Best of Orlando-Commerce
Best-dressed sidewalk mannequins Volume always increases visibility, and outside Venus & Mars (1115 E. Colonial Drive, Orlando), the number of smartly attired display figures sometimes constitutes a virtual crowd. The temptation is to stop and pose with them — although in your drab outerwear, you’d be a dead ringer for a stiff next to these…
Best of Orlando-Cuisine
Best untried theme for a restaurant 10. Catch & Eat Fish;9. Bring Your Own Buffet;8. Bikini Bistro;7. Dead Celebs;6. TV Dinner (with personal TV);5. Goth;4. Laundry Bar;3. Good Food Cheap;2. Food Fights “R” Us;1. No shirt, no shoes — yes! — service Best restaurant reading room Bathrooms in restaurants and bars certainly have their uses,…
Best of Orlando-Clubs
Best night to go downtown Within the past five years, downtown has gone from a virtual wasteland to a dense zone of bars, clubs and restaurants. Now, on weekends, a huge population descends upon Orange Avenue, crowding any place that serves up cold beer and good music. Problem: there’s too many of ya. And “lots…
Best of Orlando-Culture
Best appearance by Orlando in an independent film Coming close to matching the sleazy Chad of “In the Company of Men” is The City Beautiful as presented by writer/ director Victor Nunez in this summer’s arthouse entry “Ulee’s Gold.” Compared to the sleepy tranquility of the film’s North Florida primary locale, Nunez makes Ulee’s (Peter…
Best of Orlando-City
Best political rumor It’s said that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Here’s another fact: Power absolutely corrupts the way that people perceive those who have it. How else to explain the innuendo readers served up about Mayor Glenda Hood? (“Glenda or Glenn.” “Glenda Hood and Linda Chapin — a subplot on ‘Ellen'”?) More…
Radio theater recalls imagination
Darkness Visible Radio Theatre, WPRK-FM (91.5), 9 p.m. Tuesdays, 1997 There is, perhaps, no traditional American art form more neglected these days than the lost art of radio theater. Apart from a handful of college troupes and a couple of semiprofessional groups, Garrison Keillor’s weekly program, “A Prairie Home Companion,” stands almost alone as homage…
Late-night dance migration
Orlando City Council’s rave ban notwithstanding, the late-night dance scene is alive and well, particularly in unincorporated Orange County.;;Anyone tuned into the local media knows the tale of The Basement, the Longwood club that failed to fill the niche carved in downtown Orlando by The Club at Firestone. A combination of media attention, political rhetoric…
Politics in the schoolyard
With $2.2 billion on the line, political forces on both sides of the penny sales-tax hike are biting and scratching for the slightest advantage. In the resulting fracas, uninitiated participants such as George P. Joseph Jr. often get bruised, while old hands like Richard Schwartz stand back and look for the slightest weakness. Joseph was…
Commercializing kumquats?
Time for another voyage into the far, far, far-out frontiers of free enterprise. Today, Spaceship Hightower visits the Brave New World of your … refrigerator? Yes, specifically the fruit & veggie bin. It used to be that our oranges, carrots and whatnot just sat there quietly in our fridge. No;more, though.;;Now, various pieces of produce…
Best of Orlando-Clubs
Best night to go downtown Within the past five years, downtown has gone from a virtual wasteland to a dense zone of bars, clubs and restaurants. Now, on weekends, a huge population descends upon Orange Avenue, crowding any place that serves up cold beer and good music. Problem: there’s too many of ya. And “lots…
Best of Orlando-Introduction
You said it. We listened – again. The result is the Orlando Weekly’s second annual compendium of favorites – the Best of Orlando. And to contain it, it required the biggest Orlando Weekly ever – 100 pages listing more restaurants, more shops, more politics, more players and more things to get out and savor than…
Best of Orlando-Etc.
You know you’re an Orlandoan when …;… you leave and you miss it.;… you say, “What humidity?”;… you think 60 degrees is freezing.;… you remember when there were huge live oaks downtown.;… you are in traffic for two hours every day.;… you stop on I-4 to gawk at disabled vehicles.;… you don’t take I-4.;… you…
