Archive: Arts & Entertainment

SMART TALK SMART TALK
By  Saber S. Poder

ONE LESS: Coach Bubba Johnson has guided his D.B. Wesson High football team to its tenth Lengua Loco County championship. “Scoop” Johnson wrote in the Underbelly Prerecorder, “Unfortunately, that’s one less season before Coach retires to his cabin in the Montaña Mountains.”

“Scoop” should have written, “That’s one season fewer.” Less always refers to quantity or volume, as in less language skill or less gas in the tank. Fewer always refers to actual numbers, such as fewer redundancies or fewer birds than least year. No exceptions.

After Bubba, great coaches will be one fewer, and high school football, the unofficial religion of Texas, will be poorer for it.

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May 22, 2006 (ITHACA, NY)- The Hangar Theatre kicks off its 2006 Mainstage Season with a world premiere one-man musical featuring 20 great songs, 30 characters, dazzling dance, and one dynamic Broadway performer. From May 31st to June 17th, the Hangar presents Sammy & Me, a one-man show following the story of Sammy Davis, Jr. from his tap dance beginnings to his headlining days on the Las Vegas strip that he helped to desegregate.

In Sammy & Me, Broadway performer Eric Jordan Young joins forces with the Hangar’s Associate Artistic Director, Wendy Dann, to recount the story of Young’s life-long fascination with Sammy, the only African-American member of the famous Rat Pack. Along the way, Young unravels the complexities of being an entertainer caught between racial identity and a drive to transcend race as a performer.

GOSSIP by Marie Sirakos
is a witty comedy about life in a small town and the modern post divorce world. Lousha is trying to move on with her life with her new boyfriend, but when she discovers a box of her ex husband's belongings, she finds that getting rid of it is not so easy. Directed by Addie Walsh; Performed by Holly Adams, Michelle Foytek, Miranda Libkin, Danny Makali'I Mittermeyer, Joey Steinhagen, and Kit Wainer. (May 25; June 4, 7, 10) [MATURE LANGUAGE]

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SMART TALK SMART TALK
By Dr. Verbos Metikulos

ONE AND THE SAME: Legal language is rife with redundancies, with good reason. The law firm for the Institute for the Linguistically Impaired, Makem, Payette & Hurt, tells us that lawyers have to be perfectly clear to idiots and fellow hair splitters, and often to people who are both. Therefore, they repeat themselves with suitably idiotic expressions.

But the rest of us should talk like actual humans. So be advised and informed, we demand and insist that everyone cease and desist using such expressions. Let us strive for a complete and total end to each and every one of these repetitive redundancies, in which both words are used to mean one and the same thing. It is only right and proper.

Simple language is better language.

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Second graders were star struck last week when they completed a unit about space by visiting a planetarium in the Lansing Elementary School gymnasium.  "We rent it from the Sciencenter," says teacher Hallie Snow.  "We have it for two days.  Each second grade class comes for 45 minutes the first day, then again on the second day.  They all make T-shirts on the second day, which they wear to the second star show."

Lansing Middle School presented "Timeless Tales," four of Hans Christian Andersen's most beloved stories last weekend.  Directed by 7th Grade English Teacher Judy Hinderliter, students enacted "The Princess and the Pea," "The Little Mermaid," "The Emperor's New Clothes," and "The Ugly Duckling."

ITHACA NY: The vitality of the theater depends on a community of working theatre artists: writers, actors and designers. The Kitchen Theatre Company's KITCHEN SINK series (underwritten by First Niagara) provides a venue for emerging regional theatre artists to develop work through staged readings and informal performances of works-in-progress. This season, the Kitchen has expanded this series to include three cornerstone events: 2nd Annual 48-Hour Playwriting Marathon, Teen Extreme Playwriting Contest & Marathon, and New Play Festival. The New Play Festival includes three new plays by three talented local playwrights Marie Sirakos, George Sapio and T. Paul McCabe and will be presented in a three-week rotating repertory schedule from May 25 - June 11 with performances Wed-Sat at 8p and Sun at 4p. Produced together to create a community-wide event, this festival celebrates the art of theater and the excitement of presenting new work.