below is an email forwarded from the Working Families Party. I wholeheartedly agree – I wish the gov’t would give the working man a break. But for my money, I think they don’t go far enough. Read Christopher X. Brodeur’s platform from his 2005 mayoral campaign. He makes an EXCELLENT argument for making the subways FREE.

—–

Dear WFP Supporter,

As if the cost of living in New York wasn’t high enough, the news today is that the MTA is planning another fare hike (this time 8%).

It would be only the second time ever that transit riders faced fare increases two years in a row.

Everyone knows mass transit needs to be fully funded, but subway and bus riders already pay more than their fair share, with fare revenue accounting for far more of the MTA’s funding than the national average for transit systems.¹

The solution is clear: City Hall and Albany need to protect transit riders and invest in the MTA. It’s the only way New Yorkers can have affordable, reliable public transportation.

Tell Governor Paterson and Mayor Bloomberg, before transit riders are asked to reach even deeper into their pockets, the city and state need to increase aid for subways and buses:

Send your message: www.haltthehike.org

Investing in public transportation is a no-brainer. Subways and buses are the life blood of the city we call home. They take millions of commuters to work, school, home again, and everywhere in between daily.

But with the price of gas, housing, food – the cost of living life itself – skyrocketing, keeping mass transit affordable to all New Yorkers is just as important as keeping the system running strong.

That means the only good solution is more public investment in the biggest public asset we own: mass transit.

But we have to act fast. Winning more funding for public transportation means making our voices heard. If 5,000 people send the Governor and Mayor a message, they’ll know New Yorkers won’t stand for another fare hike.

Take a moment to send your message:

Join the call:

www.haltthehike.org

That’s all for now,

Bertha Lewis, Bob Master, Sam Williams

WFP Co-Chairs

Dan Cantor

WFP Executive Director

Sources:

1. National Transit Data Base, Federal Transit Administration, 2005 and 2006

Help Working Families fight for the little guy: We can’t count on Wall Street. We rely on contributions from ordinary people like you to keep the WFP going. If you’d like to support our work, visit:http://www.workingfamiliesparty.org/contribute.php

The Kitchen has announced its Fall 2008 (September – December) Season. Total Info Immersion after the jump. You download as PDF here.

Continue Reading

Arena Stage is hosting a program of the NEA’s: the Arena Stage / New Play Development Program.

Click through for more information. The postmark deadline is THURSDAY JULY 31, 2008.

What do they say in real estate? Location is everything? So I suppose stripping is an art if you do it in a dank hipster place on the LES or in a swank red-velvet-rope exclusive nightclub for celebutards. For that matter it is art if you do it in Deitch Gallery – or anywhere else art-y.

But in Iowa… well…. Iowa doesn’t have any all-nude strip clubs — but it does have performing arts centers where women dance naked. That, however, may soon change. Here’s the article in the NY Daily News.

And here‘s the “art center” in question.

I may not be able to define it, but I know it when I see it. And that ain’t art. And if that isn’t art, would it be art if it were an entirely made-up website created to perfectly simulate a website for an Iowa strip club/cathouse? The mind reels.

Kate Bornstein’s new workshop tonight! (MONDAY JULY 28)

doors open at 7:30 for an 8PM show!

In, How Post-Modern Queer Performance Theory can Save your Freaky, Fucking Ass!, Kate Bornstein will share fun and insightful tips on living and surviving queer.  Ze’s incredibly excited to meet you and other sex positivists and conscious explorers of gender–so come on down to Dixon Place tonight!

“Queer is the word you feel for yourself when you realize that the one thing you love to perform in your life with sex and/or gender is the very thing that gets you into the most trouble. Queer—when it’s allowed to, or when it’s strong enough—can cut across lines of age, race, class, religion, ability, citizenship, looks, sexuality, or gender.” –Kate Bornstein

Dixon Place is at: 258 Bowery, 2nd Floor, NYC

Radiohole is seeking interns to help with our new show Anger/Nation (hip deep in

shit) premiering at the Kitchen September 11, 2008 (SOON!)

We are seeking enthusiastic, curious and motivated folks to help with every facet

of production. Help in administration and stage-management also needed. We

are seeking folks for the load-in period and for all shows as well as benefit

performance and party. Working period begins with load-in and September 2 and

runs through closing September 28. Longer term involvement with the company a

possibility.

Radiohole is a 4 person performance/theater collective based in Brooklyn, N.Y.

known for it’s cutting edge ‘punk’ performance style. To find out more about the

company check out: www.radiohole.com and/or visit the Kitchen website: http://thekitchen.org/

We will be available to meet with folks during the 1ST week of August or at the

latest August 27-31 after returning from tour. If interested please e-mail:

wyyy@radiohole.com with ‘intern’ in the subject heading.

This is not normally Culturebot’s purview but Sunday’s NY Daily News gossip column reported this:

Newark Mayor Cory Booker and Oprah BFF Gayle King are still going strong. While the talk-show maven is gallivanting around Europe, sans her pal, Gayle and Cory enjoyed a low-key date night, waiting in line with the masses to see “Dark Knight.” He was nuzzling his face in the back of her hair and she was giggling like a schoolgirl, our moviegoing spy reports.

Which is kind of funny because almost a year ago, exactly, Rush & Molloy reported this:

Newark may hold a special place in Arianna’s heart

Tough-minded pundit Arianna Huffington may have found a politician she approves of. Word is that the Huffington Post founder has been quietly dating Newark Mayor Cory Booker. Huffington didn’t respond to several e-mails. Hizzoner’s spokeswoman told us, “We don’t comment on his personal life.” Huffington was an early supporter of Booker in the Rhodes scholar’s battle to unseat longtime Newark boss Sharpe James. Booker has contributed several posts to her blog.

One person bound to take an interest in the talk is TV reporter (and Oprah pal) Gayle King, who has regularly turned up on Booker’s arm at events where Huffington is also a guest.

Which Gawker quickly pointed out is, like, totally gay. But why this time of year? Is it because Oprah’s on vacation and they need to prove something? Is there something about the summer months that particularly demands full frontal beard representation? Oprah should just start dating Tyler Perry and make life easy for everybody.

Check out this article in ARTnews.

old friends, new friends, friends you haven’t met yet. Friends the TV show. Frenemies. acquaintances. No matter the words you use, social stuff is pretty tricky. For some folks. As a long-time sufferer of Social Anxiety Disorder with severe Intimacy Issues and great difficulty sustaining long-term, meaningful and productive relationships either friend-wise or intimate, (just witness the trail of once-friends, now acquaintances i left in my wake) – I totally understand the premise of Larry Kunofsky’s What To Do When You Hate All Your Friends and could identify, mostly, I think, with the lead character Enid, who is a constant awkward outcast, lower-case “friend” to a small cultish group of “Friends” (capital F) who rate each other with a point system and have fabulous secret hot-tub parties and group showers.

Larry and director Jacob Krueger are friends of mine, Amy Staats who plays Enid is too, kind of. We were in Hell House together. Todd D’Amour feels like he should be my friend since I run into him pretty frequently and kind of know him from around. I don’t know anyone else in the cast but I could imagine them being my friends too.

Anyway, long story short, I’ve been taking a bit of a break from the experimental world to just kind of relax my mind and focus on other stuff for awhile. Like Feeder, What To Do When You Hate All Your Friends, is not experimental, but it is well-written and pretty darn zippy. Its funny, well-paced and enjoyable. It doesn’t take itself too seriously, it has some nice emotional moments and all in all is a darn good time in the theater.

Personally, I was mostly psyched by the performers. All of them were great but since Todd and Amy were the only ones I had seen previously, they were the ones I focused on. It was nice to be able to see these two downtown stalwarts get to flex their muscles (in the case of Todd, quite literally) and show off their mainstream acting chops.  They’re both great comic actors and are just a pleasure to watch. Carrie Keranen, Susan Louise O’Connor and Josh Lefkowitz all do great work in a whole mess of different parts. Very funny, all of them. It is amazing how satisfying it is to watch talented stage actors rather than famous people (or children of famous people) who have no stage presence whatsoever.

Maybe not the right show for a hardcore downtown crowd, but its definitely a great show for a date or something – and at $18 its a darn good deal! So take a friend. Or a  Friend.

FOREIGN C.

A reporter watches the 20th c. pass by from hotel bars and the scaffolding of unremembered buildings – never aging, hardly feeling, always humming a sweet little song.

July 23, 24, 25, and 26 at 8:00 pm

The Ontological Theater at St. Mark’s Church

131 E. 10th St. and 2nd Ave.

General Admission: $17 ($12 student)

Tickets online at www.ontological.com/INCUBATOR/kinderdeutsch.html or by phone at 212-352-3101

Text by Abi Basch

Performed by Thorsten Bihegue, Stefanie Fiedler, and Molly Shaiken

Music and Sound Design by Paula Matthusen and Jon Nelson

Lighting Design by Marnie Cumings

Costume and Prop Design by Peiyi Wong

Set Design by Adrian French

Assistant Direction by Susanne Stephani

Dramaturgy by Caroline Weist

Translations into German by Thorsten Bihegue, Stefanie Fiedler, Molly Shaiken, and Caroline Weist

Supported within the framework of the German Chancellor Fellowship Program by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, and by the Ontological-Hysteric Incubator, Fractured Atlas, The Greenwall Foundation, Austin Script Works, Dougherty Arts Center, Chashama, The Stephen F. Austin InterContinental Hotel, and individual donors. Funded in part through Meet The Composer’s MetLife Creative Connections Program.

FRIDAY, JULY 25 RECEPTION

Please join us for a reception with the artists after Friday’s show at:

Pangea

178 Second Ave (btwn 11th & 12th St)

Sponsored by American Friends of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.

AMERICAN FRIENDS OF THE ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT FOUNDATION is a non-profit organization dedicated to furthering the goals and promoting the programs of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, which encourages international contacts and intellectual collaboration among scholars of all nationalities. For more information about their programs, including fellowships and grants relevant for scholars resident in the United States, please visit: www.americanfriends-of-avh.org