Sunday, November 29, 2009
A DEATH IN THE FAMILY
Saturday, November 28, 2009
UKRAINE'S GOT TALENT
Friday, November 27, 2009
DOUBLE FEATURE: NEW MOON/AN EDUCATION
To begin, there's NEW MOON which doesn't have a chance in hell of being nominated for an Oscar. It's the second installment in the ongoing teen vampire saga that has grabbed a certain segment of the female population by the throat and, well, you know. While the first one conveyed a modicum of sexual hunger, the second one truly sucks. It's all sublimated teen sexual desire, frustration dramatized to a fare-thee-well, literally. This time, Bella has two guys hardly able to contain themselves. There's Edward (Rob Pattinson) the gorgeous pale hunk of a vampire who dares not get too close to his lady love, lest he release the beast within and ruin her forever. In fact, he leaves! Re-enter Jacob (Taylor Lautner) the hairy, pumped-up Native American with a mouthful of dangerously white teeth, who dares not get too worked up around Bella lest he rip her face off and scar her for life. There's a lot of anguished mumbling, and funky dream sequences, and much leaping about in the forest, and bad acting, and references to Romeo and Juliet, though Shakespeare never did utter the likes of, "So. You're a werewolf." I went with my 81 year-old mother visiting for Thanksgving who kept saying, "what's going on? Why is his skin so white?"
There's a different sort of teen movie out there, which isn't really a teen movie at all: the completely winning--and very smart AN EDUCATION starring Carey Mulligan as a precocious 16 year old London teenager during the 60's who's bursting at the seams in her stuffy little middle class rowhouse. She dreams of Paris, sex, art--and Oxford! She meets an older, urbane Jewish businessman (Peter Sarsgaard) who sees her promise and offers to show her the world. What happens is enough to make you squirm, but don't avert your eyes. Though Nick Hornby's screenplay doesn't let anyone off the hook, it subtly redeems these characters, and gently guides our heroine through the moral complexities of her youthful odyssey. And Carey Mulligan? She's been compared to Audrey Hepburn. They share a certain innocent sophistication, but Mulligan is less beautiful and has stepped into much murkier moral territory. She's subtle and compelling on screen and may just be nominated for best actress for her role here.
I'm on a cinematic roll the next two weeks!
Goodnight--
and stay tuned!
Thursday, November 26, 2009
“And it was never but once a year that they were brought together anyway, and that was on the neutral, dereligionized ground of Thanksgiving, when everybody gets to eat the same thing, nobody sneaking off to eat funny stuff—no kugel, no gefilte fish, no bitter herbs, just one colossal turkey for two hundred and fifty million people—one colossal turkey feeds all. A moratorium on funny foods and funny ways and religious exclusivity, a moratorium on the three-thousand-year-old nostalgia of the Jews, a moratorium on Christ and the cross and the crucifixion for the Christians, when everyone in New Jersey and elsewhere can be more passive about their irrationalities than they are the rest of the year. A moratorium on all the grievances and resentments . . . for everyone in America who is suspicious of everyone else. It is the American pastoral par excellence and it lasts twenty-four hours.”
—Philip Roth
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Celtic Woman/THE BLIND SIDE/Adam Lambert
Monday, November 23, 2009
Saturday, November 21, 2009
Friday, November 20, 2009
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Saturday, November 14, 2009
Friday, November 13, 2009
info at http://melanomafoundationne.org
Tonight I am off to see the Boston Lyric Opera Company's production of CARMEN at the Shubert Theatre!
Also--There are two magazine articles on me this month--check out the Fall 2009 issue of NORTHWEST LIFE--I'm on the cover!
And please read Dana Farber's PATHS OF PROGRESS--I'm featured on the back page. Many people know I am a three-time cancer survivor--melanoma and ovarian. Given that medical history, I am grateful to be here-- and blogging!!! No kidding. Entering the Blogosphere is beyond huge for me. I have been holding back all this time, but now feel like I have much to say.
If you have no idea who I am, please check out my bio:
Arts & Entertainment Critic
Joyce Kulhawik, arts and entertainment critic, has been an integral part of the region’s cultural landscape since 1978. Kulhawik has been instrumental in focusing attention on local artists and events, as well as covering all aspects of Broadway and Hollywood. Paul Newman, Robert DeNiro, Meryl Streep, Julia Roberts, and Barbara Streisand are among the many entertainment luminaries she has interviewed for WBZ-TV. Kulhawik is a member of the Boston Society of Film Critics, and serves on the selection committee for The Elliot Norton Awards, Boston’s local theater awards, Kulhawik also serves on the board for the Massachusetts sports and entertainment commission.
Kulhawik was co-host of the weekly nationally syndicated movie review program “Hot Ticket” with veteran movie critic Leonard Maltin, and during the 1999-2000 television season, she was a continuing co-host on “Roger Ebert & The Movies,” the popular nationally syndicated film review program.
A three-time cancer survivor, Kulhawik was called upon to testify before Congress on the occasion of the twentieth anniversary of The National Cancer Act. Since 1983 she has served as the Honorary Chairperson for the American Cancer Society’s “Daffodil Days,” helping to raise millions of dollars in the Society’s largest statewide spring fundraising event. The American Cancer Society has honored Kulhawik with its National Bronze Medal Award for her work. Kulhawik accepted the 1994 Gilda Radner Award from the Wellness Community in Greater Boston “for engendering inspiration in cancer patients via her own valiant fight with the disease.”
In 2009 Kulhawik was awarded the StageSource Theatre hero Award for her service and inspiration as a champion of Boston area theatre and the arts. Kulhawik also received the 2009 Boston Globe Arts Champion Award by the Boston Center for the Arts.
In 2008 Kulhawik received The Emerson College Award of Distinction. She was also recognized by the Boston City Council with a special resolution in honor of her 30-year career reporting on arts and entertainment in the Boston area, and her commitment to raising cancer awareness. Kulhawik was also named a member of the Boston/New England Chapter of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences' Silver Circle. This honor is given to distinguished individuals who have made significant contributions to television over the course of at least 25 years. In the spring of 2007, she was also inducted into the MCC Broadcasters Hall of Fame. Kulhawik received the Community Spirit Award at the 2006 New England Women’s Leadership Awards, the longest running event in Boston honoring the achievements of women.
In May 2002, Kulhawik received an Honorary Doctorate in Communications from her alma mater, Simmons College in Boston. Kulhawik also received a 2001 Boston/New England Emmy Award for WBZ-TV 's Outstanding Team Coverage of Ground Zero. Kulhawik also starred in the WBZ-TV Emmy award-winning promotion “The Look” for Boston's Museum of Fine Arts.
In 1994 the Berklee College of Music honored Kulhawik for her many contributions to the Boston arts community by establishing a $25,000 newly endowed scholarship in her name, in perpetuity. In 1995 the Lyric Stage Company honored Kulhawik with their Arts Support Award. In 1990 she was the recipient of The Boston Theatre District Award, which is presented annually to a Bostonian who has made a significant contribution to the stage, screen, and/or television. Previous recipients include Lee Remick, Bette Davis, Ray Bolger, Jane Curtin, and Jane Alexander. Additionally, Kulhawik was honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award by her high school, The Academy of Our Lady of Mercy, Lauralton Hall, in 1982.
Kulhawik joined WBZ-TV in 1978 as an associate producer and tipster for “Evening Magazine.” In 1981 she became the station’s arts and entertainment reporter covering all aspects of art, entertainment and pop culture and played a key role in the public service campaign, “You Gotta Have Arts!” As part of the campaign, Kulhawik hosted the station’s Emmy Award-winning “You Gotta Have Arts!” magazine program during its one year run, as well as three specials, the first of which received an Emmy Award in 1982. She also presented “Arts Breaks,” sixty-second spots featuring local artists, museums, and cultural events. From 1982 through 1985 Kulhawik served as co-anchor of the station’s “Live on 4” newscast.
Kulhawik received her Bachelor of Arts degree in English & Secondary Education from Simmons College in 1974. One of the top two graduating seniors at Simmons, Kulhawik received the prestigious Crown Zellerbach Award and a full fellowship from the University of Vermont, where she received her MAT in English/Education in 1977. She taught English at Brookline High School from 1976 through 1978 and at the Boston Architectural Center from 1977 through 1979.
A talented musician, Kulhawik plays the piano and has sung professionally. She was the soloist and organist for seven years at her parish church in her home state of Connecticut. She resides
with her husband and daughter in the greater Boston area.
That's it for today. I promise not to be so longwinded in the future.