Gavin Rossdale

Ha! It’s just as we suspected: The wheel of style has delivered us right back around to nostalgia for the ’90s. And who better to help us revisit MTV zen and the charm of a well-tied flannel shirt than Bush frontman Gavin Rossdale? Grungy enough to garner Kurt Cobain comparisons, yet dreamy enough to rival My So-Called Life’s Jordan Catalano in the swoon department, it was Rossdale whom one Metroland staffer has confessed to first aping, air-guitar-style, in front of the bedroom mirror (and we’re sure he’s not alone in this).

Fresh off of recent stops on the celebrity tennis tour, Rossdale brings his solo band and a bunch of tunes off of last year’s WANDERlust record to Northern Lights (1208 Route 146, Clifton Park) on Tuesday (April 28) at 8 PM. Tickets are $20. Call 371-0012 for more info.

 

Boston Marriage

Pulitzer Prize-winning dramatist David Mamet (Glengarry Glenn Ross, American Buffalo) is best known for his gritty, cynical explorations of masculinity, of greed, deception, lust, and corruption, of all the vices that comprise the brutal underbelly of humanity.

In a recent essay of self-examination, Mamet stated, “I’ve found I do not think that people are basically good at heart. . . . I think that people, in circumstances of stress, can behave like swine, and that this, indeed, is not only a fit subject, but the only subject, of drama.” His terse and twisted dialogue is so distinctive it has been dubbed “Mamet speak.”

Often considered a response to criticism that the playwright did not write meaty roles for women, Mamet penned Boston Marriage in 1999, setting his signature sharp repartee in a Victorian-era, all-female household.

The title is a Victorian euphemism for a long-term, intimate relationship between two women. The one Mamet depicts is on the verge of disintegrating, and the result, according to the New York Post, is “one of the funniest American comedies in years.”

Boston Marriage opens for preview at Capital Repertory Theatre (111 N. Pearl St., Albany) tomorrow (Friday, April 24) at 8 PM. Opening night is Wednesday (April 29) at 7:30 PM. Tickets range from $15 to $44. For a complete performance schedule, or to purchase tickets, call the box office at 445-7469.

Word of Mouth

Time & Space Limited hosts and/or sponsors lots of nifty arts and community events: cinema, art, theater, performance and puppets. This Saturday, TSL becomes a literary salon for a “literary performance” by the Hudson Valley writers’ group Word of Mouth.

This group of writers, including Joan Falk, Michael Fitzell, Marcy B. Freedman, Frank Ortega, Pamela Manche Pearce, Golda Solomon, Lissa Weinstein, Sara W. Young and Jeannie Zusy, will read their own works on a shared theme. The subject couldn’t be more timely; the show is called Money: Unsettled Minds Take Stock.

We’re delighted that our regional writers are jumping into the fray of this, um, New Depression.

Word of Mouth will present Money: Unsettled Minds Take Stock on Saturday (April 25) at 8 PM at Time & Space Limited (434 Columbia St., Hudson). Tickets are $10. For more info, call 822-8448.