Boathouse Live!: A Memoriam
(Restaurant guru Sean Pepe recently closed The Boathouse Live, Newport News' best live music venue) By Craig Wynne, Guest Writer This morning, I woke up to a Facebook posting from Gary. This posting, taken from the Hampton Daily Press, read “Newport...
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COMMENTARY: The Man Who Gained and Lost An Empire
By Tench Phillips, Naro Cinema “The 21st century will be a сentury either of total all-embracing crisis or of moral and spiritual healing that will reinvigorate humankind.” – Mikhail Gorbachev, former president of the Soviet Union We old-timers at the Naro...
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French Military Eager to Share Rugby Culture with Local Citizens
By Jeff Maisey As part of this year’s Norfolk NATO Festival, a friendly rugby match between the Norfolk Blues and the fearsome XV du Pacfique French Army Rugby Team will be played Sunday, April 28 at ODU’s Powhatan Field beginning at 6 PM. Admission is free and open...
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Play Ball
By Tom Robotham For the past year or so, my life has been marked by a series of unsettling disruptions. It all started last spring when my 15-year-old car, which I loved, finally bit the dust. In the grand scheme of things, it wasn’t that big a deal. But it turned...
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OPINION: Reparations
By John L. Horton For some time now, I have been struggling with the question of “reparations…owed to African Americans?” Finally, I have decided to put pen to paper and express myself. It has not been an easy task as I find myself still conflicted and somewhat torn...
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Habr to Receive First Citizen Award in Virginia Beach
By Kate Pittman On a cold, rainy night last December a small crowd of young professionals huddled outside of Croc’s 19th Street Bistro, waiting to surprise owner Laura Wood Habr during her restaurants’ 25th Anniversary. The element of surprise is a tradition of the...
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Politics in the Classroom
By Tom Robotham Recently an old friend shared on Facebook a link to a two-year-old article in The Staten Island Advance—a paper for which I used to work—about a New York City resident who was upset by a vocabulary question on his 11-year-old daughter’s homework...
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Pharrell Williams Announces SOMETHING IN THE WATER
March 4, 2019 – Today visionary recording artist, producer, songwriter, philanthropist, fashion designer, and entrepreneur, Pharrell Williams announced his newest venture – SOMETHING IN THE WATER, a multi-day music festival and cultural experience on the beach in his...
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The Attucks at 100: The Apollo of the South
By Jerome Langston On this unseasonably warm, mid-week day, there is little activity happening outside of Norfolk’s historic Attucks Theatre, the performing arts venue famously situated at the corner of Church Street and Virginia Beach Boulevard. That is also the case...
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A Nation in Denial
By Tom Robotham Two years ago, I delivered a talk at the Tidewater Community College Literary Festival called “Scenes from a White Boy’s Life,” in which I reflected on my lifelong efforts to understand “the problem of the color line,” as W.E.B Du Bois put it. I talked...
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PREVIEW: Collaboration is Everything for I’m With Her
By Jim Morrison The members of I'm With Her sing and write together as naturally as if they've been friends for decades. While they've known each other for a long time, it wasn't until a moment of serendipity five years ago that they combined their ambitious...
ART REVIEW: Giolitti’s Abstract World Comes to Light
By Betsy DiJulio On a recent weeknight, a veritable spring still life stretched across one end of Sheila Giolitti’s table in her sun-drenched dining room: the most bodacious salad of crisp and colorful vegetables imaginable, fresh hunks of corn on the cob glistening...
VSC Closes 40th Season with Whimsical Matilda
By Jerome Langston Reaching the final production in the landmark 40th season of Virginia Stage Company feels akin to completing a particularly taxing marathon. And if that’s how I’m feeling about it, as just someone who writes extensively about this...
Take 5 (or 8) with Vicki Lawrence
By Jeff Maisey Comedian/actress/recording artist Vicki Lawrence, best known for her role as Mama on CBS’s “The Carol Burnette Show” (1967-78), will bring her “two-woman” act to Ferguson Center on June 9. (NOTE:The Vicki Lawrence and Mama: A Two-Woman Show...
PREVIEW: In Love with Little Shop of Horrors
By Jim Roberts Brendan Hoyle vividly remembers seeing “Little Shop of Horrors” at the Swift Creek Mill Theatre outside Richmond when he was only 6 years old. “It was the musical that made me fall in love with theater,” he said. “The show is this great...
Danceable Cocktails
Ballets with a Twist (Brandy Alexander from Cocktail Hour The Show) Photo by Nico Malvaldi By Michael Curry What's your favorite? Brandy Alexander perhaps. Or the Singapore Sling, a Bloody Mary or a good old Manhattan? Of course you recognize the names as...
Upcoming Film Events at Naro Cinema
MEETING GORBACHEV Werner Herzog, interviews one of the world’s greatest living politicians, Mikhail Gorbachev, the eighth and last leader of the Soviet Union. Now 88, living outside Moscow and battling illness, we’re offered a last chance to learn about true...
Getting a Handle on a Dream
By Montague Gammon III In a Summer of Shakespeare reduced and condensed, of Shakespeare symphonic and abridged and played forwards and backwards; in a world awash with the Bard bowdlerized and modernized, concertized, danced and filmed and videoed, set in outer...
Sumptuous Music for Play of Passion
By Montague Gammon III Shakespeare’s other pair of doomed lovers – Antony and Cleopatra, the grown up ones – play out their ill fated romance alongside the Virginia Symphony in Norfolk and Newport News mid-May under the baton of VSO’s much honored, triple...
Fans Share Favorite Bob Seger Songs
By Jeff Maisey Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band were a staple on album oriented rock radio stations (AOR) across the country in the late 1970s and ‘80s with hits such as “Still the Same” and “Old Time Rock n Roll.” Seger’s music continues in heavy...
Dining à la (shopping) Cart at Wegmans & IKEA
(Take a break from shopping at Wegman’s Burger Bar. Photo courtesy of Wegmans) By Marisa Marsey Have you heard about the Swedish meatballs at IKEA? They’re delicious. If only you didn’t have to put them together yourself. Ba-dum-CHING! I’m joking, of course. You don’t...
Reverend Spirits
By Jim Roberts One thing Karl Dornemann’s restaurants have always had in common: whiskey. Lots and lots of whiskey. “The first time I had it, I fell in love with it,” he said. “At least Scotch-wise.” By way of explanation—and only half-joking—he added: “I don’t know...
Tamarind: Taking it to the (Vegan) Streets
By Betsy DiJulio I cannot think of another food establishment that I have patronized three times in a month, not counting my daily stop at Starbucks for a venti Green Tea Soy Frappuccino, no Classic Syrup, no Whip. That is, except Tamarind. And it may have...
Beer Conversation with Phil Smith
By Jeff Maisey Some of the best, free-flowing conversations can be had over a beer — or any cocktail, glass of wine and dinner. I have always found this to be true, and especially when traveling. Recently, I gave Brick Anchor Brew House owner Phil Smith a...
Vegans Can Clean-Up at Sloppy Seconds
By Betsy DiJulio I don’t know that, given the meaning of the slang phrase “sloppy seconds”—which conjures up nothing appetizing—I would have necessarily chosen it as the name of my restaurant. But, alas, that’s the name and I will go back for Thoughtless Thirds. ...
Penang Town: One Restaurant, Many Flavors
By Marisa Marsey If you can travel to only one European country, pick Switzerland. With French overtones in the West, Italian in the South, and German and Austrian in the North and East, it’s a veritable continental quilt. Likewise, if you can visit only one Asian...
German Wunderbar Hefe to Debut at Norfolk NATO Festival
By Jeff Maisey A traditional German hefeweizen beer will make its debut on Saturday, April 27 in Town Point Park as part of the Norfolk NATO Festival’s International Village. Wunderbar represents the third consecutive year Norfolk NATO Festival’s Board of Directors...
Monday Morning QB-ing Saturday Morning IPA
By Jeff Maisey For just over one week in late February, Norfolk-based Smartmouth Brewing Company’s limited release Saturday Morning IPA with marshmallows was the most famous beer in America. Talk about going viral: national media outlets always looking for bizarre...
Virginia Craft Beer Rising in London
By Jeff Maisey Several independent craft breweries from Virginia traveled across the pond in late February to test the waters and taste buds on consumers and pub owners during the Craft Beer Rising event at the Old Truman Brewery London, England. Craft Beer Rising is...
Samoa Soiree Merits Your Attention
By Marisa Marsey What will they think of next? Crab cakes brightened with a surprise burst of Savannah Smiles. Torchon of foie gras in a buttery tuile fashioned from Trefoils. Baked Alaska where Thin Mint ice cream is just the tip of the iceberg. Such previous entries...
