Sir Virtue & Lazarus of the Street Poets

Clarksville Tennessee is home to a vibrant rap and hip hop scene. One of the reasons is Fort Campbell which continues to bring people in from all over the world. Another is Austin Peay State University which brings in many people from the Memphis Tennessee area, the largest hotbed for rap and R&B artists in the state.

But one only has to do an search of YouTube, Facebook or MySpace to see the abundance of talent that the city of Clarksville has to offer. On these same social networks you can find Jose Toro aka Lazarus and Chris Baladad aka Sir Virtue whom together make up a rap group called Street Poets.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Catching up to do an interview with Street Poets was a real chore because this group is doing all the things they need to do to get to the top. Constant marketing, networking, studio development and just hitting the streets, hustling and grinding their way to the top. We finally managed to get them to take some talk time out of there busy schedules, and Clarksville Online author Terry McMoore sat down with the Street Poets for a very personal and hard hitting interview.

What are your names?

Jose Toro & Chris Baladad

What are your stage names?

Lazarus (Jose) & Sir Virtue (Chris)

How old are you?

Jose: 23, born on August 17, 1985

Chris: 27, born on April 26, 1982

Where were you born, or what state or city do you claim?

Jose: I was a military brat living. I have lived around the US and in other countries including Germany. I was born in Lawton, OK. My parents were raised in Puerto Rico, and I have lived in the South for 14 years (TN for 9 years currently and GA for 5 years).

Chris: I was born in the west coast, Monterey, CA to be exact. I have lived all around the US and even Germany. I’ve been in TN for about 14 years now. I have connected with so many different types of people so you can say that I’m on a worldwide level reaching from coast to coast.

What are your nationalities?

Jose: Puerto Rican
Chris: Filipino with 1/3 Caucasian

What are your educational backgrounds?

Jose: Northwest High School graduate, APSU Bachelor’s Degree
Chris: Kenwood High School graduate; few years experience at APSU

Are you registered to vote and do or did you vote?

Yes, we both are registered and have voted for Obama.

Have you done any traveling and if yes to where?

As far as music performing, only Nashville…But this summer we have plans to travel to Memphis, Chattanooga, Atlanta, Orlando, Houston, and St. Louis.

How long have you been in the game?

Jose: Writing since 14, and started recording at the age of 16.

Chris: Began writing poems and songs at 14 and started recording a demo at 16.

How did you both get your starts?

Jose: I started rapping songs when No Limit Records was getting big in Savannah, GA in the 8th grade with a Puerto Rican classmate. Then we started freestyling cover songs. At 14, I began writing poetry and turning them into lyrics on paper. At first I tried to sing them, but it didn’t work for me.So I changed them into verses and rapped the lyrics. I can’t remember what my first alias was, but it wasn’t until 2000 when I moved to TN and got serious with the music and came with the alias “Lazarus.” I used the name to define my resurrection of real Hip-Hop music from the dead, as the name and meaning from the Bible inspired me to come with the name. Eventually, in 2006, based on my personal mistakes and bad habits, I changed my alias to Manuel (my middle name) to reform myself as a music artist. However, it only lasted for a short stint, as I reverted back to “Lazarus” in 2007 realizing it’s the alias I feel Hip-Hop needs and for me to express myself disguised as the artist I was born to be. Other nicknames I go by are Laz, Laz-O, and P.K.S. (Puerto Rican King of the South).

Chris: I have been listening to music since I was a little kid so the art has always been my fascination. I got Dr. Dre’s “The Chronic” album when I was in the 5th grade and what stood out to me was the way they were using their vocals to make a melody to flow with the beat. That’s when I really became interested in hip hop and learning my own way to perform the raps. I wrote my very first rap song with a friend when I was in the 6th grade.

It was a really short song about basketball. When I was around 14, I started writing out all types of “freestyles”, poems, and songs and eventually began posting them on online message boards using different aliases. I began to think more serious about the music when I started going with my friend Alpha Omega to the Rec Center on Ft. Campbell’s base to record a short demo.

This was when I started the transformation into Virtue, the lyricist/artist. I chose the moniker Virtue because it means excellent quality and that’s what I try to bring with my music, as being the virtue of music. I added the Sir to the beginning to signify a sign of royalty and respect and to personify my character.

How did Street Poets come together? Was it the original name? If not what was it before? Was it always just you two?

Chris Baladad AKA Sir Virtue and Jose Toro AKA Lazarus first met in the Austin Peay Morgan University Center early February of 2004. Jose was sitting on a sitting couch located by the big windows that used to be a layout of the University Center. Chris eventually went from walking around and settled on a sitting couch that was directly next to Jose. It wasn’t too long until Jose interacted with Chris based on music, seeing that Chris pulled out a little black notebook writing lyrics. They started getting to know each other more often and it wasn’t too long until Chris invited Jose to join him on a performance that him, gospel singer, Alpha Omega, and former singer and dancer, Jamal Jones AKA Correohype, was scheduled to perform in April of that year. Jose was later incorporated into the performance rehearsal with featured appearances on Virtue’s and Correohype’s performance sets. Shortly later into the rehearsals, Yatin Patel, now part of Fatalistik Entertainment, joined with the group. DJ Exile was soon joined in to the group to help with the music rotation. Soon, the gentleman contemplated on a simpler name to unify the group instead of individual aliases. The group was decided to be known as Kustom Profile. As performance day came, so did an average Austin Peay audience curious to listen to Kustom Profile.

The performance lasted well under an hour, outside in cold weather. As time progressed, the members of Kustom Profile soon withered. DJ Exile moved, Yatin Patel moved at the end of 2004 to pursue into his family business (although still attached to the indie label Fatalistik Entertainment), and Correohype moved back to his hometown, Houston, TX, based on insufficient funds for college. Virtue, Lazarus, and Alpha Omega were the only ones left in Kustom Profile. However, Alpha Omega decided to concentrate more on his gospel music rather sticking to R&B.

So as Virtue and Lazarus were the only concentrating MCs left, they scrapped the name of Kustom Profile, and soon went with their own duo alias of Street Poets. The two chose the name Street Poets because the music that they delivered was both poetic and urban related. They crafted intricate songs which consisted of unique rhyme schemes and wordplay to club bangers that contained rhymes of boastfulness and street life.

By mid 2005, they recorded an unreleased mixtape in Sir Virtue’s home using a microphone, computer, and Cakewalk software. The mix tape was tentatively titled “Street Poets: The Mixtape Vol. I”. Although never released, the mixtape was a good learning experience for the two artists. They kept writing music, creating beats, and kept on perfecting the craft of recording. However, they wanted better recording quality. In late 2007, they hooked up with Toby Entertainment’s recording engineer, I.R. Skillz, and began production of an EP. However, the music was getting too good, the recording became a fascination, and they had too much lyrics and supplied beats to just record an EP. So, as recording progressed, so did the material of a potential first album for the two MCs. For a period of nine months, twelve original tracks were completed by the Street Poets.

On May of 2008, the tracks were completely mixed. Photos were taken; an album cover was created from conceptual ideas from Lazarus and Virtue. While Lazarus added the concept design to the cover, Street Poets delivered the final draft of the artwork to Joseph “Young Holla” Long for final modifications and publishing. In June, the album was sent to be mastered. On July 24th, the first copy was sold. Soon enough, more copies were being distributed for only five dollars per album. On occasion, the albums were sold for donations to prove that Street Poets are in it for the passion.

However, the Street Poets have much more in store for Clarksville, TN, the South, and all other regions. The first album was just the beginning of what Street Poets has to offer.

Do you belong to a click, crew, posse, etc?

It’s just Street Poets, as in the future we plan to grow locally as a movement for Hip-Hop.

How would you describe your music?

Hip Hop in it’s essence. A collection of our thoughts and feelings put into words to provide the listener with an enjoyable and hopefully influential experience. We tend to be poetic with our lyrics while at the same time incorporating other elements of hip hop into the mix, such as adding witty punch lines and rhyming with multi-syllables. We do all types of songs: street anthems, storytelling tracks, club bangers, lyrical showcases, and those special songs for the ladies. We like to think of new and different concepts when it comes to lyrical content and the overall sound of the music.

Which music artists influenced you and your music?

Jose: 2Pac, Nas, Jay-Z (Hard Knock Life was the first hip-hop CD I received), Biggie, Big Pun, Eminem, Bone Thugs-N-Harmony, The Fugees as far as relating to Hip-Hop artists.

Chris: 2Pac, Nas, Jay-Z, Eminem, Outkast, Wu-Tang, Canibus, Biggie, Fabolous, Lupe Fiasco, Kanye West as far as strictly hip hop artists. Music is my passion so I like to listen to all kinds of music so I pull influence from all kinds of artists/groups from rock to R &B.

What albums have you released?

• Street Poets: The Mixtape Vol. I in 2005 (Never been released)
• The Movement (First Original Album) in July 24, 2008
• Appeared on Coast 2 Coast Volume 18 hosted by DJ Khaled with the track “1 Luv”
• Appeared on DJ Antomattei of Tokyo’s mixtape titled “East Coast Bad Boyz” for Coast 2 Coast with the track “Classic”

What are some of your new and upcoming releases?

• I Am Street Poetry (The Mixtape) in May 23, 2009
• Sir Virtue: The Virtuoso in the Mid-Fall of 2009
• Lazarus: Son of Made-Line: December 2009
• Street Poets: This Is Music – 1st quarter of 2010

Where are some of the places that you have performed?

• Clarksville: Austin Peay (multiple times)
• Nashville: Soul Food Poetry Café, El Diamante’s, Café Coco’s on 4/30/09

What was your biggest performance to date?

AP Apollo in Clement Auditorium of Austin Peay on October of 2008

What do you hope people get from listening to your music?

We hope that people can enjoy the form of art that we express ourselves through and that it influences them to work towards achieving their goals and aspirations. We want to be remembered for our lyrical abilities and for being passionate about bringing good music to the ears of the people. We hope that people see us as being artistic and being ourselves and making music that people can have a good time and party to or just think and appreciate the talent of creativity.

What does the future hold for street poets?

In the future, the Street Poets name and music is going to be very popular in the Underground scene and to be a future SEA nominee, along with the music spreading from California to New York…because our style is so versatile that a West coast or East coast music fan will enjoy the music we bring to the table. We hope to have our own recording labels and studio where we can record freely and have other talented artists join our roster.

Where do you see yourselves ten years from now?

We hope to see ourselves with a collection of great music that succeeded being distributed to people who likes music and has a Hip-Hop head on them. We also like to see ourselves CEO of Street Poets ENT (Virtue) and Made-Line ENT (Lazarus), branching from Street Poets ENT….(Take out the hyphen and you get Madeline (which is my mother’s first name, that’s how the label name derived).

We look to do what Sean Combs, Russell Simmons, Shawn Carter, and Brad Jordan did to the game, to be dominant representatives of Hip-Hop music.

What do you like to do when you are not making music?

Jose: Film production such as editing (example is Final Cut or Avid), directing, and scriptwriting, Multimedia Design such as Adobe CS3 (example is Photoshop), Sports especially Basketball & Football, thinking of my next moves with the music, and networking.

Chris: Listen to music, spend time with friends and family, go out to the club/parties, watch movies and sports, work out, play games (pool, bowling, basketball), play video games, everything else that involves the progression of an artist: networking with other people, maintaining a webpage, designing graphics, video directing, etc.

Please give me your MySpace address and Facebook or wherever your music can be found.

• www.myspace.com/streetpoetsent
• www.myspace.com/madelinestreetpoets

How can we find or contact street poets?

You can email us at . On Facebook search “Sir Virtue” and “Jose Toro” or Contact them via their MySpace websites.

]]> http://www.clarksvilleonline.com/2009/05/19/clarksville-look-out-here-come-the-street-poets/feed/ 0 http://www.clarksvilleonline.com/2008/10/09/11th-annaul-inter-tribal-powwow-is-this-weekend-october-11-12/ http://www.clarksvilleonline.com/2008/10/09/11th-annaul-inter-tribal-powwow-is-this-weekend-october-11-12/#comments Thu, 09 Oct 2008 11:00:47 +0000 Turner McCullough Jr. http://www.clarksvilleonline.com/?p=10109

The Native Cultural Circle’s 11th annual PowWow will showcase traditions, culture and customs in a truthful reflection of Tennessee native people. Songs, dance, drums, regalia, arts and crafts are all part of this Native Culture celebration.

The public is invited to attend the Native American Cultural Circle’s 11th annual Inter-Tribal Powwow on October 11-12. The powwow will be held at the campgrounds outside Port Royal State Park, Hwy 238 Port Royal Road. The gate opens Saturday at 9 a.m. and the powwow will continue until 6 p.m.  On Sunday, the PowWow runs from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., when the “The Retiring of the Colors” ends the event.

The Trail of Tears March Commemorative Re-Enactment will kick-off the powwow opening. Activities will then focus on the powwow grounds site starting with “The Posting of The Colors.”

The powwow host drum is the White Horse Singers of Alabama. Traditional songs and dance will be featured both days. All native drums are welcome. There will be Native arts and crafts as well as clothing vendors along with food and drinks vendors. The public is invited to come share in Native American culture, foods and shop the various arts and crafts. There will be also a silent auction and Native grown organic popcorn will be on sale.

Bring your lawn chairs, wear comfortable shoes and enjoy the dancing. Pet dogs will be allowed onto the grounds, but must be on a leash at all times. For everyone’s enjoyment of the grounds, we ask you to please police your animal’s droppings. Refuse stations are available on site.

Admission is Adults (16 to 59 years of age), $5; Children 15 and under, Free; Seniors (60 years of age and up), $2. Active-Duty military with Military ID-FREE.

Directions to the Powwow: Take I-24 West, at Exit 11, Turn Right onto Hwy 76E. From Nashville: Right on Old Clarksville Springfield Rd, Left on Hwy 238/Port Royal Road. From Clarksville: Left on Old Clarksville Springfield Road. Left on Hwy 238/Port Royal Road. Parking on the powwow grounds is free. There will be designated areas for the handicapped and motorcycles.

For more information, contact: Paul Slaughter- 931-358-4187 or email: ; “Red” Kirby, 931-368-1246 or email: .

The Frolic on Franklin: A Celebration of the Arts, a portion of the festival, is free and open to the public. The artists will display and sell their work, including art, jewelry, wood crafts, pottery and more. In addition, a minimum of five demonstrations including pottery, wood working/turning, a letterpress and painting, will be showcased, offering parents and children alike the opportunity to watch and learn. Interactive opportunities for the children will be made through activities such as sidewalk chalk and face painting.

This event was conceived by the Downtown Clarksville Association (DCA) members to bring arts to the streets on the same day The Roxy Regional Theatre hosts its annual Gala.

This event was initiated in order to draw attention to the numerous talented artists in the community.  Through the generous donations of DCA sponsors, the organization is able to provide tents, support and advertising for the event. Volunteers have been busy planning this event for the past year and will be present the day of the event to make sure all runs smoothly—from setting up tents, to providing the artists with breaks and assisting with preparations for the final “leg of our event” the Annual Gala for The Roxy Regional Theatre. The Gala brings hundreds of people from all over the region to the Roxy to enjoy an evening of fine food, art and, of course, theatre. The Roxy has been producing theatre in Downtown Clarksville for 25 years.

The Gala, the Roxy’s largest annual fund raiser, begins at 6 PM with outdoor dining (catered by The Bound’ry in Nashville), followed by an auction of art donated by regional artists.  The entertainment for the evening will be The Robber Bridegroom, a musical which combines a bluegrass score with a planter’s daughter, a rascally robber of the woods, an evil stepmother and a hostile talking head-in-a-trunk for an evening of pure delight and uproarious laughter.

Performances during the daytime will be by Northeast High School Choir, West Creek Middle School Choir, bluegrass by Stuart Bonnington, Acro Dance and Robert Jordan, vocalist, as well as one-act plays by the Roxy School of the Arts.  There will also be activities for the children—face painting and sidewalk art

Frolic on Franklin: A Celebration of the Arts is supported by the generous donations of our sponsors. Through their contributions, DCA is able to offer this event with no charge to the displaying artists or the public. The phrase “struggling artist” is well-known and oft used, which led DCA to make it as easy as possible for participating artists to have every opportunity to make a profit instead of gambling on booth expense and the hopes of an interested audience.

As Historic Downtown Clarksville continues to regain strength as a viable business, shopping and dining district, we hope to increase the number of festivals and activities for the families of Clarksville and the surrounding area. The DCA is firmly committed to the concept of combining the arts with the revitalization of the downtown area and is “proud to be part of the revitalization of this important part of Clarksville history”. The public is invited to come and experience all we have to offer.

Friday was a wet miserable day but even that didn’t dampen the spirits of the attendees of the 2008 Riverfest opening night. While the rain wasn’t heavy it was a persistent mist and was at least partly responsible for a reduction in the turnout. Saturday was the brighter day, with occasional clouds, a good dose of sunshine, and a cooling breeze.

Visitors to the festival were treated with access to all kinds of food in the Cumberland Bank and Trust food court including domestic favorites, and exotic international cuisine such as Jerk Chicken, Polish Sausages, and Schnitzel. Several varieties of beer was available for those 21 or over (Proper ID required).

The children’s area featured rides and inflatables, and children had unlimited play for a $10 fee.

US Bank sponsored an area called A River of Culture which exposed visitors to various cultures including Guam, Hawaii, Korea, Japan, Mexico, Panama, France, Thailand, Russia and more. A local favorite, the colorful Clarksville-based Ballet Folklorico Viva Panama dancers, also performed.

Our gallery captures the festivities of Riverfest 2008. (Photos by: Bill Larson (Friday) & Mark Haynes (Saturday))

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A little night music by stellar performers Beegie Adair Trio, Dennis Solee, Keri Alkema, Imani Winds and Trio Verlaine headline a season of classical and pop music.

The Austin Peay State University Department of Music and the Center of Excellence for Creative Arts is proud to announce the venue for the Clarksville Community Concert Association’s 2008-09 Concert Series. The series begins at 7:30 p.m., Monday, Sept. 15 in the Music/Mass Communication Building Concert Hall with the Beegie Adair Trio with Dennis Solee.

Entertainment News writes, “Beegie Adair is one of the finest piano players in the world.” Adair has recorded 24 CDs, ranging from Cole Porter standards to Frank Sinatra classics to romantic World War II ballads. She has accompanied such legendary performers as Chet Atkins, Dolly Parton and Johnny Cash and also worked with Lucille Ball, Dinah Shore, Mama Cass Elliott and Peggy Lee. Beegie Adair is accompanied by drummer Chris Brown, one of the most sought after drummers in the South and a veteran of the Maynard Ferguson Ensemble and bassist Roger Spencer, who has played with the Les Brown Band, Ray Conniff, the Page Cavanaugh Trio and Pete Jolly.

The Beegie Adiar Trio’s special guest, Dennis Solee, is an accomplished saxophone, flute and clarinet player who has accompanied Natalie Cole, Sammy Davis Jr. and Bob Hope.

Keri Alkema

Mezzo-soprano Keri Alkema will perform Friday, Nov. 21, at  7:30 p.m.  Alkema has been praised by the New York Times as “being an excellent female lead” and for having “an appealing brew of dark and creamy colors in her mezzo, which she yields with an incisive musicality.”

During the current season, Alkema plays Charlotte in Massenet’s Werther for a return engagement with the Chautauqua Opera, joins the Metropolitan Opera roster in its production of Die Walküre, covering the role of Siegrune and sings Handel’s Messiah with the Tucson Symphony. In Winter Park, Fla., she will be heard in Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 with the Florida Bach Festival and in Mozart’s Requiem with the Delaware Symphony. She also will offer a recital in Oberlin, Ohio, under the auspices of the Marilyn Horne Foundation.

In the 2006-07 season, Alkema made her New York City Opera debut as Suzuki in Madama Butterfly, and her Naples Opera debut as Mother in Amahl and the Night Visitors and Suzuki in Madama Butterfly.  She sang Brahms’ Alto Rhapsody, Bruckner’s Te Deum with the Florida Bach Festival and Handel’s Messiah with the Virginia Symphony. She also participated in Opéra de Montréal’s Annual Gala concert.  In addition, Alkema gave a solo recital under the auspices of the Marilyn Horne Foundation in Winter Park.

Imani Winds will perform at 7:30 p.m., Friday, Jan. 23, 2009. Since 1997, this Grammy-nominated wind quintet has taken a unique path, carving out a distinct presence in the classical music world with its dynamic playing, culturally poignant programming, genre-blurring collaborations and inspirational outreach programs. With two-member composers and a deep commitment to commissioning new work, the group is enriching the traditional wind quintet repertoire while meaningfully bridging European, American, African and Latin American traditions.

Imani Winds

In the previous season, Imani Winds performed extensively with jazz icon Wayne Shorter, culminating in a summer European tour of jazz festivals in Vienne, France, Lubeck, Germany, Kongsberg, Norway, Copenhagen, Denmark, Limerick, Ireland, and the North Sea Jazz Festival in Rotterdam, Netherlands. In 2008-09, the group will play several engagements with the Shorter Quartet, including dates at Carnegie Hall, Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles and Is Sanat Art and Culture Centre in Istanbul.

Trio Verlaine

Trio Verlaine will perform a classical concert with flute, harp and viola on Friday, March 6, 2009, at 7:30 p.m.  Trio Verlaine will perform a classical concert with flute, harp and viola. The members of Trio Verlaine are drawn together by friendship and a strong desire to further this unusual instrumental combination first dreamed of by Debussy. Members are Heidi Krutzen, principal harp CBC Radio Orchestra and Vancouver Opera, David Harding, professor of viola and chamber music, UBC, and Lorna McGhee, former co-principal flute BBC Symphony Orchestra, London.

They have appeared at many of North America’s finest chamber music festivals and series, including the Oregon Bach Festival, Music in the Vineyards, Sitka Summer Music Festival, Strings in the Mountains, Music in the Morning and Festival Vancouver. Trio Verlaine can be heard frequently on NPR in the U.S. and CBC radio in Canada. In addition to standard repertoire, Trio Verlaine’s exploration will include arrangements of works suited to this rare combination and the commissioning of entirely new works. Trio Verlaine recently had the honor of being granted a commission from Seattle Chamber Music Society. The new trio by American composer, Jeffrey Cotton, will be premiered at the Seattle Chamber Music Festival in 2008. Other upcoming highlights include a BC tour with guests Jonathan Crow (former Montreal Symphony concertmaster) and Matt Haimowitz (international cello soloist) as well as numerous summer festival appearances.

The 2008-09 concert series concludes at 7:30 p.m., Friday, April 3 with a performance by the John Proulx Trio. Proulx is a sought-after pianist, vocalist, recording artist and Grammy-winning composer in the Los Angeles area. Proulx’s debut CD, with legendary musicians Chuck Berghofer and Joe LaBarbera, was recently released on the Max Jazz label on Aug. 1, 2006.  He has performed with many others including Anita O’Day, Mark Murphy and Marian McPartland. Proulx currently plays in the Mike Barone, Randy Aldcroft and Kim Richmond big bands and loves interacting with the pool of great jazz musicians in Los Angeles.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The Clarksville Community Concert Association is a nonprofit organization dedicated to presenting musical performances of high artistic merit and promoting interest in and enjoyment of live concerts throughout the community.

Advanced tickets may be purchased for any of the concerts listed. Subscriptions for up to five concerts are also available for individuals of groups. For more information about advanced tickets or purchasing a subscription, contact Sharon Nass, (931) 647-7288.

This photo of the new "Strawberry Alley" only hints at the true glaring brightness of the new lightning on this reconstructed downtown street.

The $1.2 million price tag in the contract for the Legion Street/Strawberry Alley work included $75,000 for a fountain, $27,000 short of this one-of-a-kind fountain’s actual cost. The difference in the fountain cost plus installation expenses will be made up from a $250,000 “contigency line item” in the contract with Roy T. Goodwin. The original designated maximum price allocated for the fountain has fallen by the wayside.

The Purchasing Department received bids ranging from $38,000 to 138,000, but the rejected all of those bids, noting none of the proposed fountains were “unique” enough for Clarksville. The chosen multi-tiered Bronze and marble fountain and its statuary will “appeal to children.”

Over the last several months, Legion Street has been rebuilt, and now has wider bricked sidewalks, new landscaping, new street lighting and underground power lines the length of the street. The intent to refurbish the street is good; it fairs less well aesthetically.

The new lighting is the installation of double-lamp fixtures like the current lighting on Public Square. The double lamps line both sides of the street and are very closely spaced; to walk along the Strawberry Alley at night requires sunglasses to ease the glare. Planners used double lamp posts on both sides of the street when in fact a single lantern fixture on both sites would have sufficed. The clean line of Strawberry Alley is fragmented with the irregular placement of several of these lampposts, created a jarring, jumbled effect. Add to the mix an oversized vintage style clock that gets lost among the lamp posts.

Clarksville Online has learned that approximately ten of the new Strawberry Alley lamp posts that are “overkill” on that street may be moved to another street, but no discussion has been held on just who pays to correct that “error” in design judgment. May we assume that the “contigency” funds for this project, or an emergency “budget adjustment” will be used to correct this error in design?

The new look of the street itself is still mitigated by the deteriorating appearance of the existing buildings on this portion of the former Legion Street. Tangled wires, old electrical boxes, piping and older facades still line the street, which regardless of the new look is still a loading zone for businesses that, for customer service, open onto Franklin Street. Strawberry Alley is where many large trucks park to unload deliveries to local stores and restaurants.

The availability of handicapped parking spaces on Legion Street and Strawberry Alley also remains a question. At present, disabled patrons of Franklin and Legion Streets and Strawberry Alley have no designated parking except on the river side of City Hall. Handicapped placards can be used in any parking space, but without a designated space or two, most disabled drivers remain hard pressed to park to close to restaurants and stores they wish to use.

Composite photos of the Strawberry Alley project are just that: composite: the lighting fixtures and forthcoming fountain are not revealed, and one of the parked vehicles is shown angled the wrong way on what is now a now one way street. While a photo-shopped design plan for the street shows attractive refurbished architecture and signage, how that will achieved and at what cost to individual business owners is unclear. For a number of Franklin Street businesses, Strawberry Alley is their back door, their service entrance, their loading zone, not a user-friendly customer entrance.

Before I receive comments on what may seem to be my perpetual criticism of downtown projects, let me state (1) that I have studied urban planning and sustainable eco-friendly development for years.; (2) I have served on three “Future Search” commissions (the first for an APSU sized state college, the second for a private college, and the third for a major northeastern city) to determine their direction and strategic planning; and (3) I just plain love downtown districts and Main Street developments. A vibrant downtown is key issue in urban development. That said, I also expect to know the whole package at the beginning, ALL of the details, not just a selected few, not a piecemeal patch job of projects but an overall view.

Who is re-designing downtown? You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to see, for example, that there were far too many lamp posts on Strawberry Alley. What other errors, large or small, may emerge? In addressing a project like this Legion Street/Strawberry Alley makeover, the city and the developers need to address more than the kind of sidewalks they are installing; they need to address everything on the street, out loud and up front to the taxpayers and business people who are footing the bill.

Redevelopment can recharge old business, attract new business, spur tourism and bolster the economy, but it should not be parceled out piecemeal with the tax paying public footing a vague, undefined spend-as-we-go bill. Redevelopment requires a site specific plan including cost and impact statements that affect every resident, business and property owner in the specified district. That specificity comes with its “i’s” dotted and “t’s” crossed. No one has said what will happen to the backs of the buildings that now look more shoddy and unkempt than before the street upgrade. How much of a bill will be dumped on individual property owners to upgrade in this lagging economy? Can the city use grant funds to mitigate that impact?

The Clarksville City Council with Mayor Piper discussing CPRC claims of city administration misdeeds

It is hoped that when the re-opening is held, city officials will announced some type of “Main Street” grant to assist assist existing businesses with facade improvements and new signage on the backs of their buildings. It is also hoped that city officials at this opening will announce in painstaking detail exactly what business interests and development plans are underway and on the drawing boards to follow this $1.2 million dollar Strawberry Alley redo. Who gets to keep their buildings and businesses, and who will be bought out or “eminent domain’ed” in the interest of “redevelopment?” True above board, community friendly development has no problem in either making or disclosing the “complete” plan for any redevelopment area, including potential buyouts of existing property and the disclosure of what said properties would then be used for. Facts, in writing, can help dispel skepticism and quell mistrust.

As for Strawberry Alley, here’s the history: In the 1920’s in Downtown Clarksville, the area from Public Square to Second Street known as Strawberry Alley was widened and extended to Third Street as well as renamed Legion Street in honor of World War I veterans. Strawberry Alley had been so named in honor of Mrs. Lucinda Elder, wife of Clarksville’s first Mayor James Elder, because the street was constructed across her strawberry patch. The Clarksville City Council approved by a majority vote in August to rename the portion of the road from Public Square to Second Street as Strawberry Alley to preserve the past, and the portion from Second Street to Third Street to remain named Legion Street to continue honoring World War I veterans.

The Grand Re-Opening Celebration includes a ceremony commemorating the re-designations of Legion Street and Strawberry Alley. The official ceremony will begin at 6 p.m. and includes a wreath laying to commemorate the designation of Legion Street as a tribute to World War I veterans. The ceremony will also focus on the past, present, and future of both Legion Street and Strawberry Alley. The celebration includes live performances by Bump City, outdoor dining with area restaurants, balloons, face painting, chocolate dipped strawberries, and more. This event is free and open to the public. For more information, please call 645-7444.

It’s not really country, almost rock. It was difficult for the record companies to put my music in a genre, said Marshall Chapman, who spoke at APSU on July 15.

Did you get lots of pressure from them to do what they wanted? asked an audience member.

Yes. And I don’t do pressure. I’m my own person and I keep to my guns.

That was obvious. She makes southern drawl popular. She sang songs and read from her book, Goodbye Little Rock and Roller. And we were happy. Marshall charmed us with her wit and humor, and her stories about writing and singing. Best of all, I don’t think she cared if we were charmed. She was just being herself, and in so doing made it big as a song writer. She was one of those people who took the chance and bet her life on it. It paid off. She has written songs for and hung out with Jimmy Buffet, Chris Kristofferson and many many more.

In her book, she picked 12 of her songs that had good stories, and wrote them down. One story is about a baby she saw in the grocery store. She named him the Buddha baby and watched him gently calm everyone around him. Both song and story are fantastic.

Fans can order the book and companion CD at http://www.Tallgirl.com

Austin Peay State University Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts brought us this diversion, and we thank them.

Upcoming:

September 4, 8 p.m., Morgan Center, Room 303, Barry Kitterman reads from his novel The Baker’s Boy

September 10, 8 p.m., Morgan Center, Room 303, Louise Erdrich on campus as the Roy Acuff Chair of Excellence for 2008

October 22, 4 p.m., Gentry Auditorium, poets Kate Daniels and Gay Brewer

November 13, 8 p.m., Morgan Center, Room 303, Louise Erdrich gives her second reading on campus, reading from her new novel, The Plague of Doves

Novenber 25, 6:30 p.m., UC Ballroom, Bread and Words

The Conference will be held at the Cathedral of Praise Church, 4300 Clarksville Pike, Nashville, on August 5th– 9th with nightly classes from 6PM – 9PM. The week will end with a grand production finale that is open and free to the public. Divad! features select drama, dance and literature students. It is a modern day production based on the life of the shepherd boy, warrior, psalmist and King, David. Divad! is free to the public. Drama students will also be joined by the Poetry/Literature students in showcasing their talents at the Cathedral of Praise Poetry and Comedy Café.

Donna Jacobs of Baltimore, MD, will lead the Dance instruction. Donna is the artistic director for The Morton Street Dance Company and Full Circle Dance Troup and is an honors graduate of the New York School for the Performing Arts and Wesleyan University.

Edmon Thomas, (Black Actors Workshop, The Black Repertory Theatre and American Conservatory Theatre), will instruct the theatre classes. Edmon serves as the Director of Theatre for Volunteer State Community College of Nashville, TN .

Indiana native Andre Anderson (Dre the Poet) will administer the Poetry/Literary track. Andre holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Psychology from Indiana University at South Bend and a Masters Degree in Clinical Psychology from Fisk University.

Registration for classes is now open and is only $50 for the entire week. This conference, designed for all ages, has been created to promote education and instruction of the arts, excellence in ministry.

To register for the 2008 Music City Arts Conference log on to: www.cathedralpraise.org. or
call 615-876-8740 ext 208 or email . Hotel/Conference Lodging is offered by Hampton Inn & Suites Mt. Juliet at 1-615-553-5900.

Better Choice of Living hosts elegant dinner-dance in May

Doris Witherspoon’s Family Properties sponsors its fifth annual black-tie dinner and dance on Friday, May 16, and Saturday, May 17 at the Holiday Inn in Hopkinsville, Ky., 2910 Fort Campbell Blvd.

Hosted by Better Choice of Living, a recently-founded nonprofit organization, the gala begins on Friday, May 16, with a cocktail hour at 6:30 p.m.; dinner will be promptly served at 7:30 p.m. The menu consists of rib eye steak, chicken breast w/pepper sauce, twice baked potato, steamed California mix, salad, rolls, desert and tea. A dance, to include live entertainment, follows dinner.

On Saturday, May 17, the cocktail hour starts at 5 p.m., followed by dinner at 6 p.m. Saturday’s menu includes prime rib, chicken breast w/ pepper sauce, parsley new potato, whole baked apples, salad, rolls, desert and tea. The dance and live entertainment follows dinner.

The Variety Pack Band from Detroit, Michigan, will provide the entertainment on both nights. The band features Mary Burns Owens, a native of Ripley, and James P. Witherspoon, formerly of Columbia, U.S. Army retired and a Vietnam veteran.

Tickets for this black-tie affair spotlighting blues, jazz and r&b with a touch of elegance are $40 per person. Deadline to purchase tickets is May 5. Reservations only; tickets will not be sold at the door. Contact: 931-552-0286. Email:

In a complex, exhaustive and highly entertaining documentary, The Corporation, Mark Achbar, co-director of the influential and inventive Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media, teams up with co-director Jennifer Abbott and writer Joel Bakan to examine the far-reaching repercussions of the corporation’s increasing preeminence.

Based on Bakan’s book, The Corporation: The pathological pursuit of profit and power, the film is a timely, critical inquiry that invites CEOs, whistle-blowers, brokers, gurus, spies, players, pawns and pundits on a graphic and engaging quest to reveal the corporation’s inner workings, curious history, controversial impacts and possible futures. Featuring illuminating interviews with Noam Chomsky, Michael Moore, Howard Zinn and many others, The Corporation charts the spectacular rise of an institution aimed at achieving specific economic goals as it also recounts victories against this apparently invincible force.

Among the 40 interview subjects are CEOs and top-level executives from a range of industries: oil, pharmaceutical, computer, tire, manufacturing, public relations, branding, advertising and undercover marketing. In addition, a Nobel-prize winning economist, the first management guru, a corporate spy, and a range of academics, critics, historians and thinkers are also interviewed.

A legal “Person”

In the mid-1800s the corporation emerged as a legal “person.” Imbued with a “personality” of pure self-interest, the next 100 years saw the corporation’s rise to dominance. The corporation created unprecedented wealth but at what cost? The remorseless rationale of “externalities” (as Milton Friedman explains, the unintended consequences of a transaction between two parties on a third) is responsible for countless cases of illness, death, poverty, pollution, exploitation and lies.

The pathology of commerce: Case histories

To assess the “personality” of the corporate “person,” a checklist is employed, using diagnostic criteria of the World Health Organization and the standard diagnostic tool of psychiatrists and psychologists. The operational principles of the corporation give it a highly anti-social “personality”: it is self-interested, inherently amoral, callous and deceitful; it breaches social and legal standards to get its way; it does not suffer from guilt, yet it can mimic the human qualities of empathy, caring and altruism. Four case studies, drawn from a universe of corporate activity, clearly demonstrate harm to workers, human health, animals and the biosphere. Concluding this point-by-point analysis, a disturbing diagnosis is delivered: the institutional embodiment of laissez-faire capitalism fully meets the diagnostic criteria of a “psychopath.”

Mindset

But what is the ethical mindset of corporate players? Should the institution or the individuals within it be held responsible? The people who work for corporations may be good people, upstanding citizens in their communities, but none of that matters when they enter the corporation’s world. As Sam Gibara, Former CEO and Chairman of Goodyear Tire, explains, “If you really had a free hand, if you really did what you wanted to do that suited your personal thoughts and your personal priorities, you’d act differently.”

Ray Anderson, CEO of Interface, the world’s largest commercial carpet manufacturer, had an environmental epiphany and re-organized his $1.4 billion company on sustainable principles. His company may be a beacon of corporate hope, but is it an exception to the rule?

Monstrous obligations

A case in point: Sir Mark Moody-Stuart recounts an exchange between himself (at the time Chairman of Royal Dutch Shell), his wife, and a motley crew of Earth First activists who arrived on the doorstep of their country home. The protesters chanted and stretched a banner over their roof that read, “Murderers.” The response of the surprised couple was not to call the police, but to engage their uninvited guests in a civil dialogue, share concerns about human rights and the environment and eventually serve them tea on their front lawn. Yet, as the Moody-Stuarts apologize for not being able to provide soy milk for their vegan critics’ tea, Shell Nigeria is flaring unrivaled amounts of gas, making it one of the world’s single worst sources of pollution. And all the professed concerns about the environment do not spare Ken Saro Wiwa and eight other activists from being hanged for opposing Shell’s environmental practices in the Niger Delta.

The Corporation exists to create wealth, and even world disasters can be profit centers. Carlton Brown, a commodities trader, recounts with unabashed honesty the mindset of gold traders while the twin towers crushed their occupants. The first thing that came to their minds, he tells us, was: “How much is gold up?”

Planet Inc.

You’d think that things like disasters, or the purity of childhood, or even milk, let alone water or air, would be sacred. But no. Corporations have no built-in limits on what, who, or how much they can exploit for profit. In the fifteenth century, the enclosure movement began to put fences around public grazing lands so that they might be privately owned and exploited. Today, every molecule on the planet is up for grabs. In a bid to own it all, corporations are patenting animals, plants, even your DNA.

Around things too precious, vulnerable, sacred or important to the public interest, governments have, in the past, drawn protective boundaries against corporate exploitation. Today, governments are inviting corporations into domains from which they were previously barred.

Perception management

The Initiative Corporation spends $22 billion worldwide placing its clients’ advertising in every imaginable – and some unimaginable – media. One new medium: very young children. Their “Nag Factor” study dropped jaws in the world of child psychiatry. It was designed not to help parents cope with their children’s nagging, but to help corporations formulate their ads and promotions so that children would nag for their products more effectively. Initiative Vice President Lucy Hughes elaborates: “You can manipulate consumers into wanting, and therefore buying your products. It’s a game.”

Today people can become brands (Martha Stewart). And brands can build cities (Celebration, Florida). And university students can pay for their educations by shilling on national television for a credit card company (Chris and Luke). And a corporation even owns the rights to the popular song “Happy Birthday” (a division of AOL-Time-Warner). Do you ever get the feeling it’s all a bit much?

Corporations have invested billions to shape public and political opinion. When they own everything, who will stand for the public good?

The price of whistleblowing

It turns out that standing for the public good is an expensive proposition. Ask Jane Akre and Steve Wilson, two investigative reporters fired by Fox News after they refused to water down a story on rBGH, a controversial synthetic hormone widely used in the United States (but banned in Europe and Canada) to rev up cows’ metabolism and boost their milk production. Because of the increased production, the cows suffer from mastitis, a painful infection of the udders. Antibiotics must then be injected, which find their way into the milk, and ultimately reduce people’s resistance to disease.

Fox demanded that they rewrite the story, and ultimately fired Akre and Wilson. Akre and Wilson subsequently sued Fox under Florida’s whistle-blower statute. They proved to a jury that the version of the story Fox would have had them put on the air was false, distorted or slanted. Akre was awarded $425,000. Then Fox appealed, the verdict was overturned on a technicality, and Akre lost her award. [For an update on the case see Disc 2 where we learn that at one point, Jane and Steve became liable for Fox's $1.8 million court costs, later to be reduced to $200,000.]

Democracy LTD.

Democracy is a value that the corporation just doesn’t understand. In fact, corporations have often tried to undo democracy if it is an obstacle to their single-minded drive for profit. From a 1934 business-backed plot to install a military dictator in the White House (undone by the integrity of one U.S. Marine Corps General, Smedley Darlington Butler) to present-day law-drafting, corporations have bought military might, political muscle and public opinion.

And corporations do not hesitate to take advantage of democracy’s absence either. One of the most shocking stories of the twentieth century is Edwin Black’s recounting IBM’s strategic alliance with Nazi Germany-one that began in 1933 in the first weeks that Hitler came to power and continued well into World War II.

Fissures

The corporation may be trying to render governments impotent, but since the landmark WTO protest in Seattle, a rising wave of networked individuals and groups have decided to make their voices heard. Movements to challenge the very foundations of the corporation are afoot: The corporate charter revocation movement tried to bring down oil giant Unocal; a groundbreaking ballot initiative in Arcata, California, put the corporate agenda in the public spotlight in a series of town hall meetings; in Bolivia, the population fought and won a battle against a huge transnational corporation brought in by their government to privatize the water system; in India nearly 99% of the basmati patent of RiceTek was overturned; and W. R. Grace and the U.S. government’s patent on Neem was revoked.

As global individuals take back local power, a growing re-invigoration of the concept of citizenship is taking root. It has the power to not only strip the corporation of its seeming omnipotence, but to create a feeling and an ideology of democracy that is much more than its mere institutional version.

Who’s Who in The Corporation

• Jane Akre – Investigative reporter, fired by Fox News
• Ray Anderson – CEO, Interface, world’s largest commercial carpet manufacturer
• Joe Badaracco - Prof. of Business Ethics, Harvard Business School
• Maude Barlow – Chairperson, Council of Canadians
• Mark Barry – Competitive intelligence professional
• Elaine Bernard – Director, Harvard Business School Labor Program
• Edwin Black – Author, IBM and the holocaust
• Carlton Brown – Commodities broker
• Noam Chomsky – Professor, M.I.T.
• Chris Barrett & Luke McCabe – “Corporately-sponsored“ students
• Peter Drucker – Management guru
• Dr. Samuel Epstein – Emeritus Professor of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, U. of Illinois
• Andrea Finger – Spokesperson, Disney-built town of Celebration
• Milton Friedman – Nobel Prize-winning economist
• Sam Gibara – Chairman and former CEO, Goodyear Tire
• Richard Grossman – Co-founder, Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy
• Dr. Robert Hare, Ph.D. – Psychologist and FBI psychopath consultant
• Lucy Hughes - Vice President, Initiative Media
• Ira Jackson – Director, Center for Business & Government, Kennedy School, Harvard
• Charles Kernaghan – Director, National Labor Committee
• Robert Keyes – President and CEO, Canadian Council for International Business
• Mark Kingwell – Philosopher, cultural critic, author
• Naomi Klein – Author, No logo
• Tom Kline – Vice President, Pfizer Inc., world’s largest pharmaceutical corporation
• Chris Komisarjevsky – CEO, Burson Marsteller Worldwide
• Dr. Susan Linn – Prof. of Psychiatry, Baker Children’s Center, Harvard
• Robert Monks – Corporate governance advisor and shareholder activist
• Sir Mark Moody-Stuart – Former Chairman, Royal Dutch Shell
• Michael Moore – Author, filmmaker
• Oscar Olivera – Leader, Coalition in Defense of Water and Life
• Jonathon Ressler – CEO, Big Fat Inc., undercover marketing specialist
• Jeremy Rifkin – President, Foundation on Economic Trends
• Dr. Vandana Shiva – Physicist, ecologist, feminist and seed activist
• Clay Timon – CEO, Landor and Associates, global branding specialists
• Michael Walker – Executive Director, Fraser Institute
• Robert Weissman – Editor, Multinational monitor
• Steve Wilson – Investigative reporter, fired by Fox News
• Irving Wladawsky-Berger – Vice President, Technology and Strategy, IBM Servers
• Mary Zepernick – Coordinator, Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy
• Howard Zinn – Historian and Author, A people’s history of the united states

The Filmmakers

Mark Achbar Producer, Director

Working for almost 30 years on films, videos and books, Mark Achbar endeavors, through media, to challenge apathy around issues of nuclear lunacy, poverty, media control, East Timor, human rights, the religious right, U.S. hegemony and corporate power.

Achbar is best known for Manufacturing consent: Noam Chomsky and the media, which he co-directed and co-produced with Peter Wintonick. The film was honored with 22 awards and distinctions, screened theatrically in 300 cities and aired on 30 national TV networks. The two-hour, 45-minute epic is the top-grossing feature documentary in Canadian history.

Achbar received a Gemini nomination for Best Writer on The Canadian conspiracy, a cultural/political satire for CBC and HBO’s Comedy Experiments. It won a Gemini for Best Entertainment Special and was nominated for an International Emmy. In 1999 Achbar worked with editor Jennifer Abbott to direct and produce Two brides and a scalpel: Diary of a lesbian marriage, the comi-tragic story of Canada’s first legally married same-sex couple. The film has played worldwide in festivals and has aired in Canada on Pride Vision TV and Knowledge Network.

Jennifer Abbott Director, Editor

Jennifer Abbott is a documentary maker, cultural activist and editor with a particular interest in producing media that shifts perspectives on problematic social norms and practices. In addition to co-directing and editing The Corporation, she produced, directed and edited A cow at my table, a feature documentary about meat, culture and animals, which won eight international awards.

Her other past works include the experimental short film and video installation about interracial relationships, Skinned, which toured North America and Europe including New York’s Museum of Modern Art. Abbott has also edited numerous documentaries, installations and performance works including Two brides and a scalpel: Diary of a lesbian marriage, produced by Mark Achbar. She is the editor and a contributing writer for the book Making video “In”: The contested ground of alternative video on the west coast. She lives on Galiano Island.

Joel Bakan Writer/ Co-Creator

Author of The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power A lawyer, professor and writer, Joel Bakan has degrees from Oxford, Dalhousie and Harvard, and has received several honors and awards including a Rhodes Scholarship and a Governor General’s medal. His work critically examines the social, economic, and political dimensions of law, and he has published in leading academic journals as well as the popular press. Bakan’s book, Just words: Constitutional rights and social wrongs, was characterized as “cutting edge commentary by one of Canada’s rising intellectuals.”

Bakan’s most recent book The Corporation: The pathological pursuit of profit and power will be released by Penguin Canada in March 2004, and in the U.S. by Simon & Schuster. Co-creator (with Mark Achbar) of The Corporation, Bakan’s book was written during the making of the documentary and formed the basis of the research and writing for the film.

Watch The Corporation Online

The film makers offers an official download via streaming DIVX from Stage6. This requires that you have the free DIVX web player installed on your computer in order to play either of the two videos below.

Part 1

[Stage6 is no more, so this Stage6-hosted video cannot be displayed.]

Part 2

[Stage6 is no more, so this Stage6-hosted video cannot be displayed.]

Please consider buying the DVD or contributing to the filmmaker!

Learn more at http://www.thecorporation.com/

* Much of the content of this article was taken from the press materials provided by Zeitgeist films.

With Casino Royale, 2006 Daniel Craig took up the reins of Ian Flemming’s James Bond, Agent 007. While there are many new firsts in the latest Casino Royale, this writer thought this a fitting time to look back to start of Pierce Brosnan’s reign as everyone’s favorite original action hero, Agent 007, James Bond.

GoldenEye debuted in 1995. Has it really been that long ago that Brosnan picked up the mantle? Timothy Dalton, George Lazenby and Roger Moore had all worn the mantle, with Moore carrying it for the longest stretch, but it was time for a new Bond and Pierce Brosnan was his name.

This film also saw the introduction of Sean Bean, Famke Janssen, Izabella Scorupco, Alan Cummings, Joe Don Baker along with Robbie Coltrane and Judi Dench into the Bond films history. Coltrane would reprise his character in The World Is Not Enough, and Dench is the new “M,” Bond’s superior at MI6. Also notable is the theme song GoldenEye, sung by Tina Turner and written by Bono and The Edge, of U2. Additionally noteworthy: this is the last Bond film to be viewed by its namesake producer, Albert R. Broccoli.

The storyline is true to Flemming’s style- On a mission in the USSR, Bond thinks his cohort, Agent 006, has been killed by a Soviet officer. Nine years later he may have the opportunity to avenge that killing while pursuing the theft of the access codes and keys to GoldenEye, a secret Russian space-based EMP generating satellite. Judi Dench acquaints herself well taking up the role of M, going head to head with the Bond mystique and establishing the rules of operation as the new head of MI6. The first woman to hold that position. There are ruffled feathers abounding!

Sean Bean is wonderful as the one-time cohort, Agent 006. As 007 comes to know his real motives and agenda, a battle of wits is set in motion and a friendship is irrevocably destroyed. Famke Janssen is top notch as bad girl villain, Xenia Onotopp, jet fighter pilot, race car driver and vicious lovemaking assassin. It’s hard believe that this hellcat would become Dr. Jean Grey of The X-Men, years later.

GoldenEye is action-packed fun. From high explosives and higher-still dangling heights, to car and tank chases through the streets of St. Petersburg, you’re drawn into the drama and the thrill of the hunt. Alan Cummings is cut to the T as the computer geek Boris who is made to pay for his bad boy hacker attitude. And the Bond penchant for notable quotes that play on the sexual edge are wonderfully on display here. There’s one especially wicked I’ll let you find for yourself.

One thing you will note watching GoldenEye is that being Bond is a physically demanding calling. Heck, being in a James Bond film as a villain, femme fatale or even Bond’s love interest, will likely place you in some very demanding situations. Ms Janssen is seen actually driving a speeding Ferrari as it careens seemingly out of control. Brosnan’s commitment to the role is also demonstrated early in some of the opening fifteen minutes of the film. I wouldn’t spoil it for you but do note that he’s doing those stunts himself and a few times, you do hear him grunt at the impact.

Pierce Brosnan held the James Bond mantle from 1995 to 2006. That’s quite a record. As Daniel Craig takes the helm, may he be blessed with strong writing, good direction and stamina. Agent 007 is always in need of those straits. To paraphrase the British, “Long live Agent 007, Pierce Brosnan! All hail Agent 007, Daniel Craig!”

The show opens with a disclaimer that “all costumes have accidentally landed in North Dakota,” which literally sets the stage for a classic Fosse opener: scantily clad dancers in bustiers, garters and sex appeal moving in the exotic angular motions that characterize Foss’s distinctive choreography. The opening number, All That Jazz, sets this vaudevillian stage for jazz singer Velma Kelly’s (Harmony Livingston) arrest for the murder of her husband and sister, and introduces the city’s aspiring showgirl and newest murderess, Roxie Hart (Allyson Jean Malandra), who just offed a lying lover.

Both women land on “murderers row” in Chicago’s Cook County Jail, in the care of Morton (Kara Haynes), prison matron whose hands are greased with payola. With the wheels of justice well lubed, we are gifted with lawyer Billy Flynn (Scott Ramsey), who job is to find a way, any way, to help his obviously guilty female clients get away with murder. He’s good at it.

Malandra bubbles her way through the performance, shaking her tousled curly red hair and other assets, flashing smiles and widening her eyes on cue in a mix of innocence and shrewdness, having mastered the exaggerated style of true vaudevillians. Livingston brings a sultry heat to her role as Velma, steaming up the stage with a every look from her darkly shadowed eyes and every stretch of her stocking-clad legs. Hayne’s first appearance is a burst of color against the otherwise stark blackness as she appears in a bold crimson gown for the When You’re Good To Mama number in act one, and she carried her beautiful voice through Class, a duet with Velma in Act II. Another duet, My Own Best Friend, sung by Malandra and Livington, is perfectly sung to close Act I.

Another show-stopper was We Both Reached, an ensemble number with Flynn, manipulating Roxie and feeding his version of the story to reporters that respond like puppets on a string.

Ramsey’s rendition of All I Care About has style and a bit of that Zigfield flair as the slick and sometimes lecherous lawyer is circled by gartered girls with burgundy feathered fans. Ramsey bringst just the right edge to the part: charm, a devilish smile and eyes that punctuate every line.

The height of hilarity, though, is the casting was Chicago reporter Mary Sunshine (C. Tefft), who emerges in a wide brimmed, flower decked hat, long coat with fox collar and cuffs, and a comic style that was the essence of vaudeville. Tefft was, in a word, terrific, as he sang A Little Bit Of Good in a female falsetto with a hint of tremulous vibratto. It is camped up, corny and absolutely wonderful.

Jay Doolittle plays Roxie’s husband, the older, worn-down Amos Hart, with pathos as he stays fairly loyal to his cheating, murdering wife through most of the story. His Mr. Cellophane number sets him up as the invisible man who is plodding through life, oblivious to its realities.

Chicago threads story within story, weaving them into a musical tapestry a step back in time to the mobster era in Chicago nightclubs, a time when “jazz and liquor” and the front page ruled and murder was almost entertainment.

Tom Thayer directed the complex production, finding credible ways to integrate oversizing, overlapping actions on one small stage. Chicago mixes story with music, the drama zipping in and out of the ’song and dance’ routines; it takes a fine hand to master the mix and Thayer makes it work.

Erin Carter (who doubles as choreographer and the character Mona) was up to the challenge of the articulated Fosse style, and moved her dancers in a mix of the structured style Fosse made famous and a bit of old-fashioned Charleston footwork to the mix.

If there is any criticism of the production, it is that some of the lyrics were difficult to hear over the power of the live orchestra. Since the volume of the orchestra was fine, powering up the mics on the singers may be the alternative.

Nonetheless, our Roxy rocked Chicago, and there’s still time to see this terrific production.

Note: Chicago runs through August 25 at the Roxy Theater in Downtown Clarksville. Call 931-645-7699 for tickets and performances dates.

THE LITTLE FOXES

by Lillian Hellman

In a male dominated society, can a woman dare to rule?  Turmoil disturbs a charming Southern home as wickedly clever Regina vies with her scheming brothers, possessive Ben and crully arrognt Oscar, for $75,000.00 in securities and countrol of the family business.

7 p.m. on wed and thurs

8 p.m. on friday and saturdays

some sat matinees*

June 15,16,20,21,22,23*, 27, 28, 29, 30

http://www.roxyregionaltheatre.org/nowplaying/index.html

Don’t fail to posses this opportunity; get down there and see it.

coming up:  Chicago

Lets start it off with, Network: “A movie made 30 years ago that perfectly describes the situation today about television, news, and the mainstream media. It resonates louder and sounds truer today that it did when the movie was made.” (warning contains some adult language)

Click here to view the embedded video.

Here’s a pro-net neutrality PSA that paints a grim future of the internet—if telecom and cable companies get their way.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Big Media Hall of Shame, Which Corporate Media Mogul do you think has done the most, to pervert the free press in America?

Click here to view the embedded video.

Senator Barbara Boxer revealed in a committee meeting on September 14, 2006, that the FCC ordered “its staff to destroy all copies of a draft study that suggested greater concentration of media ownership would hurt local TV news coverage, a former lawyer at the agency says.” (Audio and Video is not properly sync’d)

Click here to view the embedded video.

Video clip of Al Gore, from the Altertnative MacTaggart Lecture given at this year’s MediaGuardian Edinburgh International Television Festival (MGEITF)

Click here to view the embedded video.

Here is a clip from the film “Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch’s War on Journalism”. Media analyst for FAIR Peter Hart discusses the effect of media consolidation on journalism.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Another clip from the film “Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch’s War on Journalism”. Executive Director Digital Democracy Jeff Chester discusess big media conglomerates and how they dominate debate. … (more)

Click here to view the embedded video.

Dave von Kleist (maker of 9/11 In Plane Site) explains why you can’t trust the mainstream media to tell you what you need to know, and he urges Americans to do whatever they can to take the media back and expose the truth about 9/11 and related issues. Personally, I think a better route than “taking back” the media is just simply to replace it. Youtube, Google Video, Yahoo Video, etc., we have the tools now to make the mainstream corporate media obsolete. Let’s do it.

This is raw interview footage, some of which appears in the documentary “One Nation Under Siege”

Click here to view the embedded video.

Start off with a bang, eh? The problem of Corporate Rule.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Globalization and the Media
Undercurrents explore how the media is involved in shaping public opinion during the ‘War on Terrorism’ and Globalization.

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Text describing individual videos is the property of the uploader of the video.