THURSDAY MARCH 22
Lawrence Krauser
(READING PLUS) What can you expect from an evening with the author of a book published by the rebellious McSweeney’s Books, titled Lemon, about a man in love with a lemon? Judging from the downloadable films on the Internet of previous readings, Krauser will deliver a theatrical, polyartistic event (one scheduled participant predicted it would be a “circus”), featuring, it is rumored, a mini-opera about fishing. Lemon itself is a book pulpy with astringent humor, focusing not on the peculiarity of the subject matter but rather on its poignant and yellow universality. Here is an excerpt: “But stomachs know that life goes on. Salads are finished, pasta brought out and eaten with collective mute militance…. His father’s linguini, paused halfway to his mouth, unravels slowly back into its bowl. Empty fork into mouth. Metal on teeth. Marge was smart.” I recommend you eat heartily and arrive very early. TRACI VOGEL
Speakeasy Cafe, 2304 Second Ave, 728-9770, 7:30 pm, free.
A Russian Hamlet: Son of Catherine the Great
(BALLET) Choreographer Boris Eifman bewildered Soviet authorities in the 1970s with his perversion of classical ballet vocabulary, his carnality, and his fondness for Pink Floyd. His desire to “save Russian ballet from petrification” meant 20 years of homelessness for his Leningrad company and made him one of the major figures in modern ballet. Now his innovations seem a bit creaky, but his heart is busting out all over. Eifman adores his dancers. He shapes his ballets around their physical and spiritual eccentricities; they dance shamelessly, ardently, in return. Their devotion graces the choreographer’s over-the-top theatricality, his reliance on stunning visual images and technical virtuosity, with something more mysterious: love in action. (This ballet is expensive so you should get your uncle to take you.) HEIDI SCHRECK
Eifman Ballet in the UW World Series at Meany Theater, UW campus, 543-4880,
Thurs-Sat at 8, $52. One weekend only.
LAND
(LIVE MUSIC) Seattle-based electro-composer Jeff Greinke has been creating some of the most adventurous and listenable experimental and instrumental music of the last two decades. He is an aural sculptor and a maverick of the order of the late, great John Fahey. Unlike Fahey’s guitar-driven compositions, Greinke’s terrain is atmospheric ambient and electronic music that jumps and careens with texture, depth, and movement. With LAND, his Fourth World ethno-ambient jazz quartet, Greinke has just released Road Movies. The album has more rhythmic focus than some of his solo work, sounding like a dream fusion of Miles Davis and Brian Eno. This CD release party at the Tractor Tavern promises to take the audience on a trip where the soulful and the abstract meet at the crossroads. NATE LIPPENS
Tractor Tavern, 5213 Ballard Ave NW, 789-3599, 9 pm, $7.
FRIDAY MARCH 23
Dysfunction
(DANCE/THEATER) In a brilliant piece about how self-centeredness ruins everything, KT Niehoff explores the many ways we fail to connect. Dysfunction is no dry treatise on ego cathexis–witty but not jokey, cinematically swift, the dance whips across the stage, never letting up for 45 minutes. An egoistic epilepsy early on connects to a shivering, bone-deep cold late in the dance. One dancer initiates a me-in-my-private-sandbox movement, and the other dancers catch it, like a virus. A shared supper deteriorates into a nightmare of table etiquette. Where traditional dancers provide placid lifts and assists, Niehoff’s dancers jerk and shove each other. And Bob Barraza’s marvelous soundscape adds another layer of mournful humor. Dance so often talks about love and infatuation that it’s bracing to see a dance about friendship–and the self-maiming that makes friendship impossible. BARLEY BLAIR
Lingo dancetheater at On the Boards, 100 W Roy St, 217-9888, Thurs-Sun at 8, $15. One weekend only.
SATURDAY MARCH 24
Sewn
(ART) There’s a common, almost knee-jerk reaction to art that makes use of textiles and sewing, nearly always assumed to reference the idea of women’s work, either through critique or elevation. A current show at SAM may or may not change the world’s mind about this, but it does feature one male among the six artists, and all of the artists are emphatically nontraditional in their use of materials. Wendy Hanson is best known around here for her rose-petal sculptures; the other five–Keith Yurdana, Sara Lanzillotta, Alison Gates, David Chatt, and Rachel Brumer–work with such diverse materials as animal gut, old clothing, and glass beads. Bringing formerly sidelined arts under the elite umbrella of fine arts is certainly not for women only. EMILY HALL
Seattle Art Museum, 100 University St, 654-3100. Through July 22
SUNDAY MARCH 25
Where Have All the Bookstores Gone?
(DISCUSSION) Forget the Oscars; what’s really on people’s minds tonight is, “Where have all the bookstores gone?” (At least, in my alternate reality.) Pistil Books, once a staple of Capitol Hill book-lovers, now in the process of moving its business solely to the Internet, hosts an open discussion to address the question. Pistil owners Sean Carlson and Amy Candiotti understand that the issue goes deeper than the market. “The past few years,” they write, “have seen 10 or more Seattle bookstores either go out of business completely or close their retail shops.” What does this change mean for Seattle’s “literary” self-image? What place do bookstores hold in the city’s cultural dialogue? How does market competition affect our understanding of art? Booksellers, writers, and readers are invited to participate in this open forum moderated by The Stranger‘s Bret Fetzer. TRACI VOGEL
Pistil Books & News, 1013 E Pike, 325-5401, 7 pm, free.
The Shneedles
(THEATER) Guys like Bill Irwin and David Shiner are pretty good, but playing big houses has turned them into big glossy showmen like magicians David Copperfield or Doug Henning; the Shneedles (Bill Robison and Wolfe Bowart), on the other hand, are like some scruffy guy on a street corner who does the most amazing sleight-of-hand tricks you’ve ever seen. Prickly charmers, skillful klutzes, the Shneedles will woo you right out of your chair. To raise funds for their impending fact-finding mission to Germany, they’re putting on a couple of shows that will include sister clown Stephanie Roberts, singer Bobbi Kotula, juggler Greg Bennick, and monologuist/improviser Matt Smith, along with refreshing beverages and food. BRET FETZER
Odd Duck Studio, 1214 10th Ave, 324-2375, Sun-Mon at 7, $25 (a tax-deductible donation). One week only.
MONDAY MARCH 26
Stephen W. Hawking
(LECTURE) When I was in 10th grade, my social studies class was assigned A Brief History of Time. I didn’t get it, so of course I quit halfway through. Because I also decided to forgo writing “the Hawking paper,” I got a C in Non-Western Civilizations. I consider this my chance to hear Dr. Hawking explain himself, by golly, and if he makes any funny jokes–which, they assure us, he will (he was on The Simpsons, you know)–I may be willing to forgive him for the pain and embarrassment he caused me years ago. Each of us has a Stephen Hawking story; add another chapter to yours. LISA SIBBETT
Seattle Center Opera House, 628-0888, $40.50-$85, 7:30 pm.
Gummo
(FILM) After scripting Larry Clark’s 1995 pederastic tragicomedy, Kids, Harmony Korine‘s directorial debut was so despised by critics and movie execs it was barely screened. Gummo meanders plotlessly in what feels like real time through the lives of one boy’s sordid acquaintances in the trashy ass-end of an Ohio town: Many who saw the film considered it a freak show for its documentary-like wallowing in debased and aimless lives, seeming merely to amplify the daily reality of its nonprofessional actors. But if one engages rather than pities its subjects, the film reveals itself as heartrendingly sympathetic. While the charming/scary chaos of Kids was locked within a hokey framing device, Gummo rambles entertainingly just beyond any expectation of larger significance, then closes with a narrative turn that devastatingly hits home with the preciousness and fragile beauty of simple existence. GRANT COGSWELL
Grand Illusion, 1403 NE 50th St, 523-3935, Mon-Thurs at 5, 7, 9.
TUESDAY MARCH 27
Allyourbrand.org
(WEBSITE) It began as poorly translated, decade-old video game dialogue beloved by net pranksters. But as the phrase “All your base are belong to us” inevitably disintegrates from contagious in-joke to pop cultural grist for USA Today, it’s more than likely that in a distant, casually decorated conference room sits a team of advertising executives scrambling to harness its precious built-in cred in order to sell fizzy water and short pants to 18-to-35-year-old men. That’s why Vincent O’Keeffe has created Allyourbrand.org, a gallery of hilarious subvertisements contributed by visitors with the intention of preemptively destroying the AYBABTU craze before it hits the shelves. Familiarize yourself with the many fake ads, submit your own, and tell your friends, because, as O’Keeffe puts it: “I want to be tired, tired, tired of this by the time they get their act together.” JASON PAGANO
www.allyourbrand.org.
WEDNESDAY MARCH 28
Driver 23
(FILM) The story of a hard-working rocker who tries to take his career to 11 but whose amp remains sadly unplugged, Driver 23 saw Minneapolis filmmaker Rolf Belgum spend three years documenting the frustrating existence of Dan Cleveland, delivery driver and frontman for metal band Dark Horse. His dreams of rock superstardom obscured by a constantly revolving band lineup, an awful singing voice, and a combination of Zoloft and Prozac totaling 150% of the recommended dosage, Cleveland defies the limits of talent and reason by sheer force of will, if only to endlessly create more obstacles for himself in the process. A heartbreaking and extremely funny film–be sure to reserve next Wednesday for the screening of its sequel, The Atlas Moth. JASON PAGANO
JBL Theater at EMP, 369-5483, 7 & 8:30 pm, $7.50.