Philadelphia City Paper, July 15th, 2010

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with THE PHILADELPHIA ORCHESTRAGeorge Fenton, composer and conductor

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[ 0 ] City Controller Alan Butkovitz criticizes the citys BigBelly compactors for not saving as much money or manpower as promised. He does this in a report titled The absolute lowest-hanging fruit I could find, By Alan Butkovitz.

[ +1] The Pennsylvania Liquor Control Boards new wine kiosks, already available in Harrisburg, will debut in Philly as early as September. Finally, all the classiness of Harrisburg and the convenience of a Piercing Pagoda.

[ +3] Federal prosecutors push for a longer sentence for former state Sen. Vincent Fumo, who got 55 months for mail fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy, filing a false tax return and obstruction of justice. Like that one, which was 32 words!

[ -5 ] The third high-ranking official in Gov. Ed Rendells administration in the past year leaves for a job with a Marcellus Shale company. And, on his first day on the job, he is handed a balloon full of natural gas and made to breathe it in before the con-gregation. And when he does, he feels the heaviness of it enter his lungs, but also something else, an uneasy lightness, for his soul had escaped and flown away. As the day goes on, he laments his loss, but there is plenty more gas to be had, so he drowns his sorrows in that.

[ +2] In the first issue of a new DC Comics series, Superman visits Philly. Where hes awarded a no-bid contract to protect the city, gets fat and lazy, then expends his waning political power protecting his patronage jobs at the Philadelphia Hall of Justice.

[ -4 ] WPHT host Dom Giordano camps out-side Genos Steaks to protest the federal lawsuit challenging Arizonas new ille-gal-immigration law. Thats fine, Dom, do your thing. And if, late at night, Joey Vento stops by and the two of you just start mak-ing out on the fixins stand, whispering sweet Spanish nothings into each others ears, thats fine, too. Because even back-ward bigots deserve to be happy. Are you happy, Dom?

This weeks total: -3 | Last weeks total: 5

thebellcurveCPs Quality-o-Life-o-Meter

thenakedcity

evan m. loPez

Z ack Stalberg, president and CEO of the Committee of Seventy, is used to making good press whether its calling for the (successful) elimination of the Clerk of Quarter Sessionsand the Board of revision of taxes or, before that, working as esteemed editor of the Daily News for 20 years.

So when The Public Record came out with two scathing articles earlier this month about Stalberg and his government watchdog group, our ears perked up. Granted, the Records publisher and editor, Jimmy tayoun, is an ex-City Council member who served more than three years for mail fraud and racketeering in the 1990s. (youll be pleased to know he used the jail time wisely, writ-ing a how-to book called Going to Prison?.) Not the best messenger, perhaps. But still, at least someone is refusing to bow before Stalberg; the city intelligentsias tendency to treat Seventys every pronouncement like it was handed down from the mountaincan be a bit grating.

Tayoun and co-author joe Shaheeli took issue with Stalbergs $248,733 salary; his purported inability to understand the legal mandate for the row offices; his groups allegedly too-close-for-comfort relationship with the real estate industry; and his expansion of Seventys original clean-elections mission to becoming the propaganda force for those who stand to gain from reor-ganizing city government.

I think its all completely off base, says Stalberg. I dont particu-larly respect The Public Record as journalism or anything close to it.

While its true that several of Seventys board members hail from the business and real estate worlds, Stalberg denies any impropriety. The important thing is, has any funder or anyone else asked me to do or say anything wrong or for selfish reasons? And in the five years or more Ive been here, that never happened.

As for his anti-row office campaign, Stalberg points out that the idea originated with mayor michael nutter, and last year, the Pennsylvania Intergovernmental Cooperation Authority (PICA) quantified the savings shuttering the row offices would bring: $15 million a year.

In speaking out for this, our interest is in saving money that we think is not being well spent, says Stalberg. If PICA says its possible to save $15 million, Id rather see it spent making schools better or make the streets safer.

Tayoun was out of the country and could not be reached for com-ment. But in a july 8 editorial, Tayoun made at least one semi-lucid critique of Seventys aims: If you eliminate the row offices and consolidate their duties inside the mayors office, youre going to

>>> continued on adjacent page

amillionstories Your new favorite propaganda force

This isnt nuclearphysics.

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WHAT YOURE WORTHA CHALLENGE: See if you can price a human being. Go ahead, dont be shy. If youre having trouble, ask the master himself, Gary Loveman CEO of Harrahs Entertainment. If the reports are true that Harrahs may try to take over Phila del phias flailing Foxwoods Casino project he should be in town soon enough.

We know what every customer is worth. Think about that, Loveman boasts in the 2002 book Jackpot! Harrahs Winning Secrets for Customer Loyalty by Robert L. Shook (Win a trip to Harrahs Las Vegas! says a fake sticker on the cover).

Loveman isnt just some businessman hes a kind of scientist, a technician of the human mind. With data and computers, Harrahs casinos can calculate exactly how and how much a gambler can be convinced to play longer, and to greater loss, than they might otherwise. In other words, to increase their value to the casino.

The principle is very simple: Humans, like dogs, respond to rewards. Harrahs treats its custom-ers accordingly: We would reward customers for spending in ways that added to their value, Loveman explained in a 2003 article for the Harvard Business Review.If, for example, we discovered a customer who spends $1,000 a month hadnt visited us in three months, a letter or telephone call would invite him back. [A] certain per-centage of our customers responded positively to offers of a steak dinner. We decided to make a point of routing our customers into three different lines. People who werent card-carrying Harrahs members stood in lines; Platinum customers would stand in still shorter lines, and Diamond cardholders would rarely ever have to stand in line. [W]e watched as our customers did what they could to earn the higher-tiered cards.

Loveman mined the data deeper than that: When a player slows, computers alert floor managers to comp them a drink; players whove been losing might get free credit. Ours is a push strategy, remarks Harrahs communications chief Gary Thompson in Jackpot!

Now and then, they might push a little too hard: Harrahs, like other casinos, has seen its share of bankrupt gamblers, lawsuits and suicides. But without those friendly little nudges, we just arent worth as much.

Look for Man Overboard! in its new home next to This Modern World, beginning next week. E-mail Isaiah Thompson at [email protected].

manoverboard!By Isaiah Thompson

[ is engaging in unusual business arrangements ]

have one hell of a powerful mayor. Though the notion of a mayor who could, you know, actually get shit done is not without its charms.

YOUR GOVERNMENT AT WORK

Speaking of good-government types and of the one tangible thing Nutter has accomplished City Controller Alan Butkovitz has spent the last few months investigating a very serious subject: the citys solar-powered compacting trash cans. He will now render a verdict. You might want to sit down.

On Monday, the controllers office released a 25-page report titled Purchase and Deployment of BigBelly Solar Compactors, and we read it, because thats what we do.After all, this being Philadelphia, even a relatively small-potatoes, $3 million, environ-mentally friendly thing is almost sure to be rife with is cor-ruption too strong a word? Lets call it incompetence.

According to the report, BigBelly suckered the city into a single-source contract by claiming that it was the only company that could sell the contraptions; the city could have saved 200 grandby going through distributors. Moreover, the report claims that the city had paid nearly $19,000 in interest on items it had not yet received, an unusual business arrangement.

Theres more, naturally: BigBelly doesnt have a required

Business Privilege License; the city didnt train its workers to work the machines; about 90 of the $3,700-a-pop trash canshad clouded or opaque plastic solar bubbles, meaning they couldnt generate the energy they needed to do the compacting; and 31 of the original 501 machines the city bought have yet to hit the streets.

Also and sadly, not surprisingly the report claims that the compactors didnt produce the savings we were promised: We were told the city would save $13 million over the next decadebecause city workers wouldnt have to pick up trash as often. In fact, whereas the city figured it would have to collect the compacted trash only five times a week, the report claims that, in March and April, the city averaged 10 collections a week per trash can.

BigBelly vice president of marketing Richard Kennelly told the DN that the report was riddled with inaccuracies, though he didnt elaborate. Streets Commissioner Clarena Tolson sent a letter to Butkovitz claiming that the program enabled the city to eliminate 24 positions: There is no question in my mind that the BigBelly compactor program has saved taxpayer money.

Cmon, people, this isnt nuclear physics:Either the program is a money-sucking clusterfuck or Butkovitz is as much of a hack as hes accusing the Streets Department bureaucrats of being.

Which option do you believe? Yeah, us, too.

GET A JOB YOU LAZY BUMS

Last Friday, on Pennsylvania Public Radio in Lancaster County where nearly 22,000 people are unemployed, BTW GOP gubernatorial nominee Tom Corbett let this slip: People dont want to come back to work while they still have unemploy-ment. The jobs are there, but if we keep extending unem-ployment, people are going to sit there and Ive literally had construction companies tell me, I cant get people to come back to work, until they say, Ill come back to work when unemploy-ment runs out.

For the record: Unemployment benefits are temporary, and usu-ally provide only half of a workers ordinary pay.To make matters worse, Corbett cant even get his story straight. First, he said a construction company spoke to him about those lazy wel-fare queens; then he claimed it was a candy company; later still, his spokesman said it was a plumbing business. Whichever it is, it totally sounds like a fair sampling of Pennsylvanias 500,000 unemployment benefit recipients.

For the record: Pennsylvanias unemployment rate is at a 26-year high;nationwide, there are five applicants for every open position.The jobs arent there, Tom. You prick.

Corbett rival Dan Onorato sent out a press release Monday morning reveling in the gaffe: Corbett thinks Pennsylvanians would rather be unemployed than earning money for their families, and he simply doesnt understand the economy.

True. But then, at the end of the release, Onorato reminds his audience that: A life-long Pennsylvanian, Dan Onorato was raised in a working class neighborhood on Pittsburghs North Side.

Well, isnt that convenient, you transparently political cheeseball?

Corbett, on a scale of one to 23, you get a 20 on this weeks How Evil is Tom Corbett? Barometer.And Onorato, you get a slap on the wrist.

This weeks report by Jeffrey C. Billman, Holly Otterbein and Yowei Shaw. E-mail us at [email protected].

AMILLIONSTORIES

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ity [ the naked city ]

SOCCER, IN; MLS, OUTABOUT TWO-AND-A-HALF weeks ago, the U.S. Mens National Soccer Team spent about two-and-a-half hours inside Royal Bafokeng Stadium in Rustenburg, South Africa, unsuccessfully attempting to avenge their 2006 loss to Ghana. Roughly 8,000 miles away, all of Philadelphia and if it was not all, judging from the overflowing bars, packed apartments and near-universal red, white and blue wardrobes, it was close joined 20 million other Americans shouting for our nation, cheering for our side and cursing Ricardo Clark.

Thats a lot of people, and it wasnt even the World Cups high-water mark: The championship match last Sunday between Holland and Spain drew 24.3 million American viewers. In the meantime, the Cup dominated water-cooler conversations.

All of this means one thing: The endless ques-tion, Is soccer ever going to make it in America? can be answered. Yes. Soccer can, will and has made it in America. Association football is now as American as combination Pizza Hut/Taco Bells. When Paul the Psychic Octopus becomes a house-hold name, soccer is here to stay.

Major League Soccer (MLS) and with it, our local chapter, the Chester-based Philadelphia Union is another matter.

The first major impediment to MLS success is simple: talent. Americans want the best. Roger Federer has more American endorsements than Andy Roddick, Usain Bolt has more American fans than any national sprinter, and the top European leagues, like Englands Premier League, Spains La Liga and Italys Serie A, are all more popular here than MLS. Last months exposure to top-level international soccer has increased that divide. The World Cup brought a demand for the type of quality play that can only be supplied in Europe. Casual fans, suddenly armed with favorite players to follow, will trail Andrs Iniesta to Barca, Wesley Sneijder to Inter Milan, and Americans Landon Donovan and Tim Howard to Everton. The tourna-ment gave Americans a new set of favorites, and theyre all overseas.

Meanwhile, no Union player so much as made a World Cup roster. Their best player, Congolese Striker Danny Mwanga, speaks openly about his desire to play in France. Why? Because that is what successful MLS players do. Under pressure to prove their talent against top-flight competition, make serious money (the average MLS team is worth a little less than 40 percent of Real Madrid star Cristiano Ronaldos transfer fee), and gain the international experience National Team officials covet, American stars arent stars in America for long. Dont be fooled by the several big names the MLS has drawn, either David Beckham, Freddie

Ljungberg and now Thierry Henry as all are seen world-wide as heading into the final stages of their careers.

Water will find its level, and the American tide remains low.

Star power isnt the only reason new soccer fans turn to Europe. It is literally easier to watch a Blackpool F.C. game from your couch than it is to see the team bearing your own citys name. Thanks to big-money-partnerships between top European leagues and the ESPNs of the world, foreign sides are getting easier to track. The big networks now have quality games to feed us, and a financial incentive to make sure we dig in. After ESPN recently shelled out $408 million for limited broadcast rights for the

Premiership and an undisclosed amount to air La Liga, coverage is assured. If you want to see Union stars like Sebastien Le Toux and Fred and cant make it out to PPL Park in Chester, youre probably streaming the game online. No one invites bud-dies over to do that.

The way the Union exists now in a minor league, with a pas-sionate message-board fan base and no other followers to speak of is a fine place to be. But with-out strong corporate backing and truly elite stars, theyre also far closer to their ceiling than most close to the league care to admit. Big events like the World Cup arent going to help theyre going to drive away successful National Team players and their hard-won fans with them.

So while soccer in America has, is and will take off, also realize that American soccer leagues wont be coming with them.

E. James Beale swears hes big in Europe. E-mail him at [email protected].

sportscomplexBy E. James Beale

Water will find its level, and the American tide re mainslow.

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BUT ENOUGH ABOUT MEWEEK AFTER WEEK AFTER WEEK. Writing a newspaper col-umn is a devotion you do because you love it. And I have.

For almost 20 years since 1991, to be exact Ive been writing op-eds for City Paper. First as publisher and editor (Publishers Clearinghouse) and, since 1996 (after I sold the newspaper to the Rock family), as an outside agitator, under the banner of Loose Canon. Week after week, I never missed a beat.

Ive been a very committed correspondent. I filed without fail from Europe, Asia and Israel. Ive turned in stories from hospital beds as I recovered from two heart infections and a mild stroke.

But in late June, when City Papers page count dropped, my col-umn was held for a week. And then, for the first time ever, it was bumped a second week. Two weeks without writing a column, and guess what: I loved what it did for my head.

Not that I hated the column. I think it did some good, and along the way, Ive met a lot of goofy, smart, contentious and wonderful people. But I didnt love it anymore. Sorry, friends. I have to go.

Now, its unusual for an old owner to stick around, much less be welcomed for so long by a place he once ruled. But City Paper is a strange place. Hatched at WXPN in 1981 when it was a commu-nity radio station City Paper has built a progressive community where staffers stay and readers stick around. Its wonderful.

So, Im not leaving completely. If writing were gaming, you could say Im taking on another avatar. No longer a loose canon, the aegis of an angry, young man. At 57, I am neither.

Still, tough things need to be said, and Im grateful that my colleagues especially Brian Howard, Jeffrey Billman and Isaiah Thompson have the chops to say them. And a pub-lisher my friend and former partner, Paul Curci with the stones to let them. Im honored to pass them my torch.

For of late, my rage is giving me moral heartburn. So Im taking another tack; Im following a belief that the world must be good. Ive become an optimist by necessity, because I dont see how the world or I can otherwise survive.

Instead of an orator, I am becoming an enabler. And for that opportunity, I thank my friends at the University of the Arts. While the Canon was on vacation, I taught another weeklong intensive on audio slideshows and again I loved it. (See my stu-dents work and grab a syllabus at schimmel.com.)

I need to produce audio slideshows, a sort of journalism as simple and direct as a filmstrip (if you remember them). In audio slideshows unlike movies the sound, not the image, drives the story. In slideshows, what people say matters.

I have good stories cued up: Tree House Books, Harvey Finkle, Mike Hardy, Woodford Orchard, the Airport Gardens. A series with photog Michele Frentrop on famous vacant stores on South Street, such as the former Cohens Hardware. (Got any ideas? E-mail me.)

Over beers last week, Howard and talked about my future with CP. Im thinking about an interview column to accompany my slideshows. Where people speak in a quieter key about what they love, fear, and what theyre doing about it.

With so much journalism overheated and shortsighted today, I want to create a place thats cooler and more thoughtful: a van-tage point, an overlook from which to talk about the long view.

Thank you so much for listening. See you soon.

I remain at [email protected].

loosecanonBy Bruce Schimmel

Sorry, friends, I have to go.

[ the naked city ]

WHO YOU CALLIN CORNY?Corny? Would you call the last movement of the Mahler Eighth corny [Music Pick, The Philly Pops, Peter Burwasser, July 1]? Neither would I, but dont worry, we wont play it. Rhapsody in Bluemay be corny and if the humidity stays low and the repetitions on the piano hold up, I may attempt playing it and without a net, too. Thanks for the plug for the orchestra. They are indeed a fantastic bunch and no matter what they (we) play, it will be at the highest level of musicianship and stylistic authenticity.

Peter NeroConductor, Philadelphia Pops

V I A E - M A I L

GLIMMERS OF HOPEHow come the country which used to brag anyone could grow up to be president has the highest incarceration rate in the world and the biggest defense budget! Troy Johnsons bio [Loose Canon, Growth Industry, Bruce Schimmel, July 8] is a little glimmer of hope. Bless him!

Patrick D. HazardV I A C I T Y PA P E R . N E T

MONEY BUYS JUSTICEMoney can buy justice: The rich get bailed out and get their act together for their defense [Cover Story, Bail Is for the Rich, Holly Otterbein, June 24]. Anyone else, for all practical purposes, gets punished immediately.

RichV I A C I T Y PA P E R . N E T

FULL OF FAILThis article is so full of fail that I think Jerome is a fictional person created just for this article [Cover Story, How Was I Even Able To Do What I Did? Andrew Thompson, July 1]. The NRA had nothing to do with organizing the counter-protest against HGC. Id be surprised if NRA even knew about it. It was organized by local gun owners who didnt want to see a local shop harassed.

The three 2008 Philly gun laws that werent struck down werent upheld the court just said NRA didnt have a legal standing. Theyll have to wait until someone is actually charged with breaking one of the laws before they can fight it. The laws were supposed to be such a big help, yet nobody has been charged with them in 2.5 years!

MikeV I A C I T Y PA P E R . N E T

feedbackFrom our readers

Send all letters to Feedback, City Paper, 123 Chestnut St., 3rd Floor, Phila. PA 19106; fax us at 215-599-0634; or e-mail [email protected]. Submissions may be edited for clarity and space and must include an address and daytime phone number.

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sorts of air pollution, he says. In fact, one study suggests that natural gas drill-ing near Dallas had doubled the regions air pollution. Then there are the spills: Boufadels models show that spilled frack-ing wastewater because it is salty and heavy sinks as it moves away from the source of the spill, perhaps too deep for DEP monitors to pick it up.

Nonetheless, Boufadel warns, it will even-tually resurface. The word eventually is key: Even if the toxins injected into the ground dur-ing fracking havent yet reached groundwa-ter, how, without an independent study, can the public be assured that they never will?

The idea of assuming that whatever they inject would never come up is really not scien-tific, says Boufadel. Everything that exists in the literature tells us thats not the case that you cannot ensure it will not come up.

The Environmental Protection Agency is in the midst of a large-scale study of hydraulic fracturing, but it could take years, Boufadel says, and wont be the kind of localized study he says Philadelphia needs. Meanwhile, the state has shown no interest in hiring its own academics.

We need many studies, not just one, says Boufadel. There are many institutions of higher learning in the Commonwealth. The idea that you would not consult with them is, like, anti-science, I would say.

Seeing little interest from the state, Boufadel is hoping that Philadelphia will step up and, in its own interest, commission such a study, much like New York City did last fall, when it hired a consultant whose research convinced New Yorks environ-mental regulators to effectively block drill-ing, at least for now, in that citys watershed.

In March, City Council passed a resolution asking the Delaware River Basin Commiss-ion not to approve drilling applications until such a study is done. (The commission has temporarily halted all drilling in the Dela-ware River basin while it develops new regu-lations.) Councilman Curtis Jones Jr. plans to hold hearings on the possible impacts to Philadelphia of fracking this fall, and has invited experts, including Boufadel, to testify.

Of course, resolutions are free, while studies cost money. Boufadel estimates such a study would cost between $250,000 and $500,000 not exactly chump change, but consid-erably less than, say, the $8 million the Philadelphia Eagles owed the city in skybox revenue as of 2009.

Boufadel wouldnt mind getting the research money himself but denies that he or any other academic would be in it for the money. He cites a different motive: I live here, too and I have children.

([email protected])

A friend who lives in Pittsburgh has a favorite joke: Where I live, in Pennsylvania he says; or We have that in Pennsylvania, too. Because while Philly is inPennsylvania, it is not always ofPennsylvania at least when it comes to some things: politics, guns, Confederate flags and natural gas.

By a fluke of geography, most of southeastern Pennsylvania lies outside of the area defined by an underground geologic formation known as the Marcellus Shale, which contains a fantastic amount of natural gas perhaps enough to significantly change the way America gets energy for decades. Its only relatively recently that the technology to extract that gas has become widely available: a technique called hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, in which water containing toxic and carcinogenic materials is injected thousands of feet below the water table to release trapped gas.

Pennsylvania has suddenly become the epicenter of a massive gold rush or, rather, gas rush as companies have raced to lease private and public land for drilling.

And with that drilling have come problems. There was the migra-tion of methane gas into the drinking wells of residents of Dimock, Pa.There are the frequent spills of toxic fracking fluids more than a hundred in the last year and a half. There was the recent explosion of a well in Clearfield County, which spewed toxic water for hours.

But even as the Marcellus Shale shapes up to be one of the most significant economic and environmental forces in Pennsylvania, now and for decades to come, there has been surprisingly little independent research into what gas drilling means for Philadelphia and city officials have shown relatively little interest.

What Philadelphia needs is information so says chemical hydrologist and Temple professor Michel Boufadel, who, with mild, scientific determination, has begun his own campaign to convince the city that what the state will not do for Philly, Philly must do for itself. In short, he thinks Philadelphia whose water supply, after all, depends upon the very watersheds energy companies seek for gas drilling should play a leading role in subjecting that drilling

to rigorous scientific examination. Boufadel is no stranger to toxins. Born in Lebanon, he came to

the United States in 1990, just a year after the massive Exxon Valdez spill, to pursue doctoral work on oil spills and the ways that moving water interacts with pollutants. Hes become an expert: When scientists discovered a few years ago that the Exxon Valdez oil was still resurfacing, the federal government hired Boufadel to help explain why. When the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico in April, Boufadel who now chairs Temples Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and heads its Center for Natural Resources Development and Protection was among the experts hired by federal authorities to assist.

It was less than a year ago, he says, that he first became aware of the scale and potential risk of Pennsylvanias burgeoning frack-

ing industry. And the more I read, the more I realized theres not much done in terms of scientific, objective studies on this, Boufadel recalls.

Indeed, while the natural gas indus-try has exploded in Pennsylvania in

recent years from zero Marcellus Shale wells in 2004 to some 1,700 drilled and another 2,300 permitted today virtually no systemic studies have been conducted on frackings potential envi-ronmental impacts. We do not have a law that requires or autho-rizes an environmental impact study, acknowledges Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) Secretary John Hanger.

As the states chief environmental regulator, Hanger has advo-cated for changes in other laws governing drilling a tax on gas production, and a mandate for buffers around sensitive streams, for instance. But Hanger does not think an impact study is necessary. Studies are nice, but even better is real-world experience, he says.

For Boufadel, such reasoning is backward: Without studies, how can we know what problems might surface?

He ticks off a few possibilities: On-site compressors release all

[ the naked city ]

We need manystudies.

HAIL, SCIENCE: Temple professor

Michael Boufadel says little research has been

done on the environ-mental impacts of

Marcellus Shale drilling.

JESSICA KOURKOUNIS

[ gas problems ]

WE NEED INFORMATIONA Temple profs campaign to alert city officials to the dangers of Shale drilling. By Isaiah Thompson

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Pennsylvania. Consumers overvalue the benefit of not having to pay taxes for 15 years and are willing to pay even more for their new homes than the tax abatement is truly worth.

Others arent so sure. Whether [the abatement is] enough to encourage devel-opment in a low-income neighborhood, I dont know, says Rick Sauer, head of the Philadelphia Association of Community Development Corporations.

There are political problems, too: City Council recently passed a two-year, 9.99 percent property tax increase. If long-term residents were already upset about new homeowners getting a break, how would they feel about an even longer abatement?

DiCiccos bill has a long way to go before becoming reality. It has stalled in Council.

Coming up [to] an election year, where there are so many Philadelphians who dont understand the full benefit of the 10-year tax abatement, my colleagues might be concerned about talking about a 15-year abatement, DiCicco says. Its probably not the best time politically, although I think its the right thing to do.

([email protected])

[ gimme shelter ]

THE HIGH COST OF AFFORDABLE HOUSINGHow do you spur low-income housing when developers cant break even? By Yowei Shaw

S ince its inception in 1997, the citys tax-abatement program which allows new or renovated properties to be taxed at pre-improvement values for 10 years has spurred a glut of new construction in Center City and spawned $4 billion in econom-ic activity throughout Philadelphia, making it more than worth the $27 million the program cost the city in lost property taxes between 1997 and 2006, according to reports by Econsult Corp.

From the outset, Frank DiCicco has been among the programs most ardent proponents on City Council, and in February, he introduced a bill to extend the abatement period to 15 years in low-income neighborhoods. His bill aims to assuage critics who have long complained that the abatement program benefited high-end developers, investors and buyers far more than low-income folks.

I think [the bill] sends a clear message that were not ignoring low-income neighborhoods, says DiCicco. If we were able to get developers in those fringe neighborhoods wed hopefully meet the increased demand for rental units.

Its an important goal in a city where almost 130,000 households earn less than $20,000 a year and pay more than they can afford on housing. The Office of Housing and Community Development states that demand for affordable housing exceeds the supply by at least 60,000 homes. But given the depressed housing market, will the lengthier tax abatement get developers to bite?

Construction costs in Philadelphia, all in, start at about $180 or $200 a [square] foot, says Philadelphia economist Kevin Gillen, vice president of Econsult. The median house price in Philadelphia is about $110 a foot. So you lose 60 to 80 bucks a foot on the average Philadelphia home.

Indeed, Philadelphia has the fourth-highest construction costs of any major city in the nation largely driven by the high cost of union labor. According to a joint report by FixItPhilly and the Building Industry Association of Philadelphia, labor makes up 45 percent to 60 percent of a projects cost 39 percent more than the national aver-age. Combined with the citys low home prices $142,000 for a new home versus the national average of $179,600 it is next to impos-sible to make a profit in many of the citys neighborhoods.

This is why, according to Gillen, that while the 10-year tax abate-ment helped bring about the biggest home-building boom in Philadelphia since the immediate postwar years after World War II, only a little more than 11,000 new units were added to a housing

stock of about 560,000 units. Specifically, the people who it hurts are actually lower-income and working-class households, says Gillen. Because construction costs are so high, when development does happen, its overwhelmingly at the other end of the market.

And herein lies the rub: How do you stimulate development of low and moderately priced housing when it so hard for developers to break even, let alone make a profit?

I think that the 15-year tax abatement could revolutionize the housing market in some neighborhoods by making the numbers work for the very first time, says Karen Black, a policy analyst for May 8 Consulting, who teaches urban studies at the University of

[ the naked city ]

Were not ignoringlow-incomeneighbor-hoods.

[ movie review ]

In DreamsDark Knight director Christopher Nolan piles on the layers in Inception. Can he find his way out? By Sam Adams

[b+ ] InceptIon | Directed by Christopher Nolan, A Warner Bros. release, opens in area theaters Friday

W orlds within worlds within worlds. Christopher Nolans Inception plunges us down deep, into the realm of dreams and waking delusions. Mementos back-to-front structure followed the contours of a damaged mind, but here knowing whose mind or minds were in at a given moment is the tricky part.

Dom Cobb (Leonard DiCaprio) infiltrates minds for a living. He uses dreams as a gateway, conducting industrial espionage in the targets subconscious. Rather, and heres where it gets complicated, he lures his target into neutral territory the mind of a third party whose dreams have been constructed for the occasion. The trick is to convince them to surrender information willingly, or at least let down their guard long enough for Dom to slip in and out unnoticed.

They know the tricks: Hire an architect (Ellen Page) to build a world whose edges fold in on itself, so the limits of the ersatz dream wont be spotted; a chemist (Dileep Rao) who can make a sedative powerful enough to keep the dream terrain steady; a shape-shifter (Tom Hardy) who can alter his appearance in the dream state; and a guy (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) whos just good to have around.

Trouble is, high-powered businessman Ken Watanabe doesnt want them to steal information. He needs rival Cillian Murphy to break up his dying fathers business empire, and to think he came up with the idea himself. That means constructing a dream within a dream, and another within that, planting a simple notion so deeply that it will be indistinguishable from his own thoughts.

If this sounds a lot like the process of creating a film, its surely not an accident. Inceptions closest analogue is to the shared dream of the movies, a tantalizing fantasy whose incompleteness begs us to fill in the gaps. Doms rule to create dreams from experience but never replicate memories too closely, lest the division between worlds start to blur, is sound advice for writers as well as spies. Unfortunately,

Dom is no good at following his own advice, which is why his wife, Mal (Marion Cotillard), keeps showing up, sabotaging their plans and attacking their bodies. Being killed in a dream merely means waking up, but pain can go on for eons.

From a rain-streaked city to a luxury hotel to an Arctic redoubt, Nolan pulls us deeper in. Each level fits within the previous one, but they have their own rules, and their own sense of time. The laws of physics bend as easily. Nolan handles the mechanics of his Russian-doll worlds expertly, and with more clarity than the jumbled set-tos of The Dark Knight. But its not clear after a single viewing whether Nolan has taken his own advice and put a single, simple idea at the center of his labyrinth. A candidate surfaces late in the game, but it feels like an afterthought, and very nearly a cheat. He builds a heck of a maze, but Im not sure he finds his way out, or if he wants to.

([email protected])

Off the Cuffs

Icons of costume: HollyWoods Golden era and Beyond | Through Sept. 5, James A. Michener Art Museum, 138 S. Pine St., Doylestown, 215-340-9800, michenerartmuseum.org

The sTar of the Micheners summer exhibit is one of the best-known costumes in film history: the elaborate outfit Scarlett OHara wears to visit Rhett Butler in a Yankee jail in 1939s Gone with the Wind. Designed in real life by Walter Plunkett, its fictionally confected by Scarlett (Vivien Leigh) and Mammy (Hattie McDaniel) from antebellum velvet portieres. Today, the velvet is a little faded, but with its heavy tasseled cording, its still an impres-sive, slightly bizarre and monumental achievement in costuming.

Oversize black-and-white film stills provide back-drops to outfits displayed on mannequins. The glossy feathers dominating Marlene Dietrichs svelte black ensemble from Shanghai Express (1932) are a per-fect foil for her cool, calculating face. Together, pho-tograph and object illustrate that extra dimension a skilled actor brings to a costume and, equally, the way a great costume can frame a moment in time.

Designs for movies set in the historic past tell us more about the time the costume was made. The mans court coat and vest from Barry Lyndon, for example, helped Milena Canonero and Ulla-Britt Sderlund win a 1975 Oscar for Best Costumes, but its subtly different from real 18th-century clothing. Nowadays we can easily recognize the influence of 1960s fashion on the colorful patterning and the cut of the cuffs.

Legendary artists and actors, like Greta Garbo, Edith Head and Ingrid Bergman (pictured), are rep-resented, and every item in the show teaches us something about film or fashion. Unfortunately, there are so few mens costumes that it might have been better to leave them out altogether.

([email protected])

re:viewRobin Rice on visual art

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KEN DOLL: Ken Watanabe (top) is a

businessman who wants to infiltrate his rivals dreams in Inception.

Pain can go on for eons.

[ merging spectator and spectacle ]

EVERYONE ELSE[A- ] ITS EASY TO feel like nothings happening in German director Maren Ades sec-ond feature. Chris (Lars Eidinger), an aspiring architect, and his girlfriend, Gitti (Birgit Minichmayr), laze in the sun at his parents Mediterranean villa, dreaming up private jokes and making frequent love. The movie airdrops us into the middle of their relation-ship, with only the occasional phone call or chance encounter to provide a hint of the lives theyve temporarily left behind. At first, Ades camera merely seems to be shadow-ing them; the shots feel offhand, if not haphazard. But a sense of their rapport develops gradually: his ambition and insecurity, her reflexive honesty and passionate neediness. Over the course of several days, Everyone Else plays out their conflicts. Chris weasely tendencies are brought to the fore by a run-in with an older, more successful colleague (Hans-Jochen Wagner) and his pregnant wife (Nicole Marischka). Over dinner, his conversation turns disin-genuous in ways we might miss if not for Gittis subtly pained reactions. Ade almost never uses close-ups, but the actors performances are so finely tuned she doesnt need them. Although Chris and Gitti rarely come to the point of confrontation, their vulnerabilities become so apparent that late scenes take on the qualify of a horror movie. You have the sense that either could be deeply wound-ed at any point. Gitti is the more volatile, Chris the more abrasive, but each feels unfin-ished, precarious as in some ways does Ades film. Theres an open-endedness to the movie that comes close to being vague or shapeless.Shes so inside her characters that perspective is hard to come by. That said, were inside them, too. Everyone Else feels less like voyeurism than symbiosis, merging spectator and spectacle until the boundary between them starts to dissolve. When it does inject a few conventionally dramatic notes toward the end, the departure rings false, but for the rest of the time, the nothing thats happening feels much like what happens to us every day. Sam Adams

flickpick [ movie review ]

[ kaleidoscope ]

rock/pop/festivalIll miss hearing Y-Rock on my radio, but the line up for WXPNs XPoNential Music Festival (this weekend on the Camden waterfront, xpn.org ) is encourag-ing: The Walkmen, Dr. Dog, Yo La Tengo, Free Energy, Grace Potter, Birdie Busch, Blood Feathers, Edward Sharpe, These United States and a ton more spread out over three days and three stages. Patrick Rapa

music/experimentalSome people are purists when it comes to live albums, insisting on absolute fidelity to the original experience, unedited, flaws intact. Then theres C. Spencer Yeh, whose latest release as Burning Star Core,Papercuts Theater, is a four-part, hourlong meta-concert cobbled together from more than 60 different shows over several years, in multiple venues and with varying collaborators. Its a Frankensteins monster stitching dense slabs of noise to whorls of textured drones to percussive blasts representing on a broad scale the broad sonic path swept by Yeh, who has been appearing under the BSC mantle for more than 15 years. He plays Vox Populi on Friday (July 16, phillysoundforum.org). Shaun Brady

fictionWithout memorable characters, a good story fades like sunburn. Philly resident Justin Kramons beach-perfect debut, Finny (Random House, July 13), is full of unforgettable oddballs from a narcol ep-tic pianist to a digestively challenged father who claims hes brush ing his teeth every time he rushes off to the bathroom all of whom Kramon spends plenty of time with. That way, he says, all of that characters funny little habits and obsessions have a warmth to them, like youre coming home. Speaking of which, go home and read a Q&A with Kramon at citypaper.net/criticalmass. Carolyn Huckabay

mural artCalling all Franks: The Mural Arts Programs Mural Mile series, celebrat-ing Phillys painted walls, is hosting aFamous Franks party tonight at 5:30 p.m. (July 15, muralarts.org) at, where else, Dirty Franks. If you dress up as a Frank (check the mural for ideas: Its home to Frankenstein, Ben Franklin and many others), a free hot dog is yours. My favorite Frank is Frank Zappa, says Franks muralist/guest of honor David McShane, when asked which namesake hed choose to portray. I used to have long hair and on Halloween I would grow a Frank Zappa mustache. Janey Zitomer

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THEPHILIPPINES!I like New York because its also a lot of Jews. Jew York, you know. Now I feel like a Jew pursuing my Israel, my motherland.

Imelda Marcos

IF YOU SHOUT out Bjrk when asked to name a native-born Nigerian folk singer, then you might be surprised to learn that neither David Byrne nor Fatboy Slim are from the Philippines. How ever, the subjects of their ambitious collabora-tion, Here Lies Love (Nonesuch), most certainly were. Im referring of course to former First Lady of the Philippines Imelda Marcos (perhaps the only person alive to call upon actor George Hamilton as a defense witness) and the woman who helped raise her (and whom Marcos would ultimately place under house arrest), Estrella Cumpas. Its a brilliant concept. Now lets see how they managed to totally fuck it up.

First, theres the music. Although only the first track is supposed to purposely pay homage to the early disco scene, nearly every song on the two-CD set would be perfect background for an old episode ofThe Love Boat.Gentlemen, youre not being ironic; youre just making bad 70s disco.

Then theres the libretto, which focuses on Marcos rise to power and somehow completely misses the fact that Imelda Marcos was insane were talking Michele Bachmann-on-PCP crazy. No matter how hard you try, its impossible to humanize Bozo the Clown by concentrating on his daily struggle to put on his huge yellow shoes.

Verdict:Had this project been treated as one giant joke which is the way Imelda Marcos too-lengthy life will be remem-bered it might have succeeded.

([email protected])

aidorinvadeRodney Anonymous vs. the world

Each feels unfinished, precarious.

OR ELSE: Maren Ades film is so subtle, you might not think anything is happening. But it is.

David Byrne/Fatboy SlimHere Lies Love( N O N E S U C H )

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it about? I felt violated. But I think, had I been doing what I was doing with convic-tion, it wouldnt have come up. I hadnt fig-ured it out for myself, he says, looking a bit like a man forced to discuss a bad breakup. But then came a Fulbright scholarship and a year living in Iceland. It was this whole concept of expressing emotion in the paint-ings, and halfway through the Fulbright year I just decided that if I didnt want to do that, there was just no reason to. This can be a completely analytical and explor-ative endeavor. I can just do things because I want to see what happens.

Later, Brosseau stands inches from Urban (pictured) one of more than 20 pieces in his new show, Wondrous Spaces. He runs his finger over the surface, lovingly following the angle of a color plane. Im interested in creating these spaces here, discovering them. Its a process of feeling my way through it, but its not like, Oh, Im feeling sad today, so Im going to do this kind of thing because I hate life.

([email protected])

Wondrous Spaces runs through July 31, Bridgette Mayer Gallery, 709 Walnut St., 215-413-8893, bridgettemayergallery.com.

[ visual art ]

LOOK WHOS TALKINGExpressionist Mark Brosseau opens up about art thats hard to explain. By Bruce Walsh

B ridgette Mayers high heels click-clack across the hardwood floors of her gallery, the sharp sound careening through the first floor of the converted townhouse. Were in a deep life conversation here, says painter Mark Brosseau,

sounding a note of playfulness, as she strides past our interview. Thats what I like to hear! she replies. And they, for a moment, share

a knowing laugh artist and art dealer on the same page at last. At 34, Brosseau is still adjusting to a somewhat unfair expectation

often hurled at abstract artists: that he be willing and able to dis-cuss his emotional connection to the work.

Nobody knows that better than Mayer. He was a little feisty at first, she says. But over the years hes become more open with some of the underlining ideas, and with the narratives his process. Some collectors need more of an introduction to the work, the story, or its hard for them to get into the painting.

In a genre traditionally filled with stridently brooding painters, Brosseau has always felt a bit outside the outsiders clique. Over the years, his work has been attacked for favoring the analytical over the visceral, and he admits he developed a defensive, combative stance when asked to discuss his art.

But Brosseau didnt come to abstract expressionism the way most of his contemporaries did. A working-class kid from Vermont, he was valedictorian of his high school and won a scholarship to Dartmouth. His talent or at least what he excelled in was math and chemistry, and by college he was pursuing engineering and

architecture without much conviction. I knew I had to build a drawing portfolio if I wanted to go into

architecture. So I took a drawing class, and it was just. He trails off, searching for a way to express this defining moment. It was like youre discovering how you see.

Brosseaus abstractions almost always present windows within windows, and even paintings within paintings, sometimes reveal-ing shockingly bright hues at the source. One senses the artist is leading the viewer to new plains of vision distant fields of play within the canvas.

From far away and in reproductions, his work looks almost neat and graphic-y sort of straight-edged and geometric, says local painter Rebecca Jacoby via e-mail. But then looking more closely you can see the brush work and the messiness of the process. I love that he allows us to see his hand working.

While Brosseau has always been able to intuit this meticulous, ordered journey, hes only recently been able to articulate it.

There was always this about question. Whats it about? Whats

[ arts & entertainment ]

uwishunu.comPHILLY. FROM THE INSIDE OUT.

produced by

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[ arts picks ]

HALLUCINATING HISTORY Picture a dark, fermented chapter in our nations history, Lincolns final days in the White House, where factious murk settled over the American political landscape. Now jump ahead to the year 2012, to a not-so-distant, not-so-dissimilar future in which an ideologi-cal maelstrom has shredded left- and right-wing allegiances alike, leaving only a fringe of extremists following in the spectral footsteps of John Wilkes Booth. These uncanny worlds come together in a co-production by New York-based Riot Group and Phillys own New Paradise Laboratory; the cast, along with director Whit MacLaughlin and play-wright Adriano Shaplin, will present a meet-the-artist event in anticipation of the full performance of the companies upcoming Live Arts show, Freedom Club.Focusing on the tug-and-pull of American liberty, the play time-travels between kinky sances in the Lin-coln White House and the violent radicalism of today two worlds that bridge the gulf of history. As Shaplin says, Imagining the past is not unlike hallucinating the future.

Will Stone

Wed., July 21, 7 p.m., free, Christ Church Neighborhood House, 20 N. American St., 215-413-9006, livearts-fringe.org.

theater

PLAYPENNPhiladelphias only organization devoted exclusively to plays-in-process, PlayPenn cele brates its sixth annual New Play Development Conference by sharing six intensely workshopped pieces, two by area playwrights: James J. Christys Love and Communication (July 24, 4 p.m.) and Nicholas Wardigos Hum (July 25, 2 p.m.). Artistic Direc-tor Paul Meshijian also selected new works by nationally known playwrights Samuel D. Hunter, Dan Dietz, Kara Lee Corthron and Charlotte Miller, and includes more locals with Bruce Grahams latest, Outgoing Tide (July 15, 7 p.m.), and Matt Ocks Cowboy/Indian (July 20, 7 p.m.), and discusses what it all means in a symposium featuring scientists as well as artists on July 23, titled Do We Tell Stories or Do They Tell Us? Good question.

Mark Cofta

July 19-26, free (reservations recommended), Adrienne Theatre, 2030 Sansom St., 215-717-7127, playpenn.org.

theater

printmaking

SILKSCREEN: A UNIVERSAL TOOL OF JUSTICE

The bright reds and yellows, thick black type and graphic silhouettes of South African anti-apartheid posters were the inspiration behind Spiral Q Puppet Theaters Art in Resistance program, in which silk-screening and print-making workshops educated stu-dents from Parkway Northwest High on how to use art as a form of protest . The students work, Teens Revolt: Whats on Our Minds, will be featured in a monthlong exhibit alongside fi rsthand accounts of artists in South Africa who used printmaking to challenge the regime. Teenagers need to be encouraged to speak out and find constructive ways to let the world know whats on their minds, says Tracy Broyles, executive director at Spiral Q. We need to create spaces where we hear that. In creating one such place, Spiral Q gave these teenagers an extra boost in exercising their right to free speech. And boy, do they have a lot to say.

Lauren Macaluso

Through Aug. 5, free, NEXUS at Crane Arts Building, 1400 N. American St., 215-222-6979, spiralq.org.

dance

BALLETXFor its fi fth birthday, BalletX is celebrating the best way it knows how: by mashing up traditional technique and experimental choreography. Its fitting, then, that co-artis-tic director Matthew Neenan drew sonic inspir ation from the indie band Beirut, whose antique, cross-cultural infl uences from Balkan folk and French chanson to Mexican funeral dirge blur the lines between foreign nostalgia and mod ern American pop. Neenan will premire The Last Glass,a theatrical piece he choreographed to eight Beirut songs, feeding off the bands lush sentimentality with jumps and high-energy ensemble dancing. The piece is about our daily life struggle, says Neenan. Theres a lot of sadness and darkness, but weve got to strive and move on.

Julia Askenase

July 21-25, $30, Wilma Theater, 265 S. Broad St., 215-546-7824, balletx.org.

film

CANT AFFORD THE FREEWAYThe open road, already a paradoxical symbol of freedom and oil addiction, is now the stage for modern-day warfare. Hows that for a prepackaged motif? Elana Mann, artist-in-residence at Kensingtons Philadelphia Art Hotel, smartly avoids getting too obvious or heavy-handed in her 15-minute fi lm. With an unexpected but much-appreciated sense of humor, Mann explores one soldiers journey back home from Iraq, and how it relates to her experience as a neurotic SoCal commuter. Mann steers her Subaru Legacy Outback through L.A., Valencia and Irwindale while her conversations with veteran Dylan Alexander Mack play in the background. Its one of the first things you notice when you get home from war. I would look and say, I dont need to worry about any one of these cars, or whos in em, says Mack as Mann acts out his words, awkwardly slither-ing out of her parked cars window. Manns nervous movements are funny but dont ever leech from the seriousness of Macks story.

Holly Otterbein

Fri., July 16, 8:30 p.m., free, screened with fi lms by Caleb Lyons and Kathryn Scanlan, vacant lots behind Philadelphia Art Hotel (bring FM radio for audio), 2007-2015 E. Hazzard St., 267-639-9166, philadelphiaarthotel.org.

fashion/visual art

DESIGNLAB

Thanks to the upcoming DesignLab exhibit at Moore Colleges Window on Race, the Ben Franklin Parkway is the new Fifth Avenue. Emerging Philly clothing designers and up-and-coming local artists are pair-ing up and taking inspiration from each other. Artists create a space responding to the fashion, a la old department-store windows, says Gabrielle Lavin, gallery manager for the Galleries at Moore. Wrap-ping up next March, the extensive project will rotate designers and artists every fi ve to six weeks, starting with designs from Old City-based Carmelita Couture and artists Jamie Dillon and Nick Paparone. Lavin says Dillon and Paparones emphasis on light and sound effects creates an unusual sight for a boutiques front window. [Its] an effort to not sell the garments, she says, but to display them as art.

Marielle Mondon

July 17-Aug. 28, free, 2001 Ben Franklin Parkway, 215-965-4027, thegalleriesatmoore.org.

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neweveryone else|A-See Sam Adams review on p. 20. (Ritz at the Bourse)

InceptIon|B+See Sam Adams review on p. 21 (UA Riverview)

the sorcerers ApprentIce|DThough they vary in quality as directors have come and gone, the Harry Potter series has provided six examples over the last decade of how to juggle fantasy, action and teenage angst while entrancing audiences of varying ages. The Sorcerers Apprentice has learned none of those lessons. Beginning with a clumsily truncated Arthurian prologue, the story at least hews closely to the Potter model young boy discovers heretofore unknown magical powers, trains under a more established wizard, and comes to realize hes a sort of chosen one while being targeted by evil forces. But that story is here forced to the background, behind a stock beauty-and-the-geek comedy Jay Baruchels pursuit of Te-resa Palmer is almost identical to his awkward-but-lovable wooing of Alice Eve in Shes Out of My League, with fewer laughs and an occasional dragon attack. National Treasureseries director Jon Turteltaub squanders his two great-est resources: Nicolas Cage, who one could assume would relish the chance to go batshit as an immortal sorcerer, but is reduced to impersonating an NyPD cop and brandishing an occasional pickle; and magic, which is almost entirely limited to plasma-blast shoot-outs. The obligatory recreation of the titular sequence from Fantasia stands out, not only because of the sudden shift in tone and appearance of Paul Dukas well-known music, but because its the only moment that contains the slightest charm in an otherwise ponderous effects spectacle. Shaun Brady (UA Riverview)

stAndIng ovAtIonA haiku: Tweens shimmy and shakein a music vid contest.youTube with a plot. (Not reviewed) (UA Riverview)

contInuIngcoco chAnel & Igor strAvInsKy|C-Jan Kounens double-barreled biopic Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky doesnt start well. For one thing, theres its book-report title, which seems to promise a rote rehash of its protagonists lives without shape or insight. The movies saving grace is its performances but Coco & Igor offers inconsequential insight into its titular titans of modernism. Sam Adams (Ritz at the Bourse)

cyrus|C+Despite the presence of name actors and a relatively inflated budget, Cyrus is of a piece with the mumblecore mavens the Duplass brothers two earlier films. John C. Reilly plays John, a divorced schlub whose ex-wife (Catherine Keener), soon to be remarried, drags him to a party where he meets the charming Molly (Marisa Tomei). Their relationship quickly blossoms, despite a hint of secrecy on her part which turns out to be her son, Cyrus (Jonah Hill), with whom she shares a slightly too-close relationship. The stage is thus set for an escalating battle between lover and child, but aggression is alien to the Duplass worldview, so a few early bouts of passive-aggressive sparring eventually flatline until everyone just shrugs and decides to be nicer to one another. Its an issue that by now seems inherent to the Duplasses method: With such a muted narrative drive, their films amble until they stall, at which point they wander to a limp finish. S.B. (Ritz Five)

movieshorts

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Films are graded by City PaPer critics a-F.

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things are happeningbe here as chris noth rolls the dice to kick off live table games!

*pending PGCB aappproval. muust be 21.

Thursday, July 15separate waysdj ed smooth

Friday, July 16split decisiondj gabor kiss

Saturday, July 17sensational soul cruisersbobby lynch banddj bryan basara

Sunday, July 18spoiled rotten

country nightsTuesdays 6pm 10pm

line dancing with country ken!

exit 37 off i-95 or exit 351 off the pa turnpike.

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DESPICABLE ME|ADespicable Me nets that elusive in-between all but guaranteeing feature-length grins from tykes and parents alike. Gru (Steve Carell) is a supervillain settled into the doldrums of suburbia. When hes denied a loan necessary to finance his theft of the moon he hatches an elaborate revenge plan to adopt three children. Despicablehas the rare distinction of being defined by its inclusive storyline and good, clean laughs instead of its all-star cast, all of whom seem more interested in shaping funny characters than merely building up their respective vocal brands. Drew Lazor (UA Riverview)

THE GIRL WHO PLAYED WITH FIRE|BAs in the first film based on Stieg Larssons Millennium Trilogy, Lisbeth (Noomi Rapace) is agonizingly efficient, fixated and alone. She does her best to avoid contact with Mikael (Michael Ny-qvist), the investigative journalist with whom she teamed on the series previ-ous mystery. You dont need to know the specifics to appreciate Lisbeth shes as potent a cipher as any franchise hero: as resourceful as Bourne, as lethal as Bond. What makes Lisbeth resonate is that she combines these conventionalities with complications male counterparts could never manage: She gets herself, she knows how she

looks to others and shes willing to suffer consequences because she knows she can. Cindy Fuchs (Ritz Five)

JOAN RIVERS: A PIECE OF WORK|B-Ricki Stern and Anne Sundberg fol-lowed the self (deprecatingly)-professed comedy icon, exposing the fragility of a performers ego and the challenges of growing old in show biz. But the film is less brutally honest than it is a desper-ate assertion of relevance and a plea for work. S.B. (Ritz at the Bourse)

PREDATORS|BDirector Nimrod Antal (Kontroll) and producer Robert Rodriguez havent reinvented the wheel with Predators,but at least they give the Dreadlocked Ones a vehicle worth their skill. Un-like the first film, Predator doesnt go

to its prey, but instead orders delivery, including international soldiers (Al-ice Braga, Oleg Taktarov, Mahershal-alhashbaz Ali), a drug cartel enforcer (the ever-welcome Danny Trejo), the FBIs most-wanted (Walton Goggins, always a treat and having a blast), a yakuza (Louis Ozawa Changchien), a Hemingway-quoting mercenary (Adrien Brody) and an out-of-place doctor (Topher Grace). They must band together to survive, meeting a batshit crazy Laurence Fishburne along the way (Fishburne clearly or-dered a side of ham with the scenery hes already chewing on). The best part: Instead of one Predator, there are three. Think of the entire proceed-ings as The Most Dangerous Game,except instead of General Zaroff, its some badass-looking aliens. Molly Eichel (Rave: UA Riverview)

RESTREPO|ATim Hetherington and Sebastian Jungers outstanding doc was shot as the filmmakers were embedded over 14 months in eastern Afghanistan. C.F. (Ritz at the Bourse)

THE TWILIGHT SAGA: ECLIPSE|C+British director David Slade, respon-sible for edgy fare like 30 Days of Night, relies on an athletic approach to framing action and a moody eye for setting to crank out the least sucky Twilight movie yet. Unlike the 2008 original and last winters NewMoon, the third installment in the series actually has some meat to it. Eclipses glassy-eyed young stars are still shoveling schlock, but at least we now know what its like when one vampire rips another vampires arms off. D.L. (Pearl; UA Grant; UA Main St.; UA Riverview; UA 69th St.)

WILD GRASS|B+After the cinema nothing surprises you. Everything is possible, states Georges Palet (Andr Dussollier) upon stepping out of a movie theater, but it could as easily be director Alain Resnais storytelling manifesto. His latest romance (or not) fixates on a a purse-snatching, that sets the story in motion, but its hardly the only decisive or game-changing moment. It all amounts to the octogenarian filmmaker playfully shrugging, Its only a movie, reminding us to stop worrying about what really happened and to concentrate only on what might. S.B. (Ritz at the Bourse)

REPERTORY FILMSend repertory film listings to [email protected]

THE BALCONY1003 Arch St., 215-922-5483, thetroc.com. The Shining (1980, U.S./U.K., 146 min.): In the words of Jack Tor-

rance: Come out, come out, wherever you are! Mon., July 19, 8 p.m., $3.

CLARK PARK45th and Regent streets, 215-472-0881, clarkpark.info. DisappearingVoices: The Decline of Black

Radio (2008, U.S., 60 min.): Discusses the history of black radio. Fri., July 16, 8:30 p.m., $5-$10 sliding scale.

INTERNATIONAL HOUSE3701 Chestnut St., 215-895-6543, ihousephilly.org. Best of the 2009 Ottawa International Animation

Festival:The best of the fest. Fri., July 16, 7 p.m., $5-$8. Pickpocket(1959, France, 75 min.): Robert Bressons neorealist study of Michel, who filches from the haves but wor-ries that his luck will soon end. Sat., July 17, 7 p.m., $5-$8.

LIBERTY LANDSN.Third and W. Wildley streets, 215-627-6562, nlna.org.Transformers (2007, U.S.,144 min.): Sam (Shia LeBeouf) and his boo (Megan Fox) are assisted by a team of robots to defeat the Decepticons. Tue., July 20, 9 p.m., free.

PHILADELPHIA CITY INSTITUTE LIBRARY1905 Locust St., 215-685-6621. TheSearchers (1956, U.S., 119 min.): Ethan Edwards (John Wayne) sets out on a five-year journey to find his niece and the Indians who captured her. Wed., July 21, 2 p.m., free.

THE SECRET CINEMAWanamaker Building, 100 Penn Sq. E., 215-587-9377, aidslawpa.org. Ma-dame X (1966, U.S., 100 min.): Rich socialite Holly (Lana Turner) invents this pseudonym to protect her iden-tity in a murder trial. Benefit party for the AIDS Law Project of Pennsyl-vania. Fri., July 16, 6 p.m. reception, 7:30 p.m. screening, $20-$25.

SOUTH STREET HEADHOUSE DISTRICT400 S. Second St., 215-625-7988, southstreet.com. Big Bang Kiss(2005, U.S., 75 min.): An actress is entangled in a crime when three criminals decide to hide out where she is filming. Wed., July 21, 8 p.m., free.

[ movie shorts ]

citypaper.netMore on:

C H E C K O U T M O R E R E P E R T O R Y F I L M L I S T I N G S AT

C I T Y P A P E R . N E T / R E P F I L M .

N I C O L A S C A G E J A Y B A R U C H E L

THE PERFECT SUMMER MOVIE.JOEL AMOS, SHEKNOWS

AMAZING.ANNE MOORE, SCIENCE WEEK

A BLAST.TREY ALEXANDER, FANDANGO

JEFF CRAIG, SIXTY SECOND PREVIEW

MAGICAL.LISA STANLEY, CBS RADIO

SPELLBINDING.PETE HAMMOND, BOXOFFICE MAGAZINE

AMAZING.ANNE MOORE, SCIENCE WEEK

A BLAST.TREY ALEXANDER, FANDANGO

JEFF CRAIG, SIXTY SECOND PREVIEW

MAGICAL.LISA STANLEY, CBS RADIO

THE PERFECT SUMMER MOVIE.JOEL AMOS, SHEKNOWS

SPELLBINDING.PETE HAMMOND, BOXOFFICE MAGAZINE

N I C O L A S C A G E J A Y B A R U C H E L

FROM THE PRODUCER OF AND THE DIRECTOR OFAND THE DIRECTOR OFFROM THE PRODUCER OF

Check local listings or Text SORCERER with your ZIP CODE to 43KIX (43549)SORRY, NO PASSES

ALSO PLAYINGI AM LOVE |A-Ritz Five

GROWN UPS |C-UA Grant; UA Main St.; UA Riverview

KNIGHT AND DAY |B-UA Riverview; UA 69th St.

SECRET IN THEIR EYES |C+Ritz Five

TOY STORY 3 |B+UA Grant; UA Riverview

WINTERS BONE |B+Ritz Five

For movie full reviews and showtimes, go to citypaper.net/movies.

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[ Your to-do list, no matter what youre doing ][email protected] | JULY 15 - JULY 22

[ they just seem a little weird ]

TURNING TRICKSCheap Trick screens Budokan. Watch out for the screaming Japanese girls. By A.D. Amorosi

CHEAP TRICK AT BUDOKAN | Thu., July 15, 7:30 p.m. autographs, 8:15 p.m. screening, free, Piazza at Schmidts, 1050 N. Hancock St., atthe-piazza.com | CONCERT Fri., July 16, 7:30 p.m., $29.50-$53.50, with Squeeze, Mann Center for the Performing Arts, 5201 Parkside Ave., 215-878-0400, manncenter.org

I n the early 70s, friends Tom Petersson and Rick Nielsen moved to Philly. Sometimes, they called themselves the Nazz with Stewkey, sometimes Fuse and eventually they were Sick Man of Europe. But Petersson and Nielsen figured out, like everybody did in the 70s, that Philly was nowhere. So they left, hooked up with singer Robin Zander and drummer Bun E. Carlos and became critical power pop darlings Cheap Trick. This week? Petersson and Nielsen are back, screening Cheap Trick at Budokan and playing with Squeeze. Oh, Tom.

City Paper: Its 1971 and youre in Philly. Whats wrong with that picture?Tom Petersson: We were working with our singer named Stewkey and he got some sort-of-a deal. He wanted Rick and I to come out there so we did. We trusted him. Hell, even if we didnt

there wasnt much to lose. I had just turned 21. I had a blast.

CP: Lets talk Budokan.What do you remember?TP: That we werent thinking about being recorded at all. It really was being done for a local TV show there. It wasnt [The Whos] Live at Leeds. We didnt even realize they were there the first day. We thought that they forgot about us. We were pretty burned out by that point: 300 shows a year, two albums every year. Nursing hangovers. We were completely turned around at that time.

CP:The Trick released a ton of albums per year. How come?TP: Mainly because they were unsuccessful. We just figured we were going to get dropped so we just made em fast. We didnt get dropped because we had great press. Lead reviews in Rolling

Stone but zero sales. The next ones the one became our mantra. Wed barely get one out before we heard that line.

CP: How does it feel being the ultimate American power pop act?TP:Were too close to it. Its like having someone tell you that you look like your sister and you go Cmon. Sometimes I just think of us as a prog rock act, equally inspired by Soft Machine and King Crimson as we are The Beatles. When we did those songs with those big epic weird breaks people couldnt even be bothered to boo. Booing meant you cared. We werent trying to be the kings of power pop. It just happened that way.

([email protected])

PHILLY HAS ITS mysteries. What historic art-ifacts are buried below SugarHouse? How can people stand Its Always Sunny in Philadelphia?What the hell happened to the Paul Green School of Rock (see citypaper.net/criticalmass)? What doesMichael Vick have on Jeff Lurie that he deserves this kind of job security? And the biggest mystery of the moment: Who is Kar Vivekananthan, and whats the deal with that swanky bistro Adsumon Bainbridge that he and ex-LaCroix-chef MattLevin are opening this week? Well, KV is an A/V specialist who founded OhmComm Inc., a com-munication services enterprise servicing Starr,Vetri and Garces.Hes previously been in Icepack for taking a piece of the Divine Lorraine space and helping to open hot spots backinnaday from Guru (whoa) to Osteria.Plus I got bored, laughs Kar. I know what to expect. Ive closed restaurants that I helped open. Ive never witnessed a good restaurant with a good business plan fail. KVs secret for Adsum: consistency. And were not fancy schmancy we have great price points, a great location and the best fried chicken. Mystery solved. Heather Henderson, filmmaker/one-time-Peek-A-Boo-er/Soulamite-r, leaves Philly for Hollywood at the end of July and is holding a going-away go-go burlesque jamboree to help her cobble together funds July 21 at the Troc, Phillys original haus-of-burlesque. Well miss Heather. Megan Wendell ofCanary Promotion + Design (they do sites and PR for the Wilmaand the LiveArts/Fringe fests, along with site design for Colbert Report and a zillion others) lost her husband/web-design partner, Mason.Not in marriage Mason just got a massive gig with Zivtech as creative director of its new design department. Zivtech specializes in complex web aps/content management systems on the Drupal tip. So Mason wont be able to design sites through Canary. It is a big change, but I think its a good move for all involved, says Megan. Perhaps Mason and I can find time to make music together again soon. Painter Inga Kimberly Browns annual all-day Brown Bear Art & Music Fest at Clark Park is on for July 17 with Big Unkle, LastBarbarians, Surgeon and an after-party at TheTiberino Museum. Wee. Aloha Roys, Phillys lone Hawaiian corporate-owned restaurant. We saw your closing from the mainland ages ago. While we know that building owners DavidandJoe Grasso (of Del Frisco and Union Trust, respec-tively) are opening a saloon/raw bar at that 15th Street space hopefully by 2010s end rumors are rampant that theyre also looking for a clubbier space in the same neighborhood. Theres even talk of live music involved. Pshaw.

([email protected])

theagendaicepackBy A.D. Amorosi

citypaper.netMore on:

F O R M O R E W I T H T O M P E T E R S S O N , G O T O C I T Y P A P E R .N E T / A G E N D A

CHEAP SKATES: Power pop legends Cheap Trick

(from left, Rick Nielsen, Tom Petersson and Robin

Zander drummer Bun E. Carlos no longer tours

with the band) come home to Philly.

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MUSIC rock/popTHURSDAY 7/15QA LEO SOUND WAVE withStarving The Tsunami, Gelatine & Galaxies, 9pm, $8, Khyber, 56 S. 2nd St., 215-238-5888.

QADAM MONACO BAND withShortwave Society & Bellflur, 8pm, $8, North Star Bar, 2639 Poplar St., 215-684-0808.

QCAMERON MCGILL & WHAT ARMY with Peasant, 7:30pm, $8, Kung Fu Necktie, 1250 N. Front St., 215-291-4919.

QGRIDS with Ape, Holy Dirt & Fuck Attack!, 10:15pm, $8, Trocade-ro, 1003 Arch St., 215-922-5483.

Q JESSE RUBEN with Zach Com-tois, 8pm, $13-$15, World Caf Live, 3025 Walnut St., 215-222-1400.

QKIDZ IN THE HALL withDephonic, Stalley, Writtenhouse & Akilles, 8pm, $20, TLA, 334 South St., 215-922-1011.

QMIRADOR with Dawn Chasers, 9pm, $7, Fire, 412 W. Girard Ave., 267-671-9298.

QSOILWORK with Death Angel, Augury, Mutiny Within & Shash-buckle, 7pm, $18.50-$50, Trocadero, 1003 Arch St., 215-922-5483.

Q THE GREAT EXPLAINER withTimeshares, Frost Watson & Hold Tight, 6pm, $6, Fire, 412 W. Girard Ave., 267-671-9298.

Q THE LOST PATROL with The Sky Drops & Captive Kin, 9pm, $8, M Room, 15 W. Girard Ave., 215-739-5577.

QWE ARE SCIENTISTS withLightspeed Champion & Rewards, 9pm, $15, Johnny Brendas, 1201 N. Frankford Ave., 877-435-9849.

FRIDAY 7/16QDEATHBEDS with Salome, Cadaveric Spasm & Landmine Marathon, 9pm, $8, M Room, 15 W. Girard Ave., 215-739-5577.

QDIVE with Automatic Fire, 8pm, $12, TLA, 334 South St., 215-922-1011.

QHEARTLESS BASTARDS withThe Builders and The Butchers & Peter Wolf Crier, 9pm, $14-$16, North Star Bar, 2639 Poplar St., 215-684-0808.

QKID SISTER with Gang, 9pm, $15, Johnny Brendas, 1201 N. Frankford Ave., 877-435-9849.

QPHILADELPHIA SONGWRIT-ERS PROJECT Winners of the 2010 Philadelphia Songwriters Project competition. with Tania Alexandra, Johnny Miles, Ryan Tennis & The Fleeting Ends,

IF YOU WANT TO BE LISTED:

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Philadelphia City Paper, July 15th, 2010

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