The Dubliner Magazine

The Dubliner Approved Friday Floorfiller

A semi-oldie, but a total goodie

And ok, it's not quite a floorfiller. More a toe tapper. But still.

See y'all at Voicebox tonight!

Well that's our weekend looked after

Leap Year is out. Eh, finally!

Or if you have a brain and haven't read the pretty astounding profile of Roger Ebert that's doing the rounds, read it here.

This week we can't get enough of...

Odd babies

My First Fail is the only site you'll ever need for babies making odd faces. Or in odd situations. We've plugged it in the magazine before, but then you online kids were probably too busy twattering or googleboxing to notice. Nerd smiley.

Having a Mayor

Or having a 'mare

Amidst all the other political kerfuffling going on today, you might have missed the publication of the draft legislation on our city's much-anticipated directly-elected Mayor.

Don't get too excited, but you can read the details of what John Gormley is proposing after the jump.

It's not as bad as Bertie's haircut in the photo above, but it might upset you as much as Cheryl and Ashley's split.

El Knackerado

Ham Bergin

19 years ago Patrick Bergin played a brooding wife-beating psychopath to great acclaim opposite Julia Roberts.

Then not very much happened.

But now in 2010, Bergin looks set to explode again all over our screens in the greatest B-list actor film to hit the cineplexes since I Was a Teenage Werewolf.

It's El Dorado, a horror musical revolving around the Blue Brothers, Laurel and Hardy and Edgar Allan Poe in a plot so ludicrous it'd make Salvador Dali reach for a stiff drink.

Together finally on celluloid you've got Patrick, Steve Guttenberg, Michael Madsen, Daryl Hannah, David Carradine (RIP),  and of course Ivan Drago's missus, Brigitte Nielsen.

And it's all in 3D!

 

Boorman and Miller and Quinn... Oh my!

Killruddery Film Festival: forgotten films in super surroundings

We're breaking Dublin's borders next month (March 11th-14th) and heading to the Killruddery Film Festival in this historical house near Bray. Following on from last year's Silent Film Festival, this year's programme features even more "lost, overlooked and forgotten cinema."

The festival takes place over four days in Killruddery House & Gardens. If you haven't been there before, believe us – it's magical. Films will be shown indoors in two cinemas, often with live musical accompaniment, and on the Saturday night (13th March) – if the weather holds – Powell and Pressburger's beautiful 1948 film I Know Where I'm Going will be screened in an outdoor "natural amphitheatre."

Eugene Lambert R.I.P.

The Puppet Master

Sad smileys around Dublin today with the passing of Eugene Lambert, puppeteer par excellence.

Some of us will always think of 1970s kids TV behemoth Wanderly Wagon when we think of Eugene.

But for plenty of other generations of Dublin kids who sadly misssed the adventures of Judge and Fortycoats and the rest, he'll be remembered for the Lambert Puppet Theatre in Monkstown. Running since 1972, it's one of the few "Dublin institutions" that really earns that title. And then some.

The Waiting Game

It's nice to feel this popular

So it seems like you lot are pretty excited about our March 16th debate in Tripod on what Ireland has done for the world (apart from red lemonade and Six.)

In case you've emailed us for tickets and haven't heard back, it's because we're already at capacity. Sorry. But stick with us, we're adding anyone who applies to a waiting list and hopefully we'll be able to find some space.

info[AT]thedubliner.ie if you want in, but do tell us how many seats you're looking for.

Books: Fact Finding Fiction

Given her family history, Jennifer Johnston’s publishers must be dying for her to write a book of memoirs. But her new work of ‘fiction’ is probably the closest she’ll ever come. By Bridget Hourican

January 12th, 2010, was author Jennifer Johnston’s 80th birthday and the 100th anniversary of the birth of her stepmother, the actress Betty Chancellor, described by Orson Welles as “the sexiest thing that ever lived.” Welles played opposite her in the Gate in 1931 (he was 16 at the time, she was 21, and he claimed to have had his way with her backstage).

Johnston has the kind of pedigree that makes publishers grow calculating: daughter of a famous actress, Shelah Richards, and a famous playwright, Denis Johnston, who then married another famous actress. Yeats, Lady Gregory, Edwards, MacLiammhóir – all those founding parents – clustered round Jennifer’s cot.

Crime Can Wait

Time for a quick midday kebab