Tag Archives: Hearne Christopher
Hearne: Queen of Mean Lisa Lampanelli on Kicking Butt, Her Love Life & Johnny Dare
Kinder gentler? No effing way!
Queen of Mean funny grrrl Lisa Lampanelli may have – at long last – found the dude of her dreams, but no way is she about to lighten up on the male species or any other of the many targets she infamously burns at the verbal stake.
“No, that’s the whole point,” Lampanelli says. “There’s so much in the world that annoys me. In fact, my act has even gotten more edgy because now I’ve got my own personal bodyguard.”
Translation: gone are the days when riled up or overly-enthusiastic comedy clubbers can backslap her or participate in sundry verbal indignities sans fear of repercussion.
Lampanelli and new bodyguard/beau Jimmy Big Balls hit the Uptown Theater Friday. Continue reading
Hearne: Romancing the ‘Stone – Cap Fed Park @ Sandstone 2010
They’re off!
Another summer, another season of greening up the local concert scene. Courtesy of venerable KC concert impresario Chris Fritz and the Capitol Federal Park at Sandstone.
“We’re going to do a little thing for Earth Day,” Fritz said, shortly before the venue’s kickoff concert with the Flaming Lips on Friday. “If we do 15 events, we’ll have one of the lowest carbon footprints of any entertainment venue in the country. We don’t have air-conditioning. We limit our water usage.”
The list goes on…
Wildest thing that happened last year – Season Two for Fritz new Bonner Springs Greenventure? Continue reading
Hearne on the Street: Gary Sinese Rocks Uptown
Great guy, really good cause, mediocre show…
Make no mistake. Actor Gary Sinise’s KC homecoming – in ’95 he starred in the locally lensed Truman -was triumphant. Around 700 or-so Cowtowners gathered at the Uptown Theater to catch Sinise’s Lt. Dan Band.
A good time for a good cause – Operation International Children – was pretty much had by all.
The powerfully backed Sinise, playing bass guitar, rocked the Uptown with one crowd-pleasing cover after another. Jimi Hendrix, Michael Jackson, Led Zeppelin – you get the picture.
Just one problem…
Somewhere along the line, the hipness quotient of the performance got way lost. Continue reading
Hearne: Rob Schneider Preps for New Movie at Stanford’s
About funny guy Rob Schneider’s opening night run Thursday at Stanford & Sons…
Turns out the sold out show and subsequent comedy club dates across the country the Saturday Night Live alum is engaging in is a prequel to a new comedy movie, Schneider is prepping for.
No HBO specials this time around…
“I’m going to do a movie actually because HBO specials are not so special anymore,” Schneider says. “It’s a movie that will have standup (comedy) in it. It’s all standup – like Richard Pryor’s movie.”
A few outtakes from Schneider’s roadshow to hone his comedy club chops” Continue reading
Hearne: Finally, a Broad Eyewitness Account of Plaza Melee by Official on Scene
Bored by out-of-context eyewitness accounts and stories about the Plaza riot by newspaper reporters who weren’t even on the scene? Come on down!
Hearne: KC Norml Says Pro Medical Marijuana Bill Was Thinly Veiled Effort to Ban K2
Caught up to officials of Continue reading
Hearne: Hot Summer Nights Not Too Little but Too Not Late Enough
Plans are afoot to avert KC’s annual summer wee hours, outdoor gatherings of young African-Americans…
Or better said, to keep them the heck out of middle class sanctuaries such as the Plaza and Westport.
Enter discussions to ressurect the old Hot Summer Nights urban youth distraction programs of year Continue reading
Hearne: Cinemark / Plaza Not the Only Youth Violence Victims
How quickly we forget…
The recent uproar over teen and young adult violence by blacks on the Plaza received the Mother of All Media Coverage, but it’s hardly a first. Pretty much everyone remembers the late night weekend struggles in Westport and at urban kid difficulties at four area movieplexes that the area has wrestled with off and the past 10 or so years.
AMC’s Ward Parkway Theater, for example, has struggled with kid crowds off and on for years.
How well, Ward Parkway neighbor Jeff Glazer knows… Continue reading
Hearne: Not Gonna Happen; Riot Weather Update
The dervishes are still whirling…
Kansas City police, Plaza businessmen and city leaders are cranking away behind the scenes trying to come up with a solution for the recent Plaza riots. Kinda like they did in year’s past when Westport spun out of control when thousands of black youth and young adults congregated in Westport, fights broke out and regular paying patrons wary of the scene began to back away.
Will Hot Summer Nights return? Will the city hire DJs and set up party and parking zones outside the more gentrified portions of the city? Will the Plaza convert to a police state on Friday and Saturday nights?
All of the above are now being cussed and discussed. Continue reading
Hearne: K2 Edges 420 Day Way
Yesterday was 420 Day, the counterculture holiday that won’t go away… The day that celebrates all thing marijuana. But these days there’s a new kid on the block; K2. Depending on your slant, K2 is either the world’s second-highest mountain … Continue reading
Hearne: It’s a Beautiful Day; 420 Day Arrives in Cowtown
Priorities are everything…
For readers of the KC Star’s FYI section, today’s front page news was all about Earth Day. It’s not that the newspaper merely jumped the gun on Thursday’s Earth Day festivities. More to the point, it completely missed the boat on the huge, national counterculture holiday today, Continue reading
Hearne: KC Strip Off to Slow but Steady Start
On your marks, get set…
Last weekend’s first full pay-to-play run for the KC Strip party trolleys may have been a bit underwhelming but there’s more to the story than meets the eye, organizers say.
While ridership was less than half of the Strip’s debut weekend, ride-for-free numbers, cooler temps appear to have taken a toll – not just on potential Plaza rioters – but on the party crowd in general. KC’s nightlife scene was pretty across-the-board quiet, according to most observers. Continue reading
Hearne: Plaza Riot Media Gang Bang All for Nought
About Saturday night’s media riot watch on the Country Club Plaza...
Despite veteran Westport wilding watcher’s counsel – that the youthful crowds of African Americans don’t come out when the weather is chilly or rainy – TV newsies and Star reporters were out in force.
Unlike the presumed perpetrators of the weekend before…
“A Night of Unexpected Quiet,” read the bold headline atop the Star’s Sunday Local section.
Unexpected? Hardly. Continue reading
Hearne on the Street: Studio Movie Grill Blues & Karinn Goes Go-Go’s
There’s good new and bad news where the northland’s spanking new Studio Movie Grill is concerned…
First the good
“This theater is 100 percent Dolby 3-D Digital,” says SMG spokeswoman Lynne McQuaker. “I don’t think you’ll find that anywhere else in Kansas City.”
Now the bad
A press screening sampling of the movie Date Night revealed some shortcomings not likely to disappear anytime soon. Continue reading
Hearne: Forget “Youth” Activities, Plaza & Westport Late Night Crowds Want Adult Action
Not everyone is buying into the idea that last weekend Continue reading
Hearne on the Street: Craig Glazer’s Great Escape
Saturday’s melee on the Plaza reminds Glazer Continue reading
Hearne: Lezak’s Riot Weather Forecast for Plaza
As goes the weather, so will what passes for rioting on the Plaza…
So according to Stanford & Sons main man Craig Glazer who logged more than a dozen years on the front lines in Westport, navigating the party zone’s annual warm weather swarmings of black teenagers and young adults.
At present police say they’ll be at the ready on the Plaza, should the problem revisit this weekend. At the same time, they’re not ruling out that the game could shift to another part of town in a heartbeat. If it does, they plan to be ready. They’re keeping an eye on Twitter and Facebook and asking parents to exercise judgment. Continue reading
Hearne: KC Cops Map Out Tweet Strategy for Plaza
How tweet it was…
Saturday’s urban youth rampage on the Plaza left little doubt that some serious preventative counter measures by police and Highwoods Properties would be forthcoming.
This just in: they already are and they already were.
Kansas City police met with Plaza officials last week to map a strategy for dealing with the hundreds of mostly African-American youth that spilled onto the streets two weeks ago from the Cinemark theater.
Cinemark ditched it’s kids restrictions policy last year, then slashed ticket prices in December to become something of a discount theater.
Prior to implementing the strategies, streets outside Cinemark had become overrun by unruly kids on weekend nights.
Highwoods and police met last week to try and quell the Cinemark debacle, says police spokesman Darin Snapp. Continue reading
Hearne: Near Race Riot Engulfs Country Club Plaza
The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?
There’s a reason for the sparse coverage of the Country Club Plaza’s Saturday night race wilding. And that is that Kansas City’s news media – starting with the Star at 18th and Grand – is largely an absentee ballot when it comes to weekend newsroom staffing. The Star has always fielded a skeleton staff on Saturdays and Sundays. And these days, the skeletons are fewer and farther between. Ditto, I suspect, for TV news crews.
Missing in action in the mix: Continue reading
Hearne: Police cite Cinemark/Twitter/Facebook re Plaza Riot
So many bloggers, so few facts…
Kansas City Police say Saturday’s teen wilding on the Plaza – stemmed from policy changes by the Continue reading
