One of the most highly anticipated musicals this year finally opened last week, filling the Charlotte Theater in Seoul with lines like “porn!” and “it sucks to be me!” ― received with a great deal of laughter and applause from the audience.The R-rated American adult puppet musical, titled “Avenue Q,” is a hilarious, lighthearted coming-of-age tale highlighting the anxieties and struggles associated with entering adulthood. It premiered on Broadway in 2003 and picked up three Tony awards, includi

PerformanceAug. 29, 2013

VENICE (AFP) ― Hollywood high-rollers George Clooney and Sandra Bullock kicked off the Venice film festival on Wednesday with a harrowing space drama that opens a line-up flush with gloomy tales.“Gravity,” a 3-D sci-fi thriller, sees Clooney and Bullock as astronauts who are flung into deep space when a debris shower destroys their shuttle.The stars sashayed down the red carpet to the song “Mambo Italiano” for the opening ceremony of the world’s oldest film festival, drawing wild screams from ad

FilmAug. 29, 2013

JYP Entertainment, the agency representing Wonder Girls, dismissed rumors Thursday that the girl group was poised to disband, saying that “nothing has been discussed on the matter.”An official from JYP Entertainment denied media reports that said the breakup of Wonder Girls was imminent. “Both the agency and Wonder Girls members have never discussed the group’s disbandment. The decision will be made by the members, not by the company,” the official said. Ever since the group’s leader Sun-ye marr

PerformanceAug. 29, 2013

The Dying HoursBy Mark Billingham (Grove Atlantic)British author Mark Billingham’s talent for sculpting intensely dark police procedurals complements his skill at pinpointing believable contemporary nightmares.At the helm is Detective Inspector Tom Thorne, a good cop, an insightful investigator and often a loose cannon, going off on his own hunches. That he often is right still doesn’t sit right with his supervisors. But Billingham uses Tom more as a mirror reflecting the changing times, the hor

BooksAug. 29, 2013

The Affairs of OthersBy Amy Grace Loyd (Picador)“The Affairs of Others,” a debut novel by Amy Grace Loyd, former literary editor of Playboy, has such an intense and heady narrative voice that it recalls those occasions when a substance one has just ingested is a whole lot stronger than expected. One is overwhelmed by the scent of a gardenia, by disturbing sounds from the upstairs apartment, or perhaps by the features on the face of the policeman who has just knocked at the door.“ ... (H)e pulsed

BooksAug. 29, 2013

NEW YORK (AP) ― Tony Wheeler wrote his first travel book with his wife Maureen in 1973 after driving across Europe and Asia. It sold 1,500 copies in a week and launched a guidebook empire called Lonely Planet. The Wheelers made a fortune when the BBC bought the company in 2007 before the recession, but the BBC sold the company earlier this year at a huge loss. Meanwhile Wheeler, 66, is still doing what he built the brand on: traveling the world and writing about it. His newest book, “Dark Lands,

BooksAug. 29, 2013

While literary works by Korean writers such as Shin Kyung-sook and Kim Young-ha are rising to prominence overseas, especially in the U.S., a scholar’s latest book focuses on something similar yet different: the works of literature produced by Korean immigrants in America and their descendants. A meaningful scholarly achievement in Korean Diaspora studies, the book explores the lives of Korean-American writers and their often multi-layered and autobiographical works.  The book, titled “Understand

BooksAug. 29, 2013

JYP Entertainment, the agency representing the Wonder Girls, dismissed rumors Thursday that the girl group was poised to disband, saying that “nothing has been discussed on the matter.”An official from JYP Entertainment denied media reports that said the breakup of Wonder Girls was imminent. “Both the agency and Wonder Girls members have never discussed the group’s disbandment. The decision will be made by the members, not by the company,” the official said. Ever since the group’s leader Sun-ye

PerformanceAug. 29, 2013

One of the most infamous American love stories is arriving in Seoul in the form of a musical next month, featuring an all-Korean cast including local stars Han Ji-sang and Lisa.Based on the famous story of Bonnie Parker (1910-1934) and Clyde Barrow (1909-1934), the well-known American robbers who traveled across the central U.S. during the Great Depression, “Bonnie & Clyde” had its Broadway premiere in 2011 and won two Tony Award nominations in 2012. The upcoming Seoul run is the Korean premiere

PerformanceAug. 28, 2013

VENICE (AFP) ― The Venice film festival kicks off Wednesday with the arrival of movie stars on water taxis for a dark line-up flush with fiendish tales of abuse, betrayal and survival.The world’s oldest film festival opens with “Gravity,” a 3-D sci-fi thriller starring George Clooney and Sandra Bullock as astronauts who are flung into deep space when a debris shower destroys their shuttle.Other premieres are “Parkland,” Peter Landesman’s re-creation of John F. Kennedy’s assassination and David G

FilmAug. 28, 2013

After the release of her latest EP “A’s Doll House” on July 12, Ailee is now determined to spread her wings abroad and take on the Japanese music market. Through a contract with Warner Music Japan, the young soloist is preparing to make her official debut in Japan in November with the Japanese version of her hit debut single “Heaven,” according to her agency YMC Entertainment. “Since the beginning of her career we have been preparing for her debut in Japan and she has even been learning Japanese

PerformanceAug. 28, 2013

G-Dragon, the notorious leader of one the nation’s most popular boy bands, Big Bang, will release his highly anticipated second solo album “Coup d’etat” on Sept. 2, according to representatives at YG Entertainment. Coming more than four years after the release of the debut solo album “Heartbreaker,” the upcoming second solo album was initially scheduled to be released this month to celebrate the singer’s birthday and to mark the anniversary of the release of his debut solo album in 2009. However

Aug. 28, 2013

R&B solo vocalist Wheesung will be joining hip-hop duo Bae Chi Gi at the group’s concert in Busan on Saturday. The show was originally intended to be a solo concert for the hip-hop duo; however, representatives of the singers’ agency YMC Entertainment announced on Tuesday that Wheesung will be making a special guest appearance. The artist, who is most famous for his Korean rendition of Craig David’s “Insomnia,” completed his military service earlier this month and the concert will mark the singe

PerformanceAug. 28, 2013

BANGKOK (AFP) ― On a hotel rooftop in Bangkok, dozens of barrels of green liquid bubble under the sun ― the latest innovation in urban farming. Proponents of the edible algae known as spirulina say it could help provide a sustainable source of protein as an alternative to meat.Three times a week, Patsakorn Thaveeuchukorn harvests the green algae in the barrels.“The algae is growing so fast, normally the doubling time is around 24 hours,” said Patsakorn, whose employer EnerGaia uses Bangkok’s roo

FoodAug. 28, 2013