Archive: Arts & Entertainment

SMART TALK

by Dr. Dot Pilcrow




WORKING MOTHER: This has struck me as one of the most ironic redundancies ever. Troglodyte preachers inveigh against working mothers while holding up the book of Proverbs's description of the perfect wife. The long suffering woman in that Bible chapter achieves her so-called perfection with hundred-hour work weeks, but she's not a working mother because she doesn't collect a paycheck. Meanwhile, her husband enjoys legal bull sessions with his buddies.

By the way, troglodyte is not a religious denomination, although it almost could be.

Watch a mom trying to get the grocery shopping done with the unhelpful involvement of even one small child who's tired and bored, and try to tell me she's not working. Child rearing is a fulltime job, thank you very much.

On top of the insulting and usually sexist ignorance behind saying working mother, the same airheads will refer to family vacations. That's not redundant, just thoughtless. Sure, Dad and the kids might have a great time, but too often, they expect Mom to be ecstatic about doing what she does the rest of the year but in a temporary location.

Moms, start lobbying now for an actual day off - all day - on Mother's Day. While you're at it, try for more. Aren't two-week vacations traditional for working folk?

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The Community Arts Partnership of Tompkins County (CAP) and The Park School of Communications at Ithaca College will welcome National Geographic photographer Lynn Johnson to Ithaca as part of the Park Award for Photo Activism project.  In addition to working with student photographers participating in the project, Johnson will deliver a public presentation of her work on Thursday, February 21 at 7:30 pm in the Park Auditorium at Ithaca College.

Johnson is as well known for her sensitive yet unflinching approach to stories such as 'The Impact of Avian Flu' and 'TIBET: Freedom Denied' as she is for her artful, quiet, depiction of the life of a talented but tortured artist in 'Vincent Van Gogh: Inspired by Light' (all for National Geographic). In addition to travel that has taken her to almost all seven continents and numerous nations, Johnson has had the privilege of photographing the entire Supreme Court and notable celebrities including Tiger Woods and Mikhail Baryshnikov. But when all is said and done, the stories that interest Johnson the most are about ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances—those of everyday life.

SMART TALK

by Dr. Les Terse



OVEREXHAUSTED: At the Center for English as a First Language, we like to say that we get overexhausted by patients who overexaggerate. Of course, we use that line only in the sacred precincts of the Fowler Lounge, where no impressionable patients can overhear. They might not understand that we're relieving frustration by joking, and they're the butt of the joke.

We don't feel badly for them - that would be making fun of the ignorant yet again - but we do feel bad that they don't sound as smart as they think they do. Fortunately, we're here to help.

Exhausted already means overtired. Any more over, you'd be six feet under. Besides, overexhausted fails the redundancy test: Underexhausted sounds as silly as young geezer.

The same argument destroys overexaggerate. Exaggerate already means over the top in credibility, and underexaggerate makes no more sense than risky haven.

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Two one-act operas by Giacomo Puccini open the new year at Ithaca College's Dillingham Center.  'Suor Angelica' and 'Gianni Schicchi' will be performed at 8 p.m. on Feb. 20, 22, 26, 28, and March 2. A 2 p.m matinee will be offered on Sunday, Feb. 24, with a talk-back led by conductor and music director Brian DeMaris immediately following the performance.

Written in 1918, Puccini’s 'Suor Angelica' and 'Gianni Schicchi' belong to the composer’s 'Il Trittico' (The Triptych) series of three one-act operas. 'Suor Angelica' explores the dark past of Sister Angelica in 17th- century Siena. When a grand coach arrives outside of the convent, Angelica’s reasons for joining the religious order are exposed and lead to her final desperate act.

Little Steven’s Underground Garage is an internationally syndicated program hosted by musician, producer, songwriter, actor, and activist Steven Van Zandt.  Van Zandt is most notably known as the guitarist in Bruce Springsteen’s E. Street Band and for the role of Silvio Dante on HBO’s The Sopranos.  He has hosted the program since its inception in 2002.

“We are very excited to bring Little Steven back to Ithaca’s airwaves.  It’s an eclectic program on an eclectic station built for an eclectic city,” said Aaron Terkel, Brand Manager for 98.7 The Vine.

The Tompkins County Civil War Sesquicentennial Commission continues its Civil War film series this Sunday, February 3, with the showing of the film “The Red Badge of Courage.”  The screening will take place beginning at 1:30 p.m. Sunday at Cinemapolis, 120 E. Green Street, Ithaca.  The Commission appreciates Cinemapolis’ cosponsorship of the event.  Admission will be by donation.

The film is based on the 1895 novel written by Stephen Crane, which was also the focus of a community read sponsored by the Civil War Commission, with assistance from Buffalo Street Books and the Tompkins County Public Library.

SMART TALK

by Dr. Parley Speake




MORE IMPORTANTLY: At the Center for English as a First Language, we put more importantly and most importantly into the same treatment plan as I feel badly. The pretentious yet ignorant, which is to say fatuous, make themselves sound foolish by using adverbs like a cook who thinks there's no such thing as too much spice. Hopefully is another similar faux pas, and one of our un-favorites.

We tell our patients that adverb compulsion makes them look like jerks. In speaking and writing, simpler is smarter. Don't complicate unnecessarily, we tell them. Just say more important, most important, I feel bad, and I hope.

Not only will they impress the knowledgeable, but they'll also use correct grammar.

Of course, you, dear reader, had it right all along.

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SMART TALK

by Dr. Thorn Schwa




HONE IN: It's time to revisit an insidious malady that we have difficulty treating. Many Patients at the Center for English as a First Language swear that hone in is correct. Some even cite professional writers and journalists who use it.

They're wrong. As gently as we can, we tell them that the pros don't get everything right. Even Hemingway used try and, and Shakespeare used worser, for instance, and many journalists think there's a country named MEE-an-mar instead of MYAN-mar, exactly as it's spelled.

The term we're discussing, however, is home in, as in homing pigeons, home plate, and especially, homing beacon. Whether we're talking about spitballs in a classroom or a missile fired from a drone, one homes in on one's target.

You might hone the edge of a good knife, if you know how, or even hone your skills at doing so, but that's all. You home in on home base.

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Rachel LampertHere's the thing: I am a former theater professor who wants to be curmudgeonly Andy Rooney when I grow up.  Now that I don't have to see bad productions I just won't go unless I know I will like a production.  Even then I tear the production apart, imagining that I have wild eyebrows and that Andy Rooney voice that says, "And you know what else I hate?"

So it must mean something good that I plan to attend Sunday's performance (3pm at the Lansing Middle School Auditorium) of Rachel Lampert's 'The Soup Comes Last'.  Lampert will be performing her original one woman show to benefit LTAPA, the Lansing arts booster club.  The show tells the story of her trip to China to choreograph a production of, of all things, 'West Side Story'.

I saw 'Soup' years ago at the Kitchen Theatre (Lampert is the artistic director there), I think before it played off-Broadway in New York City in 2004.  It is a hilarious and touching story of culture clash in which Lampert and an American stage director are flown to a rural community to stage the show with the help of a translator.

The Community Arts Partnership of Tompkins County (CAP) is pleased to announce the 2012 distribution of five 'CAP Fellowships' to local artists.  The CAP Fellowship program is funded through local fundraising efforts and is an annual program open to Tompkins County artists of all disciplines. Unlike a grant, a fellowship is a monetary award not attached to a particular project.   The Fellowship recognizes professional and dedicated artists who have been active on a regular basis through presenting, exhibiting, or performing their craft. 

This year, CAP received 37 applications which were reviewed by an independent jury.  The five awardees represent a broad cross-section of Tompkins County’s arts community and include artists working in several disciplines.

Tompkins County Public Library, in partnership with Ithaca Made Movies, will host “Serial Saturday 5,” the latest installment in its monthly film series, February 2 at 1 p.m. in the BorgWarner Community Room.

Made popular in the mid-1900s, serial films—also known as chapter plays—were feature films broken into short segments or chapters.  Theaters would show one chapter, typically ending in a cliffhanger, one week and patrons would return for the next segment the following week.

SMART TALK

by Dr. Verbos Metikulos


COMPLETE vs. FINISH: At the Center for English as a First Language, we've agreed that the staff will avoid certain topics while trying to relax in the Fowler Lounge after a trying day of trying to stamp out try and.

"The" is one such topic. It takes, on average, six years for a speaker of a language related to Mandarin or Cantonese (which don't have "the" at all) to learn how to use "the" in English. No simple rule guides us, only experience. We don't usually get into "complex" vs. "complicated," either.

"Complete" vs. "finish" is nearly as hard to explain, but some staff can't leave it alone. Dr. Garrel S. Utter, poor man, has lost friends by bending their ears about this after too many libations.

The problem is that dictionaries define both words by using each to define the other, and while they're similar in meaning, they're not synonymous.

"Complete" comes from words that mean "full," so generally, it means to fulfill, or to make whole. A movie might be finished, but if part of it got lost, it's not complete.

"Finish" means to stop, come to an end, or to limit. A mob boss wanting someone killed might say "Finish him." "Complete him" just won't get the job done.

Thousands of websites repeat a story about a man who supposedly won a contest with this illustration of the difference:

When you marry the right woman, you are complete.

When you marry the wrong woman, you are finished.

When the right one catches you with the wrong one, you are completely finished.



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