Laughing Stock: Laugh this year outta here!
Most funny for your money Laff’s Comedy Caffe is the place for the that New Year’s date: fancy dinner, champagne and a show to help count down the old year, then home in time to cuddle up and watch the fireworks around the world. Or hit the late show for champagne and sweets with your…
Things to Do, Christmas Eve
Christmas Eve Dinner at Tavolino. Celebrate the holidays Italian style with Tavolino’s multi-course meal the “Feast of the Seven Fishes.” This specialty dinner features six seafood-inspired dishes: cozze impanate al forno with baked mussels, marinated white anchovies, house-cured Atlantic salmon with crostini, bruschetta and creamy baccalà, and seafood lasagna or fresh sea bass. Only available…
Things to Do, Monday, Dec.23
Flandrau Holiday Shows. We’ll be honest: A visit to the planetarium pretty much always feels like a holiday spectacular. What’s more festive and twinkly than the night sky? But this time of year, Flandrau has got three holiday-themed shows that are fun for the whole family. Season of Light, set to popular holiday music, celebrates…
XOXO: Where to Rock, This Weekend, Dec. 20 – 22
Friday, Dec. 20 A Night for Amy sees some of Tucson’s finest—Katie Haverly, Brittany Katter, Lola Torch, Naim Amor, Tom Walbank, Thøger Lund, Dimitri Manos and Ben Nisbet—perform the songs of Amy Winehouse for a cause. At 191 Toole. All proceeds to benefit Southern Arizona Aids Foundation’s Thornhill Lopez Center on 4th… Club ’90s LA…
Things to Do This Weekend, Dec. 20 – 22
Friday, Dec. 20 Holiday Party at the Wilde Meyer Gallery. There are many different kinds of holiday parties, from formal galas to drunken office ones to the ones you threw in your college apartment. But a holiday party in a local art gallery is the sort of thing that strikes the perfect balance between cozy,…
Laughing Stock: Quality Comedy Week!
Kristine Levine heads up an anniversary bash Almost any comedy club in the country would welcome the lineup for Brew Ha Ha’s fourth-anniversary show. Kristine Levine headlines a bill that includes Jamie Kilstein, who just co-headlined with Ian Harris at 191 Toole; perennially popular regional headliner Pauly Casillas; and Michael Longfellow, who headlines at The…
Things to Do, Thursday, Dec. 19
Dillinger IPA Can Release. Dillinger Brewing Company is releasing their signature West Coast IPA in 16oz cans, so you can bring it home or impress at your holiday party. The Dillinger IPA reaches up to 6.9 percent ABV with 80 IBU, and is brewed with Ella, Amarillo and El Dorado hops. The brew also features…
XOXO: Where to Rock This Thursday, Dec. 19
Mashing together low-end jazz, ambient, rock and hip-hop, Brokeback is the longstanding side project of Douglas McCombs, bassist with Chicago post-rock experimentalists Tortoise. They will tap out Morse Code for the Modern Age: Across the Americas at El Crisol (formerly Exo Bar). With the synth-heavy cinematic psychedelia of L.A. Takedown and the electronic minimalist drone…
Claytoon of the Day: Trump, Slow Your Roll
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Celebrate Ugly Sweater Night this Friday at Reid Park Zoo
It’s a holiday tradition to don an ugly sweater this time of year, but did you know you can enjoy the art of the ugly attire while enjoying a night at the zoo? In honor of National Ugly Sweater Day, the Reid Park Zoo is hosting a special night of its zoo lights celebration on…
Things to Do, Wednesday, Dec. 18
The Star Wars Holiday Special. The Loft Cinema is allowing you to see the very-very-special Star Wars Holiday Special for free! (Probably because they couldn’t allow themselves to charge you to see it.) This odd holiday tradition shows the 1978 TV special that George Lucas has vowed to smash with a hammer should he ever…
Claytoon of the Day: Toasty Racist Symbols
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Movie Review: 6 Underground
Rating: Good #3 Michael Bay returns, and while these were words that used to leave yours truly stricken with terror and afraid to approach a movie theater, things have changed a bit. First off, this one is straight to Netflix, so I can do stuff like pet my dog to calm down when the editing…
Things to do, Tuesday, Dec. 17
Moscow Ballet’s Great Russian Nutcracker. There are lots of options for seeing The Nutcracker this holiday season, but this one is performed by dancers from the Moscow Ballet—only fitting, when you consider the show debuted in Russia in 1892. The troupe tours the U.S. annually, but the children’s parts are danced by local youth. So…
Help homeless pets at PACC this holiday season!
In the words of Charles Dickens… “What greater gift than the love of a cat?” And in our opinion, dogs, too! Join Pima County Public Library in helping homeless pets at Pima Animal Care Center, our community’s only open-admission shelter. Between December 16 and January 6, drop off pet supplies at any *Pima County Public Library.…
Barrio Brewing Announces Move to Employee-Owned, new COO
Arizona’s oldest craft brewer is transferring ownership of the business to its employees in a historic move for the Christmas spirit. Barrio Brewing today announced the move via an Employee Stock Ownership Plan, which begins in January 2020. Employees who work 1,000 hours in a one-year period will be automatically enrolled in the ESOP. Founded…
Movie Reviews: Bombshell
Rating: Good #3 Charlize Theron is uncanny as Megyn Kelly in this hit and miss take on the sexual harassment scandals that plagued Fox News thanks to the deplorable Roger Ailes, played here by John Lithgow under LOTS of makeup. The movie is propped up by terrific work from Theron, Nicole Kidman as Gretchen Carlson…
Claytoon of the Day: Premature Republicans
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Adoptable Pets: Beatrice Needs a Home
“Hello, my name is Beatrice. I am a sweet 5-year-old girl who is patiently waiting for my forever family. New environments can be scary for me so I will need to go home with a patient family. Once I become comfortable I become a very outgoing and friendly girl,” Beatrice (877231) Fall in love with…
Claytoon of the Day: Trumping Religion
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What Will It Take For Arizona’s Education Funding to Catch Up With Mississippi, Arkansas, Louisiana and That Distant Star, West Virginia?
The next Arizona legislative session is on the horizon. Legislators are dropping bills ranging from the sublime — another attempt at ratifying the Equal Rights Amendment — to the ridiculous — prohibiting teachers from discussing the environment from an economic or social perspective. It’s never too early to talk about next year’s K-12 education funding,…
Claytoon of the Day: Time For Greta
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NASA announces OSIRIS-REx sample-collection site
On Thursday, Dec. 12, NASA announced that the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft will attempt to collect samples from the “Nightingale” crater site on the asteroid Bennu. The OSIRIS-REx spacecraft is on an asteroid study and sample-return mission, led by University of Arizona planetary science professor Dante Lauretta. “This [site] really came out on top because of the scientific value,”…
Muchas Pupusas
If you’re looking for Central American food, your next stop should be Selena’s Salvadorian Restaurant.
Quick Bites
The best culinary adventures in town!
It’s Beginning to Taste a Lot Like Christmas
For the Past several years, my friend Amy Silverman, with the help of her co-conspirators, has organized a Phoenix storytelling event called Bar Flies. The stories range from dramatic to heartbreaking to funny. And now many of them have been collected in a book, Bar Flies: True Stories From the Early Years.
City Week
The best things to do in town this week.
Dances of the Season
Each December, thousands of dancers take to stages all over the country to dance The Nutcracker, the beloved Christmas tradition. Set to a splendid score by Tchaikovsky, the 1892 ballet was created in Russia by two choreographers, the French Petipa and the Russian Ivanov, and based on a story by a German, E.T.A. Hoffman.
Come and Hear the Music Play
Arizona Theatre Company brings an all-new production of Cabaret (written by Joe Masteroff with music and lyrics by John Kander and Fred Ebb) to Southern Arizona this winter. Set during the waning days of Weimar Berlin and the Nazis’ rise to power, Cabaret is a deliberately timed choice for ATC. Its warnings about noxious populism…
Police Dispatch
A super-high woman was caught behind the wheel after a late-night Dairy Queen run, according to a Marana Police Department report.
Chemical Lawfare
The real-life horrors of the Parkersburg, West Virginia water crisis get a strong cinematic treatment from director Todd Haynes with Dark Waters, an earnest legal drama that spares us lengthy courtroom sequences in favor of in-depth looks at those affected on all sides of the case.
Northside showdown
Pima County Supervisor Ally Miller announced last Monday, Dec. 2, she would not seek reelection to the District 1 seat she has held since 2012.
Reel Indie
Here’s the best indie and cult movies playing this week.
Breaking the Ice
The Roadrunners’ early season success has been sparked by an offense that includes sharp-shooting Lane Pederson, who leads the team with 13 goals in 21 games.
Blind Faith
The Blind Boys of Alabama are celebrating 80 years as a band, having persevered through challenges of color barriers, being separated from their families as children, the death of band mates and, of course, living without the sense of eyesight.
XOXO
Tucson is filled with music this week.
Danehy
I can’t let 2019 go by without looking back at one more ugly historic episode, that of the Wyoming Black 14, a group of thoughtful and talented young men caught in the roiling confluence of sports and politics. It was one of those things that, in retrospect, just seems exactly right for those times, even…
Know Your Product: Xylouris White
The music of Xylouris White works as a travelogue in more ways than one. The duo, consisting of Greek lute player and vocalist George Xylouris and Australian drummer Jim White, blends traditional Greek instrumentation with experimental rock structures, making for a spacious yet energetic sound. Their most recent album The Sisypheans is the fourth installment in a…
Eating Christmas
I was awakened by a text message at about 2 a.m. following Thanksgiving of 2014: “911!! 911!! I’m not bringing the rolls for Christmas. I’VE BEEN ASSIGNED THE SWEET POTATOES! WHAT AM I GOING TO DO?”
Take Home ‘Bar Flies’
Since 2015, Phoenix residents have gathered at a downtown bar once a month to listen to true stories told live on stage. The show has popped up at museums, bars, parks, and even Tucson’s Hotel Congress—and now, for the first time ever, Valley Bar’s popular monthly reading series Bar Flies is a book. “Bar Flies:…
