In 1968 Simon and Garfunkel sang: “Someone told me it’s all happening at the zoo. I do believe it, I do believe it’s true.” And after witnessing Deaf West Theatre’s production of Edward Albee’s At Home at the Zoo I’ve become a true believer. Serious theatergoers shouldn’t monkey around - head down ASAP to the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts to catch this run, which is short on number of days but long on profundity, leavened by Albee’s wicked wit about the human (or lack of) condition.

This is a very unique live stage experience delivered in a singular way on the boards of the Wallis’ 150-seat Lovelace Studio Theater. In both acts two hearing impaired thesps perform onstage, using facial expressions, body language and American Sign Language. Offstage, or on the side of the set, a pair of actors literally give voice to what the onstage pair of protagonists are communicating via ASL.

Because I’m attracted to tales of romance or redemption, it’s not surprising that I love Beauty and the Beast. It is, after all, a fairy tale that combines both romance and redemption.

But that doesn’t mean I love every version of Beauty and the Beast equally.

Who wouldn’t be won over by Disney’s 1991 animated flick, which retold the charming French tale with the help of beautiful songs by Howard Ashman and Alan Menken? On the other hand, the first time I saw Disney’s stage adaptation of the musical, I was disappointed to find it diluted the original’s power by adding tot-pleasing slapstick. It wasn’t until I saw a toned-down reboot in 2012 that the stage show claimed a place in my heart.

Now comes Disney’s live-action film version, and I find myself of two minds. The meat of the story—the growing affection between the beautiful Belle (Emma Watson) and the monstrous Beast (Dan Stevens)—is as touching as ever. But director Bill Condon (Gods and Monsters) and his writers weigh it down with embellishments designed to answer questions that really didn’t need to be answered.

Donald Trump does not always in every way appear to be the sharpest tool in the shed. Yet there is great wisdom to be found in some of his assumptions of stupidity on the part of the rest of us. If I act like a real jackass, he thinks, the media will give me tons of free airtime, and I’ll be nominated. If I pretend to oppose corrupt power, the Democrats will nominate the living embodiment of corrupt power, and I’ll be president. If I cut everything that everybody values out of the budget but move the money to the military, my spineless war-adoring opponents will tie one hand behind their backs before they even try to put up a fight.

Jodi Ann, one of the organizers of the rally for justice in the case of Shelton Adams, spoke to Channel 4 during a demonstration March 16 across the street from Grant Hospital, where Mr. Adams was pepper sprayed and wrestled to the ground by Ohio Health security guards on Monday. Jodi Ann told the TV news crew that she thought the actions by the security guard were unfounded and that video showed Adams was not doing anything wrong. Adams had been outside the Hospital smoking a cigarette when the guards approached him and without obvious rationale, started pushing him and spraying his face with pepper spray from a distance of five feet or more, the video showed. Adams ended up on the ground in very cold weather, pepper spray in his eyes, without getting any medical assistance -- again, right outside Grant Hospital.  

Dana White, a participant at the rally, recounted his own encounter with the same three security guards while waiting for a neighbor to receive treatment in the emergency room at Grant Hospital four months ago. The guards physically threw him out of the building for no apparent cause, causing injury to his back.