BEEN THERE/DONE THAT: April 26

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BEEN THERE/DONE THAT: April 26

POSTED: Monday, April 26, 2010, 4:12 PM

Filed Under: Been There, Done That

When we're not editing and writing and proofing and stressing, we A&E editors keep busy getting our culture on. Since we (that'd be Patrick Rapa, music editor; Carolyn Huckabay, arts editor; Molly Eichel, movies/agenda editor; and occasionally Holly Otterbein, staff writer/arts patron) know Philly's teeming with artsy happenings, we'll give you a weekly roundup of where we've been and what we've seen. But we can't see it all. We're taking a cue from Team Meal Ticket — who diligently report on how they've spent their foodie weekends — and opening the floor to you: Leave a comment and let us know what you've been up to since Friday at 5.

CH: Carolyn Huckabay PR: Patrick Rapa ME: Molly Eichel

What We Saw:

—Relived the awkwardest of years on Friday night by going to see my high school's production of The Wiz, which my own class performed in the, cough, late '90s. (I spent my formative years geeking out in the orchestra pit while my theater-nerd friends took center stage.) Inspired to either a) pick up the ol' French horn again; b) Netflix the Michael Jackson-Diana Ross version; or c) never watch a high school musical again, ever ever. —CH

What We Listened To:

—Quasi was awesome on Friday. Check back later for photos! —PR

What We Read:

—Flipped through an article in The New York Times' Sunday mag about tweeting about Lost. The piece, "Lost in Translation: Microblogging Lost," had a few fair points to make — that this "spectacle of state-of-the-art, real-time crowd-sourcing" will eventually be over and then all the blog-happy Losties will have to find something else to do with their time — but I think the takeaway here is that the article would have worked better as a quick blog post. Too much style, not enough substance. —CH

—Like C. Hucks, I was less-than-impressed with this NYTimes article about how casting agents are now rejecting actresses who have had plastic surgery because they look fake. I've read the same story on several movie-business blogs before (big ups to Deadline.com and Thompson on Hollywood), and was frankly much more interested in the gender inequity when it comes to plastic surgery, which was briefly mentioned by largely ignored. Silver lining: The piece led to awfulplasticsurgery.com, which I spent far too long perusing and saying "Oh gross!" to. —ME

What We Watched:

—I'm only a little ashamed of how much I love TLC's wedding gown show Say Yes to the Dress. But I love seeing how terrible other peoples' tastes are. (Hey Former Pageant Queen, the sheer — yes, sheer — corseted knee-length number did not have sex appeal. Unless you count sexiness in terms of how much you look like a turn-of-the-century French prostitute crossed with a Jersey Shore cast member.) —ME

—Possibly inspired by Sam Adams' excellent interview with David Milch or my horror at the fact that most of my friends hadn't seen it, I holed up with a group, a case of Lion's Head and the first season of Deadwood. I spent most of the trying to my control my tween-girl-on-Justin-Bieber-style freak out because I knew what was coming. If you haven't watched it, you're wasting your life. It's Shakespeare in the lawless Old West. Except they say cocksucker a lot more than the Bard would dare in such plain words. Me thinks my infatuation with Ian McShane (aka Al Swearengen) is on the rise again, calling for a screening of Personal Top Fave Movie Sexy Beast. —ME

—I forgot Best in Show was based on Philly's Mayflower dog show (although, it clearly wasn't shot here). Glad I didn't forget how goddamn funny Fred "And to think that in some countries these dogs are eaten" Willard is as announcer Buck Laughlin. —ME

What We Learned:

—Act on vintage! After a month of coveting an ivory knee-length flower-print dress with an empire waist and an uneven hem from Vintage Connection (701 St. 9th St.), I finally got a wedding invitation that gave me an excuse to drop some cash on it. Of course, it had been sold that morning to someone who is going to look fabulous in it. Tear. —ME

Drew Lazor

Posted 2010-04-26 15:27:09

Saw Hot Chip at TLA last night and they killeeeddddd it. They are amazing live. Openers Memory Tapes were good too

Lindsey

Posted 2010-04-26 16:08:11

Saw Titus Andronicus in Jersey on Saturday. All around fantastic show!! My body is still sore from rockin' out so hard. Even Jersey was a blast to be in, caps and all. I was not-so-secretly hoping for The Boss to appear on stage at any minute, but unfortunately that night the Springsteen references had to be enough. 

Re-watched part of the first season of Veronica Mars and realized once again why it was my favorite show. Veronica and Logan, siiiiggghh. It doesn't seem to be as big of a hit with the bf as The O.C. was though.

Carolyn Huckabay

Posted 2010-04-26 16:17:14

So did anyone go to Shad Fest? Anyone?

Felicia D'Ambrosio

Posted 2010-04-26 16:53:49

Spent a truly joyous Saturday morning with Mr. Martino's chef-owner Maria Farnese, ostensibly to learn more about her handmade bicycle-friendly bags, but really just being vocally amazed at all of the artistic, conscious and talented people that surround us in South Philly.  Definitely culture.

Marie DiFeliciantonio

Posted 2010-04-26 17:15:45

Watched "It's Complicated" with Meryl Streep, Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin on Saturday morning. Meryl makes Steve chocolate-filled croissants to fulfill a certain need brought on by a certain substance. Would you really wait hours to eat something if you had the munchies? 
@ME- also watched a few episodes of "Say Yes to the Dress" because I'm in awe of these girls who run the gamut from gawdy to so plain they may as well wear a sundress and save $2550. And the ones that bring their fiancees astound me.

Jesse D

Posted 2010-04-27 10:50:42

Yep Carolyn, I hit Shadfest on Saturday.
Also: Quasi on Friday.
Bowled a couple games at North Bowl on Saturday.
The aforementioned Shadfest.
Dangerous Ponies at Pterodactyl on Saturday.
Black Landlord on Saturday.
Coffee on Sunday.
All bike, all the time, all over the place.

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Featuring everything from event roundups to concert reviews and sex talk, City Paper's Critical Mass is a space for off-the-wall coverage of Philly's A&E scene.

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