Sun down, music up

June 2, 2010

Sunset Concerts return to an improved Civic Center Park

APPLE VALLEY — The Sunset Concert Series presented by Target kicks off June 17 with Phat Cat Swinger back again for opening night, sponsored by the Alaska USA Federal Credit Union.  It is high quality groups like this that earned the concert series a nod as a “Best of the Desert” finalist for special events in the 2010 Daily Press reader’s survey.  The music continues from 6 to 9 p.m. every Thursday night through August 5.
The concerts feature a delicious array of food, a beer garden and live music.  Don’t forget blankets and beach chairs as the inclined lawn seats over 1,500 people. Parking and admission are free.
June 17 – Phat Cat Swinger (Swing)
June 24 – The Working Poets (Classis rock)
July 1 – Neon Nation (80s)
July 8 – Silverados (Country)
July 15 – Latin Express (Top 40s/Latin)
July 22 – Jesus Band LA (Contemporary Christian)
July 29 – Rockit Scientists (Oldies Rock)
Aug 5 – Big Fat Steve Band (Rockabilly)

If you haven’t seen Civic Center Park lately it’s time to pay a visit! Located next to Town Hall and the library at 14955 Dale Evans Parkway just east of Super Target, the 22-acre master planned park includes a junior Olympic swimming pool, walking paths and wide expanses of grass.  The centerpiece of the park is the 1000-seat grass amphitheater, home to the Sunset Concert Series presented by Target and winner of first place honors as “Best of the Desert” location for live performances!

This winter, all of the sidewalks were widened and additional lighting installed, providing a new location for your evening walks.  The wider sidewalks will also allow a new layout at the Sunset Concert Series, bringing back a wider variety of vendors and moving the food vendors in closer to the action.
For more information please visit www.applevalley.org or call (760) 240-7000 x 7071.

See more stories like this under Newz, Music, Entertainment

Behind the Bump and Grind

May 5, 2010

By BEATRIZ E. VALENZUELA, Staff Writer

LOS ANGELES • Spangles, sparkles, tassels, bumping and grinding.

That’s what most people think is all it took to be in burlesque, but  “Behind the Burly Q” documents the evolution of burlesque and  strip tease in the United States by interviewing the dames, straightmen and second bananas that made the art what it was in its heyday.

Did you know the first Tinkerbell who slide from the Matterhorn into Adventureland was stripper Tiny Kline? She was discovered by Walt Disney, himself and was Tink until she turned 70. She died the same year she retired from Disney.

Director Leslie Zemeckis and producer Sheri Hellard criss-crossed the country to find artists like Tempest Storm, Dixie Evans, The Marilyn Monroe of Burlesque, White Fury, Alan Alda, whose father was a straight man and “tit signer,” and Chris Costello, the daughter of legendary vaudeville comedian, Lou Costello.

The documentary tracks the origins of the “cooch shows” to France, Great Britain and Greece, but they really took hold and transformed in the United States in the theaters.

The women are quick to point out that there was a difference between burlesque and stripping. In stripping the women took their clothes off but in burlesque, the bits and pieces remained covered, but not by a whole lot.

Alda kindly recalled his time in vaudeville and with the chorus girls saying they loved to “pat his head.” And also remembered a pig used in his father’s comedy act calling it his sibling.

“I hated that pig,” he chuckled adding that when there was no room for him in the car when his parents and his father’s partner had to travel to the next town, he was left in the care of his two “crazy aunts.”

Many of the women interviewed talked about their time as dancers as great times that afforded them the opportunity to make good money at a time when many women didn’t or couldn’t work.

Taffy O’Neill would dance at night and use the money to help get her son polio treatments.

“Behind the Burly-Q” is lovingly put together and gives people a glimpse into a seldomly talked or taught about era in American history. Those who enjoy learning the history of entertainment and film can’t miss this gem. The vintage footage alone will have history buffs salivating, and not just because of the subject matter.

It’s an all engrossing film that you can lose yourself in. It’s funny, sad, touching and completely amazing.

During the Great Depression, these shows were a haven for men and women and at only 10 cents for admission, the show complete with comedians, dancers, novelty acts and singers, was a steal.

Many of the performers interviewed have since passed away, making “Behind the Burly-Q” an wonderfully important piece of documented history having come straight from the artists’ mouths. Don’t miss it.

“Behind the Burly-Q” premiers at The Sunset 5 in Los Angeles on May 7 and will run for at least one week. Go to www.Laemle.com to purchase tickets.

See more stories like this under Newz, Entertainment, Events

Review: ‘Iron Man 2′ doesn’t soar quite so high

CHRISTY LEMIRE,AP Movie Critic

Lots of things get blown up and torn apart in “Iron Man 2,” as you would expect from any self-respecting blockbuster kicking off the summer movie season. The magnitude of destruction far exceeds that of its predecessor — from rows of cars to armies of drones to Tony Stark’s cliff-top Shangri-La — and includes repeated instances of characters walking away from a massive fireball without looking back. ‘Cause looking back is for wimps.

But that’s not all that gets obliterated here. The substance of the original “Iron Man,” the brain and the soul that set it apart from the typical seasonal fare and made it one of the best films of 2008, also have been blown to bits.

Tony Stark had purpose back then, and despite the outlandish fantasy of his Marvel Comics-inspired story, as a person he had a believable arc. Crafting the high-tech suit and transforming himself into a superhero gave this selfish industrialist and self-destructive playboy a sense of drive, a reason for being beyond just his whims and indulgences.

Here, he’s purely arrogant once more, with some glimmers of mortality and daddy issues. And Robert Downey Jr., so irresistibly verbal and quick on his feet in the first film (and in pretty much every film he’s ever made), seems to be on autopilot. Sure, he’s got a way with a one-liner, and his comic timing is indisputable, but he’s done this song-and-dance routine before and seems rather bored with it.

Then again the character — and the sequel itself — are less defined this time. Narratively, “Iron Man 2″ is a mess. Director Jon Favreau, working from a script by Justin Theroux, throws in too many subplots, too many characters — and what a waste of that cast, actors who can really act like Mickey Rourke, Sam Rockwell, Don Cheadle and Samuel L. Jackson in an eye patch as Nick Fury, offering a bit of foreshadowing to “The Avengers” film. (For more Marvel movie geekery, stick around until the end of the credits.)

As we recall from the last line of the first film, the whole world knows that Stark is indeed Iron Man. Now the government (led by Garry Shandling as a sniveling senator) wants him to turn over the suit for the military’s benefit, and his best friend, Lt. Col. James “Rhodey” Rhodes (Cheadle in place of Terrence Howard) can only do so much to protect him.

Meantime, there’s a new foe in the form of Russian bad guy Ivan Vanko (Rourke, buried beneath tattoos and a Boris-and-Natasha accent), who’s built a suit of his own in his dank Siberian abode, complete with electrified tentacles; sadly, he and fellow acting heavyweight Downey spend most of their screen time apart. In no time, Stark’s rival, Justin Hammer (Rockwell, turning on the smarm) snaps up Vanko and asks him to build an army of Iron Men for himself.

Then there’s the battle Stark is waging internally, as he reflects on his own weakening body and the memories of a scientist father (John Slattery, glimpsed in old movies) who didn’t love him enough. And speaking of love, “Iron Man 2″ also tries to find time for the blossoming relationship between Stark and his right-hand woman, Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow), while dangling the possibility of a dalliance with a mysterious new assistant (Scarlett Johansson).

So yeah, there’s a lot going on here. The enemy — the focal point of the whole movie, for that matter — remains murky, making you realize about halfway through that it’s unclear exactly what “Iron Man 2″ is supposed to be about.

Favreau seemed to handle all the expensive toys effortlessly the first time, an exciting discovery given his previous work on smaller films like “Made” and “Elf.” The strain shows now in a lack of momentum and a reliance on generically bombastic action sequences. (The final showdown looks like several blips of light, chasing each other around the skies above New York’s Flushing Meadows.)

The cinematography from Matthew Libatique is, once again, an engaging mix of bright, crisp exteriors (especially in IMAX, the way “Iron Man 2″ was shown to Los Angeles critics) and tangibly gritty intimate moments. But the big, shiny action sequences — the reason audiences get giddy for movies like “Iron Man 2,” ostensibly — too often look cartoony. That’s especially true of the initial showdown between Stark and Vanko at the Grand Prix of Monaco, with its cars tumbling end-over-end before — you guessed it — bursting into flames, just as it seems the “Iron Man” franchise itself is doing.
“Iron Man,” a Paramount Pictures release, is rated PG-13 for sequences of intense sci-fi action and violence, and some language. Running time: 124 minutes. Released in 2-D only. Two stars out of four.

See more stories like this under Newz, Entertainment

Behind The Burly Q

April 27, 2010

Film Summary
The art of Burlesque has experienced a new renaissance, but for years it was vilified and misunderstood, and for the most part left out of our cultural history. Now comes the feature documentary Behind the Burly Q, a thrilling yet affectionate look back at the golden age of Burlesque - America’s most popular form of live entertainment in the first half of the 20th century.

Behind the Burly Q reveals the true story of burlesque by telling the intimate and surprising stories from its golden age through the women (and men!) who lived it. Featuring dozens of interviews with performers, musicians and authors including actor Alan Alda, whose father Robert Alda was a handsome “tit singer” and a straight man; Nat Bodian, journalist who wrote and saw burlesque at the Empire in Newark in the 1930’s; Lorraine Lee, who used to dance for Bonnie and Clyde and Pretty Boy Floyd and “earned a quarter”; Tempest Storm, who still performs today and claims to have been lovers with Elvis and JFK; the notorious Blaze Starr, who escaped a life of poverty to rise to the heights of fame, and became involved with Governor Long; Kitty West, aka Evangelina the Oyster Girl, the Bourbon Street star, who entertained busloads of tourists as she “came out of her oyster”; Taffy O’Neill, who performed at night, and spent the days taking her young son, stricken with polio to treatment; Mike Iannucci, star stripper Ann Corio’s husband and producer of “This Was Burlesque”; Rachel Schteir who wrote the book Striptease, a comprehensive history of the art of stripteasing; and Janet Davis, author of the extensively researched book on Tiny Kline, who Walt Disney himself discovered and made her the first Tinker Bell when she was in her 60s.

Filmmaker Leslie Zemeckis is a veteran of stage and film. She is the creator of the one-woman burlesque-inspired show, “Staar: She’s Back and Mistresser Than Ever!” that has been performed at various clubs throughout Los Angeles garnering audience acclaim. Zemeckis recently produced the feature “Staar” starring Carrie Fisher and Jeffrey Tambor and also produced the short film “Enfants Terribles,” which she stars in opposite Peter Facineli and Christopher Lloyd and which was an official selection of the Palm Springs, Santa Barbara and Chicago Film Festivals in 2005 – 2006. Her acting credits include “Deterrence” for director Rod Lurie, “Sacrifice” with Michael Madsen, “Blowback” with Mario Van Peebles, and “Polar Express” opposite Tom Hanks. She co-starred in “Beowulf”, directed by her husband Robert Zemeckis, starring Ray Winstone, Anthony Hopkins and Angelina Jolie.

See more stories like this under Newz, Entertainment, Events

Movie review: ‘The Last Song’ sings off-key

March 31, 2010
By Bob Tremblay, GateHouse News Service
The Last Song.” One can only hope.OK, that’s snarky. This arthritic male, who’s clearly not a member of this movie’s young female target audience, actually finds its star, Miley Cyrus, appealing. I also believe she has talent as a singer and she may even prove she has talent as an actress, but she won’t help her cause if she keeps choosing movies that pile on every cliche in the cliche handbook as this one does.

It’s almost as if the filmmakers had a cliche checklist to make sure they didn’t miss any. Parents divorced, check. Teen girl angst-ridden as a result, check. Teen girl treats father with disdain, check. Teen girl initially insults and ignores the love interest, check. Love interest is introduced sans shirt to show off his hunky physique, check. Teen girl’s younger brother is ridiculously cute and provides comic relief, check. Mean girls mistreat our teen girl, check. They will later see the errors of the ways, check. Teen girl breaks up with the love interest following a lame revelation, check.

And since this is a movie based on a Nicholas Sparks novel, somebody has to die. According to the cliche handbook, it has to be somebody whose death will cause the teen girl to have a change of heart, renew playing the piano at the funeral and, most importantly, remove her nose piercing.

And the cause of death? Rickets, of course. Or maybe cancer. And do you think rain will fall after the death as if to symbolize tears? I suppose the better question here is did the filmmakers leave out any cliches.

Now, fans of Miley may not care about the film’s almost total lack of originality, but discriminating moviegoers should. Miley does deserve some credit for trying to prove she’s more than Hannah Montana, that she’s actually growing up and out of her Disney character.

That said, I preferred the “Hannah Montana” movie to this film for the simple reason that the former gives Miley a chance to do what she does best: sing. Here, she “plays” the piano. Considering we never see her body attached to her hands while she’s playing, one might assume she’s not really playing the piano, though press reports have her learning to play the instrument in order to play a child prodigy. Now that’s acting. With that in mind, the film’s title really should be “The Last Piano Sonata,” but that probably didn’t wow test audiences.

As Ronnie Miller, Miley proves she can act morosely, though in the sulking department, she’s no competition for the Goddess of Glum, Kristen Stewart.

The plot revolves around Ronnie’s relationships with her estranged father, Steve (Greg Kinnear), and the hunky love interest, Will Blakelee (Liam Hemsworth, who has since become Miley’s real-life love interest). Miley moves from New York with her younger brother, Jonah (Bobby Coleman), to spend the summer with Steve in Georgia. Give the scenery a thumb’s-up.

So, do you think Ronnie will reconcile with Steve and find true love with Will by the time the ending credits roll? Do bears play video games in the woods?

Kinnear continues to load up his resume with diverse characters. He most recently played a loathsome bureaucrat in “The Green Zone.” Here, he’s a lovable dad, so lovable, in fact, you wonder why he got divorced. Kinnear is just a solid actor who deserves better material than this.

As for Hemsworth, the Australian thespian could serve as a rival to Channing Tatum in the pretty boy sweepstakes. His character shows his sensitive side by protecting baby turtles. What’s not to love? Will and Ronnie do make an adorable couple.

One might be tempted to blame this movie’s creativity void on the fact that it marks the debuts of director Julie Anne Robinson and co-writer Jeff Van Wie, who obviously don’t want to ruffle any boa feathers here. They’re making a safe, sanitized movie guaranteed to appeal to young girls who never met a romance they didn’t like, no matter how bogus.

This arthritic male, however, prefers his romances to have oh, I don’t know just a little romance. Speaking of which, all you young females out there, if you want to see a movie that’s thoroughly charming rather than overwhelmingly maudlin, see “A Little Romance” starring a young Diane Lane. By comparison, “The Last Song” sounds like a song sung p.u.

“The Last Song stars Miley Cyrus, Liam Hemsworth, Greg Kinnear and Bobby Coleman and is rated PG (for thematic material, some violence, sensuality and mild language); 118 minutes. Directed by Julie Ann Robinson, the film opened March 31.

See more stories like this under Newz, Entertainment
— Next Page »