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Sex!
Thursday, April 4, 2019
A Sexhibiton Without Inhibition: Tucson Erotica Festival Kicks Off its Ninth Year
Posted By Emily Dieckman on Thu, Apr 4, 2019 at 10:39 AM
Sculpture Resource Center artist Joshua Woodhall says he’s been doing art ever since he had the motor skills for it. He has this memory of checking out a library book in middle school and drawing something lewd on its pages.
“The silly librarian took it all over looking for who drew it,” he says. “Everybody got to see my boob drawing.”
This weekend, Tucsonans will have their own chance to see Woodhall’s erotic pieces at the ninth annual Tucson Erotica opening reception at the Sculpture Resource Center, 640 N. Stone Ave., 7 to 11 p.m. on Saturday, April 6. Past iterations of the festival have included pieces ranging from traditional nudes to the type of sculpture you really can’t resist walking around to see from every angle to arguably over-the-top depictions of orgies. But that’s the thing: Nothing is over-the-top at this sex-positive festival. This year, the event will include literary art for the first time as well.
Event organizer Inna Rohr met two burlesque performers at last year’s event, and was so impressed by their sexual energy that she created a series of paintings featuring them.
“They were both really strong an powerful, and the had this absolutely magnificent presence about them,” she says. “The series addresses same-sex relationships and intimacy and how it doesn’t matter who you are because love is still love.”
This is Rohr’s fifth year being involved with the festival. Last year, her featured pieces were playfully positioned bananas and donuts. But she spent much of her last year traveling the world, including visiting family in Estonia. In some places she visited, same-sex relationships aren’t yet normalized.
“The work I was inspired to do there inspired some conversations, and inspired some mind changing,” she said. “That was a cool conversation to have… It’s such a beautiful thing to be in love and to express your feelings and to be okay with it and not worry about what other people would think.”
The cover art she created for the festival also features two women. One of them (the one holding the whip), who goes by the stage name Fiametta Mink, is in charge of organizing the performers for this year’s event. Mink didn’t find her way to burlesque until her 40s, and she said last year’s Tucson Erotica was a particularly good place to perform – she and the other dancers weren’t on a stage, so they were practically face-to-face with audience members who were as respectful as they were enthused.
Thursday, November 15, 2018
Laughing Stock: “Southern” Accents.
Posted By Linda Ray on Thu, Nov 15, 2018 at 4:45 PM
Allen Strickland Williams comes to Brew Ha Ha
How much love can Tucson muster for a prep-school-named comic in a suit and tie? You’re not from Stanhope country, are you, son? Somehow on him, though, the anomalous sartorial choice is kinda hot. You know he could beat the pants off Idris Alba in trivia. Then there’s that telltale Southern accent.
Allen Strickland Williams has performed twice on Conan and been named to Comics to Watch lists on both Comedy Central and the Los Angeles Times. He’s performed at South by Southwest, Portland’s Bridgetown Comedy Festival and LA’s Riot Fest, among many other festivals. And he trained with UCB in both improv and sketch.
An iPhone flip through his YouTube channel is the best choice in any waiting room. Plus, he plays guitar, writes for Vice and, in an impossible case, landed a role in the 2018 season opener of Corporate.
Brew Ha Ha co-producers Rory Monserrat and Matt Ziemak regard his booking for their Nov. 19 Brew Ha Ha a big step in the project’s growth.
“Our main goal for Brew Ha Ha has always been to produce a quality stand-up showcase,” Zeimak says, “so being able to bring in these comics we respect and enjoy lets me know that the hard work we’re doing is paying off.
“(Partnering) with such a caring local business (Borderlands Brewing Company) has definitely helped make this a show people come back to month after month.”
The rest of the Nov. 19 bill includes New Yorker Brian Bahe, Phoenicians Tristan Bowling and Dana Whissen, and Tucsonan Eli W.T.
There’s a Brew Ha Ha every third Monday at Borderlands Brewery. The cover is $5, payable at the door and includes one of any Borderlands brew.
Blame it on Estrogen
Our top women-run comedy show, The Estrogen Hour, and the upstart Let’s Talk About Sex, Baby, both play for your adventurous mind this week.
A benefit for cancer research, The Estrogen Hour isn’t entirely about sex, but it always sells out. The show is at 6:30 p.m., Sunday, Dec. 2. It’s $15 plus a two-item minimum. Go to Estrogen Hour on Facebook for reservation details and the lineup.
Rebecca Tingley says her “Let’s Talk About Sex, Baby” on Thanksgiving, is all about giving and receiving. That show’s gift is that we always learn something new. It’s at 7:30 p.m., Thursday, Nov. 22, at Club Congress; $3.
How much love can Tucson muster for a prep-school-named comic in a suit and tie? You’re not from Stanhope country, are you, son? Somehow on him, though, the anomalous sartorial choice is kinda hot. You know he could beat the pants off Idris Alba in trivia. Then there’s that telltale Southern accent.
Allen Strickland Williams has performed twice on Conan and been named to Comics to Watch lists on both Comedy Central and the Los Angeles Times. He’s performed at South by Southwest, Portland’s Bridgetown Comedy Festival and LA’s Riot Fest, among many other festivals. And he trained with UCB in both improv and sketch.
An iPhone flip through his YouTube channel is the best choice in any waiting room. Plus, he plays guitar, writes for Vice and, in an impossible case, landed a role in the 2018 season opener of Corporate.
Brew Ha Ha co-producers Rory Monserrat and Matt Ziemak regard his booking for their Nov. 19 Brew Ha Ha a big step in the project’s growth.
“Our main goal for Brew Ha Ha has always been to produce a quality stand-up showcase,” Zeimak says, “so being able to bring in these comics we respect and enjoy lets me know that the hard work we’re doing is paying off.
“(Partnering) with such a caring local business (Borderlands Brewing Company) has definitely helped make this a show people come back to month after month.”
The rest of the Nov. 19 bill includes New Yorker Brian Bahe, Phoenicians Tristan Bowling and Dana Whissen, and Tucsonan Eli W.T.
There’s a Brew Ha Ha every third Monday at Borderlands Brewery. The cover is $5, payable at the door and includes one of any Borderlands brew.
Blame it on Estrogen
Our top women-run comedy show, The Estrogen Hour, and the upstart Let’s Talk About Sex, Baby, both play for your adventurous mind this week.
A benefit for cancer research, The Estrogen Hour isn’t entirely about sex, but it always sells out. The show is at 6:30 p.m., Sunday, Dec. 2. It’s $15 plus a two-item minimum. Go to Estrogen Hour on Facebook for reservation details and the lineup.
Rebecca Tingley says her “Let’s Talk About Sex, Baby” on Thanksgiving, is all about giving and receiving. That show’s gift is that we always learn something new. It’s at 7:30 p.m., Thursday, Nov. 22, at Club Congress; $3.
Tuesday, September 18, 2018
Dan Savage’s HUMP! Film Festival Coming to Tucson
Posted By Poochie Pepper on Tue, Sep 18, 2018 at 3:26 PM
Get a load of this: the Screening Room will get extra kinky this October with Dan Savage’s HUMP!, a home-made-porn film festival. The festival features short porno flicks, five minutes or less, all made by people who aren’t porn stars but get to be one for the weekend.
The self-proclaimed filmmakers and stars shoot their movies to show the audience what they think is sexy, wild or wacky. The films showcase a veritable pornocopia of different body sizes, shapes, ages, colors, sexualities, genders, kinks, and fetishes.
"It’s hard to believe HUMP! has been going strong for 13 years,” Savage says of the festival. “We are always amazed at the variety of films we receive each year. Choosing the films that ultimately make it in the festival is a huge challenge. Audiences will be watching things that take them outside their comfort zones. Some of it is hilarious. Some of it is romantic. Some of it is totally raunchy.”
So if you feel like experiencing over a dozen new and adventurous homemade movies with a bunch of strangers in a dark room, get on over to The Screening Room. All-in-all, HUMP! is a celebration of sexual freedom and inclusion.See the HUMP! Film Fest Oct. 11 - 13. The Screening Room, 127 E. Congress St. $20. humpfilmfest.com
Friday, August 24, 2018
Reason's In-depth with Backpage.com's Founders
Posted By Danyelle Khmara on Fri, Aug 24, 2018 at 2:42 PM
For an update on the Backpage.com shutdown and a deep dive into what led to the website's closure, check out Elizabeth Nolan Brown's great reporting.
Backpage started as the literal back page of the Phoenix New Times. Co-founders Michael Lacey and James Larkin started the weekly paper in 1970. And from the get-go, they were radical.
Nolan Brown speaks with the two men, arrested in Backpage's closure last spring, and looks at the case against the media moguls and the history of the Phoenix New Times and Backpage.
In Arizona, that meant taking ample swipes at Sheriff Joe Arpaio—who would eventually demand years' worth of personal data on New Times readers and have Lacey and Larkin jailed for writing about it—as well as anyone who cozied up to Arpaio, Republican Sen. John McCain, or his wealthy wife, Cindy. The paper would report on the McCains for their involvement with savings-and-loan scammer Charles Keating; dredge up Cindy's dad's connection to mobsters and murdered Arizona Republic journalist Don Bolles; and out Cindy as an opioid addict who forged prescriptions and stole pills from the children's charity she founded.
"We weren't trying to curry favor," says Larkin. "We didn't line up with the establishments in any city that we were involved in….We didn't really care what politicians saw in us. And that's come back to haunt us."
Thursday, July 5, 2018
Laughing Stock: Going with the flow
Posted By Linda Ray on Thu, Jul 5, 2018 at 3:28 PM
“I like how shocked people are when you say 'c*nt.' It's like I have a nuclear bomb in my underpants, or a mad tiger or a gun.” So says Caitlin Moran, London Times journalist and author of "How to Build a Girl." She recently confirmed that "Lady Bird" star Beanie Feldstein will play the lead in that bestseller’s film adaptation.
While we’re waiting for that, we can continue to enjoy Tucson comedy's celebratory riffs on a girl’s anatomy.
Mo Urban and Steena Salido present another in their series, C*nts being C*nts Talking About Their C*nts! at 8 p.m., Friday, July 13. The show is 21+ and admission is $5 at Can’s Deli, 340 North 4th Ave. A portion of the proceeds goes to the YWCA of Southern Arizona Project Period, a program that provides sanitary menstrual products to those who can’t afford them. Donations of sanitary products for the program are also welcome.
Standup comedians include imports Amy Blackwell, who performs regularly at the Scottsdale Laugh Factory; Phoenix area favorites Leslie Barton, April Walterscheid and Kerrilynn Gallagher plus Hannah Tighe of Gilbert and Nikki Dinnella of Chandler. Tucson newcomers Chinna Garza and Megan Gossen make their C*nts debut.
Tucson Storyteller Gina Grande Santos and music by DJ Plastic Disease round out the show.
Estrogen Hour Remembers J-Fin
On Sunday, July 15, The Estrogen Hour, launchpad for a dozen or so women now prominent in Tucson comedy, honors one of the funniest, Jennifer Finley, who died last month of cancer.
Organizers Nancy Stanley and Mary Steed launched the Estrogen Hour a decade ago to support the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. According to Stanley, “We're departing from our usual fundraising to celebrate the life and comedy of our late friend whose candor and creativity made her a crowd favorite.” Proceeds go to Finley’s family to help defray her funeral expenses.
Stanley will host the show, a lineup of top local women comics and one featured “Guestosterone,” Dominic DiTolla. Comedians include Amber Frame; KXCI’s Bridgitte Thum; Cindell Hanson; Edna Meza Aguirre; Jessica Stapp, who also performs with Tucson Improv Movement; Mo Urban and Steena Salido, co-hosts of C*nts being C*nts Talking About Their C*nts!; Noel Hennessey of FST (Female Storytellers); and Suzie Sexton, host of the annual Comedy for Charity show at the Fox Theatre.
The Estrogen Hour takes place at 6:30 p.m., Sunday, July 15 at Laff’s Comedy Caffe. Tickets are $15 and there is a two-item minimum. The show is 21+ All proceeds benefit Finley's family.
Friday, February 9, 2018
Laughing Stock: Marga! Plus Parts and Flowers
Posted By Linda Ray on Fri, Feb 9, 2018 at 11:17 AM
Marga!
“I grew up thinking I'm an artist because I didn't know any other way,” says actor, stand-up comedian and writer Marga Gomez. “My parents were both creative. All their friends were performing artists, so I was very comfortable in this world.”Thus did Gomez become a Cuban Liza Minelli, only lesbian, del pueblo and a lot more savvy.
Her mid-century upbringing, although periodically rocky, surrounded Gomez with humor and filled her with drive. Her mother was a professional dancer; her father was a comedian and songwriter, and a producer of popular, Follies-scale variety shows for New York’s large community of Spanish-speaking immigrants. The hustle to stay on top of the entertainment business defined her family.
Between them, her parents have inspired half Gomez’ output of a dozen popular solo stage shows. The latest is Latin Standards, her tale of the father-daughter entertainer dynamic. Its title refers to the genre of her father’s music; “The comedy is a survival tool,” Gomez says. The New York Times named the show a Critic’s pick when it opened last year at The Public Theatre (Hamilton).
Borderlands Theatre presents Gomez performing Latin Standards February 14 through 18 at the Steinfeld Warehouse, 101 West 6th Street. The run opens with a Valentine’s day fiesta, including live music and food. Details and reservations are available at tinyurl.com/LatinStandards.
“I started writing solo shows because my parents were important but forgotten,” Gomez says. “I wanted the Latino community to know about these people and their times.
“At the end of the show, the great thing that people tell me is, even though I'm a Latina, I'm a lesbian, I'm from New York and I'm neurotic, people can totally relate to the father-daughter story, and they see their own father.”
Parts & Flowers
Mo Urban and Steena Salido bring their third C*nts Being C*nts Talking About C*nts Comedy Show to Flycatcher, free, at 9 p.m., Sunday, February 11 (after the Estrogen Hour benefit at Laff’s at 6). C*nts, etc., features seven comedians, including Genevieve Rice from Phoenix; poet Janet Spencer, and the all-woman rawk band, Sugar Stains. The event benefits the YWCA’s Project Period.For Valentine’s Day, Hotel Congress presents Rebecca Tingley’s talk-show-format comedy show, Let’s Talk About Sex Baby, also featuring Randy Ford and Tammy King. Local comedians play truth or dare and answer audience questions.
Also on Valentine’s day, comedy siren Lisa Landry headlines a show at Laff’s where every woman will get a rose. Visit laffstucson.org for details.
Monday, May 9, 2016
Tucson Novelist Thinks Maybe It's Time To Just Start Writing Porn
Posted By Jim Nintzel on Mon, May 9, 2016 at 2:00 PM
Over at Salon, Tucson novelist Lydia Millet offers a modest proposal about giving up on literary fiction and jumping into writing porn:
So we’ve got the unmoving words on the page. That’s the first black mark against us. Second: do we get to the point? How soon? Here’s the answer: no. We don’t get to the point, not for 200 pages at least. Sometimes 3,600, if we’re Knausgaard. At writing workshops they taught us to show not tell — well, showing takes time. We paint a slow picture. You can see the brushstrokes. We don’t get to the point, and sometimes when we do our readers don’t notice, in fact. It’s so couched in nuance it can fly right over a person’s head. What was that you said? I couldn’t quite make it out.All joking aside: Millet's new novel, Sweet Lamb of Heaven, continues to draw rave reviews. At Slate, Laura Miller writes:
Third, sound bites. We don’t have them. No pull quotes. No celebrity names. Few if any pictures. The list of what we don’t have is a long one. Our tools for captivation are few, and often ungainly.
Which is why I’ve settled on porn, come to a decision that my next book after this one will be devoted to relentless, often hardcore pornography. I can’t give you an exact preview here on the pages of Salon, of course: this is a decent website. Plus that would be a spoiler.
Monday, February 1, 2016
PETA: Vegan Men Are Better in Bed Than Meat Eaters
Posted By María Inés Taracena on Mon, Feb 1, 2016 at 12:15 PM
Disclaimer: If you feel uncomfortable about sex scenes, don't watch the video. No nudity, just a lot of moving and moaning!
The secret for men to have longer erections—and a better sex life overall—is to go vegan, according to animal rights group PETA.
PETA 's commercial proposal for Super Bowl Sunday—which is no different than past campaigns by the group that use nudity and sex to get attention—was banned by executives, because it is sexually explicit and left execs "speechless," the group says in a press release.
The online publication Mic makes a great point about this ad:
The secret for men to have longer erections—and a better sex life overall—is to go vegan, according to animal rights group PETA.
PETA 's commercial proposal for Super Bowl Sunday—which is no different than past campaigns by the group that use nudity and sex to get attention—was banned by executives, because it is sexually explicit and left execs "speechless," the group says in a press release.
Meat-eaters across the country are feeling the effects of a “deflategate” crisis taking place right on their home turf, in the bedroom. More than half of men between the ages of 40 and 70 have to throw the game because of the difficulty they have even getting started. Turns out, the cholesterol in meat, eggs, and dairy products slows the flow of blood to all the body’s organs—not just the heart.Oh PETA, where do I begin? I stopped taking you seriously the minute you decided to compare the Holocaust to animal cruelty.
Vegan Lovers Satisfy
Guys driving for the score can tackle impotence by trading in their unhealthy eating habits for vegan meals. Plant-based foods can help take your sex life into overtime.
Low-fat vegan meals tackle all the physical causes behind the vast majority of cases of impotence: high cholesterol, obesity, diabetes, prostate cancer or inflammation, and hormonal imbalances. A new study published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition also suggests that men who couple regular exercise with a diet rich in flavonoids, found in fruits like strawberries, blueberries, and apples, may reduce their risk of developing ED by over 20 percent. And each person who goes vegan saves more than 100 animals a year from suffering and a terrifying death in today’s industrialized meat, egg, and dairy industries.
The key to a long lasting, hot love life is to start with delicious vegan meals in the kitchen.
The online publication Mic makes a great point about this ad:
While the foods we eat may affect our erections, young men who can't get it up could be struggling due to psychological factors or medications that have nothing at all to do with diet.
Either way, lots of men have complicated relationships with their penises. When erectile dysfunction enters the picture, they're likely to feel insecure and ashamed — and exploiting that insecurity to promote a vegan diet probably won't help them feel any better. So let's all eat tons of sliders and chicken wings during this year's Super Bowl in protest.
Staff Pick
Tucson International Mariachi Conference
3-Day Tucson International Mariachi Conference at AVA Amphitheater Thursday, April 25 – Participant Showcase Friday, April 26… More
@ AVA: Anselmo Valencia Tori Amphitheater
Thu., April 25, 6-9 p.m., Fri., April 26, 7-10 p.m. and Sat., April 27, 11 a.m.-2 p.m.
Casino del Sol, 5655 W. Valencia Road.
