Entertainment
Brandt’s own brand of country music
Sure, there’s a division between church and state, and prayers are no longer said in schools — but Paul Brandt wants to know who took the gospel out of country?
There was a time when virtually all country artists — Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Hank Williams — would regularly put out inspirational albums of religious music. Now a division seems to be appearing between the two genres. READ
Adkins picks unknown singer to join him in TV appearances
Celebrity Apprentice finalist Trace Adkins has an apprentice of his own. In the market for a duet partner, Adkins picked out an unknown singer he saw at a junior-college fundraiser to join him for his appearances this week on Today and Fox & Friends. READ
Cho gunning for Sulu to get his own ship
Now that he has a taste for the captain’s chair, Star Trek Into Darkness cast member John Cho is setting his sights his own star ship. In the J.J. Abrams-directed 3-D sci-fi adventure opening Thursday, Lt. Hikaru Sulu (Cho) gets to sit in the cushy command spot as the Enterprise embarks on a mission from a volcanic planet to the Klingon homeland to San Francisco Bay. READ
Shaking the Family Tree
Tom Chadwick, the aimless, hard-luck bloke at the heart of director Christopher Guest’s endearing faux-documentary HBO comedy Family Tree, will grasp at any straw linking him to his brave, fearless ancestors. “I was the first out of our group to wear skinny jeans,” he brags. Played with unlimited likeability by Chris O’Dowd (“Bridesmaids”), Chadwick is emotionally adrift in London after losing his job and girlfriend. READ
Spring gala at Lacombe gallery
Lacombe’s Gallery on Main — recently called “one of four must-see galleries across Canada” — is holdings its Spring Gala anniversary art show May 24-26. READ
Ferguson to speak at artist awards gala
Best-selling author and humorist Will Ferguson will entertain next month, along with the Red Deer Symphony Orchestra and award-winning grass dancer Taylor Crane, at the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Distinguished Artist Awards Gala. READ
Right to the (funny) bone
For five thrilling, nail-biting seasons now, Bull Skit co-founder Jenna Goldade has been trying to locate Red Deer’s funny bone. It hasn’t always been easy, as some of the improvs and comedy sketches from her troupe’s fly-by-your-seat early seasons can attest. But lately, Bull Skit has been scoring many more hits than misses with a colourful lineup of monthly humour that’s been drawing bigger and more diverse audiences by poking fun at the political, the local and the just plain loco (i.e. fibbing Alberta leaders, tardy City of Red Deer road workers, and a drunken Batman). READ
Dying for a good part
It’s a good day to die, according to Red Deer actor Larry Reese, whenever you’re “shot” by Tim Roth. Reese plays a Yukon dress shop owner in the new TV miniseries Klondike. His character was killed this week by Roth’s ruthless character, The Count. READ
The Jazz Age can be revisited at graveyard
No offence, Scott and Zelda, but this plot of land, pinched between Rockville Pike and Veirs Mill Road, is easy to miss. Thousands of commuters drive past with nary a wave. Red Line trains zip by, oblivious. Nearby strip malls yawn. Not exactly the kind of place where you’d expect to find a Great American Writer and His Wife. READ
Sarah Polley’s moments of truth
The easy way to describe Stories We Tell is that it’s a documentary, by the Canadian actress and director Sarah Polley, about her mother, her family and a secret that had a seismic effect on all their lives. READ
Author Alison Wearing writes ‘poetic’ memoir ‘Confessions of a Fairy’s Daughter’
Writer Alison Wearing was 12 when she learned her father was gay. She was sitting in her family kitchen in Peterborough, Ont., when her mother was unloading the dishwasher and broke the news to her. READ
Local author rides Devil’s Pass to bestseller list
A tale of a Toronto street kid who’s dropped off to fend for himself in the Northern Canadian wilderness has become Red Deer-area author Sigmund Brouwer’s biggest success story to date. His book Devil’s Pass has consistently been on the Canadian Bestseller’s List for young readers since its release last October and is now going into its third printing. READ
For the eye, not the soul
Baz Luhrmann’s 3D movie camera swoops and dives through the lavish party scenes of The Great Gatsby, so much so you wonder how he resisted adding the exclamation mark he employed for Moulin Rouge! The Aussie director and showman is in his element whenever the lens turns towards opulence, which this production provides by the golden bucketload: jewelry by Tiffany, clothes by Prada, Miu Miu and Brooks Brothers, cars by Rolls-Royce and Duesenberg, anachronistic hip-hop curated by Jay-Z. READ
Prairie love story
Singer k.d. lang is so proud of the Alberta Ballet’s artistic take on her prairie upbringing, she wants to see it performed outside the province. Balletlujah! opened on May 3 in Edmonton and is to close in Calgary on Saturday after eight shows. READ
‘Kiss of the Damned’: a slightly duller retread
Writer-director Xan Cassavetes pays homage to the libidinous vampire B movies of the 1970s with Kiss of the Damned, a slightly duller retread of its precursors. The vampire Djuna (Josephine de La Baume) lives in an isolated house, whiling away hours translating poetry, watching classic films and hunting animals in the nearby woods. READ
CAT seeks new board members
Central Alberta Theatre is seeking business-minded “movers and shakers” as new board members. Positions becoming vacant are: recording secretary, advertising and media (PR), training and vice-president. READ
Sharpton: Meeting with PepsiCo, Till’s family ‘positive’
Officials with PepsiCo Inc. apologized during a meeting Wednesday with relatives of civil rights icon Emmett Till who were offended by a rapper who had a promotional deal with the company, the Rev. Al Sharpton said. READ
Age no obstacle for Iggy & the Stooges
When Iggy & the Stooges broke up in 1974, almost no one who’d heard of the band had actually heard it. More than 40 years later, Iggy Pop’s band has a new album Ready to Die, a place in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and growing reverence for its place in music history. READ
Ray Harryhausen, a master of special effects in films, dies
When Ray Harryhausen was 13, he was so overwhelmed by King Kong that he vowed he would create otherworldly creatures on film. He fulfilled his desire as an adult, thrilling audiences with skeletons in a sword fight, a gigantic octopus destroying the Golden Gate Bridge, and a six-armed dancing goddess. READ
Nurture your soul at East Coulee Spring Festival
With the slogan of HooDoo You Love? the East Coulee Spring Festival will offer a “soul-nurturing” lineup of music to rock the Canadian Badlands this weekend. READ
