Days of Beer and Ramen

Beer, ramen and porno are the three staples of bachelorhood—cheap, fast, dependable. But as a result of my nuptials of two years ago, my consumption of all three has fallen dramatically. Well, except for the porno. According to Nissin Foods, which introduced Top Ramen and Cup Noodles to the U.S. in the early 1970s, Americans …

Point and Laugh!

•Larry Agran. From his role in the Berkeley Free Speech Movement of the mid-'60s, at the head of the county's '80s slow-growth movement, and a '90s Democratic presidential candidate to this: a real-estate developer front man who shamelessly aligned himself in a campaign mailer with Republican George W. Bush. •Garden Grove Rednecks. The next time …

Refreshingly Dickless

At the very least, we can say this about Truth, Tony N Zenith: there were no gratuitous cock-flappings. That's because unlike most queer-centered theater companies (those that are always run by gay men), the OUT Theatre's debut production is made up almost entirely of women, including—wild guess—a lesbian or three. So is the theater's board …

Diary of a Mad County

SATURDAY, Nov. 2 Flipping through the November/December issue of Mother Jones while getting our back shaved, we stop on this story: deep in Dubya's sweeping, 670-page No Child Left Behind Act is a provision requiring secondary schools to provide military recruiters with contact information for every student—or face losing all federal aid. The military had …

Eating the 21st Century

Photo by Jessica CalkinsJust a few years ago, the eating-out/hanging-out options for young Asians around here were pretty much stratified between their own ethnic enclaves and everything else—few melting pots of cuisine or cultures were to be found. But it is a gloriously diverse new world in which we live—recent electoral results notwithstanding—and a new …

A Pin-Downable Derrida

Photo by Andrew CooperAny smart-ass critical-theory graduate student worth his or her subscription to Critical Inquiry knows you don't title a film portrait of French philosopher and visiting UC Irvine professor Jacques Derrida Derrida. Please. Way too monosemic. Overdetermined. Come on: didn't you catch the film about Derrida at UC Irvine last year, the one …

Landslide 2002

Photo by James Bunoan5:09 P.M. KFI talk-show hosts John and Ken admit they'd say “anything” to help defeat Governor Gray Davis. 5:15 John and Ken rant about the liberal media “shamelessly” aiding Davis and that nobody helps Simon. 5:25 Dave, a rugged fellow with an “I voted” decal, shops at the Camp in Costa Mesa …

Dank Shadows

The past isn't dead—it isn't even past—in The Weight of Water, Kathryn Bigelow's fiercely wrought, if sub-Faulknerian, time twister. Adapted from Anita Shreve's novel, The Weight of Water is a mystery that, like last summer's Possession, proceeds simultaneously on two temporal tracks, with more visceral results. True story: during the night of March 5, 1873, …

Commedia Is Not Funny

Photo by Jay FraleyA 10-minute sketch stretched to an hour and a half, the success of Rude Guerilla's commedia dell'arte Halloween production, Things That Go Bump, depends on how well you know the company and how much you like those interminable Saturday Night Live bits that seem to just keep going. The “plot” centers on …

Un-American Activities

Photo by James BunoanThere are an awful lot of retreads out there that don't have dick to do with Postmodernists knowingly “appropriating” the past. Usually, it's a lot more prosaic than that: young women artists excitedly tapping the Power of the P don't know they're following in the footsteps of every female artist of the …