The beep of the money-wiring machine is almost nonstop, the line is growing, and Agnes Essien is working harder than she expected during the last days of August. If the customers don't want to send cash to loved ones, then they're bringing in payments for the electric company. Or they're...
A Bronx cheer for the coppers: A shout-out to Amy Roe for a flattering and well-written article on Lake Worth's anarchist scene ("Gimme an A," August 2). She made firsthand research a priority in her story, which is much appreciated. However, I challenge the mainstream view presented on the ills...
With all the hype that surrounds film festivals in South Florida, the little guys sometimes get lost in the shuffle. Sure, the Fort Lauderdale and Palm Beach international film festivals receive plenty of well-deserved attention; the geography-specific fests (Italian, Central American, Cuban, and more) also get their fair share of...
Actor-director "Beat" Takeshi Kitano has built an international reputation over the past decade, primarily through a series of ultra-hard-boiled crime films in which he plays either a cop or a felon. With the exception of Gonin (1995; released in the U.S. in 1998), which was directed by Takeshi Ishii, all...
The young man called "Dreads" is a slippery character; the justice system can't seem to hold on to him. You might remember Dreads from our May 3 cover story, "Beach Beat." He was one of the guys who attacked 18-year-old Chris Caulfield on Fort Lauderdale beach. Caulfield was left with...
Times have certainly changed. Twenty years ago a musical about an East German transsexual rock singer would have premiered in one of New York's off off-Broadway theaters or cabarets, run for a couple of weeks, and remained the pleasant memory of a select few. But when John Cameron Mitchell's Hedwig...
Dear Ol' DadAs kids you and your siblings were ballbusters. You nearly drove your parents completely mad. When your mom said she was washing her hands of you troublemakers, dad didn't agree with her plans to ship you off to boarding school in Newark, New Jersey. Instead, he sent her...
Inside the palatial Palm Beach County Courthouse on March 29, 2000, Melvin Donald Ruth pleaded for his freedom, trying to convince the judge he wouldn't run if he were let go. Ruth, who had been jailed on a probation violation stemming from a 1996 fraud conviction, had reason to feel...
Usually when a singer goes off to do a solo project, it's either because of "creative differences" or a "need to express myself away from the band." In either case this can be translated as "I'm sick and tired of sharing credit with these bozos; I'm the real creative force...
When Joe Cox was born 17 years ago, his umbilical cord wrapped twice around his neck and nearly strangled him. He survived, but his brain was permanently damaged. Today he has an IQ of 68, suffers from impulsive behavior, and is unable to care for himself. His father, the Rev...
With legal protections for gays and lesbians in Broward and Miami-Dade counties under attack by concerted referendum efforts, 20-year-old Christine Lane, an Ontario native now studying economics at the University of Miami, has decided to protect the whole state in one fell swoop. A fundraiser this weekend, at $10 per...
Imagine walking into a hardware store, asking a clerk to point you in the direction of the hammers, and having him say something like, "Well, I'm not really into hammers. Can I show you something in a wrench?" Or fancy, when shopping for a car, a sales associate who confesses...
When Amanda Dunbar was a tyke, she had the same artistic talent as most other kids; a stick figure here and a doodle there. But at 13 years old, she and a few friends decided to take an after-school art class. The teacher, Curtis Ferguson, handed out paint, brushes, and...
Do you like change? Change is good! Some say it comes only from within. I had some in my pants pocket once. But this latest upheaval has left two of the area's best-known alternative acts irrevocably altered. Disconnect, which boasts members from Miami and Weston, is temporarily disconnected; leader Juan...
Jose Flores, Corky's southpaw singer-guitarist and Freddie Prinze Jr. look-alike, sizes up the rabid pack of 100 twentysomethings inhabiting Churchill's in Miami's Little Haiti on a steamy Friday night. "Tonight someone asked us what our mission was," Flores announces. The audience lets out a deafening roar, obscuring his explanation. As...
It's about time. Sick of hearing complaints about the poor treatment visitors to South Florida receive everywhere from cabs to cafés, the government of Broward County has teamed up with the hospitality industry to raise the bar. The program, called "SUNsational Service," employs experts in the field to set standards...
Both executive director George S. Bolge and curator of exhibitions Courtney P. Curtiss of the Boca Raton Museum of Art have made something of a fuss over the "50th Annual All Florida Invitational," which marks a half-century of such group shows. And yet the exhibition itself doesn't feel like much...
When R.E.M. morphed from altrock cult heroes to rock 'n' roll royalty in the late '80s, fans and critics prevailed upon the band to be more forthcoming. Though the band was happy to indulge in leftist sloganeering, that wasn't good enough: Many fans urged Michael Stipe to reveal more about...
Dark-suited attorneys clog the antechamber to bankruptcy courtroom 308. Six days after the World Trade Center towers in New York City and the Pentagon in northern Virginia were attacked, a jittery mood permeates the third floor of the federal courthouse in Fort Lauderdale. Snippets of conversations about terrorism and imminent...
For almost two decades, Stanley Kubrick wanted to make a film based on Brian Aldiss's 1969 short story "Super-Toys Last All Summer Long," about a robot child named David who wants only to be "real" so Mummy and Daddy will love him. The late director of 2001: A Space Odyssey...
The audience at the 26th Street Theatre's production of William Finn's musical Falsettoland can be as idiosyncratic as the play itself. In South Florida (and especially in Broward and Palm Beach counties), where theater audiences usually consist of retirees age 65 and older, a recent Sunday's full house consisted of...
To most of us, "weird sounds from Boca Raton" means diamonds caught in a disposal or wheezing geriatrics struggling with groceries. And that stereotype is unlikely to change soon. Finding something edgy and hip in this subculturally deprived suburb is about as likely as finding bean sprouts on a Big...
