Characters

The main ingredient of artist Osman Karriem Hayes' art form is so exotic it can be found right there on the grocery-store shelf, in between such household items as plastic wrap, sandwich bags, and other paper products. And to most people, the thin, shiny sheets that are Hayes' principal medium are no secret ingredient at all: They're just plain old aluminum foil. It doesn't matter what name is on the foil package wrapper. Hayes, who calls himself a "tinfoil artist," is able to manipulate the silvery, pliable material into whatever character his fertile imagination suggests.

Kristeen Fabrizio hobbled into the cafeteria at the Phoenixville Area Junior High School, her legs bound in a narrow, ankle-length elastic tube. "I swim. I fell in love," said Fabrizio, 10, of Phoenixville, when she took her turn on stage Tuesday morning. "Who am I?" Dozens of second, third and fourth graders waved their hands, eager to guess whom Fabrizio was portraying in the Barkley Elementary School's Character Costume Cavalcade. The cavalcade was part of the monthlong "Kids Who Read Succeed Program" coordinated by librarian Lois Boyer and elementary school principal Joseph C. Dougherty.

Steve Solms died last week. I knew him only peripherally, but always got a kick out of his joie de vivre. Others have reminisced about the time the real estate developer and diehard 76ers fan brazenly walked onto the court during player introductions and presented Julius Erving with a doctor's bag. I'll always remember seeing Solms in the midst of a real estate crash, but looking no worse for the wear at poolside in Las Vegas and flashing a wad of...

The Internet comic strip Get Your War On by David Rees has been commenting on the war on terrorism by showing people in offices talking to one another on the phone or over coffee and doughnuts about the state of the world. The Rude Mechanicals of Austin, Texas, have adapted the comic strip (www.getyourwaron.com) for the stage, using overhead projectors and five actors in suits, ties and high heels. They provide an illustrated, damning chronicle of the Bush administration, starting in 2001 and tracing the war on terrorism through Afghanistan and Iraq, with excursions into the anthrax scares, Enron, the Katrina catastrophe, and Terry Schiavo.

At the end of the day, Tracey Ullman has no trouble peeling off her many personae - and the various wigs, mustaches and thick accents that go along with each. "I don't get attached to any of them for more than half an hour," Ullman says of the gallery of quirky characters she plays on her HBO comedy series, "Tracey Takes On . . . " which kicks off its second season at 11 p.m. tomorrow. "I'm quite glad to take them all off and go back to being Tracey. " When she's not in character, the 37-year-old British comic actress wears simple, tailored clothing and no makeup.

Brendan Behan's 1958 play The Hostage concerns a British soldier taken prisioner by the Irish Republican Army in retaliation for the planned execution of an IRA member. That's the plot, but it certainly isn't the play. In fact, Behan spends probably less than half of this three-hour piece dealing with the plot. The rest of the time is spent on the frequently crazy doings of a passel of minor characters and in the performance of a large number of mostly humorous songs. The Hostage, which Temple University Theaters is producing, is a strange theatrical bird.

By Glenn Taylor Ecco Press. 360 pp. $24.99 Reviewed by Sherrie Flick Many of us like television shows, even the predictable programs in which the characters consistently react the way you expect. In these shows, the ending isn't so much a revelation as a logical conclusion. It can be comforting to watch these shows and not have to think much. On the other hand, I try to read a lot. Reading makes me happy to be alive, and some days when it's hot and humid and oil is spilling into the Gulf of Mexico, I need something to revive my faith in humanity.

PRINCETON - Is any play more perfectly titled than Edward Albee's A Delicate Balance? The Pulitzer Prize-winning 1966 play, now at the McCarter Theatre through Feb. 27, has well-coiffed suburbanites balancing their composure against chaotic forces within themselves and outside the door. Other balances are needed for a successful rendering of this play. As much as one wishes more of them were achieved in this Emily Mann-directed production, there's still plenty happening with such a rich script wrestled into life by high-caliber actors Kathleen Chalfant and John Glover.

Anthony Quinn is chuckling. It's a deep, warm chuckle that rumbles up from the kettle drum of mirth in the potbelly he has borrowed from Zorba the Greek. Anthony Quinn is chuckling about someone's notion that the billing of his play (opening officially tonight at the Forrest Theater) should read "Zorba is Anthony Quinn" rather than "Anthony Quinn is Zorba. " "I think it's lovely, but I think it's nonsense, but they said the same thing when I played Gauguin . . . 'Requiem for a Heavyweight.

A door at the back of the darkened stage swings ajar to disgorge a man in a black jacket, who edges into a spotlit square and begins telling you a story. It is a story of life's randomness, something about an auto accident. Soon he is joined by a second man, who also appears involved in the story; it is, in fact, somehow his story. And In on It, a production at the Arden Theatre by Daniel MacIvor's Canadian company da da kamera, is off and running. As it initially unfolds, the story is about Ray, whose wife leaves him for a friend of theirs just as Ray is diagnosed with a fatal disease.

Allan Arbus, 95, an actor best known for his recurring role as the caring psychiatrist who ministered to shell-shocked surgeons and troops on the TV series M*A*S*H, died Friday at his home in Los Angeles, his family said. The cause was complications of congestive heart failure, his daughter Arin said. As psychiatrist Sidney Freedman, a role in which he appeared throughout the long-running series, Mr. Arbus was so believable that M*A*S*H star Alan Alda later said he long assumed the actor had expertise in the field.

One in a series of articles getting you ready for the U.S. Open at Merion, June 13-16.     SO, 2010 U.S. OPEN champion Graeme McDowell, what did you know about Ardmore's Merion Golf Club before you played it last year? "[Ben] Hogan, 1 iron," he said, with a sheepish smile. "That's it. " He's likely not alone. The Open hasn't been back to Merion - which has hosted more USGA events (18) than any other venue, most recently the 2009 Walker Cup - in 32 years. That means there's an entire generation of players and fans who really don't know much about the course that was ranked sixth (up one spot)

NEW YORK - Cookie Monster stands accused of shoving a 2-year-old. Super Mario was charged with groping a woman. And Elmo was booked for berating tourists with anti-Semitic slurs. Times Square is crawling with entrepreneurs who dress up as pop-culture characters and try to make a few bucks posing for photos with visitors to the big city. But some characters are unlike anything you've seen on Sesame Street or at Disney World. They smoke, they use foul language, and they can be aggressive.

This is a huge day. The Catholic Church of the Dark and Middle Ages printed festival days and saint's days in red ink. Thus the term red-letter day , meaning any day of special import. Well, import this: It's the birthday of Twitter, which first went live on March 21, 2006. Creator Jack Dorsey, who'd thought Twitter up in 2001 but hadn't actually created it until just that day, sent the first self-inputted (that is, nonautomated) tweet message: "inviting coworkers. " OK, it's not "Mr. Watson, come here, I want to see you" (what Alexander Graham Bell is said to have said in the first telephonic message, to his assistant, Thomas Watson)

As Major League Soccer extends its season, teams must prepare more for the elements than ever before. It tends to snow during early March in Colorado, which the Union discovered firsthand. Having Saturday's game against the Colorado Rapids postponed to Sunday because of the snow would have thrown more than a few teams off their game. Traveling is already no fun when there is inclement weather, and dealing with a day's delay didn't make the situation any better for the Union. They had every excuse imaginable to come out with a flat performance.

Blanka Zizka may be the artistic director of the Wilma Theater and its new production, Under the Whaleback , but when the time came time to create the interior of a fishing trawler on stage, it was all hands on deck. The play, by British playwright Richard Bean ( One Man, Two Guvnors ), focuses on the perilous occupation of North Sea cod fishing out of the port city of Hull and the industry's decay from the 1960s to present. Sound designer Daniel Perelstein and set designer Matt Saunders worked with Zizka to create staging that depicts both the ship's cramped living quarters and the feel of the open sea, and that frames some of the play's larger themes - fathers and sons, comradeship, danger, death, decline.

WHOOPI GOLDBERG lives on the comedic edge, whether it's on the stage, on set or in her swivel chair on "The View. " She doesn't shy away from the controversial - she welcomes it. Back in 1990, in "Whoopi Goldberg Presents Billy Connolly," Goldberg began a bit by singing, "Where have all the negroes gone?" She urged members of the audience to sing along with her and "follow the bouncing Negro!" Despite early hesitation, they did. "And they said y'all wouldn't do that!" she laughed.

Flanked by former Flyers Bernie Parent, Gary Dornhoefer, and Bob Kelly, Hollywood movie director and rock musician Rob Zombie talked Tuesday night about the motion picture he is creating about the Broad Street Bullies. Parent suggested that Danny DeVito could play the role of Kelly. Dornhoefer interceded. "Moses can play you," Dornhoefer told Parent, who looked distinguished in his white hair and matching goatee. Zombie said the project is in its early stages, and he attended Tuesday's game against Tampa Bay to visit with some of the Broad Street Bullies - the brawling teams that won Stanley Cups in 1974 and 1975 - and to observe the fans.

PRINCETON - Is any play more perfectly titled than Edward Albee's A Delicate Balance? The Pulitzer Prize-winning 1966 play, now at the McCarter Theatre through Feb. 27, has well-coiffed suburbanites balancing their composure against chaotic forces within themselves and outside the door. Other balances are needed for a successful rendering of this play. As much as one wishes more of them were achieved in this Emily Mann-directed production, there's still plenty happening with such a rich script wrestled into life by high-caliber actors Kathleen Chalfant and John Glover.

* SHAMELESS. 9 p.m. Sunday, Showtime.   PASADENA, CALIF. - Emmy Rossum has stopped worrying about looking too good. Three seasons into "Shameless," the Showtime series in which she stars as Fiona Gallagher, a harried twenty-something who's raising her siblings with no help whatsoever from their alcoholic father (William H. Macy), Rossum's found a way to bridge the divide between the polished red-carpet persona that's made her the darling of fashion bloggers and her often disheveled character, whose look she also loves - if only for its ease.