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TEN FROM TWI-NY: THIS WEEK IN NEW YORK
For a great selection of recommended events in New York, check out Mark Rifkin's picks below, and then head over to http://www.twi-ny.com for more...
MACY'S THANKSGIVING DAY PARADE
77th St. & Central Park West to 34th St. & Seventh Ave.
Thursday, November 23, starting at 9:00 am
Public viewing areas: Broadway between 38th & 58th Sts., 34th St. between Broadway & Seventh Ave., 70th St. from Central Park West to Columbus Circle
Admission: free
212-494-4495
http://www1.macys.com/campaign/parade/pop/anniversary.jsp
In 1924, a bunch of Macy’s employees joined forces and held the first Macy’s Christmas Parade, as it was then known. This year Macy’s celebrates the 80th year of this beloved American event. (For those of you going crazy trying to figure out how 1924 to 2004 makes 80, the parade was canceled from 1942 through 1944 because of World War II.) Helping celebrate the anniversary will be the brand-new Macy’s Great American Marching Band, the New York City Ballet, the Harlem Globetrotters, Camp Broadway, Mobile Azalea Trail Maids, Firecrackers Jump-Roping Team, Hung-Sheng Lion Dance Theatre, and plenty of new and old floats and new and old middle-of-the-road celebrities lip-syncing and waving.
---  The famous Rockefeller ice rink is open for business
601 Fifth Ave. between 49th & 50th Sts.
Open 8:30 am – 12 midnight
Admission: $14.50-$17.50 adults, $10.50-$12.50 children under eleven and seniors
Skate rentals: $8
Lessons: $30-$32
212-332-7654
http://www.rapatina.com/iceRink
Skate under the eyes of Prometheus and the lenses of thousands of tourists in the most famous ice-skating rink in the world. The above rates are effective through January 6; after that, they go down, as does the number of skaters. However, the rink is seldom uncrowded, as countless amateurs, suburbanites, and tourists go around and around and up and down (on their seats) on the ice all winter long.
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NAPOLEON ON THE NILE:
SOLDIERS, ARTISTS, AND THE REDISCOVERY OF EGYPT
Dahesh Museum of Art
580 Madison Ave. at 57th St.
Extended through December 31
Admission: $10
212-759-0606
http://daheshmuseum.org/collection/exhibitions/index.html
 Jean-Léon Gérôme, “Napoleon in Egypt,� ca. 1867-68/Princeton University Art Museum
Duterte also drew military costumes and various men and women, Jomard contributed engravings of necklaces, tools, and baskets, Francois-Charles Cécile, Balzac, Dutertre, and Conté detailed such objects as vases, baskets, lanterns, and pipes, Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire drew common crocodiles and star lizards, and Alire Raffeneau-Delile and Jules-César Savigny sketched native flora. Some 15 paintings put Egypt in artistic perspective, including Karl Wilhelm Gentz’s “A Snake Charmer in the Second Court of the Mortuary Temple of Rameses III, Medinat Habu, Thebes” and Jean-Léon Gérome’s “Napoleon in Egypt.” Several works from caricaturist James Gillray add sarcastic humor to the exhibit, including “Buonaparte Hearing of Nelson’s Victory.” Other items to be on the lookout for are a snuffbox featuring Napoleon at the pyramids, surrounded by his soldiers; a 16-inch-long mummy arm; an article from the Connecticut Courant from April 1800; and letters, orders of the day, and receipts signed by Napoleon during the three-year occupation of Egypt. ---
 Shop for unique gifts at Chriskindlmarkt in Bryant Park
The Holiday Shops at Bryant Park
42nd St. & Sixth Ave.
Through Sunday, December 31
Monday through Friday, 9:00 am – 7:00 pm
Saturday and Sunday, 9:00 am – 9:00 pm
Admission: free
212-382-2953
http://www.bryantpark.org/amenities/shops.php
http://www.fetesdenoel.com/facts.asp
Fifth annual outdoor Christkindlmarkt features arts and crafts from more than one hundred New York artists and artisans, organized around the ice-skating rink and the fountain, which is dedicated to Civil War widow and humanitarian Josephine Shaw Lowell
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SARAH MORRIS: ROBERT TOWNE
The Lever House Art Collection
390 Park Ave. at 54th St.
Through December 3
Admission: free
http://publicartfund.org/pafweb/projects/06/morris/morris-06.html
http://www.leverhouse.com
 Sarah Morris’s tribute to Robert Towne covers Lever House ceiling --- WINTER’S EVE AT LINCOLN SQUARE
Broadway between Time Warner Center at Columbus Circle to 68th St.
Monday, November 27
Admission: free
212-581-7762
http://www.winterseve.org Seventh annual festival, featuring live music, street musicians, clowns, food tastings ($1-$3), special shopping discounts, children’s activities, a treasure hunt, and more, 6:00 – 9:30 ---
THE HOLD STEADY
BOYS AND GIRLS IN AMERICA (Vagrant, October 2006)
 The Hold Steady treats Castle Clinton crowd to acoustic set this summer
Warsaw
261 Driggs Ave., Greenpoint
Tickets: $17
718-387-0505
Friday, November 24
Maxwell’s
1039 Washington St., Hoboken, NJ
Tickets: sold out
http://theholdsteady.com
http://polishnationalhome.com/warsawconcerts.html
http://www.maxwellsnj.com
Born and bred in Minnesota, the Hold Steady might now be based in Brooklyn, but they still wear their midwestern Twin Cities roots on their sleeves. On their second full-length disc, the follow-up to the fine SEPARATION SUNDAY, they get bigger and better, with anthemic guitars, gorgeous piano, and Craig Finn’s Beatnik, stream-of-consciousness, way-too-literate-for-his-own-good lyrics about sex, drugs, and rock and roll as well as booze and Jesus.
Finn references Sal Paradise, the devil, and John Berryman in the first song, “Stuck Between Stations,” about how “boys and girls in America have such a sad time together”--“She was a really cool kisser and she wasn’t all that strict of a Christian / She was a damn good dancer but she wasn’t all that great of a girlfriend,” Finn talk-sings in what is our favorite stanza of the year. The chorus of “Hot Soft Light” will make you remember why you love music. If you’re not careful, you’ll fall in love to “First Night” right before having your heart broken. You’ll find yourself suddenly calling out in public the last lines of “Party Pit,” a song set in a real Minneapolis bar. Finn lets his Bruce Springsteen influence soar on the opening notes of “You Can Make Him Like You” (as well as in many other places). “Chill Out Tent” is so infectious, it will send chills down your spine for days. When we saw the Hold Steady play a special acoustic set this summer at Castle Clinton, they premiered many of these songs; as good as they sounded then, they’re that much better with these full-band orchestrations. Despite their overt quirkiness, the Hold Steady is on the brink of reaching the next level; catch them at one of these tiny tristate area shows while you can. ---
 Borat reveals the ugly side of America in a hilarious way
In theaters now
http://www.boratmovie.com
Believe the hype. Sacha Baron Cohen holds a mirror up to America, and you might not like what you see—although you’ll laugh your head off while watching it. Cohen stars as bushy haired Kazakhstan journalist Borat Sagdiyev, a role he created for DA ALI G SHOW, the 2001 series in which he interviewed such luminaries as Newt Gingrich, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, Andy Rooney, and Norman Mailer while pretending to be a British hip-hop wigger (Ali G); he also disguised himself as a German fashionista (Bruno) and Borat, a reporter who likes to talk about sex, especially with his sister.
In CULTURAL LEARNINGS OF AMERICA FOR MAKE BENEFIT GLORIOUS NATION OF KAZAKHSTAN, Borat leaves his little village in Kazakhstan and travels across the United States with his producer, the rotund Azamat (Ken Davitian), in search of his true love, BAYWATCH’s Pamela Anderson. Along the way, he is making a documentary about the American way of life, turning a revealing lens on racism, anti-Semitism, sexism, misogyny, homophobia, blind patriotism, fundamentalism, and southern hospitality, with a healthy dose of toilet humor (literally). The people he speaks with—a feminist group, gun and car dealers, rodeo cowboys, conservative politicians Bob Barr and Alan Keyes, etiquette and humor experts, Christian evangelicals at a revivalist tent meeting, drunk frat boys in an RV—believe he is really a Kazakh journalist, and Cohen holds nothing back, unafraid to ask any question or kiss any man, often risking his personal safety in hysterical ways. He’s got the biggest cojones we’ve ever seen—and you nearly get to see them when he and Azamat chase each other naked through a hotel, ending up fighting onstage at a mortgage bankers convention. BORAT is more EASY RIDER than JACKASS and BEAVIS AND BUTT-HEAD DO AMERICA, a road trip movie that captures the state of the nation in frightening yet very funny ways. ---
MORE THAN COFFEE WAS SERVED: CAFÉ CULTURE IN FIN-DE-SIÈCLE VIENNA AND WEIMAR GERMANY
Galerie St. Etienne
24 West 57th St. between Fifth & Sixth Aves., eighth floor
Closed Sunday & Monday
Through November 25
Admission: free
212-245-6734
http://www.gseart.com/exhibitions.asp?ExhID=500
 Ludwig Meidner, “In a Café,� 1915, ink and pencil on white paper --- A DANGEROUS MAN
by Charlie Huston (Ballantine, September 2006, $13.95)
http://www.pulpnoir.com
Back in May 2005, we raved about CAUGHT STEALING, the first in a trilogy of tales about Henry Thompson, a down-on-his-luck former high school baseball star who now tends bar, lives in a ratty apartment, and accidentally becomes the focus of a brutal hunt for four million bucks. In the sequel, SIX BAD THINGS, Hank heads for the supposed safety of Mexico, but there’s no escaping the reaches of the motley crew of murdering thieves who want that dough.
Hank’s woes conclude–sort of–in A DANGEROUS MAN. Trapped into working as a hit man for a gangster and with a rebuilt face to disguise him, Hank seemingly has nothing left to live for–the money’s still missing, and his beloved parents’ lives are threatened if he runs away or kills himself. Plus, he’s in constant physical pain and mental anguish. Assigned to take care of a potential baseball star, Hank’s past comes back to haunt his pathetic present and most likely very short future.
Once again Huston displays his exceptional command of narrative, with new twists and turns on every page. Well-drawn characters, unique situations, a fateful return to New York City, and an almost obsessive attention to the smallest of details help make A DANGEROUS MAN a fittingly relentless and bloody conclusion to a terrific series. (Next up for Mr. Huston is December’s NO DOMINION, the follow-up to the awesome ALREADY DEAD.)
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