Culture

Tonight, my friend and I were having dinner at a fun Mexican restaurant in my town, when we heard shouting and screaming. Not knowing if it was reaction to something sports-related on one of the TV screens, we casually looked toward where the sound was coming from and realized this was actually an incendiary altercation…

Residents slump over wheelchair armrests in the overly air-conditioned “living room.” The television blasts a folk tune hijacked for a diabetes drug. Off to the right and left, like airport runways, lights over patient rooms flank the corridors, because the staff has turned off the call bells. A woman alone in her room cries, “Help…

Last week, I attended a performance of Rent’s 20th Anniversary Tour. The musical follows a year in the lives of several artists, some of whom are afflicted with HIV/AIDS. In 1996, the future was grim for those who had the disease. Over the years I’ve seen Rent on Broadway, on tour, and on the big screen. Reflecting on the passage…

The COVID-19 pandemic has raised the level of human creativity. Autopilot no longer works and we continually have to find new ways to do old things. Take bridal showers, for example. Here you’ll learn how to plan and execute a memorable event during a pandemic. This is a hybrid model, both socially distanced for the…

Sometimes I’m disappointed with movie remakes, but that’s not the case with Fahrenheit 451. The theme of the first film, and the novel it was based on, is actually strengthened in the 2018 version. Both versions have just enough similarities and differences to make them both worth watching. I’d recommend reading the novel by Ray Bradbury…

As part of Cinemark’s 2019 Oscar Movie Week, we saw Green Book, starring Viggo Mortensen, Mahershala Ali, and Linda Cardellini. To say it is the best movie I’ve seen in a long time seems trite, but it’s true. Some folks say that the relationship between the real-life African-American musician, Donald (Doc) Shirley, and his Italian-American driver, Tony (Lip) Vallelonga, was strictly business, but there’s…

Every year around 9/11 we see a procession of posts on social media with the message, “Never Forget.” It is not likely that any of us who lived through that horrible day could forget exactly where we were when it happened and the many tears we shed afterward for people that most of us had never even met.…

I barely remember the first time I saw The Room, that quirky film from 2003 that people love-to-hate-to-love. According to my DVD Netflix history, I received it in September of 2015, and I gave it only one star. When I watched The Room last weekend, I hardly remembered it. It’s possible that the first time around, I packed it up and sent…

Each year when the Oscar nominees come out, it’s fun to review the list and add the ones that look interesting to my DVD Netflix queue. This year’s movies are just starting to arrive in my mailbox, and the gem we watched over the weekend was best-picture nominee, Call Me by Your Name. This film won the 2018…

I stood in the lobby of the 1891 Fredonia Opera House, in upstate New York, passing the time by looking at my phone while my husband sought out our will-call tickets. We were there to see Pat Donohue, Grammy-winning guitarist. Pat Donohue is well known for the almost-two decades he spent as a guitarist for the…