PRESSED FOR TIME
From Sylvia Plath to Debbie Harry and ACT UP to Blast Off!!!, this week will span decades and boroughs in terms of all the good shit there is to take in. Stay hydrated and keep your head out of the oven.
Downtown Calling
Oct. 13, Knitting Factory, 361 Metropolitan Ave. (at Havemeyer St.), Brooklyn, 347-529-6696; 7, $8. Directed by Shan Nicholson and narrated by Deborah Harry, Downtown Calling is an engaging, high-energy look at late-70s and early-80s New York. Featuring appearances by Mos Def, Ed Koch, Chris Franz, Jazzy Jay and many others, the film waxes sentimental for this important period in New York subculture. Bottom Line: An official selection of several 2010 film festivals, and cheaper than a regular old trip to the movies. Go before it sells out, in any sense of the term. Dueling Harps Opens Oct. 14, Abrons Arts Center, 466 Grand St. (at Pitt St.), 212-598-0400; 8, $20. Mom and dad always said to use words, not fists, to get over a disagreement. Performance artist Ann Magnuson will prove the fighting power of her words in Dueling Harps. Magnuson (on stage in New York for the first time in nine years) and Adam Dugas will meet onstage to settle a disagreement, but theyll have to battle it out using just their voices and two harps as weapons in a twisted match of musical one-upmanship. Bottom Line: Sure, its harps, but as Magnuson herself wrote about the show, There will be blood. And puppets too. CMJ Music Marathon
Begins Oct. 19, various locations. For information, visit www.cmj2010.com. People like to say that over the years, CMJ, the annual music festival that is spilling across Lower Manhattan and Brooklyn this week, has lost its charm. We loudly disagree, citing thrilling shows this week from bands hailing from across the city, country and world Unicycle Loves You. not to mention the inevitable arrival of amoral musical tourists. Bottom Line: There are a pile of shows to attend and a ton of stuff to hear. Why not just come to our showcase Oct. 20, with Hooray For Earth, Milagres, Unicycle Loves You and more at Spike Hill? ACT UP New York Through Oct. 23, White Columns, 320 W. 13th St., (betw. W. 4th & Hudson Sts.), 212-924-4212; Free. This exhibition, originally presented at Harvard in 2009, explores the history of HIV/AIDS activism through the work of some of the artists behind the movement. The collection now incorporates two new additions: a collection of filmed interviews with surviving ACT UP Members, and a new installation by fierce pussy. Bottom Line: With art-collective names like fierce pussy and Silence = Death Project, this cant be as dry as it sounds. Wish I Had A Sylvia Plath Through Oct. 31, 59E59 Theaters, 59 E. 59th St. (betw. Park & Madison Aves.), 212-279-4200; $25. This solo performance, conceived by Edward Anthony and directed by Daniel S. Zimbler, stars Elisabeth Gray as Esther Greenwood of Plaths The Bell Jar, conversing with a series of black-andwhite silent films, and a mysterious character called Olson the Magic Oven. Bottom Line: A highbrow setting for your weekly allotment of WTF? moments. Sylvia Plath.