Seattle Metblogs » Patricia Eddy

Cirque Dreams Review – Cute, Affordable

Patricia Eddy — Sat, 22 May 2010 00:12:15 +0000

We were fortunate enough to be able to attend the touring Cirque Dreams Illuminations show last night at the Moore. Despite a little misunderstanding over what time the show started (we thought 8, in reality it was 7:30), we had an enjoyable time.
Make no mistake, this isn’t a Cirque du Soleil show. However, it doesn’t cost as much as a Cirque du Soleil show either. Tickets run from $30-$50 and for that price, you get a pretty decent show.
You can definitely see the Cirque influences – the circus director comic relief, the bendy girls in largely flesh colored spandex, aerialists, muscular men in sleeveless shirts, and of course, the music.
There were good acts and great acts, some funny moments, and some impressive stunts. In particular, I’d never seen anyone play the drums using little ping pong balls (well, I don’t know what they were, but saying little balls just seemed… wrong somehow).
If you go, and your tickets are in the first few rows, there’s one point where you might get a little wet and if you’re on the aisle, you could get pulled in for a little audience participation number.
Overall though, Cirque Dreams Illuminations is a nice evening out with the family.

Tickets

Cirque Dreams Comes to the Moore

Patricia Eddy — Tue, 18 May 2010 03:44:19 +0000

I admit it, I’m a Cirque du Soleil junkie. I’ve seen O at the Bellagio at least six times. I used to go to Vegas once a year and I saw it nearly every time for a few years there. I’m mesmerized by the colors and the music and of course, where O is concerned, the water. If I could do any job in the world, for a week, and be instantly good at it, it would be a Cirque du Soleil performer. The strength and control that the performers need to have over their bodies is mesmerizing.

Now if you want to see a Cirque du Soleil show in Seattle, you’ve got to wait until they have one of their tent performances at Marymoor Park. Those tickets can run over $100 and you usually have to buy way in advance, not to mention drive to Redmond to see the show. But Cirque Dreams Illuminations gives you the chance to see a similar style show downtown at the Moore, one of my favorite Seattle venues. The seats are comfortable, the views (particularly from the balcony) are superb, and of course it’s within walking distance of more than a few restaurants.

Now this isn’t actually a Cirque du Soleil show. It’s a Cirque Dreams show. Cirque Dreams was established in 1993 to combine the French style of acrobatics made famous by Cirque du Soleil with an American circus flair and Broadway theatrics. The company has toured with a number of shows and Cirque Dreams Illuminations is their latest.

Cirque Dreams Illuminations is playing at The Moore from May 20th through May 23rd. Tickets are $30-$50 and are on sale now through STG Presents.

Columbia City Farmers Market Opens Today

Patricia Eddy — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 19:37:40 +0000

Farmers market season is upon us and today we have the first of the seasonal Farmers Markets opening in Columbia City.
The Columbia City Farmers Market runs from 3-7pm every Wednesday until October 20th.

Columbia City Farmers Market
Rainier Ave South and South Edmunds
3-7pm

Zoo Tunes Line-up Announced

Patricia Eddy — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 22:38:52 +0000

I admit, I was a little worried that Zoo Tunes would go the way of the Lake Union Fireworks show this year. After all, in past years they have been sponsored by the now defunct WaMu. But thanks to BECU, they are back again this year and the lineup was just announced last week.

Tickets go on sale on May 3rd, at all Metropolitan Market locations. Individual artists may have tickets on sale already through fan sites, so if you are worried about a particular date selling out, check the band’s site now. Great Big Sea (one of my personal favorites) for example, just had a pre-sale of tickets for fans last week. Lineup after the jump.

June 27th – Jewel with Radney Foster – $28
June 30th – Steve Earle with Joe Ely – $21
July 14th – Carbon Leaf – $24
July 18th – The Round 62 featuring Star Anna, Damien Jurado and more – $15
July 21st – Jimmy Cliff with Trevor Hall – $24
July 29th – Great Big Sea – $22
August 3rd – Mary Chapin Carpenter/Shawn Colvin – $24
August 11 – The Levon Helm Band with Joe Pug – $26
August 25th – John Hiatt and The Combo – $22
August 29th – Herbie Hancock and The Imagine Project – $27

Concerts happen rain or shine, so buy your tickets, hope for good weather, and bring a rain hat just in case.

Upcoming at SIFF – The Films of Alan Rudolph

Patricia Eddy — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 03:32:42 +0000

It’s just about time for the Seattle International Film Festival where you can see nearly countless films over the course of three weeks. But did you know that SIFF Cinema offers unique film experiences throughout the year? Well, yes, you probably did, but hey, wasn’t that a semi-catchy intro?

This coming weekend, April 23-25th, SIFF Cinema is showing the films of Alan Rudolph, including the Seattle-filmed picture Trouble in Mind. Alan will be in Seattle to introduce the first film in the series personally. More details after the jump.

This weekend includes three double features, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Oh, and what’s even better is that if you buy a ticket for the first showing of the double feature ($10 for non-members, $8 for members), you get into the second film of the double feature ABSOLUTELY FREE!

Descriptions reprinted from SIFF.

Friday, April 23
REMEMBER MY NAME (1978)
7:30PM

This off-kilter noir is the tale of a deranged woman (Geraldine Chaplin) who returns home from prison to wreak havoc on her ex-husband (Anthony Perkins), told with loving generosity toward the characters and fine attention to detail. Produced by Robert Altman with exquisite cinematography by Tak Fujimoto, and an amazing blues soundtrack by Alberta Hunter. Written and directed by Alan Rudolph.

CHOOSE ME (1984)
9:30PM

Night owls haunt the neon-lit, after-hours streets of Los Angeles where Lesley Ann Warren’s bar is a beacon for lost souls and vagabonds. Eve (Warren) is a regular caller to a radio talk show whose host Dr. Love (Geneviève Bujold) gives advice to the lovelorn. And then drifter (and maybe compulsive liar) Mickey (Keith Carradine) enters the scene…

Saturday, April 24
TROUBLE IN MIND (1985)
7:30PM

In a down-and-out brick corner of Rain City—set in the vague future/past—hapless denizens are drawn to Wanda’s café like moths to a flame. At the center of the film is a romantic triangle between ex-cop/con Hawk (Kris Kristofferson), young mother Georgia (Lori Singer), and her boyfriend Coop (Keith Carradine), but its edges are part thriller and part comic fantasy. Filmed in Seattle, with a moody score by Mark Isham and a brilliant turn by Divine in a non-drag role as gangster Hilly Blue.

THE MODERNS (1988)
9:30PM

Keith Carradine is Nick Hart, an expatriate American artist living in the Paris of Hemingway and Fitzgerald’s Lost Generation, who becomes involved in a forgery plot hatched by a wealthy art patron played by Geraldine Chaplin.

“The Moderns is Rudolph at his most literary and artificial; there are moments when one can believe the film was made by Nabokov and Charlie Parker after seeing F for Fake. [A] vivid pastiche of period bohemianism, and so alive a film it trembled with views, hints, glances, and possibilities.” —David Thomson.

Sunday, April 25
AFTERGLOW (1997)
3:00PM

In a major comeback, Julie Christie plays Phyllis Mann, a former B-movie actress who lives in Montreal with her handyman husband, Lucky (Nick Nolte), and spends most of her time watching her crummy old movies and pining for happier times. The Mann’s lives intersect with another couple’s (Lara Flynn Boyle and Jonny Lee Miller) and the film revolves around the four characters whose paths and fates intertwine. Written and directed by Alan Rudolph.

BREAKFAST OF CHAMPIONS
5:30PM (1999)

This delirious adaptation of Kurt Vonnegut’s novel takes place in a fictional town (filmed in Twin Falls, Idaho) where wealthy Pontiac dealer Dwayne Hoover (Bruce Willis) meets Vonnegut’s signature character, philosopher Kilgore Trout (Albert Finney) and goes from an All-American business leader to a man with a deep existential crisis. With Nick Nolte, Glenne Headly, Lukas Haas, Omar Epps.

For more info and to purchase tickets click here.

United Way King County Hunger Challenge

Patricia Eddy — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 06:21:12 +0000

This week is Hunger Action Week in King County. This week, a variety of public officials, local media personalities, and bloggers will try to live on the value of food stamps given to either an individual or family in the state of Washington.

The Basic Food Benefit in the state of Washington is $7 a day for individuals, $12 a day for a family of 2.
So far the new mayor, Mike McGinn is taking part, as well as KOMO radio host Brian Calvert and a whole list of local bloggers (including me).

Follow along on the United Way of King County’s blog.

Mission:Sustainable

Patricia Eddy — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 23:56:34 +0000

Did you know there could soon be a few more reality TV stars in our midst? It’s true! Mission:Sustainable (think a green Queer Eye for the Straight Guy”) is premiering at the Fisher Pavillion on February 11th. The pilot episode features several green leaders in our community including KUOW Internship Coordinator Nathan Friend and Chef Becky Selengut.
The show selects a family (nominated by their friends) who is in dire need of an environmental makeover. Three of Mission:Sustainable’s consultants will work with the family to show them where their actions are most hurting the environment and help them make changes necessary to reduce their environmental impact.
Everyone on this project donated their time and in order to host the premiere, they need to raise $5000. They’re close too. Only $497 more and they’ll be set. If you’d like to donate, visit their website and click on their Paypal link.
Mission:Sustainable hasn’t been picked up by any networks yet, so your only chance to see it is at the FREE premiere. Yes, that’s right. They need the $5,000 because the premiere is absolutely free to the public. All you have to do is RSVP.

Want a Valentine’s Day Splurge?

Patricia Eddy — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 19:54:55 +0000

Personally, I rarely eat out on Valentine’s Day. I much prefer to cook my husband something special (or we cook something special together) because most restaurants charge a lot more for those special occasions and I’ve rarely found it worth it. But if you do have some extra dough burning a hole in your pocket, and you want to impress your significant other, Canlis will be accepting reservations for Valentine’s Day starting tomorrow at 11am. These reservations fill up quickly (usually in under 2 hours) and the menu will be prix fixe.
To get a reservation, call tomorrow at 11am.
Canlis – 206-283-3313

Jasper Fforde and Shades of Grey

Patricia Eddy — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 07:22:27 +0000

Shades of Grey

Please forgive me for playing the “Jasper Fforde Role-Playing Game”. You see, I am going to try to tell you why you should read some of Jasper Fforde’s books and what they’re about. The game goes something like this.

Me: “You should really read this book, The Eyre Affair”
You: “What’s it about?”
Me: “Well, there’s Thursday… and she’s got a dodo. No, that’s not really it, well, Jane Eyre… literary detective… books, pages… Err, Miss Havisham tries to break a land speed record*…ARGH. Just read the book!”

*Ok, technically, Miss Havisham and her speed record are not in The Eyre Affair, they’re in The Well of Lost Plots, but it read well.

That is the Jasper Fforde Role-Playing Game. You can’t really describe his books with any standard categorization. After attending his talk and reading at Third Place Books tonight, I’m not sure you can describe the man with any standard categorization either. Well, that’s not really true. He’s smart, funny, and (shhh, don’t tell my husband) darn cute. Tonight’s reading was entertaining and funny. As you can probably tell from the little role-playing game above, reading a random section from one of his books isn’t exactly easy. In fact, as my husband put it, we would gladly pay for Jasper Fforde to read his books aloud to us if they always included the commentary as he went along. There was lots of “Well, you have to know that…” and “you see in this world, colors are used…”. He couldn’t get through two sentences without stopping to explain something or other in the book. But that’s why you should read the book. There is so much depth to his books, and the plots are well thought out and intricate, that they are a joy to read.

He confirmed that there will be another Thursday Next book. In fact, he’s working on it right now. On average, he told us that the Thursday Next books take him about 100 days to write, but this book, Shades of Grey, took over 400 days to write.

He showed his intelligence in more than just his talk though. My husband stood in line to get our book signed and as per the norm, the attendants put a post-it on the page with the dedication. My husband asked for “John and Patricia” and Jasper Fforde asked him, when he got up in line, “Are you sure you don’t want Patricia and John?” Smart man, that Jasper Fforde. I need to go back and read The Eyre Affair, particularly since he gave us some insight into the writing process.

The only negative part of the evening was the seating. I really love Third Place Books. The book selection is fabulous, the staff is helpful and pleasant, and even the food court is pretty nice. However, they packed the chairs in so tightly that I was touching the shoulders and thighs of the people on either side of me and my knees were practically touching the back of the chair in front of me (and I’m a relatively small person). Next time Third Place… add just a bit more space around all of the chairs. Just a touch. Please.

Jasper Fforde Comes to Third Place Books

Patricia Eddy — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 19:24:58 +0000

Personally, I tihnk the Jasper Fforde books defy a standard classification. There are the nursery crime books, the first focusing on who pushed Humpty Dumpty off of that wall, and the second on Goldilocks and those bears. Then there are the Thursday Next books, which are” literary detective” novels complete with the ability for the lead character to jump in and out of works of fiction. Strictly, the are fantasy, but really, they are so much more.

Mr. Fforde has a new book out, Shades of Grey, and he’s coming to Third Place Books tonight at 6:30 for a reading and talk. If you’ve never been to Third Place Books (either Lake Forest Park or Ravenna), you’re missing out. They have a fantastic selection and are really a neighborhood hangout location. Shop local and show your support for your local booksellers.

Third Place Books
17171 Bothell Way NE
Lake Forest Park, WA 98155