It's not often that you get a chance to help a blind man make his way...around the world in a sailboat. On Saturday, October 1, local jazz musicians will meet at Humphrey's Backstage Lounge to play a benefit show to …

The above image is terrible - intentionally so. I mean, I could have grabbed something off the web that was taken with a better camera by a better photographer, and so given you some better sense of just how astonishing …

Contrary to rampant local rumor, the downtown 5th Avenue bar Whiskey Girl is not shutting down. According to the operators, it's getting a makeover, with a new location in early 2012. "We've been hearing rumors that Whiskey Girl is shutting …

He arrived last Tuesday, when Lee Child's (pictured) The Affair came to San Diego's few remaining bookstores. Reacher's the star of something like 16 mystery novels. But the number isn't the point, nor are the titles, which blur after a …

The exact locale is still a secret, but Scott West's local rooftop concert series will debut October 15 at a "La Jolla ocean view rooftop" with the Scott West Band, Roni Lee, and Rich McGee. "We're going to have a …

The San Diego County Library is gearing up to host its annual Book Festival this Saturday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. at the library’s Encinitas branch. The event spotlights numerous local and national literary names, as well as creators …

Tomorrow night, director Gary Hustwit (Helvetica, Objectified) will screen his documentary film, Urbanized at USD's Peace & Justice Theatre. The event, presented in association with the San Diego Architectural Foundation, Neat, Neat, Neat, and Set & Drift, will include a …

It used to be blue versus gray. Now, according to pundits, it's red versus blue. Regional profiling claims that people who live along the coasts are blue-state elitist liberals; those inland are red-state conservatives and fundamentalists. One wag said it …

Decades ago, the best show in town was in Ocean Beach, Saturday at midnight. The Strand Theatre screened The Rocky Horror Picture Show. The audience, dressed as the various characters, carried on a dialogue with the dialogue. Bics flicked, rice …

Life imitates art, in David Leddy's drama, a lot. This "site-specific audio-play" requires adjustments. You don't sit. You walk and wear headphones and listen to a Scottish-lilted voice who calls you "Wanderer." You stop at eight stations, press pause or …

When I was a sprightly young college chap in Northern California, I took much joy in making summer-hitchhiking jaunts to the great cities of Left Coast America, where I rubbed elbows with the locals, visited destinations of literary and historical …

Local theater currently offers a rarely produced play by Christopher Marlowe (Edward II) at Diversionary, and a play about Don Miguel de Cervantes (Man of La Mancha) at the Welk. Along with receiving capable productions these otherwise very different writers …

All plays gear toward an audience's experience. But Will Eno's does much more than most. Just about every step is meant to disturb those sitting comfortably in the dark. The narrator's dressed in a charcoal-gray, unstylish suit. He begins by …

It's a rarity in the world of arts these days, but Orchestra Nova San Diego ended its 2010-2011 season in the black and has pre-sold 75% of its capacity with subscriptions for their 2011-2012 Nova Classics series. They're hiring, not …

“Bicycling has a way of bringing more vibrancy to a city,” Beryl Forman aka Miss Boulevard, marketing manager for the El Cajon Boulevard Business Improvement Association, told the Reader in February. “When you see a bunch of bikes in front …

She1: "Don't do it. You're so skinny. You'll look funny." She2: "I don't care. If I'm going to pay $5,000, I'm f*cking getting C cups." He: "Damn, girl - you complain about having scoliosis now..."

And maybe not just them. Several local theater people got an email this morning from Fred Moramarco, SDSU professor emeritus and artistic director of Laterthanever Productions: "Apologies for having to reach out to you like this. My wife and I …

The Spanish Inquisition stuck Miguel de Cervantes in a dungeon on a trumped up charge (he allegedly foreclosed on a monastery). When the other prisoners set up a mock trial, Cervantes defends himself with a play they'll all act out. …

There are only two more Canyonfolk House Concerts scheduled for the El Cajon home of hosts Bill and Shirlee McAndrews, who are ending the series they began in 2003. If the name “house concert” doesn’t make it clear, they explain …

Ethan Bortnick, a ten-year-old piano prodigy and national concert performer, will headline a Benefit Concert at downtown's Balboa Theater on September 25, with proceeds supporting Classics 4 Kids and their music education programs. Bortnick has performed on The Tonight Show …

Marty Burnett's set for Ken Ludwig's farce ranks among his best in some time. It's an art deco hotel suite, circa 1934, white with black accessories, geometric shapes, and squared corners. Five of its six doors have mirrored trim. Everything's …

“Just got some crazy news,” Lenny Morris posted online Saturday night, September 10. “The show for tonight at Hennessey's Pacific Beach is cancelled, including all future music at Hennesseys PB. Crazy…kind of spotty on the details, but I guess they …

Last week, an estimated 2,000 San Diegan’s made the trek to the Black Rock Desert in Nevada for the Burning Man art, music, and everything festival. The week-long event sold out of tickets for the first time this year at …

Snap decisions with lifelong consequences: a tattoo, saying something ridiculous on the Internet...a pregnancy pact? In Kirsten Greenidge's drama, Annie, Margie, and Talisha thrive on the social network. They are at once sprinting and standing still (like sitting behind a …

The Chanteuse and the Devil’s Muse, a new play with live music written and directed by local celeb David J (Bauhaus, Love & Rockets), debuts this week at the Bootleg Theater in Los Angeles, running through October 1 before moving …

In this week's theater column, Sam Woodhouse looks back on the San Diego Rep's first 35 years. I asked him not for a Greatest Hits list, but to talk about shows where the Rep or he, personally, made a leap. …

A slow week let me do something I haven't done in years: see a show a second time, away from the pressures, the hoopla, and what Walter Kerr called the "catastrophic importance" of opening night. I went back to The …

As you make your way from the elevator to the roof-deck pool, you pass through a hallway whose wall is festooned with band names and insignias. Because, as you learn when you hear Nine Inch Nails' "Closer" while shopping at …