Category Archives: Zeitgeist Movement

Following a monumental, multi-monthstretch forLGBT cinema on the awards circuit, duringwhichMoonlight about a young, gay mans journey toward self-acceptance triumphed as the Academys best picture winner one year after Todd Haynes lesbian dramaCarol scored six Oscar nods at the 2015 ceremony, French-Moroccan filmmaker Robin Campillo has stormed the Croisette with the AIDS activism drama 120 Beats Per Minute, which is being hailed as the 2017 Cannes Film Festivals first major contender for theprestigious Palme dOr.

Robin Campillos Cannes competition film gracefully, sharply humanizes a historical tragedy, Richard Lawson writes for Vanity Fair. [The] deeply effective 120 Beats Per Minute is half sober and surveying docudrama, half wrenching personal illness narrative. Those two genres are fused together with an arresting artfulness, woozy and dreamy interludes mixing with the talky technical stuff to create a film that is broadly enlightening and piercingly intimate. Its no wonder many are putting the film on the short list for the Palme dOrits a vital contribution to queer and political cinema, a testament to crusaders of recent history whose nobility does not preclude their complicated and individual humanity.

His rave review of the expansive drama, which charts a dramatized version of thelegacy of the gay men and women who fronted the Paris chapter of the AIDS advocacy group ACT UP, continues: [120 Beats Per Minute is]a vital contribution to queer and political cinema, a testament to crusaders of recent history whose nobility does not preclude their complicated and individual humanity.

In a less ecstatic (but nonetheless positive) reaction, IndieWires Eric Kohn similarly lauds the films emotional impact.

While hardly groundbreaking filmmaking, the movies familiar trajectory displays a patient approach to exploring the movement across a leisurely two hours and 20 minutes, sometimes to the detriment of the soulful material at its core. Nevertheless, assembling the story out of small moments and gripping exchanges, Campillo grounds this earnest drama in a sense of purpose,his B-grade review reads. While 120 Beats Per Second never quite takesoff into the emotional intensity suggested by the material, it nevertheless arrives at a powerful raison detre, with layers of its ecosystem slowly assemblinguntil a fully defined revoltreveals itself. The finale is a masterstroke of editing, as Campillo merges lively dance floor actionand activist antics until they blur together as one. Its a brilliant cap to a moviefixatedon one point above all no matter the desperation of this battlefield, the communal bonds ensure that the party rages on.

With a jury that has already publicly squabbled about the kinds of movies theyll be considering for the festivals highest honor (Pedro Almodovar, president of this years collective, has voiced distaste with Netflixs release model, which competition titlesOkja and The Meyerowitz Stories will employ), its difficult to pinpoint which titles this years group will go for. Though critical taste is helpful in sifting out the rotten apples, juries can deviate from the media narrative with shocking results (I, Daniel Blake taking the top prize last year was a bold move, for example).

Though Haynes latest, Wonderstruck, was warmly received alongside The Square, Loveless, andOkja, 120 Beats Per Minute has seemingly got the goods to capture both the zeitgeist as it tugs universal emotional strings key in winning over any jury.

Singlingout the projects candidly queer sensibility as vital perspective now more than ever, Varietys Guy Lodge perfectly sums up the films strengthsin his ecstatic reaction, writing:Robin Campillos outstanding AIDS activist drama melds the personal, the political and the erotic to heart-bursting effectUnafraid of eroticism in the face of tragedy, this robust Cannes competition entry is nonetheless emotionally immediate enough to break out of the LGBT niche.

Read on for more review excerpts from the films world premiere screening at Cannes.

Guy Lodge (Variety) As in Eastern Boys, Campillos predominantly candid, unvarnished shooting style wrongfoots viewers ahead of his gutsiest manipulations of sound and image in this case, a stark, unsubtle passage of widescreen visual poetry that turns the Seine purple with the blood of the needlessly damned. The oblique title, meanwhile, refers not just to medical heart rates as bleakly tracked on hospital monitors, but to the euphoric rhythm of the electronic music that soundtracks ACT UPs occasional disco breaks, in which matters of love, death and ideology are briefly lost to the rush of the dancefloor, and strobe-lit faces fade into dust motes and blood cells. In one of BPMs most gently funny scenes, a well-meaning parent is ridiculed for suggesting AIDS is me, AIDS is you, AIDS is us as a campaign slogan. By the end, you see where her critics are coming from: Campillos sexy, insightful, profoundly humane film is most moving in those ecstatic interludes where, for a blissed-out moment or two, AIDS is no one at all.

David Rooney (The Hollywood Reporter) What Larry Kramers trenchant play (and subsequent film) The Normal Heart did for the early days of AIDS activism in 1980s New York at the height of the crisis, Robin Campillo in 120 Beats Per Minute aims to do for the same subject in 1990s Paris, albeit in a more contemplative style.Drawing inspiration from his own experience as a member of frontline protest organization ACT UP, Campillo brings unquestionable conviction to his mission to ensure that the ineffectual response of Francois Mitterands government at the time and the refusal of French drug companies to expedite potential breakthrough treatments are not forgotten.

Peter Bradshaw (The Guardian) Its a compelling feature about love, life and friendship which can be compared to David Frances 2012 documentary How To Survive A Plague, about ACT UP in the United States. As a fictional representation, it sometimes looks like a politicised, if de-romanticised, version of something like Abdellatif Kechiches Blue Is The Warmest Colour, from 2013This film has what its title implies: a heartbeat. It is full of cinematic life.

Eric Kohn (IndieWire) This isnt a characteristic project for Campillo, best known to English-language audiences for They Live, the film that inspired the Twin Peaks-like TV series The Returned, and Eastern Boys, a taut gay thriller in which Russian men posing as prostitutesrob an older man. 120 Beats Per Minute contains no such far-reaching hooks, instead bearing a closer resemblance to the social-realism of Campillos screenwriting with collaborator Laurent Cantet, which includes the Palme dOr-winning high school drama The Class. Like that movie, the main narrative engine of 120 Beats Per Minute is talk profound debates, casual chatter, furious showdowns and the sturdy performances that bring it to life.

Richard Lawson (Vanity Fair) And I hope this movie will be given the distribution and marketing it deserves, as the traumas of the 1980s and 90s fade in the rearvieweven while AIDS rates are troublingly on the rise again. The films political and moral weight should not overshadow the artistry of its design, though, nor the quiet profundity of its unreserved and admirable approach to gay intimacy. Campillo has given his movie the breath of true life. It grieves and triumphs and haunts with abounding grace and understanding, its heartbeat thumping with genuine, undeniable resonance.

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Cannes AIDS drama 120 Beats Per Minute emerges as major Palme d'Or contender - EW.com

In a recent Toronto Sun column, John Snobelen had four wise, albeit chilling, watch words for those in the not-for-profit world. They are: The atrophy of purpose.

He was referring to what happens within organizations and institutions that fail to renew themselves at least once a decade. The risks of such failure are serious in the for-profit sector, he said, but at least the pressure of market competition acts as a counterbalance. Not so in the volunteer or charitable sector, where the signs of stultification can go undetected until it is too late to correct course.

The sagacious leaders of not-for-profits often preside over the most decaying structures, wrote Snobelen, a former Ontario cabinet minister. The not-for-profit sector has a less direct connection to markets, and so redundant policies, tired programs and the layering of inefficiency and waste can go unchecked for a generation.

His concern in the column was the fate of the annual Pride Parade in Toronto, whose arrival at the terminal stage the atrophy of purpose was at long last exposed by last years Black Lives Matter debacle. But as incongruous as it might seem, Snobelens warning is equally valid for something vital to Catholic hearts and minds: the institutional pro-life movement.

An honest look shows real cause for concern about atrophy of purpose within formal pro-life groups. There seems blockage of hope for progress for many of the same reasons of atrophy that left self-satisfied Pride organizers outfoxed and embarrassed by Black Lives Matter in 2016.

Given the stakes involved the protection of life itself the implications of the pro-life movement showing such signs are, of course, infinitely more grave. No one can or should direct personal critique at individual pro-life leaders whove sacrificed so much for the sake of the unborn and those at the end of life. All who toil in that vineyard do so out of faith, hope and charity. That said, the aggregate success record of the collective pro-life leadership is, being diplomatic, a succession of losses.

Its true those losses have accrued in a zeitgeist of relentless and ferocious hostility to life, and against an ideology of personal autonomy that borders on the mad. Even acknowledging that, however, we have surely reached a moment where there isnt an iota of evidence of the zeitgeist and the anti-life ideology being effectively contested. Leaders who began the pro-life fight in the Trudeau generation are still fighting it in the Trudeau generation 2.0.

Angus Reid polling data freshly published by Cardus shows 94 per cent of non-religious Canadians now give the highest priority to personal choice when it comes to abortion or doctor-assisted death. Even among the one-fifth of Canadians who are religiously committed, just 56 per cent rate preserving life as a higher moral priority than personal choice.

There is a fair argument to be made that any hope of reversing such grim statistics will be lost if those in the institutional pro-life movement pack up their campaign tools and move on to other issues. But there is also a law of diminishing returns that says if theres been no success to date, the possibility of success is non-existent if the same leaders continue using the same techniques ad infinitum. Indeed, there is a very high cost to doing so. It comes in terms of energy expended and charitable dollars consumed that could go to, say, soup kitchens. But it also comes in terms of the political oxygen denied to alternative approaches.

I recently spoke with someone deeply involved in promoting and facilitating adoption. She described a truly Byzantine regulatory regime that is the reason adoption is such a distant second choice to abortion. When I asked why more political pressure isnt applied to unravel the crazy rules, she said bluntly its because the pro-life movement monopolizes the policy space with its all-or-nothing-at-all demands on abortion.

Such hegemony might help with fund-raising and organizational brand awareness. It might keep the institutional machine humming. But it contradicts the very purpose of pro-life belief. We as Catholics cannot let the institutions that lead us in it fail to properly renew.

(Stockland is publisher of Convivium.ca and a senior fellow with Cardus.)

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Comment: Pro-life movement is in need of renewal - The Catholic Register

By Tyler Huckabee By Tyler Huckabee May 16

There is no end to the truly regrettable moments in Bill Nye Saves the World, Netflixs attempt to rebottle the 90s-era lightning of a nebbishy but dapper science guy for a new generation. But one stands out. Rachel Bloom, decked out in avante garde 80s pop gear, sings a cringeworthy song about the spectrum of sexuality called My Sex Junk. You can watch it if you like, but I cant say I recommend it.

Im a huge fan of Bloom. My Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,the CW rom-com musical series she created and stars in, is spectacularly funny, largely thanks to her note-perfect performance. Im also a fan of Nye, or, at least, I was a fan as a 10-year-old, which makes me the target market for his new Netflix series. But this is television, and in television, two positives can sometimes make a negative.

From Nyes new show to Aprils March for Science, science is enjoying a much-needed moment in the cultural zeitgeist, but its in danger of the same pratfalls that have hamstrung another subculture with which it has more in common than its stewards might care to admit: the religious one.

Religious entertainment could teach science a thing or two about the danger of pandering to pop culture.

[Christian radio isnt high art. Its just what people want.]

Both science and faith try to use pop culture to get you to buy into a certain set of beliefs without boring you out of your skull. Both can safely assume a fair number of skeptics in their audiences, and both are trying to convince you that contrary to what you may have heard the subject in question is both cool and relevant.

Take American evangelicalisms numerous failures in trying to be cool and relevant. In the 90s, a cottage industry offered Bible-ified takes on pop culture. Like Nirvana? Try DC Talk. Into N Sync? Well, have you ever heard of Plus One? And why wear an Abercrombie & FitchT-shirt when you could wear Breadcrumb and Fish?

That industry isnt dead by any stretch, but it has faded as it became increasingly clear that wherever else faiths natural habitat may be, its not in the entertainment industry. The whiz-bang pyrotechnics and giddy razzle-dazzle of mainstream pop culture simply dont lend themselves to faith, which thrives best in contemplation and reflection.

[Clergy who dont believe in organized religion? Humanists think 2017 is their time to grow.]

Science, in the meantime, thrives in study. It is, as Carl Sagan put it, a way of thinking much more than it is a body of knowledge. But you wouldnt know that from the hugely popular I Fing Love Science site, whose Facebook page boasts 25 million likes. It may love science, but that love manifests itself as neither a body of knowledge nor a way of thinking so much as a collection of clicky memes and headlines of questionable scientific relevance (Deer Caught Gnawing on Human Remains).

Likewise, Nyes fellow celebrity science whiz Neil deGrasse Tyson is far too often reduced to generating headlines. His reliably sour fact checks of science in movies (he recently weighed in onGuardians of the Galaxy, Vol 2, a movie that features, among other things, a raccoon voiced by Bradley Cooper) has earned him a reputation as a buzzkill. That, too, is reminiscent of some of the evangelical subculture at its most patronizing, butting in to tut-tut movies and music that step out of line with its worldview. Faith and culture will always necessarily be in conversation, but does anyone out there really need Focus on the Familys analysis of the spiritual elements in Resident Evil: The Final Chapter?

[A scientists new theory: Religion was key to humans social evolution]

This is doubly unfortunate, because Tyson is a man of obvious intelligence and charm, and his Cosmosreboot was as good as Nyes series is bad. There is no reason that such a naturally gifted communicator should waste his considerable talents on being the fun police for a superhero space romp. Doing so degrades his scientific brilliance to the same realm as the worst elements of the Christian subculture: turning a fascinating, mind-expanding tool for understanding reality into nothing more than a wet blanket.

Science, like religion, provides a profoundly beautiful prism through which to help interpret the world. It is organized knowledge that, in its truest essence, uses what we know about the universe to help us grasp at those things that we dont. And science, like religion, has seen better days in America. Dangerous, anti-intellectual bile about the myth of climate change and the danger of vaccines is being thrown around at the highest levels of government. Some solid science would go a long way toward fixing these and other disquieting trends coursing through the country.

In dark times, its easy to take any tiny win as progress, even something as dubious as a few extra retweets. The temptation to cater to the social media masses is understandably huge. Gotta keep the lights on, and all that.

But you need only look so far as religion to see just where such tricks will take you. The infantilization of religious discourse has elevated its worst elements, making heroes of people not fit to clean the boots of the likes of Augustine, Flannery OConnor and Martin Luther King Jr. Sciences current moment isnt immune to such a fate. It may already be succumbing to it.

But all isnt lost. For all its mainstream embarrassments, rigorous, insightful conversations around religion are happening, albeit in smaller pockets, away from the spotlight. Science, obviously, continues to thrive in institutions of higher learning, where the discoveries being made have as much to do with the I Fing Love Science crowd as a model rocket does with NASA. If the people who truly love science want to make sure the current surge gains real momentum, theyll want to highlight that discourse over the shallow alternatives. After all, as scientists and their fans know better than anyone, success often lies in replication.

Tyler Huckabee, a writer in Nashville, has previously written for Acts of Faith about great Christian moviesand the themes of The Shack.

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The first solar eclipse in 99 years is coming. To some, its an act of God.

My church taught me my virginity was lost. But Im re-choosing abstinence.

The anxious wait for an undocumented immigrant seeking sanctuary in a church

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What Bill Nye and the science movement can learn from religion - Washington Post

Monteleone Dance is coming to the Hudson Guild Theatre, presented by The Moving Beauty Series.

The company will have its world premiere of Y0UN1VERSE on June 11 3 pm, featuring the innovative movement vocabulary and multimedia work by Joe Monteleone and Visual Barz LLC, in a split-bill with The Dancing Georgina Project.

"Y0UN1VERSE" reveals a fictional society's attempt to make sense of its crumbling virtual reality. Joe Monteleone's unprecedented movement invention interacts with video projection to illustrate the manipulation of personal reality tunnels and hermetic philosophy in a dystopian cyber zeitgeist. An elaborate arsenal of movement and video projection abstract this digital catastrophe.

A limited number of tickets are available for the performance on June 11. Tickets at danceseries.org (click "Monteleone Dance"). For more information, visit http://www.monteleonedance.com.

Watch a trailer below!

Monteleone Dance is a research based Dance Company that presents highly cerebral multimedia dance works. The company and its Artistic Director, Joe Monteleone, are committed to the innovation of intricate movement vocabulary, developing new multivalent movement methodologies, and synthesizing the two to create multimedia performance. The artists navigate various subject matters, often investigating the beclouded realm between man and machine, individual and system. The work confronts the human experience, analyzing and probing the human psyche in the context of today's technological zeitgeist and cultural fabric. The company has performed extensively in New York City, as well as nationally and internationally.

Joe Monteleone is a solo dance artist and Artistic Director of Monteleone Dance. His work has been presented extensively in New York City (Inception to Exhibition Festival, APAP, Center for Performance Research, Peridance, NYLA, Dixon Place, the Dance Gallery Festival, Current Sessions, Baruch Performing Arts Center, the Norwood Club, the Amalgamate Artist Series, Green Space, The Moving Beauty Split Bill Series, Triskelion Arts' Split Bill Series, Comedy in Dance Festival, Dumbo Dance Festival, the Chocolate Factory, and Williamsburg Movement and Arts Center, among various showcases). His work has been presented nationally at the Reverb Dance Echoes Tour (Boston University), Your Move Dance Festival (Jersey City, NJ), Rutgers University (New Brunswick, NJ), The Wassaic Project (Wassaic, NJ), and the Breaking Ground Dance Festival (Tempe, AZ), to great acclaim. International credits include a tour with International BPM to Spain on multiple residencies, including the Institute of the Arts Barcelona, and a performance in the Bailar al Sol Festival. Joe won the Audience Favorite Award at NYC10 in 2015 for his solo work "Defense Mechanism" and at The Intimate Series. His live installation work has been presented at the Peridance Capezio Center (NYC), the Alpha Art Gallery (New Jersey) and the Infinito Gallery (NYC). Residencies include two Solo Commissions by The Moving Beauty Series (Brooklyn), the coLAB Arts residency, and various institutional commissions. Joe has taught and lectured at Mason Gross School of the Arts (Rutgers), Raritan Valley Community College, PMT Dance Studio (NYC), Arizona State University, and DancePlus Little Silver.

Photo Credit: Peter Yesley

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Monteleone Dance to Bring Y0UN1VERSE to Hudson Guild Theatre - Broadway World

"She persisted"

"Anarchy is female"

"Solidarit fminine"

"Feminism: Back by popular demand"

The feminist T-shirt is having a moment. Fueled by people who want to express their support for women's rights at marches but also at work, out for dinner, on Instagram the shirts are growing in popularity and power.

Minnesota artists and designers are creating some of the more popular designs, using the T-shirts to raise money for nonprofits focused on equality and women's health. They're also gathering around the messages, hosting printing workshops and discussions.

"I think this activism zeitgeist just overlapped with a renewed interest in graphic tees as a medium for artists and designers," said Minneapolis designer Maddy Nye. "Of course it's only a T-shirt, but it's contributing to a larger paradigm shift in awareness and action."

Protest art and imagery hangs from the walls of Nye's sunny home studio. For her "Matriarch" shirt, Nye used a bulbous typeface that "had its heyday during the environmental and women's movements in the 1970s," she said, "but I like to use it in a contemporary context."

So with just one word, the design asks questions about what's changed since then and what hasn't. Some people have bought Nye's tees for their mothers, women who fought earlier battles.

Angie Toner is "not shy" about being a feminist. But working in the beauty industry a few years back, she had conversation after conversation with women who eschewed that label. It got her thinking about the backlash against the word, the movement. Then she came across a photograph of a woman holding a sign: "Feminism: Back by popular demand."

"I need a sign like that," she decided, if only to hang on her wall.

Toner asked local sign painter Phil Vandervaart to draw the design. "The drawing was so great," she said, "that I was like, you know what? I'd like to move this around."

So she printed it onto T-shirts and bags at Gee Teez, a screen printing shop in south Minneapolis, and put them on Etsy in 2015: "A Grassroots Feminist Fashion Action," she calls it. Orders poured in. Since then, Toner has tried to quit the project a few times, to move on to new things. "But I've kept it going because anytime I try to let it fade out, someone will reach out," she said.

The day after President Donald Trump was elected, Toner gave the shirts away on the street. Orders again filled her inbox, she said.

'IT'S ALL CORRECT'

The image came to Crystal Quinn one night as she was falling asleep.

The Minneapolis-based artist had been reading "The Dispossessed," a 1974 science-fiction novel by Ursula Le Guin, turning over one of its ideas in her head: Because our culture is a patriarchy, run by men, then the opposition, inherently, must be female.

That night, the idea merged with a classic protest sign: the abortion-rights slogan "Keep Abortion Legal," in bold typeface, within a circle.

"I just put those two together in a very natural way," said Quinn.

She got out of bed and started drawing. The result: "Anarchy is female," in '70s script, pushing up against the black circle containing it.

"Putting it on T-shirts was the first thought I had," said Quinn, partly because she appreciates how, like those sold at concerts, they reference a specific moment. The design has since landed on mugs, buttons and, as women marched after the election, protest signs. In January, Quinn co-hosted a workshop for protesters to print the image.

"When I came up with the design, it had nothing to do with politics, at all, or Hillary Clinton," said Quinn, a multidisciplinary artist who has designed and made shoes, pompoms and posters.

But she has loved seeing how and where it's popped up the conversations it has started. "People have used it in so many different ways," she said, "and it's all correct."

'SHE PERSISTED'

For Chelsea Brink, the donations made the difference.

The freelance designer and art director had supplied the hand-lettering "a fancier version of my own handwriting" for a "She persisted" tattoo party that accidentally went public, then viral. In February, more than 100 women and a couple of men lined up at a Minneapolis tattoo shop to get the quote, referencing an attempt to silence Sen. Elizabeth Warren, inked on their bodies. Women worldwide followed suit, turning Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's words into protest.

But when one of her friends requested a less-than-permanent version of the design, Brink hesitated.

"I have mixed feelings about the whole T-shirt-message culture," she said. "What are we really doing here and what kind of difference are we actually making?"

But the ability to donate convinced her. Profits from her "She persisted" shirt have gone to the Malala Fund, She Should Run and the National Women's Law Center. Brink chose organizations focused on equality but that aren't aligned with a particular political party, she said: "I wanted it to be as inclusive as possible."

In the end, Brink has appreciated that a little lettering has caused people to think about big issues: tolerance, inclusion, equality. "If one person sees it and is affected by it," she said, "that makes a huge difference to me."

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A grassroots, fashion action: Minnesota designers fuel feminist T-shirt craze - Duluth News Tribune

SINGAPORE: The Singapore Heritage Festival signs off this week after another successful stint delivering nostalgia and tidbits from yesteryear.

But why let the fun stop there?

Hard as it may be to believe, stepping back in time does not have to be a yearly affair. Scratch the surface of glossy, glassy Singapore and youll find many ways to connect with numerous strands of bygone eras.

After all, Singapore is not just a city zooming into the future, its also a continuum stretching back 200 years. Yup, theres a hunk of old stuff, old places and even old-school hobbies to enjoy on a daily basis here.

So, put away that smartphone. Get out your lomo, pack your 555 notebook and take a plunge down the retro rabbit hole.

GETTING DOWN WITH ART DECO

Could there be a more handsome style of architecture than Art Deco? With its OCD-pandering symmetry, its bold use of anthropomorphic curves, decorative twists, geometric forms and clean lines, no other architectural movement perfectly captured the zeitgeist of an era quite like it did.

A bit of background, if you will: The 20th century was a period of unrivalled technological advancement and Art Deco, as a burgeoning aesthetic movement, sought to incorporate and express the speed and intensity - through swishes, swooping facades, curved walls, speed lines and stepped profiles - at which electricity, the motorcar, radio, trains, planes and ocean liners were fast transforming life in the period between the world wars.

At least now youll know why certain buildings look the way they do when you traipse around town.

And while Art Deco isn't quite as common as it is in New York, Chicago or Miami Beach, theres enough to go around.

Among the highlights: The rectilinear wonder that is the Asia Insurance Building off Raffles Place; the thick-set Old Tanjong Pagar Railway Station; the streamlined moderne sensibility of Old Kallang Airport; and the architectural curiosity that is Parkview Square aka the Gotham Building.

If you are the ambulatory sort, there are Art Deco clusters to go on walking tours of particularly around Chinatown, Little India and Tiong Bahru, where a conspicuous feature of the 1950s flats is their pillbox gun turret-like staircases.

YOU SPIN ME RIGHT ROUND IN SUNGEI ROAD

Ever wanted to know what it was like to get hold of music in a time before Spotify? Well, youve got two months left.

Back in the day, you could, after enjoying a steaming bowl of laksa for S$0.50 in a coffeeshop by Rochor Canal, amble down one of Sungei Roads offshoot lanes and find yourself in the middle of a thriving bazaar. You could find just about anything here, from wigs to taps, bicycles and even pets.

But one of the real pulls of Sungei Road was its music purveyors. Youd be able to find boxes upon boxes of records from Motown to punk or, if youre really lucky, a stash of Paul Anka and Nana MouskouriEPs.

Best of all, these music selling uncles also sold record players.

And props to them, even if it was a tenth-hand turntable, it would still work. In the old days, very few of them sold stuff that didnt work. If items werent in working condition, the sellers would find a way to get them repaired before they put them up for sale.

These days, while records can still be found, youd be hard-pressed to find anyone selling a turntable in working order. With Sungei Road reduced to a sliver of its former self, theres naturally a limit to what you can find.

But who knows: Sungei Roads charm lies in never knowing what you may find. You could head there tomorrow and come away with a sputtering, albeit functioning, turntable. Therein lies its (soon-to-be-gone) charm.

BRIC-A-BRAC BOUNTY

In the days before Sungei Road was scaled down, youd be able to find much more than worn out white goods, rare LPs, barely functioning transistors, records and spare parts.

But all the good old stuff havent disappeared for good. There are still a few places where youd be able to find them.

Odds n Collectibles on 128 Telok Ayer Street is a true imaginarium of period pieces, from rusting clocks to antique rotary phones and rickety typewriters. This is one of the few places in the city to head for if youre looking to pimp out your pad as a retro niche.

Elsewhere, Yasashii Trading in Bukit Merah (#01-114, Block 123 Bukit Merah Lane 1) is another vintage furniture shop that is a potpourri of evocative knickknacks from ivory bird cages, to ornate grandfather clocks and bulky cathode ray tubes masquerading as furniture.

Youll also find seasoned copies of Life and National Geographic, soft drink signs, old-fashioned amplifiers and speakers - and even an elegant armoire here.

OLD SCHOOL GRUB

Back in the day when school was out and your exam results good, you could always look forward to a treat at Swensens.

Even today, long after the banana split went out fashion, theres something out of the ordinary about tucking into its creamy goodness amid the stained glass finery of a Swensens outlet.

It's kinda cute that some old school culinary faves continue to cling on for dear life.

If you thought the banana split was an antediluvian number best left to the 80s, then what about the disremembered dessert that is the peach melba?

Would you also like plate of lobster thermidore and a bowl of prawn cocktail to go with that? You would? Then step into The Ship Bar & Restaurant (#03-16/18, 1 Scotts Road, Shaw Centre) for an ineffable platter of long forgotten comestibles.

Another yum throwback treat: The baked potato with sour cream and crispy bacon bits at Jacks Place.

THE GRAVEYARD SHIFT

No one does retro better than the dead.

A jaunt of Singapores cemeteries is always a neat way to get in touch with a past long gone. With its expansive grounds and visitor-friendly paths, Bukit Brown is always worth a visit even if to only check out the many luminaries (Chew Boon Lay, Chew Joo Chiat, Gan Eng Seng) that rest there.

But there are two lesser known graveyards worth poking about in.

One is the Japanese Cemetery Park in Chuan Hoe Avenue, where youll learn about the sizeable Japanese community that existed in Singapore before World War II. Theres also a memorial here for 135 Japanese war criminals executed at Changi Prison for wartime atrocities.

Another cemetery to head for is the Kubur Kassim cemetery in Siglap which served as a burial ground for many prominent Muslims in the area. Some grave plots here are dedicated to the Orang Bunian, which are supernatural human-like beings from Malay folklore. Spooo-keh!

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Five on Friday: 5 ways to step back in time in Singapore - Channel NewsAsia

When HAIR billed as "the American Tribal Love-Rock Musical, came out, America was shocked. Hippies! Drugs! Sex! Nudity! Burning draft cards! Did someone say nudity? It had a limited Off-Broadway run of six weeks, and was notable at the time as producer Joe Papp's first non-Shakespearian play... but maybe it's not so far off from Shakespeare at that, including in its nudity. Although many Americans who know of the show may connect its name with "that show with the naked people," in truth those same people know as much if not more of the songs in this show than they do of most musicals. Most musicals don't have songs that are almost completely identified with the zeitgeist of their time. James Rado and Gerome Ragni, with help from composer Galt McDermot, created a musical that encapsulated the discontent and discomfort of a generation.

It may not speak to a younger audience as it did to a generation fifty years ago, fearing being drafted into a bloody and pointless war, interested in marijuana as an aid to spiritual consciousness rather than as a social lubricant like alcohol, and for whom tuning in, turning on, and dropping out spoke volumes more than career education programs and the drive to find jobs immediately. But if younger audiences want to understand the America they're in today they need to understand the America their parents remember, and many of us remember a time very much like the 1960s of HAIR.

It's in a stunning production at Ephrata Performing Arts Center, directed by Pat Kautter, who remembers the days of draft cards and deferments and has done an excellent job of conveying the sentiments of 1960s hippie and wanna-be hippie youth to her own younger cast. "Aquarius," "Let The Sun Shine In," "Easy to be Hard" are all here, as is "Good Morning Starshine," which children of the 1970s were able to hear on Sesame Street at the time, so ingrained was the music of HAIR in popular culture. (This writer first learned the song on Sesame Street and had it on on of the show's back-in-the-day vinyl record albums.)

HAIR, in its loose plot, is the story of Claude Hooper Bukowski (no relation to the poet Charles Bukowski), a middle-class blue-collar kid whose family can't wait for them to make them proud by joining the Army during Vietnam. Claude has other ideas, like being cool, like staying alive, like relating to the universe. He's part of Berger's pack of hippie kids and twenty-somethings running around the parks of New York, meeting up, lighting up, hooking up, and avoiding the draft. Sean Deffley is a particularly charismatic Claude, trying to fake being English (from Manchester, no less), rather than being a Polish kid from outside Manhattan, and trying to decide if he's brave enough to avoid the draft. Berger is played by Bo Irwin, who lets loose a cheerfully wild, manic side that's barely tempered by waving peace signs. Maggie Shevlin plays Sheila, resident love interest and seriously brainy college student, who's possibly the biggest idealist of them all. Hud, the African-American hippie who wishes the movement would focus more on civil rights, is played by a spot-on Michael Roman, who nicely channels Hud's frustration with American racism and who illustrates the fact that the anti-war movement and the civil rights movement didn't really meet and shake hands - despite the war's disproportionate impact on African-Americans.

It's a beautiful production, with stellar lighting design by Jeff Cusano, and sharp musical direction from Zach Smith, and Kautter's own direction is strongly to the point; it's easy in many productions of this show to realize that the vignettes really are all directed to the story of Claude's life and to his relationship to the draft and the war. With vast quantities of music and non-linear vignettes, the point is sometimes obscured, but Kautter's direction and Deffley's performance keep the story in front rather than behind the music.

Whether HAIR is nostalgia or news for you, this production is worth seeing, and indulging your desire to sing along to. It's a multi-dimensional treat, consciousness-expanding even without having your bong handy. Enjoy. And realize that you're reading the only theatre program in the area disclosing the content of what's being smoked on stage - fortunately for your nose, it's not banana peels.

At the Sharadin-Bigler Theatre at Ephrata Performing Arts Center through May 13. Visit ephrataperformingartscenter.com.

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BWW Review: HAIR Lets the Sun Shine in at Ephrata - Broadway World

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House Republicans finally passed a bill last week to repeal and replace ObamaCare. But President Trump's Rose Garden celebration was premature.

Before the bill can become law, Republicans must still clear two almost insurmountable hurdles: First, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell must repeat the House's balancing act, this time on a much thinner tightrope. Second, Congress' two chambers must ultimately agree on the same bill. And any compromise a majority of Republican senators can agree on is likely to splinter the House all over again.

TrumpCare is basically doomed.

First off, the split in the House between GOP moderates and hard-core right-wingers that sunk the first version of TrumpCare, and almost sunk the second, will appear again in the Senate. Only this time, the divide will be even deeper. On one side are ideologues like Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), out to kill ObamaCare by hook or by crook. On the other side are moderate senators like Susan Collins (R-Maine), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), and Bill Cassidy (R-La.), all painfully aware of the poisonous politics of repealing ObamaCare without an adequate replacement.

The House GOP eventually solved its dilemma by going all in on the far-right Freedom Caucus. To TrumpCare's already draconian spending cuts, they added a provision allowing states to opt out of regulations that prevent insurers from charging more for pre-existing conditions, and that require them to cover a minimum package of benefits. The bet was that, under pressure to fulfill the Republicans' multi-year promise to kill ObamaCare, the moderates would ultimately knuckle under.

It worked, but just barely: The bill squeaked by in the House on a 217-to-213 vote. No less than 20 Republicans not to mention every last Democrat voted "no."

The Republicans' margin for error in the upper chamber is even slimmer: With 52 seats, they can afford to lose all of two votes, with Vice President Mike Pence as the tie breaker. Any more defections, and TrumpCare is toast. And four Republican senators are already on record saying they can't support the House bill.

The shape of disagreement in the Senate will also likely be very different.

For instance, a proposal by Collins and Cassidy would actually allow states to opt out of ObamaCare's basic regulatory framework, but still keep all of ObamaCare's spending. In the House version of TrumpCare, the massive spending cuts are not optional. In particular, the bill would decimate both the funding for pre-ObamaCare Medicaid and the program's expansion under the Democrats' reform, by $880 million over a decade.

The political, as well as moral, perils of the House plan are pretty clear. It was state governments that decided whether or not to go with the Medicaid expansion, and it's state populations not congressional districts that senators represent. No less than 20 Senate Republicans hail from states that took advantage of the expansion. And the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projected five million Americans would lose Medicaid coverage in 2018, and 14 million by 2026, under the original version of TrumpCare.

The House passed TrumpCare 2.0 before it could be scored by the CBO. But the agency's overall projections for the first version were even more brutal: Fourteen million people in total would lose coverage by 2018, rising to 24 million by 2026. The new score will be coming in the next few weeks, and will almost certainly be even worse. That will just add to the Senate moderates' qualms.

Now, McConnell is certainly aware of this problem: The 13-person team he's put together to craft the Senate's bill does not include a single moderate. But being a senator is very different from being a representative in the House. They're elected every six years instead of every two, and the procedural rules of their chamber give each individual senator considerable power. As politicians, they're more insulated from the political zeitgeist of the movement. They're far more likely to see themselves as individual power brokers, and to relish and defend that role. The "take one for the team" attitude that prevailed in the House is unlikely to replicate itself in Congress' upper chamber.

So the most likely outcome is that the Senate scales back the Medicaid cuts. In which case, the House ideologues could jump ship. Ryan himself is upfront that gutting Medicaid is a longstanding dream of the conservative movement. Nor does the Freedom Caucus sound understanding: "They better not change it one iota," Rep. David Brat (R-Va.) recently threatened. "If they change it, you're not going to have 218 [votes]."

Meanwhile, the House moderates should not be written off. They voted for TrumpCare knowing they weren't voting to change policy, but merely to let the Senate deal with the issue for a while. Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.) explicitly made this case for moderates to vote yes on the bill. If the Senate forces those representatives to finally take a vote with actual policy consequences, they may not be so accommodating.

The White House is reportedly giving McConnell wide leeway to craft the bill, confident he can bring the warring factions together. But while McConnell is by all accounts a brilliant legislative tactician, he can't repeal the basic laws of mathematics or logic. There will never be an ObamaCare replacement that both does and does not cut Medicaid, for instance.

ObamaCare's defenders certainly should not let down the guard. But because of the immutable laws of politics, TrumpCare is simply unlikely to become law.

Continued here:

TrumpCare is basically doomed. - The Week Magazine

@QueenRania/Twitter

Her Majesty Queen Rania of Jordan was interviewed on Monday in Hertfordshire, United Kingdom, on stage at theGoogle Zeitgeist.

The Queen spoke tothe Executive Chairman of Alphabet Inc., Mr Eric Schmidt about the ongoing Syrian refugee crisis, the popularity of populist parties, education in the Middle East and the backlash against Western globalisation.

Queen Rania has been a passionate advocate for the Syrian refugees fleeing their war-torn homeland. Speaking on this topic, she told Schmidt that the world must stop thinking of refugees and migrants as a problem and accept the movement of people as the new norm, a by-product of our current global order. She added that the worldwide humanitarian response to such situations needs to be upgraded to fit with the 21st-century criseswith innovative solutions.

The popularity of populist parties have been rising worldwide with has also come with an increase in Islamophobia. She expressed her concerns with this by saying, If we let fear morph into a wholesale rejection of Muslims and Islam and let if factor into our policies and politics, we would be playing right into the hands of extremists, at a very critical time.

Queen Rania emphasised that politicians and supporters of these parties use fear in relation to things that seem foreign as a way to force separation. She cited politicians who use Muslims and immigrants as scapegoats as well as nostalgic slogans that only provide easy substitutes to real solutions.

Her Majesty also spoke about education in the region. Poignantly, the Queen said, The future of an entire generation of children hangs in the balance.Thatis the real crisis in our region. She added on Twitter, 13 mil. children in the MENA region are out of school. A whole generations future is hanging in the balance at this years Google Zeitgeist.

The Queen said that Jordan was a test bed for education and that a model must be created to tackle the challenges of today. According to the press release sent out by Her Majestys press department, the Queen Rania Foundationfor Education and Development will be piloting contextualised and localised education interventionsat scale,with a focus on innovation and learning impact.

It was also announced yesterday that the foundation and Google.org were going to be joining forces with the latter providing a three million USD grant. Google will be creating an online learning platform for Arabic open educational resources (OERs) targeting K-12 students and their educators across the Middle East and North Africa region.

Regarding globalisation, Her Majesty both praised and critiqued its impact across the world. She said that it has done much for the world with massive benefits, but at the same time, it has resulted in many people being left behind. She believes that globalisation and its role need to be re-examined.

Queen Rania closed by praising Jordan, We have defied all odds. Jordan is not only just standing; its trying to provide an example. She said the country is a source of optimism and hope for her, and it seems many across the region and the world, as well.

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Her Majesty Queen Rania of Jordan was interviewed on Monday in Hertfordshire, United Kingdom, on stage at the ... - Royal Central

Minneapolis Star Tribune

Minnesota designers fueling feminist T-shirt craze Minneapolis Star Tribune I think this activism zeitgeist just overlapped with a renewed interest in graphic tees as a medium for artists and designers, said Minneapolis designer Maddy Nye. Of course ... It got her thinking about the backlash against the word, the movement ...

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Minnesota designers fueling feminist T-shirt craze - Minneapolis Star Tribune