Read: Fast Girls Are Not Sluts

Raunchy, juicy, lusty, and ultimately feminine in every sense of the word, the stories in Fast Girls: Erotica for Women are provocative and earth-shattering. The new book of erotica, edited by veteran New York sex writer and columnist Rachel Kramer Bussel and published by Cleis Press is a wake-up call for women (like me) who are not avid readers of erotica. Seriously, ladies. Read this book and expect to view the world in a different light. You'll no longer just be cubicle worker, waitress, mom, corporate queen or the good wife. You'll be a woman hyper aware of your own sexual power.

There's something for everyone in this collection of incredibly readable short stories: the single woman, lesbian, in-love girlfriend, devout wife, and horny college girl are all represented. Fast Girls ensures that no woman is safe from the fast girl she can become. According to Bussel, fast girls are not about being "shocking for shock's sake but following their passion, seeking out what it is that they need to be truly pleasured." As Bussel says: "What I love about these fast girls is that even as they are bold, daring and dynamic, they have a thing or two to learn about sex and themselves." Beyond the sex, the prose in Fast Girls is point blank in the tradition of crime fiction with orgasms in place of gunshots and knife stabbings. Nothing is censored, and the blood and guts is the naked flesh as a symbol for the vulnerable yet powerful woman revealed.

My favorite Fast Girls story by far is Waxing Eloquent by Donna George Storey. I love this story because it's multilayered with a solid tone of jaded sarcasm masking a college girl's insecurity. Storey also attacks the sanitized culture of L.A., which is rightly deserved. In order to get in bed with the gorgeous TV actor next door, the protagonist does a typically LA thing: she gets waxed. "I'm lying on a table in a salon in Westwood, waiting for some nice lady in a white coat to rip off all my pubic hair so I can go have a proper L.A. fuck with Cody himself." As a reward for her pain, she gets to bed the hot actor. "Thanks for keeping your promise to test me out Cody. That was one hell of a L.A. fuck," she tells Cody after they celebrate her second waxing that leaves not a hair in sight. To which Cody answers flatly: "Sorry Shannon. If any promises were kept, it's not L.A." Here the reader gets a slice of the twisted side of L.A. life served up in a smart, sexy vignette.

Another goodie is Winter, Summer, by Tristan Taormino, in which the protagonist's fear of intimacy is violently overcome through a one-night stand with a butch blond pool player she meets in a bar. Fireworks by Lolita Lopez concerns the explosions that occur between husband and wife when they decide to have sex on the sly at a family picnic. Married Life by Charlotte Stein reveals how a husband's secret sadomasochistic fantasies can be rudely awakened by a wife who's not afraid to play with whips and rope. In all of these, the reader is right there with the narrator as the hot sex and personal revelations occur. In Fast Girls, sex is merely an art that brings the participants into closer association with themselves. Each story is a healing for the writer and voyeuristic trip for the reader. In Whore Complex, by Bussel, the protagonist discovers more rewards as the personal whore of a very handsome, intelligent and dominating man than through her corporate day job.

Oh, and did I mention the scene involving menage a trois (and then some) in Fast Girls? There's the somewhat shocking Playing the Market by Angela Caperton that details how an everyday woman can become an instant prostitute, simply because she needs to pay rent in a downturn economy. Here the threesome is composed of two hunky men and one woman, while Communal by Saskia Walker gently plays with the idea of a foursome via steamy shower scenes in a college dorm setting. The women in Fast Girls are unafraid to push their own boundaries and test their limits. Perhaps the boldest heroine in this anthology is the protagonist in Let's Dance by D.L. King. Here an older woman makes the moves on a college boy with lustful force.

Not only is the prose in Fast Girls witty, raw and honest, the women portrayed within its pages are heroines. Forget about mainstream America when you read this book: there's not a single Sex in the City scenario in sight. A fast girl might love shoes, like the woman in Tess Danesi's story, Lessons, Slow and Painful, but they're merely impractical sex props for her pleasure. She lets her boyfriend knife the words "Fast Girl" into her back because she thinks his kisses are worth the pain. These fictional women know what they need to make themselves feel reborn, and they will go to any extreme to get there. Fast girls aren't worried about being "too fat" or whether or not they look like Julia Roberts; they're accepting of their own flaws and desires. Fast girls are willing to risk humiliation in order to find themselves.

In similar fashion to Whore Complex, there's a recurring theme of a reward for staying true to one's self throughout Fast Girls. In Confession of a Shopaholic by Jennifer Peters, the protagonist unabashedly carries her new sex toys on the bus, wining a handsome guy to take home to try out her new trinkets. In Waiting For Beethoven by Susie Hara, a 51-year-old woman aggressively pursues a pianist that's young enough to be her son, to her own exquisite benefit. I wish copies of Fast Girls could be delivered to every desperate housewife with the enclosed note: "You deserve more!"

Click here to read more reviews on the August 2010 virtual book tour for Fast Girls: Erotica For Women.

A Relevant Conversation with Rory Leahy

Yesterday I met with Rory Leahy, writer and lead actor of the play, The Irrelevant Adventures of Jarvis McFadden, which plays at Cornservatory until September 4. I reviewed the play for Centerstage Chicago, noting the bumps, but ultimate promise of the American Demigods theatre company that Leahy is running. What stands out about the play is its positive, upbeat message: Stay true to your childhood self, no matter how much people and life beat you down! I was also excited to learn that American Demigods has a mission I can relate to: "To know how we as humans can aspire to be better than we are." It turned out to be a very relevant conversation, topped off by news about American Demigods' exciting slate of projects for 2011: The production of two plays by Chicago playwright Reina Hardy and a 24 Hour Theatre Project. I know a good thing when I see one, so don't touch that dial.



Marla Seidell: Tell me about the original production of Jarvis, which was mounted at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign a decade ago.

Rory Leahy: I was in a group called The Penny Dreadful Players. We pretty much did our own thing with theatre. We didn’t have a faculty advisor: We were the blind leading the blind. Jarvis was first conceived in the late '90s, with another friend of mine, Tom Beach, who had the idea for the boy detective.

MS: How much of you is in the play?

RL: A great deal, although, I wouldn’t say Jarvis is based on me, it’s more like he’s inspired by life. If I had multiple personalities Jarvis would be one of them. Really I’m all of the characters, even the female characters, especially Michelle [played by Julia Beck].

MS: How so?

RL: She’s got that really nerdy thing, and she’s shy. She reads a lot, she’s not good at parties--she’s my grade school, high school self.

MS: Where did you grow up?

RL: In Edgewater [in Chicago], although I went to high school at Loyola Academy in Wilmette.

MS: So you're hardcore Irish Catholic.

RL: Yeah, my family is originally from the South Side.

MS: At what age did you decide you wanted to do theatre?

RL: I have always wanted to make things up and perform, even before I realized it was a profession. I was seven when I performed in a Christmas pageant. I had a small role as a shepard so I promoted myself to archangel, and got all the neighborhood kids together to put on our own pageant. We didn’t have a script but I phonetically dictated the dialogue to the other kids. I did that sort of thing for a while. The first play I wrote that I’m proud of is a play called Love Story, a political satire, that I did junior year of high school.

MS: How long have you been writing?

RL: Pretty much I’ve been continuously writing things, many of them awful, since I was 17.

MS: How often do you write?

RL: I usually devote my Saturday and Sunday afternoons to writing. Some weekends are more productive than others.

MS: What are you working on now?

RL: I'm working on a prose project, not connected to theatre. It’s a novella, which is premised on the notion of current events. In the story Barack Obama and Dick Cheney switch bodies, with Cheney in Obama’s body and the reverse, and the shenanigans that result.



MS: Tell me about your theatre company, American Demigods.

RL: American Demigods was officially founded in 2009, and we produced a play called Monks in Trouble [directed by Leahy; written by Marc Heiden]. It was a big hit, a lot of people like it, it was produced at the Apollo Studio Theatre. It was kind of a theological horror company, about a group of monks in a monastery, and the evil unholy force there.

MS: What do you want people to take away from Jarvis?

RL: I want people to see themselves in it--it relates to a broad spectrum of the audience. There’s a cheesy message about childhood innocence and that’s a good thing and people should not dismiss it. For most of us, youthful innocence gets ruthlessly beaten away. I want people to think of youthful ideas when they see it.

MS: Are you happy with how it turned out?

RL: Yes, I’m very happy about that. The cast embodies the characters really well. Anyone reading this that has $15 in his or her pockets and has a free Friday or Saturday night should definitely come. It’s pretty lighthearted with some dark moments. It’s a nice contract to doom and gloom in the theater medium.

MS: What are your goals for American Demigods?

RL: I would definitely like for the company to become one of the well-known storefront theater companies in the next few years. There are dozens of Chicago theater spaces and all are cranking out good material. A lot of them go on to great glorious things and die within five years. I hope that American Demigods is one of the ones that doesn’t.

MS: Tell me about how you picked the name, American Demigods, and about your mission.

RL: The reason I picked that name, is firstly, because it’s badass, and second, because I like stories about heroes and mythical things. We explore how to be good and how to be human, and how to be semi-divine. We want to explore what that [divinity] means. It’s obviously a mythical idea; it’s not normal. We want to know how humans can aspire to be better than they are. Whatever kind of theater we produce, even if its edgier and darker, we always want to create protagonists that are sympathetic, even if flawed, and we want them to be heroes to cheer for. Our name also comes from founding fathers [of the country]; they were called the American Demigods.

MS: What’s next?

RL: We’re doing a 1-day event on September 25, a staged reading of the play Erratica by Reina Hardy, followed by a burlesque show. And for 2011 we have three shows planned: In February or March we want to do a 24 Hour Theatre Project, with 4 playwrights, 5 directors, and 15 actors. We as producers will give the premises of the play, and the playwrights will have 12 hours to write short plays and the actors and producers will have 12 hours to put it together to perform on a Saturday night. It’s in the tradition of theatre bootcamp, trying to demonstrate you can really create something out of nothing under very difficult circumstances if you have the right talent and enthusiasm. For the summer, we’re planning to do Con Musical [a working title], a musical about nerd culture at Comic Con. Reina Hardy is writing the book and lyrics and the music is being developed by Matt Board. For the fall, the most likely contender is a series of one-acts I will write with a Halloween theme.

MS: It sounds like you really enjoy your work.

RL: It beats not doing it. I do it because I can’t really conceive of an alternative. I’m not really good at anything other than making stuff up and performing. I’m rubbish with math and science; I pretty much just do the artistic stuff.

The Irrelevant Adventures of Jarvis McFadden is performed at 8.p.m. on Friday and Saturday nights, at Cornservatory, 4210 N. Lincoln until September 4. On Saturday, September 25, American Demigods hosts a staged reading of Reina Hardy’s play, Erratica, at The Spot, 4437 N. Broadway, at 4pm. A burlesque show follows the reading.

ArtSlant review: Andy Moore @ Gallery 400

This week, my review of Andy Moore's exhibition, John's Luv. I loved this hunk of burning love book. The show runs until June 12.

Some excerpts:

Urban life, in all its ugly, beauteous glory, is displayed like a dead animal lying on the side of the road. You don’t want to look-- it’s overwhelming and messy. But you can’t help it. The story sucks you in, and there you are: standing over a long table covered with black-and-white Galaxy Paper, thumbing through a book of paintings and words with white gloves on.

Where does art begin and where does it end? Perhaps art is infinite, like a circle, with beginnings and endings intrinsically interwoven. The book itself is a big, hot mess. In between the corrections and bandaged-up imperfections is a man coming to terms with art and love. Moore shows viewers that art is not out of reach. It is rife with mistakes, with starts and stops and returns and revisions. Art is like life, full of errors and trials, and life is richer when you examine it.

Romance, fear, loneliness and anger are wrapped up into this big book that viewers can spend a lot of time paging through. Moore doesn’t hold back or censor himself, and it’s this honesty that makes John’s Luv worth viewing.

Venue: 400 Gallery
ArtSlant Chicago

Orange Alert Reading at the Whistler, Sunday, Jan. 17

This Sunday I'll read my short story published in Vol. 2, Issue 3 of Criminal Class Review at the Whistler in Logan Square. The event is hosted by Jason Behrends, creator of Orange Alert Press. Founded by editor-in-chief Kevin Whiteley, Criminal Class Review is one of the most honest literary journals I've come across. As noted on the Criminal Class Press website, the stories and poems published in the journal seek to transcend the gap between song and story. "We are interested in where the "hard luck" songs originated, and the tales from the street which spurned them. Punk rockers, Hooligans, outlaws and the like." Basically, this is Irvine Welsh-esque fiction. Considering the books of my generation-- Trainspotting, American Psycho, Fight Club, High Fidelity and Infinite Jest-- "the delusional, dramatic, and downtrodden stories" found in the Criminal Class Review are right on the mark.

Come out for an evening of "hard luck songs" transferred into raw, candid stories. The reading starts at 6pm at the Whistler, located at 2421 N. Milwaukee. And it's free! Authors include:

M.L. Harold
M. Seidell
Brian Murphy
Kevin Whiteley
Max Glaessner

Interview with Don Chambers!

A Tom Waits-like voice, a mean playing banjo, a stubborn band, glimmers of gospel and biblical references -- these ingredients comprise Don Chambers and Goat, an Athens-based band that makes their Chicago debut Thursday at the Bottom Lounge. Chambers has played here before, in the 90s with his former band the Vaudevilles. But musically speaking that may as well have been another lifetime. The band's second album, Zebulon plays heavily on the themes of oppression, redemption and survival--like Tennessee Williams and Carson McCullers with flashes of Harper Lee rolled into one. I caught up with Chambers on the phone this week, while he was on the road in Lexington, Kentucky, telling me about Southern Gothic, learning to appreciate home from Berlin and music as a type of magic.

The Latest and Greatest:
Who have been your musical influences?

Don Chambers:
I certainly had some musical idols. The first is Bob Dylan. 75 percent of white male musicians would say that. Johnny Cash would be another one. Growing up in the 1970s and 80s everyone was singing in this register I couldn't even get to. Even Jagger was out of my range. I hooked on to Cash because he sings in low range. I'm really into film noir and Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett-- pulp noir writers from the 30s and 40s. I like their use of language, like Hemingway, short to the point and very prosaic. They get the job done quickly and efficiently, kind of like what Cormac McCarthy has turned into now.

The Latest and Greatest:
Why is your band named Goat?

Don Chambers:
I used to work this job and I really didn't like it, and a good friend was working with me, at a coffee shop in Athens. He gave me this note and it said, "Don't let them get your goat." I still have the note to this day, and I'm like oh yeah that's exactly right, and from that I thought it worked as a band name. I was really into Jesus Lizard and they had an album named Goat so I stole that from them too. Goats are a pain in the ass of an animal, I like that they are stubborn and I expect my band to be stubborn, you have to be stubborn to be in the music business.

The Latest and Greatest:
You've been labeled as Southern Gothic rock, you definitely have a heavy Tom Waits element in your songs, and there are the biblical references and the gospel thing. How do you define your music?

Don Chambers:
I just call it rock-n-roll with a banjo. I play the banjo now, and in my old band I used to play bass, and when that ended I wanted to move as far away from the bass as I could, I didn't want to play the ukulele because I didn't think that was so cool. I was also listening to Dog Bogs and Roscoe Holcomb, and I still love that form. I think Holcomb in particular was the most punk rock thing I'd heard in years. When he was recording in the 70s, he had this rhythm on the banjo and I wanted to play like that and those are my banjo idols. I have a love/hate affair with the banjo most of the time because it's not loud enough but I gravitate to it because of the open tunings, which makes it hell of a lot easier to play, you can play open strings and add some notes in it, makes it something to write on. What turns me on about writing is composition. I don't sit around and play the guitar a lot except for the means of writing a song. I'm not good enough on any instrument to consider myself a player.

The Latest and Greatest:
Tell me about your childhood experiences in music, what influenced you and when did you decide you wanted to do music professionally?

Don Chambers:
Growing up music was church. I grew up in Florence, South Carolina, a small town. The church was Plymouth Bretheren--kind of like Baptist but stricter. When I was in my teens my sister had a guitar and I started playing that and listening to Dylan, and he kind of lets you into songwriting in a way, he's a force of nature, but I didn't find it intimidating. Listening to Dylan I wrote my first song when I was 15 or 16 but it wasn't until my mid 20s when I went to college that I realized I really liked it. I moved to Athens [GA] to go to art school and barely finished because I started playing in a band, and I think music had an immediacy to it that making art didn't and I realized I really liked playing with other people whereas as an artists you're doing it alone, at some point I asked myself whether I was going to get a really job or keep dong what I had to and keep playing music. Now it's too late. I can't get a real job; I'm doomed to this thing.

The Latest and Greatest
The inspiration for your recent album Zebulon is from a Georgia town you encountered in your travels. What about the town inspired you and how did that influence the music on the album?

Don Chambers:
First of all, I've never been to Zebulon, I saw the sign when we were touring in the south of Georgia, the name stuck to me because it sounded like the place you either wanted to go to, or the place you wanted to get the hell out of. And it's an odd name for a town in Georgia that was the attraction, I like the name of the town, I don't really want to go there necessarily. At that time the band was touring in the South and their album has a lot of rural southern references on it, and I wanted to explore that. Soon after that I moved to Berlin for a little while, I wasn't homesick but living in a foreign country, I was aware that I grew up in the south, some things I took for granted here but you get out of it and there are lots of interesting things right in front of your face if you just look at it and write it down.

The Latest and Greatest:
That's when you came back and wrote the album?

Don Chambers:
I started writing it in Berlin.

The Latest and Greatest:
So that's the homecoming you refer to on the album.

Don Chambers:
Yeah, I think you mentioned Southern Gothic and that ground has been trammeled by everyone from Flannery O'Connor to the Band, and I saw for myself, personally what I had to say about it. Because I had that perspective of being away, I saw richness in my experience, and you write from what you know.

The Latest and Greatest:
What are your specific experiences with gospel and religion?

Don Chambers:
Just growing up in a southern Protestant church, I think that was another thing about being out of the country and being around people who hadn't had any of that experience. Most people who grew up in the South did and at least when to church on Sundays. I realize it's not a phenomenon, not everyone is singing the hymns, eating the fried chicken and playing on the [church] softball league. I grew up going to church 4-5 times a week, in a very religious family.

The Latest and Greatest
How did your music change as a result of your band, Goat, joining you in 2001?

Don Chambers:
After my old band broke up I went through three years of doing Southern material, and I'd never written with someone else, so Goat forming made it a collaborative process, I write all the lyrics, and the last one has another player's song on it, and I think it just made it more collaborative and louder, which is fun. The difference between when you're writing for yourself, you don't worry if you write 10 songs and they're all melancholic and slow, in the back of your mind you write something that's going to be interesting for the rest of the people to play. Our band tends to want to rock, which is why it's different when you see us live.

The Latest and Greatest:
How has being based in Athens helped contribute to your exposure?

Don Chambers:
Well certainly being able to go out with Drive-By truckers over the year, going out with bigger bands, that's the great thing about Athens, just being on the creative end of it, there's so many bands in this small town making things, you can't go to a restaurant or a bar, without being served by someone in a band. It's just a good creative energy around. If you were trying something new 15 years ago, as I did when I moved here, it allows you to come out as a novice performer, there's a good amount of community support, you have an audience, it's a good creative Petri dish I like to say.

The Latest and Greatest:
Do you feel Southern audiences are more receptive to your music?

Don Chambers:
I don't know. I tend to think touring in the South and being form here, like selling ice cream to Eskimos, they're familiar with the sound and subject matter, might make it a little more interesting to them. We do OK in the South and we're getting a bigger touring circle over the years. It's hard for me to say, we got great reception up north but on the other hand we got great reception in Mississippi. I hope it's better outside of the South because for me it's more interesting. I want to go to Chicago and New York all the time.

The Latest and Greatest:
Tell me about your process of music writing and creating.

Don Chambers:
I don't believe in inspiration, I believe in perspiration. I think that writing songs or making art whatever you do, it's a habit, I try to work on 5 days a week for at least a few hours a day. A lot of process is collecting things. If you're a songwriter, you're listening to what people say, you're looking at signs on the road, I have to write down dreams or things right away. I'm just kind of constantly filling up the refrigerator with stuff, and then I go in and get stuff out to make a song dish out of it what I find. I love going in to my studio and working on words, and the music, and I demo all my stuff on the computer, just to get ideas. When I was younger it seemed like everything happened fairly easily. The older you get you want to surprise yourself, but working on it, I know myself pretty well, the only way to surprise myself is to work really hard.

The Latest and Greatest:
There's an element of redemption in your music. From where does this stem?

Don Chambers:
Not from religion. I think just from basic human kindness. I believe in human kindness… this sounds really cheesy…human kindness and love, and some hope at the end of the day. But don't put on rose-colored glasses and think everything is all right.

The Latest and Greatest:
Do you have any rituals to performing -- things you have do before or after a performance?

Don Chambers:
I've worn the same boots on stage for 15 years. That's my only ritual.

The Latest And Greatest:
What do they look like?

Don Chambers:
They're old army boots all duck taped up now, because they're falling apart. Eventually I'm going to retire them. Maybe put them on a [album] cover.

The Latest and Greatest:
Are they related to your first show?

Don Chambers:
No, they're related to Emmett Kelly, a clown in the 30s who wore a pair of clown boots covered in tape, and I saw them at a museum in Florida so in the 90s so I decided to wear them all the time. They already had a hole on them. They're my lucky clown boots.

The Latest and Greatest:
What song on Zebulon do you particularly identify with and why?

Don Chambers:
That changes over time, right now the one I really like to sing is "I Can Waltz." Written from a character's point of view, that's a little untrustworthy, character, that says one thing and does another. I think all songwriting is role playing, writing from a character's point of view and you kind of have to put yourself in that person's boots. But I don't think about it in any kind of moral sense. How does that person work and what do they do. Ultimately it comes back to you that it's you writing it, it's never all yourself; I'm not into confessional songwriting. James Taylor is great but that school of songwriting from the 70s that used the first person a lot made people think they were authentic because they were wearing their hearts on their sleeves. It's just a song, a little bit of truth and a little lie, if it's a good song it's got have a little bit of both, you got to be a good liar.

Don Chambers and Goat headline at the Bottom Lounge on Thursday, 8pm.

Get Slaphappy: A Review 2.11.2009

The main reason for going out to see a play is getting yourself away from TV land, from Facebook, from yourself, and from the diseases of the postmodern age that haunt you and debilitate your humanity (think Internet-infused meltdown by way of believing that the world you encounter online is real). That's why I went and saw the play Slaphappy recently. Written by Gary Slezak and directed by Richard Shavzin, the show is mounted at the Theatre Building Chicago until March 15. Although the three-act play contains none of movingly cathartic or deeply thoughtful elements I gravitate towards I enjoyed its whimsical element. And like every former (or current) American expat in Europe or frequent traveler to Paris I got a kick out of poking fun at the pate-obsessed French.

The story wraps itself around two middle-aged American expatriates in Paris coming to terms with lost love, divorce, binge drinking and overdoses on pessimistic nihilism and depression. The fact that the play confronts these heavy issues through the lens of light comic farce deserves merits.

Here's what I liked:

• The set. It's a pretty picture of a Paris hotel, with the token French windows leading out to a balcony view of the Eiffel Tower. All of my visits to Paris were spent at crappy hotels, which while cheap and dingy, afforded some kind of awesome view, either a tiny window balcony, or picturesque view of street scene.
• I like how the play through its characters appeals to all ages. Older folks can relate to the middle-aged divorcees -- the boozy and beautiful Lauren (Judy Blue) and her anguished, intellectual ex-husband Stanek (Mitchell Joseph). For younger viewers, the strapping young Philippe, the French bellboy played by Lucas Neff is easy on the eyes and does a smashing good accent and convincing character portrayal. Barely dressed French Cherie (Annie DiMaria) appeals to men of all ages and women who secretly fantasize of running around a French hotel in various revealing negligees throwing themselves at men.
• The interwoven story about saving the ducks from the evil French who don't care enough about the cruelty involved in fattening the livers of male ducks and geese for their beloved foie gras. I don't care what anybody says -- I agree with Philippe. Let's save the ducks!
• I loved the character of Philippe, who asks everyone "How can I make you happy?" then does his utmost to live up to this life mission.
• The point that tortured artists like to be tortured and in fact derive a kind of bizarre happiness from it.

What I didn't like:

• It's a busy play, with the characters all over the stage. And I'm not a big fan of romantic comedies, unless there's some black comedy or intellectual pondering involved. Yet I took heart in the play's message. "Better than being careful is to be pure in art!"

This post was published on Gapersblock.com

"Look, What I Don't Understand" Closes This Weekend 2/1/09

"Look, What I Don't Understand," the solo play written and performed by Anthony Nikolchev in collaboration with the Thirteen Pocket Theater and five directors, including Yuriy Kordonskiy, closes this weekend. You can see it tonight and Saturday at 8pm, and on Sunday at 3pm, followed by a discussion about the show. The show is currently mounted at the Athenaeum Theater. Tickets cost $15 ($10 for students and seniors) and can be purchased at Ticketmaster or at the theater prior to the show.

If you like theater with substance that tackles both the madhouse history of the Soviet-ruled Eastern bloc and the harrowing experience of escaping, then be sure to see this show. The show is based on Nikolchev's retelling of his father and grandparents' immigration from Bulgaria to the U.S. in 1969, based on research conducted during a recent visit back to the homeland. The play was originally mounted at a Wesleyan University stage in Connecticut, where avid thespian Nikolchev graduated in 2008.

The Athenaeum Theater's back studio sure isn't an archetype of coziness, in fact it's rather dreary, with seats that could use a face lift, and a general atmosphere of uninviting drabness. In other words, it's the perfect setting for a play about the life under Communism. The setting of a cage and two suitcases set the scene for nuanced minimalism. And considering Nikolchev's startling dead-on performances as various characters, including Gencho Shonev, a prisoner at a communist gulag prison, The Immigrant (based on Nikolchev's father), Vasil, a spy burdened with guilt, and Grigorina (Nikolchev's grandmother), not much else is needed in terms of scenery. The acting and intense storyline speaks loud and clear.

The play starts out with the Immigrant listening to the broadcast American news on his son's radio, while waiting with his family to be granted access to the United States from detainment at an Italian refugee camp, circa 1969. The Immigrant then goes on to relive the events that explore tyranny and oppression at the hands of the Soviets and simultaneously, the particular identity crisis of leaving your homeland in the quest for a new one. Events along the journey include: Bulgaria's collaborations with the Nazis in WWII that led to being overtaken by Soviet Russia, the purging of anti-Soviet elements such as non collective farms, torture in the gulag, spying, and the family's escape from Bulgaria to the Congo on their way to America, that involved the witnessing of a hanging.

It's no surprise that Nikolchev has studied method acting, as he brilliantly assumes each character with total immersion and conviction. The dialogue is crisp and vivid, taking you on a deftly explained tour through a complex historical chapter of the 20th century. Nikolchev is an actor/writer to watch.

Oprah Land

Okay, I'll admit it. I had fun at Oprah today. I liken the entire surreal experience to attending the taping of the Bozo Show on WGN at age 5. Big differences abound between the two shows in terms of audience demographic (think endless estrogen compared to gobs of children, with the boundless energy more or less the same), guest stars (here Kate Winslet in person, with Leo di Caprio and Mickey Rourke via Skype clearly outweighing Bozo's weird clown sidekick), and in the take home prize. We Oprah attendees went home with a copy of The Reader by Bernhard Schlink (the book on which the movie starring Winslet is based), while at Bozo a package of Twinkies was thrust into my eager hands at the exit. Comparing the two shows, I have to say that the Twinkies rank higher. My mom was a health enthusiast ahead of the curve, so for me the Twinkies equated getting the golden ticket.

And let's not forget the considerable contrast in host. Bozo and Oprah, how can you compare? Both have reputations for big hair, admirable confidence, and talents in keeping their audiences on their toes. And both exhibit elements of the television bizarre. At Oprah what struck me was the dividing line between audience and TV land. After striding on stage, Oprah took her place at her throne, making remarks to the audience like, "Don't be nervous," and to her right-hand man, "What do I have, like twenty seconds?" When the taping started she became a difference person. A TV person talking to the camera as if we the audience didn't exist. Yet when you watch the show it appears that host and audience are seamlessly interwoven. This paradoxical aspect of TV is admirably examined in Being There, the 1979 film by Hal Asby (the same director who created the cult classic Harold and Maude). In the film Peter Sellers plays Chance, a simpleton who serendipitously earns TV fame by uttering straightforward observations misunderstood as profound wisdom.

TV makes things appear larger than they are. I suppose this is the central issue with Oprah and everyone in TV land (especially talk shows). Elementary yet understood as grandiose. Oprah told Kate Winslet, "I love that you have real breasts," a statement most women in America eat up, because A) they cannot afford or B) do not wish to have silicone slabs stuffed into their breasts. Yet because she says this on TV and she's Oprah, it's a "wow" moment. It's Oprah wisdom. This is not to say that despite being a TV God Oprah isn't an interesting person. The TV queen was actually a great deal more fun when the show was over and she chatted up the audience. She made off-the-cuff remarks like, "Because that's what white people do," and used the expression "crazy-ass." Someone with their wits about them in the audience asked for her top movies of all time, to which Oprah replied, quick as a flash: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Midnight Cowboy, and To Kill a Mockingbird. Not what I expected to hear, because Oprah's so mainstream and overshadowed by her own image of megalomania.

Latest and Greatest Art Shows of the Week: January 12-18

Robert Davis and Michael Langlois' collaborative show, "House of the Rising Sun," opened this weekend at the Chicago Cultural Center. Pop culture references abound, from portraits of the artists' fathers, circa 1970s, to a large blue painting rife with sexual explicit symbols alluding to a present day Tower of Babel. Here we see images such as sumo wrestlers and and naked women tied up in S&M fashion, a warning about the dangers of excess. Like the paintings of the Dutch Golden Age, only here the it's cultural motifs, not abandoned plates of food that depict the embarrassment of riches. The artists suggest that our current danger is an overabundance of misleading messages about sex and play. The exhibition is on show at the Chicago Cultural Center until April 5, 2009.

Another opening from this weekend is "Re: Production" by Christa Donner, at Three Walls gallery. Through video, interview-based zines, and large drawings on paper, Donner nimbly examines the landscape of female fertility and reproductive power in both shocking primitiveness and resounding beauty. Particularly memorable is the painting of bloody children emerging from a woman's womb, and equally compelling, the one showing copulating couples piled on top of each other. Donner proposes the paradoxical burden and freedom women gain via the birthing process. The exhibit runs at Three Walls through February 13, 2009.

My Newcity cover story

You can pick up a dead tree version of my Newcity cover story, "Raising the Bars: The growing trend of art in bars." Newspapers are dying quietly, as you know, so it has been nice to see my byline smack dab on the cover around town. I only ask that if you do pick it up, please recycle! Nothing irritates me more than seeing people throw a newspaper into a trash bin that sits inches away from a recycling container.

What drew me to this topic was an interest in reporting on the intersection of art and nightlife. I had just turned in a piece on alternative spaces and mentioned the idea to editor Jason Foumberg. He suggested art in bars and viola! There you have it. The best part of doing this article was the "live scene" reporting I did at The Whistler. The reporter went in search of capturing the experience of "night in the life of one of Chicago's newest and most fetching bars" and found a scene immersed in serene ambiance, cool-ass cocktails, in-the-know locals and an art opening to boot. Lovely. Yes I do enjoy The Whistler. It's hot in a Paris Hilton sort of way but not at all trashy and splashy like the blond heiress. The gently glowing candles add a nice touch and you can actually have a conversation here. Not a lame-ass TV in sight, thank God.

On the polar opposite of this spectrum is the crusty, 73-year-old Rainbo Club, where art rotates every month. I say crusty because the bartenders are more interested in playing their guitars than kissing your ass. While I shot the photos there (which didn't end up in the spread) the bartender strummed his guitar the entire time. It was a Sunday evening and not a customer in sight. He was pretty laid back and cool, once he called his boss and got approval that I was a real reporter, not some obsessive fan of the Rainbo. Keep in mind that if you go here, expect a kind of attitude, along the lines of "who the fuck are you and why are you here?" from the bartenders. It's part of the holier than thou rocker shtick. But don't let that stop you from experiencing a piece of Chicago history that includes Nelson Algren and John Cusack on its list of famous regulars. Also in the area worthy of a look is the Flatiron, which opened last June. Art here takes the spotlight, and as I mention in the article this is where The Note was formerly located, the music venue that used to host the beloved "I Love House Music" event. For years it was music permeating the Wicker Park scene, now it's art weaving its way into the fabric of nightlife.

You can tell so much about somebody and/or a place of business by their online identity. Whister has a myspace page, oh so hip, Flatiron a full-fledged website, while Rainbo keeps on churning without an online presence. You have to love Rainbo for being just what it is and not giving a shit.

Add the Soto-Chacon Show to your list

Add the Soto-Chacon Show to your list of must-see art shows. The Chicago Reader has recommended it and I concur. Noah Berlatsky wrote a fine review, stating, "Identity art tends to be repetitively earnest -- my ethnicity is spiritual! my people have suffered! -- but Edra Soto realizes that putting your tongue in your cheek can stimulate your brain."

Stimulate your brain is a good way of putting it. Edra Soto's gorgeous, complex gouache paintings at Rowland Contemporary Gallery blur the division between the artist and her muse Iris Chacon. Soto celebrates yet examines Chacon's untamed sexuality, and questions the male response to female power.



Two more recent Soto additions to the Chacon repertoire were also on view last weekend, as part of the Associate Degree in Science exhibit at Finch Gallery. Here Chacon wears an outdated and confining robot/skull mask, suggesting the limitations posed on society through technology. The friendly dog in the background -- "a great companion" -- represents a last refuge of humanity in a dehumanizing world?


The Chacon-Soto Show: Featuring the Greatest Companions runs at Rowland Contemporary Gallery until December 13.

Profile of Edra Soto's Show: The Greatest Companions

I wanted to draw your attention to Edra Soto's homage to Puerto Rican television star Iris Chacon, currently running at Mutherland through October 27. Rarely do you get the chance to see pop culture and art blend together in a post-feminist commentary like this one. Soto reminds us that today's stars pale in comparison to the vivacious, "voluptuous yet powerful" Chacon. Here's a clip that shows Chacon at her best: as queen amongst her subjects -- dancing with her entourage of devoted male dancers. Unlike Latino television shows of today, according to Soto, in which women are merely the sexual pawns of men, Chacon's male dancers revolved around her unabashed sexuality. Interestingly, Soto addresses not only the nostalgic element of sexy, 1980s Chacon (big hair, red lipstick, crazy leotards and bathing suits that showed off a non-stick figure) in the exhibit, but ties in her own fascination and love for animals, which she was inspired to express from the Puerto Rican pop star's she-cat diva quality.

Jamie "Crazy Pants" Lidell at Metro 10/08/08

Here's my review of Jamie "Crazy Pants" Lidell's feel-good show last week at Metro. Tall and skinny, Lidell proved that you could wear pajama bottoms onstage and still look cool. If Stevie Wonder and Amy Winehouse were to have a child, it would look something like Lidell, minus the drugs and drama of the Brit with the beehive. Lidell's one part soul, Motown-esque, and other part electro-funk producer. Because I find his show somewhat indefinable I'll just say it's a retro-future conglomeration you don't want to miss.

Fellow GB contributor Kirstie Shanley did a bang-up job with the photos, check out the one of Lidell singing to Elvis.

Review of Keri Percival and Greg Cook @ Green Lantern

Here's my Newcity review of Boston-based artists Keri Percival and Greg Cooks's show, "The Hall of Natural and Despicable Wonders," on run at the Green Lantern gallery until October 4th. I particularly enjoyed Cooks' exploration of the American lust for war, from the Pilgrims' pillage of Native American life up through to the present day "despicable" treatment of prisoners at Gitmo, in addition to our country's overarching obsession with "victory" in Iraq.

Watching the Republican National Convention, was painful, I must admit, especially hearing Palin's discussion about achieving "victory" in Iraq no matter the odds. What exactly, is she talking about? We ousted Saddam Hussein in 2003, then failed to provide the kind of security necessary for the power vacuum in the country at the time, which helped contribute to the insurgency, and we dismantled the Iraqi Army, leaving thousands without jobs, and if there's a crisis over there now we hold a large share of the responsibility. Regardless of the question of what should be done to remedy the situation, I think using this type of demagoguery, i.e. "victory," only goes to show Palin's staggering lack of knowledge about world affairs (we already know this from the Alaska comment). What's frightening is her overwhelming ignorance, and that there are people out there (a large group actually) who eat up her "strong-sounding" words like candy.

Review of Spiritualized at Metro 9/8/08

Here's my review of Spiritualized on Gapersblock.com/Transmission. What an uplifting experience that concert was, that breathed new life into "vast internal choirs"...

And here's a clip of the band's video for the iconic (and my favorite) song, "Ladies and Gentleman We Are Floating in Space." It's from their 1997 acclaimed album of the same title, and in my opinion, epitimizes the Spiritualized essence (even though it's before they heavily infused gospel into their act): transcendent, lushly ambient with glimmers of space rock, and yes, well, spiritual. Considering how infrequently the band makes a stateside appearance I'm glad I got the chance to see them, both at Pitchfork and at Metro, although of course the latter was more more soul-infusing. Their music has the capability, like soul and gospel, to revive and revitalize.

by Marla Seidell