, kind of; Ohio scrambles to find execution drug
Hey, Cincy. There’s plenty of news to be had this morning, so gather round and I’ll start dishing it out. Well, that escalated quickly. Just over a week after his inauguration, President Donald Trump has once again sparked massive protests, including some in the Greater Cincinnati area. About 100 protesters gathered at the Greater Cincinnati…
For female renters, a landlord’s sexual proposition isn’t what they had in mind
Of all the hassles involved in renting and moving into a new apartment or house, fending off the sexual advances of a landlord is usually not one of them. But it happens. Often enough that Congress and President Lyndon Johnson saw fit, in 1968, to ban that form of sexual harassment in the Fair Housing…
Noon News: Civil Rights leader endorses Simpson; Cincy bike share among biggest; county to lose millions from tax tweak
Good afternoon all. It’s winter again, apparently. That’s neat, I guess, since it was basically spring three days ago. Climate change will kill us all someday, but in the meantime, it’s definitely providing us with a nice break from the monotony of predictable, sane weather patterns. Anyway, news time. Councilwoman Yvette Simpson got a big…
Your Weekend To Do List (Jan. 27-29)
FRIDAY 27 ONSTAGE: LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS This campy musical from 1982 tells the story of a dweeby floral assistant who unleashes a monstrous bloodthirsty plant on an unsuspecting populace — while making a Faustian bargain for fame and the heart of the girl he loves. Director Bill Fennelly calls it “a morality play for…
LISTEN: Cincinnati Music Releases – January ’17 Playlist
Looking over some of the new releases by Cincinnati musicians in the first month of 2017, it felt like the new year was moving quickly. Didn’t I just review the great new EP from Joey Cook’s Joesph project yesterday? But then I remembered that Donald Trump has only been president for one week, and realized…
Stage Door: Music, Music, Music
Little Shop of Horrors, which opened Thursday evening in a sparkling production at the Playhouse (it continues through Feb. 19), is a modern musical with its tongue firmly planted in its cheek. Based on Roger Corman’s 1960s cult fav movie, it’s the story of a carnivorous plant bent on world domination. Broadway director Bill Fennelly…
Morning News: City budget shortfall; Bible literacy classes in Ky. public schools?; Husted challenges Trump’s voter fraud accusation
Hey hey. You know what time it is. News time. The city of Cincinnati is bringing in less earnings tax revenue than expected, and it could cause a budget shortfall. The gap between expected revenue and actual revenue grew from $2.6 million in November to $4.3 million at the end of December, according to a…
Sondheim’s ‘Best’
A new documentary, Best Worst Thing That Ever Could Have Happened, that screens at the Esquire Theatre at 1 p.m. Sunday, is the bittersweet story of the young cast of Merrily We Roll Along, Stephen Sondheim’s 1981 musical, a show initially deemed a flop that closed abruptly after just 16 Broadway performances. That was a shock…
Why BuzzFeed published the Trump dossier
National news media can’t agree whether buzzfeed.com erred when it published the 35-page compendium of salacious rumors about Donald Trump in Moscow. Hewing to traditional journalism ethics, many editors sat on the unproven smears even after intelligence agencies gave a summary to Trump, Obama and others. However, buzzfeed.com saw that as justification for publishing the…
What a Week! Jan. 18-24
WEDNESDAY, JAN. 18 Could Mr. Wonderful be the Donald Trump of the north? Canuck Shark Tank investor Kevin O’Leary announced his bid to lead the Conservative Party of Canada Wednesday. Let’s see: wealthy businessman, reality TV star, uses Twitter… sounds about right. Nice try, everyone planning to move to Canada! Meanwhile in the States, Trump revealed…
Sister Solidarity Shows
Keep the spirit of the recent Women’s Marches alive in coming months with these badass lady-leading series. Since 1999, Mariska Hargitay has portrayed kick-ass detective Olivia Benson on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. Passionate, strong and empathetic, Benson often serves as a voice for victims of violence. Benson is now a lieutenant and mother…
Living with ‘20th Century Women’
As a man raised almost exclusively in the company of women, I recognized a certain kinship with Jamie (Lucas Jade Zumann), the young man at the center of writer-director Mike Mills’ sentimental yet whip-smart 20th Century Women. A bright and inquisitive teenager, Jamie has a mother named Dorothea (Annette Bening) who is intent on preparing him…
‘Little Mermaid’ has strengths, but tails off
The Broadway touring production of Disney’s The Little Mermaid has several high bars to leap. First, it adapts the wildly popular 1989 movie of the same name, from which certain 30-somethings (ahem) have every lyric etched into their brains. Secondly, Mermaid follows a spate of successful Disney theatrical adaptations, including Beauty and the Beastand The Lion King, each of which have…
Shedding light on CAM’s secret tower
“You can’t get there from here.” That’s what Cameron Kitchin, the director of the Cincinnati Art Museum since 2014, was told — in so many words — when he first spied the secret tower that’s part of the museum’s complex. “I asked on my tour, seeing all the various spaces created by these buildings, if…
New Brews for the New Year
It’s a new year, and one of the only things that will get us through this bizarre winter is beer. Luckily, Rivertown and MadTree have bigger spaces in which to drink, and Cincy Winter Beerfest is right around the corner. On Feb. 11, MadTree will officially open their new brewery in Oakley, MadTree 2.0, to coincide…
Gomez Salsa expands with a second cantina location in Walnut Hills
With the redevelopment of Over-the-Rhine has come a slew of independent restaurants, keeping diners — and dining reviewers — busy over the last few years. With some success under their belts, a handful of proprietors have doubled-down and opened more than one restaurant in OTR, and some have expanded their concepts into completely different neighborhoods.…
Sound Advice: Sara Watkins (Jan. 26)
Since Nickel Creek declared its indefinite hiatus in 2007, violinist/vocalist Sara Watkins has been relentlessly busy. She teamed up with fellow Americana artists Sarah Jarosz and Aoife O’Donovan for the trio I’m With Her, contributed to the supergroup Works Progress Administration, found new inspiration with her brother Sean in the collaborative Watkins Family Hour and…
Sound Advice: Southern Avenue at Cincy Winter Blues Fest (Jan. 28)
This weekend’s Cincy Winter Blues Fest (Friday and Saturday at The Phoenix downtown; see Spill It more info) doesn’t only offer a hefty dose of winter Blues; it also offers an appearance on Saturday by potential next-big-thing Southern Avenue, that is dripping with deep, fiery Soul. The quintet, a sensation in its hometown of Memphis,…
Sound Advice: Margaret Glaspy with The Lumineers and Andrew Bird (Jan. 31)
Singer/songwriter Margaret Glaspy offered the best of all possible worlds on her recent debut album, last summer’s Emotions and Math. As the title suggests, the songs on Glaspy’s first full-length are simultaneously impassioned and cerebral, from the Kurt Vile-like Pop Grunge of “You and I” to the vulnerable-yet-electric Joni Mitchell-like Folk Pop lilt of “Somebody…
The Grove expands its approach on new EP
To listen to The Grove’s newest EP, Coming to Terms, is to listen to a young band experimenting with some vastly different musical styles than its previous offerings. The four songs on the EP draw from wildly different points of inspiration as members of the Cincinnati-based quartet delve into their varied influences. While the tonal shifts…
Cincinnati band The Yugos brace for the impact of an impressive third album, ‘Weighing the Heart’
A Google search of the phrase “weighing the heart” reveals a myth from Egypt’s Book of the Dead. After a pharaoh’s death, the monarch’s heart was measured against a feather in the underworld. If his heart was lighter than the feather, signifying his purity of being, he was elevated to the next level to meet god Osiris.…
Critic’s Pick: ‘First Date’ at Ensemble Theatre
Ensemble Theatre Cincinnati’s current production, the regional premiere of the musical First Date, might be familiar and intriguing territory for some theatergoers in their 20s and 30s. But it’s also a show about the anxieties and rewards of launching relationships that anyone can experience — and that many of us have. The show (book by…
Jerry Springer Takes on Trump
On the surface, Jerry Springer and Donald Trump seem oddly similar. Both are wealthy white men in their early 70s. Both grew up in the New York City borough of Queens. Both rocketed to fame through reality TV. But Springer, an ardent Democrat and former Cincinnati mayor and council member, grew up embracing the legacy…
Trump’s inauguration drew thousands to local protests but also raised big questions for progressives
A group of about 50 people sat in Saint Michael’s church in Lower Price Hill Jan. 20, grimly watching a live-stream of President Donald Trump delivering his inauguration address in Washington, D.C. The weather outside vacillated between rain and sunshine, alternately filling the church’s sanctuary with gloom and light as a number of speakers representing various…
