chesterfield | If you’re up for a good laugh—and who isn’t—you can find anything on TV from Andy Griffith and SNL reruns to the improv wizardry of Whose Line Is It, Anyway? But if TV isn’t your style, maybe it’s time to flip through that stack of MAD magazines gathering dust in the attic. Or wait till spring for some improv of the same unpredictably high quality as Whose Line Is It, Anyway? Two of the show’s four nationally renowned comics, Ryan Stiles and Greg Proops, will converge with two other comedians at The Factory at The District at 7:30 p.m. March 28 for a second iteration of “Whose Live Anyway?” (A twist on the official show title. That’s funny too, right?) Who’re the other two funny men? One is none other than Joel Murray, the youngest of nine brothers who include comedy legend Bill Murray. Nothing much funny about what their mother must have gone through, besides enduring nonstop pranks and other antics. The fourth improv man is Jeff B. Davis, whose impressions of Christopher Walken, Keanu Reeves and Jeff Goldblum are said to be spot on. For tickets and more information, visit thefactorystl.com.
downtown
Circus Harmony, the internationally renowned social-circus school inside City Museum, will present its annual full-length show on weekends this February. “Unbound” will be performed by the youthful troupe at 2 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays in the ring on the unique museum’s third floor. Aptly titled, the show will highlight the talented flying children from Circus Harmony taking an unfettered view of fairy tales via classic circus acts. “Our approach to fairy tales takes the pages out of storybooks, freeing the characters,” says Jessica Hentoff, artistic/executive director of Circus Harmony and a one-time circus performer herself. The show features acrobatics, aerial performances, juggling and other traditional acts performed by kids from primary to early-college age from throughout the metro. Hentoff’s guest director, Evan Tomlinson Weintraub, has worked with world-renowned troupes including Cirque du Soleil and Montreal-based Seven Fingers. “I have met a good number of performers hailing from Circus Harmony,” Weintraub notes. “The school consistently graduates performers of the highest level, sending them to circuses and schools around the world. I feel honored to be able to work with such young talent.” The all-ages show includes admission to City Museum. For ticket information and more, visit circusharmony.org.
the metro
Ken Burns has done it again. The acclaimed documentary filmmaker has brought to life slices of American history—from the tragic (The Civil War) to the triumphant (Baseball)—and covered many other topics along the way. He’s now pulled off a two-part biography of Leonardo da Vinci that depicts the artist, inventor and philosopher as the polymath he was, and is. The package aired on 9 PBS the week before Thanksgiving and is available on demand if you have a PBS Passport. It’s like a $5 monthly donation to public television. Beats the heck out of paying your cable company another fistful of dollars for a channel that airs meaningless reality shows. Known for the most famous painting in the world, The Mona Lisa, da Vinci also dissected cadavers and sketched intricately detailed anatomical drawings in his many notebooks, as well as images of machines both real and imagined. Compelling in its own right, the trailer is available at ninepbs.org, along with sections of the four-hour presentation itself. Adam Gopnik, whose articles and essays have appeared in The New Yorker, says da Vinci’s mind was so keen that he could imagine the similarities between star movements and a colony of ants busy at work. An Italian biographer says contemporaries knew him as a very funny man whose personality engaged them even before seeing his work. Indeed, he must have been an incredible dude to hang out with. Burns himself, too: He’s sort of a hero in our house. Cate, my wife, a Beatles fan since she saw them on The Ed Sullivan Show, had no use for country music until she watched Burns’ comprehensive series on the genre. Now—often while wearing her Beatles sweatshirt—she sings Jimmie Rodgers songs and loves Hank and Haggard almost as much as Dwight Yoakam and his yodel. Mandolin genius Marty Stuart, a frequent presence on Country Music, so impressed us that we’ve seen him three times in concert. And I’ve appreciated da Vinci since childhood. Grandma had a framed copy of The Last Supper in her dining room. It’s a little sloppy; Uncle Norman used a paint-by-numbers kit.
notable neighbors
chesterfield
It’s a chicken-egg question: Does substance abuse disorder stem from nature, nurture or both? Experts in the treatment field and long-term recovering addicts themselves can point to factors that may have influenced this destructive, potentially fatal, malady. But the immediate question for someone who’s ‘hit bottom’ should really be, “Where do we go from here?” Maggie Sullivan, executive director of Gratitude House, the first sober-living home for women in the county, says treatment can spur recovery from alcohol and drug abuse. Alarmingly, however, 60% of patients relapse within a month! So, it’s important to remove the addict from the environment where habit became obsession and to isolate them from toxic people. “They have to be acutely aware of triggers,” Dr. Sullivan points out. Family members or partners may be heavy users. It could even be the aroma and noises from the coffee maker when they walked into the kitchen every morning with a hangover. Dr. Sullivan knows firsthand: She grew up in a dysfunctional home with an alcoholic father and started drinking at about age 15. Her drinking became progressively worse in college, and when her personal recovery journey began in 1998, she was 22 and working as a server in restaurants and bars, which can be breeding grounds for alcoholics. Rigorously working a 12-Step recovery program after treatment was key to arresting her alcoholism and jumpstarting her further success, which actually began in high school at St. Joseph’s Academy in Frontenac. Sullivan credits the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet with straightening her path and guiding her ever since. “When I started at St. Joe, my whole life went from black-and-white to color!” she exclaims. She hopes to add vivid color to the lives of the women who come to Gratitude House, many with little more than nothing. They aren’t mollycoddled while there. They are held accountable. They go to a 12-Step recovery meeting every day. They get help looking for work. But the environment is warm, nurturing. The live-in house manager has more than 30 years of sobriety. “Because we have a beautiful space, they have chores—they take responsibility to keep it that way.” The house manager, Sullivan and many of the all-female board members were at one time as desperate as the women they serve. Empowerment is key. Many at Gratitude House, which has a capacity of eight, come from abusive relationships. Sullivan is grateful for how far she’s come, and hopes the residents choose a similar path. She was holding on to a fraying rope in the spring of 1998, but her fortunes brightened at almost the same time she quit drinking and using. Fast-forward: She finished a history degree at UMSL, taught throughout the metro and completed her master’s at WashU, going on to teach a women’s history course there. Call it serendipity, fate, divine intervention (plus the fierce dedication of a few nuns), but she went on to become an assistant principal at St. Joseph’s, president of a revitalized Rosati-Kain girls high school in the CWE and to complete a doctorate in education at Vanderbilt. All from doing a few simple things on a daily basis through working the 12 Steps. Meanwhile, the board would like to open two or three more sober-living homes here in the next five years. Note: There will be an open house from 1 to 4 p.m. Jan. 5 at the home, whose location is kept under wraps for security reasons. Need more? Visit gratitudehousestl.org.
