Columns
Stagestruck: The Shape of Silence
In 1981, Ota Shogo had a vision: “A broken faucet center stage. A thin line of water from the spout. The sound of water. A variety of people come by, approach, touch the water, and pass on. In this composition, silence breathes as living human time, not as form.” From...
The V-Spot: We’re BOTH Healing From Trauma
Writer’s note: In this week’s column, we talk about childhood sexual abuse. Hi Yana, I’m a childhood sexual abuse survivor and I worked really hard to put my mental and emotional well-being back in order. I met my husband during the initial stages of my healing and he...
Stagestruck: Filling in the Blank
Brian Stanton, an aspiring actor, is doing a class exercise based on Oedipus Rex, and he freezes. The story of the Greek king who’s tragically ignorant of his real parents strikes too close to home. Brian, like Oedipus, was adopted, and like Oedipus he’s both eager...
Beerhunter: Vanished Valley opens new taproom and kitchen in Ludlow
For better or worse, craft beer fans tend to think like tourists, with an eager eye toward the next brewery opening and a fondness for day-long taproom treks. I can understand the excitement, given how quickly the American craft beer map continues to grow. As I noted...
Cinemadope: Screen Time
I still remember that day, bright with promise, just after the new year had dawned, when my children finally had to go to school again. Don’t get me wrong, I love the little scamps more than I’ve ever loved anything on this earth, but two weeks of holidays, sugar, and...
The V-Spot: Can I open up my relationship to date my ex?
Hi Yana, I’m currently one year and six months deep into a heterosexual relationship with my boyfriend. I’ve long regretted not asking for an open relationship from the beginning. I’m bisexual and I’ve always been in monogamous relationships. For the past two to three...
Stagestruck: Stand Tall, Mi Gente!
The name of the Performance Project’s youth program, First Generation, comes from its entrance requirement. All the participants identify as being a “first” in their family – the first to grow up in this country, to graduate high school or go to college, to be...
Cinemadope: Torch Song
Waiting is hard. Some of us skip ahead in our books, others sneak a peek at a bride before the ceremony. Some of us roar past a minivan going a perfectly reasonable 70 mph on 91 South — I’m looking at you, white Honda Civic. There’s just something about getting an...
Valley Show Girl: Sister Act
“There are stars, there is music, but where are you? I am calling you home tonight.” The beginning lyrics to opening track “Come On Home” from the latest release from Americana duo Ari & Mia welcomes you into their album as if it’s an intimate dinner party, with...
Love Letter to a Nightmare
“I secretly believe that I am a goddess with very brief moments of incarnation,” Jennifer Johnson declares, robed in a long white shift, a pair of ram’s horns set on her head. She’s portraying – or perhaps channeling – Leonora Carrington, the free-spirited...
V-Spot: My long-distance partner doesn’t want video chat sex
Hi Yana, My partner and I are temporarily in a long-distance relationship and he’s expressed discomfort with video chat sex. It sounds like it’s mostly based in discomfort with being naked and vulnerable in front of a camera, feeling unsure about how to make...
Groundskeeper’s ‘Ghost Things’ combs the depths of the psyche
The charred remains of a building smolder in patches of fire as gray smoke drifts over autumnal treetops. That image is cut, and layered multiple times on top of one another for the album cover art of Ghost Things, by Northampton-based Americana-infused indie rock...
Cinemadope: The Short List
Ever since I was first introduced to the tiny hot dog, I have been an appetizer man. Those delectable little morsels — a bite or two at most — can contain a density of flavor that many full meals can only wish to attain. And while many are served ahead of an...
V-Spot: Not The Sex Life I Want
Hi Yana, I didn’t think this was a real problem or, that it was just me. I didn’t think about it until I got into an argument with my husband, when he said “Why don’t you have sex the way when you’re drunk, when you’re sober?!” I really never thought about it till...
Making a Comeback: A preview of Double JJ Presents shows coming up
John Joyce started booking local bands back in 1998 while he attended Westfield State. What started it all was his friends from college — who were in a band called The Infamous Shoeless Joe — had inquired if he could help get them shows in the area. He started booking...
Clueless Parent: Trying to Teach a 3-Year-Old About Justice
As I write this, it is Martin Luther King Jr. Day, and I’ve just finished reading Dr. King’s 6,800-word “Letter From Birmingham Jail,” published in 1963 and written after being arrested for participating in one of his many nonviolent actions to further the cause of...
Cinemadope: Guy Ritchie returns to crime with The Gentlemen
There was a time, once, when British director Guy Ritchie was considered the across-the-pond reflection of Quentin Tarantino. The filmmaker who, four years after Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction and six after Reservoir Dogs, started pumping out stylish if patchy tales...
The V-Spot: How do I have a good threesome?
Hey Yana, It’s looking like a threesome is on the (close) horizon for me and my partner. I feel extremely secure in the relationship. I absolutely trust him and he’s been nothing but supportive of me and my feelings when the subject of threesomes has come up in the...
Monte Belmonte Wines: Trump’s Next Assassination may be the European Wine Market
I wake up very early every morning and one of the first things I do is check my phone for New York Times push notifications to make sure Donald Trump hasn’t destroyed the world. As of my writing this, he hasn’t. But not for lack of trying. I got a push notification...
Cinemadope: Child’s Work
Ask most Americans when slavery ended, and you’ll likely hear something about the Civil War and Abe Lincoln. Ask them about the rest of the world, and you may be met by a blank stare. But the truth is that it continues on in our modern era, and that many of us,...
Stagestruck on the Road: Witches in Berkeley
With all the talk of “witch hunts” flying around these days, it probably wasn’t quite a coincidence that two shows I saw recently in Berkeley, Calif., are on that very topic. Not the trumped-up political kind of witch hunt, though, but real ones born of historical...
V Spot: How Long Do I Stay in My Marriage?
Yana, I’ve recently come to terms with the fact that I don’t want to be in my marriage anymore. One reason is that I’m going through a period of intense awakening — I’m connecting more deeply to my emotions and my body while also healing from childhood trauma. Part of...
The Beerhunter: 2020 Brew Years Resolutions
Across America, the craft beer scene is fizzing with activity. Food and drink options have expanded at taprooms, many of which are finding ways of attracting a daytime crowd by showcasing new skills like coffee roasting. Craft maltsters are starting to get the...
Valley Show Girl: Howl at Lunar Brew
The first full moon of the new decade — the Wolf Moon — will start to howl at approximately 2:21 p.m. on Friday, January 10. Just so happens it’s also my birthday, maybe you’ll hear me howling at her from a distance wearing a crystal crown to welcome my 36th year on...
Cinemadope: A Developing Story — the invention of a camera for the masses
Like most everyone with kids these days, I tried my best to capture a bit of the holiday magic this season. Photos, videos, the occasional audio recording — moments to share with far flung family who wouldn’t get to see Christmas morning, and memories to share with my...
Stagestruck: Theater in Motion
You’d think things would slow down after the hectic holidays, but no. The Cratchits are still picking at the Christmas leftovers and the Sugar Plum Fairy has barely taken off her toe shoes, when January blows onstage full of New Year promise. This month I’m looking...
V-Spot: Is He Cheating By Watching Porn?
Note: In this column, we talk about gender-exotifying porn. Hi There, I have a major problem and don’t know how to proceed here. I’ve been married for 15 years and the last 10 have been sexless. To be clear, I’m the woman and he’s the man who chooses not to have sex....
Monte Belmonte Wines: Michael Quinlan — One Region at a Time
Northampton’s soon-to-be-sworn in Ward 1 Councilor also happens to be one of the biggest players in wine in Massachusetts, and I meet with him for lunch over wine at Northampton’s Filo’s Greek Taverna. It’s BYOB. He doesn’t let me pay. Ethics-schmethics. Michael...
Cinemadope: Holding a Grudge — Horror remakes, remade
Fans of the horror genre, and specifically the subset of films that have come out of Asia, will recall the mid-2000s as a heady time. With the success of the 2002 Gore Verbinski film The Ring — a remake of the 1998 Japanese film Ring, in which watching a cursed...
Five Last-Minute Album Reviews for 2019
Music lovers in the Pioneer Valley were blessed by a plethora of great local music this year, whether that was the hauntingly beautiful folk rock of Philip B. Price’s new solo record “Bone Almanac” or what I named as one of the best local albums of the year —...
V-Spot: How do I stop avoiding my partners’ partners?
Hi Yana! I’ve been practicing polyamory for three years. Right now I have two serious partners. Both of them have sex with other people occasionally, but not with any regularity. My jealousy isn’t nonexistent, but it’s manageable. My big problem is that once my...
Clueless Parent: My years-long struggle, and solution, to my son’s bed wetting
“He’ll eventually grow out of it, you have to give it some time,” my son’s pediatrician told his father and me at his physical when he was maybe about 5 years old. When my son transitioned from diapers to pull-ups at bedtime, it seemed that we would never transition...
Valley Show Girl: Don’t Forget to Water Your Leafies
Editor’s note: Advocate Associate Editor Chris Goudreau is a member of Leafies. The opening track to debut album Off Off Off Broadway from The Leafies You Gave Me tells a tale of a man who tends to the elephants and their dirty business at the circus. It is spoken...
The V-Spot: How To Kiss With Consent
Hi Yana, Often when speaking of sexual comfort and consent, people focus on the stages of intimacy that involve contact with the areas of our bodies we normally keep clothed. Kissing and intimate touch are viewed more often as foreplay and I seldom encounter guides to...
Cinemadope: Adam Sandler gets serious
Back in the Blockbuster era of movie consumption it was hard not to think of movies in terms of genre first: walk into one of those big box shrines to moviemaking and you couldn’t take a step without first charting a course by the signs hanging from the ceiling....
Cinemadope: Holly Daze
You may or may not have heard, but this thing called Christmas is happening on Wednesday. Turns out it’s kind of a big deal, and while a lot of the movie-going crowd will be busy elsewhere on the 25th, local cinemas are getting in the spirit in the days leading up to...
Monte Belmonte Wines: Sparkling wines for New Year’s Eve … and normal drinking days in 2020
We are entering into the year 2020. That year sounds fake. Like a future I never imagined myself seeing. Where is my jetpack? Where is my visiphone? Oh, I have that? Nice! 2020 is, of course, an election year. If you are anything like me, you will be doing a lot of...
Stagestruck: The Equity Equation
Every year in this column I make an equity survey of area theaters – not Equity the actors’ union, but the representation of women and people of color. And every year the outlook, once deeply depressing, gets a little better. Of the 45 full productions I saw this year...
V-Spot: I’m Tiptoeing Around His Erectile Dysfunction
Dear Yana, I’ve been dating my current partner for almost two years now and our relationship has been great with the exception of our dwindling to now nonexistent sex life. It was amazing for the first six months until he starting having some health problems. His sex...
Stagestruck: History Lessons – Recalling the past to inform the present
The past, as they say, is prologue. We look back to ground our present and see ahead more clearly. And in these murky times, that’s more necessary than ever. At least, that’s the impression I drew from the sheer number of shows I saw this year that have their roots in...
Valley Show Girl: Alice Loves Alien
Life and music partners Gina Andia and Brendan Clark aren’t new to the Valley music scene, but their latest project Alice Loves Alien is fresh to our ears. I don’t mean to judge a book (or album) by its cover but when I received an early copy of the self titled debut...
The Beerhunter: Kismet Brewing Company Prepares to Open in Westfield
After 10 years together, Rich and Liz DeSousa are trying to find a way to spend more time in the same room. That’s the kind of marriage you’re supposed to study for pointers — or maybe for the reveal of some secret ingredient. In my most recent visit with the couple:...
Cinemadope: The Age of Activism
When well-known activist Frances Crowe died this August at her home in Northampton, the loss rippled through the town in a way few passings do. One hundred years old at the time of her death, Crowe had touched generations of Valley residents — changing some minds,...
V-Spot: I Can’t Stop Masturbating to My Toxic Ex
Hello, I’m nervous to write in and feel like I’m the only person who has this problem: I’ve been on-and-off dating someone for about three years. We fight nonstop and basically it’s just not a good relationship for either of us. Recently, I’ve been trying to move on...
Monte Belmonte Wines: My Christmas Wine Wish List For Santa
Dear Santa, It has been one year since my last confession. I have been a fair to moderately good boy. There has only been the occasional quid pro quo. And even when wine companies have shipped me free wine, I have been unafraid to damn them with faint praise in this...
Stagestruck: Holiday Stages, Part Two – Potpourri
Last week I previewed some area productions of those holiday stalwarts A Christmas Carol and The Nutcracker. But it’s not all ghosts and sugarplums this Yuletide. Here are some alternatives for your seasonal theatergoing, tracking north to south, then making a curve...
V-Spot: I Can Only Climax from Masturbation!
Hi Yana, I’m a cis-woman in college and I’m in a new relationship with a girl I really like! We have sex a lot and it’s wonderful but there’s one big problem: she can’t make me come. We have tried everything we could think of, but it always ends up as me taking over...
Cinemadope: ‘I’m Leaving Now’ playing at Amherst Cinema
If you talked much politics over the Thanksgiving table this year, you probably noticed that very few of those involved knew what they were talking about. Which is to say that most of us, however passionate we might be about a particular issue, often lack a true...
Eric Cunha’s Psychic Pica is ‘80s Synth Pop in the Year 2019
Valley musician Eric Cunha started playing drums when he was a baby. For one of his first Christmases he got a Muppet’s drumkit that initiated it all. He would end up getting other toy drum sets throughout the years until he got his first real kit when he was 10. In...
Clueless Parent: I’m a bad singer, but my toddler doesn’t mind
I’ve thrown out my back. I’m constantly see-sawing between excessively caffeinated and impossibly tired. My old clothes don’t fit anymore. And I’m convinced that the tune to “Elmo’s Song” will forever crowd out more important thoughts from my brain. Some of the...
Cinemadope: A Garden Party – Franklin County gets busy
If you’re out and about in Franklin County this weekend, you might want to make some room in your Saturday calendar. In an area that is often on the quiet side for film events, this weekend is shaping up to be a busy one for film lovers in the northern half of the...
Stagestruck: Holiday Stages, Part One – Evergreens
Charles Dickens’ classic tale of the mean old miser who gets the Scrooge scared out of him by midnight spirits is likely the second-most often retold Christmas story, after the one about Jesus. The Russian fairy tale about the little girl and the nutcracker is...
V-Spot: Is Thickness Good?
Writer’s note: This is a two-part question that I got via my Instagram DMs! Editor’s note: As reported by our friends at urbandictionary.com, mtc often translates to “massive throbbing cock.” Part #1 — 1:46 p.m.: So, my case is strange. I’m wondering if sex therapy is...
Monte Belmonte Wines: Trying to Love Italian Wine
At age 2, my grandfather emigrated from Bonito, Italy, on the good ship Colombo and docked in Ellis Island in 1922. He became a U.S. citizen the old fashioned way — by waiting in a relatively short line, getting deloused and having his name changed from Crescenzo to...
Cinemadope: Hit Parade
The mob movie is the shadowy reflection of the American Dream. Stories of success despite humble beginnings, of hardscrabble times and strong work ethics, of family bonds and the desire for a better life — all the usual tropes apply. What makes it work so well in the...
Best Mann’s Debut Album is a Layered Tower of Sound
Best Mann is the art rock and indie folk alter-ego of Nate Mondschein, who produced, composed, and performed all the instruments on his debut album, …And the Sky, released Oct. 25. …And the Sky by Best Mann There are so many musical layers on this 12-song...
Stagestruck: Eye of the Storm
Nilaja Sun is, quite simply, the most exciting solo performer I’ve ever seen. She’s a small, wiry woman whose expansive presence fills a stage. Drawing on an astonishing talent for physical and vocal mimicry, her pieces are fully formed plays that bring to life a...
The V-Spot: Am I Only Bisexual When I’m Drunk?
Good Morning, I’m a straight 30-year-old man with six kids. My wife and I only drink when my mother-in-law is watching the kids for the night. However there’s something we noticed when we’re drunk. I absolutely love everything about sex — it’s almost a passion of...
Valley Show Girl: Connecting the Living with the Dead
A couple months ago, I was going through the Fall/Winter Fine Arts Center booklet, checking out the upcoming events at UMass. When I started reading the description to the Jen Shyu: Nine Doors performance, I was highly intrigued. I soon after acquired tickets for the...E-Edition
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