There will (or at least there should) be a vote in the near future deciding the majorities choice for the best-looking party ever held and this will win, with a landslide.
Don’t believe us? Take a look.
As you enter the capacious quarters of the Public Theater in the East Village, you walk through a construction site: a grand building being torn out from the inside. The space is currently undergoing renovations, but still acts as the primary location for the eighth year of Under the Radar, New York’s downtown experimental theater festival, which runs through Jan. 15.
This feeling of restoration never seems to leave as you become privy to the rich, eclectic and fiercely original performances the two weeks has to offer. Experimental theater, by definition, avoids convention, often leaving audiences questioning the value of the genre. But doubters must make the trip downtown: the offerings are impressive and remarkably diverse, including media like video, music, dance and puppetry, produced by companies based in Europe and America. Read More
When we first expressed interest in attending the Professional Bull Riders event last weekend at Madison Square Garden, PR man Jack Carnefix apprised us of the rules. Number one, we must “buckle up.” Number two, if we “go on Friday [we’re] going to want to come back Saturday. And if we go Saturday [we’re] going to want to come back on Sunday.”
(It is important to note at this point that The Transom is a wire-thin arts reporter, a Brit whose Queen’s English and Hugh Grantish stammer sounds like a royal parody.)
With weekend plans disregarded, there followed an anxious ride on the metro to Penn Station, early Friday afternoon, wondering what to expect. Will the bulls be chasing a fox? Would there be a ringleader with a bugle? Should we have bought our jodhpurs?
On our arrival, we joined the herd of cowboy hats and flannel shirts streaming into the arena, welcomed by the sound of Kenny Rodgers’s “Oh Ruby Don’t Take Your Love to Town.” At the bar more burly blokes in flannels and their denim-clad lasses drank Jack Daniels, all the time singing to an obscure compilation of country music that was foreign to this Englishman’s ears.
It appears New York is not as American as one had imagined. Or rather, is very American, but only when you give it a chance to be. Read More
PBR (Professional Bull Riders) stuck two of its finest bulls in front of the Stock Exchange this afternoon, in a bid to promote this weekends opening of the Built Ford Tough Series at Madison Square Garden. Read More
Amid the Christmas chaos of Rockerfeller Plaza, fans of the NBC show Community came together to protest its cancellation. It was a worryingly modest showing, to be honest. The Observer had to look hard for the small group of fans, who had been shunted to one side of the plaza.
But we found them Read More
“One drink for everybody!” hollered Jonathan Ames. He was standing center stage at the Brooklyn Inn to administer last rites for his show, Bored To Death. Read More
The Ziegfeld Theatre has had a busy week, and it was overrun again last Thursday night for the world premiere of Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close, the film adaptation of the novel by Jonathan Safran Foer, which fictionalizes a young boy’s experience post 9/11. Read More
Last week, The Observer stared, brows furrowed, at two emails in our inbox. It appeared we would have to make an impossible choice—more impossible, even, than deciding between St. Barts or Vail for Christmas. Two Midtown theaters were holding competing screenings for two Oscar-aspiring films starring two sexagenarian actresses—on the same night! Our temples began Read More
“I’ll find something to climb,” Tom Cruise told The Observer last night at the US premiere of his new film, Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol. “There’s always something.” He was talking about turning 50, a fact that means if insurance companies have anything to do with it, Mr. Cruise won’t be scaling buildings for much longer. Read More
Protestors took to the East Village on Sunday afternoon to beat on the walls of the empty Charas Community Center, on 9th Street and Avenue B to demand its reinstatement to the people. In what could have passed for OWS looking for a residence, demonstrators held a traditional rally with a human microphone, music and of course, the drum circle. This time however, they bought their own batons in the hope of ”turning the wall into a drum”, which unfortunately for the neighbors they achieved. Read More
