Imperfect Tragedy
The Angels and Heroes’ production of Antigone is flawed, but not fatally. The TNS Space on Agricola is too small (and too hot), so the piece is awkwardly staged. Audience members are forced to peer around posts and actors are constantly trampling on the spot representing Polyneices’ grave. The play seemed too long, with too…
Perfectly Modulated Performances and Lots of Laughs
Luna/Sea, the estrogen-powered theatre quartet of Martha Irving, Mauralea Austin, Mary-Colin Chisholm and Sherry Smith, has brought Alan Bennett’s “Talking Heads” to Studio TNS. The series of portraits of “regular” English people works wonderfully in the tiny space, and the two monologues I saw made me wish that the rest of the run was not…
Make Time for a Great Play
Time is running out to see Doing Time, a highly entertaining mystery based on a sci-fi short story by Kansas City author Mac Tonnies and adapted by the play’s director Paul Kimball. It is staged in the tiny basement room of the Wired Monk Coffee Shop, which makes for a surprisingly effective space for this…
Twinning Highways
Yesterday, the Ecology Action Centre held a press conference to announce its portion of the Climate Change Action Report Card, the collective effort that rates governments on their performance towards meeting the greenhouse gas emission reduction goals they established for themselves in 2001. The Nova Scotian government received an overall grade of C, but the…
H&M, The Mud room, Alladian Palace Restaurant, Pro Skateboards & Snowboards and Pete’s Frootique
Inquiring fashion-conscious minds want to know: Will a branch of Swedish clothing chain H&M be opening in the Mic Mac Mall? “We’re in negotiations with them, but nothing’s signed or confirmed at this point,” shares mall general manger Terry Harvie…Say it ain’t so! After nearly fours years on Barrington, The Mud Room will serve its…
Le Bon Cafe opening
Over the last couple months, Bonne Cuisine, the catering company that makes its home in the lower courtyard of Spring Garden Place, has been quietly expanding. Today marks the grand opening of both Le Bon Cafe and the Magpie Bakery, two small complementary businesses that Bonne Cuisine owner Margaret Carson opened beside Bonne near the…
Metro’s Visually Creative Artists Society opening
The One World Cafe might be gone, but all is not quiet at the cafe’s former home (2412 Agricola). The space that was once our dearly departed cafe is now the headquarters of Metro’s Visually Creative Artists Society, a collective devoted to helping those interested in photography and the film industry pick up professional skills…
Mollyz moving
Gottingen Street might be losing another mainstay. Upscale diner Mollyz and upstairs bar Menz (both at 2104 Gottingen) will both be leaving their current digs sometime in January, and re-locating. Where are they headed? “We’re looking at a couple of different locations. We haven’t nailed anything down as of yet,” says Doug Melanson, co-owner of…
Environmental Train Wreck
Nowadays, working as an environmental reporter can be like watching a train wreck in slow motion: you see the catastrophe laid out before you, you know how the catastrophe will unfold and, sure enough, there it happens, exactly as expected. All that’s left to do is document the details. This, at any event, is how…
Don Domanski
Lucky us: we spoke to Governor General award-winning Halifax poet Don Domanski, hours after it was announced that he beat out some impressive nominees, including Dennis Lee and Margaret (“my pen!”) Atwood. Domanski, who kept the big secret for over a month, receives an early Christmas bonus of $25,000 at Rideau Hall on December 13.…
Artists Against Gentrification
Friday’s Artists Against Gentrification event is poignantly timed to coincide with Turnstile Pottery’s eviction from 2207 Gottingen, the future site of sparkly new condos. Starting at 7pm, short films by Anchor Archive’s Sonia Edworthy and artist Sarah Mangle will be projected onto the wall at the future site of more new condos, the Falkland-Gottingen intersection—or…
Defective Perception & Fistfight
The dual CD release going down Thursday, November 29 is of such magnitude that it may ruin you for the weekend. Defective Perception and Fistfight (Myron Cottreau, guitar; Adam Nelson, drums; Matthew Francis; vocals; Randy Jeddry, bass; Roger Nelson, bass) both plan to unleash their demos with the power of 100 screaming harpies at Gus’…
Folds of Policy CD release
As disappointing as it is to be writing about December already, it’s nice to know that with this freezing-cold, holiday-infused month stretching out before us, some folks are doing something fun and productive. This Saturday, Folds of Policy release their third album, Paradigm City, at The Seahorse, with special guests Great Plains and Silvergun. Comprised…
HRM by Design
Watch closely: We’re about to cram three crucially important city projects into one digestible blurb. And, we’ll make it engaging. Tabloidy, even. First up: COGSWELL INTERCHANGE TO BE DEMOLISHED! …That is, if the downtown portion of HRM by Design has its way. Last night, staff presented their Preferred Downtown Scenario at the World Trade and…
Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead
Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead is a sourpuss version of a Coen Brothers movie. Sidney Lumet uses the Coens’ most frequent story template: A crime is committed, leaving characters to contend with unforeseen consequences. But Lumet doesn’t replicate the way the Coens’ idiosyncrasies and moral inquiry keep viewers concerned. Before the Devil Knows You’re…
The Mist
Horror fans are among the most passionate film-goers because, even when a movie doesn’t really work, they look out for the moments that do. The Mist, an adaptation of the Stephen King novella from The Shawshank Redemption writer/director Frank Darabont, has its share of impressive pieces. But the movie runs too long to make those…
The end of their rope
What if you held an S&M party and no one came? That’s exactly what happened to Tightrope, Halifax’s first leather and denim gay brotherhood society (founded in 1990). Last month they shelled out $100 for four rooms at Seadogs to use after a general meeting to plan their 2008 events. It would end up being…
House rules
I’m happy to give up my cell phone while behind the wheel, as long as everyone else has to. Not that the simple act of placing a call interferes with my wonderful driving abilities—which are only seriously pushed by the demands of texting and playing DJ with a 3,245-song iPod—but it sure makes other drivers…
Juke it out
A representative of a local internet service provider stands in Aaron McKenzie Fraser’s living room, having fixed the problem. He’s about to head back into the grey afternoon when his gaze finds the corner of the cozy space with its blue walls and clusters of vintage cameras. “Where did you get that?” he asks. “A…
Interplanetary craft
My roommate walks in just as I am on the phone casually asking, “So, do you believe in life on other planets?” Any concerns he has are assuaged when he figures out who’s on the other end of the line. His birth name is Kevin Donovan, but he’s better known to audiences as Afrika Bambaataa.…
Quick on the draw
Lucas Ridgeway is the bear-suited man you may have seen around town. OK, so he’s not literally running around dressed in fur, but if you’ve seen paintings of a little guy in a bear suit, you’ve seen some of Ridgeway’s work. The bear-suited man, as he calls it, is Ridgeway’s fuzzy mascot, a self-portrait of…
Destiny’s child
The interior lives of kids are far more complicated and mysterious than adults believe. Sometimes it takes a 15-minute short film and a filmmaker like Adam Garnet Jones to reveal the youthful mind, and to remind the rest of us of the power of that long-forgotten state. Cloudbreaker, which screens Friday at the Mi’kmaq Native…
Book reviews
Slash by Slash with Anthony Bozza & searchable archives.
DVD reviews
Waitress, directed by Adrienne Shelly & searchable archives
50 Best CDs of the year
Our music critics give a big, wet smooch to the top 50 CDs of the year. Guess which local pick made the most fave lists. I’ll never tell. Plus, listen to ourTop 50 CDs playlist
Anger management
Rene Angelil’s got my knickers in a twist. After Old Mr. Snooty McSnoots cancelled Celine Dion’s Halifax Common concert last week and gave as his reason the wounds inflicted by Halifax’s plentiful poo-pooing of his wife/employee, I had to sit down and ponder: are we mean? Or are we aptly critical, and just not very…
50 Best DVD’s of the year
Back in my day we had talkies. Ten cents for a show and penny candy. Nowadays, the kids are watching these shiny discuses, they like to call ’em DVDs.
Alternative astrology
Leo, love will make you sane, says Rob Brezsny.
CD reviews
A new kind of light Jill Barber, Rose Cousins & Meaghan Smith.
Shrunken junk?
Q I’m a single gay male in my late 20s. I’ve met a guy I really like. We chat all the time and we’re attracted to each other. We haven’t yet had sex, but we’re planning to get naked and sweaty (and break out the ropes and blindfolds) over Christmas break. We “scheduled” this because…
Neptune’s White Christmas
Irving Berlin’s White Christmas is two hours of great holiday escapism. There are no heavy messages or piercing insights in the show, and that’s just fine by me. It’s glittery and glitzy with catchy tunes and energetic dance numbers. The costumes are fun and fabulous and the scene changes are nothing short of miraculous given…
Draught dodging
Fighting city politics and the smoking ban, the Granite brewery chooses to expand without Halifax.
