Jul 23-29, 2014

Jul 23-29, 2014 / Vol. 28 / No. 22

Cover Story

The death of CAST

When Carolina Actors Studio Theatre was at the top of its game, the company didn’t merely produce great theater — it produced astonishing theater. Tucked into a Plaza-Midwood warehouse on Clement Avenue with a roof that leaked, CAST had the audacity to produce Omnium Gatherum with a revolving stage. Company members not only built a…

Perry Tannenbaum

‘I don’t know Hamas, I know hummus’

Editor’s note: On Monday, CL contributor Jerry Klein penned an editorial about the Israel/Palestine conflict in which he identified, though not by name, a friend and local leader of the Muslim community who shared a graphic photo on Facebook of a young Palestinian who had perished in recent weeks during an Israeli-backed missile attack. Jibril…

Jibril Hough

Lucy: A dud by any other name

LUCY ** DIRECTED BY Luc Besson STARS Scarlett Johansson, Morgan Freeman In the immortal words of Ricky Ricardo: Lucy, you got some ‘splaining to do. A valiant if ultimately futile attempt to graft a brainy mind-bender onto a traditional action film template, Luc Besson’s Lucy frequently comes across as The Tree of Life as directed…

Matt Brunson

CSA 101

Here’s a brief overview of the questions you should ask about Community Supported Agriculture.

Alison Leininger

ISIS and crisis

Most high school students spend their prom nights at a series of endless after-parties. But in April 2003, my date parked his car a few hundred feet away from my house and turned off the headlights. My dress, pink and strapless, bunched underneath my 15-year-old frame as he loosened his tie and turned on the…

Claire Gibson

Weekly horoscope (July 24-30)

For All Signs: Mars, the original god of war, is finally moving beyond Libra into Scorpio on the 25th. This planet entered Libra early in December and has remained in that sign until just now. The past 7.5 months it has been one more irritant in the grand square of cardinal signs (Aries, Cancer, Libra…

Vivian Carol

Bizarre crime from Charlotte polices files (July 24)

Open Sesame: Police responded to a domestic disturbance in south Charlotte when a man took matters into his own legs after hitting an obstacle while moving. The man was moving out of an apartment he had shared with his girlfriend of four years after they broke up. At some point, they began arguing, and the…

Ryan Pitkin

Gro takes Greek back to its tasty, healthy roots

In the dining room wall at gro greek. evolved is a map of the original long-distance run of a battlefield messenger from an ancient field in Marathon, Greece, to the city of Athens. Gro isn’t a sports bar; however, it is owned by a group of marathon runners. Partners Jimmy Clonaris, Vaki Karampourniotis, Bill Kortesis…

Tricia Childress

Playwright Peter Ackerman talks Past Midnight

Imagine being on the verge of orgasmic ecstasy. Just as you’re about to reach that glorious point, your partner screams out the unthinkable: “Do me, you hook-nosed Jew!” How would you react? In playwright Peter Ackerman’s Things You Shouldn’t Say Past Midnight, Nancy gets off to the offensive anti-Semitic slur while her partner Ben is…

Anita Overcash

Taking back Sunday

The recent decision by the United States Supreme Court to strike down the contraception mandate of the Affordable Care Act in the Hobby Lobby case has placed the concept of Christian values back at the center of our national dialogue. Through a combination of the messages perpetuated by the mainstream media and some vocal, prominent…

Ailen Arreaza

A quest for Charlotte’s head (and heart)

Without shying away from the fact that I’m no longer a young man, I can tell you that I grew up in a very sleepy, small-town Charlotte, where my parents moved me from Philadelphia in the mid-1950s (yes, that long ago), when any aspirations toward being a major metropolitan area were, to be truthful, laughable.…

Jerry Klein

Strike up the Vans

For many teens and 20-somethings, the Vans Warped Tour is a rite of passage of sorts. It can be a first concert, a first day-long festival, the first taste of independence. For 20 years, tour organizer Kevin Lyman has put together dozens of acts that travel the country in the heat of summer to put…

Jeff Hahne

Lee Bains III fries up Southern rock ‘n’ roll

Show up for the openers at a Lee Bains III & the Glory Fires show and you’re just as likely to find frontman Bains running around wildly and belting out lyrics as a random audience member. It’s an energy and a connection to the crowd that only heightens when Bains takes the stage and rips…

Dacey Orr

CD review: Museum Mouth’s Alex I am nothing

“I hate that I can’t have you,” Karl Kuehn hollers at the end of “Drool,” the second track on Museum Mouth’s hook-heavy third LP, Alex I Am Nothing. It’s the theme of the whole record, actually — across 10 tracks and 36 minutes, singing drummer Kuehn dwells on a failed relationship with the one who…

Corbie Hill

Theater review: Things You Shouldn’t Say Past Midnight

No doubt about it: While Queen City Theatre Company was absent from the local scene, they were missed. Upon entering Duke Energy Theatre, I could see that the place was sold out for the opening night of Peter Ackerman’s Things You Shouldn’t Say Past Midnight. When the company’s shy and retiring managing director, co-founder Kristian…

Perry Tannenbaum

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