Email Author Alexis Soloski

2004 Stories by Alexis Soloski

• Romancing The Stone

  published December 14, 2004

  In the second act of The Winter's Tale, Queen Hermione asks her boy Mamilius to tell her a merry story. He declines, saying, "A sad tale's... More >>

• Theater

  published December 7, 2004

  Charles Ludlam, founder of the Ridiculous Theatre, author of several dozen plays, and perhaps the only man to attempt the role of Camille in full... More >>

• Theater

  published November 23, 2004

  In "Jersey Girl," Bruce Springsteen convincingly moans, "Nothing matters in this whole wide world/When you're in love with a Jersey girl." Yet... More >>

• The Grim Sleeper

  published November 9, 2004

  The Greeks and Romans believed that the gods Sleep and Death were brothers. A recent matinee performance of the SITI Company's Death and the... More >>

• Backhand Compliment

  published November 2, 2004

  Credit 11th-century French monks with the invention of tennis. Using their bare hands to whack balls over a five-foot net, the brothers livened up... More >>

• Helping Hand

  published October 5, 2004

  When the Good Samaritan of Luke 10:25 chanced upon a naked, beaten man, "He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he... More >>

• Operation: Quagmire

  published September 28, 2004

  The time: the present. The place: an undisclosed location in the Middle East. The mission: the assassination of "Big 'Stach," a/k/a "The Bearded... More >>

• Tut, Tut!

  published September 7, 2004

  Herodotus got around rather a lot for a fellow who lived some 2,500 years before last-minute airfare deals. In his Histories, he wrote that... More >>

• Cooking With Cowboys

  published September 7, 2004

  According to a well-regarded etiquette manual, "Broiled or fried chicken should be held with the fork in the plate while the meat is stripped off... More >>

• It's Alive!

  published August 17, 2004

  In previous years, the New York International Fringe Festival has often seemed a repository for either doleful amateurism or slicked-up... More >>

• Kyle Jarrow Offers Droll New Version of A Farewell to Arms

  published August 17, 2004

  During medical school graduation, most physicians take a vow to "first, do no harm." But Dr. Phillips (Robert Carr) finds this oath tested when... More >>

• Last Licks at the New York International Fringe Fest

  published August 17, 2004

  As eating, sleeping, and the occasional ablution were sadly necessary, we could not cover all 200 FringeNYC shows. Perhaps you can. If not, some... More >>

• Showstoppers

  published August 10, 2004

  One spring night in 1871, six years after John Wilkes Booth's assassination of Lincoln, John's actor brother Edwin descended to the furnace room... More >>

• In Anticipation of the RNC, Activists Pound the Pavement, Theatrically

  published July 27, 2004

  Not so very long ago, holding a placard, bellowing the odd chant, and marching through a few neighborhoods stamped you with sufficient activist... More >>

• On Edge

  published July 20, 2004

  Caucasians, fear not: Hazelle Goodman welcomes you to her one-woman show. "I like it when white folks come," she says tartly. "They buy their... More >>

• Broad Cheekbones, Puffy Lips—It's Clear She's Up to No Good

  published July 13, 2004

  Amid the grisly curios at Philadelphia's Mütter Museum nestles the Hyrtl Collection. Joseph Hyrtl, a 19th-century Viennese anthropologist,... More >>

• The Power and the Fury

  published June 29, 2004

  LONDON—Last week, a general spoke to a bank of TV cameras. "What I have done is what I was instructed to do, and what I was instructed... More >>

• Theater

  published June 8, 2004

  Whoever invents new endings for plays will open a new era," wrote Anton Chekhov in a letter to a friend. "The damned endings won't come. The hero... More >>

• Cirque du Sashay

  published June 1, 2004

  In 1868, The New York Times published an article decrying the scourge of burlesque: "Look at the sensual exhibitions of the feminine form!... More >>

• Telling Tales Out of School

  published May 11, 2004

  Eric Bogosian ranted, David Neumann strutted, Karen Finley moaned, Meredith Monk crooned, Dancenoise ("After children and before Botox") writhed... More >>

• The Outsiders

  published May 4, 2004

  Lolling in a café in a nameless European country, Lowell (Mark Shanahan) asks his companion, "Do I look inevitably American to you?" Sara... More >>

• Romantic Idol

  published April 13, 2004

  There was little love lost between Lord Byron and William Wordsworth. In "Don Juan," Byron snipes that Wordsworth's verse stands "of all but... More >>

• Criminal Intent

  published March 30, 2004

  Pimps and prosties, flimflam men and four-flushers, Low Life author Luc Sante knows them all. He's now editing the Broadway Library of... More >>

• Less

  published March 30, 2004

  Yeardley Smith has nostrils and five fingers on each hand. Her hair does not jut out in Lady Liberty spikes, nor has she had numberless eighth... More >>

• Rummy and Co. Sink Robbins's Satire With Obvious Duplicity

  published March 9, 2004

  Playwright-director Tim Robbins wants to have his MREs—and eat them too. His play Embedded advertises itself as a satire of censorship... More >>