Restaurateurs Barton and Shelly Bloom had an almost immediate hit with Tomfooleries (see review) when it opened in 1992. However, their more sophisticated follow-up restaurant, Forks in the Air, lasted only twenty months after its 1995 debut in Leawood’s Hawthorne Plaza. The problem might have been with the restaurant’s location at the far east side of the shopping strip rather…
There’s a bittersweet irony to the recent news that Houlihan’s Restaurants Inc. has filed for Chapter 11 protection. The original Houlihan’s Old Place on the Country Club Plaza — the groovy singles gathering spot that spawned a restaurant empire — no longer bears any resemblance to its former self. Thirty years, almost to the day, after restaurateurs Joe Gilbert…
When “infectious” is used to describe music, the word’s dark side is rarely evoked. Ordinarily, it’s a commendation that denotes hooky euphoria, the kind found only in pop music. But the late academic curmudgeon Allan Bloom (author of The Closing of the American Mind) accused that same spiritual orgasm of spoiling Western youth for anything but instant gratification. And though…
When a few hard-working dreamers resurrected the El Torreon Ballroom a couple years back, rumor had it that this remarkable, supremely located space would one day become a multipurpose venue that would do the city’s music scene proud. That might have seemed like a pie-in-the-sky theory at the time, given Kansas City’s history of failing to support all-ages entertainment,…
Often, effective art carries the burden of discomfort. From the brilliant yet cringe-inducing film Happiness to J.M. Coetzee’s punishing yet poignant novel Disgrace to Elliott Smith’s diary entries set to song, such works force people to confront unpleasant issues, the kind of ugly human truths that they usually turn to entertainment to help them avoid. On the local front,…
When Keanon Liggatt, Mike Myers, Chuck Irons and Brad Hodgson played their first show together, they called their band To Conquer?, copying the name, question mark and all, from a keyboard effect. To Conquer officially ditched the punctuation after its first gig, but the sense of mystery conveyed by the symbol remained intact throughout its sporadic career, right up…
For the past ten years, Fu Manchu has pounded out red-eyed grooves so sticky with bong smoke they should come packaged with Visine. Combine that with song titles such as “Regal Begal” and “Boogie Van,” album covers featuring one tricked-out funny car or groovy chopper after another and videos overflowing with pinball wizards, skateboard parks and Bigfoot footage, and Fu…
Collateral Damage, held from its original October 2001 release date, seems dated in the post-September 11 world, but it would have felt passé and unnecessary regardless. It’s the sort of film Michael Dudikoff, Chuck Norris and their ilk cranked out on a near-monthly basis when Reagan was president. Those films were designed to make you feel good about being American,…
With painstaking attention to the copious warts of this big, proud country, Monster’s Ball moseys down South to issue the staggering proclamation that there’s racism in our midst! Fortunately, despite the occasionally facile portraiture of screenwriters Will Rokos and Milo Addica (who seem to have skimmed Mississippi Burning and Betrayed), the project is redeemed by its dank atmosphere and…
Sixteen years of solitude: To the Missouri Department of Corrections regarding Kendrick Blackwood’s story (“Time and Punishment,” January 10): As a citizen and taxpayer, I object to the manner in which Bill Herron is being confined. Sixteen years in solitary confinement is wrong. From what I read, I formed the opinion that Bill Herron lacks a conscience. However, the citizens…
Over the decades, Minnie Lou’s 65-year-old bare breast has appeared in scores of newspaper pictures when tittering photographers have sought to enliven dull head shots of Attorneys General Edwin Meese, Janet Reno and John Ashcroft. Last week, though, Ashcroft’s Justice Department employees in Washington, D.C., wrapped Minnie — also known as Spirit of Justice — in a big blue $8,000…
Like everyone else in the Kansas City firefighter’s union hall, Local 42 president Louie Wright must have been surprised when firefighter Robert Wendel rose to challenge him at the regular union meeting the first week of January. He and Wendel had just chatted, shaken hands and parted amicably, with pledges to work out their differences. But during the meeting, Wendel…
One fall afternoon in 1999, while working amid the clanking pots and pans and the smells of meatloaf in the Lone Jack Family Café kitchen, restaurant owner Sonja Callaway saw Officer Jim Nauser come through the door. He wanted to talk to her son, Donnie. The men were unlikely friends: a burglar and a cop. Donnie says Nauser brought an…
