Entering the empty stage, David Ford began to shake his maracas into the microphone. He stepped away and lowered the maracas, but, as if it was somehow coming from behind the scenes, the sound continued to echo. He then briefly vocalized into the mic and -- same as the maracas -- after the vocalization was over, it eerily continued. At this point, hushed murmurs throughout the crowd could be heard: "What is he doing?" "How......

A tall, icy glass of our favorite internet junk, just for you. The cast is filling out for the upcoming Fox sci-fi drama Fringe, produced by, amongst others, man of the hour J.J. Abrams. Sounds like it's going to be an X-Files type of thing. We're down with that. Speaking of J.J., the director of the Abrams-produced Cloverfield is already in talks to do a sequel. Seeing that the recent controversy about Mass Effect made......

The best of the internet, squirted out in flavorful neon globules, just for you. Friends, today is International Delete Your MySpace Account Day! Woo hoo! This Phillyist just took part by deleting his account, and he's feeling free and easy. Dude. Cheeseburger in a can. (Via Jason) Harvey Weinstein wants another Rambo movie, and already has an idea for a plot wherein the character would return to the United States. Yet more G.I. Joe casting......

The best of the internet, chopped into tiny bits and grilled for your enjoyment. Guillermo del Toro is in talks to direct both Hobbit movies. Woo hoo! Awards season continues! Cinematical was liveblogging as Sundance gave out their awards. The SAG and DGA awards also were announced, and the results seem to suggest that the Coen brothers' film No Country for Old Men is a shoe-in for an armload of Oscars. The Top 20 Geek......

A tall, icy glass of our favorite internet junk, just for you. How about a deep-fried, cheese-filled burger patty made entirely of bacon? We'll take a couple over here, please! (Via) Cinematical points out that pretty much anything you might want to know about Cloverfield has now leaked online, so they're going to stop talking about it now. But if that's still not enough for you, Phillyist's cousin LAist has an interview with the director.......

What's new and/or interesting on TV this week. BCS Championship Game: Ohio State vs. LSU (Mon, 8:15PM-11:30PM, Fox) - Woo hoo! It's the college football Super Bowl! Of course, the bittersweet thing is, this means college football is over for the season. But at least it'll go out with a bang. Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives (Mon, 10PM-10:30PM, Food Network) - This episode's theme is eateries that are open 24/7, and one of the places being......

What's new and/or interesting in Philly theaters this weekend. The Savages - Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman play siblings who are forced to live together again with their estranged father when his mind goes and there's no one else to take care of him. Not surprisingly, they drive each other crazy, but ultimately "start to realize what adulthood, family and, most surprisingly, each other are really about." Which sounds kind of corny. But with......

The holidays kind of snuck up on us this year. Perhaps because Thanksgiving was so early. After Turkey Day was over, it was still too early to get into the Christmannakkanzaa spirit. (This Phillyist adheres to a strict "No Christmas music before December 1" rule.) And then we got caught up with other things, and we didn't really notice that, yep, we're in holiday season. It took Thursday night's WXPN Musicians On Call benefit concert......

Go across the Walt Whitman Bridge and take the North-South Freeway to Route 55. Travel South on Route 55 for about 25 miles, and you'll find yourself in Vineland, New Jersey. (Insert wisecrack about Vineland's awesomely bad municipal website here.) Why would you go to Vineland? Well, at the moment, you probably wouldn't. But next summer, you might have a reason to. Paste Magazine is reporting that C3 Presents—the force behind Lollapalooza and the......

Mike Doughty Ticket Giveaway
11/15/07-11/16/07 ...

When a performer is a standard bearer and larger than life in his or her field, it's hard to escape knowing who that person is, even if you only have a passing interest in his or her art. This Phillyist isn't particularly interested in cinema or dramatic theater, for example, but still knows who Orson Welles and John Barrymore are, if only vaguely. Similarly, one cannot be familiar even in passing with modern dance and......

This Phillyist would like to interrupt this wonderful Wednesday to remind you that Philadelphia’s NBA representative, the 76ers, will be starting their season tonight at 7 p.m. with a road game against the Toronto Raptors. The team is not expected to do too much this year. In fact, most people are picking them to finish last in their division, and Sports Illustrated even picked them to pull up the rear in the entire Eastern Conference.......

If you ever look at our weekly theatre listings (and we hope you do!), you may have noticed that one local company has been conspicuously absent from the mix: the Philadelphia Theatre Company. They're starting their season off a little late this year so that the finishing touches can be made to their new home: the Suzanne Roberts Theatre on Broad and Lombard Streets. This Phillyist and Phillyist GW made it out to a special......

What's new and/or interesting at Philly theaters this weekend. Ira & Abby - Ira is a brilliant, neurotic Jew with tons of "issues" (hmm... where have we heard of that character before?), and Abby is a free spirit who likes to solve her friends' problems. They meet, fall in love, meet each other's parents, and decide to get married, all in just a few hours. Then, of course, a series of wacky shenanigans make them......

This Phillyist hearts Rilo Kiley. Jenny Lewis is our long-standing girl crush. So we're pumped for tonight, when they'll be at the Tower Theatre, touring after their new album, Under the Blacklight. We can't stop playing it. It's a lot more eclectic than the band’s previous CDs, but we dig it, immensely. It’s like Multiple Personality Disorder Rilo Kiley. Which is awesome, because crazy people are fun. Didn't you see Sybil? Under the Blacklight has......

This Phillyist is a Libra, a sign that is characterized by indecisiveness and the desire for nice things (Linda Goodman describes us as "pink, fluffy clouds"). It is with great rejoicing then that we greeted the news that Lush (purveyor of bath bombs the world over) on Walnut is a Libra too, and will be celebrating its first birthday in spa-ish style. They're offering goodies throughout the day, complimentary chair massages from 5-8 pm,......

Warped Tour is the gift that keeps on giving, at least for this Phillyist. We got to hear some great bands there, and we're going to continue following some of them. One of those bands is Monty Are I. Monty rocked our socks off at Warped, and they'll be back tomorrow night at the Trocadero with Sum 41, Amber Pacific and Schoolyard Heroes. Monty's latest album, Wall of People, is starting to pick up......

This Phillyist started drinking coffee in college (we're just not all that precocious, what can we say). Those days, coffee consisted of a cuppa from the student center convenience store or, on good days, the spoils from a trip to Wawa. We're in danger of dating ourselves here, but a Starbucks didn't appear anywhere near campus until half-way through our tenure, and we didn't succumb to the green goddess's siren song with regularity until......

In the interest of full disclosure, we have to tell you that this particular Phillyist grew up in the Boston area, so this review hurts us more than you know. We...really thought that Flogging Molly did an awesome job. If we paid any attention to our mother's advice about not saying anything if there's nothing nice to say...we would probably never say anything about a show at Festival Pier ever again, much less a punk......

Sure, you can wander through art gallery after art gallery tonight. The same places you always go, with the same cheap wine you always drink. Or, you can take advantage of the fact that there's always a First Friday during the Live Arts and Fringe Festivals, and there are plenty of free or pay-what-you-can PLAF events you can hit tonight and for the next week. A few that we think sound interesting: Sonic Dances A......

A few months back, we were contacted by a professor at Drexel who was planning on teaching a summer symposium course called "The Next Philadelphia." As local citybloggers, the Phillyist staffers were apparently perfect candidates for the closing panel, co-hosted by The Next American City (a magazine which, admittedly, we hadn't heard of before receiving the email from Drexel), entitled "The Next Great American City? Reconsidering Philadelphia’s Future." Would we be interested? Of course! This......

What's new and/or interesting at Philly theaters this weekend. 2 Days in Paris - Julie Delpy wrote, directed, and starred in this romantic comedy about a couple - Marion and Jack (Delpy and Adam Goldberg) - who are stopping in Paris to visit Marion's parents after a "romantic" vacation to Venice that ended up driving them further apart. After meeting Marion's parents, her friends, and innumerable exes on the streets of Paris, Jack begins to......

This Phillyist first became aware of Mike Birbiglia when my younger sister was in high school. She signed up to be on his street team. She kept putting his posters up on my door. She'd corner me until I listened to clips from his albums. People, she found audio streams of his appearances at venues across the country and wouldn't let me out of the house until I admitted that, yeah, the dude was kind......

It's official. The No Duh of the Year Award goes to SEPTA. For a number of reasons, of course, but the one that got our goat this morning was decision to remove the malt liquor ads from two buses. According to the Inquirer, SEPTA officials have concluded that the giant, tacky Colt 45 ads plastering the buses might be a bad idea given the hold violence has on our city. To that we say,......

Tonight at the Festival Pier, catch Ben Kweller with Guster. We love his latest self-titled album, and can't resist the video for "Penny on a Track," which features his "Bubbie" dancing her heart out to the song. Above is a video called "Sundress," which we thought was appropriate given the gorgeousness of today. This Phillyist has a special place in her heart for Kweller, whose last CD, specifically the song "My Apartment," got her......

Rachael Yamagata, singer/songwriter, is headed to the Johnny Brenda's tonight. If you can't make it tonight, you can see her on Tuesday, July 24th or Tuesday, July 31st. Yep, that's right - she is playing three times in Philly, a short residency of sorts. Yamagata is known for her dark, raspy alto voice and being highlighted on numerous TV shows and movies. Recently, she contributed a song to Mandy Moore's new CD, Wild Hope. On......

Starting tonight, have a fling in Fairmount. From Thursday through Sunday the neighborhood is a francophile's delight, with activities scheduled each evening in honor of Bastille Day. This Phillyist will be starting the party tonight with the Fairmount French Fling Bar Crawl, which begins at 7 at Aspen. We're sure by the time we get to the seventh and last bar, we'll remember all of our high school French, or at least the important phrases,......

We're just going to get right to the point this week. The Colonial Theatre in Phoenixville is hosting its annual showing of The Rocky Horror Picture Show this Saturday at 10 PM. Tickets are on sale now, so get your fishnets and your best bustier ready to do the time warp. Again. As if that were not enough to convince you that the Colonial is a national treasure, consider this: they're also hosting a screening......

We've always wondered what the protocol is for celebrating a holiday weekend if the actual holiday falls squarely in the middle of the week. Should we be celebrating Independence Day this weekend? Or next weekend? Or should we just celebrate both weekends and spend two weekends in a row gorging ourselves on various grilled meats and icy-cold Coronas and margaritas? (This Phillyist votes the latter.) Fortunately, Nottingham Park in Chester County is offering their Independence......

The sun may be shining now, but it was pouring this morning, and that was quite the thunderstorm we had last night. This Phillyist is a big fan of summer storms, so long as she's not at any risk of being struck by lightning, which makes the view from her desk (snapped quickly during this morning's deluge, left) kind of awesome for rain-watching. When she's in her apartment, she throws the windows open with reckless......