Thursday, September 1, 2011

SEPT 2011: Green Drinks; ComeDina; Third Man Radio Play; Jeremy Benson; Accoustic Night; Bill Plympton @ The State; Banned Books in NYC; Raconteur 54

7:00 - 9:00 PM, Tues. Sept 6
GREEN DRINKS

It all started in 1989 at a pub called the Slug and Lettuce in Northern London when a handful of eco-conscious mates pulled some tables together and drank some beer. The concept evolved into Green Drinks and now it's global. Each city has an organizer who arranges meetings in bars and restaurants (providing the greenest beer possible, and by green we mean enviro-minded, not colored; in our case, Climax, locally brewed in Roselle Park). Green Drinks meets in fifty countries from Argentina to Zambia. And now, METUCHEN! Come have a beer and get green. FREE!

7:30 PM, Thurs. Sept 8
THE COMEDINA SHOW! W/Special Guest Andy Pitz

The Rac's monthly stand up comedy show hosted by Rac volunteer Dina Hashem.Get it? ComeDINA? A roster of local jokesters (Gordon Baker-Bone, Max Lorenzi, Justin Flanagan) headlined by Andy Pitz. Pitz has performed on Late Night with Letterman and The Late, Late Show with Craig Ferguson and is a reg at Comic Strip Live, Stand Up NY, and the Gotham Comedy Club. Only $5!

8:00 PM, Thurs./Fri. Sept 15 & 16
THE 3RD MAN
A Staged Radio Play
Theatrical Lighting! Sound Effects!

Featuring Carlyle Owens, Laurence Mintz, Michael Jarmus, Alex Dawson, and introducing the new excitement of international fashion model Francesa Teschina as Anna Schmidt.

For those of you who couldn't afford the 75.00 prix fixe dinner (delicious, but steep) that accompanied our last presentation of The 3rd Man, good news! We're doing it again for the much more affordable price of a $10 suggested donation. And while we won't be doling out glasses of Austrian Gruner Veltliner, you can expect the usual comp cup of wine.

The atmospheric rubble and melancholy damp of war-smashed Europe is powerfully evoked in this thrilling radio play, based on Sir Carol Reed's 1949 film. Holly Martins is a "scribbler" of hack Westerns who arrives in postwar Vienna to land a job and join his old pal Harry Lime. Instead he finds himself drawn into a murder mystery and a network of deadly black-market racketeers.

This is our version of a "rent party" and, accordingly, there's a suggested donation of $10. That said, if you happened to be broke as a joke and still want to see it, you won't be turned away (as long as seats are available).

8:00 PM, Sat. Sept 17
JEREMY BENSON
Live Music

From his doleful dirges to his sweet, romantic blues, singer/songwriter Jeremy Benson serves up torchers, scorchers and languid back porchers bursting with woodland wisdom and street corner philosophy. In addition to being a solo performer, Benson is a member of the Jersey based Roadside Graves and the former front man for The Home Alaskan, The Takers, and DarkSongs. FREE!

7:00 - 9:00 PM, Thurs. Sept 22
ACOUSTIC NIGHT w/Sharon Goldman
Live Music

A monthly series spotlighting singer-songwriters, hosted by Metuchen-based singer-songwriter Sharon Goldman. This month, she invites NYC's Honor Finnegan and Paul Sachs to join her round-robin style, with each artist sharing original songs and discussing his/her approach to songwriting. Two sets with a short intermission. FREE!

The Raconteur & The State Theatre Present
8:00 PM, Tues. Sept 27
IDIOTS & ANGELS
W/Special Guest: Director BILL PLYMPTON
Screening/On Stage Conversation/Signing

Described by The New York Times as "ceaselessly imaginative, relentless and brilliant," and hailed simply as "God" by Simpsons creator Matt Groening, two time Academy Award–nominee Bill Plympton screens and answers questions about his latest feature film, Idiots and Angels, and reads and signs his new autobiography, Independently Animated. Plus a special onstage conversation hosted by cartoonist & Plympton fan Patrick McDonnell, the creator of MUTTS.“If The Nightmare Before Christmas, Barfly, and Wings of Desire had a menage-a-trois, their surrealist progeny would be this extraordinary film." - Interview Magazine. For more info, click HERE.

7 PM, Weds. Sept 28
MIKE EDISON'S FOURTH ANNUAL BANNED BOOK PARTY!!! FREE SPEECH, FREE SHOW!!!
Reading/Live Music
Housing Works Bookstore, NYC (Soho)
Former High Times editor and author of Dirty, Dirty, Mike Edison, hosts his Fourth Annual Banned Book Party celebrating the American Library Association's "Banned Book Week" and illuminating America's sordid past of banning and challenging great books. Guests this year include Soft Skull's Richard Nash, The Onion's Todd Hanson, memoirist Rachel Shukert, Alex Dawson of The Raconteur, and Melissa Petro, the elementary school art teacher who admitted in a Huffington Post article to having worked as a prostitute, all reading from their favorite banned books. With a live soundtrack provided by the INTERSTELLAR RENDEVOUS ALL-STAR BAND. All this plus another round of the legendary "Name That Banned Book" contest - come on down for some state-sponsored fear and fabulous prizes! After Party at Nolita's Botanica Bar. FREE!

8 PM, Sat. Oct 1
RACONTEUR 54

Our monthly DJ dance party. This month's theme: The Eighties. Outdoors. With DJ Circuit Bored and a montage screening of John Hughes classics. In conjunction with People Under the Stereo and Suite Beverly.

ON DECK: FEAR MONGERS @ THE STATE; "War of the Worlds" Radio Play; Outdoor Screening "The Cabinet of Caligari"; And THE HAUNTED BOOKSHOP is back!