BEST OF ORLANDO® NOMINATION BALLOT IS OPEN THROUGH MAY 6!

Jul 22-28, 1998

Jul 22-28, 1998 / Vol. 14 / No. 29

Sending ‘Signals’

Hollywood knocked on novelist Sherman Alexie’s doors for several years before the Native American’s first screenwriting project, “Smoke Signals,” went into production. “I got a lot of interest from non-Indian filmmakers but wasn’t interested in their interpretations of the material, which involved casting white people as Indians or changing Indian characters to white characters,” says…

Philip Booth

Crime and punishment in conflict

When F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote that the rich “are different from you and me,” he could have had in mind the special privileges being granted in Fauquier County, Virginia, to Susan Cummings. Until recently, the 35-year-old heiress to an arms manufacturing fortune lived on her 350-acre Virginia estate with her lover. But then she got…

Jim Hightower

Time is on your side

It’s not popular to tell the working masses that they’ve got plenty of time to burn, but according to Geoffrey Godbey, a professor of leisure studies at Penn State University, Americans are sitting on a gold mine of free time, and he’s got the data to prove it. “We don’t have an ideological ax to…

Desiree Cooper

Sham or shaman?

The recent media commentary about Carlos Castaneda’s death was a blast from the ’60s past. New Age guru, it said. Mexico. Studied with an Indian shaman. Peyote. Psilocybin mushrooms. Turned into a crow. Grew a beak. I tried to fix Castaneda on the era’s memory scale, with Tang Instant Breakfast Drink at 1 and Martin…

Debbie Nathan

A (guaranteed) race to the finish

At last the campaign for Orange County chairman has an underdog. And despite his posturing, it’s not Mel Martinez Fran Pignone greets reporters in a pearl plastic back brace, a stark accessory in her cool, dimly lit living room. With a recently fused vertebrae and doctors’ admonitions to stay in bed, Pignone says her main…

Ericson, Edward Jr.

Painting by numbers

White, primed and 12 feet high, an expanse of fence surrounding a downtown construction site is inspiring competing visions of what is appropriate public art. Local artists are willing to volunteer their time and money to decorate the great white wall surrounding the construction site at the old Orange County Courthouse, whose contemporary structural additions…

Mary Meehan

Dewey defeats Truman?

Thursday • 21 SLEEPYTIME GORILLA MUSEUM From their immaculate 2001 debut Grand Opening and Closing, San Francisco’s SGM seemed destined for a limited appeal. The album dumbfounded audiences with its strong-armed riffs, fractured lullabies and claims of inspiration from occult “‘black math’-emetician” John Kane. Principal songwriter Nils Frykdahl’s spattered song-splicing interposed a myriad of avant-rock…

Orlando Weekly Staff

Bread and circuit court

Kevin Gilliam, the accountant and slumlord, has been battling Daily Bread, the soup kitchen operated by the Christian Service Center just up the street from his four-unit building at 111 Glenn Lane, claiming the charity indirectly damages his property. In January he filed a lawsuit against the 27-year-old soup kitchen, citing alleged drug sales, thefts,…

Orlando Weekly Staff

Space hoax

The Space Coast Office of Tourism in Brevard County wanted some attention of the “We’re Not On Fire Anymore” variety. So they sent out a press release, fashioned to look like an article from the Tallahassee Democrat but with an Associated Press dateline, that claims a Democrat reporter was “missing” after going to cover the…

Orlando Weekly Staff

A hole in the head like I needed

Distrust of modern medicine has led to the increasing popularity of therapeutic self-trepanation (drilling a hole in the head to unseal the skull), according to a June Chicago Tribune story. Trepanation activist Peter Halvorson recalled that drilling into his own skull 25 years ago (“Smoke was coming out of the hole,” he said) brought him…

Chuck Shepherd

Crime and punishment in conflict

The Lone SamuraiBy William Scott Wilson(Kodansha, 287 pages) The Last Shogun By Ryotaro Shiba (Kodansha, 255 pages) Pornogami By Master Sugoi (Green Candy Press, 109 pages) Kingyo By Kazuya Takaoka and Sachiko Kuru (Kodansha, 390 pages) Japan has managed to remain – despite a century and a half of “openness” – one of the most…

Jim Hightower

Diamonds are a girl’s best friend

Just before hightailing it out of the furnace that Florida became to take a long, luxurious trip to the relieving cool air of Canada, and knowing I ;wasn’t going to be home to celebrate Independence Day, I did one of the most patriotic things I have ever done in my life. I went to my…

Liz Langley

Not the usual Colombian blend

Colombian singer Carlos Vives can create fluttering hearts amidst crowds of normally well-behaved señoritas and señoras simply by smiling in their direction. Some of this undoubtedly has to do with his stint on a Colombian television show, where he played the part of a romantic vallenato musician. Unlike most musically suspect video heroes, however, Vives…

Garaud MacTaggart

Canadian chanteuse is left-field Lilith favorite

Holly Cole, an underappreciated-but-inspired addition to this year’s Lilith Fair, occupies a sort of netherland between pop singers and divas from the jazz or folk worlds. But while the Canadian native can sing as powerfully as Celine Dion or Mariah Carey, she is attracted to the more subtle approach of such influences as Betty Carter…

Philip Booth

All in the family

It’s an American institution: The small, neighborhood ethnic restaurant, run by mom and pop with a wait staff of stray cousins, aunts and uncles. The menus are a bit worn, the decor is nothing fancy, and the food is to die for. Cypriana fits this mold in many ways. Here, you’ll find Greek cuisine that’s…

Orlando Weekly Staff

Spanish grocery full of adventure

Exploring one of the area’s small but growing number of ethnic markets is like an adventure into uncharted culinary territory. Even if you don’t get double-coupons or a florist center as part of the deal, you’ll find everything you need to inspire a home-cooked Spanish feast, or the option for cheap takeout, at La Nacional…

Colleen Moore

Spanish grocery full of adventure

Exploring one of the area’s small but growing number of ethnic markets is like an adventure into uncharted culinary territory. Even if you don’t get double-coupons or a florist center as part of the deal, you’ll find everything you need to inspire a home-cooked Spanish feast, or the option for cheap takeout, at La Nacional…

Colleen Moore

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