Daily Planet Originals
MOVIES | Security, snacks, security, swag, and security: What it's like to be a journalist covering the Academy Awards
When I applied for Academy Awards press credentials last November I thought that pretty much any media representative could gain access. Wrong. I had to fill out two applications. Arts editor Jay Gabler needed to verify my assignment to cover the Oscars for the Daily Planet. From a pool of about 5,000 individual applicants for press credentials, only about 300 were approved. The approval of my credentials made me part of an exclusive group frequently referred to by Academy representatives as "the legitimate press." (As opposed to what, I often wondered.)MORE »
Dead Sea Scrolls at the Science Museum: Ancient fragments with well-hidden secrets
What, exactly, are the Dead Sea Scrolls? I posed the question to a few of my friends.
"They are all kinds of old and depict battles and such. Are they a tapestry? Wait, I'm totally thinking of something else. Way to make me feel dumb. What a crappy non-Jewish Jew I am. Sigh."
"Aren't they a collection of ancient documents having to do with the Bible? I think they are some of the only transcripts of the original Bible documentation."MORE »
"I've heard of them, but I can't recall what they are."
MOVIES | Jacques Audiard, Tahar Rahim, and Thomas Bidegain talk about their Oscar-nominated film "A Prophet"
The thrilling new Oscar-nominated French crime drama A Prophet finally opens this Friday at the Lagoon Cinema. The film, masterfully directed by Jacques Audiard (Read My Lips, The Beat That My Heart Skipped), is his first in five years—and was well worth the wait.MORE »
MOVIES | Antic animated adventures in "A Town Called Panic"
In the delightful and zany stop-motion animated French film A Town Called Panic, opening today at the Lagoon Cinema, Horse, Cowboy, and Indian are three plastic toys who run amok in their small town. Co-directors, and co-writers, Stephane Aubier and Vincent Patar, who also lend their voices, play nice with their toys with plenty of adventure and humor turning A Town Called Panic (originally appearing as short television episodes on Belgian TV) into a smooth 75-minute feast for the senses.MORE »
MUSIC | Dark Star Orchestra keep the faith at the Varsity
Never cared much for the Grateful Dead after their first album, the one with incredible cuts like "Cold Rain and Snow" and "Good Morning Little Schoolgirl." I'd catch them at the Fillmore East (NYC) only because I'd come to see the opener—one time it was Love, another time it was the Allman Brothers. They were just too hit-and-miss. At one gig they'd burn tight. At another, they'd be sloppy as hog jowls. Always a toss-up. So I was taking a chance going to the Varsity Theater on February 3 for the Dark Star Orchestra, the celebrated Dead tribute band. It panned out quite nicely.MORE »
THEATER | "Welcome to Dystopia": At Bedlam, Four Humors create a funny, touching vision of a seriously messed-up future
Every once in a while, a piece of theater comes along where even as you're watching it you wish you could rewind or slow it down. Before it's even over, you know you want to see it again. This was my experience Friday night while watching Welcome to Dystopia at Bedlam Theatre, where it is being presented by Four Humors Theater. Written by Brant Miller and Matt Spring, the play tells the story of a future totalitarian city called Dystopia. Perhaps it was the sci-fi element; the combination of humor and social commentary; or the idea of seeing the equivalent of The Island, a favorite guilty-pleasure film of mine, on stage. Whatever it was, I found Welcome to Dystopia surprisingly absorbing and highly entertaining.MORE »
THEATER | Nimbus slides down a "Strike-Slip"-pery slope at the Theatre Garage
I have to hand it to the folks at Nimbus for attempting such an ambitious production as Strike-Slip by Naomi Iizuka, now playing at the Minneapolis Theatre Garage. With a large cast, a hugely innovative design, and a play that tackles themes of violence, cross-cultural connections, and redemption, the company must be given credit for risk-taking. Unfortunately, they are hindered by the script itself, which relies too heavily on coincidences and has little to say.MORE »
MUSIC | Sara Quin of Tegan and Sara: Singing it to the sky
Though they are, by unanimous consensus, extremely nice people—generous with fans, chatty onstage, active in social-justice causes—Tegan and Sara Quin are also seriously intense. Accelerating quickly from the loping folk-funk of their 1999 debut Under Feet Like Ours, with 2004's So Jealous the Canadian twin-sister singer-songwriters created a searing, surging statement on love, hurt, and longing that I put at the top of my list of the decade's best albums. Their 2007 follow-up The Con, more musically complex, upped the ante and earned them an even larger audience. As they recuperated between legs of the world tour supporting their new album Sainthood—a tour that comes to the Orpheum Theatre on March 24—I spoke by phone with Sara about music, relationships, Minneapolis, Twitter, Bruce Springsteen, and her only t-shirt.MORE »
THEATER | "The Vaudevillian" pays tribute to the Southern Theater's history in a production that's alternately charming and tedious
In celebration of the Southern Theater's 100th birthday, Fools Productions presents The Vaudevillian, an homage to the vaudeville era into which the theater was born. With tap dancing, juggling, clowning, and other tricks, the ensemble of musicians and entertainers create a quaint night of fun, though the production drags at times and seems haphazardly assembled.MORE »
Beat the clock Friday at the legislature
With the clock counting down toward zero on the Minnesota Legislature's first deadline for bills that need recommendations to survive, let's take a quick look at a couple Twin Cities-specific bills that are scrambling Friday to stay alive.
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