On the morning of Saturday, October 20, 1962, I was in a station wagon with my family en route to Milwaukee's Billy Mitchell Field to hear President John F. Kennedy make a campaign speech for Democratic congressional candidates. As we moved slowly in a long line of cars to the airport, the radio reported that JFK had come down with a "slight cold" in Chicago and was returning … [Read more...] about Film Forum: JFK vs. the Joint Chiefs in Thirteen Days
Book Reviews
NON-FICTION Two new books could be grouped under the Lg "The Irish: Then and Now." First there's Irish America Coming into Clover: The Evolution of a Culture by Maureen Dezell. A Boston Globe staff writer, Dezell takes a rather irreverent look at Irish America in the year 2000. Some may be rubbed the wrong way by her not-too-veiled efforts to expose what may be … [Read more...] about Book Reviews
Music: The Reel Thing
Modern Ireland can boast plenty of pop superstars whose recordings sell in the millions. But if U2, Van Morrison, Sinead O'Connor and Enya are undeniably Irish musicians, is what they play really Irish music? When listening to the artists whose recordings are reviewed below, you won't have to ponder that interesting philosophical question. There's nothing more genuinely … [Read more...] about Music: The Reel Thing
Theatre: Stones in His Pockets
The West End hit comes to Broadway. Seth Linder talks to playwright Marie Jones. "It's just amazing, never in a million years could I have imagined it." Belfast playwright Marie Jones is talking of the imminent Broadway run of her play Stones in His Pockets, the story of two extras in an Irish village where a Hollywood film is being shot. The play, which debuted at the … [Read more...] about Theatre: Stones in His Pockets
Sláinte! The Ubiquitous Egg
In the 13th century when theologians were arguing how many angels could stand on the head of a pin, Thomas Aquinas, an inquisitive scholar of the Dominican Order of Friars, posed the famous question: "Which came first – the hen or the egg?" After much debate, it was agreed that mama hen came before her ovoid product. Aquinas recorded the consensus in his religious treatise … [Read more...] about Sláinte! The Ubiquitous Egg