Performed in April 2009 to moderate praise, Soulpepper has chosen to
remount their production of David Mamet’s classic 1982 play about aggressively unhinged salespeople during
the height of Reaganism with the same cast and director David Storch. While the actors’ impassioned interactions present some arresting moments,
the play’s moral turpitude grows limp, thanks to the hysterically acted
cursing and door slams that feel more like comic relief.

Musically, the COC’s revival of The Flying Dutchman is a triumph. Of the three times the company has staged Christopher Alden’s
production of Wagner’s early opera, the current cast is the strongest.
Alden’s direction is a mixture of deep insights and unhelpful
peculiarities, but, in general, the few oddities do little to dampen
the power of the experience.

Don’t leave your computer without reading about: writing about yourself; The Gentlewoman; Being Tyler Brule; the most influential people; Christopher Weingarten hate-a-thon.

Don’t leave your computer without reading about: why Nicki Minaj rules; why The Hills is uniquely terrible; the marriage-anxiety industry; sex-tourism for women; and the best book about real estate you’ll ever read. 

Newly added reviews: Celine Dahiner’s document of the mid-’70s New York City avant garde, Blank City; Garry Beitel’s portrait of Montreal’s most renowned gay, Jewish hip-hop producer, Socalled; and Chaim Litewski’s Discovery Channel-style doc about the military dictatorship in Brazil during the 1960s and 1970s, Citizen Boilesen.

Today: Sigur Rós frontman Jónsi Birgisson flies solo into Sound Academy. Plus: Brit comic legend Eddie Izzard begins his five-night stint at Massey Hall; Hamilton rockers Young Rival move out of the garage; local sextet Donlands and Mortimer bring prog-rock to the kids; and today’s Hot Docs pick, The Oath, makes for a highly worthy and equally disturbing
addition to the post-9/11 documentary canon.

Horror reboots: is there a more annoyingly prolific film cliché from
the 2000s? Yes: there are the terrible horror reboots that, like
uncreative vampires, suck whatever minimal scariness from the original
works. A Nightmare on Elm Street joins the ranks with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Halloween and Friday the 13th with this return from the dead, leaving only Hellraiser the only ’80s horror relic left to unearth.

Their controversial new album, Congratulations, may be eliciting charges of commercial suicide, but last night at the Mod Club, the Brooklyn psychedelic pop outfit went about proving that they really haven’t changed at all. 

Changing tastes and a defection slow this rock trio down, but these hearts were meant to run free.

Our favourite former shantytown reporter, Shaughnessy Bishop-Stall, delivers his first fictional novel, Ghosted.