Small plates (call them tapas, call them hors d'oeuvres, call them mezze) and cocktails: a brilliant concept when it's done right, a quagmire if you get it wrong. And so much can go wrong, so quickly. Just look at the sad-sack happy hours in all the gin joints around town; you know who they are. So what a pleasure to find a new spot that does it right, Cicchetti, which is what the Venetians call them. The menu comes with its own official pronunciation guide, "chi-KET-tee," rhymes with spaghetti. "The staff thought the name was too hard," says owner Susan Kaufman. "I overruled them." more ›

One film you won't find on 2007's best-of lists is the first movie we caught on Saturday night, Nothing is Private, the debut feature from American Beauty-scribe/Six Feet Under-creator Alan Ball. It's not that his adaption of Alicia Erian's semi-autobiographical novel Towelhead--the coming-of-age story of a seriously messed-up thirteen-year-old girl living with her strict Lebanese father in early 90s suburban Texas -- is bad, just fundamentally flawed. We just didn't buy that an adolescent so used by nearly every person in her life would be so relatively undamaged, though we did appreciate Ball's restraint in not further abusing a victim via exploitative camerawork. Issues of post-traumatic stress disorder aside, big ups to the ensemble cast, including a hugely pregnant Toni Collette, a seriously conflicted army reservist/creepy racist Aaron Eckhart, and dynamic newcomer Summer Bishil as the young girl at the heart of this darkly comic, occasionally absurdist tale.
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It's Shakespeare, so you can't complain. That's just "Shakespearean language." Here it is, Act III, Scene 1 from The Merchant of Venice:

If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die?

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You know the concept: local artists create fiberglass scultpures based on Ur-piggy Rachel, eventually sold to raise money for the Pike Place Market Foundation. One such sculptor is Colin Reedy, an Oregon furniture designer whose previous contributions include a couple of ride-em "Pork Choppers." This particular creation, titled "Prosciutto and Melon Pig," ought to be positioned at a deli counter like DeLaurenti, not on the sidewalk in Belltown next to, gulp, the pork-free Tandoori Hut. more ›

The -ists this week had politics on the brain. And what goes better with politics? Partying-- that's two great tastes in one. Oh, and Kevin Federline...can't forget about Kevin Federline. That's three great tastes in one. more ›

A tent city occured at St Joe's on the Hill this week marking the beginning of the apocolypse. Rapture, please come before the fabric of our society rends. Or we run out of oil. Which ever comes first. more ›

Dale Chihuly's copyright infringement suit against two of his former contractors has hit the New York Times (yeah, you need a login). (And we look forward to seeing the Stranger's post pointing out that they wrote that story first.) more ›

growth and development, is the long-time home to the Center for Wooden Boats. more ›

Seattle Opera had a presentation of Offenbach's Tales of Hoffmann last night, and Seattlest was there. First we sipped wine in the lobby and raised our eyebrows at McCaw Hall's mid-'90s condo aesthetic: metallic silver columns and artistic use of chainlink fencing. (We raised our eyebrows separately, because we can do that.) more ›