Grandma Party Bazaar is as much an experience as it is a shopping destination
We seriously didn’t think Grandma Party, our favorite annual holiday bazaar/celebration of local handmade goods, could tempt us even more – but, with the lineup it’s offering for 2014, it has. The selection of artists, crafters and artisans involved in this year’s event has been tightly curated, and some of our favorite makers will be…
Violectric Holiday Show rocks Lake Eola Park Saturday
Everyone loves a good makeover story. Like that nerdy high-school girl who got popular by completely changing her outward appearance (shades of She’s All That), classical music has been working hard in recent years to shed its “only for the olds” reputation – whether it’s an orchestral arrangement of the Legend of Zelda theme or…
SAK Comedy Lab invades a Christmas classic
The SAK players share an original take on a groan-inducingly omnipresent Christmas classic: A Christmas Carol. We’ve seen it, all right? This thing has been passed around more than a blunt at the Osborne Family Spectacle of Dancing Lights. At this point, the only thing that could get us interested would be a Batman cameo…
Hundreds of Santas descend on Thornton Park
You know MegaCon and LeakyCon and FetishCon and Spooky Empire. But do you recall the most festive Con of them all? Saturday, the Thornton Park District invites all of the aspiring chimney sweeps-cum-home invaders of Orlando to don their gay apparel – Santa-themed, of course – and wassail the shit out of the area. There…
Albin Polasek Museum hosts Holiday Boat Parade Festival of Lights and Ski Show
Saturday night, Lake Virginia and Lake Osceola are aglow with holiday cheer and twinkling lights. This fun, family-friendly event features a parade of festively decorated boats along the shorelines of the aforementioned bodies of water in a celebration of Winter Park’s infamous 1 percent and all of their toys. Catch the water ski show, featuring…
Deadly Force, in Black and White
Young black males in recent years were at a far greater risk of being shot dead by police than their white counterparts 2013 21 times greater i, according to a ProPublica analysis of federally collected data on fatal police shootings. The 1,217 deadly police shootings from 2010 to 2012 captured in the federal data show…
Usher brings his UR Experience to Amway
Usher’s Orlando stop on his stage-hopping concert tour comes hot on the tail of his Voice win and an F-bomb-laden version of “She Came to Give It to You” with a thankfully-absent-on-this-tour Nicki Minaj at the MTV Video Music Awards. That performance may have gotten him lots of clicks on YouTube, but it didn’t help…
The Plush Monsters invite you to don your ugliest sweater at Milk District’s Sweater Fest
It started as a home-hosted ugly sweater party, but Sweater Fest outgrew the house-show stage after seven years of stretching to fit and has officially moved to the Milk District for its eighth iteration, where you can come undone at an outdoor stage or in participating venues. With more than a dozen artists playing (17…
Marc With a C offers nerdy seasons greetings at his 10th Annual Holiday Show
Mariah Carey famously sang “All I Want for Christmas Is You,” and it became a massive classic because nobody wants to be alone for the holidays. Nobody. We get it. You get it. You know who else obviously gets it? Local popsmith Marc With a C. On the 10-year anniversary vinyl reissue of his 2004…
Letters to a Satanist: Why does The Satanic Temple want to put its holiday display in the Florida Capitol Rotunda?
Why does The Satanic Temple want to put its holiday display in the Florida Capitol Rotunda? Christmas is a Christian holiday. Last week, The Satanic Temple finally received permission from Florida’s Department of Management Services (DMS) to place a holiday display in the Capitol Rotunda where a nativity scene and various other holiday displays have…
Wine AND chocolate? Sounds like the perfect festival
This weekend, Lakeridge Winery hosts a festival honoring two of the best things to ever touch our lips: wine and chocolate. On Saturday and Sunday, Dec. 13 -14, the Clermont winery celebrates fermented grapes and roasted and ground cacao at its annual Wine and Chocolate Festival, which features live music, wine and chocolate tastings, local…
Goodbye, Mills Brewpub; hello, Divas Dinner Theatre
It’s out with the frites and in with the divas as FMI Restaurant Group ditches their most recent concept to revisit an earlier one. When Bananas Diner abruptly closed, to be replaced by an announced Belgian-style frites and beer bar, few serious diners shed a tear. The Belgian frites bar concept is well-established in other cities,…
Two long-term animal shelter residents seeking a home for the holidays!
Yes, we know we post about shelter animals a lot, but we can’t help it. Orange County Animal Services takes in an average of 53 animals per day – per day – and many of those animals end up being put to sleep because they never get adopted and the shelter is often out of…
Celebrate the holidays with a classic: ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’
It’s a Wonderful Life has been ringing holiday bells (and giving angels their wings) since it hit the big screen back in 1946. However, most of us haven’t been lucky enough to catch the classic on screens bigger than the ones in our living rooms. Enzian wants to remedy that this season with a showing…
MAP: What’s the most-hated college football program in the state of Florida?
Reddit user AaronRodgers16 recently conducted a poll to discover the most-hated football program in each state. Some of the results are unsurprising. States with big football rivals tend to harbor hate for that rival: Ohioans hate Michigan, Oklahomans aren’t cheering one bit for the Texas Longhorns, etc. Here’s where it gets weird. Texans hate the…
Gorgeous photos of the Orion spacecraft launch
After Thursday’s launch was scrubbed due to valve problems, the inaugural launch of the Orion Spacecraft went off without any issues at 7:05 a.m. on Friday, Dec. 6. According to NASA, “NASA’s Orion spacecraft is built to take humans farther than they’ve ever gone before.” NASA’s plan is to send human-manned spacecraft to asteroids and…
7 New Year’s Eve concerts in Orlando: Billy Joel, Delusionaires, White Trash Bash and more
If you like ringing in the new year with live music still ringing in your ears, you have a bunch of New Year’s Eve concerts worthy of your consideration for Dec. 31 party plans. Of course, the biggest show that night was announced by Mayor Buddy Dyer last month: Billy Joel at Amway Center. There…
Council Watch: Liveblogging City Council so you don’t have to roll your own eyes
Well, hello! And welcome back to hell! On today’s agenda there are things like the human centipede – that’s actually not fair, because it’s basically a “walking bus” program for underprivileged kids via UCF – some back patting, some billing of Winter Park to cover the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts debt or…
KISS’s Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons host Rock & Brews grand opening in January
Over in Oviedo, KISS-fueled comfort-food source Rock & Brews has been open since mid-November, giving locals chance to check out the cuisine before restaurant owners Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons throw the restaurant’s official grand opening, which is set for Tuesday, Jan. 6, and benefits the Orlando VA Medical Center. According to the press release, at…
Two dance nights revived this December: House Party and I Don’t See Nothin’ Wrong
The return of two memorable parties this December offers locals plenty of opportunity to dance the rest of 2014 away. First, the ’90s R&B night at Lil Indies, I Don’t See Nothin’ Wrong, bounces back at 10 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 10, featuring Waldo Faldo spinning ’90s hip-hop and major dance hits. (RSVP!) They’re charging a cover…
Uber lame: The full ordinance limiting “livery” service in the city of Orlando
So, you may be hip to some of the hype surrounding the Mears/Uber (and Lyft) standoff, but there’s more to it than the general reporting that the tech-taxi services will be forced to charge 125 percent of what regular taxis do. In today’s City Council meeting – which we will be liveblogging at 2 p.m.…
Video: Interviews with Marvel Universe Live cast members at Amway Center
Marvel Universe Live!, the new touring stunt spectacular from Feld Entertainment, smashed into Orlando’s Amway Center last night, and I got to speak to two of its stars before the first show. Joe Dennis, who plays the “Green Goblin,” and performance captain Taylor Hemmeter both started their careers in Orlando, and you can see in the…
Photos: Local artist Chris Scala creates cheeky new public art in Mills 50
The Mills 50 District may have more homegrown public art than any other Orlando neighborhood: There’s the plethora of business murals, including work by Dolla Short, Andrew Spear and more; the permission wall at Pho 88; their pioneering painted electric boxes and dumpsters; and now this whimsical series of fence sections at 728 N. Thornton…
Elliott’s Public House is closed
After just four months in the Ivanhood, Elliott’s Public House has closed. Chef Karl Elliott’s upscale foray into serving more refined/more creative versions of the diner classics that Brian’s Restaurant served for years in the same spot never caught on fully with the neighborhood. Rumor has it that Elliott’s investors got cold feet after not…
Second Annual Revival Rally vintage motorcycle and scooter show
Hundreds of vintage and rare scooters and motorcycles inundate the Milk District today at 2 p.m., when Cafemoto and Ace Cafe kick off the second annual Revival Rally. Local artists will custom paint helmets (artists include Scott White of Rise Above Tattoos, Heidi Kneisl, Wolfrich, Chris Kretzer and more), which will be part of a…
10 cheap or free holiday concerts and quirky seasonal music nights in Orlando
From Christmas standards to soulful season’s greetings and all the way to funky dance nights, these offbeat Christmas concerts shake up the holidays in Orlando. A Very Body // Talk Christmas Michael Parallax and DJ Vsn Qst play Santa by throwing a wild Christmas party with all proceeds supporting the Space, to keep the indie…
Idina Menzel booked for July at Dr. Phillips Center, tix on sale now
Frozen queen Idina Menzel recently released her first album in six years – a collection of Christmas carols including pop stuff like Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You,” traditional stuff like “Silent Night,” Elvis-territory stuff like “White Christmas” and even an original, “December Prayer” – which gave her cause to announce a worldwide tour…
Thank You, Internet: Peppermint Eggnog Fudge and Wes Anderson presents ‘Star Wars’
The week after a short work week seems sooooooo long, amirite? Good news, though! It’s Friday! We’ve collected some of our favorite links from around the Internet to help you count down the minutes: 1. This fudge is the best of all holiday flavors all wrapped up into one heavenly bite: peppermint, eggnog and a little…
Apparently, Orlando has one of the ugliest populations in the entire country
Travel + Lesiure readers, we are truly offended. In a recent poll, you voted Orlando No. 8 for having the least attractive population in the United States. That’s not to say that Travel & Leisure has a thing against Florida cities – Miami landed at No. 1 for the most attractive and Tampa squeaked into…
Photos: Behind the scenes of Phantom of the Opera at Dr. Phillips Center
The longest-running show on Broadway — and highest-grossing musical in the world — is back in Orlando this week as the first Fairwinds Broadway Across America presentation at the brand-new Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts. The new production of Phantom of the Opera features a fresh cast and all-new sets and staging, which…
Protest today at 5 p.m. to call for racial justice
Today at 5 p.m., an ad hoc group of activists, residents and social justice organizations are meeting up at the corner of East Colonial Drive and Magnolia This is a totally organic, unofficial event, something put together by members, supporters and allies that have all wanted to take action on the racial justice issue. There…
10 free things to do in the Orlando area this weekend (12/5-12/7)
The holidays will be here before you know it, so you’re probably saving every penny you have. Here are some things for you to do this weekend that’ll keep your pennies (and dollars!) safely in your pocket: Gingerbread House Competition and Display Live the sweet life (or at least look at it) on display at this…
Tommy Lee Jones offers odd anti-Western with haunting ‘The Homesman’
The Homesman (3 stars) Capturing an exaggerated sense of 19th-century frontier adventure comes easy to many filmmakers. Everyone from John Ford to Clint Eastwood has done it. Re-creating a more realistic loneliness, serenity, and emotional and physical desolation can prove more difficult. George Stevens accomplished it in 1953 with Shane, Sergio Leone had success in…
Satanic Temple approved for Capitol holiday display
By JIM TURNER THE NEWS SERVICE OF FLORIDA The Satanic Temple is being welcomed this year inside Florida’s Capitol. And along with a pair of nativity scenes and other secular presentations, Festivus, a non-commercial festival “for the rest of us,” is close to coming back as a 6-foot stack of empty beer cans. The Florida…
Orange County Animal Services Pet of the Week: Penelope
This lovely little lady with the sad eyes is Penelope (Animal ID A306277), and she is looking for a home for the holidays! She is a shy but friendly girl who was recently found as a stray. She has a submissive personality, and she gets along with other dogs, though she might need a little bit…
Starting on Jan. 5, judge rules, gay couples can legally marry in Florida
Woah — we didn’t see this coming today, but here it is: The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals has denied the state’s request to extend a stay that would keep the state’s ban on gay marriage intact. Here’s the quick and dirty version of what went down: In August, federal court judge Robert Hinkle ruled…
Big party: Andrew W.K. announces Orlando date in January
Dude. How many people put Andrew W.K. on their wishlist for shows next year? ‘Cause yesterday, Andrew W.K. took a break from posting party tips to announce some new shows, and among them is a date at the Beacham. On Friday, Jan. 30, you can catch Andrew W.K. performing with a full band at the…
Somebody stole Carmen Morales’ house, but you can help
So maybe you missed the fact that yesterday was Giving Tuesday and still want to direct a little of that holiday generosity to someone in need. Tonight at Spacebar, you can get that chance. Carmen Morales, a comedian with local roots who has been touring out of Chicago for a good chunk of this year,…
Orlando Weekly is getting a new website today!
Today, Orlando Weekly’s website is getting a brand new look! The overhaul is happening this afternoon, so if you notice the website looking a little different, don’t be alarmed, we’re working on it. We’ll also need your help during this change. If you notice anything amiss, out of place or not working properly, let us…
Florida business interests put forward plan to expand healthcare coverage using federal money
With state lawmakers rejecting an expansion of Medicaid, a coalition including business groups released a proposal Wednesday that would extend private health insurance to hundreds of thousands of low-income Floridians. The proposal, backed by groups such as Associated Industries of Florida and the Florida Hospital Association, would target people who otherwise would be part of…
Downtown Orlando got new parking meters
Hey, look what we just got in downtown Orlando: parking meters that take debit and credit cards, so you don’t have to scrounge for change when you want to park on the street. Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer posted about them on his Facebook page, in addition to a few photos of him examining the goods.…
Savage Love
I have been insecure about the way my vagina looks for as long as I can remember. When I was young, I would fantasize about the day I would grow pubic hair long enough to cover its unsightliness. That day never came, and I was left with an enormous insecurity about it. My labia minora…
Alleged rape at a private school shows how weak oversight endangers vulnerable kids
A 2011 lawsuit alleges that local police failed to adequately investigate rape claim made by student at a Lake Wales school for troubled students
Crafted Block & Brew jumps on a familiar bandwagon
MetroWest bar-slash-eatery is a chip off the old block
Opening in Orlando: ‘The Pyramid’ and ‘Wild’
New movies playing in Orlando theaters this week
We lighten up the Tom & Jerry into a more Floridian holiday drink
Remix: A fresh take on a classic cocktail
A fracas over fracking in Florida
Letters to the editor
Film Listings
Screenings and cinema-oriented events this week
Drinking, Nightlife and Parties
Where to drink and party in Orlando this week
In his paintings, John Mellencamp’s America is a darker place
Best known for songs of the American heartland, Mellencamp cultivates a less nostalgic aesthetic on canvas
Weezer bassist Scott Shriner discusses the band’s inherent darkness
Is ‘Say It Ain’t So’ one of the heaviest songs ever written?
It’s time for cops to wear body cameras
Give Me Your Money
Frank & Steins opens in Winter Park, two-minute Pizza@Artegon, and five new restaurants
Tip Jar: our weekly food news roundup
Picks this week: Misfits, White Mystery and more
Great live music rattles Orlando every day of the week
FKA twigs is a creative (and conversational) force of nature
U.K. star speaks at length about her craft, her personal growth, her romantic life and how she fits into today’s female pop world
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 13) The National Science Foundation estimates that we each think at least 12,000 thoughts per day. The vast majority of them, however, are reruns of impressions that have passed through our minds many times before. But I am pleased to report that in the coming weeks, Aries folks are primed to be…
Celebrate the season in bite-sized servings to avoid “O Holy Overload”
A little goes a long way at the parks
There’s nothing funny about ‘Horrible Bosses 2’
The first ‘Horrible Bosses’ was funny, but the sequel is a bomb
This Little Underground: Grand Collab crosses tribal lines
Plus, Laney Jones on the rise
Florida Democrats contemplate canceling gubernatorial midterms
Lower turnout and low enthusiasm for local races cited as reasons
Rethink the Princeton to appeal City Council’s decision on College Park development
We’ll have more on this later, but for now: Community organization Rethink the Princeton, which formed to oppose the scope of a development project proposed for College Park that would put a 200+ unit apartment complex into an already congested area in the neighborhood, announced tonight that it plans to appeal the Orlando City Council’s…
Letters to a Satanist: Don’t you think you’d recruit more sympathetic minds if you used another figurehead?
Illustration by Lee DeVito Recently, Metro Times, our sister paper in Detroit, unveiled a new column called Letters to Satan. Readers are invited to submit questions about Satanism to be answered by Doug Mesner, a spokesman for the Satanic Temple. Since the Satanic Temple has been so active in Florida in the past couple of…
Holidays At Universal * Dec 6 – Jan 3
Enjoy the Macy’s Holiday Parade, Grinchmas, jaw-dropping rides and more. Oh what fun it is to celebrate the holidays at Universal Orlando® Resort December 6, 2014 to January 3, 2015. At Universal Studios Florida®, share in the joy and wonder of the spectacular holiday classic, the Macy’s Holiday ParadeTM. Plus, you can enjoy incredible live…
Public Defender’s Office holding clothing drive for those in need
Image via Genysys Works Looking for a way to keep giving back to those in Central Florida even after #GivingTuesday is over? Ninth Judicial Circuit Public Defender Robert Wesley’s office is looking for clothing for his clients to use when they appear in court. Welsey’s clients are made up of those accused of crimes, those facing…
