'West Side Story' Revival Uneven

Here is a little stage news for a change. Every Boricua remembers West Side Story well there is a theatrical revival going on in New York. Here is an article by Malcom Johnson that is worth reading:

NEW YORK — Anyone who witnessed the original production is likely to feel a wrenching nostalgia watching the vivid if flawed revival of "West Side Story."

Drawn from "Romeo and Juliet" and pitting a white gang against Puerto Ricans in New York in the summer of 1957, the production that opened Thursday night at the Palace Theatre has been widely celebrated for its use of Spanish in songs and dialogue. The idea may be a good one, but it has been poorly handled.

Those of you who are lucky enough to be living there might hop on over and check it out.

FBI Witch Hunt Stokes Puerto Rican Independence Movement

By Jessica Pupovac, AlterNet. Posted January 31, 2008.

As an anti-terror task force targets three young Puerto Ricans in New York, people take to the streets.
They say that when Filiberto Ojeda Rios was killed, all of Puerto Rico stood still.
"The financial district shut down," José Lopez, Executive Director of the Puerto Rican Cultural Center, explained recently in a small café along Paseo Boricua, the heart of Chicago's vibrant Puerto Rican neighborhood. More…