Mar 17-23, 1999

Mar 17-23, 1999 / Vol. 15 / No. 11

One joke over the line

Sending up the Oscars should be as easy as taking candy from the proverbial baby. They’re tortuously long, consistently pretentious and emblematic of the megabucks Tinseltown excess the rest of us working Joes and Janes are well within our rights to loathe. So why wasn’t last Sunday’s “Wanzie & Doug’s Most Excellent Academy Awards Soiree…

Steve Schneider

The persistence of pesticides

A frozen dinner I saw came with the following “serving suggestion”: Defrost. Good idea! But what’s a mother to do with fruits and vegetables contaminated with pesticide residues? Oh, you say, that’s not possible because our government sets standards to protect our children from these poisons. Before you swallow that, check out the March issue…

Jim Hightower

Unchained melodies

Moses Hogan played his own arrangement of “Deep River” eight times in about an hour at Disney Institute during a picture-perfect February afternoon, once for each of the African-American high-school vocalists who joined him onstage, one at a time, to compete for two college scholarships. But the day was about much more than competition; with…

Gary Monroe

Down(town) and out

Lagging behind in the boom that has construction cranes once again dotting the skyline, the Parramore neighborhood remains downtown Orlando’s Achilles heel. The celebration that greeted the opening this week of three new homes there underscores the ongoing anxiety about how to include the low-income area in the renaissance without running off its residents. That…

Jeff Truesdell

Disarming the smoking guns

Positive rebellion: That’s how one market researcher described the ethos of Students Working Against Tobacco (SWAT), the statewide anti-teen-smoking group behind the “Truth” advertisements. “They’re amazingly media literate,” said Amanda Dixson, a focus-group leader for The Informer, a firm that does qualitative research in the youth market. Dixson and her co-workers were leading small-group discussions…

Theresa Everline

Too-cozy cops

The March issue of Police magazine includes advice for all police who must investigate incidents on corporate property. Don’t be too comfortable with your biggest “clients,” writes editor and ex-cop Dennis Hall. Interestingly, he uses as an example the Anaheim PD’s mishandling of a Christmas Eve death at Disneyland. Two guests were hit in the…

Orlando Weekly Staff

Environment? What a bother

A lot of environmentalists thought the Bert Harris Property Rights Act of 1995 would impinge on the state’s ability to protect wildlife, open spaces and clean water, and they were right. But that law did not go far enough for developers and speculators, and so the Legislature in 1996 made more changes in order to…

Orlando Weekly Staff

Hot-dog fenders

Recent episodes of car surfboarding: Hampton, Va. (November): William Vaughn, 29, jumped onto a car’s roof during a dispute to prevent his friend from leaving, but the friend drove off anyway (distance surfed: 25 miles, at speeds up to 60 mph). Chicago (November): Charles Gardner jumped onto his SUV’s roof to prevent its carjacking, but…

Chuck Shepherd

Super visions

Since its 1993 debut, Crealdé School of Art’s “Biennial Juried Competition in Contemporary Southeastern Photography” has become one of its premier events. This year’s exhibition, which opened March 12 will be on display in Crealdeés Alice & William Jenkins Gallery until April 23. From intimate landscapes to leaves en pirouette, from angels to architecture, to…

Dee Rivers

Oscar bash doesnâ??t hew to the party line

If the very LOUD acceptance speeches of Cuba Gooding Jr. and Damon/Affleck were all that kept you awake during the last few Academy Award snooze-fests, maybe a little communal snarkiness is just what you need to stimulate consciousness throughout this year’s marathon. Wanzie & Doug, the official movie critics of Real Radio 104.1’s “The Philips…

Steve Schneider

Morphine lurks at dark end of the spectrum

Hard as it is to describe the music of Morphine, “Like Swimming,” the title of the band’s last full-length album, serves as an accurate enough description of the idiosyncratic trio from Boston. But nothing comes close to the live experience, which finally can be indulged when Morphine makes its local debut this weekend. The closeness…

Philip Booth

Firing up the â??net

Sunday nights on Orange Avenue are quiet from early to midevening, which can be an apprehensive thing to deal with when starting a new club night. That quiet permeates Sapphire Supper Club on a recent Sunday, where local DJ Jon Gardener is spinning at “The Loop.” It is a new, invitational dance-music night that is…

Matt Kelemen

Crowes twice as hard again

“This is rock & roll, dammit,” croaked a dazed-looking Chris Robinson of the Black Crowes last month from the stage of Tipitina’s in New Orleans’ French Quarter. The city, still hung over from Mardi Gras and smelling like a sewer, made a good match with the hedonistic guitar rock of Atlanta’s hardest-partying band. Drunk and…

Philip Booth

Hooray for Hollywood

Wanna make more money? Sure, we all do. But lots of us are lazy, drunk, unimaginative, noncommittal, weird, unemployable or convinced that some fat guy already ate our slice of the pie. Getting rich will always be a sweet dream, but those of us whose talents lie more in the area of air hockey don’t…

Liz Langley

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