Illustration by Jillian Tamaki.
June 21 marks the first day of summer, the beginning of the so-called silly season. But there’s more to hot weather entertainment than a dog-eared paperback of The Da Vinci Code and re-runs of My Name is Earl. Here's a list of 30 films, books, exhibits and events in theatre, dance and music that we think will be the highlights of the season. Get busy, people.
1. Thom Yorke, The Eraser. Radiohead’s enigmatic frontman has described his solo debut as “more beats and electronics” than his band’s usual fare, but has been coy about sharing further details: he’s using the album’s website to dole out cryptic clues about its contents. The Eraser, produced by longtime Radiohead collaborator Nigel Godrich, is planned for a July 11 release.
2. Douglas Curran: The Elephant Has Four Hearts. Vancouver’s Curran spent 10 years photographing the rituals of a secretive all-male southern African society in Malawi. The resulting shots and a short documentary are currently being exhibited at the Art Gallery of Calgary (to Sept. 3). While the recent introduction of television to the region threatens the primacy of traditional storytelling, the scourge of AIDS imperils the tribe’s very existence, making Curran’s mission an important, last-ditch effort to record this culture before it’s too late.
3. Rock Star: Supernova. Last summer’s surprisingly compelling Rock Star: INXS unleashed Canada’s J.D. Fortune on an unsuspecting planet. Now he’s actually doing a credible job as lead singer for that collection of Aussie holdovers. Can lightning strike twice? In the second incarnation of the show, hundreds of metalheads will compete to front a band consisting of Motley Crue, Guns N’ Roses and Metallica veterans. Perhaps it should be called Rock Star: Purgatory, but with reality TV mastermind Mark Burnett involved, chances are good we’ll see some memorable, cringeworthy moments. Premieres July 12 on CBS.
4. Londonstani by Gautam Malkani. Malkani, 29, is a journalist for the Financial Times in London, and head of its creative business section. Any notion that his straight-laced day job would colour the prose of his debut novel — about the struggles of young Asians living amongst London’s white ruling class — expires with the book’s opening sentence: “Serve him right he got his muthaf---in face f---’d, shudn’t b callin me a Paki, innit.” Like Irvine Welsh crossed with M.I.A. Out July 8.
5. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest. The original Pirates of the Caribbean (2003) floated on swashbuckling bravado and Johnny Depp’s scruffy charm as pirate Jack Sparrow. Sparrow returns on July 7 to take on the dastardly denizens of Davy Jones’ Locker — and we can barely contain our excitement.
 Rapper K'naan. Photo Steve Carty. |
6. Edmonton Folk Fest. Yes, it’s called a folk festival, but this event presents the broadest definition of that genre we’ve ever seen. The stellar lineup includes agit-pop-punkers (Chumbawamba), a Somali-born rapper (K’naan), gospel legends (Blind Boys of Alabama) and a country powerhouse (Ricky Skaggs). Add Sarah Harmer, Linda Ronstadt, the Neville Brothers and Bruce Cockburn to the mix, and you’ve got an astounding musical conglomeration. Runs Aug. 10-13.
7. The Glass Menagerie. Stratford Festival fixture Seana McKenna caps off her multi-year odyssey through Tennessee Williams’ Gothic South with a bravura performance in the American dramatist’s best play. McKenna has never served up a braver, funnier or sadder heroine than her Amanda Wingfield, an aging Southern debutante, saleswoman and single mother. To Oct. 21.
8. Christopher Pratt. A retrospective of 40 years of work by the Newfoundland painter fills several of The Rooms, the controversial new St. John’s gallery designed by Pratt’s brother Philip. Some 60 canvases done between 1964 and 2004 contain Pratt’s trademark precise, flat, theatrically lit representations of the Rock and points beyond. To Sept. 4.
9. Fun Home by Alison Bechdel. Bechdel’s beloved syndicated comic strip Dykes to Watch Out For has chronicled the foibles of Sapphic life for more than 20 years. Her assured, painful-funny and literate graphic memoir is certain to expand her fan club. With an almost unbearable vulnerability, Bechdel remembers her relationship with her late father — a bookish, chilly English teacher and funeral director who carried on clandestine affairs with teenaged boys while passing as a Better Homes and Gardens family man.
10. Little Miss Sunshine. One of the buzz films at this year’s Sundance festival, this domestic comedy follows the Hoovers, a family of caustic, disaffected mopes who are forced into closer proximity when Mom and Dad decide to drive seven-year-old Olive to California to participate in a beauty contest. Has all the makings of this year’s Junebug. Opens July 26.
11. Herbert, Scale. British electronic producer Matthew Herbert is celebrated in music circles for his obsessive sampling practices. While previous albums were more conceptual than enjoyable, Scale is pure pleasure. Featuring the vocals of Herbert and partner Dani Siciliano, Scale draws equally on big band, disco and deep house. The result is sultry, sassy and always sophisticated.
12. What It’s Like Being Alone. Newfoundland native and stop-motion animation genius Brad Peyton delivers an Edward Gorey-inspired tale set at the Gurney Orphanage. The kid is hot, and we’re looking forward to seeing his innovative work on the Ceeb. Premieres June 26 on CBC.
 Eagles, by Robert Davidson. Photo Tim Bonham. Courtesy Vancouver Art Gallery |
13. Raven Travelling: Two Centuries of Haida Art. Nearly 300 historical and contemporary works by Haida artists, some dating back 200 years, are exhibited at the Vancouver Art Gallery. This comprehensive survey includes masks, carvings, weavings and totem poles. Runs to Sept. 17.
14. Absurdistan by Gary Shteyngart. A gloriously vulgar novel about Misha Vainberg, a very rich, very fat heir to a Russian mobster who through various hilarious intrigues finds himself in the lawless nation of Absurdistan. In the absence of ethics, Misha heeds only his sex drive and survival instinct. Imagine a post-Soviet Confederacy of Dunces.
15. Roots: Remix. Toronto’s Harbourfront Centre offers sweet relief from the hazy daze of summer with its annual outdoor concert series. Among this year’s attractions, the Roots: Remix festival (July 14-16) features a slew of top-ranking domestic and world music. It’s highlighted by “From Jamaica to Toronto: Soul, Funk and Reggae, 1967-1974,” a reunion of Jamaican reggae artists (Jo-Jo Bennett, the Mighty Pope, etc.) who immigrated to Canada in the '60s and '70s — and, for a time, turned a pocket of TO into Kingston North.
16. Il Modo Italiano. This blockbuster exhibition of 20th-century Italian art and design features the signifiers of la Dolce Vita, from brass-eagle-topped espresso machines to Vespas, covering Italy’s transformation from fascist dictatorship to fashion hotspot. At Montreal’s Museum of Fine Arts until Aug. 27.
17. Sacha Baron Cohen in Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby. Sure, this is intended to be a vehicle for the rapidly fading Will Ferrell; but it’s easy to imagine this NASCAR comedy being hijacked by the hilarious Cohen, who plays the fey French villain, Jean Girard. “Ah ahm coming for yew, Rick-ay Bob-bay,” he coos in an ad for the movie, while shaving his legs in a bathtub. Opening Aug. 4, this is a promising stopgap until the Borat feature lands in November.
18. Sarah Anne Johnson: Either Side of Eden. The Winnipeg-born art star already wowed us with her hit series Tree Planting, a smart and funky cross-disciplinary project that combined photographs with clay dioramas. In her latest exhibit, at Winnipeg’s Plug In Gallery until Aug. 19, she contrasts the romantic vision of the Galapagos Islands — where Charles Darwin conducted his evolutionary research — with the modern-day realities of poverty and deforestation.
 Antwan 'Big Boi' Patton in Idlewild. Courtesy Universal Pictures. |
19. Idlewild. Hip hop’s arch eccentrics, OutKast’s Big Boi and Andre 3000, serve up a double shot of southern comfort with a feature film (Aug. 25) and accompanying soundtrack (Aug. 22). The rappers star alongside Terrence Howard, Cicely Tyson, Patti LaBelle and Ving Rhames in a Prohibition-era gangster musical that figures to be a cross between Chicago and Speakerboxxx. Put another way: hey ya!
20. Miami Vice. No one, we repeat no one, creates urban nocturnal atmosphere like director Michael Mann (see Heat, Collateral). That’s the main reason we’re looking forward to this reinterpretation of his small-screen '80s smash. Starring Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx, driving around Miami at night; let’s hope there’s no Don Johnson cameo. Opens July 28.
21. The Sky’s the Limit by Steven Gaines. From the author who took us behind the slatted, pine shutters in the Hamptons comes a gossipy behind-the-scenes look at real estate mania in Manhattan, where condos and co-ops can sell for as much as $50 million. The boldface name-dropping (Donna Karan, Barbra Streisand, Jackie Kennedy, Henry Kissinger, Calvin Klein, Gloria Vanderbilt) is often delicious, as are the shark-like brokers who populate these waters. One real estate agent tells an ill-bred client to keep her mouth shut, lest her accent betray her in an interview with an exclusive co-op’s board, while another agent dismisses a competitor as “showing too much cleavage for a $2.5 million apartment.”
22. America’s Got Talent. Why NBC’s newest reality show seems like a surefire hit: the American Idol-like search for the U.S.’s “hottest variety and novelty acts” is produced by Simon Cowell and FremantleMedia, the brain trust behind... American Idol. Why, once and for all, irony should be declared dead: David Hasselhoff is one of AGT’s judges. Premieres June 21 on NBC.
23. Acting the Part: Photography as Theatre. Brothers Carlos and Jason Sanchez spend obsessive months conceiving and executing their dreamy, cinematic scenes of loss and abandonment. If you can’t make it to Amsterdam for their solo show, work by the Laval, Quebec-based siblings is included in this exhibit at Ottawa’s National Gallery, running to Oct. 1.
24. Strangers with Candy. Sassy super-freak Amy Sedaris grimaced, groped and farted her way into our hearts as 46-year-old high school student and former “boozer, user and loser” Jerri Blank. At last, Comedy Central’s late (1999-2000), depraved and hilarious series gets a big screen treatment. With Stephen Colbert, Paul Dinello and Philip Seymour Hoffman — what’s not love? Opens June 28.
25. Hillside Festival. This annual weekend-long celebration of music and culture at a conservation area in Guelph, Ontario has a decidedly neo-folk vibe. Think vegan food vendors and skinny Caucasians with dreadlocks. But in the last few years, the addition of hip-hop, gospel, pop and alternative acts have broadened its scope. This year’s line-up includes Feist, Sarah Harmer, Constantines, The Stills and Kathleen Edwards. Runs July 28 to 30.
 Courtesy W.W. Norton. |
26. Foreign Babes in Beijing by Rachel DeWoskin. After graduating from Columbia University in the early 1990s, DeWoskin took off to China, where she worked for an international PR agency while starring in a soap opera, from which her raunchy, poignant memoir takes its name. “I wanted to go somewhere no one else I knew was going,” she recently said, “where nothing was in English and nothing was familiar. I wanted excitement and a jolt of culture shock.” Shelve this book in the category of be careful what you wish for.
27. Apollo. The National Ballet reprises its first-rate production of George Balanchine’s clean-lined retelling of the Greek god’s birth at the Festival des Arts de Saint-Sauveur (Aug. 3 -12) in the Laurentians. Guillaume Cote and Nehemiah Kish, the two males most often touted as possible successors to Rex Harrington, both appear on the program, which also features the company’s most technically accomplished ballerina, Greta Hodgkinson, and Heather Ogden, newly elevated to principal dancer status.
28. Don Rickles. Although “The Merchant of Venom” just turned 80, he has plenty of bile left in his system. Rickles makes his only Canadian appearance this summer at Niagara Fallsview Casino Resort on Aug. 15. So if you want to catch the comedy legend’s old-school diatribes, make your way to Niagara Falls, you hockey pucks.
29. Amadou and Mariam. With their infectious hybrid of Afro-funk, pop and blues, this blind, married singing duo from Mali, Africa (they met while studying Braille at the Institute for the Blind in Bamako) has been causing a worldwide stir since 2004. That’s when their sensational, chart-topping album Dimanche a Bamako, produced by French multi-culti producer Manu Chao, was released, making the pair Africa’s most acclaimed musical export since Youssou N’Dour. Amadou and Mariam perform in Toronto on July 2, Montreal on July 5, Quebec City on July 7 and Ottawa on July 9.
30. MSTRKRFT. If, like us, you think Daft Punk lost their mojo after 2001’s Discovery, then MSTRKRFT (pron. “mastercraft”) is your new favourite dance duo. Toronto knob-twiddlers Jesse Keeler and Al-P whip up a raucous, randy mix of retro synths and club beats. The band’s debut album, The Looks, is due out July 16.
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