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Cover Story

Kathleen Gaffney

by Anthony Chase

At the precise moment when they needed to show some courage, the Studio Arena board of trustees rose to the occasion. They made a bold choice in selecting Kathleen Gaffney as the new artistic director of the venerable institution. An unconventional candidate for the job, Gaffney is a dynamic personality who has worked as an actress, playwright, director, arts administrator, motivational speaker and educator, but who has spent the recent years of her career outside the mainstream of the theater world.

Letters to Artvoice

Is the Seneca casino in Buffalo a racist issue? It sure feels cold in Buffalo to this Seneca woman. The article in Artvoice, “Barry E. Snyder Goes Showbiz” by Bruce Jackson (Artvoice v5n13), gave me spine shivers. Is it people, media, leaders, followers? Please tell me.

News of the Weird

by Chuck Shepherd

■ You Might Want to Do Your Shoplifting Elsewhere: Increasingly, police departments and government offices (customs agencies, NASA, even the FBI) rely on state-of-the-art investigation support from the Target Corp. (as in Target department stores), according to a January Washington Post report. Target’s world-class forensics lab in Minneapolis is the first choice by many departments for examination of surveillance tapes and other evidence, and it was Target in the mid 1990s that finally moved agencies to coordinate previously incompatible databases of criminals, treating the felon population as a nationwide “inventory control” problem. A Target executive said he works for “a high-tech company masquerading as a retailer.”

Free Will Astrology

by Rob Brezsny

ARIES (March 21-April 19): If you live to be 90 years old, you will have spent a total of eight months sitting in your car stopped at red lights. In addition, you will have wasted 10 months standing in lines at stores, banks and government agencies, and you will have lost almost two years killing time while hoping that a certain phone call, letter or email will arrive. That’s the bad news, Aries. The good news is that few of those agonizing pauses will be racked up in the near future. This is one time when “no waiting” is the rule. You could make three months’ progress in 15 days.

The News, Briefly

Northern Exposure

by Peter Koch

Recycling Railroads

by Peter Koch

Right Time, Wright Place

by Geoff Kelly

Getting a Grip

Democracy's Northward March

by Michael I. Niman

If you relied on the US media for your worldview, you probably grew up equating Latin America with dictatorship and chronic political instability. Terms like “banana republic” worked their way into our language, giving mainstream respectability to ignorance and xenophobia. According to our government and media, “those people” couldn’t govern themselves—hence periodic US invasions were sold to us as nothing less than altruism.

The Casino Chronicles

The Real Villains

by Bruce Jackson

There is a document in which the Seneca Gaming Corporation—the three subsidiaries of which run the Seneca Nation’s gambling operations in Niagara Falls and Salamanca, and their planned gambling operation in Buffalo—specifically enunciates its economic vision for Buffalo. The subsidiary running the Buffalo operation is the Seneca Erie Gaming Corporation (SEGC).

Book Review

The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey, by Candice Millard

by Karen A. DePalma

After Theodore Roosevelt’s bitter and divisive Progressive (a/k/a “Bull Moose”) Party run for a third term in 1912, he was a pariah without a country. His political contemporaries shunned him for splitting the Republican vote and putting Woodrow Wilson in the White House. He was filled with “black care” and his modus operandi was to pick up the pace and push himself beyond physical limits.

Boom Days Poetry Winners

#1 Breaking Up Is Good For You

by Douglas Manson

#2 Go Boom

by Joseph A. Defetti

#3 Boomdays Blues

by Meghan Anson

Gewgaws and Gimcracks

OranguCoo Clock

by David P. Kleinschmidt

My mom thinks I like monkeys. I don’t know why. It seems that every opportunity she gets to give me a gift I end up getting some new monkey, ape, gorilla or orangutan merchandise. By now I’ve gotten so many stuffed monkeys, monkey t-shirts, monkey notepads, monkey picture frames, barrels of monkeys, inflatable monkeys and monkey-shaped foodstuffs that I’m starting to go bananas. What’s worse is that now other people are starting to get in on this monkey business as well.

Artist of the Week

Joseph Cipolla

by Caroline Phelan

Why you should know who he is: Although you may not have seen Joseph Cipolla in Buffalo recently, he has been busy running between teaching ballet as an adjunct faculty member at UB and starting up his own dance company, Configuration Dance. As a graduate of St. Joe’s and the American Academy of Ballet in Amherst, Cipolla has been dancing on international stages with professional companies for nearly three decades, including a command performance for Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace. Sharing his gifts with young students has always been one of his great loves, along with rousing enthusiasm for the cultural and social importance of the arts.

Stagefright

by Javier

An era has ended with the passing of our beloved Blossom Cohan (pictured above). The heart and soul of Studio Arena, Blossom always loved a party, especially if the bartender could mix a good martini and a respectable rye and soda. To ensure that the partying didn’t stop with her death, Blossom provided for one last party with a bequest in her will. The final Blossom Bash, courtesy of Madame Cohan, will be held at Studio Arena Theatre on May 8th, from 5–9pm.

Film

With Extreme Prejudice

by George Sax

In assembling his documentary on the case of the two Italian immigrants who were tried and executed as anarchists in the 1920s, filmmaker Peter Miller didn’t really need to include a clip of former Attorney General John Ashcroft congratulating himself and the Bush Administration on the supposed apprehension of foreign and domestic terrorists. The point, that the Sacco and Vanzetti case has trans-historical resonance for our anxious, nasty times, is quite clear without it.

Film Reviews

Holiday Retreat: Joyeux Noel

by M. Faust

The Devil Gets the Best Lines: Thank You for Smoking

by M. Faust

Hot Button Hype?: The Great Warming

by George Sax

About Face: Lucky Number Slevin

by M. Faust

See You There

Negativland's Mark Hosler

by Geoff Kelly

Story of a Girl

by Peter Koch

Matthew Good

by Daniel B. Honigman

Boom Days Celebration

by Peter Koch

NET<3: Sociable Technologies

by Geoff Kelly

Left of the Dial

Centro-Matic: Fort Recovery

by Donny Kutzbach

Margot and the Nuclear So and So's: Dust of Retreat

by Donny Kutzbach

Bandwidth

The Dustmen

Anything else you would like our readers to know about the band? We will be recording a live CD this May 26 in the pub of the Buffalo Irish Center. We’d love to pack the place that night! Check our website for more details.