Local theater, from serious to silly

Today's the day! Meet us at the Minneapolis Central Library for the annual Twin Cities Media Alliance Fall Forum. House of the Spirits resurrects ghosts of dictatorships past By Lisa Peterson-de la Cueva, TC Daily Planet There are ghosts, love stories, families, and torture—lots of it—in Mixed Blood's production of the House of Spirits.  Through much of the play the main character narrates her family's history, some of it beautiful and ephemeral, from a hostile looking torture chamber. The play, an adaptation of Isabel Allende's book by the same name, reminds audiences of the atrocities committed during the brutal dictatorship in Chile during in the late 1970s.MORE » zAmya Theater looks at homelessness in "Homeroom" By Andrea Richards, TC Daily Planet Fun and creative are not the first words that come to mind regarding homelessness, but the zAmya Theater Project has successfully combined the arts with the issue.MORE » Anchor Paper workers walking the picket line By Michael Moore, Workday Minnesota Seventeen warehouse and delivery workers at St. Paul-based Anchor Paper went on strike at 5 p.m. Tuesday after voting to reject the company's final contract offer. The workers, represented by Teamsters Local 120, are maintaining a picket line outside the company's warehouse at East 10th Street and Broadway, on the outskirts of downtown St. Paul. MORE » St. Paul panel stresses importance of closing achievement gap By Charles Hallman, Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder Putting students first is among the most important things to be done if ever the Black-White student achievement gap is to be closed, several education professionals and advocates agreed at a recent public exchange of ideas on the subject. Higher Ground Academy Founder-Director Bill Wilson, St.MORE » OPINION | Recovery Act brought rural Minnesota valuable improvements By Colleen Landkamer, Minnesota 2020 When people talk about the federal stimulus (the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act), they typically point to the large dollar amounts first. Then they begin examining how much has been invested in a certain sector of the economy, along with how much has gone to a specific geographic region or area.MORE » THEATER | Guthrie Theater's "39 Steps" is silly and sketchy By Jay Gabler, TC Daily Planet The greatest compliment I can pay The 39 Steps is to say that at no other production on the Guthrie Theater's McGuire Proscenium Stage have I felt such a reasonable chance of running into the cast having a beer at Grumpy's after the show. Directed by the Jungle Theater's Joel Sass, The 39 Steps has an appealingly loose feel that's more commonly encountered on stages Uptown than downtown.MORE » Guthrie Theater THEATER | Walking Shadow's "The Crowd You're In With" explores the child choice By Rebecca Collins, TC Daily Planet As a married woman in her 30s who has yet to have a child, I sometimes feel as if my crowd is shrinking as members "leave" to have kids. Of course, I'm not supposed to feel this way. It's not a competition and it's not a race. Right? So I could perhaps be considered the ideal audience member for The Crowd You're In With, the current production by Walking Shadow Theatre Company. In fact, if you're on the fence about having kids, going to see this production could be therapeutic—the characters take turns voicing the various questions and concerns that might run through anyone's head as they try to make this major life decision.MORE » Cedar Riverside People's Center DANCE | BodyCartography Project looks at twin dynamics in "Symptom" By Sheila Regan, TC Daily Planet Before I launch into my thoughts about BodyCartography Project's latest offering Symptom, which plays this weekend, I'd like to say one word about the venue they are performing in. Two years ago, at the height of the economic collapse, Intermedia Arts laid off all its staff and closed its gallery. It did not look good for the organization, but they held meetings to gain community support. I remember reading e-mails that said "we won't go down without a fight!" Indeed they didn't go down, and here they are, offering innovative programming without a blip.MORE » Intermedia Arts This week's highlights "So nice to see"—Riverside Plaza residents await reconstruction by Karen Hollish, TC Daily Planet Improved outdoor lighting, way-finding guides and security cameras are just a small part of the major changes expected from the reconstruction. The nine residential buildings will have their heating, cooling and ventilation systems overhauled, resulting in energy savings for the landlord and more consistent apartment temperatures and hot water access for tenants. Immigrant business owners thrive in Cedar-Riverside and Seward in Minneapolis by Sheila Regan, TC Daily Planet The Cedar-Riverside neighborhood is a hotspot of activity, with many theater and music venues, as well as diverse ethnic food offerings. As resident demographics have changed over the years, so have small businesses, which now include a strong contingent of hard working immigrant business owners doing their best to make their way in the thriving, if at times challenging, area. Crime in Cedar-Riverside decreasing by Nekessa Opoti, TC Daily Planet From trash talk on Facebook to national news, talk about Cedar-Riverside leaves many believing that this Minneapolis neighborhood is among the most dangerous neighborhoods in the United States. The facts? Not even close. While it is true that the neighborhood has suffered several tragedies in the recent past, crime statistics tell a different story. Smelly business in Frogtown? by Andrea Richards, TC Daily Planet To Frogtown residents, the zoning violations charged against Todd Nimmo, owner and president of Rail Transfer Incorporated (RTI) don't get at their concerns about the business operations. The community that surrounds Nimmo's business, which is located at 681 and 733 Pierce Butler Route, has complained of a putrid smell, dust and loud noises emanating from the two properties since the business first rented the sites in 2005. Community members, Nimmo, and city officials met on October 26 to discuss the charges. FRONT ROW SEAT | Meredith Westin, you're the best by Jay Gabler • On Friday morning, our photographer Meredith Westin will board a plane for Spain, to live there for an indefinite period-mostly just for the fun and adventure of it, but also to explore new job possibilities and to find new directions to point her lens. I'm excited for her, but like all her friends, I'll miss her a lot. Even if you don't know her, you may discover that you miss her too. Immigrant health on-line and on-screen in Minnesota by Mary Treacy, TC Daily Planet Where does a daughter go for information about breast cancer that her Somali-speaking mother can understand? Where does a physician refer her Hmong-speaking client for information on flu shots and why they are important? One place to find the answers is ECHO, the multi-lingual Emergency, Community Health, and Outreach organization. Move up and move on: Hussein Samatar's take on Riverside Plaza by Jessie Lieb, TC Daily Planet "My take is that the new Americans don't come here to live high-rise. They come here to live American. They come to live to be prosperous. And they are all aware, they believe as America believes, that their children will do better. They are not coming to live in high rises but they find themselves living in high rises because it is affordable. I know when people look at the high rises from outside they try to project their fears on these high rises as if the people who live there created them, as if they are the architect." THEATER | Sandbox Theatre's Unspeakable Things haunt Red Eye Theater by Jay Gabler, TC Daily Planet The great fantasy writer H.P. Lovecraft (Derek Lee Miller) plays the Mozart role in Sandbox Theatre's Unspeakable Things, a collaboratively created piece now filling the Red Eye Theater. Salieri is Donald Wandrei (John Middleton), a St. Paul writer who in real life was a moderately distinguished contributor to sci-fi and fantasy genre magazines—as was his brother Howard (Joey Ford). Unspeakable Things starts in the early 1970s, about 15 years after Howard's death and about 15 years before Donald's, and crawls back and forth through the decades as Donald considers the circumstances and decisions that have shaped his life. THEATER | Interact's Life is Sweet depicts a journey helped along by people with Down Syndrome by Sheila Regan, TC Daily Planet Interact Theater takes on the story of Everyman with their current show, Life is Sweet, playing at The Lab through November 27. In their rendition, the Everyman character, Everett Mann (Eriq Nelson), is visited by the "virtues," played by Interact artists with Down Syndrome. THEATER | Fully Committed at the Jungle Theater: So good, it's like printing money by Matthew A. Everett, TC Daily Planet On the surface of it, there are three primary reasons I shouldn't like Fully Committed, the returning comedy hit currently rounding out the Jungle Theater's 2010 season. It's a one-person show. It's about a struggling artist. It's about somebody's day job. These three things instead turned out to be the reasons I loved Fully Committed. What can I say? The world's a strange place sometimes. THEATER | Spring Awakening at the Orpheum: If you slept through it, don't worry by Becca Mitchell, TC Daily Planet "Wasn't it just here?" a friend asked when I told her I was going to see Spring Awakening on Saturday. When I checked and saw it was here less than two years ago, I wasn't surprised. The musical has a compelling score and its mature subject matter combined with its attractive young talent has earned it a strong following among the younger crowd. Still, I couldn't also help but wonder if it was returning so soon because it may not be so compelling a show five years from now. THEATER | Classical Actors Ensemble's 'Tis Pity She's a Whore: Isn't it, though? by Matthew A. Everett, TC Daily Planet If you enjoy watching a pregnant woman get slapped around, this play is your ticket. "Everyone's so close" at Cedar Riverside Community School in Minneapolis by Karen Hollish, TC Daily Planet The school's 2009-10 standardized test scores in math placed its students squarely above state and Minneapolis Public School averages. And overall, the student body's reading scores improved from the previous year as well. STYLE | Fresh Traditions IV celebrates Hmong designers by Barb Teed, TC Daily Planet High fashion couture and traditional Hmong design intermingled at the über-chic Fresh Traditions IV fashion show Sunday night at the Varsity Theater. FRONT ROW SEAT | At First Avenue, a community says good-bye to Mikey "Eyedea" Larsen by Jay Gabler • "I almost don't even feel like I'm really here," my friend Andrea Swensson, of City Pages, said last night at First Avenue. "It's just so unreal." WHO IS THAT? | Sonia Grover, First Avenue's booker of bands by Jay Gabler • Meet the woman who makes the magic happen—and her Twitter posse, too. THE OPTIMISTIC PESSIMIST | Midnight movies, from Rocky Horror to Nightmare on Elm Street to The Room by Jim Brunzell III • The midnight movie is a great experience, especially when you go with a group of friends, get popcorn and soda, and go into the theater to grab a seat and enjoy the "witching" hour. MIGIZI youth project premieres videos by Eliana Gramer and Larissa Peifer, TC Daily Planet An excited group of young Native Americans presented their own documentaries on October 15 at South High School. Working together with MIGIZI Communications the pupils produced short films focused on topics concerning the local American Indian community—issues that are barely covered by the mainstream media. As stated on their homepage, all projects managed by MIGIZI Communications pursued the goal "of countering the misrepresentations, inaccuracies, and falsehoods promulgated about Native Peoples in the major media Businesses along University Avenue organize to prepare for Central Corridor by Yeoryia Christoforides, TC Daily Planet "Build right, not on the backs of small businesses," is a motto of the University Avenue Business Association (UABA), according to director Linda Winsor. On October 28, UABA and the Asian Economic Development Association (AEDA) brought small businesses together for a resource workshop offering free services such as business consulting, legal services, marketing assistance. BOOKS | Stylish new photography books from Julian Schnabel, Horst A. Friedrichs, and style bloggers around the world by Jay Gabler, TC Daily Planet With holiday shopping season approaching, I took a look at three new photography books from international publisher Prestel. You might consider putting any of the three under someone's tree-perhaps your own. NEW IN BLOGS GROUND ZERO | Louis Menage and the First Amendment remedy for financial crime by Rich Broderick • Poor Louis Menage. He was a wayward financier way ahead of his time. As much as any member of the Dayton, Lowry, Walker, or Pillsbury clan, Menage has a legitimate claim to being one of the City Fathers of Minneapolis. But you've probably never heard of him, right? LOON COMMONS | The anti-GIPSA gang by Brian DeVore • As you read this, meat industry lobbyists are roaming the corridors of power in D.C. wearing buttons that say, "Kill GIPSA Rule." For those of you who aren't up on your acronyms, here's a rough translation: "We Hate the Free Market." Family farmers and others who think a free and open market is a good idea have until Nov. 22 to get a different message to Washington. THE BLOG COLU.MN | NCAA making changes to trans policies thanks to Minnesota native by Andy Birkey • Kye Allums came out as a trans man on his George Washington University women's basketball team in October, and it's prompted the NCAA to look at how they deal with gender in the college association's sports teams, according to Outsports.com. Allums, a native of Hugo, Minn., will be back in Minnesota on Friday to play Green Bay at the University of Minnesota for the Best Buy Classic. HINDSIGHT 2020 | Rural health care challenges by Elizabeth Nelson • Extending insurance benefits to more people through health care reform will not necessarily guarantee access to health services. Minnesota's medically underserved populations are concentrated in rural and inner-city areas. The reasons for the disparities differ in each region and reach beyond just inadequate insurance. OUTSIDE THE WALLS | The state of the States, and the people who live in them by Dick Bernard • Monday's New York Times headline hit me when it showed up on my computer screen "Now in Power, G.O.P. vows cuts in State Budgets." Who can do anything but love trimming the fat of bloated, hated, "Government"?
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